Tactful ways to inform people that they're playing badly?

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Originally Posted by Raldo

Has anyone mastered a tactful way to tell someone that they're severely under-performing when you're going through a dungeon, and there's not a whole bunch of downtime to write a whole essay on how to properly play a certain job?

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Doesn't exist, though you can get in some basic rotation information using the auto-translate function.

Continue to tell them to read guides for their jobs, though you should leave out comments about their rotations being bad if you aren't going to mention specifics, unless your goal is to trigger them.

This is how I do it:

If they are new and making mistakes I help them.

If they are bad I try to help them.

If they are bad and refuse help, I tell them exactly how god awful they are in party chat and how they are wasting everyone's time. <= unfortunately this ends up how it is most the times when you truly just get with a bad. I am not talking about slightly low dmg here either, but those situations where you wipe 2-3 times on each dungeon boss because someone is just screwing up royally. Gota love 70min long dungeon runs ...........


People these days just seem to resist help. The "My Sub" comment just shows you one of those trash players in the end.

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Originally Posted by Gaethan_Tessula

I do think about and critique my own performance. Here's an example: I often get lazy on hitting Lucid because WHM can nearly ignore MP management in a lot of fights, if they go well. Meaning when things go south, I can suddenly find too much spell left at the end of my mana. But being introspective doesn't make me ignorant to poor play from others.

It's a lot easier to get a big increase in results from improving a heavily suboptimal player than a decent or better player. For a more specific example, it's easier to get X000 more DPS from the player with a bad rotation or who only wants to heal, than it is for someone in the 75th percentile to squeeze that number out of further optimization.

Sometimes, in regards to specific tasks or knowledge sets, people are superior to others. Everyone has equal worth as a human being, but the value they bring to specific circumstances is variable.

There are a lot of bad things that can happen when this difference between specific value and intrinsic worth is forgotten, in both directions.

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I see, well, it can't just end there. It will lead to a deeper discussion, what exactly makes one's playstyle superior? Sure, in some cases it will be rather obvious to tell (for example, I would say that Paladin A is a superior tank to Paladin B if they use their defensive CDs and Paladin B never does), but in others, not so much. Is it maximizing damage? Is it player comfort? Is it maximizing safety and mitigation? Do not just automatically say "hurr durr big deeps duh", it's not that simple. There's a lot more that goes into making a run enjoyable and comfortable than just killing stuff fast. The problem with just automatically assuming you're superior is that you're ignoring other possible options, it's "your way or the highway", essentially. And that is narcissistic behavior. Not saying I totally disagree with you, just wanted to give you something to think about.

Just got one in roulette. ice/thunder mage spamming freeze and thunder 2 in Shishui of the Violet Tides. Like 6 freezes followed by 10 thunders type of spam. Asked them as nicely as I could if they knew their dps magic was fire and they replied they were just distracted. Ok cool. Then they started mixing fire 1 into the mix of freeze and thunder 2 and if they ran out of mp would just stand there and wait for it to refresh naturally instead of getting ice umbrals. We were in a boss so all I was able to do was hit enochain and Fire 4 via auto translate. I am more than happy to give tips on a rotations but in some situations its not viable and I wanted to just remind them of enochain and f4.

They force DC'd. We had loot in the pool so couldn't boot them, they came back a few minutes later and rolled, so we booted them then.

Was nervous about saying anything, cause ppl can be sensitive and SE caters to the worst performers in those situations. But I was not about to run a lvl 63 dungeon with a blm spamming fire 1, freeze and thunder 2. I mean if nothing else at least read your tooltips.

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Originally Posted by TheForce

I see, well, it can't just end there. It will lead to a deeper discussion, what exactly makes one's playstyle superior? Sure, in some cases it will be rather obvious to tell (for example, I would say that Paladin A is a superior tank to Paladin B if they use their defensive CDs and Paladin B never does)

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Anything I'm going to actually notice with strangers mid-instance, when I can actually talk to them, is going to be obvious things. If I actually need to look at a log to see the errors, then it's not something to bring up with randoms in normal content.

Besides, the question is easy to answer in FF14. It's whatever leads to the fastest run with the fewest errors. There are only a few cases in FF14's game design where those principles conflict, and almost all of them have to do with maintaining uptime or variant play with assumed handicaps (e.g., min ilvl runs). The latter really shouldn't be done with a non-consenting party, and I say this as someone who queued into Sirensong drastically undergeared because I knew I could still heal double pulls on it (I still made the run go slower vs. myself in full Shire), and the former can be rude and dangerous too in a party with strangers.

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Originally Posted by TheForce

but in others, not so much. Is it maximizing damage? Is it player comfort? Is it maximizing safety and mitigation? Do not just automatically say "hurr durr big deeps duh", it's not that simple.

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Safety and mitigation almost always goes hand in hand with maximizing damage. Less incoming damage = less healing = more room for healers to DPS. Aside from PLD wings, there are few defensive skills which are flat DPS loss anymore. Again, taking a hit to maximize uptime is also an exception, and I do think if you're not communicating with the healer you shouldn't do it.

Assessing player skills and comfort is a valid reason to slow down (and a great skill to have), but a tank or healer who feels they can only single pull in a basic dungeon based on their own ability is probably in need of practice, advice, or better gear. They should be willing to listen to advice, even if they can't be expected to advanced towards multi-pulling that very run. The big exception is the disabled; if someone literally cannot or would be put into significant pain trying to accomplish a given task, there's no point in trying to push the matter.

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Originally Posted by TheForce

There's a lot more that goes into making a run enjoyable and comfortable than just killing stuff fast. The problem with just automatically assuming you're superior is that you're ignoring other possible options, it's "your way or the highway", essentially. And that is narcissistic behavior. Not saying I totally disagree with you, just wanted to give you something to think about.

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I don't, and I don't think many players looking to give advice, automatically assume. We hypothesize based on empirical data: DPS, HPS, cooldowns used, how often someone fails mechanics, can the tank keep aggro? Observing these things over several encounters, even in an abstracted form like "how fast did the pull take?" for things like DPS which cannot be assessed without outside tools, reveals patterns of play. Consider this my something to think about to you: the game is largely numbers and pass/fail mechanics, and this makes it quite easy to assess performance.

And as I previously said, anything noticeable and severe enough to need redress in an instance with strangers is probably a pretty cut and dry case. Failing a mechanic once? Everyone makes mistakes. Fail it over and over? Have a totally botched rotation? Gross misuse of cooldowns? Gear 50+ ilvls behind content? These are the things people normally offer advice about.

Most people are going to completely ignore what you say even if they're being polite sounding in return. I'd just remain silent, leave, and eat the penalty. Only a small % of players are going to be receptive to suggestions and those ones will inform you at the very beginning they're new/unprepared/don't know what they're doing and to please bear with them. In that case alone would it be worth throwing out some pointers. Otherwise, you're just wasting your time.

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Originally Posted by Tint

It is nearly impossible. Even when you find the kindest words, you are still calling out someone for bad play in front of a group. You have to do that in private, but you can't use /tell inside a dungeon.

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With the changes in rules, you really cant even do that. If they take offense to you pointing things out or trying to help, you can get in trouble. In this new world where everything you say can and will be used against you... even if your right... its best to say nothing at all.

There was a WHM in my lvl 79 dungeon, who kept using the LB as soon as the bar filled, even if everyone was at full health. I said "I don't want to be that guy, but the LB in dungeons is usually reserved for Dps :) " but I got no response (despite him talking earlier in the dungeon) and he kept doing it. He uses healer LB at one bar again a few more times with everyone at full HP, and since I was starting to get a little annoyed, I asked them "So, uh, is there any point in using healer LB when everyone is at full health?" still no response. Might not be the most tactful way of wording it though,but I assume it sounds better than "Stop wasting the LB, healer."


Since I wasn't sure if I was being trolled or not, I just blacklisted them when I got out of the dungeon, as they were on the same world as me. >. >

I wouldn't usually say anything, but this was a lvl 79 dungeon, and he's gonna get a lot of hate later from others if he keeps using healer LB as soon as the bar fills.

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Originally Posted by Ilenya

"Hey [Name], mind if I give you a few suggestions?"

If they say no, I just keep going. I rarely find people unwilling to listen, though. Whether they do anything with it or not is a whole different story, but I can't control that.

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This is what I do and I get “no” for an answer the vast majority of the time.

There are a few times where I’ll just outright tell someone what they need to do and just phrase it kindly. It’s usually with sprouts in the first 2-3 dungeons. Things like a tank not in tank stance, or not using aoe skills. Oddly enough they often are on controller and don’t talk but they do fix their play and commend me at the end so I must be doing it right. Certainly works better for me than asking if they want suggestions

You can be an absolute saint and try to help with the best of intentions with the gentlest hand, players will still act as though you spat on their grandmother for daring to offer help on how to perform better.

At this point I just kind of sigh and deal with it, its not too often I get players who don't have a clue what they are doing, but when I do, I either try kick or I just leave.