What is up with the DF community?

In 15 years of MMOing, this is the first time I've found myself actively not wanting to progress through endgame because the endgame community just... terrible. Every run I have been has had some breakdown between a dps and the tank, a healer and the tank, the two tanks, etc etc. Suddenly its rage, tears and quitting, the DF working overtime trying to keep our poor teams at 8 people.

And the worst part? None of it is necessary. The slights are small- some tank misses 1 mob which doesn't remotely come close to killing someone. Some dps missed a red circle and gets hit with a large attack. Tiny, inane little things that set everyone off like it's the end of the world. 0_o

As much as people saying "WoW is a cesspool because of its random group finder!", I can say that I never had the mispleasure of seeing even a fraction of the QQing that I've seen in this game so far.

FF11 was supposed to be this awesome, amazing community, right? What happened in 14 to change that so.

I think maybe it's because this game is so much less forgiving of even the smallest mistakes, that people get angry much faster, and as such things turn sour against other players very easily. That other tired game allows for people to make mistakes and move on without much of a stir - almost laughably - so people care less there when individuals make minor errors. Only major ones get under people's skin there.

It's because most good players run with either FC people or are shouting in Mor Dhona to get a pre-made party of competent, well-geared players. The leftovers usually use DF.

http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2004/03/19

that says it all.

"DF community"

There is no such thing as a Duty Finder community. Your server is your community, and since there is no reputation loss, the anonymity that duty finder provides (in the sense of cross server) people frankly care about other people. Personally I hope to see these people drop after a 2-3 months.

It's a jaded view, but I can say you aren't the only one who is very disappointed in their fellow players found through duty finder. You tend to find more bad apples rather good in duty finder. :|

I completely agree with you. The way you worded your post got me thinking. You said that it is your progress through endgame. I'm not quite there myself, but when you said endgame I started thinking and I have a question. Is it your experience within the Duty Finder or is it also within your's and other's FC or LS?

And that is what I think is the real problem with the Duty Finder. The FFXI days communities were built on game mechanics that made you party with a minimum of 6 people as a team, starting at Lv.10-12. That was it. It was learn to play as an effective member on a team or hit a brick wall of zero progression. It made people more communal. Every bit of story, quest, leveling, etc required committed people that did not leave until the Key Quest Item was obtained.

We don't have that in this game. We have a "Click and Buy" dungeon menu for which we are only going into for loot. How could an instantaneous menu system for treasure not breed toxicity?

DF Community is the FFXIV Community..

In DF people more often fight with each other rather than primals or anything. :C
You may get some decent people sometimes, but really DF is only good for learning the fight/dungeon and then at least get in a pick up group in Revenant's Toll.

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Originally Posted by randomrope

And that is what I think is the real problem with the Duty Finder. The FFXI days communities were built on game mechanics that made you party with a minimum of 6 people as a team, starting at Lv.10-12. That was it. It was learn to play as an effective member on a team or hit a brick wall of zero progression. It made people more communal. Every bit of story, quest, leveling, etc required committed people that did not leave until the Key Quest Item was obtained.

We don't have that in this game. We have a "Click and Buy" dungeon menu for which we are only going into for loot. How could an instantaneous menu system for treasure not breed toxicity?

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Well said, there is no need to work together in this game and grow as a player. Ffxi got bad after 7 years, before that it was almost unheard of to be chastised for party performance.It was my first mmo and everyone was super helpful. Can we blame WoW for the current state of mmo players?

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Originally Posted by randomrope

Is it your experience within the Duty Finder or is it also within your's and other's FC or LS?

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For me it has just been Duty Finder. I haven't had a great deal of issue with folks on my server, but on DF? Holy crap.

Actually had someone threaten to report me and a random tank for greifing because I missed 1 charge mechanic on hard mode Ifrit and died because of it, and the tank missed 2 stuns in a row. They and one of their friends both planned to do the reporting.

3-7 day ban for missing a charge / missing 2 stuns. That would be all kinds of epic.

Welcome to Summoner's Rift!

^ explains everything basically if you want to know why "DF Community" is bad.

Honestly... I don't see why anyone would want to remain a healer or tank in DF. :-\ They are the only ones who get brutalized so badly by the others. Every run some healer or some tank is getting raged on by some neckbeard about who knows what.

It's a lot easier just to go DPS lol

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Originally Posted by Yoona

Welcome to Summoner's Rift!

^ explains everything basically if you want to know why "DF Community" is bad.

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THANK YOU! The scum of the earth forms in that game.

I personally see a lot of what i saw in Guildwars 2, i feel a lot of the elitist toxic community has come from there, people say WoW was bad try GW2 for nasty people, worst community i've ever seen in a MMO and many jumped ship to here.

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Originally Posted by DanteMog

I personally see a lot of what i saw in Guildwars 2, i feel a lot of the elitist toxic community has come from there, people say WoW was bad try GW2 for nasty people, worst community i've ever seen in a MMO and many jumped ship to here.

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We must be talking about two different GW2 games, because it is the prime example I use of the best MMO community I've experienced. Rift being the worst.

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Originally Posted by Tolmos

For me it has just been Duty Finder. I haven't had a great deal of issue with folks on my server, but on DF? Holy crap.

Actually had someone threaten to report me and a random tank for greifing because I missed 1 charge mechanic on hard mode Ifrit and died because of it, and the tank missed 2 stuns in a row. They and one of their friends both planned to do the reporting.

3-7 day ban for missing a charge / missing 2 stuns. That would be all kinds of epic.

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You missed a boss mechanic and died in an MMO? Wow. I know I wasn't there but I may have to report you as well.

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Originally Posted by Tolmos

We must be talking about two different GW2 games, because it is the prime example I use of the best MMO community I've experienced. Rift being the worst.

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Agreed. GW2 also didn't have a bad community for me. But, I was/am on the smallest NA server.

The very short time I tried WoW, the community was very bad. Then I tried LoL for a few days and that made WoW look a little bit better.

If I hadn't moved to ARR with the XI linkshell I kept in touch with after I quit, I probably would have quit this game as well.

You don't know "toxic" until you've played a MOBA.

I've gotten some impatient groups with DF, but generally I find that if you try to establish a friendly atmosphere early on by discussing the strategy and having a laugh or two before things get serious, the "Greater Internet F***wad Theory" starts to break down a bit. This is not always the case, but pulling out your keyboard and reminding everyone that there's a real person behind the avatar greatly increases your chances of having a good time.

It isn't the DF community from my experience. There has always been good and bad people online. The bad were a minority, that is changing.
In the early days of gaming the gamer was in all essence an outcast. This made the gamer value friendship more. Gamer's by nature like to be challenged and games tended to be less forgiving.
If you were an early gamer you will remember having to replay levels over and over because saves points didn't exist, It would take you time to work through some of the harder games, if you had gamer friends you would share info on games, always working together and only against each other when playing VS mode. You didn't have the internet full of guides to tell you how everything was done, so you had to work at it if you wanted to complete your favorite games.

Then the internet hit. Gamers were still very much in the minority, you didn't have to rely on friends to get/share that info due to page upon page of easily to find information.
As time went on needing to be friendly became much less important, online games like first person shooters became very popular and it was all about being the best among the people you played with.
MMO's still had that need of friends to complete content but even then the attitudes were beginning to change. You had to be a member of a small community and everyone else didn't matter. Some people would only be nice as long as they were getting that item/help they needed, when that river of help ran dry they would move onto the next river.

Now games are mainstream people are competing to be considered the best at everything. Firsts etc . Now as games began to change to need less time to fit in with the new massive audience the need for other people has become almost 0.
People expect everyone to have read up on everything in game before they get to it because if someone else plays badly it effects THEM, they have no concern for anyone else.

Obviously there are still many people out there like myself who like to play for fun and want to play the whole game. Unfortunately we are now the minority.

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Originally Posted by J_Kepler

This is not always the case, but pulling out your keyboard and reminding everyone that there's a real person behind the avatar greatly increases your chances of having a good time.

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This might explain why I've always had good experiences.

Before the the barrier has even dropped I'm immediately in there with a wedge trying to get people chatting with pleasantries and asking/discussing whether anyone's new and needs/can give a heads up before important pitfalls and strategies and they usually stay chatting and pleasant through the entire dungeon even if we royally screw up.

Pretty rare I encounter someone who remains a misery even then (Most notably a healer who kept treating me like an idiot the entire run because I stepped in an AoE early on that I could've avoided if I'd paid due attention - standing in the AoE was of no consequence in the grand scheme but to him that flagged me as "dumb-DPS guy")

What community?


From what I've seen it's Lord of The Flies meet's Fear & Loathing

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Originally Posted by Taeyeon

DF Community is the FFXIV Community..

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While I agree with your statement as a generalization. The issue is there are no social back lash with duty finder when it isn't tied to your own server. It's not a simple black and white issue. You will always have asshats on every server, however the server community tends to filter those people out when it's localized. I've seen it countless times, duty finder just gives people an easy out because they don't have to worry about interacting with the people they just trolled in duty finder.

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Originally Posted by Tolmos

For me it has just been Duty Finder. I haven't had a great deal of issue with folks on my server, but on DF? Holy crap.

Actually had someone threaten to report me and a random tank for greifing because I missed 1 charge mechanic on hard mode Ifrit and died because of it, and the tank missed 2 stuns in a row. They and one of their friends both planned to do the reporting.

3-7 day ban for missing a charge / missing 2 stuns. That would be all kinds of epic.

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Wait...You were actually banned for that??? As in two, probably middle school aged, kids made a whine complaint and you got banned for a week? I would start a personal jihad and report them both for player harassment and abuse!

edit: Never mind I re-read that...But still.

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Originally Posted by OrionInerghem

What community?


From what I've seen it's Lord of The Flies meet's Fear & Loathing

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Don't worry. As the casual players (as in people who have extremely limited time to play) hit 50, people will become more and more tolerant. A wipe is not the end of the world, given that the death penalties are so small.

FFXIV Endgame: No fun or learning allowed.

I am also fed up with the majority of the community being so hateful to tanks and healers. As a healer myself, I admit that I don't know everything and when I go to a new instance I tell people I am a first timer, I normally need 1-2 runs to get the boss mechanics down. I was called a moron stupid and any other nasty words I can think of all because I kept being raised during hell fire and instantly died again. I have no control over any of that lol. I told the party I would leave if they wanted because honestly, I don't have time for stupid kids insulting me.

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Originally Posted by Tolmos

FF11 was supposed to be this awesome, amazing community, right? What happened in 14 to change that so.

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I never saw that "awesome, amazing community" in ffxi. I think it's a case of those people hanging out with their own guild or whatever, and going "Well, they are great, it's those pugs that suck".


I'll counter with a run last of Preatorium (i forget how to spell that). Two of us had done it before, the rest were all new. We told everyone to go and watch the cut scenes as they happen, we wouldn't mind. Let them discover most things on their own, except for things that really suck to miss (lifts, getting a key for the mount, etc), there were a few wipes on ultima, when you have to run in, then out. No one raged, just took some people time to grock the mechanics of it. Every member seemed to be random. Finished the dungeon, wipes and all cutscenes watched with 20 mins on the clock. The only complaints were that people were ready for the dungeon to be over (i wonder how they felt after then watching cut scenes that lasted that long, heh).

There is plenty of good in the DF, i'd say it's part what you put out too. Everyone needs to relax, and just have fun. This goes for fate ragers who go off in shout if people turn things in or kill certain mobs.

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Originally Posted by J_Kepler

You don't know "toxic" until you've played a MOBA.

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I've found pretty much PvP to be this. Anytime it becomes PvP, even in a game like WoW in battlegrounds, people become absolutely terrible. I was on a PvE server, and dungeon finder was mostly silent with some raging with people posting recount after every fight (even if we breezed through them), but once i popped into BG? Racist, homophobic, sexist, rape jokes, etc. Same battlegroup as what it pulls from for DF, but even worse behavior.

I really worry about pvp coming into here, it might be great, but i've not high hopes for people. Take people who rage at killing lambs, multiply by a ton. :P

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Originally Posted by rabbitzero

I never saw that "awesome, amazing community" in ffxi. I think it's a case of those people hanging out with their own guild or whatever, and going "Well, they are great, it's those pugs that suck".

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Seconded, somewhat. It was a great community if you could find the right people, as most players only really talked within their linkshells and barely recruited. A new player on FFXI today would never find a group to play with because everything is so tight-knit... and the only people still playing are the ones who have been there for years.

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Originally Posted by Riot55

It's because most good players run with either FC people or are shouting in Mor Dhona to get a pre-made party of competent, well-geared players. The leftovers usually use DF.

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Just curious, what about the poor bastard who is just starting their run for the good gear? Are they "leftovers" to be excluded from parties? Kind of sets up a catch 22, does it not?

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Originally Posted by DanteMog

I personally see a lot of what i saw in Guildwars 2, i feel a lot of the elitist toxic community has come from there, people say WoW was bad try GW2 for nasty people, worst community i've ever seen in a MMO and many jumped ship to here.

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I'm sorry but GW2 community is awesome, I played GW2 a lot and I've never seen the elitism displayed here, the worst I've seen there is people QQ for nerfs on some classes but that's about it.

I had my 1st bad healer.
I've been doing a few Duty finders with a static. War(my wife) Brd(myself) and a BLM friend from FFXI. Well Warrior had BLM don't have the best of luck together. Overpower is high hate but does dmg, and Slept mobs wake up when pulling hate again.
Well we had a WHM that after a few pulls started pulling hate but didn't die. Bitched out my wife as being a bad tank. And stopped healing and refused to leave wanted one of us to leave, because they didn't want the penalty for leaving.

That's weird from all the duty finder parties I have had, even if they weren't good still had no rage. Guess it's the vibe you add to it? They probably are new to the instance, better explain, or they're having a bad day. Remember people play games to enjoy, not to be raging and frustrated.

I have had no problems so far and I DF a lot.

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Originally Posted by CrystalRainbow

I had my 1st bad healer.
I've been doing a few Duty finders with a static. War(my wife) Brd(myself) and a BLM friend from FFXI. Well Warrior had BLM don't have the best of luck together. Overpower is high hate but does dmg, and Slept mobs wake up when pulling hate again.
Well we had a WHM that after a few pulls started pulling hate but didn't die. Bitched out my wife as being a bad tank. And stopped healing and refused to leave wanted one of us to leave, because they didn't want the penalty for leaving.

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I ran into one of these as well. I was running Ifrit Hard mode FC. Problem was we needed a healer (whether we had one already I don't recall) so we used DF. After our first wipe this healer decided to bash on our Main Tank for being stupid (to tone it down quite bit). It only escalated from there, with that healer becoming more and more hostile. "tank name here go kill yourself" "I'm done, this tank is shit." *5 seconds later* "JK I don't want penalty." Shortly after that he started purposely wiping the party by aggroing Ifrit before we were ready. I mean are you serious? If I wasn't cautious of being banned on forums I'd have their name posted everywhere. This was the worst DF experience I've had this whole time.

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Originally Posted by RedAntares

I'm sorry but GW2 community is awesome, I played GW2 a lot and I've never seen the elitism displayed here, the worst I've seen there is people QQ for nerfs on some classes but that's about it.

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Very much this.

GW2's community - at least on Tarnished Coast, is/was pretty much a beacon of how a community should be. Pretty much the ONLY place you found elitist attitudes was in the CoF farmers (And frankly there was no good reason for anyone but similarly minded farmers to join those runs), and in highest-tier fractal running (Which represented the cutting edge of GW2's progression gameplay. And like any progression content you had to be completely on top of your game, so yes by it's nature people were picky about who they took with them) - everywhere else, people tended to be friendly, helpful and open to newcomers.

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Originally Posted by RyuujinZERO

GW2's community - at least on Tarnished Coast, is/was pretty much a beacon of how a community should be..

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I don't agree, but it at least wasn't as bad as i saw in the first Guild Wars. I felt it was about the same as WoW community wise. I do wonder how people would view the communities of games without dungeon finders if they added them. It's not the tools fault, it just lets people run into those they probably wouldn't before.

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Originally Posted by rabbitzero

I don't agree, but it at least wasn't as bad as i saw in the first Guild Wars. I felt it was about the same as WoW community wise. I do wonder how people would view the communities of games without dungeon finders if they added them. It's not the tools fault, it just lets people run into those they probably wouldn't before.

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Well, GW2 has a DF now, but it's structured differently (basically the same as GW2LFG). In GW2 you are able to create an "LFG" that allows you to leave notes and therefore specify the kind of player you're after (ie. speed runners, whether the group plans to do multiple paths, etc).

FF14's DF causes friction because it lumps people together randomly - it throws speed-runners in with newbies amongst it's many sins. So in response to your post, I wonder how people in games with auto-assembling dungeon finders would view their communities if they could be more selective in their party's and goals, like in GW2

DF= Tutorial Dungeons

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Originally Posted by Sixmp

/snip

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The perfect post. This should be made into a news article and named "The Natural Evolution of the Internet A**hole"

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Originally Posted by Tolmos

As much as people saying "WoW is a cesspool because of its random group finder!", I can say that I never had the mispleasure of seeing even a fraction of the QQing that I've seen in this game so far.

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You're either trolling or you never played WOW before. WOW has to have the most toxic community ever. Even worse than the crap people talk while playing call of duty games.