What happened to players?

[LordWyrme]

I remember when I was getting into multiplayer games that people were a heck of a lot nicer, helpful, and tolerant. I can't tell you how many times in FFXI I finally found an exp group and they told me to come to where they were (which took 10-20 minutes to travel) only for me to die half way there and have to start that journey over. Every so often I'd get a tell saying "are you still coming?" and I'd tell them how I died and I was trying to come back...eventually, almost an hour later, I'd get there and find a spot still open and ready for me in the group and I'd be greeted with "welcome!"

Now, people in duty finders are absolutely rude and act like they've played this game for 15 years and if you're not doing things a certain way then you should just log off the game.

I got online this morning after working my butt off for two back-to-back 12 hour shifts and asked nicely over a popular linkshell where the level 40 levequest was. One person replied nicely and another offered me a website to go to. I respectfully declined the website offer and just said that thanks but I don't trust outside webpages (honestly very polite) and the response was "You're f****** retarded"

I just don't get where people think it's ok to speak and act like this from the safety of their home.

I'm the guy who spends hours of my time not progressing further on my own character and sits in revenants toll shouting "Relic Monk willing to help those without gear or experience with anything they need" These people aren't my "friends" and I've never met them before, but I think it's great to be able to help someone through the game in parts that I may have originally struggled with.

Even these forums, it's like someone comes up with a pretty interesting idea and people race to say things like "The game has too many other problems, your idea is irrelevant". Even this post will have someone who is just searching the forums for a chance to leave a negative dent in a topic.

I don't know if I have a real question or a point to be made other than I guess my own little rant....but what happened to players? I almost wish after what I experienced today that I didn't pay for another 3 months and I just got a single player game instead.

Welcome to the new modern age of gaming, where there are now overpriveleged children old enough to play MMOs and where they learned this horrible attitudes and terrible lack of common courtesy from large communities such as WoW

[Rivienne]

One thing to keep in mind is we have a lot of FF players just now trying FFXIV who never tried FFXI and who have never played any other MMO. I've run into quite a few of them. They have that solo gamer mentality and they are used to dealing with NPCs rather than real people, which doesn't help matters at all.

Most of those who are just used to the offline mode are fine with playing other players so long as the other players are nice, and behave well and more importantly can ease them into things. Problem is more the experienced players who don't know how to deal with inexperienced players, or ease them into the different concepts that come with this kind of group environment. There are a lot of folks who have been playing MMO's for so long they are completely disconnected from what it is to be new to the genre. I have run into this with my sister occasionally. I am new. She is not. She is a speed runner, I am not. Mostly she was wonderful in easing me into the idea of playing with other players, but every so often her "why don't you already know what to do/why does it take you so long to get this right" came out and I would have to remind her I only just started. It is hard to grasp when you have been doing something for so long, that other people who haven't are going to see things completely different from you.

This can easily turn into frustration and over time downright hostility towards those who are "slowing you down" or just generally "bad players". Hard to maintain a civil attitude towards other people when you can't seem to recognize why they aren't capable after a few days of what you are after many years.

This isn't to justify rampant bad behaviour, but just to explain why it sometimes happens, even to the otherwise well meaning people, and also why it seems to be more common now then it used to be: people have been playing that much longer, and the entire genre has been out that much longer.

[Overon]

MMOs became easier, suddenly people do not have to depend on other players but for a Small amount of content..........
Guilds fall apart
People show how they really are

I try to be helpful , stick it out in DF , and I answer questions when asked on a chat I can see.
Because in Real Life I give money to charity , have faith , and love for my fellow Human Beings .........

The one thing for sure is the further we come the most selfish we are .

[LordWyrme]

This is not true. Just because some people can level fast, doesn't mean they are toxic players. It's really a bad stereotype that is causing this problem. Skillfull players are also somehow being labeled "automatic jerks" just for being good at the game or playing more than most.

There is no reason why I can't be a nice person and also be good at the game or play more than most people.

I agree. Even with open beta and early access, I leveled at a somewhat faster rate than my previous MMO experiences, but I also did try to go out of my way to help anyone who needed it except if I was in queue, dps queues being what they are, unless it was landscape help. There is no excuse to be had for the way some of these players act. I had to leave my FC which is full of a majority of nice legacy players because some acted this way or were just indifferent to helping others. I also had a lot of time to play, happens to the unemployed, but I enjoyed playing and doing my character progression. Along with helping others.

Edit: stupid forum messaging restrictions

[mylam]

As much as I agree with the OP, I think the sad reality is that the type of game FFXIV is really doesn't allow anyone to make those good relationships. I've played FFXI and WoW and I can say without a doubt FFXIV community (in game) is pretty much exactly like WoW. In FFXI you were forced to party to advance in all aspects, soloing wasn't part of the core gameplay unless you were a BST, but even then BST had their own BST parties because at the end of the day party play > solo play in XI. But in WoW I practically solo'd the entire time to max level (80 when I stopped playing) and hardly had any interaction with anyone other than my RL friends who got me into the game. And right now in XIV, it's the same thing. I'm only playing with those that I know in RL and have had zero interaction with anyone else in game except for times when I try to strike up some convos during a DF dungeon run.

This game is fun and I thoroghly enjoy it, but I have noticed that the lack of interaction (be it forced or not) is something that I miss. While it's nice to know that you can actually level by yourself whenever you want and not be required to wait on others to progress, I would actually like to have some opportunties that force us to reach out to other players. I am by no means close to "end game" and therefore can't speak for any of the interactions at the higher levels, but if I could get to level 30 without having to send a single /tell to anyone asking for some assistance, I can kind of imagine what it would be like at "end game". I think Duty Finder and the fact that the story mode is so solo focused is the reason why there's absolutely no interaction with other people in the game. Like what incentive do I have to join someone shouting to recruit for their FC when I can probably do most of what I'd want to do solo?

Not sure if this is ever going to change on XIV, unless they make some forced party events that require a lot of cooperation, or implement HNMs and rework the battle system where you can't attack a claimed mob type of thing. Something to make people work together. That's the only real way to build a community IMO.

[LordWyrme]

Honestly, this seems more of an endgame problem. I have 35 dragoon, 26 MRD and around 17 gladiator, mostly level via dungeons. Now I can count the instances when somebody in my party was someone with really bad attitude. Usually polite, more or less friendly (less counting when they do not speak or greet, rare, I think most of them are on ps3 and just dont want to bother with typing with controller, I know I wouldn't). They offer tips for new players and thank for tips I give them, while apologizing for making mistakes. If everything is that bad at endgame, where do people disappear that are nice during low level dungeons?

I play on the PS3 and typing is a bitch, but I always managed at least a hi and definitely a first time here whenever I hit a new instance

[Altheras]

This can easily turn into frustration and over time downright hostility towards those who are "slowing you down" or just generally "bad players". Hard to maintain a civil attitude towards other people when you can't seem to recognize why they aren't capable after a few days of what you are after many years.

I agree with you entirely. Intolerance for those who are new is an ugly thing. I always do my best to be patient and offer helpful tips to people, especially if I suspect they may just be totally lost and really need the help. How they take it is up to them. Sometimes they just get ugly in response to my offered help, but more often they are truly grateful and have a lot more fun when my suggestions help them out.

[LordWyrme]

duty finder makes getting group too easy . if you get bad group , get another .

back in the day you put in a bit of work to get a group going so you were more tolerant of silly mistakes .

I was fighting Chimera as tank and the healer died and said "you had boss too close to me I couldn't run away "

I mean seriously the healer blames the tank because they couldn't move away from the blue eyes AOE in time lol ?

Because it's never the fault of the person who is doing the bitching obviously. ^_^

[LordWyrme]

Sorry but I agree with this about some things. I deal with it every day at work. Everything I know I found out by Googleing it. I had no one to 'show me the ropes'. If I did it. So can you.

Some things yes, some things no. I personally get really annoyed when I ask for a bounty monster location after running around the zone it's supposed to be in for god knows how long, so I shout for the mobs location and the reply from ass hats is "just google it."
If I had a way to google it without logging out of the damn game and using the ps3's browser I would never have asked for the mob's location in the first place. Usually someone is almost always nice enough to help thank the gods, because that is a real shit thing to do to someone who is asking for a simple request.

[Hanemakikaze]

@OP, what happened was online gaming became mainstream, and manners are a thing of the past. You don't even need a large paragraph to explain how shit hit the fan over the years.