What happened to players?

[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.

[EmiliM]

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".

Actually, the issue I noticed here is that the game allows you (through DF) to more or less solo your way though to end game, and even a good chunk of end game itself, and then you hit a brick wall at around Titan HM where it becomes very difficult to progress without a dedicated group of people you can rely on.

Obviously the idea is that by this point you would have made friends or belong to a FC that you can run with, but because this "requirement" is delayed until relatively far into end-game, those who casually soloed their way there suddenly find themselves needing to join a group/FC that are capable of doing these end-game contents, and it can be a difficult adjustment unless you are lucky enough to get into a relatively casual FC that fits your play style (as opposed to joining a random end game FC and suddenly finding yourself being asked to put on a headset to "pro up" so people can start barking orders at you).