Another "they quit" thread

[Xayoc]

Disclaimer -This isn't a "I quit thread".

The rate at which people are quitting seems to be increasing. I've been saying the direction the dev team is taking XIV won't prove to be successful in the long run for a while. Just search for topics and threads I've posted in or started and you will see that.

But I didn't start this thread to toot my own horn, or tell the white knights "I told you so". I also didn't start this thread to start a debate or revisit the casual vs hardcore gamer endless argument.

Look to your community and please be honest with us and yourselves; aren't people dropping like flies?

My original 1.0 friends have all gone. They numbered somewhere between 20-25 people who started in 1.0 with me after making the switch from XI to XIV, and returned for 2.0.

We had the numbers to form an FC, so we did. Some of us formed a static coil group. We were successful and had coil down to farm status. Some others were also successful, but at least half were not. We quickly found ourselves in a situation where some of us were happy with farming coil and developing our characters together, while others felt left out. Incidently, there was literally nothing we could do for them other than guide them on TS and Vent while we watched them attempt coil and other content.

That didn't work out too well. Many of them just felt betrayed by our group's success. The situation devolved into hostility over time, and a sense of resentment towards us built. People we had known for as much as 10 years left our FC and decided to go at it on their own. They didn't last long with PUGs and within a month, unsubscribed.

Our FC, now broken, merged with another FC that were suffering from the same challenges. We tried to get people more involved this time round by mixing and matching strong and experienced players with those of us who were less skilled and with less wins under their belt.

The result was catastrophic. More resentment grew as the splitting of the static resulted in some of the members feeling less motivated to play. They logged on less, and felt that having to run others through coil and repeat the same painful learning experience was unfair. They argued for a return to the old group, and to let the weaker ones fend it out for themselves.

As leader I tried to talk 5 groups into reason, but while a person is reasonable and fair, people are generally selfish and irrational. The amount of personalities and different priorities in the mix resulted in a slow deterioration of friendships, and forming of new alliances and loyalties.

Fast forward 5 weeks, and all have unsubscribed but 3-4 members and 2 of them haven't logged in for 9 days as of this moment.

I'm in many Linkshells as well and see the same situation, more or less, being played out in other groups.

I scroll through my friend list sometimes to look for something to do and see a lot of "deleted" accounts, not knowing who it was, and where they went or why.

I played XI for many years. It was nice knowing people for many years and playing alongside with them. Maybe 64 man Dynamis was over the top, and maybe Absolute Virtue and Pandy Warden were too hard core. Maybe the exp grind was too long, and maybe the battles were a bit slow paced. But there was something there, and I'm certain it had something to do with the community.

I also played WoW for a few months and could never really get into it. There wasn't much difference between a PC and NPC; both were just names on the screen.

I'm not asserting anything here, just telling it like it is. Many of my friends have unsubscribed, and even more acquaintances.

I'd like to know if this will be the norm and the producers are happy with it, because if it is I just don't think I can invest any more time in it as it isn't living up to my expectations. That's not a threat, or an ultimatum. I'm no special snowflake, and the game will continue to prosper without me for sure. But I'm most definitely not happy with the current state of affairs.

2.2 is the first progression content patch for this game and I don't count ex primals as those were cleared by top tier FCs within 12 hours. Right now my FC is double clearing coil every week, half alts half mains. I can tell you now a lot of people "leaving" are going on hiatus until 2.2 launches and you are going to see a throng of people coming back for the new content. For the people leaving because this game isn't the grind fest 1.0 and FFXI were, good riddance imo, those games are thankfully long gone.

[Vensaval]

For the people leaving because this game isn't the grind fest 1.0 and FFXI were, good riddance imo, those games are thankfully long gone.

Except for the fact that XI is still alive and kicking. Just wanted to point that out.

[Kosmos992k]

2.2 is the first progression content patch for this game and I don't count ex primals as those were cleared by top tier FCs within 12 hours. Right now my FC is double clearing coil every week, half alts half mains.

Not everyone measures progress in the same manner. I am often reminded of a line from "It's a wonderful life"...

"Remember, no man is a failure who has friends."

This is an MMORPG, what happened to the social and community aspect? Where is the working together? Why is everything a race to get the best gear, and then NOT help others because then they would have it too?

[Jynx]

what happened to the social and community aspect?

It went out the window with the implementation of duty finder and lockouts.

hard to foster a community when you can't help anyone do the content. Sure you have the pre-coil stuff to help people with but at a point it becomes anti community with the endgame.

[ulti_19]

While some people leave, maybe 10 - 15 of your fc that most people notice, another group comes into the game. Some of those people will leave, some will stay, thus the nature of an mmo. When you find your particular taste of a game, you stick with it. Every game has forums threads about people leaving. Last game I played for 5 years, in that 5 years tons of threads of planning to quit and people deserting that game type apocalyptic threads, but the game is still played and running 5 years later just the same.

[SirSaber]

While some people leave, maybe 10 - 15 of your fc that most people notice, another group comes into the game. Some of those people will leave, some will stay, thus the nature of an mmo. When you find your particular taste of a game, you stick with it. Every game has forums threads about people leaving. Last game I played for 5 years, in that 5 years tons of threads of planning to quit and people deserting that game type apocalyptic threads, but the game is still played and running 5 years later just the same.

Also there are no "I started playing" threads or not alot at least comared tp the "I quit" ones.

[Kosmos992k]

It went out the window with the implementation of duty finder and lockouts.

That's why we need to make more effort to foster the community.

hard to foster a community when you can't help anyone do the content. Sure you have the pre-coil stuff to help people with but at a point it becomes anti community with the endgame.

As I said before...

The cliques formed by the emphasis on ... a static group are utterly antisocial and toxic to the health of a Free Company and the community in general. ...The very heavy need to form static groups of 8 hurts Free Companies and Link Shells, they become fragmented. Turning to Duty Finder simply takes the people left out of the static groups and puts them with strangers, further distancing those players from their 'friends' in the statics. That too is pretty much a cancer to Free companies.

The persistently negative tone in this forum doesn't help much either, we need to work together to improve things, rather than simply pointing at the faults and grinding our teeth.

[ufufu]

The persistently negative tone in this forum doesn't help much either, we need to work together to improve things, rather than simply pointing at the faults and grinding our teeth.

What do you want or expect people to do? All I see is you complaining in the same way.

[Kosmos992k]

What do you want or expect people to do? All I see is you complaining in the same way.

I expect people to act like adults with civility and respect. I expect that of my free company members, and I see no reason I should not expect it from the community in general. It seems to me that improving on those two things alone would be very helpful to everyone.

[ufufu]

I expect people to act like adults with civility and respect. I expect that of my free company members, and I see no reason I should not expect it from the community in general. It seems to me that improving on those two things alone would be very helpful to everyone.

That's an oblique response. How about this: a problem you've identified is that new people don't have more experienced players to help them through content. Because of the weekly lockout on Coil, and because of the high learning curve in some parts of coil, expecting statics to split up and help sets of new people through is unrealistic. Why don't you encourage new people to form a party finder group to learn the fights, or point them to a guide, or suggest they watch one of the statics in your FC that streams?