seeing all these total newbie tank is hilarious

[Kaeoni]

But, at least TRY.

Papa Bless! 100% agree.

This Winsock guy is like, on a crusade to try bury you. It's hilarious. GG my friend d=

[Jpec07]

Papa Bless! 100% agree.

This Winsock guy is like, on a crusade to try bury you. It's hilarious. GG my friend d=

Namely because he seems to be fishing for excuses to berate and belittle new players, and is evading a simple question about his criteria for whether or not he's justified in being mean.

I will restate my point: There is no 'baseline' by which you can determine if someone isn't trying solely on their behavior. As such, it is not by any means reasonable to be rude to someone or gripe at them without having directly interacted with them on the issue in question. Therefore, it is ALWAYS worthwhile to check with them to see if they know what they're doing.

You will never know what a person does and does not know. They might not have hovered over a move long enough to see the tooltip. They might be misinterpreting the tooltip. They might even not know that Google exists. If you take at least a minute to check in with them instead of roleplaying the eternal stoic? You could be the person that changes the game for them, or possibly even the Internet.

FFXIV has had a notably more positive community than other MMOs on the market for a long time, and we need to work really hard if we want to keep it that way. That means at the very least, if we want to maintain it as such, we are responsible to be accommodating, gentle, and kind.

Also, just because you taught at the university level doesn't mean anything. As with basically any other profession, I've known professors and adjunct faculty who are incredible people, and I've known just as many who were rude, selfish jerks. It may account for why you're so jaded, but if that's the case, I hope you're able to find some respite somewhere that doesn't involve ragging on newbies.

[winsock]

Papa Bless! 100% agree.

This Winsock guy is like, on a crusade to try bury you. It's hilarious. GG my friend d=

His argument is that new people should be held accountable for reading and applying the material.

Personally, I think that new people should read the material; however, there is a problem with the 'accountability' part. Before you can hold someone accountable, you must verify they did the thing you want to hold them accountable for.

For example: "Did the new person read the tooltip?" It is impossible to verify the answer to this question in the overwhelming majority of cases. If this question is being answered on a regular basis, where is the answer coming from? It's certainly not the new tank.

I speculate the answer's source is his imagination:
Dragonseth07 asks Dragonseth07: "Did the new tank read the tooltip?"
Dragonseth07 answers Dragonseth07 for the new tank without any verification: "No."

^ I dont think it is reasonable for someone to pose a question like this to themselves, generate an answer for the new tank in their imagination, and then hold said tank accountable as if the daydream was reality.

Because of this, I have asked him several times to clarify the definition of his standard through verifiable things, but the answers I keep getting back are centered around his "feels".

[dragonseth07]

You're right, I have no way of reading minds to see if someone read their tooltips. I'm not psychic. All I can do is make assumptions based on what I see, when I see someone using an ability correctly or when I see someone spamming Bootshine instead of building stacks. You're right that it's unfair, and I'm just judging performance.

Am I a jerk for judging people based on their play? Sure, yes. I'm a jerk. I judge myself and others HEAVILY based on gameplay, and I expect judgment to come at me from others.

Call me elitist, call me whatever. I judge what I see, and I hold high standards for myself and my teammates.

Those standards are why I haven't done ANY of the level 60 endgame fights yet. Literally none of them. I just got through Sohm Al. I'm not good enough yet, in my judgment.

All my time is spent practicing and improving more and more. How long can I hold FoF on the GCD before the animation clips Goring Blade? If there's only time for one more GCD on the boss, should I use an un-combo'ed Aeolian Edge for the highest potency, or is the phase short enough that I can keep up combo? What are the most important GCd's to fit into the potion timer?

I lost aggro on WAR in a dungeon a few days ago, and it was completely unacceptable. I misjudged what I could generate, and it cost the group time. So I've practiced more at that level sync range to drill in what I need to use under those circumstances.

I want to be a good teammate in everything I do, and it irritates me when it seems like someone doesn't share that sentiment. I've met plenty of players who just need some help. I met a wonderful sprout WHM yesterday, and explained how healer DPS works. It was great. I meet far more people who are just being lazy, and don't care.

[Jpec07]

Those standards are why I haven't done ANY of the level 60 endgame fights yet. Literally none of them. I just got through Sohm Al. I'm not good enough yet, in my judgment.

...

I want to be a good teammate in everything I do, and it irritates me when it seems like someone doesn't share that sentiment.

You take this game a lot more seriously than most (perhaps too seriously, some would argue). I would remind you of three things:

1. While there is nothing wrong with you holding yourself to your own standard of excellence, it makes you a bad teammate if you apply those same standards to others. Help them, sure, but don't berate them for suboptimal performance as you might berate yourself, and accept that not everyone cares about perfection as heavily as you do (especially when perfection is not a requirement for success).

2. The content is a lot more forgiving than you think. Even if you're only playing at 60% of what your job can do, you're going to be able to succeed at the content with your groups, and likely get praise and commendations along the way. You're just robbing yourself at this point.

3. It is always safer to assume that people want to do well and contribute to group success than to assume their suboptimal performance is meant as a slight against you or your group.

[Biomech]

I was drawn to this thread as I have just started tanking myself and I'm surprised to say I'm gladdened by what I'm reading!

I've mainly played DPS but I wanted to see if there was justification for the occassional berating I'd see them get in a dungeon. Walk a mile in their shoes, if you will.

Each party I've had so far has been really helpful, so long as I communicate that I'm new to the job and appreciate any advice. 1 or 2 have dropped, but the majority have been ace.

From what I understand, it's a two way street. Maybe the best way to deal with new tanks is to offer patience & advice and the best way to be a new tank is to take it! Until I started reading a few guides, threads (like this one) and tried it myself, I was clueless about how a tank held aggro so I'd be grumbling to myself when a tank couldn't hold aggro while a Bard/BLM combo rained a fiery AoE death on everything.

That said, I'd probably smack my head on the keyboard if I came across a >lvl30 GLA/MAR

[RopeDrink]

It's one thing to immediately smash a newbie with a pitchfork for not being an experienced player - it's a completely other thing when they've unlocked several different dungeons and still don't even use Flash, ignore polite suggestions from Healers & DPS trying to give them advice, and reach the end of the dungeon anyway without any punishment (eg. DPS tanking is fine if the Healer isn't asleep when playing in that bracket, so there's no early incentive to wake the hell up), thus quite a few new players psuedo pat themselves on the back for getting the job done while thinking everything was alright - because hey, we completed it, why are you complaining, eh?

My patience can really be tested when I do DPS a roulette lowbie dungeon and either the Healer hasn't a clue what cleric is and/or the Tank is flailing around with no actual emnity consideration after having clearly done many dungeons before joining me. I'm 110% perfectly fine with people learning - we all had to do it - but there's just too many plebs roaming around who will give you the silent treatment despite buckets full of blatantly obvious evidence that they're doing something extremely wrong and just don't care. As someone above has said, you don't even have to be an MMORPG player or experienced in the role to understand the basic concept of "Your job is basically to keep things from hitting anyone that isn't you".

[Ardour]

So long as the party is performing well enough to complete the dungeon without many complications, I think lecturing them is a waste of energy at that point. While its true that some players are receptive to criticism, I'd wager there are many more players who can't handle criticism or, as you suggest, just don't care. The idea that completing the dungeon is 'not enough' and that players should always try to optimize their performance is foreign to most casuals. It's an admirable attitude, of course - but not one you should try to impose upon others. Ultimately you have to be self-motivated to get good at the game, and most truly self-motivated players will figure things out regardless of whether you offer them tips or not. Hence, since offering "polite suggestions" rarely helps and often backfires (especially when many self-proclaimed "polite" helpers are in fact jerks) it's better just to let things slide in DF. An attitude of "good is good enough" goes a long way.

[Hierro]

You take this game a lot more seriously than most (perhaps too seriously, some would argue).

And I would argue that it's only expected that a man who works hard plays hard. When people decide to be subpar, and it is something they choose because at any point they can read or watch a video or practice on a dummy, it isn't a slight against anyone. No, it's not personal, it's never against anyone on purpose, but it's the LACK of conscientiousness. They don't care about you, or I, or anyone else in the party. They don't care to waste my time or someone else's time. It's contempt for the party and conformity to mediocrity for one's subpar playstyle. You expect me or anyone else to take that lightly and not be annoyed?

[Jpec07]

And I would argue that it's only expected that a man who works hard plays hard. When people decide to be subpar, and it is something they choose because at any point they can read or watch a video or practice on a dummy, it isn't a slight against anyone. No, it's not personal, it's never against anyone on purpose, but it's the LACK of conscientiousness. They don't care about you, or I, or anyone else in the party. They don't care to waste my time or someone else's time. It's contempt for the party and conformity to mediocrity for one's subpar playstyle. You expect me or anyone else to take that lightly and not be annoyed?

Yes, because you are judging them without any information on their circumstance. That's kind of a jerk move.

As long as you're succeeding at encounters and aren't failing DPS checks, then there is literally nothing to complain about. If it isn't going as fast as you'd like, and you have some suggestions for how the other players can up their game? Make those suggestions--but keep in mind that the only metric most people use to judge their competence is whether or not they die, and whether or not they succeed at encounters. If they're not failing, they are under no obligation to take your advice.

And even if someone is performing poorly and your group meets failure in some way, there is never a valid excuse for being a jerk.