After playing FFXI for a few weeks, cant wait for Trusts!

[ADarklore]

If you want mostly solo play maybe a MMO isn't for you. The second M stands for multiplayer, and the first one stands for massively.

I'm sorry, but you must be from that old school definition of MMO... because in today's era, 'massively multiplayer' simply means a large amount of people playing the same game at the same time. Check out ESO which is an MMORPG but is almost all solo content, even though they have dungeons and PvP, none is required for story advancement. Also, most newer MMOs are incorporating a lot of solo play because they know there is a huge number of players that prefer to play solo. Why you ask? Because single-player games are finite, they END... but MMOs go on for years. So you can play the same game for years, with updates, DLCs, etc... unlike a single player game. I'm not a game-hopper, I focus on one game for years at a time... spent two years in DCUO, three years on ESO, and have been in FFXIV for several months.

[ADarklore]

Doubtful. As I heard it, trusts are going to be used for queuing into dungeons specifically to help players get through older content. This means roulettes are out, and also the most recent dungeons as well. This means you won't be able to use them to acquire the most relevant tomes, or the exp rewards roulettes provide. And if they can make trusts AI good enough to get you through dungeons like The Burn without seriously buffing up their defense, then SE should be designing robots, not games.

The information was confirmed on EU fanfest and reiterated on the JP one. Trust will only be for ShB story dungeons.

[Sigma-Astra]

I'm sorry, but you must be from that old school definition of MMO... because in today's era, 'massively multiplayer' simply means a large amount of people playing the same game at the same time.

...No, they did not. You can't just change the definition of what the acronym for MMO stands for, in general, for the genre just because you feel that mentioning a few personal and arbitrary examples of games that don't follow the traditional mold to a "T" all of a sudden changes the way the entire industry looks at and frames the acronym entirely.

The first M still stands for Massive, as in, the game world is very, very large and it can incorporate an almost endless stream of locales, environments, cultures, races, cities, etc. It's huge, it's an expansive over world. You're not strictly confined towards a linear pathway or specific locale like a single player game would box you in with. You can freely roam an area that expands and seems larger than it really is.

The second M still stands for Multiplayer, as in, the game is able to host and house a very, very large playerbase. You can play with other gamers from differing background and locations without ever leaving the comforts of home. You can make long distance and short distance friends and broaden your social horizons unlike a single player game where you are solely playing by yourself. The AI's cannot converse with you, they can't hold a conversation, you can't form social bonds. You are playing with other people, therefore, it's multiplayer gameplay as in multiple people can join you.

And last, Online, this should be self-explanatory from the get-go.

If the MMO genre was meant to focus on stand-alone and single player gameplay than they would just simply be called "single player games". If an MMO has any kind of single player content, it could be referred to as flavor or additional content, but it is not a core value or component of the genre. Just because an MMO has some single player limelight in its gameplay, does not mean that the concept of an MMO is somehow radically changed. And the same can be said, again, if a single player game has a competitive, multiplayer mode in it.

You wouldn't call an MMO with some solo content a single player game, likewise, you wouldn't call a single player game with some multiplayer content an MMO either.

[TroySoFab]

Ok quite a bit to respond to here.

This game already is a great deal of solo play outside of dungeons and raids, much of the early story and various quests throughout flat out ban you from being in a party

Yes, it does. There is plenty of content already in the game to satisfy 'solo' players. Adding a whole other element to this that allows players to solo endgame and leveling content that was once multiplayer only seems counter intuitive to a MMO's design.

And it is easy enough to say "maybe this game isn't for you and you should play something else if you don't want to play a game where the second M means Multiplayer" but /some people/ play games for the story, or for the character creation, or for the ability to feel like they're on an adventure or just in general enjoying a good game.

Its easy to say because it should be commonsense. If I don't like playing with other people, why would I play a multiplayer game? There are plenty of single player games that offer the things you mentioned, and as I stated above this game does give you some solo content.

Saying that people should go play something else if they can't deal with being around others whether it's because of a social anxiety issue or just not really enjoying that for other reasons is basically like telling those people that if they aren't going to enjoy the whole game they can go away because who cares if they enjoy everything else they aren't needed in-game.

Personally I used to use FFXI as my only real way of comfortably interacting with people growing up but ultimately I was always more inclined to play solo at my own pace for the story and character creation, it can be very difficult to go through XIV without a few trusted friends who you don't need to worry about having snap at you during dungeons, and if you don't really have that then what?

I feel as though you are making light of a serious mental illness in the first section here, but your second section basically supports the need for more grouped content so, thanks.

Also, lets say I have separation anxiety or autophobia. Should I expect other single player games to add multiplayer aspects to the game that allow me to play through most of it in a multiplayer fashion?

Why should anyone be excluded from enjoying the parts of a game that they enjoy because they happen to have difficulty with other people? Now, that being said when the day comes when they release FFXIV as a single player offline game I'm absolutely going to buy it, but until then I'd imagine many people will have to cope, so~ giving them a way to play the game fully is quite considerate if they do expand on trusts.

I'll leave you with one last thing here. Say there is an amazing sushi bar in your area, and everyone talks about how great it is. The sushi is delicious, the atmosphere is great, and the service is topnotch. But you don't eat sushi, would you ask the owner to to add hamburger and pizza to the menu?

[Callinon]

Yes, it does. There is plenty of content already in the game to satisfy 'solo' players. Adding a whole other element to this that allows players to solo endgame and leveling content that was once multiplayer only seems counter intuitive to a MMO's design.

I'd like to respond to this in particular.

1: I don't believe anyone is asking for Trusts to allow you to solo endgame content. I could be wrong about that as I haven't read carefully through the entire thread, so someone may have actually asked for that, but I doubt it. Endgame content like raids and extreme trials is clearly multiplayer territory.

However

2: The leveling experience IS a solo affair. Even dungeons are basically a solo experience with 3 other people in the dungeon with you. I've leveled all jobs to 70 mostly through roulettes. Do you have any idea how many dungeons I've done where nobody has said a single word to each other? There's no social experience there RIGHT NOW. So then I ask you, what's the difference if there are 3 people in there who may or may not know what they're doing, or 3 AI-controlled bots in there? Honestly, the difference is probably that you'll get a more consistent performance out of the bots and the social experience changes not at all.

[Kaedan]

I just hope that there is some incentive to standard Duty Finder dungeons over using the Trust system. If there isn't an incentive to group, then DF for Shadowbringers leveling dungeons is going to be dead with massively long queues.

[zylo1010]

Personally I'm excited for it as well. I've been doing alot of squadren dungeons lately and wish I could do more.

[ZellosWilder]

The leveling experience IS a solo affair. Even dungeons are basically a solo experience with 3 other people in the dungeon with you. I've leveled all jobs to 70 mostly through roulettes. Do you have any idea how many dungeons I've done where nobody has said a single word to each other? There's no social experience there RIGHT NOW. So then I ask you, what's the difference if there are 3 people in there who may or may not know what they're doing, or 3 AI-controlled bots in there? Honestly, the difference is probably that you'll get a more consistent performance out of the bots and the social experience changes not at all.

You have literally contradicted yourself here. It's not a solo experience if you are with 3 players... It doesn't matter if they do not talk, you are still playing the dungeon with other players that you wouldn't if it was a solo affair and it still gives you the option to talk to the other players, you don't have that option if you are playing with AI characters.

Also you say that nobody talks to each other but have you even tried to in dungeons? if you talk first generally you will get a response in dungeons and in any other content, if you don't talk players won't reply and that's even outside of dungeons/duty finder content.

Going through dungeons also isn't a social affair as players are there to level their job so if they is no reason to talk about the actual dungeon then players won't talk, this is the same with all the duty finder content in the game they talk about what they are doing. (rarely do players talk about social things unrelated to the actual dungeon/fight)

In general though dungeons are designed to be easy to clear but when you reach a boss or some particular tricky situation that isn't easy to understand players would talk, this is up to the developers because most of the time they give no reason for players to discuss any tactics or mechanics of the monsters as most are easy but if it's not you have to interact and talk to the other players so they understand how to works etc so if "someone" did the same thing with AI characters and got up to a tricky mechanic part, they would have nobody to tell them how it works if they were confused.

[Ceridwenae]

I feel as though you are making light of a serious mental illness in the first section here, but your second section basically supports the need for more grouped content so, thanks.

I actually have social anxiety. I did not read Aryalandi's comment as if they were making light of mental illness in any way. In fact, they said something I could've said myself. Playing games such as this is recommended for social anxiety, but that doesn't mean you automatically are able or want to partake of grouped content. Some days that's actually really hard. Trusts will certainly help for those days.

Also, sometimes my family isn't playing and then I definitely don't want to do higher level, more stressful content with a bunch of people I don't know, particularly when I'm not as familiar with the instance as I'd like. Trusts could help me become more familiar with that content at my own comfort level, and then I can take a leap, if I feel ready, to run stuff with real people. I'd like it to be extended back over as many previous dungeons as possible for this reason.


Playing games helps me get outside of my brain in a way that I can forget about the anxiety, even just for a bit and I actually enjoy dungeons a lot. I just have a heap of baggage I drag around with me, some days more than other days. It's not really reasonable to expect other people who aren't aware of this to put up with it if I have a fail moment in a dungeon. Believe me when I say, it can take me a ridiculously long time to learn some stuff. You want me to put other people who I don't know under that kind of boring annoyance when they really just wanted their 15-20 minutes running through something? Hardly seems fair to them, and again: Trusts will help with that!


And yeah, people have said to me before I shouldn't play MMOs because of social anxiety (and also photosensitive epilepsy* which I have!), but those people don't know jack. When you have a condition like this, you have to meet it face-to-face, and confront the hell out of it. Even if it's one inch at a time. Even if some days you fall right back down. You keep at it and keep at it and keep at it. It may never fully go away, but those moments in game when you do actually achieve something you didn't think possible before or gave you a hard time, those moments are all the sweeter for it.

In short: Never give up! Never surrender OR

"Dormammu, I've come to bargain."

* admittedly back in the day playing games could get me killed dead for real. Not so much anymore, though I still have to pick my games wisely.

[ADarklore]

You wouldn't call an MMO with some solo content a single player game, likewise, you wouldn't call a single player game with some multiplayer content an MMO either.

Oh, but it's not a 'single player game' if you're online with a massive amount of people playing the same game at the same time and able to interact. What I'm saying is that MMO no longer means "group content only" which is how most traditional MMO players continue to believe it means. The fact remains that most newer MMOs and even older MMOs are expanding to add more and more solo content because they realize there is a huge market for players who want to play a long-term, frequently updated game but without requirements of strictly group content. As I mentioned, ESO is considered an MMORPG and yet it's mostly solo quest content and it's thriving. Other MMOs are seeing this and wanting to jump on the bandwagon as well. I remember when DCUO devs proclaimed that 'solo players are an anomaly' in their game and began limiting their solo content... a few months later... they changed course and began adding more solo content once again.

So that was my point, that MMO no longer means 'group only' content... which so many like to continue to cling to.