WoW this, WoW that: Why are FFXIV forum users so obsessed with WoW refugees?

[CazzT]

I see a lot of people saying that FFXIV has toxic people in the community and that people are using WoW refugees as a scapegoat and blah blah blah.
Lets clear some misconceptions up.

FFXIV does have some toxic people in it. Every MMO community does. Every online game's community does. No one denies this, everyone acknowledges this. The difference is how pervasive that portion of the community is. In FFXIV, it's small. The overwhelming majority, both on the forums and in game and in general, are helpful and friendly and decent to each other. The toxic individuals are the exception and are not common enough to impact the community's reputation in the broader MMO community.

WoW's community, on the other hand, are notorious for their toxicity. It's a reputation they've gained over many years. In the early days of WoW, the community there was more like FFXIV's is now: friendly, helpful, decent people. But as more and more features were added that removed accountability and allowed the toxic side of the community to run rampant, the community gained a reputation for being toxic because they became toxic. That's not to say WoW doesn't have friendly, helpful, decent people; it does. But they're quiet now because being helpful, friendly, and decent frequently gets you trolled and mocked. The public perception of the community is reinforced by the behavior of the most vocal members of its community.

I came from WoW about five years ago. I was one of the trolls there, I would troll in trade with the best of them. But when I came to FFXIV, I watched the community before I participated in it. And I saw that it wasn't like WoW. People were helpful, would even go out of their way to help newer players. This made me happy and I wanted to be part of that. So I made a focused effort to be helpful. That atmosphere of helpfulness is nurtured and encouraged in FFXIV, due to the community's overall attitude.

It's this difference in communities that has so many here concerned about people coming from WoW. Players from WoW that are running from that toxic atmosphere would best qualify as "WoW refugees". The toxic members of that community, leaving because Blizzard can't get anything right anymore, those are the people we, the FFXIV community, are concerned about. We don't want an influx of toxicity. But we're getting it because FFXIV is one of the top dogs in MMO industry right now and there's a mass exodus of all kinds of players from WoW to other MMOs.

TLDR - No one denies that FFXIV has toxic people, but it doesn't have nearly as many as WoW. And we don't want the worst part of WoW's community, but we're getting far too many of them.

[Yllania]

If you cant tell someone they are doing something wrong without getting banned maybe its you, ngl. Ive done it plenty, and hell I even get rude if they are rude to me for trying to help. See plenty of rude people in shout chat and NN chat and yet they are here day after day, so I kind of have to believe you're exaggerating and are mad you cant call someone an idiot.

As to if all WoW players are bad people, lol no. My time in WoW I met some really cool people and chill guilds, and different people like different games and thats fine. Im kind of going to have to laugh though at the people who think the average WoW player is competent at the game just because you can yell insults at them. You can buy high lvl characters and until recently heirloom gear made lvling a joke, so in dungeons a lot of people still sucked.

[LittleChickenNugget]

People keep saying we're getting a massive influx of toxic players from WoW, but I haven't seen any of them. During the leveling of my current alt or running end game stuff on my main. Where are all these toxic WoW refugees at?

[CazzT]

People keep saying we're getting a massive influx of toxic players from WoW, but I haven't seen any of them. During the leveling of my current alt or running end game stuff on my main. Where are all these toxic WoW refugees at?

I haven't seen many of them either, but I don't do a lot of lower level stuff, which is where I'm hearing most of the complaints about them from. I think most of them burn out before they get very far since FFXIV has a slower combat pace than most MMOs, at least at lower levels.

[Mugear_bahamut]

Why is it that the edgy comments get the most likes? You all know this isn't true.

The dude is obviously a butthurt WoW player, and is the perfect example of toxic.

[CazzT]

This dude is obviously a butthurt WoW player, and is the perfect example of toxic.

How does he sound butthurt? He summed up pretty well what's happening. There is no toxicity in his post. Did you mean to quote someone else?

[Akonyl]

TLDR - No one denies that FFXIV has toxic people, but it doesn't have nearly as many as WoW. And we don't want the worst part of WoW's community, but we're getting far too many of them.

I'm not really sure how much I agree with this. XIV has much stricter rules about "toxic behavior", so people will just be toxic where they can't be reported for it (private linkshells/discord), instead of starting arguments out in the open. This helps make things seem less toxic, because people don't know they're being insulted and can't argue back, but I don't think that the people playing XIV are actually inherently less toxic than people who play WoW.

[NessaWyvern]

How does he sound butthurt? He summed up pretty well what's happening. There is no toxicity in his post. Did you mean to quote someone else?

I think he saw the "edgey comments get the most likes" bit, and didn't read any more

[Makeda]

You have a point however its not the way ffxiv follow. SE does not listen to not-japan community, japanese themselves are not playing wow at all.
Game is becoming simplier because main game designer decided to make it a casual game for everyone in which you could play however you want.
Is it good or bad we will see, they aredoing fine so far.

There are a number of things that have been specifically done because the NA and/or EU community asked for them even when the JP community didn’t. One of those has bunny ears... but this also includes sone aspects of the glamour system. Yoshi-P is also on record talking about the specific struggle of making glamours that are acceptable in one culture but not another and having to pick which seems more loyal to the fans rather than just the culture those fans live in.

Ask yourself how many core staff at Blizzard speak Mandarin or are Chinese or even do fan tours in their main market? Yet several of the people that tour with Yoshi speak English, they tour JP, NA, and EU equally, and Yoshi has even appeared on podcasts of fans in NA and EU. SE makes it very obvious they love their fans worldwide.

Blizzard has hosted at Blizzcon a man who incited violence against LGBTQ fans, at the convention... Yoshi has given interviews speaking in fond terms of how his game is popular with LGBTQ players. Polar opposite in the nature and level of involvement.

[StarRosie]

This dude is obviously a butthurt WoW player, and is the perfect example of toxic.

...I'm sorry what? A "butthurt WoW Player" is...criticizing WoW players? What? I think you need to read that over again and pay attention to the context.

I mean, I don't think I've ever seen Kacho be grumpy with someone here, let alone toxic...