New Mentor requirements

[Bewhatever]

These statements are unambiguous. They state the requirements to become a mentor after 5.0. They state that earlier mentors are grandfathered in 5.0, but have to recertify to the new standard during 5.1 or will "lose their certification" in 5.2.

There is no ambiguity: 300 player commendations became 1500.

This is a significant change.

I personally am rather casual, do instances largely in guild groups, do so few PUG's that I would be lucky to get more than a commendation per week, meet the 300 commendation requirement based on PUGs from 3 and 4 years ago, and on current trajectory will hit 1500 commendations in about 2042, when I will be 85 years old. I'm not willing to exploit, nor to role play a naked young person, to farm commendations. I will not change my playstyle, my choice of playing with my guild, my appearance in game, or anything else, thank you. So this unexpected change will terminate my combat mentor status as of 5.2. Period.

If what you are saying is that people like me shouldn't be mentors...well...you are entitled to that belief.

i am also concerned that having only "elite" players as mentors, who play in content which requires them to exclude anyone who isn't on top of their rotation and gear, will set the kind of exclusive tone which poisoned WoW's culture in its early years, rather than FFXIV's culture (so far) of inclusion and helpfulness.

That's why I think this policy choice is a big deal.

incidentally, it is incorrect to say we were told more changes were coming in 5.1. We were told explicitly what the requirements were in the patch notes quoted above. There was no indication that these were subject to change, acknowledging that the devs always, always have the right to change anything they want anytime they want. But is is correct to say this late change, after expectations were clearly set publicly and in writing, is disconcerting and does cause a loss of trust in the developers by people like me who made plans and prioritized gameplay based on the previous statements.

Quite frankly, the quality problem with mentors on my server has, for the last year, been that about 1% of mentors monopolize chat with shitposting, egocentric chatter, and holding court when they are on, drowning out the ability of sprouts and returning players to get a word in edgewise to ask a question, much less have any other mentor who isn't part of spamming NN actually see the question before it scrolls off. In many cases, these aren't novices, but rather extremely experienced players who are simply bored and waiting for new content. My guess is increasing the commendations requirement will actually increase the % of ineffective but deeply knowledgeable mentors like those, and exclude many of those who are better suited to helping new players.

The "bad mentor" problem is about toxic people, not about skill or experience.