Mediocrity should NOT be the standard for players in any content.

[Packetdancer]

With that said, do you want to know why people say almost nothing nowadays? Because their advice—no matter how polite—is meant with variations of "you don't pay my sub," "I can play however I want" or <insert expletives here>. For a lot of people, they just stop trying after being told one too many times how horrible they are for daring to suggest you (general) are doing something wrong.

I feel like I need to actually note that while I hear people reference this a lot as explanation for why folks don't offer feedback—and I'm sure this does happen to folks on a semi-regular basis—it hasn't been my own experience personally. Maybe it's because I ask in party chat "Hey, <whoever>, do you mind if I offer one bit of advice?" before I offer said advice, maybe I've just been extraordinarily lucky in the six months I've been back. So far no one's snapped at me, at any rate, and I've actually made new in-game friends out of the resulting discussion on two occasions.

Then again, there certainly are times I get the sense that any advice is probably not going to be well-received; if someone eats the floor repeatedly but started the run with party chat trash talk about how amazing their skills are, I'm probably not going to bother even asking.

[Xtrasweettea]

Holy elitist Batman.. might be time to step off your high horse brother... number one not everyone learns the same way and number two it’s hard to ask questions because most people, at least that I’ve seen would rather act like d-bags when someone makes a mistake rather that point of out or offer a solution. You want to help others improve simply don’t be a d-bag about. Personally I’d rather someone point out something I’m screwing up or forgetting about. Now if you try to be nice and the person has an attitude about it then all bets are off. It’s just that simple

This thread wasn't about learning or asking questions. It was about people not even trying. People wanting to learn and ask questions is the opposite of that. Those individuals are above whom the OP was describing.

We are talking about people like this:

• Dungeon is The Qitana Ravel
• No new player alert from the system
• It's GNB, RDM, DRG, and me as WHM
• Get to the first mob, DRG eats every AOE and every mechanic wave
• For the rest of the dungeon, the DRG will be hit by every advertised AOE. There's no attempt by the DRG at all to move out of the way.
• GNB tends to lose mobs because he does one AOE at the start then single rotates until I get hate.
• RDM rarely uses Embolden, doesn't Enchant Moulinet, sometimes remembers he has a burst melee combo
• The DPS do less damage than Trusts (yes, I parse, so I know what I could consider the baseline. DPS that do less damage than Trust = bad DPS)
• I am out DPSing the tank. I am riding close to the DRG in DPS.
• By the time we get to the last set of mobs prior to the final boss, I was done going above and beyond the effort they were putting in. I stopped DPSing, just tossed regen and medica II and spammed emotes with me stopping only to oGCD cure and reapply Regen.
• I also didn't DPS on the final boss. The boss fight took longer with this group than with Trusts.
• GNB: "GGTYFP"

So, explain to me the "learning" part here? No questions were asked. No changes in behavior from the two DPS and Tank.

Also, who was/were the actual elitist in this party? Explain, because I am sure you are going to say me, and I want to know what makes you think that.

[SieyaM]

This thread wasn't about learning or asking questions. It was about people not even trying. People wanting to learn and ask questions is the opposite of that. Those individuals are above whom the OP was describing.

We are talking about people like this:

• Dungeon is The Qitana Ravel
• No new player alert from the system
• It's GNB, RDM, DRG, and me as WHM
• Get to the first mob, DRG eats every AOE and every mechanic wave
• For the rest of the dungeon, the DRG will be hit by every advertised AOE. There's no attempt by the DRG at all to move out of the way.
• GNB tends to lose mobs because he does one AOE at the start then single rotates until I get hate.
• RDM rarely uses Embolden, doesn't Enchant Moulinet, sometimes remembers he has a burst melee combo
• The DPS do less damage than Trusts (yes, I parse, so I know what I could consider the baseline. DPS that do less damage than Trust = bad DPS)
• I am out DPSing the tank. I am riding close to the DRG in DPS.
• By the time we get to the last set of mobs prior to the final boss, I was done going above and beyond the effort they were putting in. I stopped DPSing, just tossed regen and medica II and spammed emotes with me stopping only to oGCD cure and reapply Regen.
• I also didn't DPS on the final boss. The boss fight took longer with this group than with Trusts.
• GNB: "GGTYFP"

So, explain to me the "learning" part here? No questions were asked. No changes in behavior from the two DPS and Tank.

Also, who was/were the actual elitist in this party? Explain, because I am sure you are going to say me, and I want to know what makes you think that.

Why don't you just run the roulette with friends that can play up to your standards then? Clearly you feel put out by the DF roulette and filthy for having to deal with people that are behind the curve. I would say running a parser in not even a level 80 dungeon is elitist. Why were you running it?

[Valic]

Holy elitist Batman.. might be time to step off your high horse brother... number one not everyone learns the same way and number two it’s hard to ask questions because most people, at least that I’ve seen would rather act like d-bags when someone makes a mistake rather that point of out or offer a solution. You want to help others improve simply don’t be a d-bag about. Personally I’d rather someone point out something I’m screwing up or forgetting about. Now if you try to be nice and the person has an attitude about it then all bets are off. It’s just that simple

There's no one learning is the problem. I love how it jumps to "you're just elitist" though lol. Personally I offer help when I can, I even encourage questions if it's in regards to mechanics. Or if I notice someones using single target attacks in an aoe situation. IMO though... something as basic as knowing you have aoe's and single target, and the situation for when you use either one... Should already be either self explanatory or encouraged to be taught by the game without content being nuked to "very easy" allowing you to get away with doing anything and not learning.

I think the most telling part here is that you would rather force a kick by disconnect rather than try to even attempt to help another player. With an attitude like yours becoming more common it is very possible they have gone all the way to 80 without anyone telling them anything about AoE rotations. As for the gear, I thought they were adding minimum ilevel to most things now.

My attitude? You misjudge me. I'll kindly help out anyone, remind them of abilities they have, tell them how to do the mechanic, so on and so forth. I hadn't considered force disconnect... which, is still a pretty crappy punishment to want to "leave" because your party is made of incompetence. As for ilvl... Well, you can get Susano in a trial roulette with someone still wearing poetics from ARR. Just FYI....

This thread wasn't about learning or asking questions. It was about people not even trying. People wanting to learn and ask questions is the opposite of that. Those individuals are above whom the OP was describing.

We are talking about people like this:

• Dungeon is The Qitana Ravel
• No new player alert from the system
• It's GNB, RDM, DRG, and me as WHM
• Get to the first mob, DRG eats every AOE and every mechanic wave
• For the rest of the dungeon, the DRG will be hit by every advertised AOE. There's no attempt by the DRG at all to move out of the way.
• GNB tends to lose mobs because he does one AOE at the start then single rotates until I get hate.
• RDM rarely uses Embolden, doesn't Enchant Moulinet, sometimes remembers he has a burst melee combo
• The DPS do less damage than Trusts (yes, I parse, so I know what I could consider the baseline. DPS that do less damage than Trust = bad DPS)
• I am out DPSing the tank. I am riding close to the DRG in DPS.
• By the time we get to the last set of mobs prior to the final boss, I was done going above and beyond the effort they were putting in. I stopped DPSing, just tossed regen and medica II and spammed emotes with me stopping only to oGCD cure and reapply Regen.
• I also didn't DPS on the final boss. The boss fight took longer with this group than with Trusts.
• GNB: "GGTYFP"

So, explain to me the "learning" part here? No questions were asked. No changes in behavior from the two DPS and Tank.

Also, who was/were the actual elitist in this party? Explain, because I am sure you are going to say me, and I want to know what makes you think that.

**THISSSSSSSSSSSSSS** Absolutely every bit of this post is what I'm describing. Yet as I've stated, the common ignorant poster in this thread goes "lol okay elitist".

This is... what's to learn about AoEs do more damage on multiple targets than single ones? It's basic math. 100x5 is more than 200x1. And yet you still see countless people at level 80 who won't. Likewise, several mechanics have been repeated endlessly. The stack indicator is used constantly prior to make level.

With that said, do you want to know why people say almost nothing nowadays? Because their advice—no matter how polite—is meant with variations of "you don't pay my sub," "I can play however I want" or <insert expletives here>. For a lot of people, they just stop trying after being told one too many times how horrible they are for daring to suggest you (general) are doing something wrong.

And also more of this.... It's true. "I play how I want so suck it" is the general attitude people seem to take (and even show in this thread). At one point, it was literally, you HAVE to perform to a certain extent to clear/win... And then, good job! Now it's... "I do what I want because fk you and I said so I can be s lazy as I want". I repeat this title's thread... mediocrity should not be the standard. Forget not "giving your all" or "elitist" mentality as people are calling this... Let's just at least make players have to have some form of competence to give SOME effort. The bare minimum of an individual player among a group should not be the use a GCD once, afk, don't do mechs, and they're just rewarded by the end of it thanks to the rest of their party. At what point is the border for playing "a unique take on your job" vs "fk it, I just spam this skill and watch netflix on another monitor". There's the attempt at understanding basic fundamentals about your job, skills, aoe's, etc... then there's genuine lack of any effort and getting away with not having to do anything. The latter, should not be rewarded.

Take many fighting games and RPG's as a comparison. You have to understand what spells/actions do at certain times and points of battles. If not... you run that much more a risk of being defeated if not losing entirely. If I could go through all of FF8 without any form of cure/curaga/cura or any items that heal(and this is exclluing the crappy infinite health nonsense they added to the remakes)... I would do it. But the fact is, I can't... Why? Because if I don't have healing SOMEWHERE, I die an thus, I lose. the consequence? I start over and learn how to progress by improving. It's a common practice and this shouldn't be shunned or looked at as "elitist". Wanting to improve and defeat an average challenge should be the normal, no less, no more.

Just a few thoughts, because I think you need to step back a bit, with and rethink your arguments.

1. PF is NOT DF. The argument you presented is incorrect because you added in the penalty that DOES NOT exist in a full Party Finder drop than you would in a Duty Finder.

That said, has some of the content become "too easy"? Yes.
Are there people who still can't perform basic functions in the game? Yes.


Has their subscriber base dropped due to it? Doesn't look like it.

Yoshi has come out and said he wanted it more accessible and that he didn't want people to feel it to be too much of a grind anymore. That someone can come back and play instead of being on it all the time.

Part of the complaints about the game's state do come from people who do burn through a lot of this content too much too quickly and those negatives start piling up because that's what our human memory latches onto the most: negative experiences.

There is still quite a bit of content out there that is challenging but due to the reward structure has certain access locks to it, be it weekly lockouts - having to form a job composition around it etc... Part of this problem is that depending on the culture/region - it brings its own set of problems. Japanese culture will work to make sure achieve the goal with different compositions. Raider mentality in the states is general complaints about a job that is "trash" due to hyperbole over "the meta" That's not to say that there are genuine concerns over a job, bugs and reward satisfaction. Then job identity arguments making different jobs in the same classes "feel the same" because the devs trying to breakup the meta. So yes it is "our" fault that some of this blandness has happened and the game feeling less challenging overall is one issue.

Age is another issue. While I think this game isn't THAT bad off technology wise. I think it's far easier to feel that FFXIV needs a technological overhaul due to the way tech has progressed, over how FFX11 may have needed it (till the time of 14's first appearance). There's also the feel that the staff ....or at least the time to roll in content is running thin. From the way they had to do half a race for each gender (and you can see they had to keep adjusting down to the wire and on after launch) to other small "impact" but noticeable things like why only one model of Mystel like Dulia when you had a CG movie showing that quite a few were overweight. Yet it's her model NPC that's roaming around, which kind of minimizes the story's impact in some ways (it's WELL written, and still has a lot of fantastic story building elements - make no mistake) . Then not having craftable weapons for the new Jobs that were primal based. Not to mention we're this far into the patches and still no relic quests.

Now I know I digressed posting the above paragraph, but that's to show that you can see it's getting a bit "threadbare" overall.

But one other point to this problem is that in the end this is a business. If they're still gaining subscribers with a lowered bar, then that's what's gonna happen until it starts losing people.
There isn't one factor to this problem of mediocrity and some of it isn't easily solvable due to cultural differences, while the other is going to take time (if they need to just have a better game engine and at that point would it be worth it to move to a 3rd engine when you can just do another MMO from the start?)

The problem isn't also SE accepting mediocrity itself, from the tone of your rant/rebuttal this is a community problem and some of which the blame lies on ourselves in the way we approach this content and caused a clash in mentalities that many sides take to an extreme.

I agree to an extent. It's not one sole factor, and I would say it's more of 70/30 in terms of who's to blame for this mediocrity. The 70 being the developers and the 30 being players. However, grind =/= difficulty either... Again I'm not just referencing savage content here in this thread. There's regular content that's run where people are absolutely blind as to how to perform basic functions that SHOULD have been already presented to them by the level they are at. Some examples being 24 man content or some dungeons from SB and on. Things as simple as a stack marker, moving an aoe you're marked with showing it'll clip another player, using your aoe's to kill multiple enemies at once or else they explode and deal heavy damage.

We can't truly go off what they say as a subscriber count, plenty of companies lie about their actual sub count and player count. Though I know FFXIV is still up there and it deserves to be, I'm just going to say I know some people who quit because the compiled changes have made the game stale/boring for them. Now again, I agree... it's multiple factors coming from a variety of sources that have caused these changes but for a time we still had some "walls" that at the very least required pl ayers to learn in some method or another. Take the requirement in the MSQ toward the end of ShB. No spoilers but you are REQUIRED to complete a "role quest" to progress in the MSQ... So if you're going in as a tank like I'm sure many new players are doing for ShB with DRK being the posterboy of the expansion... You are required to do the following.. A. A stack mechanic. B. dodge aoe's. and C. Mitigate. Something as simple as this, which has likely been in previous quests/instances and especially should be commonplace for dungeons.... Is now reduced in difficulty. Solo instances because of the easy/very easy, and dungeons because we have party stat % bonuses and all these changes to jobs without adjustments to anything prior to the newest expansion. Even with the newest expansion in mind however... Content is noticeably simpler. I remember the end of SB felt like it took a few parties to truly complete my first time around. ShB?... One and done. Then I hope maybe the EX's will improve it.. well in SB it was certainly fun and a heck of a challenge. ShB?.... No... it's just really long cutscenes and slightly disappointing by lacking a lot of base mechanics the normal mode included.



My point?


SE is reducing how much is required from the player to progress and succeed, that thereby follows into player content. That's why we have players who die to simple things in casual content, that's why we have players who don't know their job. While at the same time, we have avenues for improving, learning... they're at no point enforced and a player is all the more encouraged with all of these stats and bonuses to NOT have to adjust themselves. Why fix what ain't broken is the logic, and it's becoming standard. It's not just community driven, it's both ends, but mainly thanks to SE nuking difficulty and trying to support more casual friendly style. A method they likely want to embrace to rake in new players to fit in nicely... Which, fine?... But at the very least give the common casual player the basic fundamental knowledge required to play down the road. Just as any game will give you a tutorial on what the controls are and how to play to progress/win. That alone should be commonplace in games, not just MMO's.

[Nephisto]

Also, who was/were the actual elitist in this party? Explain, because I am sure you are going to say me, and I want to know what makes you think that.

LOL!! I tried yesterday the Sirensong Sea for the first time in DF. I'm not an ELITIST AND A SUPER AWESOME PLAYER, I know my limits (I'm not doing Savage stuff), but I try to play well my RDM and before I watched some guide about this dungeon on YouTube. So the dungeon starts with a the advice saying somebody didn't clear it and I supposed it was about me. At the first pull, the Tank die. I don't know why. We reach the first boss. Nobody stack when the arrows appear, and one of the other guy just run like a crazy horse when the arrows was on him. The Healer die. He said RDM REZ PLEASE. I'm level 62, so I don't have Reraise yet. I said (because I saw that in the YouTube guide) we must stack. Somebody answered « we know I lagged ». Ok, so this is a group of three knowing each other, and because one of them lagged, all the others are doing weird stuff. Go back to the first boss. Same thing. The Healer die. Killed the Boss on the third try. Second boss. The Healer run like a crazy chicken in the black cloud. The Healer die. Second boss again. The Healer run again in the black cloud. The Healer die. I started to heal myself at this point and the Tank. Wipe again. Somebody must gave water to a dog, so we waited. Third try on the second Boss. Ok, we killed it, but the Healer and the other DPS were dead at the end. Last Boss. The Healer die. Wipe. The Tank die. Wipe. The Healer die again. Somebody told me RDM LB, but didn't have the time to LB and the Boss killed me. Somebody started the Abandon Vote. I said to myself « really? » I voted no, the instance stopped.

I cannot explain what was exactly the problem during this run. Mediocrity? Lagging? The thirsty dog? But that was a sad and painful run for my first dungeon in Stormblood!

[Xtrasweettea]

Why don't you just run the roulette with friends that can play up to your standards then? Clearly you feel put out by the DF roulette and filthy for having to deal with people that are behind the curve.

You assume too much. What I provided was an example. These people weren't even on the curve. I guess I am asking way to much for someone to dodge just one bright orange AOE marker. Also, even thinking that player DPS should be higher than trust AI DPS is not that high of a standard.

AI trust don't spam AOEs and they don't DPS when avoiding mechanics. So a 6K DPS Trust is the minimal I should be doing as a DPS within that dungeon. If I am pulling less than that, I am not incentivizing the rest the group to have me versus them running with Trusts.

Those Trusts are the baseline. Anyone below that is not on the curve.

Also, if I ran exclusively with FC mates, then you wouldn't get a Healer or Tank to help with that DPS queue problem.

I would say running a parser in not even a level 80 dungeon is elitist. Why were you running it?

So that I can make sure that I am not burdening my group with shotty DPS. This is a team game. When I am in an dungeon, I am group with three other people. My sub alone doesn't beat three other people's sub.

That is not elitism. I don't want to be a burden. Elitists don't care if they are a burden and state to the contrary that they are.

[Ryaz]

Maybe I'm just lucky, and while I've had a few groups that were less than stellar here and there, it's really a rarity to get players that are so bad they fail at every mechanic. People are acting as if its extremely common when it really isn't. Most people are capable of doing dungeons just fine. I don't believe I've wiped more than once in a dungeon in an extremely long time and even that is a rarity. If I get someone who's having issues because they're new, I give them advice on the mechanics and 95% of the time they'll listen. I've never had once person say "you don't pay my sub". I have, however, have had an elitist tell me off for slowing down the group by trying to help the new players.

For example, had a new player and a returner in the Aery. One didn't know the fights, the other forgot them all. I was tank and spent about 10-15 seconds for a brief explanation of each boss fight. Our RDM kept pulling the bosses before I finished explaining. Finally got to Nidhogg and RDM was like "Pls pull" when I was explaining. I finally had enough and told him he needs to be more patient. He told me he doesn't like to take advice from a mentor who doesn't know how to do his job (apparently giving advice to new players is a bad thing for mentors to do).

New players are usually grateful for advice. It's the old, impatient vets that I see more issues with.

[Melichoir]

I more or less agree with the sentiment behind your rant but I do take exception at this point:

.... Can't do an EX or savage for that mount you're eyeballing? Np, just wait an expansion when gear will allow you to steamroll through it with some randoms who just as well don't know what a mechanic is.

This is stupid, because this is no different than saying if I get to level 50 and go back to do a level 20 quests, Im just a no skill pleb because I got the gear and job skills that void any challenge that the quest may have had. That the only true way to do that quest is if Im level synced with gear that is available at that point in the game. It's a stupid point to make.

Furthermore, people waiting for the next xpac have to actually wait a while. Let me put it this way - You cant cheese O12S currently if you dont know the mechanics at all and are completely inept at the game. Even if your wearing max 470 gear (which would also mean youve been either raiding or been consistent in clearing content and again not make you a complete pleb) M/F is gonna kill your dumb butt if you dont know the fight most likely, and Hello World in P2 is gonna wipe you if you make it there. You would have to wait till much further into the expac to start cheesing o12s. And before the "Well PF is a Thing" that requires competent players to carry you, and if they dont mind carrying dead weight that hurts their chances at the mount, then thats their choice. And if youre gonna wait that long to cheese it, fine. It isnt the pinnacle of content. Its just older expired content at that point. It becomes the "level 20 quest" at that point.

Beyond that, yeah, the game does dumb down a lot and I think hats gonna be detrimental to the game long term. But at least employ arguments about this that are relevant. Complaining outdated content can be cheesed by being vastly over leveled and the only way to get in that state is to wait a few years is dumb. Youre undercutting your overall idea by using this talking point.

[ElazulHP]

It's a game. Who cares? Some people that play this are disabled too. Game is for all skill levels and has content for all skill levels. Game working as intended.

[Nicodemus_Mercy]

One thing I think everyone should remember in topics such as this... one person's "mediocrity" is another person's "skillcap". Take me for example. I think I'm an above average WHM, if not actually top tier. But someone else, say a WHM who clears ultimates (which I have never done), might group me with me and find my performance is mediocre or even bad! And compared to him it might well be! It's all relative. Expecting everyone you meet to be at least as good as you if not better isn't realistic, nor is expecting the game to be balanced around the higher skill ranges rather than the average.