"Play XIV if(cont)" and"you have a responsibility to" are not statements that coexist

[Lanadra]

I don't think it's a heresy to anyone. There's a reason that they've banned some streamers using parsers for calling out other people and being toxic.

Being able to clear dungeons ought to be enough. But this forum already has many people who immediately shoot down ideas because "this might ruin the balance and nobody wants to have someone in their party with slightly less job efficiency". That degree of hyperfocus on efficiency, any everything outside of it being limited to limit jobs, seems obsessive. Every job has always been able to clear all dungeons. And a hyperfocus on efficiency, efficiency, efficiency, at the cost of anything that might bring diversity to play. Seems like an unhealthy fixation. Not to mention people not being accommodating to new players. You don't have to be a sprout to be new. People who rushed through the MSQ are still sprouts in a sense, even if the game doesn't call them sprouts.

There are people out there who will downright tell people that they don't deserve to play Final Fantasy XIV because of a mistake they made. And that's not healthy for any game, let alone a Final Fantasy game.

This to me sounds like you didn't take the responses to your subjobs thread very well. For me personally it isn't even about efficiency, as I said in that thread, I just don't like a system that suddenly cordons off part of what I could use without limitations before.

[linayar]

Journalists writing articles like "Shadowbringers is the best Final Fantasy game in years". Players telling people who are fans of the Final Fantasy series in general, not to be intimidated by the fact it's an MMORPG, and that if they let it being an online game put them off, they're missing out on more Final Fantasy content and fun. And to "please not worry" that it's an online game in general.

The idea being that a lot of Final Fantasy fans don't want to put up with an MMORPG, and are put off by the term and concept. They just want to play a Final Fantasy. And people try to convince those hardcore Final Fantasy or RPG fans to try XIV. That it's just as Final Fantasy as the rest.


...

I don't know how else to say it. Getting irritated at people who don't use a ranged DPS limit break on Nero, because it saves just a few short seconds, does not make a lifelong Final Fantasy VI fan want to play Final Fantasy XIV. Or make the proposition look enticing.

There is this idea that FFXIV is a Final Fantasy/(J)RPG first and an MMO second. I think it mainly comes from people who only equate MMO to either forced "socialization" and/or mass player interaction.

For me, FFXIV is an MMO simply because it's a multiplayer game that supports a massive number of player (compared to single and many local co-op games) via a persistent online environment. The degree to which a player is forced to socialize with other people (as long as there is in fact still some kind of interaction between players) and the number of players contents in the game actually support does not make FFXIV any less (or more) of an MMO.

So, you can enjoy Final Fantasy as a Final Fantasy game, but let's not forget its full name: Final Fantasy XIV Online. That "online" in its name hints at its MMO nature. That means you will have to deal with strangers unless you only play with friends, and some of those strangers may not give you a good experience (and the feelings might be mutual with respect to them as well).

That said, I do believe you can still have a good experience regardless. I too cannot remember the last time seeing anyone actually saying "you don't pay my sub" in a serious manner. At the same time, I also cannot remember the last time seeing anyone getting mad at ranged/caster LB not being used against Nero.

People's experiences may vary, but the good thing about a massively multiplayer game like FFXIV is that you're bound to be able to go through the game and enjoy it while playing with other players. Any potential for bad interactions should not deter anyone from at least trying the game, especially with its generous free trial, because there is also the potential for good (or at least neutral) interactions.

[Brightamethyst]

Being able to clear dungeons ought to be enough. But this forum already has many people who immediately shoot down ideas because "this might ruin the balance and nobody wants to have someone in their party with slightly less job efficiency". That degree of hyperfocus on efficiency, any everything outside of it being limited to limit jobs, seems obsessive. Every job has always been able to clear all dungeons. And a hyperfocus on efficiency, efficiency, efficiency, at the cost of anything that might bring diversity to play. Seems like an unhealthy fixation.

There are different ways of measuring success. Yes, clearing a dungeon is an objective, true/false statement, but it's not the only part of the equation. No one complains about people being sub-optimal. They complain about people being bad. There's a big difference. Failing a new mechanic a few times is fine, and completely understandable. Never getting better at said mechanic even after learning how it works is poor play (in normal content. I'm not talking about things like savage where mechanics are intentionally hard even when you do understand them.).

If a tank wants to take it slow, or someone new to a job is doing low DPS, or we wipe because a sprout doesn't understand mechanics, or whatever, cool. It's part of the normal experience. It may turn a 20 minute dungeon into a 30 minute dungeon but that's within the standard deviation and few people will complain about it. If that 20 minute dungeon turns into a 45 minute dungeon though? Even if you clear in the end something was objectively wrong.

[Gameovers]

This to me sounds like you didn't take the responses to your subjobs thread very well. For me personally it isn't even about efficiency, as I said in that thread, I just don't like a system that suddenly cordons off part of what I could use without limitations before.

I agree with you 100% It does sound like that.

[Stepjam]

I
There are people out there who will downright tell people that they don't deserve to play Final Fantasy XIV because of a mistake they made. And that's not healthy for any game, let alone a Final Fantasy game.

Assholes exist everywhere. It's part of life. If someone is expecting you to be perfect in a dungeon, that's their problem.

That said, I've run into more players who don't understand the basics of their class even at lvl 80 than I've met players who expect perfection in story difficulty content. And to be honest, if you are at endgame, you don't have the excuse of being new. You've been playing for hundreds of hours. Most RPGs (games in general really) are much shorter amd ask much more of you within their length.
It's inconsiderate of other people's time to refuse to put in the basic effort to understand how your class works at endgame. I'm not expecting every player to put out mad deeps in dungeons. I do expect, for example, for a lvl 80 BLM to not spam fire 1. And that's a thing I've run into.

[Vidu]

People got into the Final Fantasy series for the story. If they didn't, they would have focused on a more challenging, gameplay focused series.

Please, lets not pretend like all other Final Fantasy games are basically storytelling Walking Simulators that dont have any meaningful gameplay and dont punish you if you fail to understand said gameplay...

Yes, the story is an important part and at the heart of pretty much every Final Fantasy. But that doesnt mean that they're completly devoid of at least mildly challenging gameplay and wont punish you if you fail at that.
I remember my first time playing FFX - I lost count how often I wiped to Efrye, that stupid red dragon you fight on top of the airship before getting into Bevelle. (In hindsight I was probably underleveld and had relied on Yuna to much in previous fights). Since then I replayed FFX with my partner and just a couple of weeks ago we wiped trying to fight Judgment (yeah, yeah, super boss at the end). I remember my brother quitting FFII because he walked into the wrong direction right at the start of the game and got kinda lost in an area where he wasnt supposed to be - something the monsters let him know by one shotting his characters.

As important as the story might be, FF games always had gameplay aswell - not super extreme hardcore gameplay, but challenging enough that you had to think about what you're doing, you had to know what skills/spells your party had at their disposal and how to use them. You dont need to know the optimal strategy for each boss or use special exploits or anything like that, but you need a basic understanding of the gameplay or you wont get far.
The big diffrence is that if you fail in a single player game the game ends. For you. It has no effect on anyone else. If you dont want to learn said basic mechanics: Cool, you're out of 50 bucks (or whatever you paid for the game) and thats it.

FFXIV and at large its community doesnt ask anymore of you than the old FFs did: Know the basic gameplay rules. Thats mostly your rotation or your job skills if your job doesnt has a clear rotation aswell as some basic mechanics (like "Dont stand in orange circles", "Stack with a stackmarker" etc.) - pretty much what the old FFs had aswell.
But if you fail here, it as a negative impact on 3/7/23 other people - in my experience they'll tolerate a few failures, but it still had that negative impact. Which is why you'll see people asking for being mindful and respectful of your fellow players - by making sure that you grasp the basics of the game, just how the old FFs asked you to grasp the basics of their game.

The story of any FF has always been locked behind gameplay - this MMO only allows you, in theory, to "skip" part of that gameplay should you fail it - by having other people carry you through it. These people not being thrilled by that is more than understandable.
In any other FF you wouldnt even be able to see the story if you didnt learn how to play the game.

Final Fantasy isnt a game for someone who doesnt want to see a story.
But its also not a game for someone who doesnt want any kind of gameplay that will require them to use skills at the right time and understand the mechanics of a fight.

[Packetdancer]

That said, I've run into more players who don't understand the basics of their class even at lvl 80 than I've met players who expect perfection in story difficulty content. And to be honest, if you are at endgame, you don't have the excuse of being new. You've been playing for hundreds of hours.

While I agree on the relative frequency of "people demanding perfect performance in content" versus "people who inexplicably seem to be just bonking their head onto the keyboard at level 80", the hundreds-of-hours isn't always true. There are folks who story-skip and jump potion because they want to catch up with friends. There are folks who picked up GNB as their first tank and leveled it entirely through Heaven-on-High and PvP or whatever, so have no idea how it works at level 80 in normal content. And there are folks who have SMN at 80 only by virtue of the fact that they leveled SCH, and may have very little idea how to play SMN optimally. Or at all. (Or vice versa; I know a lot of people who leveled SMN and have no idea how to play SCH.)

However, even if there are reasons someone might not know how to play the job they're queued on at 80... none of that makes it less frustrating when you queue up for Expert and end up in a dungeon where the tank doesn't know what mitigations even are, much less how/when to use them. (Or knows what they are, at least to the point they'll hit all of them at the same time.)

I tend to look at it like we're all in line at a fast food place. Many of us have been there before; we know our order, we'd like to place the order and get the food and keep moving. Some folks, it's their first time and they're going to stare at the menu for a little while before choosing because they don't know what they want. And yeah, that slows down the line a little bit, but everyone's had their own first time and folks will generally be understanding. But not knowing how to play your job at 80 at all and going into endgame content with random strangers is the equivalent of someone getting to the window at the drive-thru and trying to order pizza, and being told it's a burger joint. And then trying to order pasta, and being told it's a burger joint. And then trying to order BBQ brisket, and being told it's a burger joint. And then trying to order fried chicken, and being told it's a burger joint. And then...

After a while, everyone else in the line behind them is going to start getting really annoyed at how long something they expected to go quickly is taking.

If you don't know what you want to order at a drive-thru, it's polite to pull aside (and discuss with friends if necessary) before going in, rather than holding up the line. And if you don't have any idea how to play a job at 80, it's polite to try running some things with Trusts—or grouping up with friends/FC members—to get some practice before launching into roulettes.

(Mind you, yelling at folks who do launch themselves into said roulettes probably doesn't actually do much to fix the situation, and will only make people feel defensive and less willing to listen to advice.)

[GeminiReed]

There's being hyper-optimal and there's being functional.

A tank in level 15 gear with an ilvl 5 weapon doing Garuda normal is not going to function correctly as a tank. Heck they wouldn't even function properly as a DPS. This did happen to me. Unfortunately the healer was not god-tier so the tank essentially folded whenever the boss cackled. Fortunately both DPS were overgeared and we managed to kill it on pull 3 or 4. No amount of advice or understanding is going to make that a pleasant situation for anybody.

Getting normal trials in Leveling Roulette is annoying on its own if you're there for XP (I was). Having it take the time of a more lucrative dungeon was just the icing on the cake.

I get that people come here for the story unfortunately Square chose to gate story with mandatory team instances (and vice-versa). If you can't function don't inflict yourself on PUGs.

[Jojoya]

That said, I've run into more players who don't understand the basics of their class even at lvl 80 than I've met players who expect perfection in story difficulty content. And to be honest, if you are at endgame, you don't have the excuse of being new. You've been playing for hundreds of hours. Most RPGs (games in general really) are much shorter amd ask much more of you within their length.

Hundreds of hours of time played does not mean hundreds of hours of combat experience. The bulk of game time for a new player is watching cutscenes, reading dialog and traveling to the next quest objective. We end up with something closer to 15 hours of combat time (mostly in dungeons where a new player is getting carried by veteran players who know the dungeon inside and out, and are overpowered due to the way level sync works) per 100 hours played.

So when it comes to combat, someone at 80 could still have the excuse of being new because the game hasn't put them in the position of needing to learn how to use their job competently. Get the occasional "kill 5 beasties" as a quest objective? Those beasties can be killed using the basic attack combo with no need to dive into more advanced aspects of the job kit (assuming the player has access to most of it at their level). It's hard to learn when combat doesn't last long enough in most of the combat situations you encounter.

I can't blame the new player that much when they haven't really had an opportunity to learn in an environment that is dumbed done for the sake of veteran players who want to get in and out of that dungeon they've done dozens of times before as fast as possible. Think about it - dungeons have been given a 90 minute expiration timer but many veteran players get angry if the dungeon run lasts more than 15 minutes. How is the new player supposed to learn when they're effectively being dragged along in the wake of a speed run? How much better would they be if things actually took time to die so they had to learn how to use more than just Fire 1 efficiently?

It's really easy to forget as a veteran MMO player what it's like to be a new player without a clue what to expect or what you should be doing. I can remember being a WoW noob with only single player RPG experience to draw on. There were some really dumb mistakes and assumptions I had been making when I first started playing that I could only recognize in hindsight. But I had to learn faster there because WoW is much more heavily combat focused during the leveling experience than FFXIV is.

Am I going to cut the new player in this game, even if they're at level cap, some slack as a result? Absolutely. Not everyone is a gaming genius.

[Merrnryn]

I have been playing this game for many years, as well as many other MMORPGs, and in many instances, these are newer issues. Story AND gameplay went hand in hand. They should not be separated from the other. Everyone should be able to enjoy the story AND play the game, casual, hardcore, etc. The disconnect is the player base themselves. I have seen instances of a party in Arum Vale screaming at a dps and calling them insulting names for killing the morbol pods and not letting them 'hatch'. I have seen people say and mean "you don't pay my sub." I have seen sprouts be handheld I have seen sprouts be harassed and abused. I have seen the same for new content. I went in with friends yesterday, new to diamond. The tank was so toxic (mind you this is story normal mode, not EX) and was screaming at anyone and everyone how they should know the mechanics and this and that, First-day content.

The disconnect comes mostly from a lack of patience and care toward each other once that magical sprout is gone. No one is perfect, those 99 parses or for some blue or purple, etc? How many hours did it take you to get there, how many deaths, damage downs. Hours and hours and hours. Yet when someone new comes in on a practice party there is always that one player that pulls twice then leaves with nothing nice to say at all on their departure. That or the anger and frustration set in.

Story and Gameplay are meant to coexist, the game was designed for such. It's impatience, elitism, and a general feeling of no culpability because it is an online interaction and we can hide behind an avatar and our screens. Therefore we can say what we like, how we like because there is literally 0 culpability aside maybe a blist. These people don't care because there are always more people and players. Start taking that culpability, and understand your actions and words have consequences.

"It's just a game" Needs to stop, Yes it is 'just a game' Yet, we all are interacting with real people, who have real feelings. You know that frustration you feel when a party member doesn't get a mechanic? Likely so are they and screwing up even more because they feel like crap about not understanding it, but the community is so nasty to people that do mess up, they won't speak up. Instead, reign it in and ask them if they are having trouble. If there is any way you can help. Ask them what about the mechanic has them confused or not getting. Sometimes it could be a camera issue, not everyone is great at moving a camera and character around independently from the other. Maybe they can't get a camera angle correct. Maybe they have a low frame rate. Who knows.

Be kind. Kindness costs nothing.
Story and Game can go hand in hand, they can co-exist.