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

[linayar]

I just want to respond to this part specifically without trying to take anything away from the overall point of the post.

Many people say savage is full of toxic people but what they don't realise is normal mode is too. The difference is normal mode has a far lower failure rate and it doesn't require much communication from people. You could be unknowingly playing with someone incredibly toxic but because the content doesn't require too much coordination they may not say a word. So then you have no idea what that person is really like. However in savage good coordination is a requirement, which means people need to communicate. Which of course means those silent toxic players are no longer silent and then you see what they're really like when they have something to say.

Once again, I'll just say that toxic people not being toxic is irrelevant.

This goes to an increasingly common phenomenon that I've been seeing lately where if someone says something positive about FFXIV's community, someone else eventually seems to want to say that the community is actually filled with toxic people who are just not toxic because of either the lower failure rate and lack of need to communicate or because of fearing enforcement of the rules and the possibility of being banned.

To that, I would say that the reason is irrelevant. If they're not being toxic, then they're not being toxic regardless if their nature is wanting to be toxic deep inside.

Another thing is that people don't seem to realize that passive aggressive behavior, unless very subtly done, is still toxic behavior, and in fact can go against the prohibition on nuisance behavior, specifically on obstruction of play. So that is subject to report as well.

So while the reality is that toxicity (whether direct or via more serious passive aggressive behavior) still appears in this game, it's also true that some of it has been negated either by the lack of difficulty of the main content or by the enforcement of the rules.

Whether that means it has successfully created a better environment would differ from player to player, but certainly it would support people who speak positively about the community.