The Forum Community - in your opinion.

[Nishira]

I think what has struck me as odd in a way is that the general discussion forum does not seem to be representative of the game as an experience. Now I know fora usually represent a vocal minority who enjoy exchanging opinions and debating so discussions may be a bit more… expressive than the general consensus is most of the time but often you still recognise the community itself one way or another. The contrast seems bigger in this case, I am wondering whether that is because it’s not as attractive for those of more moderate opinions to post here, or within game people feel more censored, or perhaps other reasons. I may be wrong tho obviously, I’m still in the process of trying to figure it out.

[Kolsykol]

The forum is ok I guess. It's the only place where you can actually discuss about the game and its features and not a wannabe imageboard like the subreddit (which I absolutely despise).

I'd like to have some moderation though, the level of necroposting in troll threads is unreal and there's a certain person (or people) that keep making alts to s**tpost and bait those that are new here.

It does have moderation, the issue is what they choose to moderate.
You can get banned for like two weeks for saying '' wtf is wrong with you '' to someone who's being racist, but the racist person won't get banned if they're being sneaky about it and aren't being racist against a specific person.
That's why a lot of people get away with it on the forum, because they're not being personal about it ( most of the time at least ).
And often they can bait people into getting mad and snap, and then those people will get banned for having a pretty human response to someone being garbage.

The moderation is seriously robotic as hell.
The most bizarre ban I've gotten was for telling people to stop derailing a thread with US politics specifically about a certain president whos name begins with T.
I literally got banned for '' hate speech '' LOL...
Because apparently telling Americans to stop derailing a thread with their native politics equates to hate speech???????
It was seriously the most bizarre ban I've seen, and I've literally never been banned on any other forum or game ( including ingame in FFXIV ) before.
But I've been twice here...

So yeah it's not that it doesn't have moderation it's just that there almost doesn't seem to be any human oversight of it.

[Goji1639]

It's a typical gaming forum community. Most people are here to complain and fish for attention/praise.

Like with most forum communities, this place has developed a hivemind on certain issues that is completely out of touch with the game in general. As a result many forum regulars have consistent in-game issues with others, and retreat to the forum hivemind whenever they need reassurance.

I tend to not like forum communities in general, as I feel they usually represent the worst elements of any game. I can't deny they're entertaining, though.

[LisSquid]

Forum seems normal (even with the lack of action against necroing and troll threads. That's just how these things are). Although people are a little more cagey here at times, it's probably one of the more tame MMO forums I've been on.

As for me? Well, I just like the sound of my keyboard go clickity clack.

snip.

I approve of your character name.

[Larirawiel]

Seriously, either a MMO has a (semi) toxic community in the forums or the game is dead because nobody plays it. I have played many MMOs and FF14 is not an exception here. Yes, it is not pretty but if you know it, you can propably live with it.

And maybe you should be more vocal to get a community manager for the english part of the forums. Fortunately we have one for the german part.

Cheers

[hobostew]

I feel the reason why the forum community doesn't seem to reflect the situation in game is that people here hyperfocus on weird niche issues that affect nearly nobody and that ends up drowning out any feedback about other wider reaching problems the game might have. It's like people here are addicted to being outraged so they turn every tiny molehill into mount everest.

[Breakbeat]

My experience to base this on: Online text communication for the last 35 years (yes, 35, I was dialing into BBSs when I was eleven, in 1986), and perhaps somewhere between six- and eight-thousand posts total on two other popular MMO forums over the last ten or twelve years.

This community is one of the nicest and friendliest I have seen. Discussion here on the general forums is civil by any comparison. The "rabble" here is damn near benign compared to other discussion boards - even non-video game boards. There are a few that seem to perpetuate troll threads and divisive topics, but I already see those being the same few folk; both the ones that start those threads and the ones that feed the trolls. As those are the small minority, they're not relevant to my description of these forums; if someone were to ask me about the climate around here, I'm going to describe how 97% of the discussion is around here, not the 3%.

We need to stop doing that, actually, IRL, and soon. That is, looking at what the 3% does and thereby labeling whatever groups they belong to (race, sexuality, religion, politics, etc.) as "all behaving like that." If there are 97% decent folk here and 3% rabble, anyone's description of these forums should be glowing, with only the tiniest of shade.

Overall, coming here directly from the WoW forums has been like stepping from full dark into the light of day. Many people are decent here. Many people will disagree and go on to explain why, which is excellent. No ad hominems, no off-topic nonsense, just their disagreement and reasons for it. The front page here is not flooded with political, sexual or social "hashtag" issues.

This is even more interesting to me because on the WoW forums, you cannot swear, you cannot link pictures unless you have the highest trust level, etc. Here I can say something is bullshit or even link a pic with my measly 75 posts. Yet, it's calm and decent around here.

Am I having fun? Yeah - I have fun on any discussion forums otherwise I wouldn't have been doing text discussion for the last three decades plus. Are these discussion forums something special? It actually pains me to say they are since humans should be decent and kind to each-other everywhere... but yes, people around here are far more personable and sociable than many other spots on the internet.

[Rinhi]

I think what has struck me as odd in a way is that the general discussion forum does not seem to be representative of the game as an experience. Now I know fora usually represent a vocal minority who enjoy exchanging opinions and debating so discussions may be a bit more… expressive than the general consensus is most of the time but often you still recognise the community itself one way or another. The contrast seems bigger in this case, I am wondering whether that is because it’s not as attractive for those of more moderate opinions to post here, or within game people feel more censored, or perhaps other reasons. I may be wrong tho obviously, I’m still in the process of trying to figure it out.

from my experience it's this, I'm in a few discords that range from FCs to various expanded linkshells to ones focused on RP or taking photograps and they surprisingly all have very similar opinions and views on game, player or story issues similarly to this forum, even if they'd never say those in-game

I enjoy the forums and reddit for the ability to get different POVs. I won't always agree with everyone, they wont always agree with me, but that's what makes it great!

I agree, I'm personally tired of the RMT botters trolling the place, though, though the posts of certain narcissists are pretty funny so it evens out

[ReynTime]

Better than the echo chamber of worshippers in the game's subreddit.

[xxmiamorecadenza]

Better than the echo chamber of worshippers in the game's subreddit.

Not a fan of screenshots, commissions of cat girls in casual attire and ‘I just got to level 30 and this game is amazing’ posts?