"Everyone's so open and friendly" is a lie

[Fyrebrand]

Who is telling you that literally everyone who plays this game is open and friendly? Obviously they don't know everyone, so I suspect they were just trying to express what positive experiences they've had in the game but phrased it in a hyperbolic way. Your mileage may vary, and of course you will not meet the same people or have the same experiences they do.

Personally, I think this game does have a generally kind and chill community. However, that is coming from someone who is still leveling and not doing any extreme/ultimate or endgame content yet. I'm also not in an FC and don't really go out of my way to talk to other folks. So, most of what I see is just who I interact with in towns, open world, and dungeons. And so far, almost 100% of the time people are pretty nice. Players are not scared to say that they're new to a duty, people give tips when needed, tanks ask if they are pulling too much, and if there's a group wipe nobody gets mad we just pick ourselves up and keep going. I often get nice compliments about my glamour, and sometimes random strangers just come up to me and give me items for seemingly no reason without wanting anything in return. Most of the time if somebody asks for a revive in the map chat, somebody else has gotten them up before I can even get there.

What little "bad apples" I have seen so far are: 1) Some of the people on these forums (not naming any names, obviously) and 2) Folks getting grumpy in Alliance Raids because they don't like the Duty that Roulette gave them. Also, people seem to get spicier than normal in those Sky Pirate raids (Dun Scaith and the like).

I have no idea what your experience has been like, OP, and if you have had to deal with some genuine jerks then I'm sorry to hear that. We're all human beings here after all, and some of us are not great people. But every time I hear about how the FFXIV community is secretly bad and it's all a big conspiracy, I have to wonder what circles people are running in and how do they put themselves out there in the game. I've seen people making threads complaining about how "people can't take constructive criticism," and they post screencaps of their dialogue in a dungeon thinking they're the "good guy," meanwhile they don't even realize they are just being needlessly rude and not actually offering any help at all.

Another random anecdote: I was in Golden Saucer once and somebody was calling out how to get an easy 60,000 MGP for the Fashion Report, and offering free item kits as gifts for whoever wanted them. Call me crazy, but I thought that was a pretty nice thing for somebody to do, and counted in the "FFXIV community good" books. However, some random Hroth Bro decided to chime in, questioning publicly "What's the catch?" and basically accusing them of trying to scam people. They explained they didn't want anything in return for it, but Hroth Bro didn't believe it and continued accusing them of trying to get away with some kind of scam. So OF COURSE other people naturally told him off and pointed out he was being rude to somebody just trying to do something nice. Almost immediately Hroth Bro breaks into a "FFXIV community is so bad, look how I am being harassed" tirade. I mean, he could have just admitted he was wrong and apologize, or choose not to engage further, or simply not be silly grump from the start -- but I guarantee you, this dude still thinks he is in the right and he has this great tale of how he exposed the "toxic underbelly of the FFXIV SJW Tumblerverse" or whatever.

[Krotoan]

1) Some of the people on these forums (not naming any names, obviously) and 2)

I would like to comment that while I have encountered some of the "baddies" people describe in posts, I have literally never encountered people as contrary minded as I have on the forums , in game.

[Fyrebrand]

I would like to comment that while I have encountered some of the "baddies" people describe in posts, I have literally never encountered people as contrary minded as I have on the forums , in game.

True, I would agree with that. My in-game experience and my forum experience is like night and day.

[Rinhi]

I would like to comment that while I have encountered some of the "baddies" people describe in posts, I have literally never encountered people as contrary minded as I have on the forums , in game.

I've ended up in a duty twice with a notoriously obtuse poster that fails to understand the basics of math or seasons and they were nice, helpful and 'pogging off' performance wise, so to speak
I just think some people give the forum too much weight, like many of the people who criticize SE or aspects of the game, or the players and/or community, are usually completely "normal" in game, tbh
like, I probably come across as some kind of elitist hardcore raider who expects only the best of players and anything below 100% is seen as slacking, meanwhile I'm a casual af player that wiped a party like 3-4 times on dohn mheg because I pulled too much and wasn't watching my CDs properly (though to my defense the healer was using benefic and not 2 all throughout the first wipe, the rest were all on me)

[Nyarlha]

I've ended up in a duty twice with a notoriously obtuse poster that fails to understand the basics of math or seasons and they were nice, helpful and 'pogging off' performance wise, so to speak
I just think some people give the forum too much weight, like many of the people who criticize SE or aspects of the game, or the players and/or community, are usually completely "normal" in game, tbh

People just fall too easily for forums personas/trolling. A huge part of this forum is so contrarian that it just motivates those people to post huge baits to get a rise out of them. They can't resist but go full "Ackshually...!" when they read something they disagree with.

[Rinhi]

People just fall too easily for forums personas/trolling. A huge part of this forum is so contrarian that it just motivates those people to post huge baits to get a rise out of them. They can't resist but go full "Ackshually...!" when they read something they disagree with.

I wouldn't go as far as to say that everyone who's not fitting in with the majority is trolling or using a persona, I think most people are just speaking their mind instead of keeping quiet around here, even if it's an unpopular opinion - though the forum certainly does have quite a few trolls/gimmicks, i.e. titanmen with his lgbt stuff the last few months or the aforementioned player trolling regarding prime numbers or when fall begins and whatnot, though those threads are super obvious in the first place (and still get 2000 pages because ???)

[Larirawiel]

I've ended up in a duty twice with a notoriously obtuse poster that fails to understand the basics of math or seasons and they were nice, helpful and 'pogging off' performance wise, so to speak
I just think some people give the forum too much weight, like many of the people who criticize SE or aspects of the game, or the players and/or community, are usually completely "normal" in game, tbh

True. It is the reason why i do not post in the german part of the forums anymore. I don't like the passive hostility there. I made also the mistake and told them that i played this other mmo in the past.

Cheers

[Adeacia]

My very first experience with other players was when I ran Sastasha for the first time. I was a GLA and didn't know what I was doing. The party took it slow, and worked with me. Told me how I should manage myself as a tank, how I should gain aggro and such. I was really happy for their help.

It's been years since then, and the only major toxic players I've seen since then has been on these very forums, not in the game itself. Sure I have encountered a few negative players here and there ingame, but that's pretty rare in my experience. Even when a wipe happens and it's my fault, we just try again without issue. Sometimes I do joke about it to try to diffuse any potential anger with things like "I blame the healer" or "Who let this trash healer in this party?" when on both occasions, said healer is me. Usually gets a laugh out of them.