Discuss : is ffxiv in trouble

[OdinelStarrei]

I mean, plenty of people are (many of those people have quit or just take long breaks while complaining on the forums or discord about job simplification).

But plenty of people are not up in arms. You know why? Because the truth is, a lot of people like simple jobs ie. SMN and WAR's popularity and find the challenge of extreme and savage alright ie. all the people who can't do rockbreaker2 even if you help them for a few hours, or the people who couldn't do double meteor and gales2 in farm parties nevermind clear parties.

This is ridiculous! SMN and WAR didn't used to be like that! What happens to the players who you take away the jobs from? Does no one think, "Yeah, it kinda sucks for the players who are getting screwed over every time the developers do a simplification rework." I really don't think the ends of more players playing a job justify the means of ruining that job for the people who loved it, and stuck with it. If people can't handle it, make newer, simple jobs then.

I do not play WAR anymore because of what they did. I don't play SMN because of what they did. Those were some of my most-played jobs. I don't trust them to touch any job in the game because of what they continue to do. It's eroding the little faith I have in good, fundamental gameplay because people are lazy, and SE keeps catering to them. Do you not feel insulted, that SE thinks so little of the majority that the game needs to be dumbed down? Because of how stupid they think everyone is? How absolutely unable they are to do basic actions? How unengaged and flaky they must be to give up if they don't win immediately and all the time? Doesn't that bother you at all?

Players are just split and SE has chosen their side already.

Exactly, they chose a side when they didn't have to. We were totally fine in Stormblood where we had diverse but easier jobs than HW, Ultimates, and tons of midcore content. There was no need to have "sides" back then. They screwed that up, and now everyone is acting like it's a zero sum game, where if I'm happy with the game, everyone else who isn't like me is going to have an AWFUL time, and if you're happy, I'm automatically going to have an AWFUL time. There was a point where I trusted CBU3 not to screw something up if they put their grubby hands on it, you know.

I guess they just disagree that it's an issue. I usually see hotfixes when things are actually an issue, so it's probably just your opinion.

If they disagree, how about telling us then? Why guess? Why do I have to keep guessing on what the developers think outside of "remove everything I like". How about actually opening a dialogue to see what some pain points are in the collective rather than taking an axe to a problem that requires a scalpel? How about actually communicating with your playerbase for something beyond telling us when we can expect the next patch with the same stuff we've been getting so it can be predicted down the date of release, or when we can purchase the next over-priced, character locked merchandise?

The majority of people on the forums tend to be... veteran players, who have burned through all the content that they are going to and came here to complain they are bored. Humans don't like change, so naturally, said veteran players will constantly complain about how things have changed from when they started.

Meanwhile, all the newer players have plenty of content to sink their teeth into and don't have some past that they yearn for as if they are Emet-Selch.

Really man? So because I am a veteran, and really frustrated that SE continues to ignore the support role, actively remove things that I find enjoyable in the game, and have essentially called the entire playerbase too stupid to have gameplay that extends beyond 1-2-3 guage builder+spend based on the "uuuuu, we're happy we're extending 5.0 job design, more players like it like this!!!" I can be equated to an omnicidal, depressed lunatic. Very cool. Next, I'm sure you'll tell me this relic series is totally uncontroversial because more people did it. Just say it properly. Newer players are easier to please because they don't know any better. They didn't have a game they liked rug-pulled. That's it.

You may see the same type of responses yourself but it does kinda depend where you actually hang out. Different subsets of the community will give you a very different experience in how satisfied they are with the game. If your FC contains mainly veteran players from Heavensward then... of course, they will probably be pretty tired of all the changes over the years because humans often don't like change.

Statements like this really bother me, because I honestly am fine with change. Eureka was a change. Expert Crafting was a change. Shadowbringers narratively was a change. I liked those things. Just because something is changing, doesn't automatically mean I'm going to hate it. One of my best friends in this game started in 5.4 (I started in 3.3 for reference), brought all of his friends from other games with him, and they hate the direction the game is going. Why do you have to pigeon hole people in your statements, and not treat them like they are individuals instead of a hivemind? Oh no, the Heavensward players are complaining again!~ Better ignore everything they are saying! If I am having a GOOD time with things in the game, and the DEVELOPERS remove the things I like doing, what the hell am I supposed to do? Just sit there and take it like a good little consumer? No no, I'm supposed to "vote with my wallet" and leave, regardless of any investment/friend groups/sunk cost fallacies that may get in the way. I'm supposed to be objective when it comes to viewing the game as a product, but because I'm "human", I'm fated to hate whatever the dev team does, it seems.

You say that, but what if the players we lose, eventually all return to catch up on the MSQ? That does happen. That's what the hundreds of thousands of flower icons are.

Returners don't make the game more fun to play. They are a metric, and a source of income for SE. Returners didn't give me an exploration zone in Endwalker, in fact, they didn't do anything for me in Endwalker. Unless my guild are the returners, I don't care about them. I'm not a god-forsaken shareholder. I'm a player who keeps getting things taken away, and keeps getting talked down to by the developers, and by you.

I straight up don't understand you guys. You're already winning. You already have the game you want, and continue to enjoy. You have a legion of players who are going to keep this game alive at least as long as FFXI, if not longer. That is not going to change, it simply won't. So why are you rubbing my face in the dirt and insulting us over it? Is it not enough for you that the game is doing what you want and that anyone who isn't a fan of the direction is progressively getting shoved out? Why do you need to support them for screwing over me and my friends?