Seriously, it's the white knights who should leave the game (not trolling)

[Gurgeh]

I'm not trying to open a discussion with the following. This is a fire and forget diatribe in the truest sense of the word.

To the white knights:
The nature of people (humans) and how they react to stimulus, and how they behave socially at scale, that is not going to change. We are talking about genetics and instinct. We are talking about pools cultural inertia far larger than this game and your voices in it.
Unless the game changes adequately you will always have yesterday's new players, becoming tomorrow's jaded, bored, disillusioned veterans.
(If you are lucky. If you are unlucky, the new players will dry up, and then your game WILL die. I think there are many white knights who are actually fine with the game dieing, as long as it can stay their happy game until it does, because they have already reverse rationalised to themselves, that that's inevitable for every MMO. Which I agree with. The question is 'when'. WoW still isn't dieing yet. Not nearly. And it was. But they did what needed to be done. They changed, and it became a new game. My god did we learn nothing with 1.0 Vs ARR?!)

So I am quite serious in the point I am making. It is you who just need to get used to how the game is and that it makes people fedup, and that you will always have this in your community. It is the 'reality' of how XIV shapes it's community, or it is 'you' that needs to leave and 'go play other games', hopping from one game to the next, every time a game gets things wrong and the players start to complain. Because everyone gets it wrong sometimes.

Humans be humans.

Or you need to just stop complaining about people complaining (oh the irony) and stay in Island sanctuary, or keep soloing Khloes books, or standing around Limsa ostracizing the players you don't approve of, or getting back to progging ultimates with those 3trd party tools or what ever it is you've been doing for five or more years.

I'm not trying to piss you off (I just accept I will but you'll get over it because you don't respect my opinion much anyway). But I am trying to make a point that will hopefully, sow a seed in subconscious of just a few of the more mentally agile and flexible among you.
It might be that it's you that are the more resilient ones. It might that yours is the best way to lead a happy content life. But your not going to be able to make other people more resilient, and frankly you don't sound 'happy' about other people being unhappy.

Or maybe you can actually start to contribute to making things better and do a little bit of campaigning to make things better where they need to be (changing the bloody software) instead of just complaining about complaints.

But... I guess people don't change. Like I say I'm just trying to sow one or two seeds where 98 others will never grow. Making a big change needs more charisma than I have.

I doubt cider will read this properly if at all. It's too long and boring for any YouTube audience. I didn't come to the forums for you tube attention in the first place.

[CVXIV]

goober moment

[Gurgeh]

XD
I don't entirely know what that means, but I think I know enough and it makes me laugh. Because I probably agree. This is just a game, it doesn't matter, so I'm not going to bother filtering what I think. I'm just gonna keep doing stuff. Because everything we've chosen to do and not do hasn't worked so far.
One thing that DEFINITELY WILL NEVER WORK is doing nothing. As far as I can see this forum is all we have if we don't have the charisma or sufficient lack of self awareness to be a YouTuber (it never both but sometimes I think it is the other).
Oh cider, you've got bags of self awareness, and a lot of charisma. Think your vids are great. I understand you can't afford to take all our shit seriously. Keep at the forums, your a leveling perspective, you question what you see, and you keep a mind of your own while taking stuff on board. (As far as I can tell)

[Gwenkatsu]

And that's why you should never drink and post, kids

But I am trying to make a point that will hopefully, sow a seed in subconscious of just a few of the more mentally agile and flexible among you.

And if this was indeed a try at being subtle, then... well... I see a lot of space for you to improve in that category

[Jojoya]

...

The nature of people (humans) and how they react to stimulus, and how they behave socially at scale, that is not going to change.
...

Humans be humans.

...

But your not going to be able to make other people more resilient

...

Making a big change needs more charisma than I have.

Back at you.

Some people are happy with the game. They don't see problems with it the way others do. Is it that hard to understand why those people are puzzled over why the complainers don't just quit the game?

Because it's clear the game is not going to change in the way the complainers would like. The developers have their own vision for the game that they're following. As players and paying customers, we need to be willing to follow along with them. Or to leave if we don't want to pay for what we're getting.

Change doesn't need charisma. Change needs courage, and seems like a lot of posters around here don't have the courage to change games.

[Valence]

Back at you.

Some people are happy with the game. They don't see problems with it the way others do. Is it that hard to understand why those people are puzzled over why the complainers don't just quit the game?

Because it's clear the game is not going to change in the way the complainers would like. The developers have their own vision for the game that they're following. As players and paying customers, we need to be willing to follow along with them. Or to leave if we don't want to pay for what we're getting.

Change doesn't need charisma. Change needs courage, and seems like a lot of posters around here don't have the courage to change games.

Back at you.

Some people are unhappy with parts of the game that are being changed constantly, in their eyes, for the worst. They still cling to the game for many different reasons, like being satisfied or entertained by other types of content, or the community, or whatever. The usual "just quit the game if you don't like it" is not only offensive but misinformed. I may be especially scathing with what SE has done with a product that I have by now probably poured more than a thousand bucks in subscription alone into, that I used to be the audience for, and that is now considering me as an inconvenient thing that they would rather discard or alienate away. I do feel that I have a right to make myself heard because a game that's been a non negligible part of my life, that I pay for, have supported for years through many other means even, is slowly being butchered for another audience.

The real issue is that a lot of happy customers feel like we, older players, are a threat to their game and enjoyment, or our existence and opinions are somehow offensive to theirs. In reality it's become exactly like politics. We do not see eye to eye on what the game should be, and just because the developers suddenly swing your way doesn't mean I'm going to shut up. "White Knights", or who the word truly is aimed at, aren't just content to "be puzzled over why complainers dont quit". White knights will consistently show up, start up ad hominem replies because they cannot actually address the points being made. White knights will bait discussions out of constructive criticism into flamebait and mudslinging. And I'm perfectly happy to accept that the other side will also show up in happy bubbly threads about the game and constantly crap over their posters in the same fits of rage, because yes it goes both ways.

[ovIm]

The usual "just quit the game if you don't like it" is not only offensive but misinformed. I may be especially scathing with what SE has done with a product that I have by now probably poured more than a thousand bucks in subscription alone into, that I used to be the audience for, and that is now considering me as an inconvenient thing that they would rather discard or alienate away. I do feel that I have a right to make myself heard because a game that's been a non negligible part of my life, that I pay for, have supported for years through many other means even, is slowly being butchered for another audience.

Thank you for very much for that - it encompasses my own feelings much better than I could have. Its also a fact that is so often neglected by those that say that we can leave. Of course, a live service game evolves during its life, and it grows with the players. The changes of this game for the past few years however were more often more on the puzzling side than not.

[Kazuke_Miso]

Back at you.

Some people are unhappy with parts of the game that are being changed constantly, in their eyes, for the worst. They still cling to the game for many different reasons, like being satisfied or entertained by other types of content, or the community, or whatever. The usual "just quit the game if you don't like it" is not only offensive but misinformed. I may be especially scathing with what SE has done with a product that I have by now probably poured more than a thousand bucks in subscription alone into, that I used to be the audience for, and that is now considering me as an inconvenient thing that they would rather discard or alienate away. I do feel that I have a right to make myself heard because a game that's been a non negligible part of my life, that I pay for, have supported for years through many other means even, is slowly being butchered for another audience.

The real issue is that a lot of happy customers feel like we, older players, are a threat to their game and enjoyment, or our existence and opinions are somehow offensive to theirs. In reality it's become exactly like politics. We do not see eye to eye on what the game should be, and just because the developers suddenly swing your way doesn't mean I'm going to shut up. "White Knights", or who the word truly is aimed at, aren't just content to "be puzzled over why complainers dont quit". White knights will consistently show up, start up ad hominem replies because they cannot actually address the points being made. White knights will bait discussions out of constructive criticism into flamebait and mudslinging. And I'm perfectly happy to accept that the other side will also show up in happy bubbly threads about the game and constantly crap over their posters in the same fits of rage, because yes it goes both ways.

Frankly, you should just quit the game. Because the game is dogshit and will never improve.

80% of the active characters are not even playing. They are just ERP, alts, or bots. This game is basically already dead - if you check the [forbidden stalking plugin] numbers it shows that most characters logged by LuckyBancho ain't even real people.

Vote with your wallet, and do your best to let disaster companies and studios shut down.

[Illianaro]

- snip -

This is really well put.

After my favorite game City of Heroes was shut down, FFXIV became my new home. I once no-lifed this game, but I have kids now. Steam informs me that I have clocked 5,691 hours of game time. There are 8,760 hours in a year (8,766 adjusted for leap years, or an additional 0.25 days in a year). When I mathed this out, it showed that I have spent 65% of a year playing this game. I have multiple alt characters (I know, I know, I can be all jobs on one character so why... yadda yadda yadda). I've spent more time in FFXIV than I ever spent in COH (which I now play again thanks to community-run servers popping up starting in 2019).

This isn't to say "look at me, I'm a veteran, so my opinion is the most important ever!" but to stress that when I say I love this game, I mean that I ADORE FFXIV. The most disingenuous response to criticism I see is "if you hate this game so much, go play something else." It is predicated on an assumption about my intent and motivations, on an assumption that criticism is born out of hatred. I feel so angry when people tell me how I feel, or make assumptions about my intents and motivations, because it shows a fundamental disinterest in understanding my point of view. After all, it's much easier to write me off if you assume that I don't care about something or hate it.

And it goes the same in the other direction. Assumptions are being made about why "white knights" are white knighting the game, which leads to ad hominem attacks happen. I cannot speak for why white knights are currently on the warpath against criticism but, as a former white knight myself, I ultimately realized that my responses came from a place of defensiveness and fear. After all, I had found a new home in FFXIV. I was afraid to lose another home. Whether I liked it or not, I had made this game a huge portion of my identity; in some ways it still is, but my relationship with it is healthier than it used to be. I was afraid that the complainers were right, that FFXIV was going downhill, and that it would die. Ultimately, many concerns the community had about the trajectory the game was headed - as far back as Stormblood/Shadowbringers - turned out to be remarkably prescient.

I am not here because I hate this game. I have way too much on my plate to add pointless, empty hatred to it. There aren't enough hours in the day and it's not worth it to waste my life hating a game. If I hated this game, I wouldn't be here.

I am here because I love this game so much. I am here because of the stories I have lived and created during my time in this game and the community. My frustrations with the parts of the game that I think need some serious attention and care come from my love of this game. I think about what this game has been, and what it could be, and I want to offer my support to it.

[NaoSen]

I'd just rather people accept that others have different thoughts on different things and behave accordingly, put context to their reason, understand the other persons point of view. This goes for criticize and defend.

If someone has attached themself to this game so hard that any negative talk against it is seen as a personal insult then that's on them, it's most definitely an unhealthy thing to make a game part of your very identity to the point where saying something bad against the game is the same or worse than saying something bad about them.