why so mean?

[SeraviEdalborez]

The problem is that a lot of experienced players say things they may intend as "advice" but which are completely meaningless to an actual newcomer. If you give someone advanced high-level instructions when they're still trying to work out the most basic aspects of controlling their character, they aren't going to suddenly be able to play as though they've been playing MMOs for years and have run this specific content a hundred times. Too many players regard that inability to accumulate years of experience in a couple seconds as meaning the newcomer "doesn't listen", and then they get mad at being "ignored" by someone who never had a chance to do anything else.

Of course, part of the difficulty lies in the fact that the person giving the advice likely has no idea what experience level the newcomer is actually at. That same advice that's complete gibberish to one new player may be just the piece that another new player needs to bring together a lot of half-understood information. The result (from the advice-giver's perspective): One player was told this and got better, another player was told this and nothing changed. So clearly the one that didn't change must be ignoring me. It's taking the only pieces of information available and forming an erroneous conclusion from them.

To give very specific examples: over the past few months I have seen dozens of Black Mages and Dragoons doing... very sub-optimal things in level 50 dungeons (Dragoons doing Full Thrust combo only, no Heavy Thrust; BLMs doing single-target rotation [sometimes using Fire 3 only] where AoE would be preferred). In full i90, or nearly full i100. These cannot be "new" players. They must have at least SOME semblance of how to play.

Almost verbatim I open with "Hey (name), not meaning to be rude but can I offer some advice? You should try (rotation). It will work better." They either say nothing or otherwise do not make any effort to reciprocate. I can recall maybe 1 in 50 cases where they actually took the advice and improved on the spot.

I wouldn't get upset with low level players unless they were exceptionally disruptive. But this, I don't think, is an unreasonable standard.

[Niwashi]

Almost verbatim I open with "Hey (name), not meaning to be rude but can I offer some advice? You should try (rotation). It will work better." They either say nothing or otherwise do not make any effort to reciprocate. I can recall maybe 1 in 50 cases where they actually took the advice and improved on the spot.

Yes, that's just the sort of thing I mean. The advice may be useful, but players who can take such advice immediately and improve on the spot are extremely rare. Most players would have to take the advice and later after the dungeon is over re-check how the skills work together and try it out on some overworld mobs until they get the hang of it. Then maybe in their next run they'll be able to do better, but you won't see it in the run where you gave them the advice. Whenever you give advice, you should assume it's advice for how to do better on their next run. You should never expect immediate changes in a player's capabilities just because they've gotten some advice, even if the advice itself is good.

As to whether they say anything in reply, was the group stopped there long enough they'd have a chance to? I can't count the number of times I've started to type out a reply to something but then the group took off and I had to abandon that message to grab my controller so I could go with them.

[SeraviEdalborez]

Whenever you give advice, you should assume it's advice for how to do better on their next run. You should never expect immediate changes in a player's capabilities just because they've gotten some advice, even if the advice itself is good.

As to whether they say anything in reply, was the group stopped there long enough they'd have a chance to? I can't count the number of times I've started to type out a reply to something but then the group took off and I had to abandon that message to grab my controller so I could go with them.

I don't understand though why it's unreasonable for them to try out the new advice mid-run (or rather why it is acceptable that they can do it "next time"). Because the standards are lower? Because it's not (say) First Coil or Titan HM?

Yes, it was at breaks between bosses or pulls in most cases. In some rare cases the party stopped while we addressed this.

[Kaeda_Valentyne]

It might help with the feeling of being ignored if new people knew that in the settings you can change / add a sound to the party chat to notify you when someone wrote something.

I just found this out and being completely new to mmos and starting as a healer I have probably "ignored" people on accident being completely focused on everything going on in a fight and not noticed someone actually wrote much needed advise to me.

[Kloe]

Almost verbatim I open with "Hey (name), not meaning to be rude but can I offer some advice? You should try (rotation). It will work better." They either say nothing or otherwise do not make any effort to reciprocate. I can recall maybe 1 in 50 cases where they actually took the advice and improved on the spot.

The example message you send to players "Hey (name), not meaning to be rude but..." is not as nice as you think it is. This may be why you have such a high rate of people ignoring you and not following your advice. I think the tone of that message is very similar to the saying "i'm not racists, but..." where you say something that actually is racist and think it's ok just because you said you're not racist. The truth is you are being kind of rude even if your intentions are good. The way you're saying it will come off as "you are bad at your job, so do this". Which is not going to make anyone feel good and want to follow advice. A better approach would be to simply ask them if they are new to the dungeon, then based off of their answer of "yes" you could say something like "since you are new to the dungeon, would you like some tips on ABC". If their answer is "no", then you could say something like "i've noticed you're having trouble with ABC, would you be open to some advice?". If they say no then you know what kind of person you're dealing with and either carry on with them not doing things correctly, or find a new group if it's causing big problems. You have to be careful how you word things. It may sound good in your head, but it might not sound as good to someone else. I don't want to spark a debate over this subject, I just simply wanted to let you be aware of this so that you can try something new next time and hopefully have a better experience.

[Jarvix]

To Kloe

ROFLMAO--- Call a Spade a Spade and stop with the touchy feely babble. He is not talking about a new player. I have seen plenty of those lvl 50's myself. They are the ones that keep gold spammers in buisness getting their toons Power Leveled.

[Ginfress]

Newbie here (PS4)! I always try to ask for advice and i havent even seen the first dungeon yet. Was just wondering about stuff that happened around me. Most wonderful reply back to me was "go back to WoW and leave us real gamers alone". Not that it mattered but i spilled some coffee after that. Any tips for a beginning gladiator playing on Odin?

[Iowella]

My best advice for a new Gladiator, and I'm still somewhat new myself, but learn to "mark" mobs, in other words you need to mark at least "1" for the mob you're focused on killing, it will help you a lot with hopefully the DPS following your "marks". If you put a "1" on a mob, the DPS should focus on that mob first. Very basic, and very helpful, especially for new Gladiators. You can "hotkey" the "1" so that you can do it quickly and easily. Sometimes it's best to kill one mob first over another, as you progress you'll learn more about that. You can also "tab" between different mobs to make sure your "hate meter" (bar on the left of your party health bars) on the mobs is high for you.

[Nyalia]

Any tips for a beginning gladiator playing on Odin?

I'm sorry you ran into people like that. Obviously, not everyone is like that.

Here are some tips for a beginning gladiator. Most of these only apply when you are in dungeons (which start at level 15 if you're following the main quest).

1. Your enmity combo is Fast Blade -> Savage Blade (and later on, you'll get Rage of Halone as the third part of the combo). Use this as your primary means of attacking in dungeons. Do not use the Riot Blade combo even if it does slightly more damage. The difference is minor and keeping aggro is important.
2. Pull with Shield Lob (you get it from your level 15 class quest). This has a 3x enmity multiplier, meaning it's three times as good as opening with Fast Blade for getting that initial enmity.
3. Never pull with just Provoke. Provoke sets your enmity to the highest enmity in your party +1, so it is essentially wasted when used to pull and the first DPS to hit the target will steal aggro from you. That said, Provoke has a much longer range than Shield Lob. If you really need to pull something that's out of Shield Lob range (like, a patrolling enemy), Provoke to aggro, then Shield Lob when they get close enough.
4. After you pull a group of two or more enemies with Shield Lob, run into the middle of them and use Flash. This will get you initial aggro on all of the enemies you're fighting.
5. In the party list, to the left of people's names, are meters. These tell you how much enmity each person in your party has on your selected target. Whomever's bar is full should have an A next to their class icon indicating that they have aggro and the monster will attack them.
6. When you're fighting a group of enemies, be sure to cycle through them regularly to see how full your party's enmity meters are on each. Remember that your job isn't to deal damage, but to keep aggro on everything. Do this by finding which monster you're closest to losing aggro on due to another party member's enmity bar filling up, and comboing that monster with your enmity combo.
7. An easier way to keep aggro on a group of enemies is to just flash between each combo. This is not as efficient and drains your MP fast, but it's easier to do.
8. When fighting 5+ enemies at once, just spam flash. You probably won't be able to keep aggro on all of them, but when you are fighting this many enemies, it usually means they're really weak and die fast.
9. Mark enemies. I don't know the PS4 controls, but you should be able to assign the marks (the yellow 1, 2, 3 in octagons being the most important) to your hotbar. Mark the target you want dead first as 1, and so on. Don't bother marking the last enemy - a majority of people will understand that the unmarked one comes last. Make sure you get initial aggro on the one marked 1, as your DPSs will build enmity fast on that one.
10. Newer CNJs don't realize just how much enmity Regen generates. If you go into a fight with Regen on you, the first time it ticks, your healer will probably pull aggro. You can cancel a buff by rightclicking on it (no idea how with the PS4), and you should cancel Regen before pulling at low levels if it's on you.
11. Face enemies away from the party. Several enemies, and most bosses, have cleaving attacks that hit everything in an arc in front of them. Many enemies and bosses also have AoEs that they point in front of them. By facing them away from the party, these attacks will only have a chance of hitting you. To face them away, after you throw your shield lob in, run through and past them before stopping and turning around to fight them.
12. Use CDs ("Cooldowns" - the buffs that take a while before you can use them again) liberally. They recharge pretty fast (most in 60-120 seconds) and are an important part of damage mitigation.
13. Fairly early into the game, you unlock the Armory System, which gives you the ability to change your class at will. When you can, switch to MRD and level it up to level 2. This gives you the cross-class skill "Foresight" which is a defense-raising CD. To equip cross-class skills, open your skill menu (P on the computer, no idea on the PS4), and go to the cross-class skill section. You get one cross-class skill slot every 5 levels as a base class (like GLA), and every 10 levels as a Job (like PLD). For leveling (not dungeons), you might want to consider also getting the skill Feint from Lancer level 2. You can't use it later in the game when you become a PLD, but it can really help in the low levels.

Hope this helps!

[Niwashi]

ROFLMAO--- Call a Spade a Spade and stop with the touchy feely babble. He is not talking about a new player. I have seen plenty of those lvl 50's myself. They are the ones that keep gold spammers in buisness getting their toons Power Leveled.

The issue was using that to justify being rude to actual newcommers. This stemmed out of:

Because a lot of "noobs" don't listen to the advice given. So we've become jaded about giving wasted advice.

If people are using bad experiences with power-leveled players in i90/i100 gear in endgame dungeons as a reason for treating newcommers like crap, then there's a real problem. People shouldn't be trash talking new players because they've met some lousy players at endgame.