Why Speed Pulls?

[ThirdChild_ZKI]

not wanting to speedpull does not mean you are a bad player. correlation=/=causation. But it sure is a fairly reliable indicator of it.

In no way insultingly, your experience leads you to make too many assumptions.

My abilities as a player - regardless of how anyone might want to scrutinize - are just fine. Exceptional even. This is something I know to be personally true, and something frequently celebrated by other players both known and random. Self confidence and praise aside, let me state that I've done speedruns, PLENTY of them to this day, and on all three roles. I started the game as a tank, and regardless of methods, just never enjoyed it fully (ironically, because I feel like the classes themselves are slow), I became a DPS fell in love with it, learned what I could do, should do, then how I could bend any and every one of those rules at will for whatever's best for my party. THEN I started healing. Turns out I actually really enjoy it. I made more of a name for myself as a highly capable player in Second Coil as a WHM more than I did as my chosen primary, to the point that people preferred me on a secondary role over my main. At face value, can you dispute THAT speaks of skill and ability?

I can still tank just fine, and occasionally dust off the old sword & shield to help friends, but I know I'm simply not enjoying myself fully when I do. Not even with friends. And especially not with randoms. Why? Because of people who believe you MUST be able to speedrun and do so to be a good tank. Because of people - usually NOT tanks or ones who didn't queue as such - telling you how you should tank, and generally dealing in absolutes. Were I to apply your same logic, I'd say this: I can tank as a Bard - a class with no enmity tools and far less defense, and have done so MANY times. . . That's an indication I'm an EXCELLENT tank.

So let me simplify the statement a bit and say this: My desire not to speedrun - because regardless if I'm a Tank, Healer, or DPS I find it boring, and generally NOT fun - is in no way an indication of my overall skill as a player, and to even imply basis in that is not only foolish but shortsighted. To assume that not wanting to means that you can't or can't properly is again, foolish. I don't enjoy doing it, because - PLEASE READ - I DON'T ENJOY IT. It's not about efficiency, not about numbers, not about optimization of skills and abilities (THAT idea, honestly makes me laugh hard), and it certainly isn't about time. It begins and ends with whether I'm actually enjoying what I'm doing, in-game.

/dropmic

[Sousoulsu]

/dropmic

This post is simply you quantifying your own personal skill, but that is not the point of the topic. Perhaps you're a good player. Perhaps not. Either way, it is irrelevant to the assertion I've made that players who do not want to speedrun tend to not be very good.

So, to reiterate what I said in the post you quoted, somebody isn't a bad player because they don't want to speedrun. But in my experiences, people who don't want to speedrun have been subpar players in a fundamental sense. (Using Doton on a single target, failing to hold aggro off of lower-geared DPS, being unable to heal people during light damage in a single pull, etc).
That is not to say I think that everybody who chooses not to speedrun is a bad player. It is just my observation that many of them have been subpar players.


Let's pose the question of the relation between preferred playstyle and personal skill a different way: Which would you say takes a more skilled group of players to pull off?
-Pulling one pack of enemies and dealing with the damage output from that pack as a tank or healer; or
-Pulling multiple packs of enemies and dealing with the damage ouput from that pack as a tank or healer?
With your answer, I'd appreciate if you could quantify why you think that your answer is correct.

I appreciate your continued responses. I know this is a topic you don't like discussing, so it's very good of you to stick around.

[Zedd702]

Let's pose the question of the relation between preferred playstyle and personal skill a different way: Which would you say takes a more skilled group of players to pull off?
-Pulling one pack of enemies and dealing with the damage output from that pack as a tank or healer; or
-Pulling multiple packs of enemies and dealing with the damage ouput from that pack as a tank or healer?
With your answer, I'd appreciate if you could quantify why you think that your answer is correct.

I appreciate your continued responses. I know this is a topic you don't like discussing, so it's very good of you to stick around.

I'm actually goin to chime in and give my two cents on this quoted area here. The answer is: that both of these scenarios take a skilled group to pull off. Just as you have had your fair share with bad players being the ones to request smaller packs of enemies, I have had similar experiences with over geared raiders coming into dungeon, calling it brainless content and then they fail because they pull everything not noting the type of team they have to work with for the following reasons:

1. Lack of communication
2. Not even bothering looking at gear until the first wipe.
3. Asking the group if they want a SR, so instead they assume it (this also falls back to #1)
4. Brainless tanking, due to their ego and assumption that it is the healers full responsibility to keep the tank alive even if they stand in AoEs and not use their cooldowns, while spamming flash/OP. And yes I've seen this one ALOT.
5. Healers DPSing and not taking note of the tanks life and how much damage they actually take during large pulls.
6. DPS not knowing which skills to use in rotation to actually make for a successful SR.

All of the above (with the exceptions of #4 & #5) actually stem from communication.

This is not to say that all raiders are this terribad, but this is to give you insight from the other side of your question.

Bad groups fail from the start, only skilled groups complete the task, regardless of how many attempts it took to do so.

[Sousoulsu]

I'm actually goin to chime in and give my two cents on this quoted area here. The answer is: that both of these scenarios take a skilled group to pull off. Just as you have had your fair share with bad players being the ones to request smaller packs of enemies, I have had similar experiences with over geared raiders coming into dungeon, calling it brainless content and then they fail because they pull everything not noting the type of team they have to work with for the following reasons:

1. Lack of communication
2. Not even bothering looking at gear until the first wipe.
3. Asking the group if they want a SR, so instead they assume it (this also falls back to #1)
4. Brainless tanking, due to their ego and assumption that it is the healers full responsibility to keep the tank alive even if they stand in AoEs and not use their cooldowns, while spamming flash/OP. And yes I've seen this one ALOT.
5. Healers DPSing and not taking note of the tanks life and how much damage they actually take during large pulls.
6. DPS not knowing which skills to use in rotation to actually make for a successful SR.

All of the above (with the exceptions of #4 & #5) actually stem from communication.

This is not to say that all raiders are this terribad, but this is to give you insight from the other side of your question.

Bad groups fail from the start, only skilled groups complete the task, regardless of how many attempts it took to do so.

I appreciate your response, but it is not an answer to the question I posed - and I have a feeling you're sidestepping the question.
A completely unskilled group will fall flat on its face from the get-go.
What I asked is:

Which of these two requires a more skilled group than the other?
-Doing single-pulls, or
-Doing multiple pulls

[Zedd702]

I appreciate your response, but it is not an answer to the question I posed - and I have a feeling you're sidestepping the question.
A completely unskilled group will fall flat on its face from the get-go.
What I asked is:

No... you are just trying to seek an answer you want to hear vs the reality of the bigger picture.

What you want to hear is that SR = more skilled players and that Speedrunning = skill... and that is not the case.

The reality of the matter is that it takes skill to complete a dungeon whether it is speed running, casual mob by mob, or w/e other method.

People can classify speed running as a reckless tactic, which I've seen many different ways of doing speed running. Some require skill, coordination, knowledge of your job/role, and no interruptions in real life. Others just run through all trash mobs sacrificing the tank while the group runs in to the boss and once the tank dies and enemies reset the healer will resurrect the tank and then we can begin the boss fight. The latter method, though reckless, actually requires communication, but lots of players fail at that so they might not have known of that strategy...

What I provided was a proper answer to your question, just because it's not what you want to hear does not make it unacceptable...

[Sousoulsu]

No... you are just trying to seek an answer you want to hear vs the reality of the bigger picture.

What you want to hear is that SR = more skilled players and that Speedrunning = skill... and that is not the case.

The reality of the matter is that it takes skill to complete a dungeon whether it is speed running, casual mob by mob, or w/e other method.

People can classify speed running as a reckless tactic, which I've seen many different ways of doing speed running. Some require skill, coordination, knowledge of your job/role, and no interruptions in real life. Others just run through all trash mobs sacrificing the tank while the group runs in to the boss and once the tank dies and enemies reset the healer will resurrect the tank and then we can begin the boss fight.The latter method, though reckless, actually requires communication, but lots of players fail at that so they might not have known of that strategy...

What I provided was a proper answer to your question, just because it's not what you want to hear does not make it unacceptable...

I posed a simple question to get a simple answer in order to further the discussion past the question of "skill".
I acknowledge what you're saying, but if I'm being honest it's just a lot of fluff.
However, you answered the question amidst the fluff, so moving on:

Since Speedrunning typically requires more skill from the players than single-pulling, it can be assumed that people who opt to single-pull tend to be less skilled than people who opt to speedrun.
/topic closed

Back on the original topic: Why do you, in-particular, dislike speedrunning? =3

10 mobs. You are going to basically tanking the exact same way as with 5 mobs, and the healer is going to have to heal and deal with the greater incoming damage, but, it is more gear saving you, again in my mind, with 10 mobs, than say the skill it requires with 5. Because both the tank and the healer will be doing the exact same things, only the gear reduces the damage, increases health for more buffer, and gives better healing.

Generally speaking, you're right. But I would say it doesn't flatline after 5; but the increase isn't exponential anymore. It just requires the tank to be better at cooldown management and the healer to know when spikes are coming and be aware of what the tank has available.
Large pulls definitely take more skill as well as gear to pull off, but once you have the gear, more skill will let you get away with more.

I think what makes this topic so sore to some people is that they're used to other MMOs, where dungeons are challenging in their own - or can't be steamrolled because trash have mechanics or abilities that make it impossible.
This is not so in XIV.
I think it's a flaw in XIV's dungeon design. A flaw I would like to be alleviated. But as it is now, speedrunning is prevelent in the community. While not at all an exhaustive study:

http://strawpoll.me/3728005/r

shows general community sentiments; and will get slightly more accurate as more people vote on it.

[Zedd702]

Since Speedrunning typically requires more skill from the players than single-pulling, it can be assumed that people who opt to single-pull tend to be less skilled than people who opt to speedrun.
/topic closed

Amusing that you still take it as though I said SR = a more skill group from my latest response... Let me clarify in saying that this is far from the truth. And I will explain why.

1. Speed running requires alot less from a tank other than spamming the their AoE/Cone high enmity attacks/skills, excessive movement (mostly due to not being able to see telegraphs with all the graphics from BLM Fire spam among other attacks) and the occasional popping of CD's to make the team think you know what you are doing with holding hate and mitigating damage.

2. It also demands a lot from the healer, more than they should really have to do and it also requires the healer to play the most on point than Tanks and DPS in SR's. Let me take a moment to touch on #2. Anyone notice that healers are more in demand now than tanks are in queues? I'd say SR teams have a HUGE impact on that because healers want to do more than spam cure every recharge...

3. SR does not teach a player anything, but how to piss off a healer... You cant tell me SR teaches you anything that would be remotely useful for coils. It's a reckless attempt to shave a few minutes off completing the dungeon for people who only care about themselves in farming the most tomes possible, which boils down to preference, not player skill. Nice try though...

Back on the original topic: Why do you, in-particular, dislike speedrunning? =3

I never said I dislike SR to begin with, this shows just how much you paid attention to what I've wrote in this thread. I don't mind SR at the request of my team, but there are days I want to enjoy my game, but I still pull two packs by habit, unless I notice something about team make-up or I feel there might be an issue with combining certain types of enemies in mass pulls.

[ThirdChild_ZKI]

No... you are just trying to seek an answer you want to hear vs the reality of the bigger picture. . .

What you want to hear is that SR = more skilled players and that Speedrunning = skill... and that is not the case. . .

What I provided was a proper answer to your question, just because it's not what you want to hear does not make it unacceptable...

This is exactly what I noted several times already too. I'm glad I'm not the only one that sees it.

[Sousoulsu]

This is exactly what I noted several times already too. I'm glad I'm not the only one that sees it.

I've already addressed this sentiment.
The point of this topic is not player skill. But since the subject came up, I felt beholden to address it.

I've only ever ignored sentiments that are outwardly hostile, or that fail to address something I actually said (as opposed to something you perceived I said).

If you'd like to continue the correlation between skill and people who opt not to speedrun, we can. That's on you. I simply addressed something that came up without my even mentioning it.

[Kaiser-Ace]

Which of these two requires a more skilled group than the other?
-Doing single-pulls, or
-Doing multiple pulls

My opinion on this is that the greater skill is shown from knowing when to do either.

If you have a SCH, a DRG and a MNK it's probably not a good idea to pull full floors how ever if you have a White Mage, a Black Mage, and a Bard it's almost a waste of potential to pull lest than at least half the floor per pull since they're potential is wasted on single targets.

It also shows good judgment for the Tank to consider the capabilities of the healer and DPS through an examination of gear and seeing if they feel that their skill is up to SRing.

No one should be forced to do either but efficiency always achieves faster runs than failures cause by stubbornness and clashing Egos. And no matter what the player's preference efficiency is one thing every one should be looking for. Just SRing isn't ALWAYS the most efficient method but again the real skill is shown by being able to pick the most efficient method and A DPS/Healer should have already recognized the same just by the party make up. If any one has an objection to a "Normal Run" for that team setup then it should be discussed before pulling which, at most, would only add about 10s to the run. (30s with Consol/slow PC typers)