I'm Crap and I Know it

[Remilia_Nightfall]

Ok, I am going to be the unpopular one here by commenting from a strictly pragmatic point of view.

First of all, I am calling this an "attention grabbing" thread. By calling out your illness while at the same time self-commiserating yourself with terms like "crap" you are clearly expecting a bunch of people to try to convince you otherwise due to the fact that "being nice with unlucky strangers on the Internet is cool".
You then write that you are just curious, but if that was your original intent, there was no need to label yourself as "crap" or adding stuff like "watch out for me". You could have kept it much more neutral without attracting the horde of white knights.

Secondly, "crap" is a subjective term. You probably aren't suited for endgame raiding (or, more generally, group content as a whole), which means that yes, if put into such a situation, you would be severely underperforming and thus bad. There are no two ways around it. Performance is a parameter which is objectively measurable regardless of your personal circumstances.
Accept that, due to your situation, you are indeed "bad" in terms of performance. People in this thread trying to convince you otherwise in order to feel better with themselves are not going to change reality.

Now, feel free to flame away at me.

[Mycow8me]

I play with essential tremor. Causes uneasy shaking in the hands and arms. Very rarely when excited or nervous (near death or first time in dungeon I guess) it happens in my neck.

I've found playing with weights and magnetic apparel helps kinda. The idea is to lower the effect of the shaking.

Playing with the keyboard was rough cause the shaking had no where to go and spasmatically hit wrong keys. Hooked ps3 controller into PC and got a made in china driver for it and now its a lot easier to play. Arms can shake freely and there is hardly any shake in the hands, none in the fingers.

Magnetic wrist watch ftw.

[Aegrus]

First of all, I am calling this an "attention grabbing" thread. By calling out your illness while at the same time self-commiserating yourself with terms like "crap" you are clearly expecting a bunch of people to try to convince you otherwise due to the fact that "being nice with unlucky strangers on the Internet is cool".

You beat me to it. That being said, people are indeed bad, and while you may play a subscription to play, so do the other 3-7 people in your group. You seem self conscious enough to be aware of your performance, but that does not mean others are. I personally can care less on what someones situation is, nor should you care about my own. It is a game you play, and you are allowed to play it the way you see fit, just as others are within their rights to choose who they want to, and if that happens to not be with you, who are you to judge.

[Ketch]

My name is Joxer TheMighty in game.

I was born with Polio effecting both legs, my left arm, and my eyesight. Like a past person who posted, I lack depth perception.

Who am I in the game? I am usually your tank. The only guff I ever get if from younger folks who seem to have disabilities worse than I (ADHD and Turrets)

Look past your disability or work with it. I can attest to your only limitation being those you set up yourself.

[Stormfur]

Yes indeed. You've got to work within your limitations. If I know my performance is going to affect the rest of the group severely, I'm not going to queue for that thing immediately. This is why I'm actually looking forward to a sort of mentor/practice system so that I can wail away and get the mechanics down without wiping a group.

[Nyalia]

Hi. I suffer from Narcolepsy. While I have meds that significantly reduce the disorder's effects, the meds only work for about 12-18 hours. By the end of the day, they've worn off, and I sometimes suffer from micro-nap episodes (imagine falling asleep for ~1-5 seconds several times a minute and having dreams during those "naps"). It can be hard to predict when or if this will happen because it can come on pretty suddenly. When I'm trying to get in a bunch of daily roulettes before going to bed, I'll often go until I either finish or have a dungeon run where it happens to me. Sure, I could stop running dungeons late at night, but I'm not one to let an illness dictate my schedule, and it can be pretty variable when it occurs (sometimes at 10pm, sometimes not until 2am) if it even occurs at all.

When I start having this problem in dungeons, I'll often start running into walls, or backwards, or leroying forward and aggroing stuff I shouldn't be aggroing. I usually catch myself pretty quickly, as there's only so much you can do in 1-5 seconds, but still. I sometimes do get kicked when it happens, especially if it happens multiple times in party-wiping manners, or if I fall asleep for an extended period of time (contrary to the movies, this is rare - micro-nap episodes are much more common, and when it does happen, it usually comes after several micro-nap episodes, not just suddenly out of the blue). But, people have been surprisingly okay about it. "Let's just finish the dungeon" is the usual response to me apologizing for falling asleep.

While I feel really bad about it when it happens, I'm with the OP in not letting a medical condition keep us from playing the game, even if it might cause some inconvenience for others. And, while that stance could be seen as selfish, it's no worse than someone wearing spiritbond gear or being severely undergeared or lacking a key cross-class skill or using a sub-optimal rotation or single-targeting when the tank multi-pulls or single-pulling in easy content or not DPSing as a healer or in any other way playing their role sub-optimally. If I don't have a problem with healers who don't DPS or tanks who don't pull at the right pace, I think its fair for other players to deal with a player running into walls for a few seconds (in my case) or who is sometimes a little slow on skill use (like the OP).

[Nyalia]

Ok, I am going to be the unpopular one here by commenting from a strictly pragmatic point of view.

I don't know the OP and can't speak for them, but I can say it can be comforting for someone with a disability to know that they aren't alone. I read the OP as them just trying to (1) validate their decision to run dungeons despite a handicap that adversely affects their ability to play the game optimally, and (2) see if anyone else is in a similar position and how they handle it. These are, in my opinion, both totally valid and important. Look, it's great that you don't have a disability. It really is. But other people do live with a disability every day, and it isn't always easy. We aren't here to troll you. We just want to play the darn game.


If you think its selfish for someone to go into a roulette knowing they might perform worse than the average player, then you must think the majority of players are pretty selfish. It turns out that half of them perform worse than the average player.

In DF, you get matched with random people. Some of them perform better than others - that's just how it is. Is it also selfish for someone in minimum ilvl gear to queue for a duty? Or healers who don't have THM to 26 for Swiftcast? Or anyone who is playing a role they are unfamiliar with? Or anyone who has new skills that they haven't completely figured out how to use optimally yet? If you only ever want to run dungeons with the absolute best performers, set up parties through PF (and be sure to indicate just how awesome you are at the game in the PF description - its very important).


Strictly speaking, the most pragmatic way to deal with underperformers is to change your playstyle to accommodate them where possible. That gets the duty over sooner, reduces wipes, prevents having to wait for someone new to join, and keeps the environment from becoming hostile or unwelcoming. Calling out everyone who isn't as good as you think they should be for being an underperformer is not pragmatism, nor is saying that people with disabilities shouldn't play video games.

[Eisen-Zorn]

Hi.

If any of you feel devalued because of a condition or any reason rather, you're welcome to switch to my server and join my FC. I want people to have fun regardless of their skill or condition, and I realize that many of the top players in this community have a nasty habit of being incredibly exclusive towards other players. They want avatars of stats and progress, and aren't concerned with the players who control them.

Regardless, try and seek out those who are social, kind, and helpful. If people can't understand your situation or make you feel bad because of it? Don't be around them.

There are those, like myself, who are considerate of others. Seek them out.

[Remilia_Nightfall]

snip

I never said "bad" people should not play videogames, please do not put words into my mouth, thanks.
What I said is, opening a thread stating that you are "crap" because you have an illness is clearly an attention grabbing thread. Period.
Feel free to play the game, but please do not be hypocritical. Bad is bad, no two ways around it. Still want to play? No one is stopping you. But I am not going to lie and just hide my head under the sand by saying "Oh no, please don't say such things, you are good!"

OP says he/she is "crap"? Fine, then. Crap it is. Who am I to disagree? If he/she is the first one to think like that, then I am going to think the same.

[Nikoshae]

People are very quick to judge someone based on immediate presentation. In this case a character acting irrational, running into things s/he shouldn't, not making proper attempt to get out of the fire and other bad stuff on the ground, so on and so forth. But then you learn the reason behind the presentation. And hopefully you become enlightened, and show compassion.

I'm glad you've found your fun in the game, though I would certainly be honoured to come across you in a dungeon. You're already a big, bad, whamma jamma.