Voice chat and anxiety

[Zetsumei_Tsunarashi]

I've had plenty of people come in voice chat and then just respond to everyone in /party chat. You don't have to speak if you don't want to. Actually though, I've heard of many cases of people using MMOs and voice chat specifically to over come social anxiety issues. As others have said, just listen in at first and then work your way up to using your mic once you feel comfortable with the people you play with.

[AlphaFox]

I am kinda the same, which is funny cus my job required me to be on the phone 24/7 but I still don't like talking in groups. As you listen (and assuming they are joking and having fun) you can find it easier to ease yourself into the conversation and actually want to talk. However most people and groups really only ask that you can listen.

[Ninster]

I would never give out my phone number online to random people, if that's what you meant by calling.

On this point, that may be roughly 1/10th to 1/20th of what led to my reaction. This FC mate and most of the FC are friends of a friend. This friend and I actually started as online gaming friends (through Super Smash Bros.) but over the course of 8 years we've become real life friends as well. That being said, my friend is a lot less introverted and paranoid as I am, so he happens to have some of his closer friends' phone numbers. I'm not sure if this is the same with the FC, but I do agree with your sentiment: I'm not the type to make friends this way.

On a related note, I'm not very familiar with voice chat in general, so not only do I not have any chat programs at the moment, I don't think I have the equipment for it as well. I know my friend and his FC chat through PS4, but I'm on a laptop. Do raid parties generally play on the same platform or is there some voice chat program that both platforms can make use of?

[Adire]

OP, I have awful voice anxiety.

I am much better able to communicate with text than I am with speech. I have severe social anxiety that's worst in small groups of mutual friends or my friends and their friends. The few times I've entered voice chat with people in this way, it's been disastrous. It's weird really considering I'm able to speak to large audiences fine for the most part.

My anxiety also relates to my speech disorders, the more anxious I am, the more my speech suffers. Which in turns worsens my anxiety more, and the cycle repeats worse and worse.

This is partly why I don't raid in this game.

But don't worry, you aren't alone. I decline requests to voice chat with the simple explanation that I'm better off communicating with text than with voice since my voice chatting essentially becomes a big, awkward mess. Even listening to them talk and responding with text has always made my anxiety flare up since it becomes clear I'm the "oddball" of the group.

If you're the same way in that your anxiety cripples your ability to speak to them on voice chat, just be up front with them and tell them that you'll be able to communicate far better with text. If they aren't understanding, then don't worry about it. Not your fault.

[Kitfox]

Do raid parties generally play on the same platform or is there some voice chat program that both platforms can make use of?

VOIP programs are usually PC based but some also have phone apps. So, if a player is using PS4, they usually have a laptop on the side for the voice chat or use their phone for it. Teamspeak3, I believe, has a paid phone app, Discord has a free one, not sure about Mumble but pretty sure there was an app for that also. The PC clients are free for all three. Teamspeak is probably the most popular and Discord is starting to get more common cause can be used without a seperate app with PUGs.

[Cherie]

i have a lot of social anxiety as well when speaking. I know I'm a goof on forums but I'm rather shy when speaking in voip or just in game. It doesn't help that if I speak in voip I'm frequently greeted by "OMG A GURL!"... >.< Fortunately, this game seems to be fairly balanced gender-wise so it's maybe not as scary as voiping in WoW, Rift or Aion or some such. I usually avoid speaking if I can. I don't really like attention... >.<

As far as speaking for a first time in voip, just remember, most often you can get away with just listening too. You can always mute yourself and just listen to people and type. That would satisfy most people. If you tank or heal you might need to speak at some point, but don't always need to. I know some fast typers that just listen in voip.

[Zer0]

This got me to thinking, are there any raiders that deal with some form of anxiety or social anxiety that could help me... well, not do that? I mean... if I'm really going to push forward, I'm going to need to accept that at some point I'll be having to introduce myself to 7 strangers on a microphone.

Quite a few people in my FC are like that. In fact we don't even have comms at all. Some of the progression raiders will use it just for that, but you're not required to talk just kinda listen. Outside those progression raiders, nobody in my FC does any voice chat. It's all text.

[Andrea]

Try to talk to smaller crowds first, like for example you and an fc member then increase from there.

I feel that if you are in a static and they use voice chat the very least you have to do is just sit in it and listen. Im sure some groups would be fine with you not speaking as long as you are in the call with them to hear call outs as they happen.

So if thats the case you can sit in call and when you're used to them and they aren't no longer strangers then you can begin speaking.

[Chasely]

Start slowly by downloading voice chat and just enterring chat with one person you trust. You can listen to their voice and respond back with text until you're comfortable enough to start talking. thne, you can add people to your voicechat group slowly over time until they're all there. As each new person gets added, go back to text until you feel comfortable enough to begin talking.

If you don't eer feel comfortable enough to start talking, that's okay, too. If they care about you, they'll understand.

[Uhm]

This is what keeps me from raiding and it is sad but at the moment I can't do anything about that. I hope someday I'll manage to get myself to use voice chat but until then I guess I wont find a static that works for me.