Is progressive content or the community to blame for player skill gap?

[Yukiko]

Yesterday: more than 300 minutes DF waiting for "The Weeping City of Mhach"
Not only old Content becomes a marathon...

There is little to no motivation for doing old content again!
SE tried to use prickwalls with relicts and made it even worse because now you just farm it once and then you will never see it again...
Relict was just one example, look at how many stopped doing "wondrous tales".
The more gamble SE adds into the "progress" or "target goal" more and more players will just turn their back on it...
At beginning (2.0) a lot were farming pets or mounts, but at current state its not possible to collect all of them (look at pvp ranking)... you know why pokemon is famous for years?
Square Enix having good ideas, but they have awful taste of balancing!
When i see korean and japan players who love to grind things, saying they need a break and are not motivated to do those things in ffxiv, you have to question if SE is on the right path.

SE trying to defend on fanfest with showing us 24h grindings (example atma) and telling us "its not as rare as you think" but i do not think that motivates many to come back or start the quest again... Its like telling you all is ok and you do something wrong! When it comes to gambling, the fun stops and sorry but RNG is pure gambling!

Edit: I forgotten to say something about the weeklies - special because i mentioned "The Weeping City of Mhach"
It helps, but only one or 2 days after weekly reset because it IS a weekly cap... i can understand why they cap it, but that way it doesnt help much against the problem. Still, it is better than nothing!

[Kosmos992k]

To answer the points raised in brief using the Titan example. I cannot teach people that standing in an aoe is going to hurt if they have not learned so by that point. If enough of the party cannot evade the initial landslide/wotl that is not a teaching mechanics issue, it is a cannot perform the basic requirements of the game issue. This should have been learned in the first dungeon or prior.

Problem. New players running dungeons with veterans are dragged through at speed by players who despite level/ilvl sync are still way more powerful than what the dungeon is balanced for. So, actually, new players may not see all the mechanics that they need to, and certainly have less experience of dodging them than they should.

[thegreatonemal]

Problem. New players running dungeons with veterans are dragged through at speed by players who despite level/ilvl sync are still way more powerful than what the dungeon is balanced for. So, actually, new players may not see all the mechanics that they need to, and certainly have less experience of dodging them than they should.

To add onto that while yes people should avoid aoes its no big deal in dungeons if you do get hit by them you don't die and you hardly take any damage so people get used to the idea that its no big deal. then they step in an ex primal or savage and stand in an aoe and die instantly or wipe the raid.

[Kosmos992k]

Yesterday: more than 300 minutes DF waiting for "The Weeping City of Mhach"
Not only old Content becomes a marathon...

There is little to no motivation for doing old content again!**snip**

Indeed and wow that's a long wait, I will have zero chance of running that content in future based on this.

One thing that I think they could do is create some level 50, one star craft recipes such minions, glamours, weapons, special foods, special dyes and even mounts, and have each crafting recipe include at least one material that can only be obtained in dungeons. Recipes could require more than one of the material as needed, or appropriate, and each new material should be unique to the dungeon (and/or the hard version of the same dungeon) it is found in. Of course recipes for consumable items would be most effective since demand would never completely vanish.

This materials should be untradeable and market_prohibited so that if you want to craft the thing, you have to actually run the dungeon needed to get the material - there was something like this in Haukke Manor if I remember correctly. With every second patch, some new craftable items need to be added that use these materials.

Finally, these materials should not be available when running unsync'd, and will be awarded after the last boss fight.

Many will complain of being forced to run the dungeons. Except you're not forced, since the craftable items are entirely optional, and you might even be able to buy the crafted items themselves (not the materials) from the MB.

This would bring some motivated players back to the dungeons. I am sure many would still stay away, but increasing the number of players in this content would help new players and bring older players back to things they may not remember any more.

By adding new craftable items that use the materials with every other patch, SE refreshes the incentive to run the content to get the material. Otherwise as these items start to saturate the player base, the content would die again.

This would also support crafters to some extent as well.

To add onto that while yes people should avoid aoes its no big deal in dungeons if you do get hit by them you don't die and you hardly take any damage so people get used to the idea that its no big deal. then they step in an ex primal or savage and stand in an aoe and die instantly or wipe the raid.

Agreed, but that too is fixable. Level sync was meant to keep older content in balance to prevent overgeared players from ignoring mechanics and the like. Level sync should be tighter to ensure that things in old dungeons actually retain their original sting and danger.

[Chronons]

Snip

I completely agree, giving an incentive is the most appropriate way to generate interest. Id like to see mentor roulettes specifically for old primal fights or other content that is hard to que for synched (like Weeping apparently). Make them count as double towards the mentor mount or give higher amount of tomes and I think the problem would be solved.

[JunseiKei]

To answer the points raised in brief using the Titan example. I cannot teach people that standing in an aoe is going to hurt if they have not learned so by that point. If enough of the party cannot evade the initial landslide/wotl that is not a teaching mechanics issue, it is a cannot perform the basic requirements of the game issue. Just having more of them does not significantly change the difficulty outside of coverage area. This should have been learned in the first dungeon or prior. To an extent beyond that I am willing to attempt to teach the mechanics of a fight that new people may have not been exposed to up to that point. Repeatedly failling that beyond the value I gain out of it (satisfaction of teaching others/bonus rewards/comradery which in a roulette enviornment I don't really derive any/odds of directly easing difficulty of further attempts, again in a roulette enviornment no value.) I will leave.

Pause.

I really need to point out something here: Titan was a massive wall for the longest time for a good majority of the community (or at least it was for my server). It was the first thing that made you dodge that was actually punishing - you get it wrong, you fall off with no chance of coming back. It's also one of the first mechanics the game gives you that the animation/skill effect lasts longer than the cast. Not moving in time for the cast is what gets most people killed because they go off the skill animation, especially people that do not know focus target is a thing and may not be looking at the boss the whole time. They will undoubtedly keep failing the mechanic, confused why they failed it; clearly they moved out of the way on their screen before the animation finished. Until someone would point out to them it's based on cast, not animation. This is absolutely one of the most important things to learn in the game that you encounter pretty late; most encounters are avoiding a giant orange area that vanishes when the cast is done.

Just to this extent, I'd have to say the blame lays on both; the game failing to show that it's also casts and cast bars that are important, not just getting out of the effected areas. It would then also fall to blame the community, or rather those present at such failings, that would rather leave than to not even try to help the person to understand. Yeah, it gets annoying typing out things several times, but not doing anything to help progress others is a contribution toward keeping the skill level and experience level of the overall community low.

There's still a lot of other factors to why the overall skill and experience gaps are the way they are, but this is just one aspect of it that I really wanted to speak up on.

[bswpayton]

they won't be thrust into , .

Well of course but with how dungeons work , its pretty much nothing like , some of the extreme primals are so its very possible that someone could either jump to storm bold never doing any of the harder content before it. Or other players will deal with wats going on now with Arr content , people will run all of the primals unsync and cake walk over them like whats happening now already. And once they get to the end of storm blood they would of had no experience with extreme such content. There wasnt a single dungeon or hardmood that I can say that prepared me for any extreme primal when I first started, now I see what people mean by mid-core content its like going from the easy last msq quest dungeons to an extreme primal are night and day. The hard mood versions of these arent even close to preparing u for the extreme versions either, its actually pretty int interesting how wide that gap even is.

[Miste]

Indeed.

I think the problem with these gaps are community based. It is the community that deems it OK to demand that all players view online videos prior to actually playing the game, and then castigates those who do not.

Are you sure most of the community feels that way though? I think most people agree that people need time to learn and I don't see tooooo many people say things like you have to watch a video prior to doing the content nor do I agree with that. People should be able to try the content blind if they want to.




As for topic...both sides of the community have bad apples. We have some people impatient and not willing to give new players time to learn, but we also have some new players who insult people who try to give them help or advice and don't actually try to learn. So I just don't know about making it out to be one side is the only one at fault for some players lack of skill.

In general blaming our peers for our own lack of knowledge or skill just doesn't work. If someone felt they were not getting taught properly usually it would fall to the teacher not your fellow peers right? The teacher is the one with the obligation to teach you, not your classmates.

So if mentors aren't helping then yeah they signed up to help they should be helping, but normal other players...they don't actually have any obligation to spend the time trying to teach others anything really.

Despite all that though insulting people for playing not up to your personal standards is definitely wrong, but so is insulting people who offer help or advice (unless they are throwing out insulting words in their advice). I've seen both happen so I don't agree it is only the knowledgeable/skilled players who are causing problems.

[Laerune]

Its both, in my opinion. The game itself hardly teaches the player anything about their class or what one must in a dungeon that requires more then the basic stuff. This is why we have alot of:

- DPS players who can not do the required DPS that their class should be doing, the developers have said many times that when they make a encounter, they do not add the dps that a Healer can bring to a fight. This means that for alot of groups, killing a boss requires DPS+Healer, which in reality it should only require the DPS, if they were able to preform as the developers intended.

The community is to blame aswell, somehow we as the mmorpg community turned from a group of players that want to help our fellow players improve into people who just leave after we see an newcomer or after have a wipe. Maybe its SE fault for making us grind the same dungeons for tokens or maybe we as players have just become impatient. I have noticed that we do not want to teach the newcomers, that we hold double standards when it comes to progressing. Everyone was new and everyone started out with less skill, the benefit that we had is, that since it was new we could make mistakes and keep trying or someone helped us. The newcomers that come after will not be as lucky and from what I have witnessed on this forum and ingame as an mentor, I see them being verballiy abused or demeaned.

I do think there is a third factor, the player themselves. Even if the community is very helpfull and the game does teach the player about how to play the game, this will still not help them, if the player himself/herself does not want to improve. Wether we like it or hate it, there are players that want to play the game on their terms, the BLM who casts only Ice Magick, the Bard that does not want to use any of their Songs, the healer that prefers to stand and do nothing, instead of doing damage or the tank that thinks that defensive cooldowns are not worth it. Those type of players are still here and will stay here.

[Maddonious]

You guys are trying to pass the blame to the veterans. I say stop that. As a player that has mostly played consistently since 2.0 launch I can say that if the new players are so desperate to learn the new content then find other new players willing to do it and don't try to leech off the veterans with higher gear to drag you through it if its so important to your "experience".

If you feel the way they do things is not in line with your expectations find a different way.

You forget they are not here to service you and your desires. They are players who have responsibilities outside of the game and don't have time to do content the slow way or retread the old ground they have walked over thousands of times because you demanded it/needed it. They have goals to make themselves better in other ways in the game that take time. The reason most content is optional is because SE realized this flaw in the game and that players did not want to do the same content 10000 times over to help bring up the bottom line of the player base.

If you truly can not find help I do feel for you, i've been there but that just means you need to find players who are more friendly and wont treat you like a number in their FC or LS (if said LS is based on this theme).

As an MMO you are late to the party and therefore do this the way the vets do them or spends countless hours trying to do things the "pure" way. Altho that's a lie too because unless you do content at minimum ilvl the dungeons/ex content are still much easier now due to higher gear levels then they were when they first came out.

Every MMO has worked like this and players should do some research and ask around about why its like this rather then be against it. It's progress. It happens in every MMO where old content is phased out making way for content that is on par with the rewards the players of higher level require to further better themselves.

I am a mentor. I may come off as a bit aggressive sometimes, I know this, but when I see a player in a dungeon or primal using a rotation that severely limits their dps ouput I try to give them advice. Guess what that advice is met with? I either get complete silence back with no change to their rotation or feedback about it or I get told to mind my own business for trying to make a player better then they already are.

I try to help still but to a much less degree because no matter how you word something to another player about what they could do to get more out of their role you will only ever sound like a condescending twat to them when you had no ill intentions in the first place. They always see what you said as "oh so hes saying I suck".

In the end its up to the individual to get better, to want to be better. Tooltips tell you everything you need to know about certain skills and traits yet most ignore them. It is due to their own ignorance that they are falling behind and it has nothing to do with the game itself.

A player mentioned titan and how they could not teach someone basic skills. That is true. Some things in this game you just cant teach like reaction time, common sense. I can only watch as someone can get hit by the same mechanic so many times before I just give up and rather not waste my time when I could be leveling another job or crafting an expensive gear piece to sell or actually helping a player that wants to be better rather then think the game revolves around them.

Thats the biggest issue with the new players of the MMO genre. They don't see themselves as a burden to other players. They think they are the king of the crop and the game is ment to serve them when in reality they should have the opposite mindset and see themselves as a player who may burden others. All the long lasting/High skill players have this trait when traversing new content or walking down paths not taken yet. I rarely see anyone apologies for messing something up or taking responsibility for their actions. I still do cause when I mess up im taking time away from other players and I am aware of what i just did unlike most of the playerbase.

I rarely see it but the minute I see someone feel remorseful about what they just did and apologies for their actions, maybe even explaining that they are new and are getting used to it so forgive them if they mess up further, I will carry that person on my tiny lalafellin shoulders and do whatever they want cause I can tell they have potential by the way they felt remorse. (Obviously when I have free time to spare.)

TLDR: Your late, if you don't like the way things are handled then leave. The new players are more to blame then the vets from how I see it with their lack of remorse and self awareness. If someone wants to be better they will be, its not something you can fully teach someone.