No Community

[Callinon]

I think people spend the vast majority of their "free time" in game searching for social connections because the actual game doesn’t provide any. This game is suffering from a fatal lack of community. It sought thru mechanics to empower the solo gamer and in the process precluded them of ever making a real friend. Some of the prerequisites to a meaningful friendship are shared hardship, sacrifice, and trust - all of which have been meticulously removed from this game lest it be “too hard". I think in not forcing people to eat their veggies they've gotten fat, unhappy and restless - which does not bode well for XIV.

One of my best in-game friends I've done practically no content with. I also didn't know her prior to playing the game (we live in different countries). We met in an FC and just enjoy talking to each other.

There are social connections out there. Go find them.

[Rinari]

The reliance on moderation has ruined social interactivity in chat channels as well as RP communities; People need to be exposed to each other without fear of ban hammers. Not to mention trying to solve RP problems through reports? Come on guys, either commit to your RP or don't be in the RP community.

Have you seen what happens without moderation in large channels? It will be an endless stream of ASCII art and toxic screaming, entirely useless for actual conversations. Of course, the report feature is a form of moderation... just a slow one, but that might work well enough since people have a lot invested in their characters and subscriptions where risking a ban is usually not worth it. The novice network is moderated by mentors, which has worked well to handle the 100+ people in the channel.... well enough to stamp down on the random ASCII spam waves at least. Used properly, moderation facilitates communication, rather than obstructing it!

[MihaelB]

Well it's the community's fault to blame too as well as the mechanism we have been given.

A linkshell can fit 128 players only, a free company can fit 5XX players yet on each server, how many players are divided into the 500+ FCs on each server, isolating each other in the process?
If each free company could host 300 players in each one and players bothered to go join those, you'll have your 'communities' and the house situation under control to a larger extent.

I used to feel the lack of community on my old server but since joining Tonberry, I haven't been happier. There are hundreds of us scattered still but our server hosts several strongly dominated sub groups which makes it feel more worthwhile.

[Dzian]

I get what the OP is saying. And it's true in many ways.

While I have quite a lot of friends in XIV I'd honestly say most of them are pretty superficial... it's just how the game is. If You're around to run roulettes with then you go together sure no worries. If you aint around they just go without you or you go without them.. There's never much consideration for other people except when its convenient...

I'm still great friends with half of my endgame LS in XI see some of them every couple of months go out for drinks or pizza, Others I still play other games with. 4 of us played the division together for example start to finish... even 7 years or so after we stopped playing XI still great friends.. But in XIV I wouldn't say many of my friends are even close to that level... got 80+ people on my friendlist I could probably name 10 of them without actually looking at my friendlist that's how superficial the rest are....

In one form or another it's a fairly common opinion and has been for a long time.. The reason so many statics fall apart is because the bonds between its members are mostly superficial and easily broken once there's no self gain or a better opportunity comes along. No purpose in sticking with it and helping the others who helped you out once you're done.. This is something that has been said a lot in the forums regarding savage and stuff...

Some people say the same with relic and stuff. A group of people start out working on them together and then one of em ends up joining a light farm or something and is suddenly way ahead of his friends..

I think it's also why people have been asking for real content designed around free companies actually working together rather than just jumping in the duty finder individually and go... In some cases PotD 51-200 works for this. Because it requires a fixed group of players which means you typically form bonds with people. People have been asking for this kind of content ever since beta. because FCs are literally nothing more than a glorified chat channel.

Then when it comes to duty finder it's not necessarily social anxiety that stops people talking its just the feeling of it being worthless. I could have a great group of players in a party, crack a few jokes along the way, complete and leave the duty. Done!, I might never see those same players again, or if I did it might be weeks or even months later when I cant even remember there names or they mine.....

Or its why people feel they can act like a douche in content. Who cares if you p*** off someone in the party, Probably never meet them again so whats it matter....

The social element is pretty shallow for the most part...

This game was designed to do things as a group. The only time you do things solo is some quests in MSQ.

Yet at the same time everything is designed to be done "solo". got no friends? or connections at all? It doesn't matter just queue the duty finder and go.. You don't need a group of players or to build bonds or anything.
Yes you're doing content with other people but they could just as easily be ai and it wouldn't really matter because the level of connection between players is so superficial

Using relic as an example if I wanna get lights I don't need my friends or a group of players. All I need to do is hit the duty finder and go... I can do it on my own with no thought to the other people in my party nor them any thought to me. just 4 or 8 people all "soloing" even if they are in the same party. they're still "soloing"

[thegreatonemal]

I'd say this game is the best of both worlds. you can be soical but its not needed to pretty much do anything in the game unlike in mmos of old where a disagreement can cause your game life to become hell for example.

[Vidu]

cut for convience

The thing is though: if your friends choose to do content without you because its possible it was still their choice to go ahead and do this content. They could have waited. Me and my friends are doing excatly that - we wait for each other. I could be running Dun Scaith right now, but a friend of mine wont be online for the next two hours and because I want to run it together, I wait. (Same in reallife: If you want to spend time with a group of friends, you choose a day when everyone has time - sure, you could go and see that movie alone, but if you want to see if with your friends, you can also wait two weeks - your choice, their choice.)
Not being forced to do the content with the same group everytime (and being screwed when someone doesnt shows up!) doesent seem like a bad thing to me?
If you want to form a bond you can do that - and you're doing it now because you want it rather than because you have to.

Right at this very moment there is a thread asking to open PotD a bit, so you're not forced to go in with a fixed group everytime anymore - and while I dont agree with that to preserve the difficulty of that content, I feel we need to have a look at both sides here. Not being forced to spend time with your friends, but having every option to do so, seems the better option to me. Its not the games fault if people rather get their stuff done asap instead of playing with their friends.

[loreleidiangelo]

Eh, I've never been a fan of forced grouping mechanisms as social vehicles in games, so there's that. It's okay to be able to do a lot of basic things solo, or in DF.

That said, this game seriously lacks in flexible-size group content that's actually relevant. For the most part it's either 4 or 8 people or GTFO, and I'd like to see the game start to shift away from that a bit. Aquapolis is a good fun example of that, especially if the rewards keep being updated to be desirable. PotD is nice, but ideally you'll still want to go with 3 other people...I think mob scaling would do a lot to allow flexible group sizes to tackle it together.

So yeah. I don't want to be forced to group up for every little mundane thing, but it sucks not really being able to play with my friends in awkward group sizes like 5, 7, 10 people whatever.

[bswpayton]

Id like to see more things like an oden or a rare fate or hunts that took longer than ten seconds to finish , while you may not be talkin I like when alot of people get out and do stuff together in the game. The most active Ive ever seen the open world was when I first started during the yoki event people would just be waiting on fate to fate. Take it Im a bit burnt on fates now but It really made the game feel alive and like someone mention nn is where I met many of my friends, I dono maybe it would be nice to have something like that for players that arent mentors are new.

[Rhuazie]

Hmm...

I met my long distance boyfriend (finally met irl after 2 years together!) and my best friends...just by joining one fc and talking. Perhaps I just got lucky. Either way, this game's community literally changed my life.

[Arcsol93]

I have to disagree with the console thing. I've been playing this game on ps3/ps4 for three years without a keyboard and I get on just fine with making friends, being active in my fc and in a few linkshells. Not wanting to use the built in keyboard is not an excuse for not being part of the community, that's just laziness. And besides the keyboard thing, if you feel you can't communicate with the fc or linkshell you're in, move on and find a different one that suits you.