The general player base needs to improve

[Riardon]

I don't need to improve when I can faceroll keybaord and win everything in this game (excluding Extreme primals and Raiding).
The game is way too easy and people expecting to win everything win one or two clicks.
See what happened with the Steps of Faith. It was hard but not too hard. It needed coordination and good dps (nothing extreme but it needed some effort).
People immediately started crying that it is too hard. And that because they didn't learn to have patience and play well. They expected to clear it at first try and when they didn't they outraged.
So SE said "lol fine whatever as long as I have my subs here take a nerf".

[Sesera]

I don't need to improve when I can faceroll keybaord and win everything in this game (excluding Extreme primals and Raiding).
The game is way too easy and people expecting to win everything win one or two clicks.
See what happened with the Steps of Faith. It was hard but not too hard. It needed coordination and good dps (nothing extreme but it needed some effort).
People immediately started crying that it is too hard. And that because they didn't learn to have patience and play well. They expected to clear it at first try and when they didn't they outraged.
So SE said "lol fine whatever as long as I have my subs here take a nerf".

You can faceroll because the other players are putting some effort.
If all the party is doing the same you aren't going to pass the first pack of mobs.

[KaivaC]

You learn to overcome a hard dps check by just trying that check; nothing else works. The "enrage" at fractal's boss is just him stopping attacking otherwise; the real dps check is the whole fight in an ex or hard mode. Rab makes you learn to read a line aoe by murdering you every single time you fail it, and the bosses where they don't are easy because they can't kill you when you make a mistake. You cannot do this gradually, because every attack you survive can be cheesed.

And therein lies the problem. There's been a couple posts I've engaged in where we discussed some ideas...whereas all you're doing is complaining and saying 'No, it can't happen!' or 'This doesn't help anyone if it can be cheesed'

Come out of that glass box and actually engage in the discussion at hand instead of being so quick to dismiss everything.

[Dualgunner]

I don't need to improve when I can faceroll keybaord and win everything in this game (excluding Extreme primals and Raiding).
The game is way too easy and people expecting to win everything win one or two clicks.
See what happened with the Steps of Faith. It was hard but not too hard. It needed coordination and good dps (nothing extreme but it needed some effort).
People immediately started crying that it is too hard. And that because they didn't learn to have patience and play well. They expected to clear it at first try and when they didn't they outraged.
So SE said "lol fine whatever as long as I have my subs here take a nerf".

Sesera said it before but you're my case in point. Others in df pick up your slack.

[BorisDaBlade]

I’m a little late to the discussion and didn’t read the whole thing, but my two cents anyways:

For me, it’s just the sheer monotony that make me underperform. I can out dps almost anyone when doing ex/savage stuff, but normal content? We see it so much during the weekly merry go round, that it becomes tiresome to be a tryhard.

[Keridwyn]

There is a definite problem when I start noticing poor play. I am about as bog average a player as you can find, I do my job competently but long ago ceeded the fact that my ping did not predict greatness. On a good day it's still over 100ms. On a bad day...well...I am sure Hashmal appreciates the sacrifice. If I start spiking I will drop group, you will clear faster waiting for another healer than putting up with me if you've a need for speed.

That said, before we start ramping up difficulties I think we need to focus a bit more on in game learning. A Hall of the Intermediate where they show off things like all the various markers and telegraphs might go a long way to easing some of the derp for those who don't watch vidoes or read walkthroughs. Maybe even cover some mid-tier class combos and abilities? Level 15 was a long time ago...

[Nedkel]

I don't need to improve when I can faceroll keybaord and win everything in this game (excluding Extreme primals and Raiding).
The game is way too easy and people expecting to win everything win one or two clicks.
See what happened with the Steps of Faith. It was hard but not too hard. It needed coordination and good dps (nothing extreme but it needed some effort).
People immediately started crying that it is too hard. And that because they didn't learn to have patience and play well. They expected to clear it at first try and when they didn't they outraged.
So SE said "lol fine whatever as long as I have my subs here take a nerf".

You never faceroll on DRK, ever.
You dont do it even or War or PLD, you are wasting a tons of potential DPS doing so.

[Vhailor]

That’s what I want to say, but that doesn’t help improve the overall NA playerbase. So now I turn to the OF. Combat skills for most classes have been neutered enough that players should have a general idea of how to do their rotations. Other than SMN and possibly some other DPS which I have little to no experience with, what else can the devs do to get the playerbase on a much higher level?

Honestly, I don't know that SE can do much. The root problem is how FFXIV (and most modern MMOs) is designed, in my estimation.

Take Garuda EX, which you used as an example. There are three factors that lead to it being a struggle for the vast majority of level-synced groups making the attempt: (a) it's old content, so memory has faded; (b) it has a number of mechanics that will punish a group quite severely (typically wiping it) if they are forgotten; and (c) it's fast-paced enough that groups can't easily communicate in the middle of it. There's nothing SE, nor really anyone, can feasibly do to mitigate the significant struggles that arise as a result of these three combined factors, and they don't just impact Garuda EX - they eventually impact every piece of content in FFXIV that isn't nerfed into the ground, difficulty-wise.

Older MMOs evaded this problem somewhat because content didn't age so quickly, and because it was slower-paced, allowing for communication. Take Dynamis from FFXI as an example; that event required vastly more coordination than virtually any content in FFXIV, and was quite brutal if anyone messed up. Yet, it was relevant content for years, and it was slow enough that the leaders of any particular group could ensure everyone was on the same page for the most part. That translated to a higher perceived level of competency, because individuals didn't have to deal with memory and speed and difficulty all at the same time.

All this to say, I don't think the general skill of gamers has gone down that much. I do, however, think that FFXIV's design demands far more from players than we sometimes realize. There's a price to pay for fast-paced content that is rapidly deprecated, and this is a significant part of it. And, to connect this as well with the attitude problems of players, people who are overwhelmed often lash out in anger or frustration. It's human nature. And it's a guaranteed outcome from the design decisions that SE has made for FFXIV.

[MoroMurasaki]

snip

I healed Shin and Rab at launch as well. I've disbanded two Rabs (one of which was last week) and 2 Shins. In my opinion if your healer is awake and paying attention there is a lot that you can live through and if people are being kept alive (sometimes in spite of their own stupidity/ineptitude) you generally have the dps to clear.


Your antecdotal evidence is completely contrary to my own so at best both are moot points but yours certainly doesn't serve as any kind of reliable reasoning to not tune up dungeons that are going to find themselves in a roulette labeled "Expert".

The point is that they should be something other than faceroll. Letting bad players routinely complete something declaring them an expert is only helping to inflate their egos and let them think that level of play is going to serve them well through subsiquent tiers of content. This is how you make yourself an Ice Mage that doesn't take advice because they think they know what they're doing while they're contributing less damage than the healers.

The playerbase aren't tools to be used to your own satisfaction in order to complete content. If you re unhappy with the level of the players you're matched with then maybe it is time to start your own guild and see if people are willing to play with you.

Starting to think I need to keep this post open in a tab so I can just edit it into all the people making this idiotic argument...

The "if you dont like x about the general population you should only do things in a static" argument is a little dated at this point don't you think?

Don't like zero-DPS healers? Only use a static.

Don't like tanks that pull big? Only use a static.

Don't like wiping over and over to content of trivial difficulty? Well clearly the problem is not the people subjecting you to their poor play - it's you expecting them to be considerate of others! Use a static.

What's next? Don't like Miqo'te? Use a static.

God, it's so tiring explaining the same things to the same people over and over again.

[ThirdChild_ZKI]

Some of the things said here recently got me like. . .