How much do FRIENDS make a difference with you?

[luicei375]

If I can find friends that have as little life as I do right now, that sounds like a stretch. And XIV is one of the only things I play recently, too.

I'm long used to playing solo, and even the FC I'm in is pretty much self-owned since my friends left. But hey, an estate and the entire company chest all to myself, I'm not complaining. My friends either play in super speedrun style, take their sweetest times, and rarely anything in between so I just learn to play by myself through PUGs and DF. Hell, new friends who just joined XIV recently are already camping with their other friends on other servers, and I'm not planning on doing server transfers anytime soon.

But they're always nice to have, as long as I don't take too much commitment with anything group-related, because people I find so far aren't on the same boat as I am or already have their own friends.

[Dzian]

I'm a little surprised by the majority of people saying their experience with FFXIV is mostly solo.

I understand it, but I definitely think there is a community for everyone in the game. You just have to look for it. I probably wouldn't be playing as much as I do today if it weren't for the friends I've made along the way. I'm in a tight knit group and through them I've made more connections, so being able to play with friends makes a huge difference for me when it comes to my enjoyment in the game. Can I play solo? Yeah, because just as everyone else mentioned, a lot of my friends are playing other stuff during the content lull we've been having. When I find myself playing solo more than usual I just put my hand out more and interact with people I may not usually interact with on my friends list, Linkshell, or what have you.

The problem many people have is the game is antisocial by design pretty much. There is no actual content for free companies to do as a free company to build bonds between players for example.

What content the game does have is strictly tailored around 4 or 8 people which makes including everyone a pain. Youre nearly always having to either exclude some one or completely change your plans by grabbing outside help from total strangers. If you've got 3 5 6 7 9 10 11 people that all want to do something your royally screwed.

It's like with heaven on high. 4 of us are doing that someone else wanted to come. Sorry mate parties full next day sorry mate parties full. Next day sorry mate parties full. It's impossible to include him without excluding someone else.

Then you have systems like savage where if you've cleared it you cannot go back and help your friends out because you'll mess with there chances at getting loot that week.

And even on a story level. How often do you see that stupid thing. "You cannot progress because you're in a party" it's a god dam mmos people want to play with there friends...

Especially with things like cold steel in 4.0. When your all there spamming the same npc trying to get into the same instance.. letting people go in with friends would have lightened the server load so much. Then you get a point where 2 of you have got in and the rest are still trying the next day so now your not even atvthe samevpartbofvthe story anymore..

All of these are big reasons why my friends list has shrunk as people quit over time because the game is so anti social it's unbelievable. Even in duty finder where you're with other people you can wave say hello be polite and not hear a peep from anyone else. They don't care they'll never see you again once the run is over. You could just as easily be ai.

It's really no surprise then that people say ffxiv is a solo experience because your actively discouraged from making friends and connections in so many ways right down to the most fundamental aspect which is the main story.

One of the best things about xi was you could virtually always do something And always include everyone regardless of how many people you had. 6 people 16 people 26 people any number in between it really didn't matter. Everyone felt includedcand involved and that lead to much deeper bonds between players.

[Ilan]

Without my friends i wouldn't even play this game ever again.

[Risu0042]

I have people that I kind of talk to in this game. some IRL friends that play as well. we mostly just help each other out, though i kind of miss how close i use to be to some people in other MMORPG's (WoW) use to be really tight with my guild about 12-13 years ago.

[LineageRazor]

I came into this game with real-life friends and family, and I would likely lose interest if they were to leave. I have a few in-game friends, but I can't say I feel that they're close enough to hold me in the game.

Then again, I said that about FFXI, as well, and even though my real-life friends and family left that game around Adoulin, I stuck around until after Rhapsody - the better part of two years. So who knows? It's true, though, that for the bulk of those two years, I was playing almost completely solo...

[Fhaerron]

Everything.

This isn’t a single player game.

That said my experience in this game is bad/sad to say the least. In 2014 I bought the game for myself and my GF at the time so we could play together which we did, however something happened and we broke up, this was about a month after we started and I didn’t continue anymore after that.
On 3th March 2016 I decided to play again with a new character & on Moogle server but I’ve only played for around a month as well because I was pretty busy in life and didn’t had any time to play any games.
And then basically I started ‘for real’ in March 2017 and have been playing until recently. With SB I got free transfer to Omega, one of the reasons I left was that Moogle was 90% French (I don’t speak French) and that I was playing alone all the time anyway.

Omega didn’t really brought any difference. I had a pretty good friend at the start (or so I thought) but once I finished leveling my last tank job to 70 he just left me, was a guy I did the roulettes with.
I tried a handful of FC’s but they’ve always been horrible, either people that can’t play or just FC’s going inactive, dramafests, etc.

Same with premade raid groups, And I rather shoot myself in the head then pug raids so no finding people there either.
I spend a lot of time in the housing (Shirogane) but it’s 99% of the times empty there, when I did find somebody it was the occasional guy looking for Au ra or neko girl (must be girl in real life) to ERP with.
Some other ‘friends’ or rather people I met, on this very forum actually were also quite ok but they also stop talking after a while and/or remove you out the blue so there goes that.
I do have 1 friend though who I’m still friends with. She’s probably the reason I kept playing for so long but I just couldn’t play any longer. I was bored out of my mind and pugging stuff gets you nowhere.

In ESO and in GW2 I am much more social. Even just chatting with random people. The playerbase of other games are quite different overall.

I would even dare to say that the playerbase of other games are quite 'better'?

So much this. I’ve only played ESO for about 4 months when it launched but I had 3 different guilds and quite a lot of people to talk / play with.
I’ve also played Destiny 1 a lot back in the day (around +3K hours), always having fun in voice chat (there is no in game text chat) and doing raids just about any day even when I already had the loot that week I kept doing it because it was fun and to help people. Apart from that every day people were always asking me if we could run things together. Fun times!

And now I’m back in WoW (have been playing since 2007 until 2016). I didn’t really played Legion (the current expansion) much because I don’t like the story in it, but I’m back now because XIV failed for me and I’m preparing for the expansion but the social difference is so huge. I’ve only been back for a month (not having played it for 2 years) and I’ve already had so much chats, In this one month I’ve talked more than I ever did in XIV in the course of one year and a half. Made new friends, did the latest raid already, etc. It’s just amazing.

Same story in Guild Wars 2 which I play casually but still have social stuff in it.
Weird thing is people always say how toxic wow is and that XIV has the best community and is very social but for me it’s just the other way around.
I guess that I’m just not ‘compatible’ with the people in this game and their ‘mindsets’? I don’t really see any other explanation.

Anyway this is the main reason I quit XIV about 2 months ago because no friends and the content drought is real.

Note for the people that take the exact words in the context:
I did quit XIV, I’m just subbed for my house. I do not consider renewing my sub the last day before my house gets demolished and logging back in the last day remaining of my sub to lengthen the demolish time in between my ‘freeze’ periods ‘actively playing the game’.
Though I really should stop this, I don’t want to support a full price sub MMO with a cash shop like a F2P MMO.

Extra note: sorry for the crappy format, I used my text editor to write this but I forgot that this forum board doesn't support that. (No surprise).

[Skivvy]

I would even dare to say that the playerbase of other games are quite 'better'?

Same story in Guild Wars 2 which I play casually but still have social stuff in it.
Weird thing is people always say how toxic wow is and that XIV has the best community and is very social but for me it’s just the other way around.

I just recently went back to GW2 and am having a great time Finally picked up the expansions as well and so I have a ton to do.

Out of all the MMOs I've played, I've always felt that GW2 had the best community. I'm a PvE'r, and the most I've seen is the occasional frothing by someone at a Meta event, but even that is usually quite tame compared to XIV. Perhaps the PvP side is more flavorful, but that does tend to always be the case. But overall, I think that game does a lot better at fostering a community. With how the gameplay is set up, it makes it really easy to jump in and play with your fellow players and to help out with little effort.

Note for the people that take the exact words in the context:
I did quit XIV, I’m just subbed for my house. I do not consider renewing my sub the last day before my house gets demolished and logging back in the last day remaining of my sub to lengthen the demolish time in between my ‘freeze’ periods ‘actively playing the game’.
Though I really should stop this, I don’t want to support a full price sub MMO with a cash shop like a F2P MMO.

This is me as well D: I'm back to subbing for the house at this time, and each time I log in I'm tempted to just sell the damn thing. I've had a list of my furnishings that I want to sell for awhile - I should probably just bite that bullet and get it over with.

[Fhaerron]

I just recently went back to GW2 and am having a great time Finally picked up the expansions as well and so I have a ton to do.

Out of all the MMOs I've played, I've always felt that GW2 had the best community. I'm a PvE'r, and the most I've seen is the occasional frothing by someone at a Meta event, but even that is usually quite tame compared to XIV. Perhaps the PvP side is more flavorful, but that does tend to always be the case. But overall, I think that game does a lot better at fostering a community. With how the gameplay is set up, it makes it really easy to jump in and play with your fellow players and to help out with little effort.

Guild Wars 2 IS a better community. There's so much friendliness and help you get as a 'stranger'. As I said above, I play GW2 casually so I don't have an army of friends like I have on WoW but the amount of help I receive is the same.
On GW2 random strangers get out of their way to help you, there's always people around even in the low level zones.
When I'm having a sad day and feel lonely I can just hop on GW2 and there's people around to chat with, most randoms are just super friendly there and most likely also making new friends in the process.



In XIV it's the total opposite. For me at least.

[ko_]

I want friends. I have a few and I snuggle th he crap out of them on discord. I need more tho. :c

[Voltyblast]

Despite being quite anti-social, they do affect me a lot on my gaming choice and as a matter of fact this is the last expansion I'll be bothered to play with.

I lost everyone I used to know and play with during the great disaster of patch 3.1 and nobody ever returned, making me wonder why I kept playing - oh right the housing reclaim, couldn't leave for more than 45 days.
I lost my sister, who only managed to reach lvl 50 before giving up after knowing that she "had to deal with the main story" which she really didn't like (and me as well), and we're both huge jrpgs fans since the ps1 era.
And there's not even much need to interact when I can just hop on the PF - which is now cross-realm - get my group, get done with the trial/raid, and move on like nothing happened. Without it was nearly impossible to get groups going anymore, even though I liked, but it was simply not functional anymore.

Meanwhile in wow, everyone I used to know a decade ago are still there - including my sister - and as it turns out they're the main reason why I'm coming back, because at least I got someone to talk and play with and, surprisingly, I still meet a lot of good people and we become friends rather quickly. Not only that but my friends from there are those who made me the person I am today and despite the many bad things happening, I also had a lot of good things happening thanks to them.

This game just...had nothing of the sorts so I dunno.

The Roleplay aspect is nice at least!