These 46 (so far) pages tell me that FFXIV has the same issues as other games when people with different ideas of "how the game should be played" end up in the same group. You get toxicity. And this is why I'm so uncomfortable doing group content. My personality type is that I don't handle confrontations well at all. If I don't group with others, I don't have to face that possibility, so when a game *requires* group content to continue the story line, I get all hesitant and have to pluck up the courage to dive into DF to get the dungeon done.

Why use DF for dungeons?? I literally do not know anyone else playing this game; none of my friends have (or are likely to) follow me here. I'm not in a free company, nor do I really want to be in one because those usually come with expectations that I simply do not wish to have hanging over me.

I'm playing a dragoon and loving the at-level skills; leaping into combat, etc. and I finally got my AoE skill. I try to use all the skills as appropriately as I can and love executing combos (and boosting damage on combo3 when I can), but there's nothing to tell me just how well I'm doing. I hit a FATE with a solo opponent, the big roc in Coerthas Central Highlands yesterday. I was lvl 42, it might have been at + difficulty as well, plus I didn't drink my healing potion in time so I died (everything was on CD)...but it was so close that my beginning level Chocobo was able to finish it off and I got the reward. So I think I'm doing OK but that doesn't give me the confidence to go into a dungeon with other people!

I don't completely object to occasional interactions with other players. There's nothing more depressing that running around a major city when there are no other players doing the same thing. I absolutely appreciate other people being around; I just don't necessarily want to interact with them.

WoW has the concept of world bosses popping up what a random collection of 40 players gang up on it and those are mad fun. FFXIV has FATES, sort-of similar world quests, which I don't mind either. None of those are laden with the same expectations about "doing your job and doing it right" as dungeons are, where you spend more than a few minutes with a bunch of other people.

And that's why as a level 43 Dragoon I'm still stuck at Toto-Rak! I hasten to add that's no-one's fault except mine. What I'm hoping to do is demonstrate that sometimes it's not about the level of competence of the player, its about the comfort level and a person's own perception of their competence. Because there's no real way to see how well you're doing. And I don't have a clue how you could do that in-game without causing all sorts of other issues about expected performance from those other "elitist" players. Because those do exist...and I'm very much afraid I'm going to get one or two whenever I have to do group content.

I've rambled enough; I'll shut up now.