"Swift completion" is relative to the game, not the community

[Illmaeran]

What else is silly is not striving to become better. Being content with mediocrity.

Generally people won’t touch a comment with real life situations as you have included.

Here's another real life example. I went through nearly a year of incredibly intense chemotherapy a couple of years ago. Due to that I've got cognitive impairment, as in my brain no longer works as quickly or as flexibly as before and my reflexes are shot. This means I can no longer play Dragoon in a group setting as I simply can't do the rotation, keep track of positionals, and stay out of the bad. In short; since coming back to the game I've had to stop playing the class I've mained since 2014 when in groups. This absolutely kills me as I LOVE Dragoon, but to avoid catching pushback from strangers, "being mediocre" or "passable", or, God Forbid, not be able to get through a boss encounter no matter how many times I try it, I've stopped.

Now, tell me why in the world I should have had to make this choice. I'll tell you why, because people like you who hate on "casuals", "lessers", "noobs", etc complaining about people who aren't, and my never be, playing up to your expectations and ruining your enjoyment. You know what? Having to quit playing the class I love to avoid catching flak ruins my enjoyment. You will never know if the person on the other side of the screen is doing their best or completely slacking off so have some empathy and relax.

[Kolaina]

Here's another real life example. I went through nearly a year of incredibly intense chemotherapy a couple of years ago. Due to that I've got cognitive impairment, as in my brain no longer works as quickly or as flexibly as before and my reflexes are shot. This means I can no longer play Dragoon in a group setting as I simply can't do the rotation, keep track of positionals, and stay out of the bad. In short; since coming back to the game I've had to stop playing the class I've mained since 2014 when in groups. This absolutely kills me as I LOVE Dragoon, but to avoid catching pushback from strangers, "being mediocre" or "passable", or, God Forbid, not be able to get through a boss encounter no matter how many times I try it, I've stopped.

Now, tell me why in the world I should have had to make this choice. I'll tell you why, because people like you who hate on "casuals", "lessers", "noobs", etc complaining about people who aren't, and my never be, playing up to your expectations and ruining your enjoyment. You know what? Having to quit playing the class I love to avoid catching flak ruins my enjoyment. You will never know if the person on the other side of the screen is doing their best or completely slacking off so have some empathy and relax.

People like me? And i would know if there was communication. People in general wont crap on someone with an impairment. Ive run into people myself at the very least claiming to play with one hand. What can i do? I sit back, take the run as it is. People are not talking about those with actual issues preventing them from doing certain things. People are talking, as i said in my post you are quoting, those who are “content” with mediocrity. Those who can do better but choose not to.
Don’t try and villify me because you gave up a class you love. People with legitimate issues also don’t excuse those who lazily get by. Or again, those who enable bad play, excusing it because X reason. There are always exceptions to the rule. But people need to communicate and you’d be surprised how welcoming and accepting people generally are.
Far more than those throwing around hateful terms such as “people like you”

[Nishira]

What else is silly is not striving to become better. Being content with mediocrity.

Sincere question. Why is that bad?

I get what you mean from a personal viewpoint. I enjoy learning. I like growing. I have fun figuring stuff out, seeing how things work together, understanding synergies. But if that’s not someone’s cup of tea it doesn’t bother me. We’re different there, ok. There’s more to people than whether they are driven to excel in a videogame, and out of all the characteristics someone can have I don’t find it a particularly interesting trait either.

My personal experiences with people who lacked that particular drive have been extremely positive overall. They’d be generous with their time and help. They’d be social and kind. They had a great sense of humour and doing dungeons with them was a hoot. I felt blessed for knowing them, and spending time with them.

If anything, I’d say they excelled in humanity. And that beats parses by a thousand, a million, an infinite amount of miles for me. I don’t excuse anything. To me it’s simply the sum of a person. And there is so much more to them than this one thing. With strangers I simply assume it may be the exact same thing.

I fully understand that for you this is something that sits not well with you. We’re different there, ok. But perhaps you can see how people value things differently, and will draw different conclusions based on that.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

Sincere question. Why is that bad?

I get what you mean from a personal viewpoint. I enjoy learning. I like growing. I have fun figuring stuff out, seeing how things work together, understanding synergies. But if that’s not someone’s cup of tea it doesn’t bother me. We’re different there, ok. There’s more to people than whether they are driven to excel in a videogame, and out of all the characteristics someone can have I don’t find it a particularly interesting trait either.

My personal experiences with people who lacked that particular drive have been extremely positive overall. They’d be generous with their time and help. They’d be social and kind. They had a great sense of humour and doing dungeons with them was a hoot. I felt blessed for knowing them, and spending time with them.

If anything, I’d say they excelled in humanity. And that beats parses by a thousand, a million, an infinite amount of miles for me. I don’t excuse anything. To me it’s simply the sum of a person. And there is so much more to them than this one thing. With strangers I simply assume it may be the exact same thing.

I fully understand that for you this is something that sits not well with you. We’re different there, ok. But perhaps you can see how people value things differently, and will draw different conclusions based on that.

I guess a lot of people's problem here is, without any communication, it just seems like people are being lazy in a team game. You aren't playing with npcs, but other people.

If a dps is doing 10% of the damage in a dungeon, that means 3 other people are picking up the slack. How is that fair to them?

No one is saying you need to be try harding, but when you are clearly not even pushing buttons, then I have an issue.

You can do more damage by just pressing your combo buttons in order than quite a percentage of df players.

[Nishira]

If a dps is doing 10% of the damage in a dungeon, that means 3 other people are picking up the slack. How is that fair to them?

I think fair or unfair is just a really alien concept to me in this sense. If someone is afk, or obviously trolling, sure I don’t appreciate that. In all other cases I’ll assume they’re trying, and when it’s great, wonderful, and when it’s not, we’ll be alright anyway. I understand the necessity of gatekeeping actually hard content, and expecting a certain amount of competence there. But if it’s not hard, if it’s laughably easy as so many suggest with DF, why worry so much about carrying someone?

If it’d be someone you like, you’d probably do it in a heartbeat and just accept that ok, they’re not the best player but no sweat, I got this. Fair or unfair doesn’t apply then. To me it seems a great deal more enjoyable to extend the same sort of friendly goodwill to strangers because you can, than denying them because they don’t pull their weight. In the first thing there is a shared joy, in the other judgement. This is obviously from my perspective, and you may experience this entirely differently

[ForteNightshade]

I think fair or unfair is just a really alien concept to me in this sense. If someone is afk, or obviously trolling, sure I don’t appreciate that. In all other cases I’ll assume they’re trying, and when it’s great, wonderful, and when it’s not, we’ll be alright anyway. I understand the necessity of gatekeeping actually hard content, and expecting a certain amount of competence there. But if it’s not hard, if it’s laughably easy as so many suggest with DF, why worry so much about carrying someone?

If it’d be someone you like, you’d probably do it in a heartbeat and just accept that ok, they’re not the best player but no sweat, I got this. Fair or unfair doesn’t apply then. To me it seems a great deal more enjoyable to extend the same sort of friendly goodwill to strangers because you can, than denying them because they don’t pull their weight. In the first thing there is a shared joy, in the other judgement. This is obviously from my perspective, and you may experience this entirely differently

Because people don't like having their time wasted due to someone else's laziness. The fact dungeons are laughably easy only makes the lack of willingness some people have to give a damn stand out even more. It's simply disrespectful, especially when it's blatantly obvious. For example sake, I recently had a freestyle Samurai in Doma Castle. He literally never touched Midare; never even put up Shifu and stopped to just auto-attack on occasion. When I happened to go AFK as the loot timer ticked down, he ran ahead, pulled the last boss and then chimed in he hadn't been paying attention because he'd been chatting with friends on discord. So here we have someone that made the dungeon needlessly long because he kept alt-tabbing to his discord friends and couldn't give a damn we carried what was essentially deadweight though the whole dungeon.

Can't say I wasn't satisfied to see that Vote Dismiss go through.

[Rinhi]

But if it’s not hard, if it’s laughably easy as so many suggest with DF, why worry so much about carrying someone?

because it adds a considerable amount of time to things as dungeons, trials or raids
because it means that player will most likely continue to get carried through content and be a burden to others
because it means that player does not want to put in a modicum of effort into learning their class (50+ content)

toxic positivity isn't a good mindset to have. it downplays problems, it enables bad behaviour/habits and it invalidates the opinions, experiences and other things by people that think differently, as seen by the various proponents in this and other similar threads

[Nishira]

Thank you for your answer Kolaina, and I do get your point. I think you may have experienced more (rightful) annoyance than I, simply because if I can’t be arsed to deal with the unpredictability of strangers I’ll stay far away from group content, and only sign up for it when I feel I can handle anything thrown my way lightheartedly

I still find it tricky tho, because how does one come to the conclusion someone is just really not even trying? Not so great play doesn’t automically imply that. It can but there may be perfectly understandable reasons. And while I understand your point with Illmaeran, I also understand if someone doesn’t want to state at the start of each run: this is my issue. In a way a videogame is also an escape from rl issues, or it may feel like asking for a pity carry each time.

I’d cry a bit on the inside if another whm only used Medica II, I really would haha. All these beautiful, amazing abilities… And I’m not denying you, and others who look at this the same way, are fully justified in it at times. But sometimes these discussions feel like a lot of people who don’t play optimally would be looked at that way. And I think that would not be fair on both sides tbh, it would paint both sides in too dark a light and not do anyone justice.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

Thank you for your answer Kolaina, and I do get your point. I think you may have experienced more (rightful) annoyance than I, simply because if I can’t be arsed to deal with the unpredictability of strangers I’ll stay far away from group content, and only sign up for it when I feel I can handle anything thrown my way lightheartedly

I still find it tricky tho, because how does one come to the conclusion someone is just really not even trying? Not so great play doesn’t automically imply that. It can but there may be perfectly understandable reasons. And while I understand your point with Illmaeran, I also understand if someone doesn’t want to state at the start of each run: this is my issue. In a way a videogame is also an escape from rl issues, or it may feel like asking for a pity carry each time.

I’d cry a bit on the inside if another whm only used Medica II, I really would haha. All these beautiful, amazing abilities… And I’m not denying you, and others who look at this the same way, are fully justified in it at times. But sometimes these discussions feel like a lot of people who don’t play optimally would be looked at that way. And I think that would not be fair on both sides tbh, it would paint both sides in too dark a light and not do anyone justice.

Because there is a big difference between 25% total group damage and 10%.

As a dps, if you are doing less than a quarter of the dps in a 4 man group, you aren't trying. You aren't even attempting to push buttons in any kind of reasonable manner.

I have been playing for 8 years, and I've leveled every job to 80. I can tell when people aren't trying. Can I tell if someone is doing a proper opener and rotation on every job? Of course not. But I can tell when a nin doesn't have huton, or a blm4 doesn't use fire, or a smn doesn't use their summons, etc, etc

[Kolaina]

I still find it tricky tho, because how does one come to the conclusion someone is just really not even trying?

The best and most obvious answer is experience. Playing thousands of instances. Watching other players. Playing every class and getting at minimum a basic understanding of how they play. Duty completion timer. The party list has a gauge under each player with a number showing where they fall on enmity. There’s more, but thats a start.

Rinhi has a great point. Toxic positivity. We should be raising each other up. Encouraging each other. Not excusing bad behaviour, including effortless play. Not shouting down people who offer advice. I’m tired of being told “they’re doing fine” or “you’re being toxic” when i try to offer someone a genuinely helpful tip. Those players aren’t helping anyone. Those players are encouraging nothing positive. Don’t be that player.

I understand your desire to be nice and friendly. That can be rare and sometimes a breath of fresh air. But sometimes, it hurts the situation in the long term. It does nothing to truly better the situation. Got to think long term and not just the moment to moment