Does anybody else really dislike the direction the devs seem to be interested in taking the game? When I hear them say things like how they want the game to be more solo friendly my head starts to swim, like... it's an MMO. There are singleplayer final fantasy games. FFXIV is not one of them. FFXIV should not cater to people looking for a singleplayer game. I don't necessarily have a problem with people playing the game as a mostly solo experience, but like 90% of story content is ALREADY solo, why make it even more disconnected from the community?

I don't think it's bad to occasionally force the player to interact with the community in the form of a dungeon run, or a trial completion. Why would a new player EVER choose to run dungeons with other players when every dungeon and trial needed for MSQ completion is doable with trusts? Not to mention the issues that crop up with needing every piece of new content (besides maybe savages and ultimates) to be doable by NPCs as well. And just to be clear, there are arguments for doing all of these things I dislike, I personally just do not think they justify the negatives that come with removing social aspects from your MMO.

I've been thinking about this for a while, and I've been lurking the forums like a psycho for the past couple of days hoping somebody else might bring this topic up, but no luck. I've just never seen a game with such a friendly and interactive community completely ignore that aspect of their MMO. The players keep the community interaction in this game afloat because the devs seem completely unwilling to. To anyone who doesn't run content that requires party finder, when was the last time you NEEDED to interact with another player, in the Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game you play? Come on SE, it's IN THE NAME.