Do people on these forums only complain endlessly?

[Hurlstone]

It has certainly been... interesting, spending a bit more time at these forums of late and seeing the debates firsthand! I used to post a bit during my original time in ARR but only started playing and reading social sites again last year or so. Mostly I have been lurking but my love of the lore has caused me to creep out of the shell more. No community is ever perfect and exaggerated complaints have always been present (Pretty sure I have seen people here declare they will cancel their subs due to tooltip changes) but negatively is as important aspect feedback. It certainly seems however that things have taken a turn for the worst of late in regards to constructive criticism. Most notably veiled personal attacks are an toxic techniques hidden behind niceties are deployed far more openly now, which really feels uncalled for. I remember the lore forums used to be a rather chill place, and they should really be a venue where one could openly talk about any aspect of lore… now the same arguments just seem to repeat over and over with rising ardour. Say what you will about Endwalker and its story, but the passion it has brought out of people is impressive! I think there are many people on both sides of the pendulum that would like to debate themes and stuff in a more civil way, but feel they cannot for whatever reason, which is a shame.

It should be noted that I do not think this is a unique thing to this community, it seems to have been the norm in almost every social space or forum I have attended. Its very interesting in a way, and disconcerting. It is always worth remembering too that we are all just a very small minority of players who actually bother to find a social media site or forum and speak out. Whilst the people in-game are not perfect in anyway either, I have found it perhaps the most friendly and less intimidating community I have experienced over my twenty or so years of MMO gaming.

Also something that made me really happy recently was the fans over on Twitch managed to get a Chicken at a petting zoo near London named after Zenos during the pre-6.2 Mogchute Farm Livestream… that gave me pride in the community!

[Oizen]

yeah i do
/

[dapperfaffer]

true, but often thats because only one persons opinion can be right. and with how fair weather these forums are often it leads to personal attacks because thats what makes it easier to dismiss what someone else is saying. aveyon is an example of such behavior for about 4 pages or so where people were discussing him and not the topic of the thread. people need to learn to either post and move on, or not engage.

[Iscah]

people need to learn to either post and move on, or not engage.

"Post and move on" is the opposite of how a forum is supposed to work. It's a conversation. Read the other replies and engage.

It does work better when everyone in the forum has the same starting point (eg. "I'm here because I enjoy this thing and want to talk about it") though. When a chunk of the forum population is here because they don't like the thing, it's harder to get a positive conversation going.

[dapperfaffer]

"Post and move on" is the opposite of how a forum is supposed to work. It's a conversation. Read the other replies and engage.

It does work better when everyone in the forum has the same starting point (eg. "I'm here because I enjoy this thing and want to talk about it") though. When a chunk of the forum population is here because they don't like the thing, it's harder to get a positive conversation going.

And very often it doesn't go in that manner by a number of posters. The thread "people who say first time in new content" as an example. You can't tell me that the discussion wasn't resolved after the first 2 pages, yet its 10 pages long and filled mostly with commentary that comes off as if its aimed towards lambasting the OP. As well as the aformentioned Aveyon section of a thread. And even your reply to me which you singled out the last sentence for what discussion to occur?
And remember, before you go arguing with me, all I said in the post that you segmented for 'discussion' was reiterating what Theodirc had already said. Only in different words.

[SentioftheHoukai]

No, a lot of posters just like to make strawman arguments and personal attacks towards anyone who is invested in the game and using the forum for the intended purpose of providing feedback.

I've been posting on these forums since the early days of ARR and have met a great many wonderful players through these forums. It's really a matter of curating one's personal experience, learning how to politely agree to disagree and recognising which posters are only there to stir up trouble.

Precisely, and really it truly is quite telling that OP's very first example is one such strawman. Makes one inclined to question her intentions, so to speak.

Yes.

Even the topics about what people are enjoying quickly devolves into shitflinging

So long as you admit it comes from all angles, including the corner of the room you and your fellows have chosen to stand in I will agree to this notion. If not, and some are mysteriously immune then nay I refuse to.

"Post and move on" is the opposite of how a forum is supposed to work. It's a conversation. Read the other replies and engage.

It does work better when everyone in the forum has the same starting point (eg. "I'm here because I enjoy this thing and want to talk about it") though. When a chunk of the forum population is here because they don't like the thing, it's harder to get a positive conversation going.

So sorry that this place is not an uber-positive perpetual hugbox. It is a forum, and on it criticism and critiques are welcome and warranted even if they as you say "often devolve into the negative". It nevertheless fails to diminish the value of talking points. Such is the nature of critique, and I cannot find it in myself to feel particularly apologetic about this.

[kaynide]

Well, if you check your complaint threads carefully you’ll find that typically

A) it’s someone without post history or newly joined which indicates a troll or just someone who really felt their issue was so important it merited making an account for.

And/or B) someone who complains a lot. Like holy hell a lot. Typically because this game isn’t the game they want to play, and they really want it to be. We’re talking people that want to force the square peg into round hole.

Or C) legit issues that are talked about calmly and thoughtfully, without the OP or whoever flipping out when there is debate. However rare this may be.

As with anything, I humbly recommend my mantra for these forums:

“Is there anything I can say that would add or enhance this conversation?” If the answer is no, just ignore/move on.

[Sigma5]

The datamining complaint is wild, like yall wanna suffer hours on mechanics instead of developing strats right off the bat. uh ok bro.

[Illmaeran]

The datamining complaint is wild, like yall wanna suffer hours on mechanics instead of developing strats right off the bat. uh ok bro.

To be fair, raiding used to be all about "suffering hours on mechanics" to develop the strategy and achieve a sense of accomplishment when your group finally succeeded. Whether people with the opinion that data mining's "ruining" raiding are old-school/boomers, crazy, and/or simply prefer to go blind and figure things out through trial and error is up to interpretation. Personally, I believe the prevalence of data mining's done a lot to decrease my enjoyment of raiding as common opinion is people should read a guide/watch a video and memorize it before going into a raid to better bash through it as efficiently as possible. Now that I say this, in my opinion, it's a game-wide phenomenon, not just a raiding thing.

The best times I've had raiding were back in Vanilla WoW when the forty of us bashed our heads against encounters, developed our strategies, and had a massive cheer-fest when we finally succeeded. I'll prefer this method over all others for as long as I play MMOs.

[Jeeqbit]

Yes and it's not necessarily a problem provided the complaints are considerate of all the issues and counterbalanced with opposing arguments, but when people only come here to complain instead of debate, it can get disproportionately negative without any scrutiny or counter-arguments.