Content geared towards FCs

[Deveryn]

Try joining one of them and see how it is when, out of 150+ people, only <10 are online at primetime.

It's time for us to realize that we've been living in an echo chamber. It's not normal for the game director to tell us to play a different game. It's not normal for an MMO to struggle in social activities. It's not normal for FFXIV players to genuinely loathe having to play their own game. Most of us have very, very low standards. The player base just doesn't seem to enjoy FFXIV like they do other games. And while one can certainly opt to play old content, or make do with what we have, players just simply aren't in the mood for that. That's why they take breaks for months at a time. It's time for Square Enix to fix that by providing more incentives for group content instead of making everything single-player like the shareholders tell them.

Or you can play other games, your choice. I'm sticking with FFXIV.

Nothing here is normal and that's probably the best thing about this game and why I choose to stick around. I've been more social here and made more connections than other MMOs because there's more freedom to do so. I'm not wasting energy sitting around in a glorified chatroom hoping someone will see me advertising my class in the sea of LFG messages.

It's great to have the option to play at one's leisure and not just be forced into unsubbing because no one's around to do anything, especially the older content. What to farm old EX or savage content for a mount? You can find people to do that. Nothing feels forced, but that's exactly where we would be headed if they re-introduced the idea of FC activities. People can already to plenty if they put their minds to it.

At the end of the day, folks like you have nothing concrete to offer in the way of ideas, only complaints about how things are. Maybe you should channel that energy into improving the social situation in your neck of the woods.

[Jojoya]

Try joining one of them and see how it is when, out of 150+ people, only <10 are online at primetime.

It's called people have lives with varying schedules. It's unrealistic for everyone to be online at the same time.

I also wouldn't be surprised if 2/3s of those 150+ members are alts. People who are happy with their FCs and also enjoy playing alts tend to move their alts into the same FC.

It's time for us to realize that we've been living in an echo chamber.

It's not an echo chamber when there are dissenting opinions, as is clearly happening in this thread.

It's not normal for the game director to tell us to play a different game.

You're right. It's not normal behavior for a Game Director. It's refreshingly different to have a Game Producer and Director that is grounded in the reality of what it is to be someone who plays games instead of a MBA that only understands log in statistics.

You know what else isn't normal? Expecting people to play a single game and no others.

It's not normal for an MMO to struggle in social activities.

How on earth do you think this game is struggling in social activities when the forum is littered with complaints about players advertising their social activities in PF?

Social activities are player generated, not game generated.

It's not normal for FFXIV players to genuinely loathe having to play their own game.

1) I'm a FFXIV player. I don't loathe playing the game. I'm enjoying it.
2) No one is forced to play the game.
3) Only idiots continue to play a game they no longer enjoy. Sounds like you've surrounded yourself with idiots if you don't know anyone who is enjoying the game.

Most of us have very, very low standards.

Stop thinking that "standards" are standard. Players are looking for different things. It's up to the individual to find the game that provides what they're looking for. It's not up to the game to tailor itself to each individual player's "standards".

The player base just doesn't seem to enjoy FFXIV like they do other games.

This is no different from any other game. Go into other game forums and you'll find just as many of its players complaining about their game (assuming the moderation team doesn't remove negative feedback which is done in some forums).

Once again it sounds like you're surrounding yourself with idiots who are forcing themselves to play a game they hate instead of quitting and playing a different game if you think the player base isn't enjoying this game.

And while one can certainly opt to play old content, or make do with what we have, players just simply aren't in the mood for that. That's why they take breaks for months at a time. It's time for Square Enix to fix that by providing more incentives for group content instead of making everything single-player like the shareholders tell them.

And it's fine for players to take breaks when they've run out of things they want to do here.

Why do you keep failing to understand that?

We don't need more incentives for group content. There are plenty already.

You want to know what turns most solo players into solo players? It's people acting like jerks in group content. No sane person wants to deal with that. No reward SE gives is going to be enough to entice players sick and tired of the jerks into doing group content.

If you want more to do group content, make being part of the group a fun and enjoyable experience. Kick the jerks instead of making excuses for them.

Or you can play other games, your choice. I'm sticking with FFXIV.

Why are you sticking to a game you apparently loathe?

Do you think it's suddenly going to change if you stick around long enough?

If you want it to change, then you need to be the change you want to see. If you want the game to be more social, then you need to step up and facilitate social activity.

[Deveryn]

btw, if it feels like an echo chamber, you might actually be wrong.

[MonteCristo]

btw, if it feels like an echo chamber, you might actually be wrong.

No...and furthermore there is a HUGE stigma about our community in literally every other place outside of the official forums when it comes to any form of criticism regarding ffxiv and as someone who has supported since 1.0 beta i think im more than qualified to say.....innovation is long overdue. And for the love of god not everyone wants to keep running old content! im so sick and tired of people bragging like there is so much content stop the cap...glamour is NOT content its glamour!

[Jeeqbit]

No...and furthermore there is a HUGE stigma about our community in literally every other place outside of the official forums when it comes to any form of criticism regarding ffxiv

The stigma comes from people who wilfully ignore how people do criticize the game in a healthy way.

I have conversations in novice networks a lot and elsewhere in the game and when there is something that is legitimately a problem with the game we just all agree that it's a problem and explain that it is to sprouts and move on. For example, people usually universally agree having to go through the base game and 4 expansions worth of MSQ and their patches is daunting to new players and a problem and we are honest about this to sprouts so that they know what they are getting into. We are honest about little annoying things like the clicking people by accident and losing a GCD and just say well, yes, it's a problem and just got to put up with it.

Where people start being excessively positive is when someone else is being excessively negative. It's a glass half-full or glass half-empty thing. Some people are glass half-empty types and just want to be excessively negative as if the glass is entirely empty, so people with a glass half-full perspective try to help them see the positives.

The whole point of the forums is for your idea to be scrutinized. Even if you have a point, we have to play devil's advocate and find any holes in them.

And for the love of god not everyone wants to keep running old content!

Veterans don't but as I explained in an earlier post, the majority of people who play now were not even around in the first half of Stormblood and have a lot to catch up on.

[Jojoya]

No...and furthermore there is a HUGE stigma about our community in literally every other place outside of the official forums when it comes to any form of criticism regarding ffxiv and as someone who has supported since 1.0 beta i think im more than qualified to say.....innovation is long overdue. And for the love of god not everyone wants to keep running old content! im so sick and tired of people bragging like there is so much content stop the cap...glamour is NOT content its glamour!

Few are going to be against innovation.

Trying to force players to join FCs (or a game's equivalent) by locking content access behind FC membership isn't innovation. It's been tried by other games in the past - and failed hard. It's why games no longer do it.

Just because you've done all the content before doesn't mean there isn't a lot of content in the game. Talk to any new player and they are overwhelmed by the amount of content there is.

That is why people need to be playing different games - so they don't keep doing the same thing over and over and over until they're so sick of it they can't do it anymore. There's only so much content a single development team can produce at a time.

Thinking that throwing more bodies at a game solves it is a fallacy. Ask Blizzard what happened when they almost doubled their staff thinking that it would allow them to create and release content faster. We ended up with Warlords of Draenor, arguably the worst expansion in the games history at that time.

Most innovation comes through the need to solve problems that others haven't solved and/or gain an edge in competition. Everyone has their own ideas about what are the problems in the game, and SE may or may not agree. They also may or may not have the ability to address those problems depending on what they are.

Player socialization is not something they can solve. While they can offer content that facilitates socialization, designing that content in such a way as to force players to socialize is a good way to lose players. Not everyone has the same needs and desires for socialization.

[Deveryn]

No...and furthermore there is a HUGE stigma about our community in literally every other place outside of the official forums when it comes to any form of criticism regarding ffxiv and as someone who has supported since 1.0 beta i think im more than qualified to say.....innovation is long overdue. And for the love of god not everyone wants to keep running old content! im so sick and tired of people bragging like there is so much content stop the cap...glamour is NOT content its glamour!

I don't care how long you've been around. That doesn't mean all your ideas are good. If you want to throw out a legit innovative idea, I'm all ears. This is nothing but a poor excuse for laziness in FCs. SE cannot save you from yourselves and your lack of initiative.

[Nyxs]

I think this would be a great idea. Rewards could give a few things when you complete them (please dont do it if only the leader gets something) like gil and items for everyone in the fc. The fc leader could get the other rewards plus a free higher tier buff and and some credits for the fc.

For items maybe it could be from the loot pool of what the subs can bring back?

[MonteCristo]

I don't care how long you've been around. That doesn't mean all your ideas are good. If you want to throw out a legit innovative idea, I'm all ears. This is nothing but a poor excuse for laziness in FCs. SE cannot save you from yourselves and your lack of initiative.

New school vs ol school...we literally see from 2 different perspectives. Id debate with u but truth be told it doesnt matter cuz the gag is..SE doesnt rly read NA forums so like someone said before this is all banter in the end but for the record you being newer doesn't mean your ideas or POV is valid either. Furthermore, to be very blunt...u likely wont support this game nearly as long as i have and for that reason alone your opinion is valid but doesnt really hold weight because its extremely biased seeing as you arent trying to consider povs of those who have been playing far longer than you have.

[Vidu]

No...and furthermore there is a HUGE stigma about our community in literally every other place outside of the official forums when it comes to any form of criticism regarding ffxiv and as someone who has supported since 1.0 beta i think im more than qualified to say.....innovation is long overdue. And for the love of god not everyone wants to keep running old content! im so sick and tired of people bragging like there is so much content stop the cap...glamour is NOT content its glamour!

Yes, innovation can be a good thing - if you ask me it was a great innovation to move raids into the DF (instead of having to walk up to the entrance to queue for them), the addition of PF was amazing (no more shouting "We need a bard or paladin!" near wineport when one of the 8 people in your static didnt show up on raid day), even adding the more difficult content to DF so that you can give them a shot (more or less successful) even if you dont get a full party together, being able to unsyc content thats not current anymore and thus allowing you to attempt it with a more flexiable number of people, the new Criterion Dungeons that offer a challenge for light parties instead of a full party (so you only work around 4 schedudles instead of 8), even the addition of Squadrons and Trusts, which argueably into more of a solo-experience but also more into the experience of a game you get to play at any time you want instead of a waiting game if you happent to want (or "need") way outside of primehours for your server.

All those things I'd label innovations - those ideas move away from the notion that finding people to play with or waiting around for them to show up is the main appeal of the game and instead make sure that you actually get to play the game.

I'm starting to wonder - how often have you (or anyone wanting more of this mysterious, innovative FC-content) organised some kind of event that required a large number of people to show up at a certain time? I dont want to make assumptions but my guess would: not to often - maybe because it can be frustarting and tiresome? And maybe thats why you want the game to do that for you, basically? But the game cant do that. The game cant change the workhours, timezone differences and other obligations people have outside of the game that lead to clashing scheduldes. I'd like to see the "innovation" that fixes this problem...
You could argue now that we need something that would lead to people making this game their priority - the FC-content would need to be so great that they're willing to make accomodations to take part in it that they're currently not willing to make. And I'm not sure thats really a good idea or something we should really ask for/promote - I'm saying that as someone whos been raiding with a static with 3 timezones for the past few years. In order to do that, some of us stay up a little later than they probably schuld during the week, some get up a little bit earlier than they'd like so they can join us before heading out to work and some rush home from work - its not an ideal situation for anyone, but its the only way this works. And we're willing to do it this way because we enjoy each others company and playing together, so we're making this work somehow.
But I cant imagine this on a bigger scale - currently this is managing 8 people. For FC-content I'd expect it would allow for a lot more people to join - and ideally for less, too. You'd end up picking your FC based on overlapping scheduldes, not on (social) compatibility. You might end up with more "lively" FCs, but not more social ones.
...or it would have no effect at all, because people would decide that its not worth bothering with it in the first place if its impacting their lives and/or enjoyment of the general game to much. Very likely scenario, if Diadem is any hint to go by. In which case we'd have content thats pretty dead, pretty fast.

All in all I cant help but wonder if these requests mostly come from people who dont realise that maintaining realtionships and specially managing large groups (and keeping them together against all odds!) will always take effort. It wont get any easier if there is an extra incentive in the form of content that you only get to see if someone puts in that effort. And I'm wondering how many people who wish for more FC-content would be willing to be the "someone" putting in the effort of setting a date, that most people can make, making sure that no one is excluded, making sure that everyone gets treated fairly (or at least feels like they've been treated fairly), that no one is uncomfortable and that everyone is having fun. Because the game cant be that someone - it can only provide the playground, as it already does. Inviting your friends to come there, will always be up to you. Sure, the playground could always do with more slides and swings and a better sandbox - but getting together will always be up to the players. And if you dont feel like putting in that effort right now with all the toys available... I doubt a new toy, even one thats locked behind "you need so many friends online at the same time", is going to make that any easier.