Where are the NA Community Devs? :(

[Knot_D]

Community Dev nowadays are like in-game's Big Fish

[Themarvin]

Here is a short answer to the question.

They are not here to hear or react upon pointless claims and make this or make that or whatever... and that is what the fora direction currently is, only complaints, no actual questions... and SE should start taking a strong line on alot of things especially third party exploitable features.

[Deceptus]

Community reps dont get paid enough to engage with this part of the forum. Mods dont get paid enough to do so either. We're on our own now.

FFXIV forums:

[Connor]

SE gotta cut costs somewhere lol

[DrWho2010]

They're not here to baby everyone and wag fingers and say "don't do that".

[Connor]

They're not here to baby everyone and wag fingers and say "don't do that".

Isn’t that pretty much the exact purpose of moderation lol

[Greyhawk]

Isn’t that pretty much the exact purpose of moderation lol

Difference between moderators and Community Reps. Moderators are pretty self-explanatory and don't post anything here, they are just taking action against complaints when someone is reported.

The Community Reps though - these are the other useless tools of SE that serve no purpose on NA forums. The Comm. Reps are supposed to carry our voices (concerns, suggestions, etc.) to the developers and in a sense - represent the community on our behalf and represent SE on their behalf.

Now, if you think that SE even gives a two-bits shit of what we say, then you are delusional. Yeah, people just keep using one example to try and prove that wrong (Reaper job) but that's about all that was carried to SE. Even though NA is their largest audience with this game, they only hear the JP cries of outrage and act on those, they have NOTHING to do with NA other than just provide service to play this game. They don't interact with us, they don't talk to us, they don't participate in or address concerns. They are the furthest thing from ever having a 'Community Rep' as they can get. I'm surprised they even keep a forum for us.

[Connor]

Difference between moderators and Community Reps. Moderators are pretty self-explanatory and don't post anything here, they are just taking action against complaints when someone is reported.

The Community Reps though - these are the other useless tools of SE that serve no purpose on NA forums. The Comm. Reps are supposed to carry our voices (concerns, suggestions, etc.) to the developers and in a sense - represent the community on our behalf and represent SE on their behalf.

Now, if you think that SE even gives a two-bits shit of what we say, then you are delusional. Yeah, people just keep using one example to try and prove that wrong (Reaper job) but that's about all that was carried to SE. Even though NA is their largest audience with this game, they only hear the JP cries of outrage and act on those, they have NOTHING to do with NA other than just provide service to play this game. They don't interact with us, they don't talk to us, they don't participate in or address concerns. They are the furthest thing from ever having a 'Community Rep' as they can get. I'm surprised they even keep a forum for us.

Ohh I was thinking the ‘community reps’ and ‘moderators’ were the same thing for some reason, but that does make sense lol.

Agreed about the second half, the English forums feels like it exists because it ‘had to’, not because they actually wanted it to lol. Probably explains the complete lack of community engagement / moderation / anything really lol

[TAS]

The Community Reps though - these are the other useless tools of SE that serve no purpose on NA forums. The Comm. Reps are supposed to carry our voices (concerns, suggestions, etc.) to the developers and in a sense - represent the community on our behalf and represent SE on their behalf.

Now, if you think that SE even gives a two-bits shit of what we say, then you are delusional. Yeah, people just keep using one example to try and prove that wrong (Reaper job) but that's about all that was carried to SE. Even though NA is their largest audience with this game, they only hear the JP cries of outrage and act on those, they have NOTHING to do with NA other than just provide service to play this game. They don't interact with us, they don't talk to us, they don't participate in or address concerns. They are the furthest thing from ever having a 'Community Rep' as they can get. I'm surprised they even keep a forum for us.

Those "Useless tools" are still people friend, no need to dimmish them. As you said, The Reps are supposed to carry our voices on to the development staff and I'm sure that's what they're doing silently.

Back in the day, I believe we had a pretty solid NA Community Dev Team who were pretty consistent, despite even having to provide input on a less than respectable post.

Honest to god, the forums weren't always just the trolling, sniping, b*tching, self-entitled wasteland that it is now... There was a jacuzzi!

Bad jokes aside, this used to our direct line to SE for Feedback and Suggestions, and the old Comm Devs made us, as users, feel seen and heard. Our Dev Tracker wasn't just for copy paste info that we couldn't just find ourselves. They we're direct responses to player feedback.

[Avoidy]

Let's hope this isn't a sign what's to come, what generally happens to mmorpgs in the western market.

I've been thinking that for a while, but I didn't want to say it. Usually it's a bad sign when communication ceases like this.
On the bright side though, outside of the forums the developers do a pretty good job with communicating via live letters, which are unlike anything I've seen in other mmos. My only complaint there is I wish they'd bring back the English translator. Far too often, between live letter slides, there'll just be idle chatter between Yoshi and anyone else at the table, or he'll elaborate really quickly on slides talking about future content, and the translating work for that is left to really diligent redditors/discord people basically trying their best and doing it for free. Usually it's fine, but it's an issue later on when you're having a conversation about upcoming content with someone and they're like "do you have a source on that?" and all you can do is pull some discord logs of a fan translator who might not have even gotten it right since live translating of JP->ENG can be tricky as hell even for seasoned pros. But even with that gripe aside, at least the LLs are a thing. And at least the devs play the game. It could be worse. But yeah, the state of the forums worries me from a communication standpoint nevertheless. It feels straight up abandoned here.