Reverse WoW exodus

[TDawnstar]

WoW have been trying to perform better these last few years to restore the players' faiths and the numbers. Now it's FFXIV turn to do the same.

I doubt it's even possible. The resources are not even remotely comparable between the two, I am afraid.

[Jeycht]

I feel like the normal reasonable people left. I genuinely do. What we have left is the mmo equivalent of sloppy seconds.

It's weird because at one moment, 14 feels dead as hell. Maybe not in people afking, but like when you try to engage socially or try to be civil, this game is a corpse. I'm not talking about the 1000k people in a zone breaking the hunt train. I'm talking about the game. The queued up for frontline or msq or leveling. That game is dead. Anti-social. Anti new player, whatever you want to call it. Either out of contept or fear from moderation, this game is socially dead. Sure, your FC or your friend group are lovely, but your average player doesn't care. Your average party member is just in it for the reward. The joy of doing it is dead.

I just feel like if you told me 11 years ago, the community would devolve twice, I wouldn't believe you, but here we are. From the indistinguishable Wow/FF14 players of 2.0 to the heavily moderated players of today. Both kin in their contept for a social aspect. Both content with getting theirs while leaving you to twist. The passive aggressive arrogant sort. The "My game is the best game ever!" sort. The hypocrites and those who prop them up.

If there is an exodus, it's of the people who cared about the game. About its health and future. Because it's hollow now.

Not sure what you are talking about with queue. But about social part I can tell you I indeed "fear" the moderation. Whatever I could say, even to help would escalated super fast without saying anything afterward to not get it worse, some people just keep bringing it during the whole dungeon or simply refuse to play. It's not even anti new player, new players don't want anything from anyone too.
I don't want to be ban or kick right before the last boss because I dare to tell someone how to do something easier without any afterthought.
So, yeah no thanks won't talk anymore in duty.

[Dante131]

You'd not only have to pay me, including the sub fees and whatever expansions I'd need to purchase (I left in Legion, I have no idea which later expacs are included in the base game now), you'd also have to buy me a new PC, because I ain't doing it.

you know that you dont have to buy expansions beside of the new one right ? anyway this posts are insae so someone tell you how much of dissapointing a new launch is and all of you like daaaah no wow , wow bad, ignoring that someone who played this game here for a long time leaving the sinkin ship

[Ardeth]

I despise how much I felt this.

I despise that I feel it. That it comes out like that. After 11 years, this game is not social. It can be sure, but it is not by default. Absolutely not in no way.

To be fair, that describes the world as it is in real life. It's just that this is meant to be an escape from reality, not a reminder of it.

[TDawnstar]

had this feeling that it's just designed specifically to waste your time. Dragonflight gives me a game to play in my time.

I don't know about Dragonflight, but WoW was a huge time sink before.

[Voidmage]

I doubt it's even possible. The resources are not even remotely comparable between the two, I am afraid.

I don't know.
What CBU3 lacks in funding they have in goodwill of the players.
FF14 devs don't have to do much for the people to be happy just stop stepping into poop which they did quite a bit lately.

My opinion on all this:

A strong WoW is the best thing FF14 can have right now. The game has gone quite some time without any real opposition and it shows in parts.
There was a certain air of superiority in EW and thinking like they could do no wrong and the players would just eat it up.
They have already admitted fault with the combat design in dungeons, overcasualisation and lack of stuff to do in EW. Even their golden cow of job design was admitted to be wanting (what they do with that is to be seen).

No matter how much Yoshida want's to sell that as their own ideas in interviews ("we fell asleep in dungeons", "we think jobs are to samey") it was due to feedback in EW that got louder and louder and culminated in content creators.
DT's story for example might be a leftover of that.

So yeah, I think it's good they get competition again even though I will stay with this game for the forseeable future.

[Jeeqbit]

I despise that I feel it. That it comes out like that. After 11 years, this game is not social. It can be sure, but it is not by default. Absolutely not in no way.

That's just because people avoid social spaces in the game (mostly out of not knowing that they exist). It is a social game. Here is where you can find it...

Hunt trains
S ranks
Spawner/conductor groups
Alliance Raids
Field Operation /shout chats
Free Companies (actually active ones)
Novice Network
Venues
Roleplay events/hubs
Joining PF for any content... raids, spell hunting, maps, FATE farms. Often they will socialize, depending on the people in there.
Discord communities (which can be for FCs, statics, PUG groups that made a discord server, roleplay groups, etc).
Obviously statics themselves.
Content like Ishgard Restoration (or soon Cosmisc Exploration) when it's actually current content.

I do agree it is often hard for new players though. They feel that there isn't any because a lot of this is endgame stuff or they haven't got used to using Party Finder, haven't got into roleplaying or venues, haven't joined any discords, haven't joined the right FC or the Novice Network and haven't tried hunting or anything like that. So they don't see the social spaces. I believe that is why SE made the Fellowship Finder - as a way to funnel people into some social spaces that they have struggled to find and contrary to popular belief, it does work. Often these fellowships fill up with hundreds of players rather quick, despite all the memes people make about fellowships.

I think the problem you have is with people not chatting in a dungeon or in PvP and this is really why:
1. They don't know anyone there.
2. They are too busy fighting.
3. If you actually start talking in PvP often there is chatter. Just got to take the initiative. Someone has to... I do and it works.

[Hallarem]

Riot MMO was the only feasible proper exodus target, but it's been indefinitely halted. We have two corpses of an MMO that don't have any incentive to be innovative because they hold the major market share of players and the rest just don't matter, to put it bluntly.

So hold onto your pants and "please look forward to it"

Honestly, they've done a lot of new stuff now which is GOOD, but took TEN HUGE steps back with promoting / hiring total rookies into their MAIN WRITING STAFF who have no idea how to write a proper narrative that is well paced, heck I'd go so far in my tinfoil hattery to say they probably don't even know what happened in the past story aside from cliffnotes or a whiteboard bullet point presentation. And the MSQ is one of their MAIN DRAWS. It's honestly baffling.

[Colt47]

I feel like the normal reasonable people left. I genuinely do. What we have left is the mmo equivalent of sloppy seconds.

It's weird because at one moment, 14 feels dead as hell. Maybe not in people afking, but like when you try to engage socially or try to be civil, this game is a corpse. I'm not talking about the 1000k people in a zone breaking the hunt train. I'm talking about the game. The queued up for frontline or msq or leveling. That game is dead. Anti-social. Anti new player, whatever you want to call it. Either out of contept or fear from moderation, this game is socially dead. Sure, your FC or your friend group are lovely, but your average player doesn't care. Your average party member is just in it for the reward. The joy of doing it is dead.

I just feel like if you told me 11 years ago, the community would devolve twice, I wouldn't believe you, but here we are. From the indistinguishable Wow/FF14 players of 2.0 to the heavily moderated players of today. Both kin in their contept for a social aspect. Both content with getting theirs while leaving you to twist. The passive aggressive arrogant sort. The "My game is the best game ever!" sort. The hypocrites and those who prop them up.

If there is an exodus, it's of the people who cared about the game. About its health and future. Because it's hollow now.

I don't share that opinion about the community. It's sort of an expectation that people are going to complain when something goes wrong and they are more likely to complain if they are still trying to play the game and want to play the game, then if they dislike something and just jump to another game. The main issue with the forums is that it often inflates minor issues into bigger ones due to herd mentality. If someone dislikes viper changes and makes a post they are going to have other people who are either going to disagree with them or agree with them post. Then it turns into an echo chamber because there is no outlet or summation to conclude the conversation. Typically, people talk about things because they want action done so a confirmation of inaction or action is generally all that is needed to conclude the conversation.

However, there's no community management on this forum nor a direct line to give feedback on the game anymore. Sure, they have moderators but what is the point of moderation if there is no person to conclude the conversation?

So my own conclusion is that the forums are a relic of FFXIV's original development and are only kept around for legacy purposes.

[Sivante]

So my own conclusion is that the forums are a relic of FFXIV's original development and are only kept around for legacy purposes.

Welp. That stung. Truth hurts I suppose, but that stung.