The slow decline of FFXIV, a summary.

[Arrius]

You're right. After all, the game is already flawless.

I'm not saying it's flawless.
There are issues that needs addressed, without a doubt, but the amount of unreasonable posts about 'fixing' it and everyone making a new thread about their ideas instead of consolidating constructive feedback in a few is not helping the case.
The result is bickering, cynicism, whiteknighting, drama and doomers driving the genuine people away that also look for a positive experience and exchange it with others that the forum could provide.

Nowadays I look onto the XIV reddit, of all places, that provide a balance the community desperately needs.

Yes, I am a sucker for new players telling their awesome stories of their first steps into the game.
Because the forum certainly does not provide the environment anymore for it.

[Supersnow845]

I'm not saying it's flawless.
There are issues that needs addressed, without a doubt, but the amount of unreasonable posts about 'fixing' it and everyone making a new thread about their ideas instead of consolidating constructive feedback in a few is not helping the case.
The result is bickering, cynicism, whiteknighting, drama and doomers driving the genuine people away that also look for a positive experience and exchange it with others that the forum could provide.

Nowadays I look onto the XIV reddit, of all places, that provide a balance the community desperately needs.

Yes, I am a sucker for new players telling their awesome stories of their first steps into the game.
Because the forum certainly does not provide the environment anymore for it.

This is the forum where the devs send us to give critiques on what’s wrong

Why the hell would anyone be posting about how exciting it is to reach HW for the first time

Like that’s literally not what these forums are for

[Arrius]

This is the forum where the devs send us to give critiques on what’s wrong

Why the hell would anyone be posting about how exciting it is to reach HW for the first time

Like that’s literally not what these forums are for

It's hub for players to engage with others, which also means posts of their favorite places, outfits, looks and whatnot. ALONG with feedback posts.
We even got a section for helping new players.

Open your eyes and look properly around the forum, please.

[Daralii]

It's hub for players to engage with others, which also means posts of their favorite places, outfits, looks and whatnot. ALONG with feedback posts.
We even got a section for helping new players.

Open your eyes and look properly around the forum, please.

Have you considered not going to the general discussion board in that case? The support desk specifically directs people to this board.

[Arrius]

Have you considered not going to the general discussion board in that case? The support desk specifically directs people to this board.

Doesn't change what I said towards the other poster. It's more than just posting feedback.
Or are those 'Show your [Race]' threads just needlessly cluttering the place because people like posting their characters and enjoy seeing others?

[Bekuta]

It's hub for players to engage with others, which also means posts of their favorite places, outfits, looks and whatnot. ALONG with feedback posts.
We even got a section for helping new players.

Open your eyes and look properly around the forum, please.

There's nothing stopping people from posting those things, and there's still plenty of them. You just don't like the number of critique posts there are.

[Arrius]

There's nothing stopping people from posting those things [...]

Then my argument I provided towards Supersnow845 is valid.
My thanks for backing it up.



Alas, it's time for my roulettes and then getting to work.
You all have a good evening.

[Bekuta]

Then my argument I provided towards Supersnow845 is valid.
My thanks for backing it up.



Alas, it's time for my roulettes and then getting to work.
You all have a good evening.

Then I, frankly, have no idea what your argument even is. That people can also post good things about the game? No one is stopping them from that, you were just complaining about the number of posts criticizing the game.

[ForsakenRoe]

Having multiple different threads for different-but-related topics allows for far more precision in reporting issues/discussing things.

As an example, the Character Creation update that DT brought. Rather than a 'Character Creator issues megathread' where every race's issues get discussed (which leads to the possibility of less-played races like Hrothgar or Roe issues, getting lost in the deluge of Miqote or Viera players reporting the issues they're running into), it's instead far more sensible to have a thread that is dedicated to each race individually. It also allows for, when an issue is resolved, for that thread's purpose to expire, and it to fall off the front page. For example, Ungarmax was a problem in Stormblood. It was fixed. We no longer see the Ungarmax threads being bumped, because their 'purpose' (to being attention to the bug) no longer exists, the bug is resolved, so now we can have relevant threads bumped to the first page, such as 'FFXIV poor performance outlier on new Radeon 9070 XT cards!?', that seems pretty important for SE to have a look at. Or 'FRU has been cleared without Tanks!'

So, if someone were to have ideas on 'how to fix X issue with the game', which is more sensible? A: Make a thread specifically to share those ideas with the rest of the playerbase (and theoretically SE, if they actually read this forum), or B: Jam it into an existing thread, which may only be tangentially related (thus the 'ideas post' could be argued to be off-topic by anyone who's not interested in having actual discourse), and is very likely to just get buried in the rest of the thread, thereby making it exceptionally difficult for SE to find the ideas even if they were searching specifically for them (again, assuming SE reads EN forums at all)?

Or how about an example thread, of someone having ideas on 'how to fix an issue the game is currently facing'? Note how the exact argument of

but the amount of unreasonable posts about 'fixing' it and everyone making a new thread about their ideas instead of consolidating constructive feedback in a few is not helping the case.

takes up the last three or so pages of the thread? But the issue is, if the thread creator had posted their ideas (on how to rectify the Healer issues) in the Healer Strike thread, they'd have been buried and pushed off of the 'latest page' within 24 hours, and that's not going to help anybody, least of all SE who A: asks players for feedback on various topics (the contents of that thread being an example of such feedback), B: directs that such feedback be left in the General Discussion section of the forums (which is where the thread was posted), and C: have admitted, themselves, not having a solid idea of how they want one of the Healer jobs to grow (which is evident, considering the next expansion gave them a skill that turns them into a completely different Healer Job), which gives a very good reason for the feedback to be given: 'If SE doesn't have a solid idea of what they want each of the Healers' identities and gameplay to be, here's a player's take on it, which SE could potentially find some inspiration from'



I'm aware that JP prefers the 'megathread' feedback method. I'd argue that their preference, and how hard it is to find specific feedback, is precisely the reason that 'address feedback' is so glacially slow a task for SE to handle. Unless it comes from inside SE (VPR changes), in which case, it's so fast that even JP is left asking 'who asked for this'