Group finder changes that will help foster a better community

[Tofu_Shark]

That's just silly. That's like saying if you drive a car, you need to learn to be a mechanic. The majority of people have not learned to "type". It's not a skill that is required by daily living - except for those who's job requires it.

Also, of course, some people have physical limitations.

 

 

There is usually a function called "mute", and, of course, "kick" would still work. 🙂

In some games, when you "mute" a player you don't hear them speak, nor do you see things they type.

"In some games," being the operative phrase. We have no idea how Bioware would've gone about it.

 

That is hardly the analogy. What you're saying is akin to, "I can read, but this writing thing, it's just too much for me." Typing is an essential part of computer literacy, which is important in a digital world. Sooner or later, you're going to join an online forum and want to post in threads, or have to write up a letter to dispute some BS charge on one of your bills or want to create a spreadsheet, perhaps for a family budget or who knows what or you want to play a game and the main form of communication is text. If you want those tasks and activities to take 10 times longer than they would, be my guest, don't learn to type. (Might as well forget about communicating in the game though.) Typing is as essential as reading and writing on a physical medium.

 

Yes, some people do have physical limitations, but he didn't state he had any.

[JediQuaker]

That is hardly the analogy. What you're saying is akin to, "I can read, but this writing thing, it's just too much for me." Typing is an essential part of computer literacy, which is important in a digital world. Sooner or later, you're going to join an online forum and want to post in threads, or have to write up a letter to dispute some BS charge on one of your bills or want to create a spreadsheet, perhaps for a family budget or who knows what or you want to play a game and the main form of communication is text. If you want those tasks and activities to take 10 times longer than they would, be my guest, don't learn to type. (Might as well forget about communicating in the game though.) Typing is as essential as reading and writing on a physical medium.

More silliness.

Yes, it could be called a "digital world", and typing may be, for some, an essential part of computer literacy, but we're talking about gaming here, not computer science or IT.

Yes, it will take a hunt&peck'er 10 times longer to write an e-mail, etc, but it also takes your average person 10 times longer to change a tire than it does the guy at your local service station (or a tire guy in a NASCAR pit stop). But again, that doesn't mean we all need to be trained in the fastest way to change a tire, because we drive a car.

And it doesn't mean we need to learn to type in order to occasionally write an e-mail, or play a video game.

[Damask_Rose]

 

Voicechat would also come with a tradeoff. How many people would be yelling and screaming about things if voicechat was built-in because they have no self control, manners, or etiquette? Also, the ubiquity of other chat services probably made incorporating a voicechat feature largely moot.

 

 

I haven't done voice chat in a long time and I'm sure things have gotten much better, but here are the issues I had with it: Voice chat depends on people having a functioning mic, which many people do not, including me right now. Back then a lot of people didn't get set up for push to talk resulting in a lot of back ground noise. A lot of people have their mic in the wrong location resulting in feedback, breathing noises or are impossible to hear. DDO had a built in voice chat for group content which many women quit using it because there was so much harassment.

[Lhancelot]

"In some games," being the operative phrase. We have no idea how Bioware would've gone about it.

 

That is hardly the analogy. What you're saying is akin to, "I can read, but this writing thing, it's just too much for me." Typing is an essential part of computer literacy, which is important in a digital world. Sooner or later, you're going to join an online forum and want to post in threads, or have to write up a letter to dispute some BS charge on one of your bills or want to create a spreadsheet, perhaps for a family budget or who knows what or you want to play a game and the main form of communication is text. If you want those tasks and activities to take 10 times longer than they would, be my guest, don't learn to type. (Might as well forget about communicating in the game though.) Typing is as essential as reading and writing on a physical medium.

 

Yes, some people do have physical limitations, but he didn't state he had any.

 

Well said. His analogy wasn’t an analogy at all, lol. Think maybe there’s some confusion for others what the word “analogy” actually means. 😃

 

Continue on destroying idiocy across the forums and I will enjoy the show! 👌

[Tofu_Shark]

More silliness.

Yes, it could be called a "digital world", and typing may be, for some, an essential part of computer literacy, but we're talking about gaming here, not computer science or IT.

Yes, it will take a hunt&peck'er 10 times longer to write an e-mail, etc, but it also takes your average person 10 times longer to change a tire than it does the guy at your local service station (or a tire guy in a NASCAR pit stop). But again, that doesn't mean we all need to be trained in the fastest way to change a tire, because we drive a car.

And it doesn't mean we need to learn to type in order to occasionally write an e-mail, or play a video game.

Namecalling does not refute my argument.

 

This is comparing apples to oranges. While changing a tire is one of three basic automotive repair operations I believe every driver should know, one does not have to know to do it quickly (Although, the quicker the better. Who wants to be stuck out in the rain any longer than necessary when the time comes? And time is a precious resource but I digress.) it is not required, given the frequency that scenario is expected to come up. Changing one's tire by one's self is a lot different from having the pit crew of a motorsport team do it for you who practice it over and over until it's second nature or your local mechanic that has equipment most people don't have at home, such as a lift and an impact wrench. I'm not going to entertain this subject further, as it has nothing to do with the argument.

 

Writing (and by extension, typing) are tasks people are expected to be able to perform fairly quickly because they can be expected to be performed every day. We don't expect to wait several minutes for someone to write a very short message on a piece of paper, nor do we expect someone to take several minutes to type a response not because they are thinking of what to write, but because it actually takes them that much time to type it out and send it.

 

Typing is not a skill unique to computer scientists and IT professionals. Many jobs require the ability to type. In the daily operation of a computer, depending on what one uses it for, a person may be expected to perform a lot of typing, such as for their job (documents, spreadsheets, presentations, etc.,) or very little typing, such as for recreation. Even surfing the internet requires some level of typing typically, whether typing your query into a search engine, typing in a URL, using a website's search function, or using the browser's Find tool to find something specific on a webpage quickly.

 

It is no more a magic power than writing in script is or cooking a delicious meal. Students have been learn typing in school for decades now, so it is a common skill. Yes, people who went to school before typing classes became part of the curriculum may not have ever learned how to type, but there are classes out there one could take if they desired to learn that ability. If they are an autodidact, they could also seek out the numerous resources that teach typing, such as websites. However, their quality varies.

 

Gaming is part of the digital world, whether you think it is or not. If we are referring to a multiplayer game such as SWTOR, the player can expect to do quite a bit of typing if they're going to communicate with other players. Your performance will be greatly limited if you don't. What if you're running an FP or an op and you have important knowledge on the upcoming boss fight that the entire team overlooked that could result in a wipe? Or what if you're in a down to the wire PvP match, the enemy is swarming your gun in a desperate last ditch attempt to turn the match in their favor, and you need reinforcements immediately. How are you going to communicate this before you're dead and they've captured the gun/control point and won the match? in the first scenario, your team probably won't wait, and in the second, the enemy doesn't care, as it plays to their advantage if you can't get a message out in time. What if you had the answer to a question a player had that people have only provided troll answers and distasteful jokes in response to, but you can't type out a response fast enough, so their question goes unanswered and they leave the area or log-out and are probably left with a bad impression of the community? You want to get a group together for an objective such as a world boss or conquest goal. You're expected to coordinate this group. How are you going to do that? Yes, you can let other people run things, but you will always be at the mercy of other players if you do that. You have less control over your game experience. If you can't communicate things quickly, clearly, and concisely in a game like this, the kinds of activities you can participate in, your effectiveness as a player, and your control over your experience are greatly limited.

 

Typing is basically an essential task. Everyone is expected nowadays to know how to do it, not just people working in computer-related fields. It's less common to encounter someone that doesn't know how to type than someone who does today because it's been part of education for a long time now. From searching the web, to typing up a document, to playing multiplayer video games, typing is an important basic skill. It makes tasks quicker, easier (and if you're a cunning linguist, possibly even more seductive).

[SoonerJBD]

That wall of text hurts my eyes. I can’t fathom why you would think anyone will read that mess.

[xordevoreaux]

Namecalling does not refute my argument.

 

There is a difference between calling someone silly and labeling what they say as silly.

 

Recognize that pains can be taken to separate positions that people put forward from the people themselves. Recognize that criticizing an opinion is not the same as criticizing the person.

 

Jediquaker did not call you silly. He described your statement as more silliness. Doing so is entirely within the realm of appropriateness in any back and forth argument.

 

He took issue with what you said, not with you personally. There is a difference.

Edited April 15, 2020 by xordevoreaux

[JediQuaker]

Typing is basically an essential task. Everyone is expected nowadays to know how to do it, not just people working in computer-related fields. It's less common to encounter someone that doesn't know how to type than someone who does today because it's been part of education for a long time now. From searching the web, to typing up a document, to playing multiplayer video games, typing is an important basic skill. It makes tasks quicker, easier (and if you're a cunning linguist, possibly even more seductive).

More silliness. 😍

I assume from your text that you have been to university where everyone needs to type to do reports, projects, thesis's, etc.

But in the real world, most people don't go to college. The fork-lift driver at the local Home Depot doesn't need to type. The typical fast-food worker only needs to press buttons on a terminal. Your plumber doesn't type up a resume of his experience while fixing your plumbing. Construction workers are not sitting around typing.

 

Etc, etc, etc. Stop sounding like an elitist. (And, no, I didn't call you an elitist, I merely said "stop sounding like one". 😏 )

[phalczen]

But in the real world, most people don't go to college. The fork-lift driver at the local Home Depot doesn't need to type. The typical fast-food worker only needs to press buttons on a terminal. Your plumber doesn't type up a resume of his experience while fixing your plumbing. Construction workers are not sitting around typing.

 

I'm not exactly sure how the argument devolved into this topic, but as the world advances in technology, it is becoming clearer that even in so-called blue collar jobs, some technical prowess is required. Plumbers don't need to type up resumes, but many plumbing companies are part of larger heating/cooling/water conglomerates. They do have to present write-ups of recommended repairs to the customer to obtain their approval before going through with the repairs. And having some technical prowess with digital equipment (like controls for tankless water heaters), or the electronics that govern variable-speed air handlers for an HVAC system, is quickly becoming standard, if it isn't already.

 

Furthermore, if you are really trying to present an argument that literacy is not required of people in this day and age, then you are the one who is being silly.

 

Back on topic, assuming that all members of a group speak the same language, I think that standards of common decency suggest the polite thing to do is to communicate, through typing in chat, desires like skipping trash, doing bonus bosses, line of sight pulls, spacebarring through conversations, not breaking crowd control mezzes, etc. Civilized people do this, even if they abbreviate this in leetspeak. Fostering community means enabling and facilitating communications between the members, not introducing new game systems that make it even easier for people to completely ignore each other.

[StrikePrice]

The bottom line is that PUGs are not going to have protracted discussions before running a FP. If you think they are, you don't play the game (or any multi-player game for that matter).

[Tofu_Shark]

There is a difference between calling someone silly and labeling what they say as silly.

 

Recognize that pains can be taken to separate positions that people put forward from the people themselves. Recognize that criticizing an opinion is not the same as criticizing the person.

 

Jediquaker did not call you silly. He described your statement as more silliness. Doing so is entirely within the realm of appropriateness in any back and forth argument.

 

He took issue with what you said, not with you personally. There is a difference.

No, he's calling my position "silly." Calling my argument silly though is attaching a label to it and thereby, associating that label with me because it is my position. It's just short of ad hominem.

 

More silliness. 😍

I assume from your text that you have been to university where everyone needs to type to do reports, projects, thesis's, etc.

But in the real world, most people don't go to college. The fork-lift driver at the local Home Depot doesn't need to type. The typical fast-food worker only needs to press buttons on a terminal. Your plumber doesn't type up a resume of his experience while fixing your plumbing. Construction workers are not sitting around typing.

 

Etc, etc, etc. Stop sounding like an elitist. (And, no, I didn't call you an elitist, I merely said "stop sounding like one". 😏 )

More namecalling, I see. That just proves your argument hasn't a leg to stand on.

 

Typing isn't just exclusive to one's occupation. Writing a document doesn't necessarily mean a report, it could be (and I already stated this previously) a letter. The most likely purpose of a letter one will be compelled to write is that to dispute a faulty charge on a bill or a resume. A plumber doesn't have to type up a resume, but he or she will need to present invoices at some point.

 

Anyone can create a spreadsheet for a variety of uses. Hell, I made a workbook just for SWTOR to track GTN prices and list heroic mission completion times, their rewards, and other stuff about the game I found interesting. It makes tracking certain things and visualizing them a whole lot easier than they would be otherwise. Others have created spreadsheets to demystify this gearing mess we have in 6.0.

 

And there it is...ad hominem. Saying that isn't an allegation? "I didn't hit you. I just grabbed your fist and rammed it into your face."

 

With the usage of ad hominem, you definitely have no argument left. I accept your concession.

 

 

 

Now then.

 

We need to figure out how to allay the fears of newer players, because they fear being reprimanded (whether it be publicly or privately) for being unskilled. They seem to hope to be carried through group content without their lack of skill or inexperience being discovered. At the start of an FP, I always ask if anyone is new, and if they are, to speak up, because I'm willing to explain the fights and other mechanics. Just the night before, I wound up with a healer that got me killed on MM Hammer Station in the Tunneler fight. He claimed his cleanse was on CD, and I took a full 10 stacks of Targeting Laser 2/3 of the way into the fight, killing me. I wound up in a second queue with this same healer, and we had a lengthy discussion where he said he was clicking and had trouble identifying the icon. When I recommended he used keybinds, he attempted to backpedal and say he was using keys. I couldn't get him kicked, and he wound up getting me killed again against the first boss, this time wiping the rest of the team except for himself because of being able to stealth.

 

In another MM FP, the healer and I noticed the DPS were not playing their roles to the best of their abilities. They were also jumping back into the fight immediately after being revived without letting the healer heal them first. We both gave the both of them advice on how to better play their role to ensure the safety of the team, but they didn't listen, and during a boss fight, we wiped because they were not coordinating. They also seemed to think Master Mode was just like Veteran.

 

So even when you give inexperienced players a chance to come forward, they won't. And then their fears come true, someone comes down on them. In the worst case scenario, that a player becomes belligerent towards them and chews them out in Group Chat. Even when you politely attempt to correct mistakes, they don't listen. (And the best ones say something like, "don't tell me how to play!") I don't know what else one can do to dispel the fears one will get reprimanded for being unskilled if they're found out or encourage them to think about the safety of the team. They are more interested in protecting or inflating their ego than the safety of the team. Does anyone have any ideas?

 

And to you newer and/or less experienced players out there, it's best to be honest about your lack of skill and experience, rather than the team finding out the hard way by wiping or being put in extreme danger. And especially when more than one person offers you the same advice, it would be wise to reevaluate how you play.

[xordevoreaux]

No, he's calling my position "silly." Calling my argument silly though is attaching a label to it and thereby, associating that label with me because it is my position. It's just short of ad hominem.

 

One of the things we learned when the director of our theater troupe sat us down and told us just how horrible our portrayals were, the very first thing Vic Coledi told us all in 1981 was don't take the criticism of one's portrayal as a direct criticism of us as people.

 

He repeated that speech every week after every rehearsal, and was a coaching moment that taught me that it's indeed possible to accept criticism in a mature way without conflating the criticism of one's statements or in my case my performance as a criticism of one's self.

Edited April 16, 2020 by xordevoreaux

[phalczen]

The bottom line is that PUGs are not going to have protracted discussions before running a FP. If you think they are, you don't play the game (or any multi-player game for that matter).

 

Who said you have to have a protracted discussion?

“Good [morning/afternoon/evening] all. Are we doing the bonus boss, or no?”

 

This is too hard for you? It’s a yes or no question.

 

It’s usually the first thing I type upon joining a pug, often followed by, “Everyone know this fp?” Admittedly if a bonus boss is a conquest objective I am more direct:

 

“Good [morning/afternoon/evening] all, I would really like to do the bonus boss. Any objections?”

 

And it’s not like we have ten minutes of debating. I decide how important it is to me to do the bonus, in this example, before I even queue up. So if everyone denies my request, then I already know if I am going to stick it out or bow out before the mission starts and accept the lockout penalty. In fact I don’t think I’ve ever left because the other people didn’t want to do the bonus and I did. I just suck it up and hope I earn enough conquest points otherwise. If it’s an even split usually the intractable speed runners drop out.

 

No wonder your group experiences are so bad.

Edited April 16, 2020 by phalczen

[Tofu_Shark]

That is a different scenario. Art is open to interpretation and can be argued indefinitely. Technique and methods will of course be criticized and/or debated. I think there is a definitive answer to computer literacy vs. computer illiteracy in a world where digital technology is becoming increasingly ubiquitous. There is nothing "silly" about the argument I presented on the subject. Calling it such is a low tactic. Edited April 16, 2020 by Tofu_Shark

[JediQuaker]

Properly pointing out that a silly statement is indeed "silly" is not a "tactic". 🙂 Edited April 18, 2020 by JediQuaker

[DarkGruffalo]

Who said you have to have a protracted discussion?

“Good [morning/afternoon/evening] all. Are we doing the bonus boss, or no?”

 

This is too hard for you? It’s a yes or no question.

 

It’s usually the first thing I type upon joining a pug, often followed by, “Everyone know this fp?” Admittedly if a bonus boss is a conquest objective I am more direct:

 

“Good [morning/afternoon/evening] all, I would really like to do the bonus boss. Any objections?”

 

A

I usually do the same, and TBH, if they don't want to, it doesn't really bother me, most of the times, I'm happy enough to finish the FP, get 1/3 in the social, and que again, at some point, I normally get a PUG who do the boss, either because most want to originally, or because they just go with the flow.

[Tofu_Shark]

Many times when I ask, they don't respond, even though I say "yes or no will do." Nobody wants to communicate, period. It's like they think if they don't communicate, they don't have to negotiate. Edited April 19, 2020 by Tofu_Shark

[Sattee]

this thing got derailed, lol...............silliness

[killdozerone]

 

Now then.

 

We need to figure out how to allay the fears of newer players, because they fear being reprimanded (whether it be publicly or privately) for being unskilled. They seem to hope to be carried through group content without their lack of skill or inexperience being discovered. At the start of an FP, I always ask if anyone is new, and if they are, to speak up, because I'm willing to explain the fights and other mechanics. Just the night before, I wound up with a healer that got me killed on MM Hammer Station in the Tunneler fight. He claimed his cleanse was on CD, and I took a full 10 stacks of Targeting Laser 2/3 of the way into the fight, killing me. I wound up in a second queue with this same healer, and we had a lengthy discussion where he said he was clicking and had trouble identifying the icon. When I recommended he used keybinds, he attempted to backpedal and say he was using keys. I couldn't get him kicked, and he wound up getting me killed again against the first boss, this time wiping the rest of the team except for himself because of being able to stealth.

 

In another MM FP, the healer and I noticed the DPS were not playing their roles to the best of their abilities. They were also jumping back into the fight immediately after being revived without letting the healer heal them first. We both gave the both of them advice on how to better play their role to ensure the safety of the team, but they didn't listen, and during a boss fight, we wiped because they were not coordinating. They also seemed to think Master Mode was just like Veteran.

 

So even when you give inexperienced players a chance to come forward, they won't. And then their fears come true, someone comes down on them. In the worst case scenario, that a player becomes belligerent towards them and chews them out in Group Chat. Even when you politely attempt to correct mistakes, they don't listen. (And the best ones say something like, "don't tell me how to play!") I don't know what else one can do to dispel the fears one will get reprimanded for being unskilled if they're found out or encourage them to think about the safety of the team. They are more interested in protecting or inflating their ego than the safety of the team. Does anyone have any ideas?

 

And to you newer and/or less experienced players out there, it's best to be honest about your lack of skill and experience, rather than the team finding out the hard way by wiping or being put in extreme danger. And especially when more than one person offers you the same advice, it would be wise to reevaluate how you play.

 

 

I would have to agree with what you said about how people won't come forward and admit they are new/inexperienced. My theory is that at LEAST 50% of new players to this game come from World of Warcraft... a game where dungeons devolve into literal ****flinging over one or slight mistakes...so people have become accustomed to not talking, because more often then not in WoW if you told someone you were new to something, you'd get called a "noob", or "bad." It's just the same childish mentality that has carried over to this game. Theres nothing wrong with admitting you haven't done something, its better than learning the hard way. Which is so ironic because 20 years ago the community of MMO's seemed so much friendlier towards newer players.

 

The only idea I have is that they could make EVERY flashpoint have a solo mode, with scaling difficulties if you want. Then you could have the group mode as it is. This way people could have a way to learn the fights, albeit at an easier pace, making them ready for the "real thing".

[JediQuaker]

In actual fact there are several reasonable explanations for why some people don't respond to chat.

- they don't know how to type (whether or not they should know)

- they are incapable of typing, either because of handicaps, or because they have a pet sleeping on one arm, broken keyboard, etc.

- they turned OFF chat on the Fleet (for obvious reasons) and forgot to turn it back ON.

- their chatbox is small and can be hard to see depending upon screen rez, chatbox size, light reflection, etc.

- they just don't care. 🤔

- English is not their native language.

Etc. 🙂

 

"Always look on the bright side of life" - Monty Python.

Edited April 20, 2020 by JediQuaker

[HoloTweed]

It is up to the player to point out that they are new to the game or don't know the FP. If someone does something blatantly... unwise... and wipes the group, they deserve to be called out. If their response is "how am I supposed to know? I never did this FP before!" then they get vote kicked.

 

I'm happy to educate newer players about how to run a FP. I received the benefit of such instruction myself... BUT I immediately stated upon starting that I didn't know that content. People were almost always helpful. But if someone conceals their ignorance to the detriment of the group, they deserve the boot.

 

These same players usually are very belligerent (if you ask "why did you do that?!" they get huffy and either say to not tell them how to play or try to suggest everyone else is a bad player for not handling the situation). Either fess up or exit stage left. But I'm not here to play dentist and try to extract a confession. If someone won't speak up, that tells me everything I need to know about that person as a player.

 

We had one player in VM Directive 7 that refused to spacebar through the cut scenes. Every other person in the group mentioned "space bar" so it became obvious who the culprit was. He didn't ask if he could watch the cutscenes and proceeded to get testy because the group wanted to skip and suggested he do a story mode. The verbal insults and abuse from that player immediately started... and he was surprised when he got kicked.

 

They are ALL surprised when they get kicked after wiping the group through ignorance of the fights (or even their basic abilities) and their belligerence at not immediately telling the group that they don't know the fight and instead only reveal it after doing something monumentally stupid (tactically). We're here to have fun and the needs of the group outweigh the individual. Join in and play along or move along. We're not here to carry or try to make up for the bad gameplay of another player.

[SoonerJBD]

I don’t care why people might be reluctant to admit they don’t know an encounter. It’s irrational. If you mess up and wipe the group, you are quite likely to be vote kicked. I have NEVER seen a group kick someone for saying, “I’ve never done this FP before” or otherwise asking for help. People are generally quite happy to explain key mechanics. If I first find out you don’t know the fight because you wipe us, I will immediately initiate a vote kick.

[Shirvington]

Why do sub-75s intentionally choose KDY?

[Tofu_Shark]

I would have to agree with what you said about how people won't come forward and admit they are new/inexperienced. My theory is that at LEAST 50% of new players to this game come from World of Warcraft... a game where dungeons devolve into literal ****flinging over one or slight mistakes...so people have become accustomed to not talking, because more often then not in WoW if you told someone you were new to something, you'd get called a "noob", or "bad." It's just the same childish mentality that has carried over to this game. Theres nothing wrong with admitting you haven't done something, its better than learning the hard way. Which is so ironic because 20 years ago the community of MMO's seemed so much friendlier towards newer players.

 

The only idea I have is that they could make EVERY flashpoint have a solo mode, with scaling difficulties if you want. Then you could have the group mode as it is. This way people could have a way to learn the fights, albeit at an easier pace, making them ready for the "real thing".

Giving the other FPs a solo mode won't help, as you can go through the entire story with an OP companion set to heals. Most won't bother to learn the mechanics. They have to be forced to do that in an actual group.

 

When I'm new to content, I tell the group I'm new, reviewed a guide, (which I actually have,) and would like to do 100% run so I learn all the fights, important mobs to LoS, and can start determining the most efficient route for the bonus mission. Often, this is met with passive-aggression. They just ignore me and start running through the encounter. After bringing it up a few times, some groups become outright hostile in their responses. The ones that respond before we start, I've never had trouble with. It's a similar to the approach the newbs take, "ignore them and hope everything will work out." It's not going to work, because sooner or later, things will come to a head.

 

 

It is up to the player to point out that they are new to the game or don't know the FP. If someone does something blatantly... unwise... and wipes the group, they deserve to be called out. If their response is "how am I supposed to know? I never did this FP before!" then they get vote kicked.

 

I'm happy to educate newer players about how to run a FP. I received the benefit of such instruction myself... BUT I immediately stated upon starting that I didn't know that content. People were almost always helpful. But if someone conceals their ignorance to the detriment of the group, they deserve the boot.

 

These same players usually are very belligerent (if you ask "why did you do that?!" they get huffy and either say to not tell them how to play or try to suggest everyone else is a bad player for not handling the situation). Either fess up or exit stage left. But I'm not here to play dentist and try to extract a confession. If someone won't speak up, that tells me everything I need to know about that person as a player.

 

We had one player in VM Directive 7 that refused to spacebar through the cut scenes. Every other person in the group mentioned "space bar" so it became obvious who the culprit was. He didn't ask if he could watch the cutscenes and proceeded to get testy because the group wanted to skip and suggested he do a story mode. The verbal insults and abuse from that player immediately started... and he was surprised when he got kicked.

 

They are ALL surprised when they get kicked after wiping the group through ignorance of the fights (or even their basic abilities) and their belligerence at not immediately telling the group that they don't know the fight and instead only reveal it after doing something monumentally stupid (tactically). We're here to have fun and the needs of the group outweigh the individual. Join in and play along or move along. We're not here to carry or try to make up for the bad gameplay of another player.

Skipping conversations is such a divisive issue, I think it's best to address as it comes up, as it's not actual gameplay. Gameplay however should be handled before the encounter begins. I mean it is gameplay, but at the same time, it isn't. You can't die during a conversation.

Edited April 21, 2020 by Tofu_Shark

[KendraP]

Why do sub-75s intentionally choose KDY?

 

Because queuing random at say level 15 only gives you 2 options, one of which is kdy