Don't let Experianced palyersneed to to early lvl flaspoints

[dynatrope]

I've only experianced a poor or abusive time with lvl 80 experianced players doing eary lvl flahspoints with lower lvl charcters just because they need the week;y achivement - I'm tired of them and have cancled my sub

[SteveTheCynic]

OK, bye, please give your stuff to Tora on the way out.

[DWho]

Unfortunately, a mechanic put into the game to encourage people to do group content (and learn how to play it) by making it easier to group up with other random players seeking to do the same, has been completely taken over by speed-runners and other "toxic" elements (mostly players that got kicked out of guilds for bad behavior or couldn't get into guilds because of their reputation). They are looking solely for the rewards (particularly the bonus for having all flashpoints checked in group finder which includes the low level ones) and not the "social" aspects of playing in a group. There are some good players that use group finder and actually do help you out and will interact with you. Unfortunately that seems to be becoming more the exception that the rule.

[RowanThursday]

The whole 'spacebar' thing seems to be a minefield. Wherever you look, someone has an opinion on it, and it appears to provoke more bitter feuds between players than anything else in the game. 

Don't mistake me, I'm with you on this, I absolutely loathe getting pugged with speed runners who zoom through everything like a hyperactive hamster on speed and fly into hysterical rages if anyone takes a moment to, you know, work out which way they're going, take a sip of a drink, breathe, or fart, let alone accidentally engages a mob group that the speed runner has judged to be skippable but is incapable of taking the time to communicate their intentions about, because, apparently, you're supposed to know.

I admit, my prejudices are showing, and I won't deny that, but there are more than enough threads around with incredibly bilious rants from those speed runners, furious about newbies or just slowbies apparently wasting 'their time' by not frantically hammering their spacebar till it breaks in every conversation, and so forth.

Now, my answer to how to resolve this discord would be "remove the option to spacebar cutscenes" so there's no longer the disagreement about doing it- but, like I just said, I'm incredibly biased, grins.

A fairer and more sensible answer, would probably be to add to the gorram group finder checkboxes for "Speed-run" and "Auto-skip cutscenes", and let us choose.  That would be better for all of us. 

The speed runners wouldn't be being slowed down by us stopping to smell the daisies and enjoy the game, and so would get a far less frustrating experience of playing "their" way, and we'd be able to enjoy playing our way without either enraging them, getting enraged by them, or both.

[Shayddow]

Quote

A fairer and more sensible answer, would probably be to add to the gorram group finder checkboxes for "Speed-run" and "Auto-skip cutscenes", and let us choose.  That would be better for all of us. 

This would be great!

[BladedDingo]

On 3/17/2023 at 2:15 PM, RowanThursday said:

A fairer and more sensible answer, would probably be to add to the gorram group finder checkboxes for "Speed-run" and "Auto-skip cutscenes", and let us choose.  That would be better for all of us. 

FFXIV has an option for "Skip cutscenes I've already viewed."

This will automatically skip any cutscene you've already seen once.

[DawnAskham]

Stop putting higher-level characters into BT / Essessels, let players select / deselect (even a limited number) and still get credit for weekly / CQ / seasons, and / or remove the 'random' requirement from weekly / CQ / seasons.

OR auto-skip ALL cut scenes in group finder accessed FPs that have a solo mode (I really don't care if someone watches the 30 sec to minute cut scene in Hammer or Cadmimu or RR - it's the FPs with 10+ minutes of cut scenes that annoy me, BT / Essessels at the top of the list.

Also if you don't want to be grouped with three other players wanting to get the FP completed efficiently instead of spending the day exploring every corner, use solo mode - that's why it exists.

Edited March 22, 2023 by DawnAskham

[Darcmoon]

1 hour ago, BladedDingo said:

FFXIV has an option for "Skip cutscenes I've already viewed."

This will automatically skip any cutscene you've already seen once.

The problem then would probably be the same as it is now.   You would still be locked into a type of cutscene until the X number of players finished watching the whole thing.   It’s the way they built the stupid things in FP. 

[casirabit]

Well, you could do them solo and skip your problem. 

Edited March 22, 2023 by casirabit

[DWho]

1 hour ago, casirabit said:

Well, you could do them solo and skip your problem. 

two problems with that approach

1) not all early flashpoints have a solo mode (Athiss for example)

2) You can't learn how to play tanks or healers by doing the solo flashpoints. They are all set up for DPS.

[casirabit]

22 hours ago, BladedDingo said:

FFXIV has an option for "Skip cutscenes I've already viewed."

This will automatically skip any cutscene you've already seen once.

FFXIV also has the option (for the main dungeons/flashpoints) that you can use NPCs for them (and sometimes those NPCs are better than regular players, lol).  They also have the option (once you unlock them from your Grand Company) to use your squadron for some of the dungeons that do not have the option.

[casirabit]

17 hours ago, DWho said:

two problems with that approach

1) not all early flashpoints have a solo mode (Athiss for example)

2) You can't learn how to play tanks or healers by doing the solo flashpoints. They are all set up for DPS.

Maybe not but it would give the OP a choice since they do not seem to like certain people grouping with him/her.

[xxSHOONYxx]

The easier solution would be for the whole group to get extra DRMs or something like that (that is not transferable) when there is at least one new person to the fp or have done it less than 3 times. So people that have done the same fps for over 10 years and know everything by memory are encouraged or want to have new players on their group. 
Outside of that it should be expected everyone to spacebar through conversations/auto skip unless you go in manually with other 3 people or in solo mode.

[DWho]

29 minutes ago, xxSHOONYxx said:

Outside of that it should be expected everyone to spacebar through conversations/auto skip unless you go in manually with other 3 people or in solo mode.

It should be expected that anyone using Group Finder to run FPs instead of putting together a group outside of it should expect to have to wait for people to watch the cutscenes. Group Finder was put into the game for new players to experience the flashpoints more easily (and learn how to play their classes in them) not make it easier for people to speed run content for rewards. If spacebarring is required, there should be no extra rewards.

[Darcmoon]

1 hour ago, DWho said:

It should be expected that anyone using Group Finder to run FPs instead of putting together a group outside of it should expect to have to wait for people to watch the cutscenes. Group Finder was put into the game for new players to experience the flashpoints more easily (and learn how to play their classes in them) not make it easier for people to speed run content for rewards. If spacebarring is required, there should be no extra rewards.

It wasn’t added to make it easier for new players.  It was added to make it easier for all players to find a group for flashpoints.  

[DWho]

10 minutes ago, Darcmoon said:

It wasn’t added to make it easier for new players.  It was added to make it easier for all players to find a group for flashpoints.  

New players got the most benefit out of it since "experienced" players have played the game enough to have a cadre of friends to play with and know how to form groups. New players don't have the connections in game yet to form their own groups, for many the early flashpoints provided that. It is unreasonable to expect those least able to form groups to do so, so that the more experienced players can speed run the content more easily.

Edit: It was added back in 2.0 when high level characters could still solo all of the low level flashpoints (and the game population was high enough that finding a group to do a flashpoint was as simple as standing by the entrance to it) so there was no reason, other than social, to group up a bunch of high level characters to run them (there were other flashpoints for high level characters to run in groups if they wanted the challenge). Now, the reason people run them with high level characters through Group Finder is for the increased rewards (primarily anyway).

Edited March 23, 2023 by DWho

[Darcmoon]

2 minutes ago, DWho said:

New players got the most benefit out of it since "experienced" players have played the game enough to have a cadre of friends to play with and know how to form groups. New players don't have the connections in game yet to form their own groups, for many the early flashpoints provided that. It is unreasonable to expect those least able to form groups to do so, so that the more experienced players can speed run the content.

I don’t think most players are forming connections to run vet FPs.  Even those who have the connections, use them to do MM FPs.  They jump in the que to run a vet FP because it is fast (in theory) and rewards, conquest, tech frags, etc….   Additionally, there are a number of ‘experienced’ people who play the game effectively solo.  They may ( or may not) be in a guild but said guild doesn’t necessarily have others willing or even available to run a FP when someone is playing.  

[DWho]

Just now, Darcmoon said:

I don’t think most players are forming connections to run vet FPs.  Even those who have the connections, use them to do MM FPs.  They jump in the que to run a vet FP because it is fast (in theory) and rewards, conquest, tech frags, etc….   Additionally, there are a number of ‘experienced’ people who play the game effectively solo.  They may ( or may not) be in a guild but said guild doesn’t necessarily have others willing or even available to run a FP when someone is playing.  

This wasn't about vet flashpoints as there are virtually no low level players running Vet flashpoints which is what the OP was complaining about

[Darcmoon]

1 minute ago, DWho said:

This wasn't about vet flashpoints as there are virtually no low level players running Vet flashpoints which is what the OP was complaining about

I saw his original post which he has edited.  Even there it doesn’t say it is about MM or vet FP.  Also, I have seen a lot of lower level players running vet FPs.  Saying there are virtually none running them is false. 

[DWho]

4 minutes ago, Darcmoon said:

I saw his original post which he has edited.  Even there it doesn’t say it is about MM or vet FP.  Also, I have seen a lot of lower level players running vet FPs.  Saying there are virtually none running them is false. 

The lowest level character I recall seeing running one of the "vet" flashpoints through GF was level 50 or 60 which I wouldn't consider low level.

[Darcmoon]

2 minutes ago, DWho said:

The lowest level character I recall seeing running one of the "vet" flashpoints through GF was level 50 or 60 which I wouldn't consider low level.

That may be but I have run into many between the levels of 15 and 50 running vet flashpoints. 

[DWho]

4 minutes ago, Darcmoon said:

That may be but I have run into many between the levels of 15 and 50 running vet flashpoints. 

Well then you can put your limits on Vet and above flashpoints and I wouldn't care. Story mode flashpoints should be accessible without restriction (level, space-barring requirements, mob skipping, etc) to anyone high enough level to be on the planet/station where they can pick it up (or whatever the original level limitation was). If you want to play a Story Flashpoint through Group Finder and don't want "low levels" or "story watchers" or "non-skippers" along, it is your responsibility to put the group together, not theirs.

Edited March 23, 2023 by DWho

[Darcmoon]

10 minutes ago, DWho said:

Well then you can put your limits on Vet and above flashpoints and I wouldn't care. Story mode flashpoints should be accessible without restriction (level, space-barring requirements, mob skipping, etc) to anyone high enough level to be on the planet/station where they can pick it up (or whatever the original level limitation was). If you want to play a Story Flashpoint through Group Finder and don't want "low levels" or "story watchers" or "non-skippers" along, it is your responsibility to put the group together, not theirs.

Story mode flashpoints are done solo.   They don’t need more than one person and hasn’t been the topic of this conversation. 
 

Edit: ok, story mode has popped up in a few of the posts but the main issue has been about spacebaring and/or speed running in vet FPs. 

Edited March 23, 2023 by Darcmoon

[DWho]

6 minutes ago, Darcmoon said:

Story mode flashpoints are done solo.   They don’t need more than one person and hasn’t been the topic of this conversation. 

Story mode is not Solo mode. Those are two different things. Most of the "low-level" flashpoints don't even have a solo mode.

[Darcmoon]

1 minute ago, DWho said:

Story mode is not Solo mode. Those are two different things. Most of the "low-level" flashpoints don't even have a solo mode.

People use story and solo mode interchangeable since it is the same thing for the FPs where you get the Jesus bot.  It’s only been since around ‘Fractured Alliances’ that BW has had differences in them.