I laughed harder than I should have lol. But this is actually kind of one of the problems in XIV. I mean, they did stuff to address it. They are pretty good about addressing problems imo, but just like, the way the game is setup, it's really easy to be anti-social. Which is both good and bad right, cause people who don't have time to make friends with a lot of people/or sit around waiting for someone to respond to shout/PF can get on and do their own thing, and everything works out for them.
On the other hand, people who like the social aspect of MMOs have a really hard time keeping anyone around for long. Even my good friends, if I wanna do content with them, I have to catch them before they do it once, like with roulettes. Because everything is scripted, if you do it again, you literally do the same thing twice, and that really irritates/bores a lot of people. Like even me, I can't stand doing a lot of the content again and again. Like extremes and stuff. I grab up 7 friends if I can, and farm it till I got my weapons. Go back occasionally if someone asks for help, and has a group setup, but like, going and taking a whole new load of 7 friends is agonizing. I almost never do it. Then the fact that stuff like Raids, and now, even this new Palace of the Dead, the fact that they have gates for things is also a counter against social aspect.
Raids, it's the gear lockout. Everyone wants a shot at the gear, so you can only go once a week on one character, so if you want to raid with multiple people, you have to have two characters.
Palace of the Dead, it's the save file system. Oh your file this time has you and 3 specific other people? Go get them if you want to continue. If you want to do it with anyone else, start over. Oh you went in with a "matched" group? Well, you'll have to do matched with that save till you beat it. Which it's not hard at all, just time consuming. But then the fact that it's not hard, pushes people to challenge themselves, and solo/duo/trio it or whatever. Which is fun but like... if you duo it, you're gonna be in there at a minimum without breaks, like 2.5 hours. If you're solo, almost 5 hours. I'm guilty of that, but I probably won't duo it again.
Just like, I realize this is a long whiny rant, but I honestly think it's a legitimate problem that the content either encourages or enforces less socializing.
I mean, Palace of the Dead is the best thing they've done in 3.0 so far imo. It's fun, different, exciting, and reminds me of old dungeon crawler RPGs. If you go in with 3 friends, you can *** around and talk to each other while you're doing it, cause it's really easy, but it's really easy without being boring. At least to me.
Just like, going back to my complaint from last night, if I didn't play with the people from this forum on Excalibur, I wouldn't have any reliable friends in game, at least hardly any. Which might sound odd, especially to Drac, since I invited a ton of people to the FFXIah LS over time, so much so that he has to be like, "Ugh! Another one of Vyre's "friends!" But like over half those people quit the game or are quiet all the time lol.
Just like, there's no incentive for me to go out and talk to someone, or try to make friends. Furthermore, once you do make friends, since they won't let us be like GMs and able to send Tells across instances(which is dumb as heck, but kinda good cause of RMT tell spam), you have to invite someone to an LS or FC if you want to talk to them while they are in an instance(so like between pulls or something). Most of the time they are full of LSes and don't want to drop one, so you have to join one of theirs, or they just simply think it's creepy that you want to get them in an LS.
Ai yi yi! I'll stop and post lol, but jeez I really got going. Idk, it just really bugs me sometimes.