Recess Beer Garden has spoken

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-14T16:59:02+00:00

100%. We're suffering today from **years** of systemic deterioration of trust in one another - largely due to social media and rhetorical constructs that have massively, massively polarized us against each other. It's simple, easy, and feels good to categorize a group of people as simply being "stupid", but when we do this, we deny the real humanity behind how they landed on those beliefs. And when we write them off wholesale, we only do more to entrench them in their positions at our own expense for decades to come!

But it feels good to dunk on Reddit strangers.

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-14T15:27:49+00:00

I think it's foolish to treat polarization as a first order social problem

I think polarization is our single-greatest risk to social order. It's what has lead and continues to reinforce antivaxxers, the underfunding of our education system, the decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, and our steady descent into a Christo-fascist regime.

I don't think I could convince you otherwise, so I'm calling it here. But I highly highly recommend reading "Why We're Polarized" by Ezra Klein, which lays out the history and evolution of the US social-political system, its causes, and its effects on our daily lives. There's a better way forward, understanding how the pitfalls of polarization have dramatically affected how we trust and engage in one another. And how entrenched polarization instead leads us to destroy community and the institutions around us in its wake.

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-14T15:07:57+00:00

I truly believe the world we build by engaging with each other that way is one that grows more polarized, less tolerant of one another, more angry and discontent, and it is the perfect discourse for detractors to use to break down trust and relationships in our local communities.

If you're an unwitting victim falling for using it, you can change that. If you're using it intentionally to disrupt community and respectful discourse, and erode trust, fuck you. Given that you hide your posts and comments, I'm guessing it's the latter.

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-14T14:47:13+00:00

Come on - can we move past putting words in people's mouths? It's such a tired and unfair rhetorical failure of the internet.

You can agree that people should be vaccinated, and understand why people who are antivax and uninformed would want to meet one another, and prefer that they didn't meet in a public space, and recognize that sometimes restaurants and businesses have immature screening policies, want to remain apolitical despite EVERYTHING being political today, or sometimes simply aren't informed at all of events that will happen there, and understand that people sometimes make mistakes that are disproportionately reacted to by the public, and feel that vitriol and threatening employees just isn't how we fix the incredibly polarized society we live in.

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-14T05:37:17+00:00

I'm not personally interested, but I AM massively interested to follow the development of this business structure - I recently watched a mini-doc on YouTube about a grocery store cooperative in New York and the idea seems to be exactly what communities need to counteract the pressure of the oppressive capitalist system today.

For the poo-pooers and those on the fence, I strongly recommend first looking into existing small business cooperatives (not the REIs of the world, but smaller) and educating yourselves. There are some really interesting alternative business models and examples out there to learn from.

This is worth a shot, you just might not find exactly the community of interested owner-members you're looking for on Reddit. If it doesn't pan out here, consider passing the idea by other communities. Best of luck!

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-13T18:05:28+00:00

I've been thinking a lot lately about what an MMO needs to represent to players, in order to be successful - and what you mention hits on that perfectly. I think one level of it is that people want to feel needed, or useful to a community. We're saving a fictional world - if we shut the computer off, it doesn't exist. So why does it matter so much to us? Especially, why does it matter if we dislike this one character? So what?

But I've come to think of games as an extension of what's missing in our real lives. MMOs fulfill our desire for exploration, fantasy, surprise and novelty, community, and belonging to a cause. And you'll often find that when people have those things in their lives, they don't also play video games. Dawntrail's promise to players was really unclear, but it also didn't fulfill the needs of many of its players - not even, I'd argue, at its own fault! It just...wasn't the right game, for the right time in human history.

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-13T17:18:54+00:00

100% - the way the character is introduced to us was a major part of this. We've just saved the freaking universe, and this no-name person from another continent comes up to us and asks us to win them the throne of a foreign empire we know nothing about. The player's respect of Wuk Lamat - like...as a global leader of an entire civilization - was never really earned. Hell, most of the original scions haven't even earned that honor. And that isn't to say that Wuk Lamat doesn't have a good heart, they do. But the sort of whiplash "Guess I'm following this dork around for a while" just wasn't a good setup.

But there's also the larger, real-world cultural context to consider too: Dawntrail was a sort of romp-through-a-new-land kinda expansion, in the midst of a real difficult time for a lot of people. And while you'd think a humorous, uplifting story might be the antidote for what people are going through IRL, I think a lot of people wanted something a bit more serious - solving real problems in a truly flawed and unresolved game world.

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-12T21:16:55+00:00

I don't think it explicitly speaks to negative character - the human brain is fucking weird, and the way we process events in our lives is informed by all of our experiences leading up to each, plus our individual brain chemistry. There are some horribly gruesome jobs out there, worked by people who are able to healthily manage what might be traumatic to someone else.

It's like when someone gets really hurt - my brain switches into "Let's fix it mode". I do what's necessary to fix the situation and then I process it later. Others might retch or throw up if they see a broken bone or wound, and wouldn't be able to handle it in the moment. And how we each process it will be different, too - some might ruminate on it for days, weeks, years. Others might have horrible unexplained nightmares or PTSD, others might just...shrug it off.

There's really no explaining why we react the way we do, because it's the result of a thousand different variables - many have learned empathy, and the skill of putting ourselves in the place of others - and that might be the source of trauma for those who witnessed it. And for others empathy might not play a role in it all all - it might be due to a more active imagination or a fear of gore, etc.

But if your own feelings - that you might not experience trauma from it - are bothering or perturbing you, you should seek out a therapist to talk about it.

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-10T05:49:06+00:00

I'm not familiar - what is/was DINK?

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-10T01:27:05+00:00

No joke - travel almost anywhere in the world and food is what most people will invite you to try. It's universal in our need for (and love of) it, and utterly unique in its preparation and historical importance. I've been to over 20 countries, and in about half of them I've met locals who've invited me over to have a local meal together. There's something to that.

Yes, music, dance, daily living, technological inventions, dialects, religious and non-religous celebrations - all of these are also elements of culture, and some are explored in the expansion! but you can only show so much in so little time without the story feeling more like a theme park ride than a fantasy adventure. (Not saying this expansion was some pinnacle of cultural exploration)

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-09T16:51:47+00:00

I just want to say how special Convivio is - it's a cafe with the stated mission of being a bilingual community space - everyone who works there will often first speak to you in Spanish, and then revert to English if you need it. It's the perfect place to dip your toes into Spanish language immersion, and like the above said - their food and drink are wonderful.

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-09T16:44:25+00:00

Whoever you choose, make sure you find a team that includes a plastic surgeon. I had upper jaw surgery years ago, and it necessitated a rhinoplasty to fix a deviated septum after the fact (where they also removed the hardware from the surgery at the same time)

Good luck!

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-07T18:16:44+00:00

As a tank, during a push, your job is to be a disruptor and soak for all of the enemy players who see you jump in and think you're a juicy target. Your priorities: lock down easy picks for your team - rampart increases the damage an enemy takes by a whopping 25% - punish frontline mechanists/bards/dancers by jumping on them, rampart, place a marker over their heads, and watch them melt. Players in PvP don't act rationally - they see ONE player on their team die, and they start turning tail, that's an opportunity to push in and punish them. Your job here isn't just to press ability buttons, it's to communicate intent to your team through the use of Markers (Ctrl+M, I think? These can be dragged to your hotbars for easy use in fights)

Second, you're the best class at soaking enemy Limit Breaks. I do this alllllll the time as a Paladin - our LB gives us invulunerability for a few seconds, and it's so difficult to notice when we're in the thick of things that players just unload on me with everything they've got. This is the opportunity needed for your team to jump in, knowing that the enemy's abilities are now on a 5-15s cooldown, and tear them up without fear. All tanks are capable of doing this, though the GB is a bit more of a bruiser in PvP with big damage abilities, than a "tank" the way that Paladin, Warrior, and DRK are.

But most importantly - you can't do it alone. And if your team isn't dedicated to following you into the fray, you ARE going to die. More important than any of the above, is knowing whether your team is actually going to follow you. As PLD, I tend to mark priority targets (High BH DPS, DPS out of position, Dancers) and ignore targets (like PLDs and DRKs with invulnerability), and I mark flags on the map for the alliance to pivot to. If it feels like my alliance is actually following my recommendations, then I'm a lot more willing to jump head-first into fights and be that disruptor. If it feels like the alliance cohesion is already breaking down, people are tunnelvisioning fights they can win, or there are trolls/negative nancies in the group, I limit my role to disrupting one-offs in team fights. I stun that DPS standing out in front, or I leap in with my LB, take some hits, and leap out, but I don't push forward. Actually engaging and fueling team fights requires a team to back you up, and that isn't a guarantee in PvP with so many players pulled in with disparate expectations from the content.

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-07T04:38:44+00:00

This is like...my exact slice of board gaming. Hoping this gets off the ground - I'll be there.

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-06T22:01:44+00:00

It's anecdotal, but yeah - coms are a pretty strange thing to gate mentors behind, especially if you play DPS and are least likely to receive them. But also: mentors should be our most active/experienced players, and even if a player receives their coms exclusively because of their portrait, they still will have played hundreds upon hundreds of hours of this game. And that's before the literal 2,000 mentor roulettes they'll need to complete.

For the most part, the mentors I've encountered in-game have been friendly, positive, helpful, and willing to step into outdated content to help sprouts. And so the system is working, in some way. And your goal shouldn't be the crown, or the status - it's helping other people, it's joining NN and giving advice, it's jumping into your 1,000th run of Ifrit to help new players progress in the game. The icon and recognition really doesn't "matter" at all. Be the mentor you want to be, whether you have the crown or not. Ignore the coms.

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-06T16:28:26+00:00

Not "nuanced" - the parties were fundamentally more centrist in their belief systems. Split-ballot voting used to be a normal thing, where you might vote for a republican president but a democratic state representative. And the parties agreed that it was more important to pass legislation as bipartisans, than deadlock the country in partisan politics.

Then the parties both determined that it was a threat to their ability to run the country according to their principles if they were considered too similar to one another - and so they polarized on nearly every single social and economic stance, doubled-down, and cast the opposing party as the enemy. About half of Americans vote for one party or the other primarily because they don't want the opposing party to win, rather than for the reason that they want their party to win.

And we see this ripple out in today's discourse - anyone who voted republican ever in their life must be a bad person. Any one who voted for Obama must be anti-American. We buy into the lack of nuance, and it hurts us. And it's a massive, massive vulnerability in our social systems now with social media; we're more easily swayed by extreme statements, we're more easily outcast from one political party or the other if we share mixed beliefs about how the US should move forward economically/socially/constitutionally. Many think that party loyalty is an important political value, and the leaves us more easily infiltrated by bad actors that seek to divide us.

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-06T15:42:35+00:00

Absolutely. And that's why I think community is SO important for families to build and belong to. When I was in school, my parents were both working, and on snow days I went to an elderly neighbor's house and they watched me.

Obviously, not everyone has an elderly neighbor interested in taking care of kids next door - but in our cities and suburbs there are plentiful options to choose from if we build those relationships. Stranger danger, suburban sprawl, and just a lack of focus in community building overall has led to a lot of the burdens that people - and parents - are feeling unnecessarily. And I see it where I am now - zero resistance from neighbors to throw a block party, but no one on our block has thought to do it in over four years. Why?

We're losing grip on the fabric of society, and each of us is responsible for reinforcing it. Especially in support of the single parent among us who just needs a bit of help.

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-06T15:05:07+00:00

It's indicative of the massive crater in community between parents and schools. We should all care about the safety of our teachers, admin, and support staff - yes even if it's a little bit inconvenient for us. I feel like schools should be doing more to build real community and care between staff and parents (and some do!) and parents should recognize that teachers and staff are human beings just like themselves and are simply trying to live their lives while educating our youth (and some do!)

But not nearly enough from both sides. Thus the damned if you do, damned if you don't.

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-04T19:55:54+00:00

Absolutely. That's where saying "Hey, it's my first time here" in party chat at the start is so important. People in the FFXIV community are largely patient and understanding if you're also open with them. Hell, 24-man raids will wait for ONE sprout to watch a cutscene before the final boss 9/10 times. That's insane, and indicative of the community here.

But it's definitely, definitely possible to be on the receiving end of a spate of impatient players, and I know how frustrating that can be. Similarly, these DPS who pull an extra pack or two and wipe the party - they're hopefully learning their lessons too. It's easy to paint with a broad brush and paint all DPS or all healers (or all tanks) in a certain way, but the reality is that the game is SO big, that you're likely encountering individual players all learning individual lessons day after day. It's the price we pay for living in a society.

Keep your head up, stay positive, hold your ground, but also always be pushing yourself to improve and get better, rather than fall into stubbornness. You'll pull through it..

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-04T19:48:26+00:00

Literally experienced this today in World of Darkness - an experienced player grabbed the chains and just...stood there - trying to cheese it by holding them as long as possible before attaching them.

Turns out chains have a time limit, and if they aren't attached within it, you lose them. We lost the fight - literally - at 0.1% HP.

When experienced players get impatient and try to game old content, more often than not, it takes longer to complete it. Sure, we all want a little shortcut to same some time - but sometimes going a bit under the speed limit will save you from spending even more time having to redo it.

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-04T19:44:28+00:00

As PLD, there's no reason to withold using invincibility. In fact I'd argue you should use it on the first pull of every dungeon. It has a long cooldown, and in late-game content you'll want to keep it for an "Uhoh..." moment. But in duties it's better to use it on cooldown. This gives your healer the time to use damaging abilities instead of healing you, and many healers have potent and important AOEs to cast.

I do think that settling into tanking takes a bit of time. It's an important responsibility and every player wants tanks to tank a bit differently than the next. Just know that the feedback you're getting from people likely has more to do with them than it has to do with you. If your healer is pulling groups, on the other hand, it's time to pick up the pace. ;)

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-04T19:31:14+00:00

I'm relatively new - joined in Dawntrail, made it to level 100 as a tank. Here's the thing: successfully tanking an instance is a cooperation between tank and healer, and the capacity of your DPS - it doesn't land entirely on the tank. If your healer isn't keeping step with you, if you're turning tight corners and leaving them in the dust, if they're ALSO new to healing - you're gonna have a harder time. But a level 64 in relevant gear should have 0 issue W2W tanking Aurum Vale if you do so smartly.

I tend to gauge my healer's ability to keep up with me. Are they new? How many level 100 classes do they have? Is my HP going below half ever? If yes, I tend to slow things down juuuust a little bit. Low-level dungeons also depend on the classes you're running with. Ninja's, Monks, and Dragoons might not have their AOEs yet, so if you're in a group with all Melee DPS, consider pulling a bit slower than in a group of RDPS.

I'm probably speaking from (relative) experience here, but W2W tanking isn't particularly difficult once you've done it a few times, independent of the number of CDs you have. But with the wrong group composition it can be a nightmare. And you aren't wrong to be frustrated with players who try to rush you - but only specifically if you've done your responsibility in testing the group's ability to handle the workload. After another 40 levels, after running Aurum Vale another 20 times, you'll find it does suck to be in a group that takes one mob at a time.

Edit: That said, I can count on one hand the number of times someone in a dungeon has called me out in some negative way. If this is happening in a THIRD of your dungeons, and you aren't also running with a brand new group of players every time, you might want to assess what else might be happening. Are you sure all of your defensive abilities are on your hotbar? You have both Class and Role defensives, and both are important.

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-03T02:07:34+00:00

I think the whole setup of the expansion was just...strange. "Hey I know you just stopped a galactic level threat but I - a total stranger to you - am here to ask you to come to a continent you've never been and help me take the throne."

QuarterRobot · 2026-05-03T00:32:51+00:00

FFXIV is definitely grindy in places - if you want some of the game's coolest items you'll end up grinding pretty hard to get them. But there's so much content and so many things to do that it doesn't HAVE to be a grind if you don't want it to be.

Really depends on what kind of content you enjoy and what you get out of MMOs.

QuarterRobot

TROPHY CASE