Friend requests

Aendruu

Please excuse this obviously newbie question, but when someone sends a random friend request, are they:

1. seeking assistance in a dungeon/delve
2. attempting to invite you to a guild
3. wanting to expand their friends list
4. genuinely seeking an online friend

I'm still trying to learn the etiquette of ESO, but if I were to ask someone to be my friend, I'd first greet them in chat and validate my request. But then, I know absolutely nothing about grouping for quests etc. That is, do you need to be friends with someone to form a group in order to play though a delve i.e. is this merely a temporary friendship? I'm confused that if I'm asked to be someone's friend in a random encounter in some deep dark cave, am I being impolite to deny their request simply because I don't know who they are?

Essentially, I really feel terrible when I I deny someone's friend request, and in doing do, am I actually being the rude person?

Taleof2Cities

You be you, @Rhypon.

There’s no requirement that you have to accept a friend request.

It’s just like real life ... where players have a multitude of reasons for wanting to be your friend.

They may send a request after completing a difficult dungeon together ... or because they like your outfit style.

Or, you may get a request because a player is brand new to the game and has many questions.

A friend can also be temporary. Like when I occasionally craft gear for a player and have to switch characters to my Master Crafter.

Nestor

You don't need to be Friends to Group. Just have a common goal, like wanting to do a Group Dungeon.

You Friend a person in this game because of one or more of the following reasons:

1. You want to be or already are their friend
2. They are a crafter and you want to find them again
3. They are fun to run dungeons or content or pvp with
4. You want to stalk them....just kidding

There could be other reasons.

JKorr

I'll ask someone to add me as a friend if they want a werewolf bite and I have to change characters. I tend to lose the name, and chat goes away when you switch characters....

AcadianPaladin

@Taleof2Cities nailed it: Folks make/accept/reject friend requests for a variety of reasons and one cannot conclude what goes into their individual decisions or situations.

One advantage of a big friends list is that when you have a new char trying to get around, you can port to any friend on line. That makes it easier to get to new areas.

A drawback (to me) of a big friends list is the nonstop 'xxx logged on/off' messages that you cannot filter out in vanilla chat box. I also don't like actively advertising my presence since I'm playing generally to spend time with my elf, not other humans and, frankly, prefer being a little harder to find. Therefore, I keep my friends list at precisely zero. I belong to two small guilds and guildmates have no trouble seeing if I'm on line if they want by actively checking the guild roster. I know how to play 'offline' but do not wish to do so. I've looked at addons but they are not an improvement to the arrangements I have (which I like).

For those I get to know who ask me to be friends, I explain my situation. For friend requests from more or less strangers, I simply decline them and hope they do not take it personally.

Kelces

Sometimes it just happens as an accident when someone wants to revive. Otherwise it's mostly point 3 and 4.