Polite & Social vs Annoying and Persuasive in a chat

myskyrim26 · January 2020

TL DR: I don't know how to keep conversation in a chat. Either I have to log off, or my correspondent logs off to stop it. No, I'm never rude. No, I never argue. No, I never play a teacher or whatever.

Guys, I have a problem.
I'm not used to be quite a social person, I'm rather reserved and I keep to myself. I'm not used to a live chat with some unknown person. So, problems arise:

Sometimes I chat with someone from a guild, or in a zone, or even somebody I made friends (just accepted a request, as I never refuse such requests). We wisper, not talk "in public". At some moment I feel... like I have nothing else to say, or I don't want to do what my correspondent offers. For example, I don't want to do dungeon right now, or RP, or whatever. And you know what I do then? I'm telling some lie - the reason i need to log off right now. And I feel bad about a person I had to lie to, and about myself being so incapable to talk to someone, and again about myself sitting offline istead of playing ESO.

Today was just vice versa. I had a conversation. I was not particularly interested, but I talked because I wanted to be polite. And... my correspondent told me that he/she needs to log off right now because of <put a reason here> for just 2 minutes. I felt that it was because I was was annoying. 2 minutes passed, 10, 20 - my correspondent never appeared again in chat, yet was active in a guild rooster. Damn, I don't want to be annoying, and I understand what that person feels! But how to keep the chat conversation in a right way?!

Edit because of: Spelling...

Wheresthetea11 · January 2020

You’re looking into things too much. Relax. If you don’t wanna do a dungeon/bg/rp etc, just say no. 9.9999/10 times the other person is not going to be upset. If someone says they’ll be back and don’t? C’est la vie, they didn’t know how to end the conversation either and just decided to make up some excuse. If the convo dies, eh time to do something else or go your separate ways. If what they’re talking about is boring as sh*t? Listen for a bit, to be polite, but you can say you wanna go do your own thing. You can change the topic if you want. People have thicker skin than you credit them for.

myskyrim26 · January 2020

Wheresthetea11 wrote: »

You’re looking into things too much. Relax. If you don’t wanna do a dungeon/bg/rp etc, just say no. 9.9999/10 times the other person is not going to be upset. If someone says they’ll be back and don’t? C’est la vie, they didn’t know how to end the conversation either and just decided to make up some excuse. If the convo dies, eh time to do something else or go your separate ways. If what they’re talking about is boring as sh*t? Listen for a bit, to be polite, but you can say you wanna go do your own thing. You can change the topic if you want. People have thicker skin than you credit them for.

Thank you for understanding and good advice. I'm always afraid to hurt someone and be rude.

Wheresthetea11 · January 2020

myskyrim26 wrote: »

Wheresthetea11 wrote: »

You’re looking into things too much. Relax. If you don’t wanna do a dungeon/bg/rp etc, just say no. 9.9999/10 times the other person is not going to be upset. If someone says they’ll be back and don’t? C’est la vie, they didn’t know how to end the conversation either and just decided to make up some excuse. If the convo dies, eh time to do something else or go your separate ways. If what they’re talking about is boring as sh*t? Listen for a bit, to be polite, but you can say you wanna go do your own thing. You can change the topic if you want. People have thicker skin than you credit them for.

Thank you for understanding and good advice. I'm always afraid to hurt someone and be rude.

Always happy to help

SeaGtGruff · January 2020

I wouldn't worry about it. Sometimes people log out expecting to be back on after a brief break, but then something comes up and they can't log in again as they'd expected to. Life happens.

Of course, it's possible that they knew they weren't going to be back on until several hours later, but they intentionally lied for some reason. Personally, I think it's better to just be honest and say you don't know when you'll be back on again, but I guess some people prefer to be evasive rather than direct.

Finedaible · January 2020

myskyrim26 wrote: »

Wheresthetea11 wrote: »

You’re looking into things too much. Relax. If you don’t wanna do a dungeon/bg/rp etc, just say no. 9.9999/10 times the other person is not going to be upset. If someone says they’ll be back and don’t? C’est la vie, they didn’t know how to end the conversation either and just decided to make up some excuse. If the convo dies, eh time to do something else or go your separate ways. If what they’re talking about is boring as sh*t? Listen for a bit, to be polite, but you can say you wanna go do your own thing. You can change the topic if you want. People have thicker skin than you credit them for.

Thank you for understanding and good advice. I'm always afraid to hurt someone and be rude.

I agree with Whereisthetea11. Many people also communicate quite differently through text/chat than they do in real life too, so don't read into it too much. Odds are the people you are chatting with are in much the same situation as you are. I've been told I express myself more clearly through text/chat than I do in real-life conversations, so I actually find the difference between online personality and real-life personality to be a rather interesting subject, and insightful. Don't be afraid to hurt someone's feelings just because you disagree with them. It is possible to be respectful while also disagreeing with someone. If they take offense to that, then that's their problem, not yours.

Kahnak · January 2020

Whenever this happens to me, I like to imagine that the person that left the conversation had to do so because they had to take a violent poop and simply wanted to be polite. Then I have a brief chuckle and move on with my life.

NordSwordnBoard · January 2020

The fact you examine yourself in this way is a good thing. Don't over examine though, I bet you did your social part in the exchanges. You can't satisfy all the people all the time, yourself included.

Loves_guars · January 2020

Oh dont worry, aka, hakuna matata. I don't know your age, but back in my day we used to have face to face interactions. Crazy, I know.
With those it was so much easier to tell if the other person wants to keep talking or leave (it's a lost art you have to learn to read other persons).

So for example, when you are in the internet is a lot more difficult, but you can tell if the other person is taking more time to answer then she obviously her mind is wondering away, and you can do the same to hint that you want to end the conversation. Or reply with shorter answers. It's nothing personal of course, sometimes you want to take a rest or do some stuff, happens all the time, so don't get upset about it. And never be afraid of saying you don't want to talk or you make an excuse to leave.

myskyrim26 · January 2020

Thank you all, guys! Now I feel much better ready for how conversations go!

myskyrim26 · January 2020

Loves_guars wrote: »

I don't know your age, but back in my day we used to have face to face interactions. Crazy, I know.

That's it! I can do it in real life. I can handle hard situations in real life. I did. But in a chat? Talk to the person you never see? Quite a different experience.

P.S.: age 36, country - Russia, had quite a tough time in 90-ies

JKorr · January 2020

myskyrim26 wrote: »

Wheresthetea11 wrote: »

You’re looking into things too much. Relax. If you don’t wanna do a dungeon/bg/rp etc, just say no. 9.9999/10 times the other person is not going to be upset. If someone says they’ll be back and don’t? C’est la vie, they didn’t know how to end the conversation either and just decided to make up some excuse. If the convo dies, eh time to do something else or go your separate ways. If what they’re talking about is boring as sh*t? Listen for a bit, to be polite, but you can say you wanna go do your own thing. You can change the topic if you want. People have thicker skin than you credit them for.

Thank you for understanding and good advice. I'm always afraid to hurt someone and be rude.

Two days ago I logged off for what was supposed to be a short break, like 20 minutes.

Then the cats demanded to be fed, and one had a hairball, so of course upchucked in their water fountain. It took time to clean that out, put in a new filter, and refill it. Then my package from Amazon showed up. And dinner had to be started. Laundry was lurking as well. So 2 hours + later, I finally made it back to the game.....

Path · January 2020

Chat. Have fun. Don't worry if you have to go...you don't even have to say you are going.

Chatting with a new person is fun, for you and them.

Games used to be based on chat. Do it. Nothing bad can happen.

DaveMoeDee · January 2020

myskyrim26 wrote: »

Wheresthetea11 wrote: »

You’re looking into things too much. Relax. If you don’t wanna do a dungeon/bg/rp etc, just say no. 9.9999/10 times the other person is not going to be upset. If someone says they’ll be back and don’t? C’est la vie, they didn’t know how to end the conversation either and just decided to make up some excuse. If the convo dies, eh time to do something else or go your separate ways. If what they’re talking about is boring as sh*t? Listen for a bit, to be polite, but you can say you wanna go do your own thing. You can change the topic if you want. People have thicker skin than you credit them for.

Thank you for understanding and good advice. I'm always afraid to hurt someone and be rude.

That is part of your problem. Worrying about what you will say. Better to just have good intentions and not worry about that. Otherwise, you will have a lot of self-fulfilling prophecies. And don't worry about whether people bailed on you or not. Doesn't matter. People are just trying to live their lives.

Loves_guars · January 2020

myskyrim26 wrote: »

Loves_guars wrote: »

I don't know your age, but back in my day we used to have face to face interactions. Crazy, I know.

That's it! I can do it in real life. I can handle hard situations in real life. I did. But in a chat? Talk to the person you never see? Quite a different experience.

P.S.: age 36, country - Russia, had quite a tough time in 90-ies

Hehehe then not so different from me just 2 years. I found many people "odd" when chatting via text, which only means they are different. It still happens to me all the time but I'm very used to it by now. Nationality and language are certainly an issue. For example I'm from a country with european ascendancy so I find europeans easier to click with than americans. Like other said real life happens and you never know what the other one is doing. I find it easier to imagine that most peeps are high with something xD

Chaos2088 · January 2020

Hey I often say Im just goign to be back....then i go to the loo, feed the cat, then I gotta feed myself and think nah Im going to watch a movie before bed.....things/life happens. Don't look to much into it.

Hey even one of my closest mates in eso @ItchyTheRat (looking at you kid) sometimes it goes weeks before saying hello in game! :P

vestahls · January 2020

I'm also not very social, so it's difficult for me to maintain conversations in chat, and I too have the natural instinct to worry about what the other person might be thinking if/when I say no to something.

It's a lot easier in RL, because if you want to get away from a conversation, there's all sorts of physical cues you can use to indicate you want to leave - like angling your body away from the person, making one or two small steps towards the door or whatever - and a (normal) person is going to get it and end the conversation themselves out of politeness. In game there's no real way to do this - unless you move your character slowly away, I guess. There's an idea.

A solution I've found for the over-analysing is to think that in one hour, or even in 10 minutes, that person will completely forget about it and worry about a host of other things that come up. Just like when I get offended or upset about something, and then half an hour later I'm thinking of something completely different. People forget things quite quickly.

So, maybe try thinking like this and see if it helps take the pressure off yourself.

And yeah, figuring out when the cut off the conversation can be trying. Heck, even continuing the conversation can be a problem for me, because I'm not just wondering "wow, this person might be offended if I say I'll be off to do something else", I'm also worried that "oh no, what if I'm talking too much and they just want to get away but are too nice to tell me to stuff it". There's no escape

But, if there's nothing to keep conversing about, best to just let it fizzle off and part with well wishes.

D0PAMINE · January 2020

Just use emojis or "nice" "k" "cool" "XD" "sick" etc or say "brb" and never return.

EllieBlue · January 2020

Don't overthink it. Chatting in MMO in-game is nothing like in real life. You don't need to make eye contact, say goodbye, shake hands or give out hugs. Not even the e-version of it, unless you want to do it. No one expects it. Very often my conversation with people will end with whatever the last sentence I typed or they've typed. For no other reason than they've (or me or both) ran out of things to say and/or they got distracted and forgot about the conversation or caught up doing something else. No hard feelings. Until next time we say hi to each other again. It is very much socially accepted in MMO.

As for saying no to people when they ask you for your time, whether running dungeons, crafting, shrine tp or whatever, you don't owe anyone anything so say no if you don't feel like doing it. Most people will not care. If you don't even feel like replying to an incoming whisper or chat, then don't. Or you can also just say to them, hey I just need some quiet time by myself so maybe next time, raincheck! And 99.9% of the time, people will understand and leave you alone. If they don't, they would have rightly earned your Ignore button. Your game time is your personal time. You share it if you want to and you won't if you don't want to.

Enjoy the game!

Ryath_Waylander · January 2020

Remember you don't have to log off from the game. You can go to the group/friends page and just set your status offline. If it is a fellow guildie and you're not feeling chatty, reply in guild chat instead of whispering. I find if the chat is just casual and not a hunger for company, it winds down. Lastly steel yourelf to type. "Well cheers, nice chatting. I'm off to farm/dungeon/trade now. See you later" and after ending the pleasantries, close the chat window.

Vanos444 · January 2020

Lol! Does ESO have a decent conversation that I remember of...xD
Op, your issue can be fixed easily. Go Cyrodiil PvP and then you will see the "Magic " xD

kijima · January 2020

Was going to suggest your status to 'offline' but Ryath has already done so. It's a powerful feature that can almost instantly change how you feel when you play.

For me there are times, that even with the fantastic guild mates I have and like the company of, sometimes I just want to enjoy my own company and play ESO without any outside influence, albeit good or bad.

Sometimes, it's the only time I can hear myself think, either PvE or PvP it does not matter. True solo as it were, sometimes that's my Nirvana, my happy place.

It's rare that I do this, but having the ability is a saving grace for me.

rpa · January 2020

Chatting with random people can be fun but it is not a duty you have to do when it is not. It's perfectly fine to thank them for the chat and nicely tell em you are off to do your own thing. Some politeness and manners make everything easier, in game and in real life too.

barney2525 · January 2020

I always just say - Gotta go back to real life right now. Be back later

Which is never a lie

JanTanhide · January 2020

Been there myself. After years of online chat I simply am blunt about it. If I don't want to do something I simply type "No, sorry, not interested atm" or something similar.

It's like when I get a Group Invite out of the blue. I ALWAYS decline. Sometimes the person who sent the Invite made a mistake (was porting to my location for example) but sometimes they just want to dominate and make you do what they want. I've had quite a few players send me Invites over and over with me declining each time. If they don't stop I put them on my Ignore list and move on.

I wouldn't worry much about sensitive people being hurt or offended in this game or any online game. Sometimes you have to be blunt and keep the chat short.