Xeno is a bit of a jerk, honestly, and he tends to have the worst of takes. As far as the topic at hand though...well, streaming with mods/addons was a bad idea from the get-go. Anyone receiving a ban of some kind for this shouldn't be shocked.
Again they knew the risks of streaming with this stuff. So that's their fault, shoot one of the clips I watched the streamer's static members said "I told you" So to me the streamer's own static member warn him also about streaming with these addons. So who's fault is it that he is getting banned for breaking tos? Sound to me like he had plenty of warnings from his friends about this and choices not to follow said warnings.
We pay SE a monthly subscription for the license to access their product. We're not obtaining any ownership of the product at all, zero, zilch, none, nada, through that subscription. We agree to SE's Terms of Service when subscribing to their service (the game). They clearly state that they reserve the right to revoke access to any player, at any time, for any reason, for any duration, up to permanent bans.
Bans are disciplinary actions given to people who violate the ToS. It really is that simple. Any person who violates the ToS in any way risks disciplinary action as SE see fit.
It doesn't matter one whit if you think the game "needs improving" because "it's unplayable without mods". If SE doesn't want to have certain functionalities in the game, that's their prerogative. We subscribers have no say in that and are bound by our agreement to abide by the ToS. Personal opinion on modding the game is of no consequence; they say no and they mean no, regardless of whether or not they can detect them. For a long time they've tried treating us like adults with some modicum of reason by reminding us that modding or adding functionalities via third party tools are against the ToS and asking us to not use them. Unfortunately, it's gotten to the point where they have to start treating people like children and hand out bans to the people they find using them.
Again, your opinion on the matter doesn't matter one tiny little bit. You break the ToS, you risk getting your license suspended or revoked.
To me, it's more about how excessive ToS enforcement can be in this game. Yes, it's always a risk, but, from what I gather, SE wasn't really actively striking players for using addons on stream. They have said in the past not to do it, of course, but people have been doing it publicly for years. In front of the devs, apparently.
Oh, absolutely. Players have been warned a couple of times over the years, but the last time it was really talked about at all was 2 years ago. This is on SE as much as it is on the players. They have been warned, but nothing has been done to enforce the ToS in this regard, so players kept pushing the envelope. Even so, many mods/addons have been relatively harmless, so I think that SE is being extremely heavy handed here. Sadly, that's how they do things. They either do nothing or enact a scorched earth policy.
After some thinking, the bans are caused by streaming, and again, it has no overall impact besides the user.
They aren't harassing people, they aren't being toxic, they aren't at a noticeable advantage because it's prog and the community race is already over. No one should care about it but it happened anyway because people who think it mattered would exist still.
I can't tell if someone has a plugin that shows untelegraphed aoes which does give an advantage to solely the user, but I'd believe it to be a malicious third party application because it reveals something that shouldn't be there. No one would know unless they decide to give video evidence themselves.
Take an example, this person https://gfycat.com/flamboyantsilverfluke can I report them for supposedly botting? Yes, do I think or do the GMs would possibly accept this link as evidence? No, they stated they do not accept such evidence, for all it could be interpreted, it could be that their controls are whacked in such a way for such a phenomenon to occur. Could they have checked the logs and assumed GMs would handle it? I have no way of knowing what happened if it was done.
Each time I look at people thinking these minor plugins that should've been features be called an unfair advantage, it feels like they don't even do said content to even know if it is an advantage. It's an MMO, the line for what makes an advantage should be simple, a literal rotation script and packet manipulation. If someone can have hands off and have the game do it's thing, it's botting. If someone has suspiciously frame perfect reactions in PvP, it's going to be hard to tell but the more blatant ones such as CC immunity and sprint are obvious.
Let's have streamers not show any plugins at all, streamers with a 2nd monitor can just move all the needed info onto the screen that isn't showing FF14 and pretend filters don't exist because I doubt anyone would care to notice. It's an overall pain that SE decided to take action and people are off to throw assumptions like this post because no one else knows exactly why except SE to think this is bad to the point people got denied prog time. Buff timer/cactbot, these are the main assumptions, but they aren't explicitly mentioned the be the reason. They're TOS breaking, some people get it. It infuriates for how some bots/scripters are persisting, rare but unwanted.
Should SE have people witch hunt because that seems to have an impact? I certainly hope not. It's the reason why some games have people mass reporting to get rid of someone.
I'd be surprised if they started accepting gif links as evidence to get someone banned for potentially botting, the main gripe I get are occasionally stumbling into bots in fates or bozja, and I'd expect eureka to have the same, persisting after several patches. A bot I remember still exists 5.3 onwards. I don't even know what to look for in the report against bot trains that have persisted.
The problem, which Xenosys pointed out, is that the "new" rules are so unsharp, that you could be banned for using Discord, Teamspeak, Excel, a browser etc. And the second good point is, this player got banned for using some functionalities, which the devs themself find good and want to implement them into the game later. That is very inconsequent, imho.
Cheers
And that is completely fair of them to go full scorched earth. SE is not at fault for policing the game against ToS breakers. It's the players responsibility to abide by the rules. PERIOD.
Hell SE even continuously tells people they CAN'T SEE what people are doing but we don't want people doing this openly.
Like it doesn't take a magician to figure out what they are saying here by the first part. It's clearly a "if we find out, there will be trouble potentially"
And how does the playerbase respond?
DIRECTLY SHOWCASING SAID MODIFICATIONS THEY SAID NOT TO.
CREATING PVP SCRIPTS THAT AUTO TARGET AND DISPLAY INFORMATION NOT NATIVE TO CC.
Bro seriously what don't you understand? It's the flagrant disregard of ToS that is forcing SE's hand. And yes, you are dumb for showcasing these items on stream.
If you are using add-ons, they quite literally have said countless times between the lines, shut the hell up about it and we better not see it. Case. Point. Done.
Let's be honest here, Xeno's take and many people on this thread are being intellectually dishonest. Ya'll know what he's referring to as third party tools. And it's OBVIOUS they don't mean Discord or any related VOIP service. Obviously Cactbot is an overt circumstance when you refer to setups with ACT and Discord that provide callouts but clearly we know the difference being contextualized here. And BTW, they actually defined in the ToS what a 3rd party tool is, and Discord does not count based on their definitions.
Please somebody pin this post on the forum! We can argue whether addons are good or bad till the cows comes home. The whole entire point being made here is that people are being idiots publicly showing themselves using third party tools! This was already an established rule within this community; dont ask, dont tell, and most certainly DONT SHOW.
https://c.tenor.com/VGmG5Diho8AAAAAC/wtf-confused.gif
...I mean, I guess it is like the fastest turtle in a race......That does not mean the turtle that finished 1st is fast perse......
You seem to be under the impression that I'm against SE on this. I'm not. Calm down. They just went from 0-100 without any real warning after years of silence or "don't ask, don't tell". The player base had it coming, of course, because they kept pushing to see what they could get away with. The only issue I have is that SE didn't actively enforce the ToS they created until now. They let it get this far. But, to be fair, the players shouldn't have tried to push the envelope so much knowing full well what they were doing was wrong in regards to the ToS, especially putting it on full display with their streams. Hopefully Yoshi P makes good on his word to implement some of these things by default into the game, because even he acknowledged that there should be more on the UI/HUD. That will solve a lot of problems, I think.
I 2nd this! The whole point is people shouldn't be openly streaming themselves using 3rd party addons or mods. It's been like this for years and nothing has changed. I know ppl who were dumb enough to post modded pics of their characters and was banned for that also. This isn't some new stance SQ has created, some yall just never seen it happen before. Now that some big-name streamers are getting banned for this stuff some of yall think this is some new TOS or stance they created. It's not, mods and 3rd party addons have always been bannable offence if they find out you do it. So follow the rule the rest of the community has set: don't ask, don't tell, and don't show.
Sorry but no. Every non-FF14-program, which runs parallel to FF14 is per definition a third-party-tool. Because it is not part of FF14. And the point:
Use of tools that allow players to more easily complete content.
affects every voice tool like Discord or Teamspeak. Because many encounters will be easier when the communication between the players is better. I do not believe, that they will ban people using Discord. But the current formulation of this rule allows it.
Cheers
Yeah, I do think more clarification is needed here. They basically said "the internet is so big, so we'll just ban it all". That isn't exactly informative or helpful. Common sense dictates that a lot of things (Discord, Nvidia/AMD driver software, etc) are in the clear, but SE didn't make those sort of exceptions in their announcement. Until we are notified otherwise, just about everything can potentially be in their crosshairs because it is so vague. They drew a line in the sand, let the tide wash it back out to sea and left us guessing where the line actually is.
Why do you believe there has been 0 enforcement until now?
I know of several instances where streamers have received bans, all within the last few years. I have read the posts of any number of players in these forums who have received bans for something, including pics of the gaol in their posts (not the reason for the ban, but additional 'proof' of their ban).
I don't follow every ban that SE lays down on players. I don't believe you do either.
The recent ones just happen to be splashed more across the Internet.
Was it crappy for people to gang up and report bomb someone? Absolutely.
Are there useful QoL and accessibility improvements provided by mods that would be valuable for SE to implement as in-game features? Absolutely.
Do either of those points change that these things are against the ToS? No.
SE's point for years has been "We know you use these. Don't bring them to our attention and we won't have to take any action." But streamers and content creators kept essentially thumbing their nose at these rules openly. Yoshi-P JUST made a very lengthy and detailed post about this very subject. And every time we have a parsing thread on these forums, what's the one thing that gets asked? "If they're against the rules, then why doesn't SE ban these streamers?"
Well, now everyone has their answer. We should continue to encourage QoL and accessibility improvements. We should not condone report bombing. But we also can't openly thumb our noses at SE's rules and expect they aren't going to take any sort of action.
I'm a little confused, did people think they could ONLY get a warning, when a public one has been done time and time again? Is it not based on severity?
Somehow we now have a sudden memory lapse because the last warning was 2 years ago, so it doesn't count? Did the rules change?
So our best arguments now come from a person that harassed another user due to a parse? Weren't these supposed to be about self improvement.
Again not against mods, and they were pretty clear about it not being public - but if we're using arguments from the above perspectives - the problem isn't just SE but a lot of it is the community either being intellectually disingenuous, spouting whataboutism (Discord) and it doesn't bode well to actually make things come off more constructive.
Apparently JP is outraged by Hiroro's ban
https://twitter.com/ArtharsFF14/stat...NdUeInwPfp4S0Q
https://ibb.co/Lrg1s0Q
Technically by definition, Discord does not do any of the following:
From SE ToS:
- Modifying, analyzing, integrating, and/or reverse-engineering game software or data.
So please try your strawman somewhere else.
So many people defending the dev who took a "neutral" stance for so long about things like ACT and what not.
It's weird that he decided to grow a spine now...
But it's never been a neutral stance. https://youtu.be/e_i6mjiGerU?t=131
They keep saying for people not to use them.
Specifically the part at 2:42
"So to reiterate, third party tools are not allowed, please do not use them"
How can so many of you tunnel on the people breaking the ToS when this event is triggered by a mob witch hunting players on JP and NA because they are full of hatred in their basement.
No 3rd party tools ?`Hmm, funny - is use my second monitor, or use post-its on my first monitor to remind me of stuff. But hey, "it is what it is". Addons = Cheats, always. Remeber where ACT gave a streamer with a button press all Ultimate clears. Yeah, sick stuff.... (reminder: this is a joke)
Are we watching the same video? Because I clearly see him state a "question" but not actually stating either as such and instead eluding to an expanded conversation people will force the devs to have if they say "THIS" is allowed but "THIS" is not.
Assuming your reading comprehension of the English language is on point, at 2:13 he is referring specifically to ACT.
Why try to misinterpret his words on purpose?
This. Literally this.
If they were doing hard bans of streamers who just had a UI modification (IE: Just makes the UI look visually different), I would honestly have a serious problem for multiple reasons. Not the least of which is I'm on the spectrum. I have quite a few friends who are as well, who use those mods to make their brains not scream at them about things. I'm not talking *anything* game enhancing or that could be considered remotely cheating, just an aesthetic change. (For the record, *I* do not use mods. I'm talking about my friends who have a problem with the UI appearance. I, personally, find it really soothing. I'm weird.)
If the streamers were getting full out bans for that? I'd be upset. Because they should at least get a warning "Hey, do not stream with this. We get it doesn't effect anyone but you. But don't," and get a temp suspension. That's fine.
But honestly, Yoshi-P has told us *time and time and time again* "Use mods, we can't track it, just do not share them, do not talk about it, and do not shame people."
WELP. They're definitely sharing, streaming may not be "talking" about it, but you're letting literally millions of people potentially see it, and I mean.....you can track someone's cooldowns? And you're using ACT? What reason are you using those mods other than *to* shame someone?
Like....c'mon.
The suspension is warranted. It's 10 days, deal with it.
It's really easy: Use them, enjoy them, don't hurt other people with them or broadcast that you're using them.
they cant ban all of us. can they?