turn off crossplay for Ranked CC?

Only for ranked! . One could pull out the ye old faithful argument of get gud or Spaghetti code.
But being serious here for a moment. With PC having access to third party plugin advantages console players do not. They are at a possible disadvantage. And now with xbox in the mix and soon switch. It might not be a bad idea going forward to have that option.
Marvel rivals for example turns theirs off for ranked.


Id love to hear arguments for or against this.
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Ranked playerbase struggling to keep the mode flourishing for more than two weeks as is, you want to introduce crossplay restrictions? Because people on PC may or may not use plugins (i.e. TOS breaking)?

This works for games like Marvel Rivals and Overwatch because the game is inherently built for PvP from the ground up. FFXIV pvp, as much as I love it, is classic sidecontent, yet sidecontent nontheless.

Terrible idea, do not do this.

Since ive posted this ive talked with alot of people and ranked Having cross play is turning quite a few off from playing it. So doing nothing is hurting it also. So they have to do something. Even today i ran into quite a few instances of questionable stuff. Like a bard with unlimited knock back and the good old auto target low health one. And as a console players. Im quite quite over it myself.


Something has to change.

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Originally Posted by John-Kaidus

Id love to hear arguments for or against this.

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The biggest problem is that FFXIV doesn't do crossplay, at least not in the way you are think of it. Typically most online games will connect to severs managed by whatever platform you are playing games on, crossplay is a server restructuring to allow those separate servers to connect, and in those circumstances, crossplay is a toggle, and can be turned on and off with relative ease once it is set up. FF XIV does not work that way, the servers of the platform only handle your login so they can validate your game liscense, and then you are connected to SQEX's servers, this is why if Playstation or Steam services go down, someone playing on those platforms will be able to remain connected to XIV, but someone trying to login won't be able to until the services are restored.

As a result, they can't turn off crossplay, because there is nothing to turn off, and without knowing how their servers work internally, it might require them to create a whole new system to be able to segregate players based on platform at all, not impossible, but far more intensive than you think.

Then maybe they can do a file check. Only can que and stay in if the files are unmodified.

Might be easier with that route.

A fair competition is for everyone.

I’ve only been in CC for a very short period of time hence only hearing horrors from little birds & whatnot, so take my words are grain of salt.

I think they just need a better moderation team. Both quality & activity. By activity, I mean live moderation by staying ‘ghost mode’ & observe each rounds anonymously. Surely they have the capacity to do just these? It doesn’t have to be 24/7 but imo they need to be in the scene unannounced from time to time. Especially when they understandably refuse to act on evidence that they cannot confirm themselves (video proofs) & some of these 3rd party plogon seemed to be doing something that’s very obvious to naked eyes i.e. unlimited kb BRD like you put it?

It's more of moderation issue. Whoever is responsible for PvP has been overtly lax when dealing with issues.

I think it was back in season 2 or 3 when Light DC had obvious wintrader couple (like literally queuing same job and the other one AFKs the whole game) and they took weeks to take action, tons of matches got ruined during that time.

As it is PvP remains quite fringe content even with the return of Feast sets and the problem kinda feeds on itself as when there's fewer players there's more unbalanced matches that might make lower rank players quit due sheer frustration.

The problem is not with the PC gamers – as with any game, the cheaters are the problem.
Even if it's just win trading in Frontlines or automated runs in the Fall Guy event.

And while cheat options do exist for consoles (adapters that affect aiming in shooters and other things),
many games would suffer significantly less from cheaters if PC players could not join the same lobby.

That's why I've never been a big fan of crossplay. Honestly, I'd even welcome a separate console server.
No mods, no big ERP scene, RP that's purely text-based, knowing that what you see is the "real" thing.
But then you also couldn't play with everyone and the game would suffer from very long queues ...

In my opinion, the best solution would probably be to release many more micro-updates …
since I've heard that after every update, it takes days for certain mods to work again.
But this also has enormous implications for the entire gaming community – not just the cheaters.

That said, do you even know of a game that has solved the cheating problem?
And if so, what was their solution?

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Originally Posted by Clerith

The problem is not with the PC gamers – as with any game, the cheaters are the problem.
Even if it's just win trading in Frontlines or automated runs in the Fall Guy event.

And while cheat options do exist for consoles (adapters that affect aiming in shooters and other things),
many games would suffer significantly less from cheaters if PC players could not join the same lobby.

That's why I've never been a big fan of crossplay. Honestly, I'd even welcome a separate console server.
No mods, no big ERP scene, RP that's purely text-based, knowing that what you see is the "real" thing.
But then you also couldn't play with everyone and the game would suffer from very long queues ...

In my opinion, the best solution would probably be to release many more micro-updates …
since I've heard that after every update, it takes days for certain mods to work again.
But this also has enormous implications for the entire gaming community – not just the cheaters.

That said, do you even know of a game that has solved the cheating problem?
And if so, what was their solution?

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From my experience alot of them do a file check and if it detects the client files are not modified you are then allowed to que.

Some as i said previously turn cross play off so
Its more fair that way. Others have better anti cheat detection that gets accounts flagged.

Theres plenty of ways to do it but will the devs even want to?

And for the record i dont care what anyone does with their game in a PVE coop setting.
But when pvp is involved with rewards based on performance. It matter aloooot more.

All I'm reading is, "SE should take a harder stance and actually act against mods and plug-ins" without anyone actually saying it, because that's the actual problem here.

I already don't play Ranked because I don't want to hop off Aether.

https://x.com/i/status/2054344395978068380

Here is what ive been talking about!

Its out of control.

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Originally Posted by Reinhardt_Azureheim

Ranked playerbase struggling to keep the mode flourishing for more than two weeks as is, you want to introduce crossplay restrictions? Because people on PC may or may not use plugins (i.e. TOS breaking)?

This works for games like Marvel Rivals and Overwatch because the game is inherently built for PvP from the ground up. FFXIV pvp, as much as I love it, is classic sidecontent, yet sidecontent nontheless.

Terrible idea, do not do this.

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l don't think the idea itself is bad but just not practical for ffxiv given how small the playerbase is.

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Originally Posted by John-Kaidus

From my experience alot of them do a file check and if it detects the client files are not modified you are then allowed to que.

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That won't work. Without including the director's firm stance against "snooping around our PCs to find mods" (he said something similar when asked about anti cheat), it's quite easy to hook and inject your mods at runtime, leaving the game's files untouched, just replacing calls to fetch other files to load instead.

First roadblock can't be changed unless Square does something to change it internally. Second part? Its just a cat and mouse game, and personally, since PvP is side content, I'd rather they spend resources elsewhere, than chase modders away from a game that doesn't have enough development capacity to give us all the features on time (hello, BST, where are you?)

Rather than turning off crossplay, ranked needs better competitive integrity measures. Something like:

Ranked-only integrity checks - Before going to ranked CC, the client could do a basic integrity check to make sure the game hasn't been changed in ways that would affect gameplay. If the check fails, the person can't queue for ranked until its resolved. This way people who use visual aides or QOL mods for PvE wouldn't be affected.

Better server-side detection for stuff that's impossible - Some cheating behavior should be detectable without having to scan a person's computer. If a bard is using knockback more than the job allows, or a player repeatedly targets low health enemies faster than an ordinary human reaction, the server should flag that behavior. Not instantly ban, but flag patterns for review by a GM.

Live or replay-based ranked moderation (LOL I know but a girl can dream). Maybe a GM or PVP mod team could watch matches anonymously, either live or via replays. Even surprise random monitoring would probably discourage a lot of bad behavior. If live review costs too many resources then maybe give us a ranked replay/report system. This way the mod team could see the replay from the server perspective without having to rely on player-recorded videos.

Win trading action - SE could track suspicious queue patterns, repeated losses to the same players, same job coordinated queuing and such. Players caught doing this would lose their rating, rewards and at worse, not be able to queue at all for ranked the rest of the season.

Maybe give use the option? Like console players could check a box that they prefer matching with other console players in ranked. Not that it would be guaranteed (that would kill queues0 but it might prioritize them when there are enough console players on.

BETTER COMMUNICATION FROM SE. We have no idea what's being done, if anything at all. You don't have to tell us what detection methods you're using, but seasonal pvp enforcement updates would go a loooong way toward easing some of the frustration.

Thank you for coming to my PvP TED talk.

I'm sure there is probably some reason they can't. But if you can detect and see that a player is out of bounds, levitating 20+ yalms in the sky, moving faster when they shouldn't be, or moving when they should be animation locked, Square should be able to detect it. Stop with this BS and just do better and quicker moderation.

But hey, don't say a bad word in chat though, amirite?

How about we just ask them to be less lenient with the PVP hacks?
They need to respond to reports more efficiently.

I'd actually like that quite a bit. The very reason I stopped playing CC was because SE said they will do nothing against the cheaters, and I'm sure I'm not alone.

The top players are blatantly cheating and there's nothing you can do to beat that unless you also cheat, which you can't do on console. No matter what SE does, CC is going to die. Either more people get fed with the cheaters and quit, or they punish the cheaters and most of the people keeping the mode alive quit cuz they're bad and can't keep their rank without plugins. Either way, CC is on it's last leg. They'd have to invest into punishing cheaters AND offering better rewards to incentivize new/returning players; which I don't think they're ever going to do.

So yea, splitting up the player base so that more console players can compete in the higher ranks is not a bad idea.

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Originally Posted by RyoXander

I'd actually like that quite a bit. The very reason I stopped playing CC was because SE said they will do nothing against the cheaters, and I'm sure I'm not alone.

The top players are blatantly cheating and there's nothing you can do to beat that unless you also cheat, which you can't do on console. No matter what SE does, CC is going to die. Either more people get fed with the cheaters and quit, or they punish the cheaters and most of the people keeping the mode alive quit cuz they're bad and can't keep their rank without plugins. Either way, CC is on it's last leg. They'd have to invest into punishing cheaters AND offering better rewards to incentivize new/returning players; which I don't think they're ever going to do.

So yea, splitting up the player base so that more console players can compete in the higher ranks is not a bad idea.

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That won't spare you from any rat-shift dead hours "we're just helping the queues" booster activity though. There's more to cheating than just using plugins or... sensational outright hacking stuff seen in the video (which is just super rare, so that video is more of a piss-take than anything else imo).

There was some very vain stuff implemented for when Feast existed, including the both hands up in surrender that was nuking the party ranked mode for a while, and then permanently. zelul

Mod and anti-exploit teams don't know how to deal with infractions beyond the meanie words people, at least not in a balanced non-kneejerk manner. I'm not sure if anything actually happened to anyone I was more confidently able to i.d. as a persistent soft win-trader/saboteur so far. Any absences might've been mere coincidences.

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Originally Posted by John-Kaidus

Then maybe they can do a file check. Only can que and stay in if the files are unmodified.

Might be easier with that route.

A fair competition is for everyone.

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They can't do this because of japanese law iirc

I'd rather they just be harsher with the cheaters than make a new leader board

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Originally Posted by Stormfur

Rather than turning off crossplay, ranked needs better competitive integrity measures. Something like:

Ranked-only integrity checks - Before going to ranked CC, the client could do a basic integrity check to make sure the game hasn't been changed in ways that would affect gameplay. If the check fails, the person can't queue for ranked until its resolved. This way people who use visual aides or QOL mods for PvE wouldn't be affected.

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How are they meant to detect what modifications are innocent and what ones are cheating automatically? And for that matter how would you even draw the line between accessibility/QOL mods and cheating mods? There definitely accessibility/QOL mods that can be used to gain an advantage over other players and mods that are borderline hacking that you can argue are just for QOL.

I don't think anybody cares about noclippy or whatever, what's always been pointed at are speed hackers, teleporting out of map bounds, and animation lock breakers among similar things.

The only thing you'll achieve by turning off crossplay anyway is to kill the mode and the queues which are outside of JP already anemic as they are. Your controller players especially will be left with nobody to play with. Therefore I'd rather have SE actually moderate their game.

I was about to mention Eli Blue and their shenanigan to expose how bad SE is at moderating matches, but lmao the link was already fired!

They had done this not just this once, but also many times in the past. All to gain the attention of GMs. The previous time they mentioned about being gaoled but that's about it. It's basically GM saying "Hi please don't promote cheats usage." (read: hi please be hush hush about the usage).

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Originally Posted by Valence

I don't think anybody cares about noclippy or whatever, what's always been pointed at are speed hackers, teleporting out of map bounds, and animation lock breakers among similar things.

The only thing you'll achieve by turning off crossplay anyway is to kill the mode and the queues which are outside of JP already anemic as they are. Your controller players especially will be left with nobody to play with. Therefore I'd rather have SE actually moderate their game.

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Agreed. All of which (the cheats effects) are pretty noticeable through naked eyes.

It kinda baffles me, but I think this is the first MMO that features a PvP mode where there are close to zero GM/moderator 'ghost spectating' random matches to keep cheaters on their toes (and maybe to break some popcorns themselves on the background lol).