Would you like an in-game parser?

[Kaurie]

It doesn't matter how many people here care. This is polling FFXIV players that bother to come to the forums that speak English that only care about a parser one way or another to even click on the thread to read it. It's like going to an elementary school on a hot day and asking the kids "Do you like chocolate ice cream, vanilla ice cream, or do you not want any?"

Sure, the data is obviously biased, but that doesn't make it useless. Can we say definitively that the majority of players want a parser? No. However, there have been a lot of discussions on the forums about parsers and there is a large vocal userbase who cries out against it. It is interesting to see that in sheer numbers on this community, the number of players who wants a parser is larger than not. This information could help Square read the previous data from other threads on the subject. It also could simply show Square that there is likely a significant interest for a parser. In other words, no it gives no definitive answers, but it does give information - which is still useful.

So the servers would have to constantly calculate the average DPS for every ilvl for every job across all servers and display it every... how often are we proposing here? 1 minute? 30 seconds? 20 minutes? Even if you change that to an ilvl bracket that's a lot of data the servers would have to be constantly tracking.

Why would you need to have it calculated this often? These calculations are already taking place. The server knows what ilvl we are, what damage we are doing etc. I cannot imagine this being a heavy load on the server - but they could simply have a rolling average calculated in a daily basis, during off-peak times.

I can't imagine that what you're asking for is a trivial task for any server or group of servers. I can't even begin to imagine how many attacks are being made with dots and everything every second in game. Then having to link that data to ilvl and weapon ilvl for every single character online then finally average it all out. The amount of processing power for every interval that the servers are polled for such data, assuming they are even logging it at all, and asked to compile it into a meaningful form can't be trivial.

Look, I don't want to imply that all "proparsers" are horrible evil people. I just feel that parsers can potentially do much more harm than good and the sort of fight club (First rule of parsing is you don't talk about parsing) status of them currently is the best way for it. Either way, Parsers are not the magical wand that will fix all problems in FFXIV as many of the "proparsers" in this thread seem to think they are. I honestly don't think I could enjoy the game with a public parser available to everyone and I know it's a horrible example, but this is the feeling that comes to mind:

Let's say the US government implements an opt in Anti-Terrorist plan where you can have microphones installed in certain rooms of your home (bedrooms and bathrooms omitted, naturally) and a website would track and parse partial logs of what happened in your house to prove you are not a terrorist and everything. Well, you have nothing to hide so you opt in because OMG terrorism is scary right. Then one day you're at the line at the supermarket and some guy says, "So I heard about you yellin' at your kid for not doing his homework the other day." Wouldn't that weird you out?

I dunno the idea that someone is monitoring my game play constantly whether they comment on it or not just makes me feel uncomfortable and it would distract from my enjoyment of the game.

I dislike your analogy, because the main reason a parser is useful, is that you are working together as a team to overcome something. In virtually every other team-based environment, performance metrics are monitored and posted. For example, in hockey games, your shots on net, saves, hits, goals, points, time on ice, time on offensive, +/- (etc.) are all recorded and posted for you to see. In a work environment, your performance metrics are undoubtedly recorded (i.e. sales numbers, revenue, expenses, clients, satisfaction rate etc.). In these situations, it is important to have these metrics visible by all for two major reasons. First, your performance often affects your team, and thus it is important to your teammates to know your strengths/weaknesses, where you can improve etc. Second, having this information sparks competition, which is an excellent motivator to improve.

In a game like this, where everyone is working towards a common goal, and there is no parser present. It provides a system which does not promote accountability, cooperation, nor competition. It is in everyone's best interest to let their teammates carry them, so they can receive maximum reward, with minimal effort. This is a well studied principal of human behaviour, and is pretty much the cornerstone of our economy.

I get that you may feel uncomfortable being held accountable, but equally so many people feel that players who are not held accountable distract from their enjoyment of the game as well.