Built-in Parsers

[Aster_E]

Also, I feel you have a very binary vision about players who use parsers and fflogs, as if they were all the same "bad" people and "elitists".

Then you are clearly not seeing what I read correctly. Read it again, and keep reading, until you recognize the gray area any simple-minded person can extrapolate from what I stated, as well, as how I never once insulted fflogs users as a whole, and even stated how the tool can be fine in the right hands. Or, can you not parse words very well?

just a few questions, wouldn't you want to know how you performed in a fight ?

Short answer: No

Long Answer: As long as I'm following mechanics and doing my part with whichever role I'm playing at the time, and we happen to win, I don't need to know unless I see how I can improve well enough on my own. Then I will. I don't need numbers to tell me how high my contribution is on Drk, Whm, or Brd (my main three).

Or, during progression, being able to see what caused a wipe, what can be improved, why the dps check wasn't reached ?

The last time my dps was ever problematic was in early Heavensward, during Bismarck Ex, when we Bards needed to adjust to our lengthy cast bars (high SkS wasn't likely for most people), deal with the loss of 20% of our dps from auto-attacks being turned off for the promise of another 20% dps being added for the Minuet (that was adjusted later to 30%), and hope that our dots crit enough times since the crit stat also wasn't high enough to matter for beans for level 60s just yet. My dots weren't critting often enough when it actually mattered back then, and the slow cast times during that period were so sluggish that I ended up not touching Bard again, save for grabbing the relic, until 3.3 when Crit, Det, and SkS were all high enough that it didn't feel like I was sacrificing anything to put so many points into one or two of the others. Then my Bard felt like an aggro-stealing beast again, even with the forsaken cast bars (that were no longer quite as bad).

So no, my concerns with meeting DPS aren't that bad. If I was concerned with progression in a fight, I would just learn the mechanics and hope that everyone else does so as well. A parse doesn't tell you that someone didn't do Fang and Claw correctly in NidEx. A parse doesn't tell you that people didn't stand next to their partners in matching colors during Broken Seal in ZurvEx. A parse doesn't tell you that half of a 24-man alliance didn't bother to move during the second boss of Rabanastre. Though, the parse might show a drop-off of numbers, it won't tell you that Timmy or Barbara didn't break their chain in the end boss of the Vault.

There are informations only a parser can provide, and regarding FFlogs, it's an extremly powerfull tool that's not limited to an "epeen" scale.

*is information
("Information" is a non-countable noun)

*extremely
*powerful

And, once again, I'm not harking on FFlogs. Please re-acquaint yourself with words. That is all.

[NovaLevossida]

I think it's complete crap that console players don't have access to a basic parser while SE turns a blind eye to everyone using parsers and all the other features including fight callouts on PC so long as no one is specifically using it to directly harass people in game. We have people pasting their screenshots in game with third party program overlays on the official forums with SE looking the other way. And what makes it all the worse is that those plug-ins / API stuff haven't come and apparently aren't ever going to come, so console players are inherently disadvantaged and uninformed compared to PC users using "illegal" third party apps that SE doesn't care that they use.

I'm just getting a little tired and wore down with the direction of the game lately and SE's decisions, and this no parser nonsense for consoles where everyone on PC can use one is getting more irritating.

[RiyahArp]

explain how people plated mmo before the parser.... as mmo existed before a parser. It isn't hard to figure stuff out on your own with out a parser.

Older MMOs generally didn't have as much of an endgame or raid focus as modern ones did. Just getting to the level cap alone was an achievement, and there was much more alternative play such as RPing, open-world PvP, and more freedom for players to create their own identity. WoW wound up being a curse on the genre imo in that it sped up the leveling curv, created cross-server play, and created the idea of modern endgame raiding based on math and stats. They contributed to the munchkinization of the genre, and tipped the balance of the MMO genre to the math nerds.

I think this is why the genre is in decline. You have a brief leveling curve and a rather bare-bones world focus, with the majority of long term play in endless raids. The idea of MMOs as worlds gives way to MMOs as math exercises.

[Deithwen]

snip

First of all, english isn't my native language, so yeah, it might not be perfect.

Maybe you don't feel the need to know how you perform. That doesn't mean you're performing well. Only numbers can tell you how well you perform. The rest is mecanics knowledge.

And for your information, a parse is not just a dps meter, and provides you with a lot of information, everything you listed :
"A parse doesn't tell you that someone didn't do Fang and Claw correctly in NidEx. A parse doesn't tell you that people didn't stand next to their partners in matching colors during Broken Seal in ZurvEx. A parse doesn't tell you that half of a 24-man alliance didn't bother to move during the second boss of Rabanastre. Though, the parse might show a drop-off of numbers, it won't tell you that Timmy or Barbara didn't break their chain in the end boss of the Vault."
can be extracted from a parse.

[ThirdChild_ZKI]

. . .so console players are inherently disadvantaged and uninformed. . .

Except we aren't.

This may be an unpopular opinion, but do something enough and you'll develop a sense of whether you're doing it right or not. In time, you'll even learn to do it better, provided you aren't simply putting in a token effort.

Now then, yes, a LOT of information made readily available is achieved through pioneers with parsers, and that's great. But once again, I (and perhaps I can only speak for myself) have never run into a situation where I couldn't clear something or struggled or was disadvantaged purely for not having/being able to parse. I have learned a lot of things the hard way, and at times seen a mechanic once and said "oh that's just X mechanic with new paint", then never had issue with it ever again. The key there is the effort that went into it, though some might say it's more than necessary. . . I counter that by saying I've run stuff that groups had on farm, and watched just how lost they were without ACT callouts. Meanwhile, having done it enough, or simply paying attention, I can handle things accordingly.

I want to clarify again: I'm not saying parsers aren't helpful. They ARE. They AREN'T 100% necessary, console or PC. If they were, we'd have a tool in place already. But we console players aren't inherently disadvantaged for not having the option available. Not if we make the effort to be good.

[Nezia]

snip

You assume lots of things and completely misinterprets others, or maybe you willingly assumes these things in order to better suit your agenda? Who knows.

1 - There was no shaming, the leader literaly said something like "Monk is not doing enough, gotta look for another dps.", which, you like it or not: Was a straight up fact!

2 - Who cares if he was lagging or something? I also have lag and some other issues at times, and guess how I handle it? I DON'T PLAY THE GAME. That's right, if I'm lagging or have visit at home or know that I'm probably gonna be requested to do something IRL in the next couple moments I simply do not play the game. I watch some video, draw something, read something. A pretty revolutionary idea eh?

3 - There was no "carrying", do you run a parser or check FFlogs? Probably not, or you would know that anyone can EASILY do 3.5k+ unless there is some mechanic that forces you to stop attacking for longs periods of time(like susanno trans phase). What happened was that we changed someone that was not even trying to play the game right, to someone who was actually doing fine, not an expert, not a world first material, simply someone who was doing fine like the rest of us.

4 - You ask how people can get better? That's easy, Dummies and normal version fight. Again if you did not interpret things in a way that better suit your agenda you would have noticed that if we got the boss down to 3% that means people knew the fight mechanics or else we would have a wipe much before that point. Even the monk guy was handling the mechanics just fine, he simply was not doing damage because he either did not know how or did not botter to try, if it was the first then the dummy is the better place for him, if it's the second then he should not be a group based game in the first place.

5 - Where in the world am I saying that I assume people played wow? I just used my experience with oh so scary and oppressors parsers in a game that has had parsers for 10+ years now.

On a last note, your history about your wife and wow is most likely a lie, yours or hers. If this history passed during Vanilla, then there were almost no addons and 95%+ of the players did not even know what addons were. If it was post vanilla then all <46 content is simply irrelevant and people simply would not ask her to have addons to run low level dungeons.

[Deithwen]

snip

But having to make extra effort to acheive the same isn't the very definition of disadvantage ?

[Nezia]

Sure, this is where one might say "But a parser can. . ." Yes, it can. But where I can't use it, I simply bricked my way up. It's not impossible. And while it's not easy, anyone who makes the effort can do it.

And that's what a disadvantage is. Can a bare handed person defeat someone with a gun? Definitely! You only need to spend 15+ years studying martial arts in order to defeat someone who picked up a gun 15 minutes ago.

Of course this is a completely hyperbolic example, but the fact remains the same, I have acess to a tool that you don't, this simple fact puts me in an advantage. Can you work around it? Sure you can, but you still worked around a disadvantage.

[ThirdChild_ZKI]

But having to make extra effort to acheive the same isn't the very definition of disadvantage ?

Is the effort really that extra? I don't recall working any harder to learn content than anyone else. That "extra" work was the practice I put in, and the time I personally put into making sure I can play my job well, regardless of the content. PC players, parser or not, have done the same thing and the ones that wanted to play well very likely put in the same effort, wouldn't you agree?

And that's what a disadvantage is. Can a bare handed person defeat someone with a gun? Definitely! You only need to spend 15+ years studying martial arts in order to defeat someone who picked up a gun 15 minutes ago.

Of course this is a completely hyperbolic example, but the fact remains the same, I have acess to a tool that you don't, this simple fact puts me in an advantage. Can you work around it? Sure you can, but you still worked around a disadvantage.

By this logic, I should never outperform anyone with access to a parser, right? And yet I have before. So what made the difference? Personal effort and skill, or the tool? Once again, there's nothing wrong with having the tool, but it's pretty well established that a good craftsman can produce good work whether his tools are top of the line or not. If you choose to look at being on console as not having top of the line tools, that's fine. I'm simply saying I (and again I suppose I should only speak for myself) have never been disadvantaged for not having a parser.

[Aster_E]

First of all, english isn't my native language, so yeah, it might not be perfect.

Maybe you don't feel the need to know how you perform. That doesn't mean you're performing well. Only numbers can tell you how well you perform. The rest is mecanics knowledge.

Pardon, those spelling corrections were simply me providing you with some help so you have a reference for later. Also: "mechanics." I had even included the spelling in my previous post that you were so quick to cut to point out that you're not native to this abomination of a language. Kudos to you for trying at least, by the way.

As to whether or not I'm performing well, on Bard rotation at this point for example, it comes down to my gear, whether or not the enemy I'm fighting lasts long enough for a rotation--because it can be annoying if I'm about to Barrage + Refulgent Arrow something and it jumps into the air, unable to be targeted until Barrage and Straighter Shot both wear off--and whether or not Straighter Shot even procs because that Refulgent Arrow is a beautiful thing when we can actually use it. I can see the difference, generally, in the health bars of bosses when Refulgent Arrow can or cannot be used, when Pitch Perfect hits the third note often enough, and so on. It is a rather proc-based job, in addition to the resources we provide, but when it works, it devastates and makes quite the difference per phase. No, I don't need the damage meter; that is not a feeling but a fact.

Mechanics matter most to me in any fight. Mechanical knowledge of a fight entertains me, and has even left me giggling like a schoolgirl gone mad on a couple occasions because I enjoy them. I'm not a hardcore raider, but good gods do I enjoy what fights have to offer? I mean, that's as long as the sole mechanic isn't a just pure dps race or two, with a middle phase that's another dps race to kill or destroy stuff before the whole group wipes to a large attack; that is generally boring and has been since before it was used by almost every boss in Heavensward. Give me the baited AOEs of Thordan's Reign or Nidhogg's Rage. Give me towers like seen in Sephirot, Coil, and Thordan. Give me a dance partner like in Zurvan Ex. Give me a healing target like those dragon heads in Shinryu Ex. I will gladly take them and more.

And for your information, a parse is not just a dps meter, and provides you with a lot of information, everything you listed : [ . . . ] can be extracted from a parse.

Amusing how you say this without evidence or further elaboration. The way you are currently making it sound, a parse simply tells you how to play this game, rather than you figuring it out for yourself. Would you care to build upon this, leaving nothing unclear and without debate as to how it works? Furthermore, would you like to state why it is, exactly, that everyone I've met who uses a parse only seems to do so for the damage meter?