In competition with myself: a request for PERSONAL parsers

[Sebazy]

What I would suggest is to get around the "Lack of context". It offers a percentage of the maximum DPS you can put out with your ilvl and gear. So let's say SMN can pull off a maximum of 5'000 DPS and Joe Bloggs pulls off 2'500. The personal parser could say "You pulled off 2'500 DPS. This is 50% of your potential. <snip>

To be clear, you're suggesting a fixed value calculation correct? In that not based on any external buffs/debuffs. I.e. no slashing/no cards, Trick attack etc right?

A good but flawed suggestion and an on point retort.

I do think it is actually dooable and have made similar suggestions in the past.

There is a more serviceable means of doing this though.

In essence, SE could record players raw potency per second across the entirety of the run and build up an anonymous percentiles stack much akin to logs. After a week or so of building up the initial data (Which could likely just be pulled from the QA team), you could simply rank players against their class averages and give a semi vague score or alphabetical rank from there.

Most importantly, once coded in it'd be self maintaining. As players improve, the difficulty of scoring highly increases, not to mention it wouldn't need to be adjusted for new content as it's simply building a table of averages from a pool of results.

Going off potency negates the majority of group comp disparities as well as removing gear from the equation giving about as pure an apples to apples comparison as you're ever likely to see in this game.

[Paladinleeds]

snip

Indeed, I was trying to work with the ideas already being tossed around, and build on them. That being said, I do really like your idea. What I was hoping to build was something self-maintaining like what you're suggesting (as I explained in my follow up post to her), but it seems your idea would do it more easily. Perhaps the game could auto-calculate the potencies and build up an optimal rotation based around thousands of calculations of different scenarios. A bit like "machine learning" and AI.

[Sebazy]

Perhaps the game could auto-calculate the potencies and build up an optimal rotation based around thousands of calculations of different scenarios. A bit like "machine learning" and AI.

There really is no need for that when you can just let the players do it for you

[Oscura]

You just gave an example of how one would obtain context for their numbers in-game.

The grand majority of "personal parser," posts wants to live in a world where asking or demanding another's numbers is a ban-worthy offense. There is no guarantee that people will willingly share their numbers at any given moment, and some people will forever keep themselves stuck in their bubble to avoid being criticized or yelled at. Simply put, if people want to obtain context for their numbers, they should just ask for an actual parser.

People keep saying this with absolutely no basis behind it.

I literally posted my basis behind it. A personal parser is useless, middle-of-the-road, half-assed garbage. If you want a parser, ask for a parser. Do not ask for a "personal parser," do not ask for a "damage rating," do not ask for a "damage ranking system post-dungeon/run," ask for an ACTUAL PARSER. There is zero point in asking for any other alternative aside from wanting to avoid offending people who will be offended regardless of whatever alternative you try to bring up.

[Sebazy]

I literally posted my basis behind it. A personal parser is useless, middle-of-the-road, half-assed garbage. If you want a parser, ask for a parser. Do not ask for a "personal parser," do not ask for a "damage rating," do not ask for a "damage ranking system post-dungeon/run," ask for an ACTUAL PARSER.

And you refuse to pay any heed to the multitude of explanations as to why despite being half-assed and middle of the road, it certainly isn't useless. /shrug

Look at it this way.

Little Timmy gets paid $10 an hour, he's struggling to get by on that and feels that he is due a pay rise. He'd quite like $100 an hour but that simply isn't going to happen. He decides to do one of the following:

A) Ask for a pay rise to $100 an hour.

B) Appreciate that that's never going to happen and not ask for anything.

C) Ask for a pay rise to $11 an hour.

Option A is one side of your suggestion, feel free to make your own thread asking as such and we'll see how that goes. I'll even bring the marshmallows.

Option B is the other side of your suggestion, nobody wins and the sorry state of affairs we have stays in place.

Option C is the choice grounded in reality. Is it what Little Timmy really wants? No. However.... It's a request that's much more likely to get a positive result. Even if it isn't a huge result, it's a start and it's progress. Once more people warm up to the idea and realise that this parsing stuff isn't actually all that bad then perhaps we can put option A back on the table again.

[Oscura]

Look at it this way.

Little Timmy gets paid $10 an hour, he's struggling to get by on that and feels that he is due a pay rise. He'd quite like $100 an hour but that simply isn't going to happen. He decides to do one of the following:

A) Ask for a pay rise to $100 an hour.

B) Appreciate that that's never going to happen and not ask for anything.

C) Ask for a pay rise to $11 an hour.

Option A is one side of your suggestion, feel free to make your own thread asking as such and we'll see how that goes. I'll even bring the marshmallows.

Option B is the other side of your suggestion, nobody wins and the sorry state of affairs we have stays in place.

Option C is the choice grounded in reality. Is it what Little Timmy really wants? No. However.... It's a request that's much more likely to get a positive result. Even if it isn't a huge result, it's a start and it's progress. Once more people warm up to the idea and realise that this parsing stuff isn't actually all that bad then perhaps we can put option A back on the table again.

Your analogy is weak. Little Timmy doesn't have a choice because he needs that money to live. We do not need parsers to live. There is also the fact that someone else would probably be desperate enough to do his job if he complained too much about how little he got paid and was fired, but anyway...

It's not that my suggestion is "little bit of column A, little bit of column B." I'm calling a personal parser useless because it is. There is no proof Square Enix is any more accepting of this than a normal parser, therefore, asking for $11 or $100 an hour, it's pointless to choose 11 if in the end, the possibility of "No," as an answer is still the same.

My point is, unless Square Enix goes on the record to say they want a personal parser but need to see enough feedback or push for it, a regular parser has just as much chance to be accepted. The only thing that a personal parser benefits over a normal one is that they could still enforce the rule of don't ask/don't tell for numbers. Personal parsing literally only exists to avoid offending others. That's it. It has no extra benefits compared to an actual parser. That is why it is useless.

[Sebazy]

It's not that my suggestion is "little bit of column A, little bit of column B." I'm calling a personal parser useless because it is. There is no proof Square Enix is any more accepting of this than a normal parser, therefore, asking for $11 or $100 an hour, it's pointless to choose 11 if in the end, the possibility of "No," as an answer is still the same.

Yoshida openly stated that he felt warrior was fine but the community objected en mass and thus WAR promptly got buffed through the ceiling. I don't really care what SE feels about it frankly, if enough of the community gets behind an idea that's not entirely unreasonable to implement, then there's a fair chance it'll actually happen, doubly so if it's not actually much work either (It's a pretty safe assumption that SE will have some form of DPS metric in the QA team's client at the very least).

Let's be realistic here, the community isn't going to rally behind a fully blown in game parser without a first step to introduce the masses to it's benefits in a watered down and easy to swallow form. However, the community does appear to be warming up to this. It's a start. I really don't see how this is so hard to understand?

Comparing it to an actual parser is completely missing the point. This isn't for you or me. This is for the overwhelming majority of people who are either unable or unwilling to run an actual parser. For these people, stepping into EX and Savage content is akin to being given a minimum speed limit on a motorway in a vehicle with no speedo. If you truly feel this is useless then there is literally no point me trying to explain anything else to you.

[Oscura]

Yoshida openly stated that he felt warrior was fine but the community objected en mass and thus WAR promptly got buffed through the ceiling. I don't really care what SE feels about it frankly, if enough of the community gets behind an idea that's not entirely unreasonable to implement, then there's a fair chance it'll actually happen, doubly so if it's not actually much work either (It's a pretty safe assumption that SE will have some form of DPS metric in the QA team's client at the very least).

Then add a parser? A parser isn't unreasonable to implement? If you don't care what SE feels about, why are you trying to make a request based on their feelings? You're contradicting yourself. The community just needs to push harder on their demands for a parser then. We don't need baby steps because we need to placate SE, not unless we care about their feelings anyway.

Let's be realistic here, the community isn't going to rally behind a fully blown in game parser without a first step to introduce the masses to it's benefits in a watered down and easy to swallow form. However, the community does appear to be warming up to this. It's a start. I really don't see how this is so hard to understand?

I am being realistic. The majority of people who oppose parsers are either terrified, nervous, hateful or greatly dislike the idea of someone else seeing their numbers without their permission, or having to share their numbers, or being judged on their numbers. Most of those people will never change. It has nothing to do with skill level, it's the same way a lot of people dislike FFlogs. They just don't like the idea of information about them readily being available and ready to judge, even if they perform well. It's rampant enough that even in the OP, it's stated to just lie about your numbers if you feel the need to, or feel uncomfortable. The only problem is that people would just be kicked for lying, and if the GM questioned the party leader about it, they could simply lie and say the numbers weren't high enough. No rule against elitism.

Also, if you've read most parsing threads lately, there's actually been more replies in support of it than rejecting it. The problem is that unfortunately the forum isn't a big enough sample size.

Comparing it to an actual parser is completely missing the point. This isn't for you or me. This is for the overwhelming majority of people who are either unable or unwilling to run an actual parser. For these people, stepping into EX and Savage content is akin to being given a minimum speed limit on a motorway in a vehicle with no speedo. If you truly feel this is useless then there is literally no point me trying to explain anything else to you.

It's not missing the point, and it has nothing to do with me. I've constantly stated and stand by my opinion that I don't care either way if a parser is officially supported. The majority of people who are unwilling to run parsers won't change their mind because of a personal parser. Most anti-parsing posts are about being judged, criticized or harassed by peers. Their feelings regarding this won't change. All it takes is one incident with personal parsing for people like that to feel validated. Eventually some rude person, somewhere, will go too far and demand numbers or act like a jerk, and it'll paint a bad light on all of us. People constantly cite one incident from Japan as a big reason why parsers aren't allowed today, if you're wondering where I get this assumption from. The person was being harassed for more than their damage, but regardless, since it was part of it, that's good enough for most people to explain or validate why parsers should never be allowed.

[Reinha]

The grand majority of "personal parser," posts wants to live in a world where asking or demanding another's numbers is a ban-worthy offense. There is no guarantee that people will willingly share their numbers at any given moment, and some people will forever keep themselves stuck in their bubble to avoid being criticized or yelled at. Simply put, if people want to obtain context for their numbers, they should just ask for an actual parser.

So your beef with the proposed personal parser is that it fails to force anyone to care about their performance. Sorry to tell you but there is no magic cure for that. If a player cares about how well they are doing relative to other players, they have the means to find out even if pestering others for their dps numbers remained forbidden. They can ask if people think their numbers are good or not, check out fflogs or compare the dps numbers they got in SSS versus the actual battle. Seeing party members' dps is not actually going to reveal anything more about performance than what a player can voluntarily find out by using a personal parser.

[Oscura]

So your beef with the proposed personal parser is that it fails to force anyone to care about their performance. Sorry to tell you but there is no magic cure for that.

That's not my beef with it. I just dislike things that are only done half-way. There is zero conclusive evidence that a personal parser would be more accepted than a normal parser by SE. You might as well go all the way. Square Enix has the final say-so, regardless of community feedback. Even if 99% of the community said they wanted a full blown, normal parser tomorrow, if the shareholders felt they wouldn't lose money and the dev team didn't want it anyway, it wouldn't be added. They've already proven that time and time again, with many things that are constantly requested either to be shoved under the rug or completely ignored.

Seeing party members' dps is not actually going to reveal anything more about performance than what a player can voluntarily find out by using a personal parser.

This is flat out untrue. The more skilled a Ninja is, the more DPS the entire party will be doing. Do not forget that buffs and debuffs are part of rotations, and that usually doing them as optimally as possible lines up with high and/or good DPS. If a bad ninja is in the same exact party as the good one (more specifically, with the same other 7 people in the same piece of content without the good ninja), the party will inevitably do less damage because of it.

This is a game based on teamwork. It is not a solo-player game.