An Alternative? to parsers..

[Tridus]

You're not gonna find any. Anyone who uses a parser is aware of the "don't ask, don't tell" policy so no one's going to hang themselves out to dry by announcing it in a pug setting. By that same turn, that's also why someone gets silently kicked or the party disbands and the bad player can't return to the party via blacklist. That's where the claims come from. They can't prove with hard evidence that they got kicked because of bad parse. They can only strongly guess that's the reason but this begs the question: if you got kicked without any jeer whatsoever, why call it harassment?

Yep. And I'm failing to see why that's better. Silently kicking people and leaving them no apparent reason as to why is less "toxic" than telling them exactly why so they can work on it?

Doesn't make much sense to me.

[Gelesto]

snip

Many games have a grading sytem but doesnt that spur you on to get a higher rank?

EDIT: just recently I played sonic forces and retrying to get that S rank was a great feeling when I got it why not have that feeling for dungeon runs too?

[cheolsu]

We already have dps benchmarks for tanks healers dps for stone sea sky. It would be nice to have the pop up when you win or wipe in a raid like the score card after a pvp match. And the window would only show if you were below, at, or above the benchmark.

[Lilseph]

Story Time

It sucks that it happened to you, but in an online environment, one of the things we learn is to grow a thick skin. Since we started with the anecdotal evidence: I'm a slow learner myself and I've been called out several times at the begining of each expansion or when I try out a new job, because "I am bad" and I should "Do X" instead of "Y", or won't give me advice at all. Yes, it feels bad. But what can you do about it? Improve. Take a more positive approach and see it as an opportunity for self-improvement. Don't have a parser? Go get it and use it for yourself. Sit in front of a dummy and train.

It's a game, I agree. However, there are a lot of games, both online and offline, that grade you based on your performance. Some of those even include a highscore ladder, where you're being compared globaly or among your friends. Knowing how to play a game is part of the game. If you want to take it with a casual approach, then you're doing the wrong content or pairing yourself up with the wrong people.

[KaivaC]

snip

I hear you. This is my first actual MMO as well (I've tried others, but never for longer than two weeks because I never knew what I was doing). I had that experience on Garuda. Not Ex. Hard Mode Garuda. There was a point in time last year when I quit tanking entirely. I was self-conscious too, then me being being, I got pissed off that somebody judged me, so I wanted to prove them wrong. I won't say that it doesn't happen. But I'm not the type to let others tell me I don't know how to play a class/job. I am very much like my character lol - hot-blooded, seeking self-improvement. But that's also just me because I do tend to get defensive and want to prove I'm better than what some say I am.

[Tridus]

During the course of a duty damage done, damage taken and effective healing (not overhealing) will be calculated awarding you with a grade at the end C, B, A and S.

Who is going to figure out what the threshold for these grades is, and how are they going to determine what it should be? You see wide fluctuations in expected DPS on different fights due to the mechanics of that fight and group composition (a SAM paired with BRD and AST is going to look a lot better than the same one pared with BLM and WHM on any DPS measurement scale). SE having to assign someone to come up with grading criteria for every new piece of content they add, without having large quantities of sample points to work with because it's new content.

That will be a significant ongoing expense any time new content is added, let alone if they wan't to give meaningful feedback on existing content when job mechanics change.

Now depending on your job these values will differ for example a MCH will not be weighed as heavily for damage to say a BLM or SAM each is taylored to the job much like the savage dummy challenges

So take the above cost and multiply by the number of jobs, because now you have to do it for all of them. Do we want SE developers doing this instead of working on game content or system improvements?

For healing as stated above effective healing (damage absorbed by shields also would count towards this) meaning no overheals would increase your "score"

But non-overhealing amounts are determined entirely by how much damage people take. A good group will require significantly less healing than a bad group, and thus in the good group a good healer will have less healing but more DPS than the exact same healer in a bad group. Grading how effectively healing is being done is a not-straightforward task. That gets even more true if you want to grade stuff like "did the AST use their cards correctly", because what does "correctly" mean in the context of a dungeon where the tank is undergeared and getting hammered, thus making extended Bole a great card?

So during the course of a dungeon you will generate invisible points for your contribution to the group and after the duty complete message you will recieve your grade card showing you what rank you got ( varies on job and duty naturally) showing people where they have room to improve ranks A, B and C or knowing you did well with a rank S, your grade is only viewable by yourself to stop abuse if you didnt meet certain expectations.

Perhaps include a rewards system to help enforce the idea that if your playing with people especially strangers that doing your best is best for all. C 1 point, B 2 points A 3 points with S granting 5 points possibly to spend on glamour items, minions, mounts, untradable consumables, titles etc

Any thoughts? Additions? would like to know what you all think, could it work or is it just another shower thought.

I think it's an overcomplicated way to try and get around the problem. An entirely new system needs to be built to mostly track something that's already trackable (DPS) and will require constant work because every time new content is added new scoring tiers will need to be added for every job.

It also doesn't address the problem that C is entirely satisfactory for a lot of people, and with no failure grade that'll cover someone who is trying but just doesn't understand their rotation, and the guy who thinks Jolt is the only spell that he should ever use even when there's 10 packs to AoE. Not to mention the guy who stands in stuff and dies 10 times.

Fundamentally, the content itself needs to give you the risk of failure in order to address this problem. I'd much rather see them introduce enrage timers in Doma Castle or even earlier, instead of letting people get by until it suddenly slaps them in the face at endgame.

[Alma_karma]

improvement grades

I am not the kind of player who wants to Ace everything. Sometimes you have that one map you struggled terribly to get through and you get a poor rank after finally completing it. It is like a little slap in the face that the level you struggled on for so long decided you still sucked. High scores don't bother me, getting ranked doesn't bother me. I just want to clear the content even if i didn't do it perfectly. If i know what i am doing and can clear content i don't think the grade at the end matters. Its the struggle that you did to get there. Its no fun if you are forced to be perfect and never make a mistake. And being able to get those amazing clears and scores just means you know the gameplay well. We all celebrate our victories in our own way.
I know in sonic forces you get more rewards the better got do too. Not the same for ffxiv. Motivation for things helps drive the game play. And you basically are retrying in dungeons anyway with the duty roulette. Just with less rewards.
Plus i play a lot of rpgs and open world games, i havent seen a rating since ps2 days.

[Zeonx]

It... really didn't die for that reason, though...?

No but I don't think people really cared for the ranking system at end.

I believe the game died because they re-made it and then reset every ones skills.

They shouldn't of touched it, it was great before the changes side scrolling anime type beat em up game with rpg elements co-op and you could use a controller would be great for a ps4 xbox free game but oh well.

[Bourne_Endeavor]

It is a game. Its meant be enjoyed by all. Even if they don't play to a certain ideal.

Look at it from their perspective. You were birb farming yet slowed down the run, which lessened their enjoyment. Those groups are intended for fast and efficient kills, ideally. Learning groups, on the other hand, should be more patient, though I can understand their frustration if it wasn't a mechanical issue on your end but a rotation one. EX Primals isn't where you should be learning your rotation. None of this excuses rude or antagonist remarks. I don't mean to condone that in any way. All that aside, did you consider seeking out guides and maybe setting up a parse yourself? I have been called out before; most good players have at one time or another. It can sting a little, but I used it to better myself by seeking out guides and asking friends what mistakes I might be making.

We're on the same server. If you ever did want some advice, I'm happy to help.

[KaivaC]

snip

At best, I am above average when it comes to how I'm doing with my DPS classes in the current Savage tier. I don't want to be perfect, nor am I trying to be perfect - however, I do aim to be better than 'trash noob' or 'bottom DPS' that I've been called before. I just get motivation from criticism to do better than before. And considering I'm approaching one year since entering FFXIV, I think that's really the best advice that anybody who has received criticism over their numbers/rotations can do - get better. Figure out what is wrong and work on what could be the problem - if it has merit, of course. Not all criticisms are valid.