Just realized something: FFXIV is a terrible DPS player's DREAM come true...

[RichardButte]

How many times does it need to be explained you can see it without a parse....
You do not need a parse in 4 man to see if a dps is spamming the 1 key or sitting there on idle 20-80% of the time.

It's more about the fact that you know immediately if a healer or tank isn't doing their job but a lousy DPS can take a lot more effort to unmask.

When there are 4 DPS in particular, you'll have to watch ALL of them mid-fight and then check their gear one at a time as well.

Again, compare this to tanks and healers where it's infinitely easier to know who is causing wipes.

I started this thread because I was in disbelief at the hypocrisy of the community regarding how we treat both tanks and healers vs. how DPS are treated. It's sickeningly hypocritical that tanks and healers can be kicked after a single error (I've seen it happen) but DPS aren't subject to at least the same level of scrutiny for their performance.

But more and more, I've realized that the whole parser debate is a symptom of the true problem, and that is that XIV does a horrendous job of teaching DPS players how to play their classes effectively.

This wouldn't be THAT bad, except for the fact that the game features DPS checks in content that is far from savage raiding.

When designing any game, the #1 priority is to teach the player how to play well enough early on that they are prepared for the challenges they'll face later in the game.

With DPS checks in the game, it should ABSOLUTELY be teaching players proper rotations for their class to ensure they're able to meet these DPS checks when they encounter them, but no such training or tutorials exist in game that do this.

The end result is that we get DPS players arriving at endgame with no clue if they're doing even marginally well at their class, as well as no guidance on how they might improve.

There should 100% be an NPC called the "Battlemaster" or something that the game directs you to upon reaching the level cap, where you learn the rotation of your abilities and how to be the best you can at it. Not that this forces the player to BE the best before they can complete the quest, but it would at least show them the path to how they can do so.

Some part of me wants to slap together a video tutorial for some DPS classes, but aside from not having the time, it wouldn't change anything because we need something IN-GAME that teaches people...

[Vstarstruck]

Some part of me wants to slap together a video tutorial for some DPS classes, but aside from not having the time, it wouldn't change anything because we need something IN-GAME that teaches people...

There is plenty out there already, but yes, as I told you a few times now I made a thread on this subject too (before you came back bumping things)

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...able-to-use-DF.

Also smart people do not kick a healer for a single mistake, likewise can point out who is lacking severe DPS before checking gear. Sometimes in 8 or 24 man it can be easy to tell as well, they are laying on the floor for longer time then they spend attacking things.

[ErryK]

we need something IN-GAME that teaches people...

Hi, I'd like you to meet tooltips.

[Krotoan]

Hi, I'd like you to meet tooltips.

I don't think they're saying the problem is the system or information is unavailable. It's that it's optional to read or participate in the content that teaches you HOW to play your job.

[ErryK]

I don't think they're saying the problem is the system or information is unavailable. It's that it's optional to read or participate in the content that teaches you HOW to play your job.

So then the user is at fault.

[Krotoan]

So then the user is at fault.

The game currently doesn't really require or even encourage you to learn your job well until it's suddenly do or die. So it's partially people not wanting to engage and partially people just being blindsided by a sudden check where there hasn't been in all previous compulsory content. Mostly DPS though since tanking/healing requires you learn your job pretty quickly or fail.

[Vstarstruck]

So then the user is at fault.

In a way it is? it is common to see people take the route of least resistance and only put in effort that is needed.

So it is common for new players to think they are doing well enough because they cleared, no one says anything, or rarely rather, because experienced players are tired of hearing "you do not pay for my sub" So now we are having social problems in the game where players are not ready for content, and when too many are in one run it is just vote abandon and every ones time is wasted because this game is not presented properly to its target audience. So if the idea of making a game is based on ease of access, it needs some kind of teaching tool that will show people proper play.

FFXIV's target audience is not those few that take the time to research things, break damage formulas down, like FFXI was. You can't put FFXI hidden like information when you are not targeting that kind of audience. The current game just encourages bigger skill gaps and frustrations between those that know what to do and those that do not know what to do, because they do not know more effort needs to be put in then spamming the 1 key, level 1 though 69.

So you are given easy mode spam one button to clear to entering content that kills you for it, and people do not learn that quickly. The skill gap and difficultly gap is way to big going from 69 to 70 to endgame 70

The game currently doesn't really require or even encourage you to learn your job well until it's suddenly do or die. So it's partially people not wanting to engage and partially people just being blindsided by a sudden check where there hasn't been in all previous compulsory content. Mostly DPS though since tanking/healing requires you learn your job pretty quickly or fail.

Yup.

In the end of the day both development and the user base are both at fault. It is clear People are not going to go the extra mile and prepare for things any time soon, so it is up to development to put that in the game.

Is it part culture too? does the Japanese servers have problems with the average user being carried etc? Maybe the development team did not expect users of NA/EU? just one region? to act like this. I am really interested to know the frequency of each region of how often people try to ilevel bypass or enter content they are not ready for. Not having your level 70 ability in the last level 70 df? ilevel 300 to enter? no foul and a i285 weapon? why is this happening? shows you how willing people are motivated on their own to do better.

[TaleraRistain]

This is never going to be fixed until SE decides to respect the roles in groups more. So long as there's a melding where everyone is expected to be dps, then there will be pressure on the non-dps roles to make up for the dps roles if they are lacking. If tanks had to focus on tanking and healers had to focus on healing because the content required those roles to perform their main abilities throughout the entire fight, then lower dps would definitely be noticeable. But then people couldn't have their mass pulling Expert speedruns. I think sometimes the community doesn't really know what it wants in this game.

[Tridus]

Hi, I'd like you to meet tooltips.

I just got funny looks from people in my office, because as a software developer this is the most hilarious thing I've read in quite a while.

Here in UX design, you have a sizable percentage of users who won't read tooltips (especially with how long some of the ones in game are). Of the ones that do, another sizable percentage won't understand them because their literacy skills aren't that good (or they're not playing in their best language). Of the ones that do understand it, another sizable percentage won't able to figure out how that relates to using it in a rotation with anything else, and only a small number are going to be able to get anything even close to optimal out of just tooltips.

And of course, you still need a parser if you want to validate that you did all that correctly and actually came up with something optimal.

I've had people who deleted things and then asked for help asking how they deleted things where I had to explain they pushed the big button marked "Delete", twice, and on the second time ignored the big red text saying "this will permanently delete the permit". No amount of tooltips can fix that.

Tanks and healers get more immediate feedback because stuff either runs away and hits someone else, or someone dies. Things like the way skills light up in combos is helpful feedback as well, because it's very easy to understand: you probably want to hit the button that just started glowing (especially when doing so makes another button glow).

But when are you supposed to use Wildfire? The game doesn't help you with that all. Hell, I had to read Wildfire a few times to figure out what it actually does, because the way it's worded you can read it as deferring damage until later (rather than adding more later). It's pretty easy to miss the damage number on it when it does go off if it's mixed in with other damage numbers, so your average person can get this wrong very easily. Unless they have some way to measure how effective it is or already know how fast everything should be dying (which they probably don't because the people most affected are new to the game and don't have a frame of reference), it's something of a black box.

[Zojha]

Here in UX design, you have a sizable percentage of users who won't read tooltips [...]. Of the ones that do, another sizable percentage won't understand them because their literacy skills aren't that good [...]. Of the ones that do understand it, another sizable percentage won't able to figure out how that relates to using it in a rotation with anything else, and only a small number are going to be able to get anything even close to optimal out of just tooltips.

And these same people would would equip a new item and think they improved their skills because their numbers went up, if they even have the math skills required to realize the number is higher, because they clearly lack the comprehension skills to make the connection between the higher iLvL and the better performance.
If they don't even bother with tooltips, all kinds of guides will be dead in the water as well - those are even longer and literacy becomes an issue there as well.

The only thing ambiguous about Wildfire for example is the "most" in the description, because nothing tells you which damage is compiled and which isn't. But it's common epic rarity sense that this essentially amounts to a 25% damage buff for the duration and you wanna cram as much skills as possible into it and thus... you wanna use it shortly before you unload.

If the average user really has issues with that... I suppose I'm an exceptional user and shouldn't project my standards.