Letter to MR Yoshi: Why parses system is destroying the ffxiv world.

[Vstarstruck]

You are neglecting key difference. First and foremost, FFXIV is not WoW nor does it boast even a fraction of the equivalent playerbase. The two cannot be directly compared in this regard because you'll inevitably see worse offenders in a game with several times the subscription numbers. It's no different than assuming Balmung or Gilgamesh are terrible servers because you come across more jerks from there than anywhere else. Considering Balmung once had more than triple the players of smaller servers, it's hardly surprising you will see more jerks from Balmung than say, Zalera.

Secondly, WoW focuses almost exclusively on raiding. Therefore, it fosters a stronger competitive environment—a fact made all the more evident with open world PvP. This inevitably attracts a more aggressive element. None of this occurs in FFXIV, thus you will see less people openly abusing parsers because the mindset between each game is different.

Finally, it ultimately comes down to moderation. If players who do abuse parsers are swiftly dealt with, this becomes a non-issue long term. The only way this ever balloons into a serious problem is if SE allowed it to happen. Regardless, their stance is entirely counterproductive to the game's design. As someone mentioned elsewhere, we have a game dedicated almost exclusively to pumping out damage—so much so, even tanks and healers are expected to contribute—yet the game goes out of its way to conceal all that information. Even worse, they waste development time and resources on frivolous pursuits in the name of "improving player skill!" which accomplish nothing, i.e., the tacked on job gauges, when a parser does precisely what they want.

You have a point, forgive me if this feels like I am putting words in your mouth but this is my spin on the situation after reading that.

Remove all DPS checks and make the game more "unskilled friendly" or put in parsers. You can't have your cake and eat it too. All those gauges and attempts to lessen the "skill gap" did not achieve anything.

I forget where or who said it. The meaning was basically "parsers don't turn people into jerks" if someone is going to be a jerk, they are going to do so without parser, likewise those intend to be helpful and not toxic will continue to do so. I do think there is a type of person that is more or less "passive" until put in some environment that triggers them to say something. Basically I do feel parsers will increases minor harassment in trying put people down, but as your post says, it will not balloon effect if SE takes action on it. The other problem with this though, and SE may be aware of it, they would need to change their policies to make room for it. It is likely they will end up banning more people then they will like to with parsers with their current "3 strikes per lifetime = ban" Having parsers is likely going to see a large hike in bans just because 3 of the most miner things can = ban. (Though they should change that regardless, Oh made 3 "mistakes" in 10 year span? ban. that isn't fair)

Another problem is the target audience of this game. Look at all the MSQ complainant threads, some stated almost quitting because people leaving them behind getting kicked etc. What about those that did quit over it? or felt the community was too toxic for them because of it? That blanket change they did was to prevent potential sub loss. Now the point in bringing this up is what will happen to new players with parses being public okay? THIS was a LONG time ago, I do not remember when, but ironically I did witness parser harassment in a MSQ roulette dungeon. (the one doing the harassing STILL pestered the victim even AFTER 2-3 people telling them to stop they can get in trouble because of SE's zero tolerance policy on parsers). People are definitely willing to this anywhere, and even in low level content. What if the person being harassed left the game forever? costing SE a sub? GM policy has no reimbursement type actions when stuff like this happens. So even if that person doing the harassment is punished, the damage is done to the customer, and is not reversible leading to a loss in sub. I am sure that is SE's strongest motivation in deciding what to do.

so having a public parser means overhauling GM policy and I am sure SE does not want all that extra work, time, and money investment. Much easier to just say no parsers.