Why people still USE ACT knowing their breaking TOS ??

[JanVanding]

A personal parse has little to no intrinsic value without having something to compare against. What does 14,000 DPS mean to someone who has no reference point? They might assume it's a high number, thus they're performing well when in reality 19,000 is where they ought to be. A personal parse is no different than our current sub stat values. Without third party tools and theorycrafter those numbers are entirely pointless since you'd have no way of knowing how much they actually contribute to your damage. Case in point, Tenacity was briefly thought to have huge potential yet due to theorycrafting, it's proven to be more or less forgettable; take it only if there's nothing else better.

As for the whole "no means no." The irony here is by allowing third party parses, people will simply resort to the silent kicks/disbands we do now. Instead of someone actually being able to see why they were kicked and potential improve, they'll just keep getting kicked without a single word spoken.



Those players clearing quickly are typically much better. Which means the fights, in turn, are easier as a result. When enrages actually become an issue is when you mix in everyone else. You may not "need" them per se but someone woefully underperforming means everyone else now has to compensate for them—something plenty of people dislike.

Nonetheless, parses are what keeps Savage alive long term. Without everyone's favourite site, the higher ilvl is utterly meaningless beyond Ultimate gear. Which brings up a bigger problem. Ultimate would become increasingly more exclusive without parsers. People would be far less inclined to recruit outside their inner circles since they have no way of knowing how that person performs. And DPS matters in Ultimate.

If we want to use semantics, GDPR says no and the parser has to be kept "Dont ask Don't tell" because it breaks GDPR

You're illegally taking someone else's data without consent

That's not just bannable, it's straight up illegal, there's a reason the tool runners in question have offered the ability for players in the know to block their data from appearing in logs because its become legally unacceptable and opens the makers up to being dragged into EU courts.

The fact you're using the tool to quietly boot players shows that if the rules changed you'd call people out as well.

Slice it any way you want, the intentions of seeing others' data, the fact it's now illegal to do so in some countries without consent shows a gross misunderstanding of why SE have such a hard stance against an official one

[JohnSpawnVFX]

If we want to use semantics, GDPR says no and the parser has to be kept "Dont ask Don't tell" because it breaks GDPR

You're illegally taking someone else's data without consent

That's not just bannable, it's straight up illegal, there's a reason the tool runners in question have offered the ability for players in the know to block their data from appearing in logs because its become legally unacceptable and opens the makers up to being dragged into EU courts.

The fact you're using the tool to quietly boot players shows that if the rules changed you'd call people out as well.

Slice it any way you want, the intentions of seeing others' data, the fact it's now illegal to do so in some countries without consent shows a gross misunderstanding of why SE have such a hard stance against an official one

We've already had this discussion here. Parsing doesn't fall under GDPR in any way whatsoever.

1. The data belongs to SE, in the first place anyway
2. The data is shown on everyone's combat log, therefore not even private

[JanVanding]

We've already had this discussion here. Parsing doesn't fall under GDPR in any way whatsoever.

1. The data belongs to SE, in the first place anyway
2. The data is shown on everyone's combat log, therefore not even private

Taking data without the consent of company or user = clear breach of GDPR

SE does not consent, the users don't consent, why do you think the tool itself is not allowed to be talked about openly?

Go read the law, there is no consent so it's effectively stealing the data because SE don't want it publicly available and nor do the users consent.

[Snek]

I think parsers are both fantastic and awful.

They're amazing (and almost necessary) for self improvement, which is why I'll always be for a limited official one to be added into the game. Why limited? Because why do I ever need to see someone else's parse? What use is that to me outside of stroking my ego if I'm significantly higher than them? Yes, if I have a friends parse I can help them improve... But they could just give me their parse instead of me already having it. A button on the official parses that could say "share parse with <name>". I've also seen them breed poor play. I can't tell you how many times I've seen parties wipe (while being like... 10% ahead of enrage) because they NEED to hit the boss 1 more time because "muah DPS".

Personally:

Instead of a parsers that just tracks DPS, they could add a sort of feedback box that told you how well you did in relation to players on the same job (all other players, not players in your instance) and at the same ilevel. I think something like this could help push players to improve in FF14. I'm not sure what data Square keeps but if they do (or start to) keep data for each job at a few ilevel ranges for different fights (perhaps only keeping the latest 2 weeks worth of data for storage's sake) they could create a feedback box to show players while minimizing the effect ilevel has...

How this could work:

After clearing Shiva as a ilevel 490 Dragoon the game could tell you "You did 12345dps! That's higher than 70% of dragoons at a similar item level!"
or
"You did 1234dps! That's higher than 5% of dragoons at a similar item level!"

Both of these are worded in the positive, but could help people realize when they are performing poorly or feel great when they're shown improvement. Since this removes (or minimizes) gear as a factor, the only factors that are left is player skill and mechanics. Perhaps this would push them to improve, ask for help, or they could just disable the feedback in the options.

Now, obviously, this isn't perfect... Since standing in an AOE to eat vuln stacks means you could do more DPS. However the feedback doesn't have to just tell DPS. It could tell them how many vulnerability stacks they had, how many times they broke their combo, what they cast during their buffs, that they caused X deaths due to failing a mechanic, how much damage they absorbed/took, how much overall time they had without casting a GCD... or any other data that Square collects about a fight and thinks is important to the player.

If being compared to other players is too much they could instead be compared to a set standard for each job placed by SE. That is, of course, a lot less useful... But it can still be great for improvement.

Example: They expect a DRG at ilevel 500 to do 10 000DPS in fight X, you clear at ilevel 500 with 11 000DPS, the game can tell you "Good job! You did 10% higher than what's expect of a Dragoon at your ilevel!"

[JohnSpawnVFX]

Taking data without the consent of company or user = clear breach of GDPR

SE does not consent, the users don't consent, why do you think the tool itself is not allowed to be talked about openly?

Go read the law, there is no consent so it's effectively stealing the data because SE don't want it publicly available and nor do the users consent.

I didn't know I needed consent to scroll up and down on my battle log and copy it down to a sheet of paper or a spreadsheet, which the tool automates.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

Taking data without the consent of company or user = clear breach of GDPR

SE does not consent, the users don't consent, why do you think the tool itself is not allowed to be talked about openly?

Go read the law, there is no consent so it's effectively stealing the data because SE don't want it publicly available and nor do the users consent.

If thats the case, wouldn't you quoting people against their will be against GDPR?

[Mhaeric]

Taking data without the consent of company or user = clear breach of GDPR

SE does not consent, the users don't consent, why do you think the tool itself is not allowed to be talked about openly?

Go read the law, there is no consent so it's effectively stealing the data because SE don't want it publicly available and nor do the users consent.

I don't know if you realize how ridiculous you sound with this. The GDPR went into effect in 2016. SE has made their stance on parsers clear well before that. Nothing about damage numbers is private information. If your damage numbers actually qualified as "personal data" according to the GDPR then SE would be obligated to completely block them from appearing in game at all. Every time you play the game you are consenting to SE owning your character data including the name, data, chat transcripts, non-personal account information, etc. It is quite explicit in the opening paragraph of the user agreement.

[JanVanding]

If thats the case, wouldn't you quoting people against their will be against GDPR?

You already click to consent when you sign up to the forum.

Whereas you don't consent to your data being published on a third party tool on a third party site.

That's the difference between signing up to a consent for an official games forum versus unencrypting data via a third party tool and publishing it as public information.

Why can you do that in other games that have official support for parsing tools? Because it's part of the TOS consent.

Here, you consent to SE gathering and compiling that information in your TOS, you don't consent to someone else unencrypting that information and publishing it publicly which is actually against SEs TOS and breaks GDPR as it's not covered in your consented TOS.

I don't know if you realize how ridiculous you sound with this. The GDPR went into effect in 2016. SE has made their stance on parsers clear well before that. Nothing about damage numbers is private information. If your damage numbers actually qualified as "personal data" according to the GDPR then SE would be obligated to completely block them from appearing in game at all. Every time you play the game you are consenting to SE owning your character data including the name, data, chat transcripts, non-personal account information, etc. It is quite explicit in the opening paragraph of the user agreement.

Other companies actually updated their policies based on the GDPR changes to cover themselves, there's a reason Dataminers for example tend to be based in Russia or an outlining Balkans state where GDPR doesn't apply.

Just because the data puts an encrypted file client side doesn't mean you should be un-encrypting it with a third party tool and making it public information. That's like me saying "Well I have all this information at my finger tips from my employer, they let me access it so they won't mind if I de-crypt it and make it public" Yes they would, I'd get straight fired and I'd likely get dragged into court for breaking the law.

Again, just because you "Can" doesn't mean you "Should"

Make sense?

[Mhaeric]

That's the difference between signing up to a consent for an official games forum versus unencrypting data via a third party tool and publishing it as public information.

Why can you do that in other games that have official support for parsing tools? Because it's part of the TOS consent.

Here, you consent to SE gathering and compiling that information in your TOS, you don't consent to someone else unencrypting that information and publishing it publicly which is actually against SEs TOS and breaks GDPR as it's not covered in your consented TOS.

Make sense?

You're making yourself sound even more silly. Parsing doen't involves anything encrypted. All it does is copy the damage numbers as displayed in the chat log. Someone could manually enter them into a spreadsheet or even just write it down using pen and paper and it would be the same thing.

Edit, since the misconception escalated:

Other companies actually updated their policies based on the GDPR changes to cover themselves, there's a reason Dataminers for example tend to be based in Russia or an outlining Balkans state where GDPR doesn't apply.

Just because the data puts an encrypted file client side doesn't mean you should be un-encrypting it with a third party tool and making it public information. That's like me saying "Well I have all this information at my finger tips from my employer, they let me access it so they won't mind if I de-crypt it and make it public" Yes they would, I'd get straight fired and I'd likely get dragged into court for breaking the law.

There is no encypted file of your actions being placed client side. The game sends an unencryted feed to your client that includes the raw text to display in your chat log and which the parser documents as it comes in along with the timestamp and player position.

[JanVanding]

You're making yourself sound even more silly. Parsing doen't involves anything encrypted. All it does is copy the damage numbers as displayed in the chat log. Someone could manually enter them into a spreadsheet or even just write it down using pen and paper and it would be the same thing.

If the tool was that simple it would be inaccurate as hell, because it would be open to compiling bugged damage figures which can and have happened.

If it was that simple, they wouldn't need to patch the tool every time there's a big patch, you want it to seem simpler than it is because it makes it easier to digest that it's a plug in going through game data.