FFXIV's Double Standard - Third-Party Usage and Spam Report Trolls

[HyperiusUltima]

This is becoming a big issue. I've been seeing an uptick of some people getting suspended for the dumbest things. My tank for my group today was suspended for 10 days over absolutely nothing - and a lot of this is caused by the double standard that was set by SE from when Xenos was banned for a clip on Twitch(which is OUTSIDE of FFXIV).

The way this is being abused is that if someone doesn't agree with you or is mad at you, they basically can call the GMs on you for "Third Party Usage" when in fact they weren't using them at all. It makes things difficult because based on what streams have been done by influencers, I've wanted to believe it's a "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" rule among the community for a long time.

However, there have been more and more reports that have caused suspensions in the last few months without viable evidence and they haven't done any wrong. If anything, I want to put out a petition to Naoki Yoshida, the Director of FFXIV and his production team, to update their Rules and Policies in regards to this issue, because it is not explicitly mentioned in the User Agreement.

2.1 Cheating and Botting. You may not create or use any unauthorized cheats, bots, automation software, hacks, mods or any other unauthorized software or hardware designed to modify the Game and gameplay. In addition, you may not take advantage of game system bugs and exploits during gameplay.

2.2 Real Money Trading, Farming and Power-Leveling. You may not sell, purchase or exchange for real-world money or value any in-game currency, accounts, characters, in-game services, or in-game virtual items. You may not play the Game for the purpose of acquiring virtual items or advancement in game play on behalf of a third-party or for the purpose of selling any virtual assets to a third party for real-world money, specifically including "gold-farming" and power-leveling services.

2.3 Commercial Use. You may not exploit the Game for any commercial purpose (for example, advertising any product or service in-game, or use by the operator of a cyber café) without Square Enix's prior written consent.

2.4 Private Servers. You may not create, operate, participate in or use any unauthorized servers intended to emulate the Game.

2.5 Data Mining. You may not intercept, mine or otherwise collect information from the Game using unauthorized third party software.

2.6 Hacking and Circumvention. You may not hack, disassemble, decompile, or otherwise modify the Game or server computer code, whether the Game code is located on a DVD, Blu-rayTM disc, your computer/console or on Square Enix's servers, except as expressly permitted by Square Enix or applicable law.

2.7 Modifying or Creating Derivative Software. You may not modify or cause to be modified any files that are a part of the Game or Service in any way not expressly authorized by Square Enix, and may not make any derivative works of the Game.

2.8 Commercial Spamming/Spimming. You may not use (or abuse) the in-game chat and message services to distribute advertisements.

I will compare these rules to what ACT runs on, which multiple people use for personal use. At most, ACT is a use violation of Term 2.5, which includes Data Mining(this infers to the mining of information of any kind from Final Fantasy XIV). However, Final Fantasy XIV has not upheld this agreement on their side in regards to their influencers and others that stream the use of such programs on Twitch and has been normalized over the years.

What they need to do is follow their own guidelines, but in regards to the report abuse that can be used against people by saying they used Third Party Services, I recommend that they do a proper investigation - however, the problem that shows itself when they attempt such is that they are unable to know on that individual computer whether they are using ACT or mods in that regard.

Instead of assuming that these things are in use, there must be proof shown instead of this idea of 'guilty until proven innocent'.

To properly protect players from Report Abuse in bad faith in regards to Third Party Usage, I recommend that the Final Fantasy XIV Team adds a clause to their policy:

3.10 Abuse of the Report System. You may not exploit the report system against other users, in accordance with Term 3.2 on false grounds. Should the user be found in violation of 3.10, the punishment will prompt action from suspension up to termination from Final Fantasy XIV.

As for third party platforms, they need to write themselves in the User Agreement how they're going to handle it because there is no agreement currently in regards to what happens on Twitch. Any criticism from the community helps, but it's becoming more and more of an issue that the FFXIV Development Team needs to address, if not Naoki Yoshida directly as he did when he went over how their system works when they did a Live Letter one time.

Note: Their User Agreement was last updated on 12/24/2019.

[znushu]

the only reason why SE turns a "blind eye" to Third Party Tools usage is due to a small flux of users that use them but honestly I think they shouldn't turn a "blind eye" to them. As third party tools only reinforce toxic behavior and tends to make the game easier to play.

in regards to being punished for out of game actions while playing the game on a public platform like twitch or youtube. The fact that they are streaming the product and playing it as they did makes what they say and do offline still subject to the User Agreement. just think of a person in a E-Sports tournament that was suddenly shouting derogatory things as they were playing in a live match but the opponent couldn't hear them due to their rooms being soundproof and the game having no mic. Yet the camera picked up everything and it was broadcasted to twitch. It's the same thing just on a lesser scale.

edit:
The posts below me in this very thread only reinforces my first statement at how the usage of third party tools just reinforces toxic behavior as there is not only bashing on other players but also advertisements for the usage of such illicit tools and at the end of the day all Third Party Tools (including Damage Meters) require the user to have violated a few rules in the User Agreement. My stance has not changed and I still believe that SE should not turn a blind eye to the usage of such tools

[HyperiusUltima]

the only reason why SE turns a "blind eye" to Third Party Tools usage is due to a small flux of users that use them but honestly I think they shouldn't turn a "blind eye" to them. As third party tools only reinforce toxic behavior and tends to make the game easier to play.

in regards to being punished for out of game actions while playing the game on a public platform like twitch or youtube. The fact that they are streaming the product and playing it as they did makes what they say and do offline still subject to the User Agreement. just think of a person in a E-Sports tournament that was suddenly shouting derogatory things as they were playing in a live match but the opponent couldn't hear them due to their rooms being soundproof and the game having no mic. Yet the camera picked up everything and it was broadcasted to twitch. It's the same thing just on a lesser scale.

To be fair, Third Party Tools such as ACT and its Triggers do make it easier to do things such as Ultimate and Savage, however it still is violating the User Agreement in this regard. As for the toxicity you mention, I have not seen it except in the smallest minority of groups become used as a tool to bash someone for not doing their DPS or something else. Out of game actions on the other hand should not be as heavy-handed on that punishment, as they have no jurisdiction over those areas(Twitch, Youtube) that have their own individual User Agreements(hence the suspension of a Twitch user for bashing someone's DPS on FFXIV the other time because it was considered 'toxic' or directing their own viewers to attack another streamer in a hateful way). Final Fantasy XIV has no jurisdiction in those areas, and at best can only talk to Twitch/Youtube about it in regards to that site's Terms of Service and User Agreement rather than banning for something that someone said on another site and not in-game(which, if it was in-game, it would be under FFXIV's User Agreement).

[Kurando]

Feel like we are only getting half the story here. Sure you want to defend your friend who you feel was wrongly suspended, but these things don't just happen without sufficient evidence so clearly SE had something to go on in order to execute some kind of action against the player. Not really a double standard though, more use common sense online and no one should really get in to any trouble to begin with.

[Krojack]

As third party tools only reinforce toxic behavior

This has little backing. It feels like you're taking most of this experience from WoW. In my entire life of playing FF14 I have only run into 1 person that was blurting out DPS numbers to others and how bad they were. I simply reported them. They likely got banned.

and tends to make the game easier to play.

Why do you care how easy or hard the game is for others to play? Shouldn't you only worry about yourself when it comes to this? If you think they make the game easier to play then stop using them.

[HyperiusUltima]

Feel like we are only getting half the story here. Sure you want to defend your friend who you feel was wrongly suspended, but these things don't just happen without sufficient evidence so clearly SE had something to go on in order to execute some kind of action against the player. Not really a double standard though, more use common sense online and no one should really get in to any trouble to begin with.

It would be best to explain the common sense SE uses because it obviously doesn't follow through if you're just going on word of mouth and a person's record. Would you act on that without even hearing the other person first? Because honestly lack of communication between who is being accused without chat logs or anything is important - and if they even crossed over into Discord Territory, then that's an entire different can of worms since they've done it on Twitch and Twitter*.

*Doing that with the mod community was justified since it the graphics and such are their property and modification of it violates 2.7.

[Jojoya]

However, there have been more and more reports that have caused suspensions in the last few months without viable evidence and they haven't done any wrong.

Where is your proof of this?

Edit: you also neglected to quote the Materials Usage license, which is going to apply to any content creators including streamers.

https://support.na.square-enix.com/rule.php?id=5382&la=1&tag=authc

[NanaWiloh]

Yoshi P. Has no control over the TOS or The EULA for the game that is handled by the legal department. As for bans there are players in this game who will never admit to wrong doing. Some players do things they don't believe is wrong or would offend someone but SE sees it as wrong or offensive. It always needs to be kept in mind that no player can 100% monitor at all times what another player is doing or saying.

[Liam_Harper]

As third party tools only reinforce toxic behavior and tends to make the game easier to play.

I'm always impressed when people who do literally no endgame at all (which is the main place things like ACT are used or matter) are such experts on it.

[EaMett]

I'm always impressed when people who do literally no endgame at all (which is the main place things like ACT are used or matter) are such experts on it.

Not to mention that I would really like to see what would come from having no parsing at all. Can you imagine trying to put a week 1 party together without parsing? And how would you know to improve?
All I can think of is that the playerbase would set a website up with their speed kills of the SSS dummies and everyone would compare themselves to those. Which in essence is the same as parsing and fflogs.
What this says is that the content provided by the devs requires a measuring stick that they aren't willing to provide themselves. Hence why players use tools like ACT and why devs turn a blind eye.