Parsers add replayability for casual players

[Shurrikhan]

"Link to a screen-shot of your numbers, or you can't join this party. By the way, you'll need to have your gear inspected to ensure your iLevel is at least 30 above content requirement as well."

Followed by "This is bad. How did someone like you ever make level [60/70/80] !? Blacklisted".

[Based on conversations in WoW, where you could actually use a parser].

I'm guessing you haven't been on WoW in a while?

Any content prior to the latest expansion is level-scaled. However, the scaling is such that low levels are effectively, in their one- to three-button spam, supercharged as if benefiting from a level capped player's full toolkit's worth of cooldowns at all times. "Damn, you're putting out numbers like you're still level 10" would be a complement. Except, people don't really talk about numbers. They didn't much before, as they were useless without context, and they certainly don't now, as scaling has made them utterly useless for figuring out performance during leveling unless one is familiar with how much that spec can put out with X relative gear at Y level across Z number of enemies.

By the time you get to upper content, such as Mythic+ (which caps its rewards at level 15 but technically continues upwards indefinitely, and is presently nearing level 30 for the world's best groups), parses still play very little part except in informing tanks of safe pull sizes when working with PuGs. That aspects has been replaced, ultimately, with Raider IO, which is essentially a sum of dungeon difficulty levels cleared. If I want to see who to invite to my +10, I look for those who have timed at least an average of +9, which is what raider IO then tells me (though it's rather more lenient and granular than mere pass/fail checks). That's it. In difficult content, there is literally no way to replace someone anyways, and the parses are irrelevant outside of specific contexts of comp, tank style, party ambition, dungeon, difficulty, and affix, so you just go by what people have done so far.

Please don't take this as a wholesale defense of M+. There's a ton wrong with it, especially in terms of creating unnecessary points of conflict among players. But parsers at best form some manner of explanation for why someone left a failing group (e.g. repeatedly wiping to what should have been an easy boss or taking forever on would-be easy trash) after they'd already left it. They do not influence your joining a group (they've little correlation to success and are entirely falsifiable) and they do not influence your remaining in it (because you literally cannot be replaced anyways).

And for anything under M+ difficulty, your relative throughput scarcely matters.

Raids, meanwhile, are no more likely to check your logs until Mythic level than a Savage PuG would be here, and certainly will not accept, let alone require, a screenshot of your parses. (And, as mentioned before, fflogs (and warcraftlogs, for that matter) do not need live parsers to operate; they are a separate technical matter, even if they may share "parse culture".) Rather, they will simply look at your ilvl, whether you've completed at least up to the prior boss, and compare those two factors against competing candidates.

[Goji1639]

Let's consider the prior context here:


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Analogous to this would be among a team of models, the majority of which found that one of their members has a waistline of greater circumference than their chest (as, parsers in this context have provided purely numbers, not any pass-fail evaluation--which is still found only in or through the content itself), and whose success is largely dependent upon their, on average, being passably attractive, for which certain ratios between the two areas may be more favorable than others.

:: I.e., let's not suddenly turn a measurement into an evaluation as to provide a straw-man for your pithy retort. A measurement cannot evaluate outside of a given criteria or its context, and this interaction would be among people with shared interests and responsibilities, not strangers.

First, people in DF are strangers who have been randomly positioned together in a specific setting. It's not so different than running into random people at a store; where the shared interest and responsibility is to cordially conduct your business in each other's presence.

As for the shared responsibilities in DF, those are outlined by the parameters the game has set. The games parameters are an extremely lenient 90 minutes to complete the instance. Any expectations beyond that have not been dictated by the game or by the situation; so those expectations don't translate to a responsibility anyone in that situation has to you or anyone else.

A team of models isn't as analogous because their parameters for success are probably far less lenient. The parameters for DF, however, are more comparable to just running into people at random in a situation where you all have very simple, similar goals.

[Mikey_R]

As for the shared responsibilities in DF, those are outlined by the parameters the game has set. The games parameters are an extremely lenient 90 minutes to complete the instance. Any expectations beyond that have not been dictated by the game or by the situation; so those expectations don't translate to a responsibility anyone in that situation has to you or anyone else.

Just because you have 90 minutes in a dungeon, doesn't mean it should take 90 minutes. I suspect there is a large time to account for potential disconnects, waiting for new party members, time to explain boss mechanics etc.

I would also argue that an expectation HAS been set by the game and that expectation is set by the trusts. Trust dungeons normally take about 30 minutes with the trusts doing variable damage in relation to how skilled the player is. If the player is doing less than expected, the trusts do more damage to compensate, if the player is doing better, then the trusts do less (they probably have some sot of minimum, which is where they expect them to be, then increase damage to compensate).

With this expectation that a dungeon should take about 30 minutes, it should be unreasonable to expect runs to take longer than this (issues not withstanding). Trusts were designed not to replace humans after all. So, you can argue, if your dungeon run takes longer than a trust dungeon, something is wrong and people are performing worse than a bot designed by SE to be worse than a player.

[Shurrikhan]

Well, if she joined a beauty contest, it's fair game to tell her she's ugly.

I'm not sure it is, at least if conveyed as such. But, admittedly, none of these analogies are going to be a perfect fit.

My hope, though, would be that use of parsers (especially if properly contextualized, which an officially supported parser could more afford to be) would help speed us towards such notes as "You'd more attractive if you let your shoulders back."

Barring any further step, noting someone's damage as simply "low" may be useful, but more often it's just going to be redundant and/or snide. You may as well have said "Dead grass grey-brown; Blue Man Group blue."

I mean, what is one supposed to do with that just "your damage is low"? As someone in position to help, the parser should merely be a way to direct your attention to something if your eyes didn't otherwise already catch it. We can, without loss, save the comments for when we have something useful to say, such as after we -- made to notice the disparity despite our own tiredness or whatnot -- see that the BLM keeps cancelling their casts or forgetting to refresh Enochian in time, that the Monk is consistently missing their Leaden Fist positional or isn't yet using their shiny new Raptor-form AoE... whatever it may be.

First, people in DF are strangers who have been randomly positioned together in a specific setting. It's not so different than running into random people at a store; where the shared interest and responsibility is to cordially conduct your business in each other's presence.

Yet the shoppers do not share conditions of success unless their goals were each, in fact, not to shop, but merely to be infused with the communal spirit of having passed by other humans (ideally, cordially). I would think, at least prior to the pandemic and its lockdowns, that alternative would seem rather ridiculous.

A group of DF dungeon-runners each benefit from one another's performance, and have signed up specifically for that vein of activity. The setting in which shoppers operate creates, at most, competitive interactions for them. While the models analogy may seem to overexaggerate the requirements (though, one should remember than most models are not professionals, unless one conflatingly uses the term to strictly mean "professional models" and not those who act as a model for a given task or work), it is at least far more appropriate than strangers happening to cross one another just because their interests share adjacent destinations (though such may appropriately describe XIV as a whole).

[Awha]

There are plenty of situations in life where it's in your best interest to prioritize being friendly over being honest.

"Hey boss, your wife is fat!" "Hey waiter, if you were better educated you wouldn't have to be a servant working for tips." "Now why do I keep getting fired, and why does all the food at Denny's taste like urine?!"

I have called my bosses wife fat once, thought she was pregnant turns out she is just fat, and I did say “Oh so she just fat?” Still have my job. Hard to let someone go if you do your work extremely well, and do not give them the reason outside of a person one to let you you.

I also personally do not believe in tipping someone simply for doing their job, though I also do not eat out all that often I find it more enjoyable to cook my own meals.

Even so personally it is in my best interest to tell someone the truth as to how I really feel. Though as mentioned I get where you are coming from, but I just respectfully disagree the cons just in my opinion do not outweigh the pros when it comes to telling people exactly what you feel or think letting them know where you stand.

[Goji1639]

Just because you have 90 minutes in a dungeon, doesn't mean it should take 90 minutes. I suspect there is a large time to account for potential disconnects, waiting for new party members, time to explain boss mechanics etc.

I would also argue that an expectation HAS been set by the game and that expectation is set by the trusts. Trust dungeons normally take about 30 minutes with the trusts doing variable damage in relation to how skilled the player is. If the player is doing less than expected, the trusts do more damage to compensate, if the player is doing better, then the trusts do less (they probably have some sot of minimum, which is where they expect them to be, then increase damage to compensate).

With this expectation that a dungeon should take about 30 minutes, it should be unreasonable to expect runs to take longer than this (issues not withstanding). Trusts were designed not to replace humans after all. So, you can argue, if your dungeon run takes longer than a trust dungeon, something is wrong and people are performing worse than a bot designed by SE to be worse than a player.

This isn't a parameter for success or failure, though, it's speculation. Most people would agree that 30 minutes is a reasonable expectation, but it's not anyone's responsibility to accommodate your expectations.

The games parameters are hard defined; 90 minutes and ToS stipulations that everyone in the party has to be working towards the goal of meeting that 90 minutes (AFKing the whole time and/or attempting to sabotage the run are reportable). I prefer parties where everyone's working their hardest, but I understand that's a preference and not their "responsibility" to me.

[SturmChurro]

This isn't a parameter for success or failure, though, it's speculation. Most people would agree that 30 minutes is a reasonable expectation, but it's not anyone's responsibility to accommodate your expectations.

The games parameters are hard defined; 90 minutes and ToS stipulations that everyone in the party has to be working towards the goal of meeting that 90 minutes (AFKing the whole time and/or attempting to sabotage the run are reportable). That's your responsibility to the team. I prefer parties where everyone's working their hardest, but I understand that's a preference and not their "responsibility" to me.

30 minutes in a dungeon... a reasonable expectation?

That is literally double what it should take! To take 30 minutes in a dungeon requires at minimum people not DPSing properly AT ALL (no AOE), and or wiping more than once!

[Goji1639]

30 minutes in a dungeon... a reasonable expectation?

That is literally double what it should take! To take 30 minutes in a dungeon requires minimum people not doing not DPSing properly AT ALL (no AOE), and or wiping more than once!

That was the expectation he presented by using Trusts as a guideline, so that's the one I used in my response. The expectation is that an instance shouldn't take longer than 30 minutes, and that's reasonable.

The point is that your expectations don't really matter. The game has set it's own parameters for success and failure.

[Artemiz]

I have called my bosses wife fat once, thought she was pregnant turns out she is just fat, and I did say “Oh so she just fat?” Still have my job. Hard to let someone go if you do your work extremely well, and do not give them the reason outside of a person one to let you you.

Wow, um....OK. I would generally recommend not insulting the wife of your boss though, even if you are good at your job.

[SturmChurro]

That was the expectation he presented by using Trusts as a guideline, so that's the one I used in my response. The expectation is that an instance shouldn't take longer than 30 minutes, and that's reasonable.

The point is that your expectations don't really matter. The game has set it's own parameters for success and failure.

Well, I never read that post. It seems I have to disagree with two people then. Trust dungeons take about 30 minute so people don't necessarily want to do them over a DF dungeon that should be faster. It's not meant to be a replacement. That's the parameters this game has set.