Can SQ-EN draw a line in the sand w/ 3rd Parties?

[LittleImp]

Yeah. I do higher end stuff on occasion, less so now due to no new content coming out til EW, and I've experienced people reacting to things or calling out things before they exist. Things that come to mind are Titan Savages multiple punches or Diamond weapons different attacks. For Diamond, I stopped playing it after a couple clears because of how egregious and obvious it was that people were doing it. It just feels dirty to be in these parties and scenarios. I've also been in a few different Ucob parties and people don't bother to read naels quotes, look at their debuffs, etc., instead opting for a text to speech like program to do all the work for them.

Yeah, it's gotten pretty out of hand but it's really a losing battle these days. Cactbot is more widespread than ever before, and I've even seen Ultimate groups that outright require its usage. I've cleared multiple without ever personally using it, but its essentially impossible and usually more trouble than it's worth to try to convince people in your group not to use it. I've had to just learn and let live when it comes to cactbot, though I still try to steer newer players away from it and explain that they will ultimately become a better player if they avoid using it.

There's also the elephant in the room of parsing and triggers being inherently tied together, with parsing being (like it or not) responsible for a significant portion of this games content longevity in the raid scene. I think the devs, being players of their own game, are aware of this relationship and it plays into the don't-ask-don't-tell policy they've developed around it.

[LittleImp]

What totally random mechanics would those be?

My most memorable example was the Optical Sight patterns in A11S, wherein ACT could detect and call the mechanic well before it was actually telegraphed on the client. There're other RNG mechanics that send typically invisible information to the client ahead of time, but I don't know them all offhand because I don't use Cactbot.

In the case of Nael quotes, learning to parse those quotes mentally is a fundamental part of the fights design, so it's lame when it's trivialized to a robot saying "out, stack, in " the literal millisecond the quote reaches the client. No matter how good a person becomes at calling mechanics, they will never achieve a near 0ms response time and they will make occasional mistakes.

There're also additional plugins that allow you to actually automatically trigger button inputs based on information parsed from the client; This is how the Gaol plugin in UWU works, which automatically marks players with numbers.

[ItMe]

Can SQ-EN draw a line in the sand w/ 3rd Parties?

You want a line in the sand?
Do you honestly mean that? If so... why?
Or do you not know what that means?

[Reimmi]

It's illegal to have a program that scans for hacks? Don't many other games do this....?

The programs in question are all overlays, not "hacks" i believe
Not that i agree with it playing the game for you, but it is what it is

[Adeacia]

Here it is again. People keep complaining that the game is too easy, as they use things like these tools to make it as easy as possible.

They don't actually want difficulty, they just want stuff so they can brag about how amazing they supposedly are.

[Clicked]

It's concerning for me as well. While I don't care about whether other players use these tools, I do care if it becomes expected that everyone should use it.

For one, that would exclude all console players from being invited to certain groups.

Secondly, this game is a breath of fresh air compared to WoW where you had to maintain an entire suite of addons just to make the game playable, then install more to customize the raid experience to the point where it's just Simon Says led by a robot. This can't become the norm here too. I know it's a slippery slope, but this game is the most similar one on the market to WoW so the influence and cross-pollination of players and ideas (and bots) are obvious to see.

That said, I don't know how to stop it. Like was mentioned earlier, it's not like they are going to install something on your computer to scan it. That's problematic and also illegal in some places.

I would say, report the person using this tool. That's all we really can do.

[SaberMaxwell]

Here it is again. People keep complaining that the game is too easy, as they use things like these tools to make it as easy as possible.

They don't actually want difficulty, they just want stuff so they can brag about how amazing they supposedly are.

Life is so easy when you can conflate two positions into one and assign that new fake position to a group of people you have a personal distaste for isn't it?

[LisSquid]

If you are blaming not having a 3rd party callout tool for your ease of a clear, you weren't going to clear anyway. The fights in 14 are designed around not having them, and are 100% unnecessary. I would rather SE "draw a line in the sand" for RMT, botting, and their frankly terrible report/player safety systems. These are far more pressing issues than someone using Amazon Alexa to tell them to move right when the left side of the room is lava.

[Garnix]

Just let people play the game. What does it take away from your experience?
It's not giving them any sort of competitive advantage, since those tools do not work during the world first race.
If anything needs to be done to prevent that, it is for the fights to be more randomized.
As a console player, I really could not care less what addons people are using, as long as they enjoy the game.
If those addons help them enjoying it more, good for them.

[Kes13a]

Just let people play the game. What does it take away from your experience?
It's not giving them any sort of competitive advantage, since those tools do not work during the world first race.
If anything needs to be done to prevent that, it is for the fights to be more randomized.
As a console player, I really could not care less what addons people are using, as long as they enjoy the game.
If those addons help them enjoying it more, good for them.

I am happy you are good with blatant cheating if it helps them "enjoy" the game.
if they arent having to actually PLAY the game, how much are they really enjoying?
these programs that you are so happy with people using, are not only used so you dont have to really learn everything, but also to have completely bot map parties, bot crafting, bot market selling, all to provide gil in exchange for real money

you happy with all that too?