They Should Add An Official Damage Meter With One Condition

[Avenger]

People seem to not understand yoshi has never once changed his position on damage meters. He seen in another game what it can lead to and does not want it here. It's a horse thats been beaten to death since 2.xx patch series. If it hasn't change since then, don't expect it to anytime soon..

As I understand it, they (devs and/or Yoshi-p) did suggest early on (e.g. at fanfest 2014 or something) that they were considering a client-side scripting/add-on feature for FFXIV (which may have even been in development at the time, e.g. allowing users to write lua scripts which would be executed by the FFXIV client) and that it would enable the creation of DPS meters as well as quality of life features. Post ARR however, they 1) never delivered that feature and 2) made it abundantly clear on multiple occasions that they never intend to provide a DPS meter because, although certain players would enjoy it and possibly benefit from it, Yoshi-p and company are 100% convinced (based on evidence from other MMOs as well as their own thinking over many years) that it would be used for bullying, exclusion, and even more of an overemphasis on efficiency, and therefore can never be added to FFXIV as an official or permitted feature.

In spite of groups of vocal players beating the dead horse for many years, they have not changed their position and are probably unlikely to. The closest thing we're likely to see is Stone/Sky/Sea type DPS challenges.

[HyperiusUltima]

The closest thing we're likely to see is Stone/Sky/Sea type DPS challenges.

This has been for the best. It at the very least provides a medium of what you should at least be doing before mechanics come into play, and sure - it's a dummy meaning it's near useless outside of actual dummy fights like P2S and P1S - but it doesn't mean that it's not a decent tool for gauging your capability with your current gear.

[Sebazy]

Congratulation! When did you join the testing team? How did you get the job? Was it difficult to learn enough Japanese to be useful during the raid testing?

Or are you hand-waving like the rest of us when it comes to speaking about this issue?

Or maybe A) I did my homework and B) I've got actual relevant experience in the industry with a similarly large scale developer and publisher so have a fairly good idea of how this stuff is handled in a timely and cost effective manner.

Here's probably the most relevant interview to this topic:

https://www.4gamer.net/games/278/G027835/20151224179/

https://www.bluegartr.com/threads/12...tions-requests

It may be difficult to deal DPS close to the 100% result. By the way, we also got some posts asking if the members who worked on developing the battles had cleared the end-game content themselves during development.

Yoshida: So like asking whether or how we tested the end-game content and performed balance adjustments?

I think that's the gist of it.

Yoshida: For high difficulty battle content like the extreme battle series, Bahamut's Coils, and the savage version of Alexander, we begin by performing adjustments to the mechanics from an invincible state. Since members of the planning team are practicing the fights for the first time just like players do, if they had to wipe repeatedly there wouldn't be enough time to make adjustments. The priority in this stage is to make sure the mechanics are understandable and hinted at.

By looking through the whole fight in an invulnerable state, you can still repeat with trial and error but it takes less time to get used to the mechanics.

Yoshida: Well, since we're doing adjustments we're starting from a "rough" state of the final fight, so it's a bit different. By implementing the mechanics roughly and testing them in an invincible state, we can make larger adjustments for the mechanics and get a feel for each phase. Once we've made the primary adjustments to the mechanics, we apply a different version of the invulnerable status.

What are the differences?

Yoshida: The HP gauge will drop from damage as usual, but instead of falling when it hits 0, it gets refilled to max. Finally, we remove it and we see whether it can be cleared normally with no changes.

I see. And this applies to the highest difficulty content like the fourth section of Alexander savage?

Yoshida: For the third and fourth parts of Alexander savage specifically, we tested each phase. The FFXIV battle team is made up of some pretty good players, but these aren't world class players. It would have taken longer to perform adjustments if we tested as usual, so we tried to shorten it a bit.

So the release would be delayed if they tested until they could clear.

Yoshida: Since the development cycle is limited we had to proceed with the development of other content. You could sort of say we've cleared it completely through (laughs).

If you could easily clear it then it wouldn't really be fitting as the most difficult end-game content.

Yoshida: That's right. The battle check members of the development team look at FFXIV players and take samples of log data from the hardest battle to compare. The DPS values for the world-class players is really amazing....

So, what was it you were saying?

[Zarkovitch]

I think damage meter shouldn't not be implimented on casual content aka no enrage timer. However they should add somekind of dmg test to pass if you want to touch newer savages or extremes. That would be the best path.

[Avenger]

I think damage meter shouldn't not be implimented on casual content aka no enrage timer. However they should add somekind of dmg test to pass if you want to touch newer savages or extremes. That would be the best path.

So like gating savage raid finder behind stone/sky/sea, or providing a stone/sky/sea clear checkbox for savage PF recruitment? I don't imagine there would be strong objections to that.

I have to think about whether I would object to a stone/sky/sea clear checkbox for regular EX trials. I think not, but they also feel more mid-core than hard-core so I'm not sure it's needed? I remember getting surprisingly far on Susano and Titania EX with people who had never actually played the game before - maybe clearing stone/sky/sea beforehand might have helped in that instance.

[EagleDynamics]

So like gating savage behind stone/sky/sea, or providing a stone/sky/sea checkbox for savage PF recruitment? I don't imagine there would be strong objections to that.

its a good idea but id imagine there would still be some objections to that. there are some players that will say gating content based on someones dps is "toxic."

[RobynDaBank]

So like gating savage raid finder behind stone/sky/sea, or providing a stone/sky/sea clear checkbox for savage PF recruitment? I don't imagine there would be strong objections to that.

I have to think about whether I would object to a stone/sky/sea clear checkbox for regular EX trials. I think not, but they also feel more mid-core than hard-core so I'm not sure it's needed? I remember getting surprisingly far on Susano and Titania EX with people who had never actually played the game before - maybe clearing stone/sky/sea beforehand might have helped in that instance.

I'm sorry, like, I know you're simply suggesting a solution and I don't mean to rain on your parade. I just feel that SSS cannot compare to a Savage the same way. It'd be an annoying obstacle to people who know what they're doing and not much of an assistance to new entrants to high-end.

[CosmicCoqui]

To be honest if people need a damage meter to clear content, something else is wrong... Say that because SE has made fights and jobs easier over the years.

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

I'm sorry, like, I know you're simply suggesting a solution and I don't mean to rain on your parade. I just feel that SSS cannot compare to a Savage the same way. It'd be an annoying obstacle to people who know what they're doing and not much of an assistance to new entrants to high-end.

SSS needs to be updated accordingly to be a sufficient gatekeeper.

[Klytania]

To be honest if people need a damage meter to clear content, something else is wrong... Say that because SE has made fights and jobs easier over the years.

Yes and you identify what is wrong by tracking progress with a damage meter