In-Game Parser.

[Lycelle]

I've raided before and quite honestly most gear is suitable for raiding. It boils down to player skill. Sure you're running numbers, but no amount of parsers is going to tell you how to do a rotation or how to dodge. It comes down to everyone's personal play style which is why a parser will always be a vicious tool to me. Because you are digging into someone else's personal business with the use of a parser, whether they want to hear about the numbers or not. The mentality of, "You have a low DPS score. Get out." Does not fly with me. I've raided and during those raids I've never really had an issue with anyone, I'm no hardcore elitist that thrives off parsing like it's a lifeblood. But I'm certainly not a casual person either. I enjoy progression just as much as anyone else, but I don't make it my goal to micromanage each skill and try to tap into everything possible about the class. Am I playing to my full potential? Probably not. Am I having fun with how I am playing? Certainly. I would never subject myself to going into a party without feeling comfortable as my skill as a player. If I know I am going to die a lot or if I DO die a lot in a raid I will openly tell people I am doing badly and I back out. I don't need a 3rd party tool to tell me I am doing bad when I can clearly see it myself.

Also for those elite players, why do you subject yourself to these kinds of people and then later complain about it? Why not just make an FC or LS with just elitist and roll from there. Stop blaming people in PF for your own lack of self-coordination. Nobody is putting a gun to your head and saying, "Play with bad or underskilled players." You make that choice on your own. The same can be said for casual players, stop going into PF's and pretending to know what you are doing, because at that point you become a liability to the rest of the group.

[Kazumac]

snip

If you are playing with a group that treats you like that, leave. They are not the friends you are looking for. By your same logic, no one has a gun to your head saying you must group with people who act like that or you must use parsers. So why deny the tool to the people who would benefit from it.

Maybe it's because I take the stance that I find people who I like to game with, I don't have this idea that I'm forced to play with people who will treat me like crap. I take my game experience in my own hands and make it what I want it to be (I suggest doing this). Therefore all I see is a constructive tool that others want to deny me all because they haven't learned how to deal with other people.

This could be why I don't see eye to eye with most on those because I play with like minded FC and LS people... And I know how to deal with 12 year old maturity and bad adittudes. Novel idea huh?

[Lycelle]

Well in terms of "right now" I don't. I sit in my FC house crafting all day. My progression has come to a stand still, back when i90 was the cap I was excited about progression and did a lot of min-maxing and tried out different styles. But now I see no point to it if it's just becoming something players can use as an excuse to be ruthless. It's just something I don't want to deal with, I pay my monthly fee like everyone else so like you said I take the game experience in my own hands and I just go from there. I shut myself away inside my FC house and simply craft, I'm tired of the elitist bigots, I'm also tired of the bad players. So I'll probably give up raiding until I can actually find a good solid group that will take me for who I am as a person, rather than the gear I am wearing.

[Kazumac]

snip 2

Well I do apologize if my reply is/was a bit on the aggressive side and I'm sorry to hear that you've had difficulty finding a constructive group to run with. I am hardly on the tip of progression myself as my friends like spending time on a variety of content outside of raiding but we've all seen the benefits of a constructive approach to improvement that solid metrics can bring to the team.

I can count the times on one (actually zero times) hand that I've seen it used as a ruthless tool to belittle or ostracize another player. I'm sure it happens (but this happens from many sources not just parsers), I just as a rule don't run with those types.

[Lemuria]

I can count the times on one (actually zero times) hand that I've seen it used as a ruthless tool to belittle or ostracize another player. I'm sure it happens (but this happens from many sources not just parsers), I just as a rule don't run with those types.

I've seen so many examples of parsers being used to ill-effect in video games that I honestly don't see their benefit other than to compare egos. I'm fine with some kind of self-improvement, a means to see only your own DPS and overall damage, but I see it as highly detrimental to compare them to your teammates without prior consent.

It has already been used before to belittle players, such as in Frontlines where myself and other healers were insulted for doing more healing than damaging (go figure). In an ideal world, we could all be mature about it and see it as a guide for self-improvement, but there will be plenty of players who see it as a way to boast superiority.

[Zeful]

Maybe it's because I take the stance that I find people who I like to game with, I don't have this idea that I'm forced to play with people who will treat me like crap.

So do the casual players. This is not an argument of efficiency or playstyle or any of that shit. It's an argument of motivation. Players that are against parsers see the attitude of people like this:

Yes, let's embrace mediocrity. Excellence is a sin!

As shitty, and thus see the proliferation of parsers in general as the game actively forcing them to play with people who will treat them like crap. This is the huge fucking disconnect that the raid-lifestyle players do not fucking get (which I can only assume is, generously, because they are too stupid to get it) and continue acting high and mighty about it as if numbers are somehow sacred.

Giving players tools to encourage excellence only work when a player is given time to use them. Given the current attitude of the raiding player-base like Ellatrix, a parser is worthless, because they won't give that time.

[Ellatrix]

-

Tell me, have you actually tried to help someone when they are playing really, really poorly? Like killing the party with mechanics horribly? When they insist they are doing fine? They will tell you to gtfo. Having numbers to bash them over the head with will help, because otherwise they don't listen at all, and the only recourse is to vote kick them in hopes of getting someone who will stop failing party wipe mechanics (perhaps by dying right at the start, can't get expectations too high!). Figuring out basic job rotation to deal damage is something you do before you queue up or join PF. Learning the fight mechanics is something you do before you queue up or join PF.

It's the players who need help the most that are in their little bubble of 'im doing fine stop telling me how to play' that need that bubble popped when they choose to step into a raid/trial encounter.

Also, as an aisde, it's that "raiding player-base like Ellatrix" that provides the guide vids to fully explain and get YOU through a fight, and also that figures out optimal damage rotation and constantly provides useful help for those who ask on forums.

[Zeful]

words

Cute strawman. That addresses all of nothing I've said though, but that's to be expected. You aren't interested in having other players climb to get to your level, you just said so yourself: "Figuring out basic job rotation to deal damage is something you do before you queue up or join PF. Learning the fight mechanics is something you do before you queue up or join PF." Your argument is so short sighted and filled with logical holes that we should still be waiting on World First clears of the story dungeons if reality was actually reflective of your beliefs. After all, someone has to go into a fight perfectly blind.

Let's look at this from a purely objective perspective. A player does not get his full suite of abilities until level 50, and has to make due trying to optimize a slowly growing stable of abilities for literally most of their formative experience. This means that a parser only has value in the post game, as before then the lack of abilities makes optimizing DPS a simple math problem. Except endgame dungeons get complex quickly compared to what comes before in massive contrast. Especially when in consideration to the ever changing stable of people you play with. When you actually think about how the tempo of each fight plays out, you quickly realize that there is no "basic rotation". The "default Ninja opener" for example is worthless against Garuda and Titan EX because they have such an early phase transition that will push you out of it. With this in mind our objective perspective shows us that there isn't a "basic" rotation, there is a heuristic logic to an ability's timing. This means that a parser is logically even more necessary to optimizing the fight, because the changing nature of the fight and the timing of when bosses become immune to DoTs or damage alters the "weights" of each ability for that fight.

But looking at your statement, this is impossible. Experimentation is verboten, the "rotation" is sacrosanct. "Figuring out basic job rotation to deal damage is something you do before you queue up or join PF." Ergo, it doesn't matter if a parser exists or not, it's effect in the face of this statement is the same either way; nothing.

[Dwill]

Snip

Except what he's asking is the basic job rotation, not perfect adaptation to every possible scenario. For example, the amount of Dragoon that let Heavy Trust falls is really high and the amount of Summoners who start their DoT opener via Bio therefore locking themselves in the GCD is just as bad. This is basic stuff that doesn't even take 30 minutes to learn on a dummy after you hit 50 and yet, these type of players are widespread and are anchors to group content and I don't about you but I hate having to carry anchors.

[Zeful]

snip

I'm refuting that a "basic job rotation" exists in a meaningful sense at endgame, which when you look objectively at the rules of each fight is absolutely true, there isn't one because the mechanics of the fight prevent that. Are players that perform poorly at their class' mechanics (loosing buffs, not keeping dots up, poor management of OGCD abilities) going to have that performance mirrored overall? Yes, and I'm not refuting that. But how does that logically transform a heuristic flowchart into a rotation?

More importantly, isn't "perfect adaptation to every possible scenario" the desired endstate behind adding a parser? To make those anchors you carry around able to carry their own weight?