The Real Problem with Parsers

[drmambo1999]

One thing I will say that I have noticed from players in regards to parsers that does kind of irk me, is that some players will pick what they consider to be the best rotation based on parser results off Youtube or Reddit and hold that as the "One way to play the class." This mind set is limiting in my opinion and I think that might be a factor as to why many dislike parsers.

I do think, however, that parsers can and should be used to encourage players to experiment with their jobs and find new better DPS results. I for one would really appreciate a tool like that as I play on PS4 and don't have any FC buddies that can Parse me as my FC is made up of IRL friends. I find myself doing a lot a research and trial and error with my job because of this and it would just be so much easier and faster to know if I am holding up with my DPS if I had a personal Parser.

I think adding parsers you can use on others might be a step too far, at least at the moment, but I see nothing wrong with having personal ones.

[Clarkamite]

Okay, so it's basically just so you know where a specific problem may happen, for example, if they strangely popped a CD just before a phase where they wouldn't be able to really use it to its full extent (for example, boss goes invulnerable and they're only 5 sec into their cooldowns)?

I suppose that would be a benefit but I believe Sleigh was more or less implying that the parser would be able to show you more accurately specific points in time where your numbers dip and why. I stated this like 30 pages ago or something along those lines how having a parser available to me at all times would allow me to really get a feel for certain phases and where I stand. I suppose if a parse could be designed such that it would show me a timeline, as you called it, that might be worthwhile but even if that was possible I would still much rather have access to it in real time.

Seeing a graph or a timeline of my numbers and cooldown usage after a wipe or a clear doesn't really carry the same weight as in real time. In real time I can start to notice a trend and immediately fix it. After a wipe I can only see that there was an issue and can only hope to rectify in the future.

Interesting how I leave this thread every couple of days only to see it grow and expand to new arguments. Last time I was checking this thread it seemed like the argument was parsing was bad because of the animosity it could spread. Now it seems as though the argument has shifted from that to, why do you need to see your numbers right away?

Not saying anything other than I'm noticing a trend. The longer this conversation goes on, the more it seems to be leaning towards the side of adding in an official parsing tool for the game. Either the people devoutly against parsing aren't as strong in their convictions enough to continue to have a discussion on the matter or they're changing their stance.

[Elazu]

Hey, I asked you a question about you making things up back on page 50. Could you answer it, please? I'm honestly curious.

Hey, had you on ignore since the first post you posted! Lucky you I actually checked this one!

'Elitist' on this forum is generally used as a synonym for 'someone who is capable'. And the 'I play for fun' excuse always comes up when people are being called out for bad play, as if being good at the game is not fun.

Seems like you're ignoring the stuff the person on page 50 posted just to argue for the sake of arguing with someone who is pro-parsers (as always). It's easily interpretable the way I did (looks like I'm not the only one either!).

[segagamer]

Why is this thread still going?

[Lyrica_Ashtine]

You gave objective benefits of seeing the information, which I've not disagreed that seeing the information can be important in the right situations. You did not give objective benefits of forcing the information to be public over being optional to be public, particularly for content where DPS doesn't make a difference outside of saving a few minutes.

This was discussed on page 48. Where your "counter argument" was "personal parsers". I elaborated that "personal parsers" are more jerk/abuse sensitive than public parsers

[Waliel]

Anyone (provided they have a brain and have played any mmo) can tell you what parsers end up doing. Provide solid evidence that this doesn't happen and that people somehow benefit from being harassed in a video game, no more stating opinion as fact, no more blatant lying, no more complaining about a strangers dps checks.

I've played different MMOs for about 9 years now and I can't remember running into harassment, even in the "oh so toxic" WoW and I've yet to see it happen in here either. The worst thing I've seen is someone complaining inside FC/LS/guild/whatever how this run is taking so long, because of bad DPS, or a general "We need to do more damage". I do remember seeing the occasional praise for high DPS. Vast majority don't simply care about the numbers of others as long as the content gets done.

I suppose if a parse could be designed such that it would show me a timeline, as you called it, that might be worthwhile but even if that was possible I would still much rather have access to it in real time.

This is possible with the most commonly used parser. You can watch a timeline of the whole fight that shows a rolling ten second (default, changable) average DPS, HPS and damage taken; a "VCR", where you can see who attacked or healed what for each second and tooltips for exact values; or you can create a scratch encounter of the fight or individual players and see their exact numbers and how and what they did from 2:41 to 3:20 of the fight, for example. There is even a death report, which shows what happened in the last ten seconds before death.

[Aiselia]

I suppose if a parse could be designed such that it would show me a timeline, as you called it, that might be worthwhile but even if that was possible I would still much rather have access to it in real time.

Seeing a graph or a timeline of my numbers and cooldown usage after a wipe or a clear doesn't really carry the same weight as in real time. In real time I can start to notice a trend and immediately fix it. After a wipe I can only see that there was an issue and can only hope to rectify in the future.

Okay, but what if you can see your data during but not others'? You still can see your own data to know whether you need to pick up the pace during the fight, you just wouldn't be able to point it out to someone else, and I'd assume that if that someone else was capable of picking up the pace to adjust in mid-fight, they should be able to do it while being able to see their own data as well without being told.

The longer this conversation goes on, the more it seems to be leaning towards the side of adding in an official parsing tool for the game. Either the people devoutly against parsing aren't as strong in their convictions enough to continue to have a discussion on the matter or they're changing their stance.

Well, I've always been for adding at least a personal parser into the game for the objective benefits it brings, with a minimal amount of stepping on peoples' toes. Even the biggest fear monger can't argue that a personal parser that others CAN'T see will breed elitism because there wouldn't be a difference between that and what there is now except that each person can see their own. Unless they become elitist to themselves. Which I'd kinda like to see.

"YOUR DPS IS TRASH, ME. LEARN TO PLAY. I AM SUCH A LOSER. Why am I so mean? I don't need to harass me like that. I'm going to report me."

Almost all of the people "devoutly against parsing" don't really stick around more than a few posts to say how every DF group will turn into a drooling ragefest.

Right now I'm just trying to find out what would be the happy medium where the most people are at least satisfied, even if their situation isn't what they feel to be perfect. From the anti-parser side, it seems to revolve around "Other people don't need to know my DPS", so personal. From the pro-parser side, it seems to be important that it shows enough detail to be able to figure out what went wrong instead of just having a "You did this much DPS during the whole thing!" flat number and that seeing others' DPS in certain situations is important. Which is why I suggest a parser that's default personal but can be shared. It's not forcing the anti-parsers to always be visible, while giving pro-parsers the information they need on themselves and an option for them to get the information they may need about other people in the situations where it is important.

Hey, had you on ignore since the first post you posted! Lucky you I actually checked this one!

That's an odd claim since you've responded to me a few times, but okay.

'Elitist' on this forum is generally used as a synonym for 'someone who is capable'. And the 'I play for fun' excuse always comes up when people are being called out for bad play, as if being good at the game is not fun.

Okay, but the person you responded to didn't say anything about that. They didn't bring up whether people are capable or not. They didn't even imply that being capable was synonymous with being elitist. They only said not to be elitist.

So what you're saying is that because other people that weren't the person you responded to (allegedly) used elitism and capability as synonyms, you just assumed that because this person who is a completely different person than they were used the word elitist, they must have been referring to people who are capable, and not actual elitists? And that when they say "I play for fun", they're not just saying "I don't concern myself with how much DPS the others in my group are doing because I'm too busy having fun" (which they basically did say), they're really saying "I'm bad but it's because I'm having fun"?

So the answer is that you actually do believe that just because they use the word elitist they're automatically lumping elitists with all good players, period, even if they say nothing of the sort? Huh. Okay, thanks.

This was discussed on page 48.

On page 48 you gave the subjective benefit of not having people hide their information. It appeared to be your stance that if everyone chose to hide their data after a failed DPS check, it would have been inherently better to have been able to force you to see it. I then responded to that with

If nobody's willing to share at all, vote abandon. If they're not willing to help solve the problem, then being able to default see their numbers won't solve it either.

Actually, you know what, upon looking back there, I made this post:

Shortcut

The only thing in that post you responded to at the time was accusing me of lumping people together again because you didn't notice that I said "some people", not "everybody", which wasn't even a point directed at you. Which, by the way, you also conveniently didn't respond to when I pointed out that I didn't say everyone, which is poor form from someone who accuses me of avoiding people who prove me wrong.

Your next post after that was asking me how I'd prove someone's using only one attack without a parser, which is an incredibly strange question.

We then skip forward to page 51 where you claim you made an argument 6 pages previous that I didn't present a valid argument against. But it's obvious that you're the one that skipped out on that argument because I was the last one to say anything on that train of thought on page 48 before you moved on to accusing me of saying things I didn't and implying you need a parser to see someone spamming the same animation.

[Gorlioliolio]

Maybe we should just add the expert roulette options skilled party or I like to push buttons so that if the people who pull less dps than level 50s show up I'm allowed to kick them. Or isn't that what the term expert implies?

[Clarkamite]

Okay, but what if you can see your data during but not others'? You still can see your own data to know whether you need to pick up the pace during the fight, you just wouldn't be able to point it out to someone else, and I'd assume that if that someone else was capable of picking up the pace to adjust in mid-fight, they should be able to do it while being able to see their own data as well without being told.

This is funny you say this. Several months ago I posed this same idea. I certainly wasn't the first person to come up with this idea and judging by the number of times I see someone come into new parser debate threads and say, "How about this idea I had: Personal Parse," I wouldn't be the last. Its been pointed out that just a personal parse wouldn't be nearly as useful as one that can show all the numbers which I can agree with but I'm much more open and receptive to the personal parse. On a basic level, I'm mainly interested in my own numbers anyways so just the personal parse at least satisfies what I'm mostly after. It's only after I've perfected my own runs that I start worrying about other people performing.

I would rather have something over nothing so if my only option was personal parse or no parse, I'd take personal parse. I firmly believe the best option would be for SE to create the personal parse that has the option of displaying the numbers to others if you so choose. So at least we are like minded in this respect.

I'm sure there's someone out there who would argue against that but then I think at that point they're not necessarily right anymore. To be fair though, in certain content I'd rather see all of my teams numbers so that I could actually see how poorly they were performing and I know some of them wouldn't turn it on. There's a couple people in my static who routinely underperform and I'd much rather know about it than not know about it. So I guess there's always some argument to be had on this issue but I'd much rather have that middle ground then nothing at all.

EDIT: It's interesting I just thought of this. Having access to all the numbers in my group would allow me to more accurately fix problems that arise. For example, if I see that there's certain phases where a fellow DPS or a tank is just not putting out numbers, even though it's on them to fix it, my group is funny where there's some member who's just can't or won't perform well enough. Countless times we've had to step up and devise strategies as the DPS simply just to push the phase even quicker just so our OT doesn't have to tank another T9 add because he just isn't good at mitigating anything. I say this because having the numbers of say, our bard, and knowing he really really struggles with an important phase of the fight, rather than yell at him to "git gud" I'll just see what I'm at and pump out even more if I can. It's not really fair to me but that's just how our group has operated for the last two years and if we only had a personal parser, I wouldn't be able to see those numbers. Just food for thought I guess.

[pushin_tin]

Someone tell me how I'm supposed to know who to give Balance and Arrow to without a parser.