The Real Problem with Parsers

[Malevicton]

Prove it. SE thinks that the number is high enough to warrant not allowing it, so they're the ones you have to convince. Prove it.

Well, there's the very next sentence of my post that you clipped out: "We don't really need to guess. Parsers in mmos are not unexplored territory. "

That position isn't really specific. There are a lot of vague qualifiers (like "as long as they don't create extra jerks"), and you rely heavily on it being SE's opinion without ever really backing it up.

Edit: You aren't SE's spokesperson. Here are some actual quotes:

"This is a very difficult question to answer. We are first and foremost a software company, and as a software company we cannot really approve of anyone modifying our product in any way. We would prefer it if everyone played within the original design of the software, otherwise we can’t really guarantee the quality of the product itself. Officially, the policy is that any additions or modification to the game are against the rules and privacy policy and when playing our game, everyone has to have gone through the steps to agree to the Terms and Conditions when you sign up.

However, I too am a hardcore PC gamer so I understand that there are a lot of plug-ins and add-ons available to many games. So as a PC gamer, all I can really say is “Please, don’t get caught.” If you are going to use add-ons and plug-ins please be discrete about it. Don’t go around telling your friends you mod the game on chat, or ask a GM if using such an add-on is ok. We can’t really go around and check if add-ons and plug-ins will work with our game and debug it, and check that it doesn’t break anything – its too much. Really what it comes down to is I can’t really say “Yes” to these things, and players have to realize that by using an application that accesses game files that they are the ones that are assuming the risk of viruses and possibly compromising their account.

And as you probably know, Final Fantasy XI had a particularly strict policy on this kind of thing, so there are quite a few players out there who moved from XI to XIV who definitely view any kind of add-on to the game as bad. So please, just be discrete if you will be using tools or add-ons."

-http://gamerescape.com/2014/02/12/ps4-media-tour-interview-with-naoki-yoshida/

You can also watch this interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-WX...outu.be&t=6m4s where he never mentions harassment. Obviously they don't want people being jerks to each other, but they've never said that they think parsers would exacerbate that. That's something a group of players on these forums think.

Stop making up dev positions.

"As long as they don't create extra jerks" isn't vague at all.

Screw it, I'm done.