The Real Problem with Parsers

[SlyRoyale]

.

Parsers are not always used to belittle others over insignificant dips in DPS. Parsers are used to calculate all readouts of damage, how much damage is being done during certain phases or the course of a fight, and all sorts of objective information that provide further insight to how an encounter went. They are used to gauge where players are in regards to the amount of damage they do, and provide evidence on whether those numbers are fine or could be improved on. If someone has a parser and abuses it to harass others, we already have the means to deal with those people. Should SE implement an official parser, there would arguably be little difference in how parser abuse would be handled.

Despite the fact that tools can be abused, the fact remains that the benefits outweigh the negatives, especially against embellished claims how parsers are always used to belittle and exclude people over minimal DPS dips.

[Attarik]

char limit.

So, they're not used to exclude others based on dps drops, they're just used to exclude players who don't do the dps you think they should. Wonderful.

[SlyRoyale]

So, they're not used to exclude others based on dps drops, they're just used to exclude players who don't do the dps you think they should. Wonderful.

I have not said anything along those lines. All I explicitly stated was that parsers are used to calculate DPS and provide evidence to support those calculations, and such boons are more valuable than the exaggerated fears against the tool. Anyone who abuses that information should be dealt with appropriately through harassment reports. Please do not twist my words around to fit your fear mongering anti-parser agenda if you want your stance on the matter to be taken seriously. All you are doing is shooting yourself in the foot.

[Aiselia]

Heck, when battling the enrage we had to look at what a class is doing at X point because we could know who was slacking

Okay, and here's what I'm trying to get at. I'm not saying it's not useful to have the information at all. I just do not understand why it's inherently more useful at the time of, when you won't really be able to do much of anything about it until after the wipe. If you can get a breakdown of the fight after you've wiped, getting the same information as you would have during the fight, and now have the time to actually look at the data and talk to whoever it was that was slacking and make suggestions, why would it matter much if you saw it during the fight or after?

If your DRG is 200 DPS lower than they should be, which, for argument's sake, is definitely going to lead to a wipe because it's just too low, why does it matter whether you see that before you wipe or after? How often could you actually save a wipe by pointing out that the DRG is too low and they manage to pick up and make up for what they lost when you've already spent X amount of time being too low, as compared to you having to go another try but this time talking to the DRG beforehand?

Not to mention countless times we've wiped and looked into the healing/tanking side of things and found out what wiped us, who was slacking with CDs, and how to fix that with new CD timelines or an altered strat.

Which you would have generally looked into after the wipe, no?

you believe that info shouldn't be given to others unless they want it.

I believe that the information shouldn't be default available to everybody in every form of content. You don't need to know somebody's DPS in Fractal or Neverreap or a vast majority of dungeons because you're unlikely to wipe due to DPS. The worst that's going to happen is it's going to take a bit longer.

I do agree that there IS some content where knowledge of party contribution IS a big deal. It's a minority of the content in the game, though, and with optional sharing of information, you can limit when other people can see your output to the content where it actually matters if you want, and the people who fear that parsers will cause elitism don't have to worry when they queue for a dungeon that someone's going to look at their DPS and mock them because they can keep theirs private for that.

Your core belief is simply that it's a change that would create animosity from certain players to others. And that outweighs any potential usefulness in your mind.

No it isn't.

My core belief is that in a majority of the content in the game, such as dungeons and story trials, knowing how much DPS the rest of your party is doing is not a huge enough issue unless EVERYBODY is low, because there's little outside of EX trials and raids that will wipe you for not meeting a strict DPS check. In content like raids and EX trials, where you actually do have strict DPS checks, yes, I agree that being able to see what your party's putting out is useful and important. I disagree that it's important enough in anything outside that.

Which is why I don't think a forced-visible party parse is the way to go. By letting people choose when to share it, they can choose not to share it in unimportant content if they wish because it's unimportant, and show it in high end content where it IS important enough.

real time parse data isn't useful just seems silly - it most definitely is. I don't even think that's debatable.

Okay, so how is being able to see that someone's DPS is low 4 minutes into the fight more useful than seeing that it was low after a wipe due to low DPS? If it's not debatable, it should be easy to answer that.

That would work....but I don't think you realize quite how much data that is if it isn't already being stored by the client, which means that you have to hope that they allow each client to store parse data for all party members, just not show it unless allowed to by said party members. Otherwise they likely wouldn't allow you to see full parse data for others unless it's pre-shared.

Well, I mean, the data's already being shared between people now and essentially being stored in your chat. Effectively, an in-game parser, from the way I understand parsers, and I may be wrong because I've not exactly created one, would essentially be your combat log organized into specific people and sorted to a readable state with math pre-done for you when it comes to things like DPS calculations. The data is already "stored" in your chat log, it's just not in an organized state. Sharing the parse would essentially just be allowing your group's parse windows to put the already-stored data into a readable state.

Maybe you shouldn't try to speak for other people after how the whole "I'm gonna make up SE's position" debacle went.

I didn't make up anything. I repeated things that I've seen from other places. If you want to crap on someone for "making up SE's position", go talk to them. Also, start crapping on people who make up what others are saying when they're quoting things that clearly contradict it. I suggest starting with Elazu who keeps saying people who are good are all elitists.

Also, you shouldn't be the one acting smarmy over it when you didn't come up with the argument.

[Malevicton]

This is what you said:

I don't have to claim that. The pro-parser side already proves it by saying that they'd totally take people to task over low DPS even in content that doesn't have DPS checks at all. Regardless, that's not my claim. That's SE's fear. It's irrelevant if I make that claim because you still have to prove SE wrong. If I stayed out of this thread completely? Yeah, SE would still think the same thing.

Who says it's unneeded? Remember, SE already has the stance that they don't want people to turn into mouthy jerks if they let them talk about others' DPS. If you want to try to help get parsers, you've got to somehow convince them that they're wrong. Which means dispute is absolutely needed.

You were leaning pretty hard on it being a dev position.

And then many posts after this was disproved you pulled back to the whole I'm-just-going-off-what-I-heard (which doesn't make it better, btw, you shouldn't be spreading that kind of stuff around based on unsourced rumors you heard on the forums). Pretty much every time your position turns out to be provably wrong, you just abandon it and pretend you never actually argued it. And then if someone asks you to clarify your position you just insult their reading comprehension. It's getting old.

I'm also not sure what you mean by your last sentence.

[Lyrica_Ashtine]

Not my fault if you can't come up with objective benefits.

I gave you the objective benefits back at page 47 and 49 and discussed it with you on page 48 in detail about the post on page 47 in particular. Your only source of "defense" was your "anti-jerk stance", which you came with "personal parsers" which I elaborated that personal parsers would be far more jerk-prone than public parsers on page 48 as well.

I gave you objective benefits: Beneficial for the majority of a group who have a common goal. Your only reasoning so far that's against this kind of benefit are "people are jerks". I reacted to you that your kind of thinking would cater to the jerks you're so "anti-jerk" about, making entire communities bow down to those who you supposedly despise or even fear so much.

[Anze-chan]

I haven't really read those 53 so I guess my post must be random right now.

The only thing I honestly see SE doing is adding a damage/healing points counter tab with not that much detail outside of the current combat log. Something similar to PvP end results but it's an actual live feed. I think it would be nice if there was an option to view the best record for every instance on the most damage done by each job as well as damage taken/mitigated and total healed/restored points (not overhealed)

[Elazu]

So, they're not used to exclude others based on dps drops, they're just used to exclude players who don't do the dps you think they should. Wonderful.

This again.

If a tank or healer is not doing their job, causing your party to be unable to beat the content they'd be called out on it and replaced. Why is it fine for a dps to hold people back? I take it the anti-parser crowd still has no answer for this question?

A DPS who makes it impossible to beat certain content should absolutely be replaced, just like a tank or healer. They don't deserve a free pass just because they play a dps job.

[Sleigh]

Okay, and here's what I'm trying to get at. I'm not saying it's not useful to have the information at all. I just do not understand why it's inherently more useful at the time of, when you won't really be able to do much of anything about it until after the wipe. If you can get a breakdown of the fight after you've wiped, getting the same information as you would have during the fight, and now have the time to actually look at the data and talk to whoever it was that was slacking and make suggestions, why would it matter much if you saw it during the fight or after?

If your DRG is 200 DPS lower than they should be, which, for argument's sake, is definitely going to lead to a wipe because it's just too low, why does it matter whether you see that before you wipe or after? How often could you actually save a wipe by pointing out that the DRG is too low and they manage to pick up and make up for what they lost when you've already spent X amount of time being too low, as compared to you having to go another try but this time talking to the DRG beforehand?

Mainly because sometimes total DPS isn't as important as what someone does in a particular phase or up to a particular spot, when learning. It's good to have a timeline as you see it, basically; the end result number isn't always one you can analyze and get some info out of, especially if someone dies or does a mechanic wrong which would destroy your results when otherwise you could get some info out of them during the fact.

Yeah you typically do just look at the information after the fact for tank/heal deaths. Main thing I was trying to say there was the group should have that info all the time, not privately attached to individuals or otherwise unavailable.

[Aiselia]

I gave you the objective benefits back at page 47 and 49

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 again.

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

Shortcut to question

Mainly because sometimes total DPS isn't as important as what someone does in a particular phase or up to a particular spot, when learning. It's good to have a timeline as you see it, basically; the end result number isn't always one you can analyze and get some info out of, especially if someone dies or does a mechanic wrong which would destroy your results when otherwise you could get some info out of them during the fact.

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)?

But, I mean, if we assume that a forced-party parser is going to show you in-depth information into their CD usage or when/where they died, couldn't an end-result parser also show a timeline? Like, select a player, then it opens up a window that shows a more in-depth information timeline, while the standard UI view of the parser would be limited to more limited information.

Alternatively, what if the optional part was only who it shows to, but still would show real-time data if you selected to make it public? In which case, literally the only difference would be that instead of the party being forced to be able to see it even in content where it largely doesn't matter, one can choose whether or not theirs shows up on someone else's sheet. When doing savage content, you could still set rules to have it set to public for the run.