This is why this game should'nt get a parse

[Melichoir]

People seem to not be understanding my point. So Ill clarify.

On the one hand, Parsers are good because they can tell you a lot of useful information for raid Content. On the other hand, it can be used to abuse other players, particularly by those who tend to have a very high opinion of themselves.

There are of course high end raiders who do well, and foster positive group interactions and use Parser's appropriately. But there are people who are quite the opposite, and use parsers as a cudgel to judge and dismiss players because their numbers arent high enough. Or in short, they use the Parser to Trash Talk other players.

If you havent experienced this, groovy. But your personal experiences arent evidence it does not occur at all. Merely that you have not encountered players who do this. Thats all it means. But there are plenty of personal accounts who have said they have encountered players like this (in raids, in dungeons, in Trials) in some capacity.

[Sebazy]

People seem to not be understanding my point. So Ill clarify.

I think we fully understand what your point is, in my case, I just think it's disproportionate to the reality of the situation.

I had a Rabanstre today where the group struggled to make it past Mateus and literally had no hope in hell of ever getting past Hashmal without some serious improvement. One guy had been trolling in /a for most of the run and after a wipe where both other groups had their orbs explode, he proceeded to trash talk about DPS and even claimed he was top of the list.

The fun past was, he wasn't, not even close.

Was that a fault of le parser? No, not at all, the guy was just an idiot/troll. Parsing had nothing to do with it.

Some people will just be a hazard irrespective of what tools they have in their hands, take the gun away and they'll use a van.

[Melichoir]

Snip

If you understood my point, you wouldnt have posted what you did. I was not condoning or condemning parsers. Pointing out that there are ups and downs. That there WILL be people who will use it to attack others. And your response/inference was "I havent personally seen it, so must not be happening."

Youre second anecdotal point actually bears out my argument. Players who have a high opinion of themselves take the data from the parser and use it as a means of attacking other players. Im not suggesting that we shouldnt have parsers. Only that you will have to acknowledge that should they be incorporated, you will see an increase in that behavior as it becomes more readily accessible to the player population. There are ups to it, but there are also some downs. And what the Devs may be trying to avoid is excessive striation of the player base due to numbers not being high enough.

snip

So some quick things

Anecdotal experiences that say "I havent experienced it, therefore it does not happen" is not the same as anecdotal experiences of "Ive experienced it, so it must be happening on some level."

One is saying their experience is an absolute, the other is saying that their experience is proof that is is occurring in some capacity. So its nto canceling the other out. The second experience is outright refuting the first due to the applications of those experiences.

Also, yes. There ARE good people who want to help others. Im not saying they dont exist. In fact, they could very well be a majority of players. But that does not mean that there arent people who are jerks, or people who that theyre not in significant enough number to be damaging to the player base. It is really one of those things that a handful of jerks can spoil the whole experience.

Snip

Youre conflating in game mechanics with a function that is not necessary to the game, as well as arguing that some people are negative, so adding a parser to teh game wont change the status quo.

Parsers are, ultimately, not necessary for the game. They provide a LOT of useful info that definitely helps people, but they ultimately are not integral to beating a raid. If youre hitting an enrage, you already know its cause Damage is to low, so people need to review their class and practice it as well as gear and make sure theyre doing fight mechanics right. A parser can help you optimize, but again, is not a necessity. It is a creature comfort, nothing more. Unlike lets say a threat meter, which is necessary due to boss mechanics requiring swapping or making sure tank is the primary focus of the boss.

Furthermore, you will most likely see an increase in toxicity if it became a part of the game for two reasons. 1 is Greater access, means more trolls statistically, and two it will be argued that because its an official part of the game, it can be used as a means to weed out players from groups. This phenomenon has happened in other MMOs via other superficial additions. In WoW, when achievements were added, people soon were required to 'link their achievement' in order to join a group for content. No achievement, no access. This ended up striating the player base a bit and fueling some toxicity. It made it harder for enw players to experience the end game stuff and be a part of the community. Not impossible, just more difficult. And the reasoning was the same: Its officially a part of the game, therefore it can be used as a means to sort out the baddies from goodies.

The Devs may be aware of this, and trying to avoid that facet.

[Jijifli]

If you understood my point, you wouldnt have posted what you did. I was not condoning or condemning parsers. Pointing out that there are ups and downs. That there WILL be people who will use it to attack others. And your response/inference was "I havent personally seen it, so must not be happening."

Tell me if this helps.

Yes people can abuse it. Everything you put in the game can be abused. Wanna guess what I found the day Play Dead went on the mog station? Can probably guess when a M Lalafell sticks his butt up in the air. So should we remove Play Dead? Because some people are abusing it to do things they shouldn't?

Or what about another one. Sound Effects. You remember <se.7> right? People can abuse that to annoy you in chat, forcing a BL or to mute the game/section that the noise is tied to. Should we remove sound effects? They're useful for getting important mechanic related info out, but people can be mean with it, just like parsing is good for getting tons of combat information, but someone can be mean with it.

Also, I don't need a parser to tell you that your dps is trash. I can see it just fine by watching your rotation and enmity generation. Should we remove those enmity bars then? And animations?

[StarRosie]

Anecdotal experiences that say "I havent experienced it, therefore it does not happen" is not the same as anecdotal experiences of "Ive experienced it, so it must be happening on some level."

One is saying their experience is an absolute, the other is saying that their experience is proof that is is occurring in some capacity. So its nto canceling the other out. The second experience is outright refuting the first due to the applications of those experiences.

I have to disagree, Neither Bourne nor Sebazy seem to be saying "I don't see it, so it never happens." but asking for evidence that it happens and this is mostly due to perception. I'm merely taking a stab here, but I think it's a little on the money. But they may not see it due to them being in groups that use a parser either personally or responsibly. So it is not that they are saying "I've never seen this so it must never happen." but more "I've never seen this, can you please provide me an example so I can understand. Because the groups I run don't do this." if that makes any sense. Meanwhile, our perception is that we have been in groups that have jackholes that do use parsers in a abusive manner so we do know it happens and have either been victims of it or know victims of it and that can color one's perception in a discussion like this. But, like all tools, it is subject to abuse by some. A hammer is a tool but some will use it as a weapon. (No, I'm not gonna use the "Should we ban all hammers?!" argument, that's silly.)

Personally, I wish people wouldn't be huge dicks to eachother and we could all get along and hug it out! So, I don't like the idea of leaving a possible tool of abuse on the table. But we don't, so there isn't much I can do other then report those who use the hammer to kill people rather then pound in some nails. Sooner or later, either you'll weed out enough of the jerks that they won't be a problem anymore or the jerks will get the message and either shut up or tone down. But again, the majority shouldn't be punished for the acts of the minority.

[StarRosie]

snip.

But that is still anecdotal evidence. Basically both sides counter each other's points with anecdotal evidence and personal experiences. Trust me, when I was starting to dip into raid content or savage back in HW, I dealt with a couple rather toxic parser folks, but like most groups, I understand that some experiences are not representative of the group as a whole. While I personally do not parse and have no desire too and I am sure pro parser folks don't mind that, I don't mind or care in the grand scheme of things if they do parse. Yes, people will abuse others with parsers and logs, yes in the grand scheme that abuse isn't really comparable to emote or chat abuse, BUT! There are way more who either use the tool personally and keep to themselves or keep to within their close group of friends. We should not persecute the majority for the acts of the minority.

I am personally rather neutral these days in this debate, I think some things with FFlogs should change a bit and that would alleviate some, if not the majority of the abuse claims with logs. But again, whole different discussion. But I do not think the overall group should be judged based on the actions of a few. If that were the case then the anti parser side will require equal punishment, cause lord knows they aren't innocent in this debate.

You can go through this whole thread and see both sides basically bein' dicks to eachother, using personal experiences as evidence to 'crush' the opposing opinion and overall doing the same thing back and forth. If you encounter someone who is being a dick with parsers and logs. Report them and move on cause that is literally the best you can do right now. Save copies of the conversation if ya need to.

But if you look, it is very clear that there are more reasonable and overall nice people who use parsers. Not to single out but quickest to come to mind are Bourne and Hyomin (Though I could just be guessing they use them...I don't think I've seen them directly say they do.), while I don't agree with all of the things they say, both seem like good people who just wanna help and I wouldn't wanna see folks like them get punished for the actions of people they probably don't even know.

I'm gonna stop here for now. All my thoughts aren't gather for this post and overall I'm rambling (And still at work...I think my boss is eyeing me with his nerf gun...) so, I may edit with more when I get home. Just...idk, don't be closed out to listening to the other side I guess? That goes for both sides? Eh.

[Squintina]

If you havent experienced this, groovy. But your personal experiences arent evidence it does not occur at all. Merely that you have not encountered players who do this. Thats all it means. But there are plenty of personal accounts who have said they have encountered players like this (in raids, in dungeons, in Trials) in some capacity.

So because some people will be jerks, no one should get it (officially)?
Some people are jerks in dungeons if you mess up a mechanic. Some people are jerks in pvp. Some people are jerks in hunts. Some people are jerks just talking in chat or novice network. Some people take advantage of FCs. Heck one person was being a jerk in the gold saucer by dancing right on top of the NPC to handle the jumping GATE challenge in to making it difficult to hand in.

If you take down anything someone could abuse to tear others apart, you have nothing left except a single player game.

Besides there are people who want an official parser that works only for them (not the whole party, just "me") so they can see their own numbers and not anyone else's. They could then compare with people they trust by chatting and asking about their respective numbers. What about that version?

[HyoMinPark]

If you havent experienced this, groovy. But your personal experiences arent evidence it does not occur at all. Merely that you have not encountered players who do this. Thats all it means. But there are plenty of personal accounts who have said they have encountered players like this (in raids, in dungeons, in Trials) in some capacity.

While I’ve never seen a widespread epidemic of harassment via parsers, I’m not claiming that it doesn’t exist. I don’t think anyone in this thread is saying that. I’m just saying that it’s probably not as widespread (i.e., occurs at some alarmingly high rate, or that 9 out of every 10 people who parse abuse people with it) as some of the more anti-parser crowd make it out to be. In my personal experience, I have seen (and reported) harassment via parser once, and I’ve been playing for 2 years, and doing harder content (Extremes/Savage) for a little over a year. The harassment in question occurred in a Zurvan Ex farm group (and, as everyone knows, that fight was already a gathering for the worse sorts of pissants), and the person doing the harassment certainly had no right to be talking big when it came to their damage. I see far more negativity from people that are against parsers than from people who are for them (like the poster who appeared in another parser debate a few months back that said they report anyone and everyone who they think is maybe parsing, evidence or no, and even this thread’s OP).

On the flip side, your argument can also apply to your own experiences: you may have seen more parser harassment than myself or another poster in this thread, but you can’t use your anecdotal evidence to back up a claim that it is wide-spread. There are plenty of personal accounts that say they have never encountered harassment via parser in the entire time they have been playing the game. The argument goes both ways.

No one will say it doesn’t exist. But to base whether or not such a tool should be implemented on the chance that someone is going to abuse the tool is wrong. There is potential for abuse in every feature in this game; should they all like-wise be removed to protect players from potential Vote Kick abuse? Vote Abandon (because we all know of that one person who likes to spam it in 24-mans the minute the alliance wipes once)? Party Finder exclusions (though, to be fair, the PF leader can set any rules he wants and they be valid; their PF, their rules)? Custom emotes (because there have been some lewd ones)? Implementing an in-game parser would not suddenly make harassment okay; a lot of people assume that, if the developers gave us a valid in-game parser, people could suddenly start harassing people left and right with it, and not be punished for their behavior. But that would not be the case; harassment would still be policed as it is now without a supported parser.

Youre second anecdotal point actually bears out my argument. Players who have a high opinion of themselves take the data from the parser and use it as a means of attacking other players. Im not suggesting that we shouldnt have parsers. Only that you will have to acknowledge that should they be incorporated, you will see an increase in that behavior as it becomes more readily accessible to the player population. There are ups to it, but there are also some downs.

With regards to the bolded statement, no one can actually prove that implementing an in-game parser would cause a rise in assholery. No one can prove that it won’t. It’s best to not make such assumptions because they simply cannot be proven. On either hand. All it does is create unnecessary doomsaying. And there are ups and downs to every system; that’s just the way it is. You can’t have a system that is nothing but good or nothing but bad.

Also, yes. There ARE good people who want to help others. Im not saying they dont exist. In fact, they could very well be a majority of players. But that does not mean that there arent people who are jerks, or people who that theyre not in significant enough number to be damaging to the player base. It is really one of those things that a handful of jerks can spoil the whole experience.

I’ve always been of the mindset that you shouldn’t let the bad apples ruin the entire bunch. Don’t punish the good players because the bad ones are being twats.

Youre conflating in game mechanics with a function that is not necessary to the game, as well as arguing that some people are negative, so adding a parser to teh game wont change the status quo.

I think what he’s getting at, is that adding in parsers is not going to suddenly decrease the amount of harassment that occurs via other avenues because all the harassment is suddenly going to funnel towards parser abuse.

Parsers are, ultimately, not necessary for the game. They provide a LOT of useful info that definitely helps people, but they ultimately are not integral to beating a raid. If youre hitting an enrage, you already know its cause Damage is to low, so people need to review their class and practice it as well as gear and make sure theyre doing fight mechanics right. A parser can help you optimize, but again, is not a necessity. It is a creature comfort, nothing more.

You’re right that parsers aren’t necessary. But, for the rest of your paragraph here:
—If you’re hitting enrage, yes, you’re right that it is already known that damage is low. But, how do you know specifically who and/or what is the culprit? Is it the MNK in the HQ crafted gear? What about the MCH in his high-end gear? Is it the NIN? The BRD? And why? There’s no way of knowing the answers to any of those questions without using a parser to further analyze a log and see: “Oh, well the MNK is doing great, but the MCH is really low for his item level” or “Oh, the NIN isn’t actually using any mudras; that could be why” or “Why is the BRD not using their songs? Or reapplying their DoTs with Iron Jaws? Or using Raging Strikes?”

Furthermore, you will most likely see an increase in toxicity if it became a part of the game for two reasons. 1 is Greater access, means more trolls statistically, and two it will be argued that because its an official part of the game, it can be used as a means to weed out players from groups.

Trolls will be trolls regardless of the tools they have at their disposal. An official parser won’t change that. That being said, like I said previously: harassment will still be handled just as it is now if it’s reported to a GM. They aren’t going to suddenly ignore it because parsers are now “legal”.

This phenomenon has happened in other MMOs via other superficial additions. In WoW, when achievements were added, people soon were required to 'link their achievement' in order to join a group for content. No achievement, no access. This ended up striating the player base a bit and fueling some toxicity. It made it harder for enw players to experience the end game stuff and be a part of the community.

There is already a system like this that “excludes” people: Party Finder’s “duty complete” and “duty completion” options. One filters out people who have not cleared content from joining groups that are for farming, and I think such a filtering is justified. If you haven’t done the content, why are you trying to join a farm group for it with no clear? If you haven’t cleared, start a learning or clear party; don’t join one that has a different objective. I don’t think that implementing a parser would have the same exclusions as your WoW example. If, if you end up in a group that, for whatever reason, demanded 95th percentile play, just leave and find/make another one.

Will maybe add more to this after I finish catching up to the thread; just wanted to write this little bit before I forgot.