An Alternative? to parsers..

[Tridus]

I honestly think it's not quite that easy. Gear plays a massive part and the powercreep the game has is getting steeper and steeper.

What that then means is it's simply not possible for many players to reach the high percentiles. I'm incredibly casual at the minute .my highest job is my i334 paladin still rocking 320 susano weapons. My sam is i327 still sporting a 320 susano weapon. My blm is i323 stilll rocking a 310 verity weapon and couple of 310 accessories.

The point is then that it's going to be impossible for me to reach 80-90 percentile levels of dps. Simply because my gear isn't the best. My blm for might not even hit the 60th percentile rocking it's 310 weapon. It's just an impossibility. It Does not make me a bad player simply one with less time than others.

It's impossible for many players to reach the high percentiles because it's a percentile. By definition, only 1% of players can be 99th percentile. If everyone improved to the point that everyone was within 200 DPS of each other, only 1% of players would be 99th percentile, but the gap between a 99th percentile player and a 25th percentile player's DPS would be ~5% and not a big deal unless fights are tuned extremely strictly, so only people going for world firsts would be concerned about it.

Obviously due to practice, skill, and gear, the gap will likely never narrow up that much. But you can't focus entirely on percentile as a measurement. It's a useful tool to see where you are relative to everyone else. It's not a useful tool to see if you have the required DPS to clear the content (whereas raw DPS measurements are). Half the playerbase will always be below 50th percentile. The aim should be to help bring everyone up so that the gap isn't as wide as it is now, because right now it's a huge spread.

However if instead of measuring dps you were to measure for example pps potency per second. Then you might find my 60th percentile blm is actually up there in the high 80s maybe even 90s. It's not player skill that's the problem it's simply the power creep of gear.

You then have a scenario where great players appear bad simply because of there gear and available time to play.

PPS can measure how effectively you're using your skills, but doesn't tell you "can I beat the enrage?", which is ultimately the result people care about. So long as gear is a factor, it'll be a thing. But yes, it's a useful measurement of how effectively you're using your skills.

It's another reason why my stuff is hidden on logs because people might look at that see me at like 60th percentile and think I'm crap at blm. But it might actually be a good performance with my gear because I'm whacking out a ton of pps and uptime. Just gear and power creep drags it down a lot.

Part of this is a mentality issue. If you're measuring percentiles, 60th isn't crap. It's significantly above average. That goes back to how wide the spread between top and bottom is, though. 60th probably isn't going to be enough to do ultimate because it's meant to be super hard for top people, but if the gap is closed somewhat, it can be enough to do savage. That should be the goal, at least.

[Vejj]

Mhm... 1 big puppet with boss attributes. Limited Time and deal as much damage as possible. Based on the dealed damage the system gives you a Rank, for example A. Sounds good for me. But i guess, then there will be lot of guilds who wants new players with dps check of S rank xD

[JohnnyDevo]

I don't currently have time to read through the thread, so I apologize if this was already brought up.

The problem surrounding the parser is a complicated one. As it stands now, it essentially exists as the most un-enforced rule in the game. It's in the terms of service to not use them, but the director has said (paraphrased) "it's fine, just don't use it to be a dick". This creates the situation we have now, where it's blatantly obvious to those who use a parser who is underperforming, but they can't speak up about it for fear of getting reported for parsing.

As it stands, there's basically three options.
- Crack down on parser use officially
- keep the system as it is
- implement an in-game parser of some kind.

+ Option one represents a reduction of dps-based discrimination entirely, since most people would stop using it, and those who do use it would keep completely quiet about it or get banned. Outweighing this advantage, however, is the negative opinion of players who might quit the game because of this decision and the increased manpower on SE's end to actually police this.
+ Option two represents the least amount of effort on SE's part. In addition, it kinda combines the best of both worlds; players can record and compare their numbers, but there still exists a deterrent against, to use an over-used term, toxicity. As a counter to it, it can be said that toxic players will be toxic regardless of said deterrant and the existence of an internal/external parser wouldn't really change that or SE's rules against it.
+ Option three represents the highest amount of effort in developing and implementing an in-game parser, but once that's complete the "effort input" remains the same as option two, in that SE simply puts passive effort into policing problem players. Another disadvantage is that those who are defined as "poor performers" might become discouraged and quit the game.

The common theme? Both options one and three represent a higher resource allocation and a possibly lower income for the game as a whole. I can see them going with option three with the condition that they become strict with dps-based harassment, but there's still the issue of actually devoting resources to developing the supported parser. In the end, if it happens, it'll be one of the things we get instead of a dungeon during an odd patch. So 4.3 at the earliest.

Just my two cents.

[RiyahArp]

no, we don't need a parser or parser alternatives, people are clearing content fine as it is. Quit asking.

[MoroMurasaki]

no, we don't need a parser or parser alternatives, people are clearing content fine as it is. Quit asking.

Practically a meme at this point, I swear...

Why do you think most people are clearing content? Because guides, strategies and rotations are being developed by people who parse then being distributed to the masses.

Quit playing so dumb.

[RiyahArp]

Practically a meme at this point, I swear...

Why do you think most people are clearing content? Because guides, strategies and rotations are being developed by people who parse then being distributed to the masses.

Quit playing so dumb.

Because rotations were simplified and all the annoying button bloat that reduced dps overall was stripped out. You did poor damage before because you needed to cram four buttons in just for buffs, and spam OGCDs virtually every single gap if not doubleweave. Now its a lot easier to tell your dps and do your basic rotation, which is what it should have been.

[F_Maximillian]

Because rotations were simplified and all the annoying button bloat that reduced dps overall was stripped out. You did poor damage before because you needed to cram four buttons in just for buffs, and spam OGCDs virtually every single gap if not doubleweave. Now its a lot easier to tell your dps and do your basic rotation, which is what it should have been.

Do you truly believe this? Suppose for argument's sake this was true (most who look at things logically would disagree with the truthfulness of this statement), what do you attribute content being cleared to prior to stormblood? I'm fairly certain the game was playable and content was clearable before stormblood..

[RiyahArp]

Do you truly believe this? Suppose for argument's sake this was true (most who look at things logically would disagree with the truthfulness of this statement), what do you attribute content being cleared to prior to stormblood? I'm fairly certain the game was playable and content was clearable before stormblood..

level 50 rotations were easier than stormblood, it was only level 60 ones that became supercomplicated, and the people who cleared hard content in general were much fewer than now. If you played BLM at the start of HW compared to start of SB, its night and day. Even healers had to maintain 2-3 Dots to do decent dps. Ppl were complaining that most DPS couldn't even do a decent opener with zurvan.

[Gleipni]

Do you truly believe this? Suppose for argument's sake this was true (most who look at things logically would disagree with the truthfulness of this statement), what do you attribute content being cleared to prior to stormblood? I'm fairly certain the game was playable and content was clearable before stormblood..

Even now,Healer don't have to worry about priest stance ,to forget to put it out ,or activate it but have to heal right after but because of it your next heal would hit at 10%.
The dev did a lot to make all class simplier,and even so the community didnt improve ,even the opposite,tahts why a parse to show people their performance would be great.

[Reinha]

Practically a meme at this point, I swear...

Why do you think most people are clearing content? Because guides, strategies and rotations are being developed by people who parse then being distributed to the masses.

Quit playing so dumb.

The tool used to make those guides already exists. Guides are not a reason to implement another parser. This discussion was about implementing a new, official in-game parser or parser alternative and what Riyah said is correct in that context. Content is being cleared just fine without one.