Increasing number of players using 3rd party tools

[ForteNightshade]

There were plenty of cheats in ranked Feast matches for the last 3-4 seasons. People running at ridiculous speeds, people that cannot be stunned, people floating mid air, people teleporting out of the starting ring before match warmup ends hitting the other team from the outside without any danger, people having programs automatically interrupt enemy Limit Breaks at 0,0001% of their cast bar every time etc. These didn't use to happen but I noticed a clear trend of more and more people with these kind of things last few seasons

You know what prompts that trend? A lack of enforcement in general. It's widely known SE does absolutely nothing about bots and speed hacking unless it's blatantly obvious. Hence why market board bots have infested the crafting scene throughout Shadowbringers. They know nothing will happen. Which it doesn't considering I can list a good number of bots on Cactuar that have been around since Stomrblood.

That is far more impactful on the general playerbase than someone using a plugin for chat bubbles or texture mods.

[Beytran70]

For me, addons/mods in MMOs generally fall into the same category in my brain as cheating and mods do in single player games. If it isn't negatively affecting other players, it really doesn't matter, and as far as I can tell most of the things people use in FFXIV are more about helping the individual player than anything else. As stated before, though, bots are something else entirely and should be prevented as much as possible. I don't even think addons that supposedly make fights and such easier are an issue, either. The bosses aren't going to have their feelings hurt, they're going to die regardless, and if the issue is as blatant and impactful as some people say, the devs would do something about it.

[Absimiliard]

While I myself do not use addons, I am forced to question why it's such an issue? I have yet to hear of a single static ever demanding its members modify their game in any way. Some people choose to use local mods that alter the way the game looks, others utilize non-invasive programs to study and analyze their numbers. No one is being openly shamed or harmed by these things, so where's the problem?

[Aurora_Sylphy]

A WoW like situation where mods/addons are required to even get into the raid scene is very much an unlikely hypothetical that could ever happen in FF14 though primarily because FF14 is cross-platform with PS4/5 where they do not have access to any tools like this. Hence this fear is a mute point that won't happen.

On the hand of third party tools on PC, as most have said barring public/twitter NSFW stuff which really urks the developers (for fair and obvious reasons), if it doesn't affect your gameplay, I see no reason why anyone would ever have an issue with someone using a mod to automate combos or something of a similar nature. Someone having ACT up doesn't affect you until they start to give you shit about you're performance, or go into toxic, unhelpful and uncritical insult flinging for your terrible/sub par dps (in their eyes at least). At that point, backlist and report them, and I guarantee they'll get a penalty and perhaps a ban if they are a repeat offender (assuming it is hate/toxicity and not constructive criticism)

Same with things like Cactbot, if they don't clip and kill you by misunderstanding the directions, it just means they die less (hopefully), deal more damage (hopefully) and help the clear go smooth and/or faster (hopefully). It is important to remember Cactbot won't make you a savage raider, and you still need to pay attention to the shorthand's it uses, as well as fight context (directions, buff windows, who's dead/alive, someone else taking your assigned safe spot in a mechanic, etc), well Cactbot ain't going to save you then. Same with any mods to UI, armour and items, clothing, gshade, etc, it is all Client side, not server side, and thus does not affect you in anyway. If the mere idea of other people having fun and having an enjoyable time using addons that don't in any way, shape or form affect or alter your game play experience affects you and irks you inn some deep, weird way, I hate to break it to you but that's gatekeeping and frankly no better then the people who refuse to accept some people mod Souls like games to have an easier time because they like the story/art/style/aesthetic etc.

Sp long as you they don't insult, belittle or hurt people with these, well, Square is not going to really ban anything, even if something like ACT is seen on stream without good reason, and will only take action when the use of it leads to toxicity and or harm (such as a streamer flaming their fellow party members on stream cause of their dps numbers). The TOS says that third party addons are not allowed, but Square does seem to maintain a common and loose 'Don't ask, don't tell' idea. It's the same with the copyright warning when you first open bard music instruments. They are not going to ban someone for playing a Coldplay song in game until Coldplay calls them up and makes a fuss. That's why that, as well as the no addons clause exist in the TOS, it gives them justification when they do take action (or in the bard music case, protection from being sued for copyright).

[VerdeLuck]

A WoW like situation where mods/addons are required to even get into the raid scene is very much an unlikely hypothetical that could ever happen in FF14.

ACT and FFLogs are already a required part of raiding, good luck finding a static or people to join your static if you don't use those two, and have parses ready to show.

[Fhaerron]

ACT and FFLogs are already a required part of raiding, good luck finding a static or people to join your static if you don't use those two, and have parses ready to show.

I've joined several statics during ShB where providing a log was not required. Even some of the more higher skilled groups I joined where the entire group had orange / purple yet you were not required to show them.
You could say that they look up people who apply but I had no orage/purple and was able to join without issues. Just had an interview on Discord voice.

[IdowhatIwant]

ACT and FFLogs are already a required part of raiding, good luck finding a static or people to join your static if you don't use those two, and have parses ready to show.

I don't know of any pug or static that verifies you have ACT installed before allowing you to raid. And as far as requiring a parse goes, well you don't need ACT to have a log uploaded as it is very common for most people running ACT to upload logs automatically. You simply need to do content, which is really what they are looking for to verify that you have actually done some form of end game content. That being said FFLogs is not an addon, it is a web page.

Stop making up BS it is clear you don't even understand what you are talking about.

[Colt47]

The only tool I can think of the game needs is a DPS meter that is strictly available in savage. The whole reason they don't have DPS meters in general is they don't want what happened in WoW where you get elitist behavior, but savage itself there's no real way around it because it has an enrage and a lot of the jobs still need work to get them to a point that a DPS meter is unnecessary. Like no one running reaper needs a DPS meter, but some jobs like BRD and DRK definitely do.

I do feel that some people want tools to solve problems that can't really be solved by tools. Like if someone is constantly getting walled by add phase on p3s, that's either on them not understanding how it works, or getting into groups where people do not understand how add phase works. That and a lot of groups stuck on adds keep using the worst strategies for adds so they got nothing to blame but themselves...

Bah, now I went off on a tangent on savage when talking about tools. I suppose that is normal since tools are there to make difficult things easier.

On another note, people mentioning WoW and not wanting this game to become like "WoW": This game will never become like WoW for a whole lot of reasons. First, WoW was released in 2004 during an era where a lot of games were released in buggy states, so you'd have college students and all sorts of people making mutators, mods, and sometimes even patches to fix these games. So companies at the time had a much less strict policy on third party code when it came to gaming.

Now we are in an age where the internet has matured, online access via broadband, fiber, and cable is ubiquitous in many places, and gaming as a service has become a major model. Companies aggressively defend their IPs and want to monetize everything, including cosmetics, so it's created a culture where your average modding college student is probably going to get a ban just for fixing some clipping issue.

[Imora]

ACT itself is not an add on either. It's a glorified packet sniffer.

And there's statics that will take you without logs.

And it's not the wow crowd using them. It started in coil. The program was developed for EverQuest 2 and has been ported to a few games.

[Asari5]

recently i read at several places (even at places where i disnt expect talk about add-ons) from people asking about add ons and talking about them.... the users never really told the not-yet-users that add ons are illegal. everyone has to decide on their own if they use them or not... but it should made clear that add ons are illegal.

and... i tecently read several times about an illegal client so people dont have to log in every time... is that a thing now? being so lazy people dont even want to write two words?