Mods and cheat engine

[Saraide]

So now we are on "cheaters are fine, its about how YOU feel about it" stage? Seriously? All gameplay affecting stuff SHOULD be disabled on developers lvl. Noone cares if your modded dress on your screen look different, but how you make invisible telegraphs appear on your screen with 3rd party software? Software calls out mechanics from you because you cant encrypt network packets thats also fine? How we remove intended animation lock form some abilities so you can tripple weave since some mysterious jp server dveller is supposed to be able to do it? Where do we stop with that crap?
I dont say we should ban people for using ffxivalexander or something. They just should make game fair for everyone.

You seem to be under the impression that having a working anti cheat software is just as easy as flipping the light switch on and off. It's not, CoD warzone is employing kernel level anti cheat software and it still fails regularly at preventing cheaters. Cheats are a massive arm's race, one that's not worth getting into in a game that's not pvp focus'd and not relying on f2p economics.
Also, what do you consider fair? Is blind progging the whole tier on the same level as just looking up every strat? Is it fair that i get to brag with my e12s mount despite not having to figure out any of the relativities? Is it fair that people can just do old savage fights unsync'd and do strats like goodbye world?
Let me ask you again, what do you find fun about savage, ultimate or any other difficult content in any game you play?

[LittleImp]

Also, what do you consider fair? Is blind progging the whole tier on the same level as just looking up every strat? Is it fair that i get to brag with my e12s mount despite not having to figure out any of the relativities? Is it fair that people can just do old savage fights unsync'd and do strats like goodbye world?

I mean, using a guide or un-syncing a fight isn't explicitly against the terms of service, and doesn't involve automating portions of the game. It's pretty easy to see that their definition of fair is probably something like "Not using an explicitly banned cheat program to gain an advantage".

[Saraide]

I mean, using a guide or un-syncing a fight isn't explicitly against the terms of service, and doesn't involve automating portions of the game. It's pretty easy to see that their definition of fair is probably something like "Not using an explicitly banned cheat program to gain an advantage".

Morals inform what is fair and what isnt, laws/rules dont do a good job at that. Unsyncing often times cuts off massive portions of fights. When I farmed o12s for the mount we never got to see hello world 2, yet I have the mount all the same. Outgearing the fight is an insanely unfair advantage over those who did the fight when it came out and you get to show of mounts and achievements anyway. Additionally, they seem to be fine with people using alexander to solve ping issues. That's an "explicitly banned cheat program" as you put it. It's just also the same program used to reduce animation lock to 0 to allow triple weaving without clipping if someone chose to go that route. Clearly we have moved beyond being a TOS herald and therefore we have to ask, what is fair?

[LittleImp]

Morals inform what is fair and what isnt, laws/rules dont do a good job at that. Unsyncing often times cuts off massive portions of fights. When I farmed o12s for the mount we never got to see hello world 2, yet I have the mount all the same. Outgearing the fight is an insanely unfair advantage over those who did the fight when it came out and you get to show of mounts and achievements anyway. Additionally, they seem to be fine with people using alexander to solve ping issues. That's an "explicitly banned cheat program" as you put it. It's just also the same program used to reduce animation lock to 0 to allow triple weaving without clipping if someone chose to go that route. Clearly we have moved beyond being a TOS herald and therefore we have to ask, what is fair?

XIVAlexander is used by people who don't even have serious ping issues because it allows them to send series' of normally impossible inputs by emulating an impossible game-state, so yeah it's also essentially a cheat program.

Really, it's not that complex of an issue at all. If a third party piece of software is offering active assistance with fight execution by doing something that would be impossible under normal circumstances, it's very easy to see why it's cheating. Even more-so when it's very explicitly prohibited by the rules created by the developers of the game.

You could make reasonable fairness argument around simple QoL plugins, graphical mods or combat loggers, but when it comes to things like Cactbot and XIVAlexander it's pretty black-and-white.

[ArcaviusGreyashe]

So now we are on "cheaters are fine, its about how YOU feel about it" stage? Seriously?

Yes, we are. Because it's something you do on your free time to feel good about yourself. Gaming is self-care. And you're the one that transforms that self-care into stress by looking at what others do and have, and being jealous, not that they have more, but that they have the same. You're the only reason you feel bad about them having said mounts and titles. If those are that important to you, you should just seek help. FFXIV is a game, you can be proud of what you achieve, proud of what you build with people, but if something becomes so offsetting to you even though it doesn't affect your achievements, nor makes it more difficult for you to do your things, you have a toxic relationship with the game.

And it's a big "you", there seem to be many such cases around here.

[VerdeLuck]

The only thing I really care about is if developers start balancing content and classes around players having low ping and callout mods installed, and they become mandatory to clear content. Luckily even ACT and parsing isn't mandatory outside of some idiots in PF who take practice and clear parties too seriously.

[Rolder50]

The only thing I really care about is if developers start balancing content and classes around players having low ping and callout mods installed, and they become mandatory to clear content. Luckily even ACT and parsing isn't mandatory outside of some idiots in PF who take practice and clear parties too seriously.

I mean, they already design classes assuming you will have low ping. Just look at MCH!

[Shialan]

I mean, they already design classes assuming you will have low ping. Just look at MCH!

Which has nothing to do with any of the ping tools, but is the default state of every ISP. It's not normal to have 100+ ms ping. So why would any developer actively develop for such cases, when it's more common to have 10-60 ms ping?

[Rolder50]

Which has nothing to do with any of the ping tools, but is the default state of every ISP. It's not normal to have 100+ ms ping. So why would any developer actively develop for such cases, when it's more common to have 10-60 ms ping?

It's plenty normal for those who don't live within a few miles of a datacenter. Internet data can only travel so fast, so distance absolutely plays a factor, you know? As an example, I'm sitting here with 75 ping to the game, but only 7 ping when I run a speed test.

[Melorie]

Which has nothing to do with any of the ping tools, but is the default state of every ISP. It's not normal to have 100+ ms ping. So why would any developer actively develop for such cases, when it's more common to have 10-60 ms ping?

Uh, I have been playing online games since I'm a teen, and I can count on my fingers the times I played games with 10-60 ms ping.