Third party software

[NasaX]

Just as addon isn't Windows a 3party software as it was not made by SQUER ?
So we need some clearance from SQUER

[Packetdancer]

Just as addon isn't Windows a 3party software as it was not made by SQUER ?
So we need some clearance from SQUER

I mean, this is getting a little ridiculous.

But treating the question seriously...? No, it doesn't count as third-party software.

In the sense it's used in the ToS, third party software almost certainly refers specifically to software which either alters the game process from the intended state (mods, in-game overlays, etc.), alters the game data from the intended state (mods that directly affect the game assets on disk), or extracts information not accessible by any other means.

Moreover -- and this is the key point -- any software the game cannot function without is not unauthorized third-party software, but rather part of the game's base operating requirements.

Windows, in contrast, is the host platform on which the software is designed to run; the Windows version of the game cannot function at all without Windows. (Or some sort of reasonably complete Windows-esque API translation layer, a'la WINE, Proton, Crossover and such.)

[Rolder50]

I mean, this is getting a little ridiculous.

But treating the question seriously...? No, it doesn't count as third-party software.

In the sense it's used in the ToS, third party software almost certainly refers specifically to software which either alters the game process from the intended state (mods, in-game overlays, etc.), alters the game data from the intended state (mods that directly affect the game assets on disk), or extracts information not accessible by any other means.

Moreover -- and this is the key point -- any software the game cannot function without is not unauthorized third-party software, but rather part of the game's base operating requirements.

Windows, in contrast, is the host platform on which the software is designed to run; the Windows version of the game cannot function at all without Windows. (Or some sort of reasonably complete Windows-esque API translation layer, a'la WINE, Proton, Crossover and such.)

If you want to get real technical and nit picky about what their vague definition of third party software means then...

Discord can count by this definition as you can toggle an overlay which appears in game. It's just a list of people who are speaking in the voice channel, but an overlay is an overlay.

ACT Parsing would not count by this definition (with just base functionality installed) as it does not alter the games data and does not alter game assets. It reads network data and computes that into a parse.

[Packetdancer]

If you want to get real technical and nit picky about what their vague definition of third party software means then...

Discord can count by this definition as you can toggle an overlay which appears in game. It's just a list of people who are speaking in the voice channel, but an overlay is an overlay.

ACT Parsing would not count by this definition (with just base functionality installed) as it does not alter the games data and does not alter game assets. It reads network data and computes that into a parse.

Discord hooks DirectX and thus bootstraps its own code into a game to handle the overlay; no question it qualifies.

That said, ACT could easily be said to extract information not otherwise readily available. (Moreover, I think -- though may be wrong on this -- that the FFXIV parsing plugin for ACT not only reads network traffic, but also reads the process' memory space to provide some additional context.)

However, you're not entirely wrong, either; my analogy/definition there probably lacked a few qualifiers. For instance, XIVAlexander does not -- so far as I know, though admittedly I've never poked at that program, much less analyzed its method of working -- directly alter the game [i]process[i], but it sure as heck messes with the game's network traffic.

The key point, though, is that any software which is explicitly stated to be required in order for the software to function in the first place -- e.g. anything in the System Requirements list the publisher puts out, or implicitly included as a result of what's there -- is not going to be "unauthorized third-party software". Saying you need a graphics card capable of DirectX 11, for instance, also implies you need appropriate graphics drivers for that card; the drivers for your Nvidia or AMD card are thus not "unauthorized third-party software".

And the operating system that's explicitly stated as the target environment for a given version of the game -- i.e. Microsoft Windows of at least a specific minimum version, for the Windows version of the game -- is obviously going to be part of the base operating requirements, not "unauthorized third party software".

[KariTheFox]

I'm curious about how a Gunbreaker is supposed to figure out which skillspeed tier is best for thier ping - since picking that is very ping dependant - without using a parsing tool.

And don't say "Stone, Sea and Sky", SS&S only lasts three minutes, which means it cuts off right at the start of GNB's biggest burst phase.

[Wolfund]

I mean, there's a scale isn't there. Plenty of people just use ACT, all that does is read combat logs and turn it into a human readable format. Or plugins that help compensate for packet loss, which just simulates "living in California or Japan" for most players.

I don't agree with the kinds of mods that give new visual indicators for mechanics (I actually find them distracting and annoying, and they make it more difficult for me to learn content) but I don't think people who use them are really a big deal. They still have to execute the mechanics and play thier jobs, after all.

With some pen and paper, a dummy, a chronometer, and a calculator.

[HyoMinPark]

With some pen and paper, a dummy, a chronometer, and a calculator.

Anyone that uses the “you can just do it manually” argument I have to wonder: did you ever use a calculator when you were in school for your math or science classes? Or did you do all the work by hand?

A parser is a calculator. At its most basic level. No different from those TI-83s or TI-84s you may have used in school; or even a more basic Casio calculator. They just streamline a process, which isn’t inherently a bad thing. I really wish people would stop acting like it is.

[KariTheFox]

With some pen and paper, a dummy, a chronometer, and a calculator.

Assuming you're not joking, I'd like to try running a little thought experiment with everyone who has a strictly anti-parser viewpoint.

I want to figure out my damage per second during a period of say, 8 minutes. First, I do exactly what you say, hit the training dummy for 8 minutes, then with a pen and paper and a calculator, I calculate what my dps was over those 8 minutes. These calculations probably take a fair bit of time, 8 minutes is a lot of GcDs to add up.

So, I do it again. But this time, instead of using a pen and paper, I simply use my computer to copy and paste the entire combat log into a notepad file. Then, instead of doing the calculations myself, I send that file to my friend, he's much better at math than I am, and can calculate my dps much faster than I can.

Next time, my friend sends me a little computer script. He's not only better at math than me, but also a pretty good programmer. He tells me that instead of sending my combat logs to him, all I have to do is have this script he wrote read them, and it'll calculate my dps for me. All on my own computer and everything.

Next, I decide that I don't want to have to copy and paste these combat logs every time I want to calculate my dps. So I ask my friend, he tells me to use a screen capturing program, and run another script of his. That script will "read" my combat log in real time and transcribe it to a notepad file, which the then first script will read and calculate, just like before. Now, this works fine, I can even look at my dps in real time if I really wanted to.

Next, my friend tells me that he realized that using a screen capture program to read my combat log introduces a lot of unnecessary overhead. It would be a lot easier and simpler to just read the incoming network traffic that carried the combat log to my cilent, more accurate too, since sometimes the combat log in your cilent can leave things out.

Now finally, my friend then bundles his scripts up into one program, that can read incoming network data of combat logs, and then calculates the dps of players that are in those combat logs. I'm vastly oversimplifing, and might have some details wrong, but at this point we have pretty much arrived at the base functionality of parsing programs.

My question, at what point of this process did I do something wrong? Was it copy and pasting my combat logs to a notepad file? Was it having a third party use those logs to calculate my dps? Was it having a script on my computer do those calculations? Was it capturing the output of my combat log in real time? Was it reading incoming network traffic? Or was it somehow, doing all of those things at once?

[Elesh]

The game's accessibility options are terrible and need work. This is simple fact. Hopefully they improve upon this going forward, but there's no denying the reality now.

I also do think that any game that wants to maintain a competitive scene needs a method for players involved in that scene to monitor their own individual performance where it counts.

Aside from that... I don't think any tool use is really justified *shrugs*