All addons are not equal

[YukiB]

Legitimately curious what this problem is. You're not going to convince them to change the ToS, since this is literally legal text that goes well beyond the credentials of nearly every player of this game. Is the problem that people can't stand the idea that they're violating the ToS? As a 3rd party program user for this games still active predecessor, I can assure you that it gets easier and its not a big deal.

The problem is exactly what I quoted. Not all add-ons have the same kind of impact on the game, but they're all treated the same in the ToS.

1. Some add-ons only affect the graphics or UI information displayed on the client. GShade, buff timers, chat bubbles for example. They have no impact on another player's experience.

2. Some add-ons address serious issues that could prevent certain players from performing as well as others, such as latency-based animation delays or lack of accessibility options. These could be seen as providing advantages if abused.

3. Some add-ons make mostly harmless hobbies in the game, like posing, music playing, or housing easier, but alter the game in ways that are perceivable by other players and may involve automation or glitches.

4. Some add-ons allow players to do things which are normally impossible or automate gameplay in ways that harm others' experiences, like gold farm or pvp botting.

Why should all these things be treated as equal?

IMO they should focus on the things that provide tangible advantages or affect other players' games. By that I mean aggressively ban #4, implement gameplay features that make #3 redundant, address the underlying issues associated with #2, and ignore or incorporate ideas from #1.

That does not mean scanning for mods like OP wants. That's gross and I hate it when any game company implements intrusive anti-cheat or DRM.

Mostly what SE has done in the past anyway is ignore everything but botting. The exception are cases where some people in this great community decide to witch hunt streamers or specific players for mods of the #1 variety, not because they're concerned about the use of mods but because they have a personal grudge against the player. SE's blanket ban on mods compels them to take action against these players even though the infraction is nowhere near as serious as #4. Whenever one of these cases goes public there's immediate backlash against it and a flurry of activity from worried forum posters. I think it would benefit SE to have more nuance on this issue.

We might not convince them to change the ToS, but we won't know unless we try.

[Welsper59]

Why should all these things be treated as equal?

Because that's how software works. You're still doing something to the game that is not intended. The way you're doing it is relying on modders to create programs/tools that interacts with folders/files/etc that are legally controlled by SE. Even altering the shortcuts directory pathing is, in a broad sense, a grey area if not an outright violation (due to that being the same action as redirecting it to 3rd party tool launchers). Severity is irrelevant when you're trying to curb bad actions from people. This is protection for the company at large, not any of us or even exclusively the XIV team.

No major company does otherwise in this regard and blanket statements are the go-to. Letting things go, as they have been doing, is simply giving players an out if they don't abuse it... so that they don't have to waste time trying to catch people for things that are extremely hard to prove, if not impossible in-game (like Gshade).

We might not convince them to change the ToS, but we won't know unless we try.

And I do encourage people to do that. I just rather people have stronger arguments that aren't correctly shut down immediately because they don't understand something as simple as a blanket legal text and how it'd be applied in context. I do agree that I would not want crap like Anti-Cheat in this game. Keep in mind however that, if forced to BY THE PLAYERS ACTIONS, they will go that route. Things would have to be really bad though to get to that point.

That said, like I pointed out about this being protection for the company, a handful of consumers aren't going to make them create unnecessary vulnerabilities. Most of us will just continue staying the course of using whatever, even if they don't say anything, because nothing actually changed for nearly everyone.