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Alpha Two Phase II testing is currently taking place 5+ days each week. More information about testing schedule can be found here
If you have Alpha Two, you can download the game launcher here, and we encourage you to join us on our Official Discord Server for the most up to date testing news.
Comments
The situation would have been just as bad without a combat tacker as it was with it - and to suggest that is not the case is to suggest that trolling someone for low DPS is equal to sexual harassment.
It is not.
This situation would have happened with or without a combat tracker, and Square Enix have simply made use of it as a means to support their stance on the matter - when really they should have treated the situation as one of sexual harassment.
I'm not going to say events like this don't happen. They do, some people are dicks.
However, there is no reason to believe that this event wouldn't have happened if a combat tracker was not available to the players in question - and the aspect of the situation that the combat tracker was used for was without doubt the lightest part of the whole thing.
Anybody using 3rd party programs gets banned.. Doesn't worry me. 🤷🏼♂️
This is another point I have addressed a number of times.
First of all, the term "third party program" actually needs to be specifically defined in the games EULA.
Blizzard does this in this specific way "Use any unauthorized process or software that intercepts, collects, reads, or “mines” information generated or stored by the Platform". Edit to clarify - I am using Blizzard as a fairly general example here.
Every mention of third party programs in the EULA after that specifically refer to programs that fit this description.
If they were to refer to all third party programs, that would include Windows and Chrome, as both Microsoft and Alphabet (Google's parent company) are third parties to the EULA between the game developer (the first party) and the player (the second party). Third party programs would also exclude any application made by the player, as the player is the second party, thus any application they make is a second party application, not a third party one.
So, rather than it being a case of all "third party programs" being ban-able offences - which is both unenforceable and uneffective - it is actually only programs that specifically perform one or more of the specified functions that are against any rule.
Game developers (or their lawyers) also put in clauses that basically say the developer can run software on your computer to detect what other applications you are running on your computer.
So, when developing a combat tracker for an MMO, the developer of that combat tracker can either come up with a way that doesn't go against the things that the game developer has said are not allowed, or that isn't able to be detected (this second one is hard).
Both of the combat trackers I know of in development for Ashes run on a device that is not running the client game - one is on a second computer, and one is on an Android device. Intrepid have no business (or legal right) to do anything with any computer that doesn't have their game client running. Their EULA has no jurisdiction - if you will - on applications running on a computer that isn't also running the games client.
Based on that, there is no way Intrepid can detect who is and who is not using a combat tracker in conjunction with the game. Intrepid could have the exact code for the combat tracker that I am using, and could have complete access to all data on my client computer, and they would still come up without any reason to assume that I am running a combat tracker.
I don't know why it has to be that specific to include windows. Do it like Runescape did it.. Just ban shit that interferes with gameplay and/or the client.
That is basically what I just said they do.
However, in doing that, they need to specify exactly which things they don't want you to do. A combat tracker can work around those limitations.
The simple act of running it on another computer completely circumvents anything that could ever be put in an EULA.
It's usually pretty obvious for anyone who stops and pays attention to what's going on.
During a fight with some **** in Blade and Soul, my group of... 5 I think? Repeatedly died about 6 times. One player bitched constantly about it, blaming everyone. Eventually I had enough and just yelled at him to shut the hell up and do his job of keeping the adds off the group's only heavy hitting DPS (me) so that I can keep hitting the main target rather than fight off the god damn cats. Took all of 1 fight for me to pay attention to what was going on, 1 fight to confirm, and 7 seconds to snap at the offensive jerk.
Low and behold, it took 1 try after that. He shut up, I pissed off, and my guild mate acknowledged my furious anger with a "That... was awesome".
You should always just have someone dedicated to watching the fight and noting who's doing what and how they're doing it. Usually, this role defaults to the healer. Tank is busy watching the enemies, the healer is usually far enough back that they can pay attention to everyone's position and health. Beyond that, the DPS should focus on the environment, and watch for patrols and potential adds from the periphery of the battle.
The fact that trial and error takes time and dedication is part of why it's easier to avoid being a judgy asshole, at least in my own experience. Since it took ME hours of game play, practice, and experience, I can't expect everyone else to operate at my level.
Data tracking takes that away. What normally requires experience and expertise is reduced to noting numbers and graphs, and this is something everyone can do. So when not everyone does it, it becomes frustrating to those who do. Frustration leads to shorter tempers and that leads to toxic behavior.
Know your role, do your job. If Brad the Bard keeps dying, and you know how Bards work, advise. If not, it's not your job
Eh, not really.
Stopping data tracking would be very easy, 1) don't save combat data in any accessible system registries, and 2) Don't show combat data in system chat dialogues. Remove these two factors, and data tracking becomes all but impossible on the user's end.
Or, alternatively, just do the first option. That seems an effective deterrent all on it's own. Making the data trackers for systems that have to read the combat text is a huge ass pain, and could be made to only track damage you personally take or dish out, and not what other players are doing around you.
Or, if you absolutely must allow for data tracking, manipulate both 1 and 2 so that the only data available is data too or from you. Meaning you only have access to numbers of damage/health that you dish out, receive, or are damaged for.
You really have no business knowing what my numbers are, under any circumstances, unless I have access to those numbers and voluntarily tell you.
As for toxicity, competitive game play is a major contributing factor, but not the only one. A lot of it is "what does the game allow", and "what will the game masters allow". Demonstrating strict game master presence in force helps ensure that in game toxicity is minimized. The subscription and P2P setup will both help with it as well. People will be far less likely to be assholes if they know they can get banned for it and they sank money into it. Implementing these things during the initial creation phase probably isn't that difficult, yet an easy to use system for players will help the GMs police the servers efficiently with minimal direct invasive action.
It's all part of routine MMO maintenance though, if a company can't maintain it, they are going to lose their player base very quickly. I suspect the reason it's so rampant these days is simply that game developers don't try very hard to quell it. Everything is "F2P" and supported entirely by cash shops. I believe Intrepid is going to look into the toxicity situation as a whole, and consider any and all viable options for keeping it minimal.
We absolutely can have a competitive game with a friendlier community. It just takes far more than people policing themselves.
All you're doing here is pointing out that this kind of behavior happens regardless of whether a combat tracker exists or not.
More than anything, this is an example of poor leadership. 12 years ago, these two together probably would have stopped combat trackers.
In fact, this may well even stop one of the two that I know of in development from actually happening.
The other one though - the one I am unable to fully grasp the basics of - it won't do much to stop that one.
The person developing this specific tracker has one operational for another MMO (one that some people assume no combat trackers exist for) that simply reads the memory of the client computer remotely. So basically, if the game client knows a thing to be true, the tracker knows it to be true as well.
However, since this tracker works remotely, all you need to do is have everyone in your raid log in to the same tracker, and suddenly that remote tracker is tracking combat for your entire raid - and sending the results back to your phone.
There is also talk about pulling data directly from the client CPU if there are any issues accessing it in memory.
I don't know enough about the details of computer systems to really understand what was being said when it was explained to me, all I know is that this developer essentially had a plan in place for any avenue that Intrepid (or any MMO developer, for that matter) would take in order to block combat trackers.
As this person was someone that was working on the Spectre/meltdown issues a while back before they became public knowledge, I have to assume they not only have a solid understanding of what they are doing, but also have access to people that are leaders in their particular field of expertise for when painstaking detail in a specific area is needed.
And that right there is why most games don't go too far in to preventing combat trackers. In order to stop them, Intrepid need to defend every single potential point of access to the data required. In order to make one work though, a combat tracker need only find one point of access to that data. It becomes a never ending race that will always favor the attacker (combat tracker developer) over the defender.
Just because people will steal, you don't delete a law about stealing.
If meters are against ToS, most of the population won't take a chance, even those that really want them.
Also, if you post guides with meters logs, you're exposing yourself about having access to a meter, so this leaves out official forums, meaning people will have to search in other places.
Eventually, with some luck, this will be obscure knowledge that only a few will have, and we won't have everyone running with cookie cutter builds
Over the last 20 years, a number of nations have legalized a number of things (marijuana and prostitution are the most common) simply because people were doing it anyway.
So that thing that you say you shouldn't do is exactly what many nations do indeed do.
This can be seen more specifically in MMO's in regartds to combat trackers as well, with GW2 having to make exception for players to use combat trackers after originally not allowing them, simply because people were not going to stop using them.
However, as further example of how out of place this analogy is, Intrepid would actually need to add that rule to the rule book, not remove it.
MMO's have been around for over 20 years, and combat trackers for all but about 6 months of that. In this time, players come and go between MMO's with an amount of frequency, and generally speaking, the rules for each game are largely the same. Those few games that had rules that were outliers from the general pool of common rules eventually had to change their rules to fit in with every other game.
If Intrepid are putting in a rule against combat trackers (which they have not said they are doing, fyi), then they would have to add that rule to the general pool of common rules that MMO's have.
I see some positives. I personally enjoy smacking a dummy for a couple hours figuring out that one thing to fix to make myself better. I enjoy playing classes better because I have a metric for proof of my ability to better myself. Not only that, but the raw data is helpful for calculations regarding bugs as mentioned by @noaani which is something not many people think of but is a very good point. These are personal and informational aspects which benefit the players for certain.
I see some negatives. People of all skill levels and those with different timeframes they can dedicate play the game. Meters sometimes misconstrue less time to dedicate to the game as "bad" because of the numbers due to gear restrictions or progression related issues that are beyond their time scope and beyond their control. This is a community aspect, where the meters impact negatively in cases of the mistake that low numbers are automatically linked to poor skill and not first exposures to content, lack of information available to the player (or lack of community that has access), or less time available to invest in practice compared to the creme of the crop. These are detriments more often than not as they drive a wedge between portions of communities depending on the type of players.
There are more reasons in both categories of course.
I think meters are more of a question of aspects of the game it impacts, rather than the benefits or detriments of the meter itself. If we purely weigh usage by itself for data's sake, a meter would benefit the players, but usage of the meter is not in a vacuum and there is bound to be a bleed into community aspects.
I've always proposed something before to some friends when we discussed this before like the "MVP" concept. Which is not a novel concept, but would be a good compromise. Dealing damage and killing the bosses is important, but with the MVP concept we can bring in the people who take the least damage, do the best at mechanics, revive the most people, protect the most people from damage... I've always felt there are metrics of good play that are not just restricted to dps numbers.
I mean, at it's core, this is an issue of player segregation. The predominant thought is that those with combat trackers want to push through content and those without don't (or can't, same thing at the end of the day).
My question to this is - if we assume that combat trackers didn't exist, why would we assume that the people wanting to rush through content suddenly wouldn't?
To me, this is more a case of some people rushing, and some people not. The people that rush use combat trackers as they make things more efficient, and those not in a rush tend to blame the combat tracker as being the source of the problem (which, when framed as the above, is clearly misplaced).
To me, the answer to this issue isn't to attempt to bring everyone together in to one play style. Attempting to do this will see one play style or the other simply play a different game.
Rather, to me, the answer here is to accept that these are different play styles, and to develop the game with this in mind. Ashes will do that with PvP and PvE, both are different play styles that the game will accept, and all players will need to participate in both to at least a degree.
Why shouldn't efficiency vs casual (or any other way you want to frame it) be likewise taken in to account when designing the game?
In one guild I used to run, we had a few new raiders not understand the importance of specific mechanics in some fights. One in particular was an AoE that had it's damage range based (the further away you were, the less damage you took).
In order to get around this issue, the leadership of the guild decided to award a DKP (points to bid on raid drops) bonus to who ever in the raid took the least amount of damage from the AoE on the pull we killed the encounter.
Only way we could manage to do this was by looking at our combat tracker to see how much damage each player took on that pull.
Like I said before, I see benefits and deficits and I am very neutral in this argument. It's just there seems to be more people on the side of favoring meters and I just want to make sure both sides are heard I suppose, that's all. Good to have it as a conversation though.
They want meters to make the encounter easier. Because they want to know for sure what killed them.
That argument just seem weird to me.
No it’s more like “painkillers can be used in excess, but that’s no reason to stop everyone from using them”
But again, combat logs are and information gathering tool. Nothing more and nothing less.
I also want to know who did the worst, and why they did the worst. On top of that, I want to be able to track how well each player does over time, so I can see if they are improving - or see if they are slacking.
I also don't want the game telling me who has done best, I want to figure that out for myself. If one of my raiders playing a class with no real mobility options does exceedinly well at a mechanic that requires mobility, I want to highlight that. The player likely wont be in the top three, but given their class, they deserve recognition.
The game telling you who did a mechanic well is no different to the game telling you who did the most DPS - both are useless without additional context, which only comes from additional data.
We want to know what killed us, sure.
But knowing what killed us shouldn't make the encounter easier. The thing that killed us will still be there regardless of if we know about it or not. If the difficulty of the encounter is based on key aspects of it being hidden behind a curtain, that just seems like poor design to me.
You wiped.
You don't know why.
Instead of playing the game and figuring it out, you just check the log. Oh, look, this ability called LAVA DAMAGE killed us.
Next time you look for lava and it's done.
You didn't play the game, just looked at a table and figured out a mechanic.
The same could be said about an ability called REFLECTING SHIELD
I can't see how you can be pro-combat log, but anti-combat tracker, since at the most all a combat tracker can do is display the information in a combat log in a different manner.
Either way, if you are arguing against combat trackers, you also need to be arguing against combat logs, and so saying we don't need a combat tracker because we can just look at the combat log is just... odd.
And let's not get in to how you are only looking at this from the perspective of the easiest of content. It becomes much harder to find what killed you when the encounter has 30+ different damaging abilities, and all of them are going off on all 40 players in the raid.
I'm assuming you've never been involved in a top ten kill in any game. There is nothing wrong with that, 99.9% of players haven't been. However, if you haven't been, then you probably don't really know what you are talking about in terms of how to find out what killed the raid on such an encounter.
Edit; I've seen raids that generate several megabytes of pure text data in a given raid night. Since each megabyte is the equivalent to about 500 pages, we are talking 2,000+ pages worth of reading to try and understand one nights worth of raiding.
Again, I don't think you understand what you are saying.
And I'm glad it isn't up to him.
And this seems to be something of a diversion away from the fact that you are somehow pro-combat logs yet anti-combat trackers - a stance that makes no sense at all.
I'm all for dps meters. Dps meters are dps meters and dont play the game for you. The Devs should build us a dps meter for the game with no exploits and no cheats.
In regards to WoWs current corruption system pointing out that someones damage is 80% corruption and 20% class skills is quite alarming and with competent devs they can action it.
Works the same way for class abilities too obviously and provides a data base accessible to players and game developers.
Just my 2 cents, not sure if it has been mentioned above because there is A LOT of writing up there ^ xD
But yes, the fact that combat trackers allow players to find things that are broken has been bought up before, and is one of the more salient points that have been made in their favor.
You say “combat tracker” then describe a combat assistant. Combat trackers are for recording fight data, nothing more and nothing less.
You must have a limited experience in terms of Comprehensive Combat Trackers - Comprehensive Combat Trackers do much more than measure Heal Output, Damage Output and Damage Received.
While DPS meters have been around for years, Combat Trackers are much newer and in my experience, often have exploits and cheats built in. I can see why Steven doesn't want to consider this option but I still remain adamant The Devs should implement a DPS Meter in Ashes of Creation. I'd rather trust Intrepid than a third party.
Edit: While Add-ons are railed against, an Intrepid System wouldn't be an Add-on, it would be a mechanical aspect of the game.
WoW Logs is 7 years old, that’s not what I’d call “new”
If a combat tracker has cheats or exploits built in, it is not a combat tracker, regardless of the name.
If it does anything other than show information on what has already happened, it is a combat assistant.