Personally, I love trackers because I really love min-maxxing and trying to get the most out of my class and gear. Imo not having any kind of dps estimation options limits the design of boss encounter mechanics, e.g. if players do not have the option of estimating their dps then you cannot include hard boss enrage phases that require the raid group to do x amount of total dps. Furthermore, for me (and this is just my feeling) not doing high dps is like failing my group, I want to be sure to contribute as best as I can towards completing the task, e.g. killing raidbosses.
I'd be content with having a built-in tracker that just tells you whether you're doing good damage or not, e.g. it has 5 indicators that tell you how good your current dps is: low dps, low-mid dps, mid-dps, mid-high dps, high-dps. (I know this would come with lots of implementation "baggage", but I don't want to do a deep dive, it's just an idea)
And to those of you who are of the belief that trackers are unnecessary, I'm not saying you're wrong, it's just that time and time again it has been shown that you cannot get rid of them, FFXIV is probably the most prominent example of that. I think the only way to circumvent that is to approach this by offering players a compromise.
That said, I think the tracker should absolutely not show any kind of incoming damage and other types of statistics, e.g. number of interrupts, otherwise it really is, as others have stated, a kind of cheat that makes encounters too easy.
DPS meters are useless. I need to know whether my buffs are working, not whether my "damage rotations are perfect". Any pure "DPS meter" is useless, and no-one should bother making it. That's the "compromise" I'd offer the "toxicity" crowd. Don't include a DPS stat.
Let's assume that a team member is counting on me to heal them and I keep getting frozen/stunned/knocked back when I try to, the Tracker tells them 'during this period no healing happened'. The Combat Log parser often tells them WHY no healing happened.
One question though. Couldn't they just ask the healer? Like, I'm fighting the boss; the boss does some mechanic that brings me to low hp; I see that I'm at low hp and expect a heal; the heal doesn't come, I die and the raid wipes. I then ask the healer why the heal didn't come (assuming that I did everything correct and the boss mechanic wasn't avoidable at that particular moment). Healer just tells me that he was CCd.
I played a solo healer for a 36member raid a few times back in L2. The mechanics themselves weren't too complex, but because L2 didn't have any raid addons (or at least I've never used/seen them) - I had to know the voices of players in different groups so that I could heal individual players correctly (L2 didn't have raid-wide heals) and I needed to know mechanics to know when I'd be needed the most.
Theoretically, if it's not the very first attempt at the boss, you'd know the potential mechanics of said boss and would know which ones are the most dangerous ones (at least that'd be my expectations for the raid, if I was a RL). So if the raid wipes due to one member dying after a particular mechanic, I'd assume it shouldn't have taken up too much of healer's "ram" to remember that he was CCd during the last mechanic and that was the reason for the wipe. So he'd be able to answer my question w/o much trouble and w/o either side needing a tracker.
Maybe in some games it's that straightforward.
But if the reason is that the Healer had to heal the Summoner because a Summon fell at the wrong time, and they took an extra hit before they could resummon it due to ability cooldowns, and in that time the boss used a CC ability on the DPS which needed to be cleansed afterward. Then you the Tank took a decent hit but the big heal wasn't off cooldown yet so you used your own, at which point the Healer didn't need to heal you right away, and could prioritize other (originally) less injured party members and finally get around to dealing with the extra Poison effect from the boss that was busy ticking while they were saving the Summoner from a cooldown issue.
Five minutes later when you finally reach the end of the fight, win or lose, the question you the Tank are wondering isn't "Why couldn't you heal me, so we wiped just now?". It's "Why was it so hard to keep my MP up in the last half?"
You don't remember the missing healing, because rhythms shift, and because it's natural to sometimes have to heal yourself.
The summoner never associated them taking that hit with you spending MP in the first place.
The boss just happened to use Poison Aura more often today.
And you, at the end, don't even remember that extra healing beat or two that fell on you, because you were focused on the actual fight for the next 3-4 minutes before things finally broke down, and that self-healing requirement is normal, it just came up a few times too often.
In the end, the ANSWER, wasn't even any of that. The Bard missed an ability speed buff on the Summoner because someone's positioning was a bit off, and the Summoner eventually got unlucky as a result (and maybe that happened twice).
Who do you even ask?
There's not much reason you would remember those specific extra self-heals.
The Healer doesn't know for sure why the Summoner got hit.
The Summoner feels like it was just bad luck on timing.
The Bard didn't notice that the Summoner got knocked back while they were singing the "Speed Boost" buff that was supposed to have fixed the timing.
And the Boss may have even used more abilities later on that also made you spend more MP, as a red herring.
Literally no-one even knows, and those who do don't remember, because to NOBODY was their part of this chain of events more than 10% of what they had to focus on in fight as a whole.
But you could ask a tracker:
Tank: "Where'd my MP go?"
Tracker: "You self-healed more frequently than usual during this period."
Healer: "Then how much was I healing at that point, and who?"
Tracker: "You healed the Summoner 5 times in that part of the fight."
Healer: "Hm. Odd. I should only have needed to heal them two times."
Summoner: "Why'd I have so much trouble getting that summon off? Was the boss just extra lucky today?"
Tracker: "You only managed to heal each summon 3 times today instead of 4, due to cooldowns."
Summoner: "Wait, that's not right, why was I slower than ususal?"
Bard: "Hm? I sang the usual things."
Tracker: "The Summoner was out of range for the third recast of Speed Boost."
Party, after all of this: "Oh."
Summoner: "Well that sucks. I'll watch for that and call out if I get caught by cooldowns again."
Bard: "Hm. Okay, then that means I probably need to stand over here instead, even though I'm more likely to get hurt."
Healer: "I can afford to heal you at that POINT in the fight. The problem only comes up later on, after you're done with your buffing."
Tank: "Okay, cool. I won't fix it, cause it ain't broke, and I'd only end up making things worse."
A difference of perspective.
Maybe Ashes will be simplistic. "You wipe right away." instead of "This problem cost you some of your ability to adapt, and you didn't have enough left later on."
If every mistake instantly ends the raid, rather than demanding adaptation and allowing the opportunity to recover through skill, resources, or luck, I'm going to be a bit disappointed.
This isn't cheating. This doesn't tell me any of the boss's secrets. (Unless you really thought I wouldn't notice the boss had a knockback ability.)
This is about my own performance. It's not about damage, it's about "did I even notice I failed to do my own basic job?". Don't blame my healer because I fucked up. Don't tell me "git gud" because the Summoner got unlucky. Tell me HOW I failed.
Battles are complex. If your combat system isn't terrible, they're fast, complex, reactive, tactical, and there's a lot going on. Defeat can seem random. Except when you know what happened, out of the thousands of events, actions, and reactions in a given fight.
You shouldn't have to be lucky to see it, or have another group member see it. That just wastes your party's time. I need to know I fucked up three minutes ago and caused that wipe.
This is the point of trackers. They show you how to improve.
My group's got a "tracker" in semi-super-human form. A lot of people don't.
So, we're at the stage of not trusting the devs because the devs are human and instead we want to trust tracker devs who are....also human? I don't understand the logic. The devs and QA people use trackers, its a design tool that was taken to the player base, much like other tools used in development. I admire the tenacious approach to trackers, I've used trackers myself but in most games I've used tracker these bugs and errors simply didn't happen. Perhaps after some patches the results were skewed but, after all the fuss the change still stood. Just because a tool tip isn't updated when a dps drop happens, doesn't mean its not intentional.
I can agree in the rare occasion changes are reverted a tracker can be useful. Also, not all guides are written by those with trackers. Some guides are literally written from personal experience. Trackers only become mandatory for guides and raid groups when the devs design raids with a tracker. If a tracker hasn't been used, then more often than not a tracker is not required for the encounter - despite whether the encounter is top 10% or top 1%. However, I still think banning trackers is a tad childish.
This is simple, if the creators want to create difficult PvE on a level, the damage / healing meter is needed because:
a. It affects the overall balance of the game, you can see what the class is OP, and it should be nerfed and vice versa
b. On difficult bosses, not only tactics count is the most important !!, you will not kill the boss if someone dps/heal let's say 1/3 of what others do, and by a couple of such people all of them they die.
In general, weak players prefer to live in the shadows, and they are always on "no", the simple solution you do not want, do not use, let others have fun too
In general, human creativity knows no limits and I have always been for "all addons"
you have SWTOR or New World and a lot of other games where the "no" dmg metter is, and a handful of people play there, because no one knows who is playing well, who is playing badly, there is no competition, there is nothing ..
No one plays SWTOR and New World because the games suck. I doubt if we forced trackers into those games the games would suddenly be good. I know these games suck because I've played the crappers.
This is simple, if the creators want to create difficult PvE on a level, the damage / healing meter is needed because:
a. It affects the overall balance of the game, you can see what the class is OP, and it should be nerfed and vice versa
b. On difficult bosses, not only tactics count is the most important !!, you will not kill the boss if someone dps/heal let's say 1/3 of what others do, and by a couple of such people all of them they die.
In general, weak players prefer to live in the shadows, and they are always on "no", the simple solution you do not want, do not use, let others have fun too
In general, human creativity knows no limits and I have always been for "all addons"
you have SWTOR or New World and a lot of other games where the "no" dmg metter is, and a handful of people play there, because no one knows who is playing well, who is playing badly, there is no competition, there is nothing ..
Rage mechanics are boring those are old age to add difficulty, the fight should be difficult from start to finish and allow people to take as much time as they need in their approach unless they wipe.
Yes knowing if a class is broken is important, devs can take care if something is op and they will 100% of their own trackers to use top help gauge things, a player doesn't need that.
SWTOR and new world have nothing to do with it, im sure there is trackers in swtor even if it isn't widely available because that game is based on WoW.
This game doesn't support add on and i do not want all add ons and that is where things lead to and people start pulling out combat assistance and you are fight half human half bot.
Personally, I love trackers because I really love min-maxxing and trying to get the most out of my class and gear. Imo not having any kind of dps estimation options limits the design of boss encounter mechanics, e.g. if players do not have the option of estimating their dps then you cannot include hard boss enrage phases that require the raid group to do x amount of total dps. Furthermore, for me (and this is just my feeling) not doing high dps is like failing my group, I want to be sure to contribute as best as I can towards completing the task, e.g. killing raidbosses.
I'd be content with having a built-in tracker that just tells you whether you're doing good damage or not, e.g. it has 5 indicators that tell you how good your current dps is: low dps, low-mid dps, mid-dps, mid-high dps, high-dps. (I know this would come with lots of implementation "baggage", but I don't want to do a deep dive, it's just an idea)
And to those of you who are of the belief that trackers are unnecessary, I'm not saying you're wrong, it's just that time and time again it has been shown that you cannot get rid of them, FFXIV is probably the most prominent example of that. I think the only way to circumvent that is to approach this by offering players a compromise.
That said, I think the tracker should absolutely not show any kind of incoming damage and other types of statistics, e.g. number of interrupts, otherwise it really is, as others have stated, a kind of cheat that makes encounters too easy.
DPS meters are useless. I need to know whether my buffs are working, not whether my "damage rotations are perfect". Any pure "DPS meter" is useless, and no-one should bother making it. That's the "compromise" I'd offer the "toxicity" crowd. Don't include a DPS stat.
I was assuming people mainly meant damange/healing/aggro meters. I don't view buff/debuff/CC trackers as part of a "tracker". Tracking buff/debuffs/CCs are normally built-in into any game UI anyway (WoW, FFXIV, ...), to some extent at least. I just need a good customizable UI. Everything else can be handled by communication, it's really a trivial issue, I don't need any trackers for that.
On that note: Buff/Debuff/CC trackers are mostly used to align cooldown timers and maximize burst dps. Interrupt trackers are mostly used to make interrupt rotations easier. Maybe this comes across as me having an arrogant and overly simplistic stance on that but I've never seen the need for trackers just for those things. Imho, a player that doesn't notice a change in the flow of the battle, especially after having tried/cleared a boss multiple times, and that is not able to communicate that effectively to his group, is not a top-end player.
Just to clarify: I'm not against those kind of trackers, I'm just saying that I don't see a real need for them. I do, however, see a need for dps/hps meters. Also, yes I love competition and yes I love to theorycraft and yes I love to make guides, so I do have a natural bias towards wanting trackers.
And on a side note: I know there's a heavily negative stereotype surrounding dps meter-users, but imho I wouldn't call most dps meter-users toxic at all. Most of them, in my experience, have been the most helpful and reasonable players I've come across, especially when it comes to helping me improve. Sure there are toxic ones, but you'll always find those kinds of people, dps meter or not.
1
FiiaMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
Rage mechanics are boring those are old age to add difficulty, the fight should be difficult from start to finish and allow people to take as much time as they need in their approach unless they wipe.
I highly agree with you on this. But if used correctly, rage mechanics can really make a fight more engaging, if used incorrectly, it can break the fight.
Yes knowing if a class is broken is important, devs can take care if something is op and they will 100% of their own trackers to use top help gauge things, a player doesn't need that.
I highly disagree with you on this one. I'd really like to know a devs view on this point.
This game doesn't support add on and i do not want all add ons and that is where things lead to and people start pulling out combat assistance and you are fight half human half bot.
Just out of curiosity, do you guys use DPS meters in all games?
If you're not using meters and stats in single player games and only using them in online team games. You have to admit that the biggest reason is to inflate e-Peen and not really to just min-max and improve yourself; and I don't just mean picking items with higher stats.
i don't play a lot solo games... the last years but i mostly try to get the best of the characters, no one needing tracker for this due to how they are design :
Hollow Knight (testing charms and charms combinaision is fast and information given are small number)
Redid drakengard 3, did nier gestalt, automata and replicant => easy games, you faceroll it, try to push character but when game doesnt resist...
DoS1/2 = optimised a lot, but turn base with not huge quantity of data to read. no need tracker.
Same goes for Pathfinder WotR (and this is needed for this game to have the good builds)
Only souls game : DS3 : was not fan of games, killed all bosses, pushed character for it, just to kill them all... But was really not fan.
I also play a lot on Neverwinter Night 2, persistant roleplay server... but as DoS1/2 tracker is not needing to optimise build, it remains DD3.5 with a "false" real time. I produce lot of build for me friends or ideas, i try to make them as efficient as their concept allow (RP concept of character first so... they are never "perfect")
For me, but also build for friends. I have fun building characters a lot in 3.5 system (old DD or recent pathfinder)
Maybe, incoscious it is my e-peen, but i always loved to find out how to have max efficiency, even before having internet. Always fun to break the game for me.
I think the vast majority of people play solo games without meters because their focus is on entertainment instead of spreadsheeting. I don't see anyone making a DPS meter for Skyrim to figure out the perfect rotation for shout, spell and weapon meta.
As lot of players play MMORPG without trying to be top level with their character, i am perfectly fine with it. You don't need to look at solo game to see this. When you don't imprint a competition mindset too deep in the game, lot of people don't care about their efficiency... When i was on Aion, being a game around mass PvP most people try to be as good as possible (with, for limit, the time they wanted to spend in the game) far more than wow. And i also felt less overall toxicity than wow (not only around who has biggest DPS but simple able to clean content or not) but maybe because i had a friend list with really good people...
On FFXIV lot of people just... dropped the idea to do savage content, staying on primal xtrem that are easy content, they try to have enough mastery in their character to make it smooth and stop there.
Guildwars 2 is an example of this, even the developers claim that certain people deal 3-5x more damage than the average player.
GW2 is in a special situation.
the builds are not so easy to figure out by themselves, the "talent trees" are not as clear in benefits as other games. . . I always begin with simple mathematics to have base ideas. On FFXIV, it can be enough, tracker being more for combat specific rotation, on WoW it is a good basis but not enough. but for GW2... i didnt manage to have result.
The game itself is ONLY horizontal progress, reaching awakened stuff is just a month of farm (maybe 2 if you don't play a lot) and ... there, you are bis stuff... You bis from the time you got full awakened until today. The endless farm for legendaries gives only QoL benefits and aesthetic.
Also, recent expansion in GW2 show a problem : lot of people doesn't want to step up at all, and it forced Arenanet to hard nerf a wonderfull meta event, that was not so hard when you figure out all mechanics (and the tracker was not the tool to understand it due to how meta event works)
But also, they continue to work in getting their PvE more enticing for all, and THIS will make even "low players" to improve their gameplay (without even trying specifically)
The large difference in GW2 is also a consequence of it, lot of players just don't touch raids, strike of factals. So they can't feel the need to progress, and they don't even go thru harder challenge making them passively progress.
You said solo games, but the best solo games begins to be quite easy, and while you go thru the story, fights becomes more and more technic. but in GW2 people never continue to go find a slightly more difficult challenge that what they are already able to do.
You could claim that they should instead rebalance the game so that it increases difficulty to a relevant level but then take a look at Path of Exile's current ongoing issues with loot and game balance for end game. They are currently trying to balance around their top end players that use external tools and this is causing issues for everyone else.
Some content is literally impossible without a guide or extensive theorycrafting outside of the game beforehand.
PoE is a hack and Slash in a seasonnal system... and i hate seasonnal system because this will always lead to this problem.
Same goes for Diablo 3... just with a far less complex game to do builds. but the problem is still similar.
Your players want to have higher and higher challenge. (Don't say me that people would play seasons after seasons just for doing the story again and again... ) PoE have really hard bosses (the "ubers" ) D3 has this greater rift system.
BUT the need of extensiv theorycraft in PoE is NOT a consequence of the high difficulty, but the complexity on building a character. With the passiv skill web, the huge amount of affix on stuff, and the gem system.
Sure if the game was easier (lets say to difficulty are boss without their "uber" version) but would the game still have a such activ community ? Not sure honestly, it would be fast boring.
Guides are good tools to skip people all long maths needed to get the top of your characters... Some would absolutely hate doing it. The only problem with guides is, most of time it is a "do it, obey don't think" but in PoE it is not a so big problem (the game is a H&S... closer to single player with eventually coop time)
And because i do currently my second season on POE (did a first with the delve season, and didnt push far for various reason) yes i just took guide... and just due to my habits, try to understand deeper. but don't even need it to progress.
About Tracker for all or hardban :
The matter in "tracker for all" remains some are hugely missusing it. And it generates problem... AND MORE
Some people totally dislike it... The FFXIV/WoW situation result a thing that is for me a problem : some people don't dream to reach summit, just want to do the contents in the range they defined (as "only primal extrem, not savage raid" in FFXIV is real for a large part of community)... But get their data recorded, and uploaded on warcraftlogs/fflogs without their consent, so anyone can see their data, and judge them... For me it is a soft version of "private life"...
A regulation is needed... and the best way to regulate is to find a system to limit this record even when not needed. a game based a lot around grouping with guild/friendlist is a first basis, a good tool but with limits is another one i think.
Hard ban third party :
I said that FFXIV never banned for "kick another due to low parse" but "saying they kicked for this reason". because this is the reality... Third party in FFXIV are forbidden... But even radar, which was a real problem for the hunting system, they had hard time to ban it... really.
Mods are also forbidden, they change gamefiles. But because they don't scan gamefiles... they simply can't ban. Was same for wow before, until a change in the .exe (and people got ban early, then, blizzard didnt flag the modders but can happen any time again).
FFXI... SE was even more dumb, there was a mod making the game far better to watch (reshade) but ALSO added a way to have windowed full screen and other similar QoL. This also was the way for people to mod the game (which was forbidden by itself) most people used it while there, SE had a strict enforcement of rules but... couldn't do it.
For third party, there are many way to have a tracker... some have absolutely 0 direct interaction with game, some simply read game information, and other can even read the information your computer and the server is sharing. The first case, it is impossible to detect it if you don't watch what is happening on computer. Personally, it is a big NO to allow a game to scan my activity on my computer.
A top end player can finish all 10 Acts within a day with barely any difficulty. The average player can take 3 days to finish and even then, they will still not be ready for endgame content.
Where is the problem ?
Me average for this second league went thru act 1-10 with 4-5 death with my custom build (i always do them squishy because... why have a tough character if you avoid to be hit?!) and spend few days as you said...
In the meantime, some people who was playing their 20th league, that know perfectly the story, and are even bored of it do it in a single day... This is normal.
with each wow xpac some does it in 12 hours, i need around 24h and some people needs far more game time than me. Even worse in FFXIV, where i need less than 48h (not 48h gameplay) while some in my FC needs close to 2 weeks, and 5 time my own gametime to do it... same then i had to raid lead in primal extrem (so not a disaster gameplay wise)
A player with spend months to do all elden ring bosses, maybe never malenia because they abandon after 100th fail. They will needs hours even on their second character to rerun the game with another buid to reach the first major boss and kill it
meanwhile, speedrunners glitchless will do a full boss in some hours.
I don't see any kind of problem.
In fact i think it is better to have PoE this way : each one at their pace. anyone with custom random build can end act 10... I don't see any issue here.
@Noaani Do you mind humoring me for a sec? I'm hoping to better understand where you are coming from.
A quick thought experiment. Let's say we have an MMO that managed to hide all their combat information to the point where trackers couldn't provide any information. Let's also assume that the game's top end is just as difficult as any other MMO we are used to. Could you see yourself having fun in that game?
Was called for a long time FFXI... and the community was complaining about it. (not all was hidden also.. but still lot of major informations)
It reached its pinnacle with Pandaemonium Warden and Absolute Virtue...
Fun was not what came to my ears speaking about those boss, or those problems... but a pain in the ass.
(ok... the hours long fight was part of problem... but when after months players still don't understand strategy and devs just gives a really cryptic hint... ... )
We speak about a game where a class was thought as DPS by devs, they wanted it to be DPS, and it ended to be one of the top tank (if not the top tank) for lot of fights...
A really good game FFXI, but... this is also a good example about how devs can be totally out of touch on their own game... And why it is nice to have players able to... check what is happening
You coudl say "devs were bad simply" ... But so what about the C'thun problem? the mistake in some ARR bosses ? Here are example of the early times of the 2 big mmorpg. in a new born, before they reached their peak.
Devs are human, and do mistakes. MMORPG are complex game, with far more risk of mistakes.
Mag7spy will say again "you are not dev, you don't have to check"
The list of game saved by the community doing the work of the developpers is not even limited to MMORPG... i mean, remove modders for skyrim... Not sure Todd "it just works" Howard could still sell new edition of skyrim today without a dedicated community fixing their bug...
And back in 90's and even more true in 2000's ... the huge amount of bug fix in games that came not from devs of various game but from community ?
The emulator for PS3 making some game far better and smooth to play now than before... while also getting from 30 FPS to 60 and from 720p to 1080p ?
NwN1 and 2 still living with around 20 years old with lot of bug fixed but community, or so goes for wolfenstein ennemy territory that recently got to steam and proved to never be dead thank for community improving it.
The history of video game speaks a lot about the community doing the developpers' work...
And after recent fallout4/fallout76, i trust enough bugthesda to make this history continue to grow with starfield.
I also consider that any mmorpg to be released yet, be it from big companies like riot, or from crowd fundings like AoC won't stop this history because i see no way they could not need it...
I was assuming people mainly meant damange/healing/aggro meters. I don't view buff/debuff/CC trackers as part of a "tracker". Tracking buff/debuffs/CCs are normally built-in into any game UI anyway (WoW, FFXIV, ...), to some extent at least. I just need a good customizable UI. Everything else can be handled by communication, it's really a trivial issue, I don't need any trackers for that.
I'm going to give you my take on this - and you are free to agree or disagree with it.
To me, the real value in a tracker is in using it after the fact to analyze. Using a tracker during combat is of limited use, imo.
This is the reason buffs and debuffs being tracked by a tracker is of use to me. While I can keep a close eye on mine during combat, if I am looking at things after the fact, I want to be able to see when each buff or debuff was active for the whole raid.
Obviously there is no need to see or know this information during combat - I doubt anyone playing content where this kind of information would be of value would have the time to even process it, let alone act on it.
However, after the fact, it is very useful to have.
You are bring bethesda into this, i feel like i shouldn't need to say a single thing on that alone...Your goal isnt' to improve the game with trackers, the goal is you know all information about boss fights at a far faster rate, and attempt to have gameplay revolve around trackers.
Yes knowing if a class is broken is important, devs can take care if something is op and they will 100% of their own trackers to use top help gauge things, a player doesn't need that.
I'm confused.
Are you suggesting that games never have bugs, because developers always find them before they get to players?
I ask, because if that is not what you are suggesting, then the comment I quoted above makes no sense.
Either the game can have bugs and players find them, report them and then the developers attempt to replicate, analyze and fix them, or games simply do not ship with bugs.
Yes knowing if a class is broken is important, devs can take care if something is op and they will 100% of their own trackers to use top help gauge things, a player doesn't need that.
I'm confused.
Are you suggesting that games never have bugs, because developers always find them before they get to players?
I ask, because if that is not what you are suggesting, then the comment I quoted above makes no sense.
Either the game can have bugs and players find them, report them and then the developers attempt to replicate, analyze and fix them, or games simply do not ship with bugs.
Which is it you are saying?
This is the comment you make when you attempt to take things out of context to fit what you want to hear.
Imagine being that desperate to hear what you want....Granted you most likely don't play other games so you have no clue of context and only relate it to what you want to hear again.
I'm going to go with what i have said before, you don't need tools you aren't a developer nor are you QA. Stop trying to use that as an excuse to cheat in a game. If you think you need tools to know what was wrong with fallout 76 you honestly are blind or acting stupid on purpose.
1) A fight is easier if you remove timelimit. Anything is easier without timelimit.
Travel 10km with feet = anyone can do. travel 10km in 1h = lot can do it, not all. reduce even more time, and even less people will be able. You are so increasing difficulty.
This goes for fight, the fight have to be hard with difficult mechanics... and be then hardened asking people to still send huge DPS.
Else? Remove any kind of DPS check, and just go a raid with 10 tank, 30 healers, enjoy.
2) you mistake deeply thinking that because of "action gameplay" tracker won't be able to do their work... It exist already for such kind of gameplay on other game.
"buuuut AoC is hybrid"... ok, so part tabtargetting, part action, 2 kind of gameplay where tracker are functionnals... so... yes it is not a matter at all.
1. You imagine a fight being easier because you can't think of ways to add difficulty besides a time limit. This is 2022, not a 2002 mmorpg
2. We have already gone over this, clearly trackers aren't as effective depending on the game and the systems Between trackers not being supported by the developers and action combat trackers will be far less effective.. ..Which will cause people to not care about trackers and make them mostly obsolete except for some try hards needing to desperately hold onto it because they lack actual skill.
1. You imagine a fight being easier because you can't think of ways to add difficulty besides a time limit. This is 2022, not a 2002 mmorpg
There are lot of ways to add difficulty... but if you have no time limit, it will always be easier and far more open to all than with a time limit.
You can add 20kg backpack, i could do it in 10 hours, allowing to do 15 minutes walk, 45 minutes rest. easy.
add more and more difficulty, hard mechanics, that hit hard ? no problem with a team full of tanks and healers it won't be a problem, if the fight was thought for 1hours but i kill it in 10h, i still win.
But if you are sure i mistake, show me example to add difficulty that can replace adding some kind of DPS check ? (and i say replace, it means that adding time limit would be useless to make the fight harder)
I still know no mechanic in anygame that make a time limit useless to make fight harder
Aaaaand don't speak about limited mana for healers... This is... a form of enrage. A soft enrage to be exact.
You have to kill boss before healers run out of mana. the most basic form of enrage
2. We have already gone over this, clearly trackers aren't as effective depending on the game and the systems Between trackers not being supported by the developers and action combat trackers will be far less effective.. ..Which will cause people to not care about trackers and make them mostly obsolete except for some try hards needing to desperately hold onto it because they lack actual skill.
Will ? why do you use future while there are already tracker on action gameplay MMORPG ?
What limit tracker efficiency is how they can gather information.
You want tracker impossible to use ? Remove combat log (there will be one) remove numbers near character when they hit/get hit (there will be) remove displayed life bar and hide any kind of proof when a button for a skill is used. . .
If someone does something for a living that you do not do, and they make a comment specifically in relation to the thing they do for a living that you do not do, would you believe what it is they are saying?
For example, if a plumber came to your house and fixed a leak, and said that you needed a new fixture or some such, would you believe what they are telling you?
@Aerlana - These are all very fair points and I agree to quite a lot of them.
I'm not sure the single player games you mentioned are fair comparisons since the majority are turn based and inherently mean you're calculating damager per turn which as you said, is significantly easier to calculate rather than needing a meter to record damage over time (DPS).
The only question I'd raise; would you like AoC to have a similar complexity level to PoE and if it does not, do you think it justifies not having a DPS meter?
I mean, based on current gameplay it doesn't look like it'll be harder than Drakengard 3...
Perhaps a compromise could be that only for specific encounters (world bosses/raids) a DPS meter is available to turn on for coordinating rather than for open world.
Alternatively, do you believe these kinds of trackers and stats should be available in game aswell?
DPS meter, skill range trackers, cooldown trackers or AoE indicators. These would all help players to analyze the raw data. But I do think this would be unfun in the long term.
Based on current gameplay, it doesn't look like there are even AoE indicators to dodge in AoC (GW2 / FF14 have these).
In a game so focussed on conflict between players, I can understand why IS might want to obscure some information and force the player to learn timings and range of skills themselves rather than use a tool to calculate for them in the heat of the moment.
1. You imagine a fight being easier because you can't think of ways to add difficulty besides a time limit. This is 2022, not a 2002 mmorpg
There are lot of ways to add difficulty... but if you have no time limit, it will always be easier and far more open to all than with a time limit.
You can add 20kg backpack, i could do it in 10 hours, allowing to do 15 minutes walk, 45 minutes rest. easy.
add more and more difficulty, hard mechanics, that hit hard ? no problem with a team full of tanks and healers it won't be a problem, if the fight was thought for 1hours but i kill it in 10h, i still win.
But if you are sure i mistake, show me example to add difficulty that can replace adding some kind of DPS check ? (and i say replace, it means that adding time limit would be useless to make the fight harder)
I still know no mechanic in anygame that make a time limit useless to make fight harder
Aaaaand don't speak about limited mana for healers... This is... a form of enrage. A soft enrage to be exact.
You have to kill boss before healers run out of mana. the most basic form of enrage
2. We have already gone over this, clearly trackers aren't as effective depending on the game and the systems Between trackers not being supported by the developers and action combat trackers will be far less effective.. ..Which will cause people to not care about trackers and make them mostly obsolete except for some try hards needing to desperately hold onto it because they lack actual skill.
Will ? why do you use future while there are already tracker on action gameplay MMORPG ?
What limit tracker efficiency is how they can gather information.
You want tracker impossible to use ? Remove combat log (there will be one) remove numbers near character when they hit/get hit (there will be) remove displayed life bar and hide any kind of proof when a button for a skill is used. . .
If you are fighting a boss for 10 hours straight that sounds like a pretty hard boss and you would have to be pretty skilled to be fighting it without the boss hp resetting.
By default the boss / adds/ players missing attacks on you won't be read with action based attacks so there is going to be a gap in information. Also The dev taking action against people they find using trackers is also important. When people start getting hard banned they will think twice from the progress they lose.
if the fight for 10 hours is a difficulty for you, you have no idea what you are writing about, no offense for u
If PvE is to be demanding, which is a very good example of WoW raids Mythic, everyone must know the tactics perfectly and play to the full or close full potential of their class & gear, very often there are people who play poorly, their task is to learn to play correctly, and the raid group must have preview if people are playing well or if they press any keys and do their tactic job, but weak dps or heal etc - and this is incorrect.
there must be preview tools, that ultimately help a lot with balancing the class as well
if the fight for 10 hours is a difficulty for you, you have no idea what you are writing about, no offense for u
If PvE is to be demanding, which is a very good example of WoW raids Mythic, everyone must know the tactics perfectly and play to the full or close full potential of their class & gear, very often there are people who play poorly, their task is to learn to play correctly, and the raid group must have preview if people are playing well or if they press any keys and do their tactic job, but weak dps or heal etc - and this is incorrect.
Name me a raid in wow that last 10 consecutive hours for a single fight. And I'm not talking about wipes.
Granted if you feel you got context wrong you are free to correct yourself.
If someone does something for a living that you do not do, and they make a comment specifically in relation to the thing they do for a living that you do not do, would you believe what it is they are saying?
For example, if a plumber came to your house and fixed a leak, and said that you needed a new fixture or some such, would you believe what they are telling you?
If someone does something for a living that you do not do, and they make a comment specifically in relation to the thing they do for a living that you do not do, would you believe what it is they are saying?
For example, if a plumber came to your house and fixed a leak, and said that you needed a new fixture or some such, would you believe what they are telling you?
Sounds like a lame example, If you are paying someone for professional advice and it is something you don't know much about then it makes sense you take that advice unless they do something that you feel is wrong.
So, in other words, listen to a professional unless you disagree with them.
So, fun fact, Margret has said that the job of CS is far easier when players have access to objective data. We are able to state what issues we see (or think we see) much better, in a way that allows CS to more easily and quickly understand and reproduce. It saves them time and money, and allows them to get to more bug reports more quickly.
Based on this, would you then concede that trackers are a useful tool for bug finding, or are you just going to disagree with someone that actually knows what they are talking about, on a matter where you do not?
So, in other words, listen to a professional unless you disagree with them.
So, fun fact, Margret has said that the job of CS is far easier when players have access to objective data. We are able to state what issues we see (or think we see) much better, in a way that allows CS to more easily and quickly understand and reproduce. It saves them time and money, and allows them to get to more bug reports more quickly.
Based on this, would you then concede that trackers are a useful tool for bug finding, or are you just going to disagree with someone that actually knows what they are talking about, on a matter where you do not?
You can find bugs without trackers, if you think something is wrong you are free to test skill even more so after a update. If you really cared to do so that is already available to you.
It is very obviously if you have dev tools everything is easier including some elements of gameplay. You don't need tools so you can in turn use that for gameplay.
Trust me I'm well aware you are manipulative you will take any words and stretch it. Now how you are trying to use it to benefit your bias take doesn't really matter. I'd simply ask if they want gameplay to be designed around trackers, if it is fine if it makes some element of the game easier and if they are for that.
Really you are just taking a quote at the end of the day and are just saying the grass is green. Doesn't really help push your point. Also you forget I also work in the entertainment business.
The only question I'd raise; would you like AoC to have a similar complexity level to PoE and if it does not, do you think it justifies not having a DPS meter?
It doesn't need it, and it don't seem to take this path.
POE you can virtually do anything you want (still, a build around archery with witch is not so efficient due to starting point ^^')
On AoC, your primary archetype will already define a lot your character.
What i hope is to have 2+ build avaible per secundary archetype in average. (by avaible i mean strongly efficient)
I mean, based on current gameplay it doesn't look like it'll be harder than Drakengard 3...
Drakengard 3 bosses have nearly no strategies, (so goes for other Yoko Taro's game)
We currently don't have realy idea of what bosses will be in AoC. the dragons we had in Alpha 1 were not a real difficulty, but could easily wipe raids without a basic structure (having tanks/healer defined, etc)
I think there will be high end fight, because it was said they wanted some of PvE content to be done by a "single digit percent" but there are various way to have this in fact
Perhaps a compromise could be that only for specific encounters (world bosses/raids) a DPS meter is available to turn on for coordinating rather than for open world.
The first use of tracker is to test and makes various build.
Lets look at pathfinder : there are tons of absurdly strong builds avaible. but we have still to find them out. After thinking "oh, this class, and this one, and this feat and..;" is not enough, after you have to look at some statistics. Mainly your AC, AB, damages outside of the weapon itself, etc.
We will have the same base situation : we have lot of way to do (augment from secundary archetype but also race, and other source... AND the free choice around weapon and thise skill point spent in weapons. and also armor) But even if we have all informations about how the game works, and how the statistics impact character (how many of this to have 1% crit, attack speed or what else) which is what i really hope, due to the real time, there are still some test to do, and measure them... Sometime ideas are good, but makes gameplay too complicated (really short timeframe to refresh buff, complexe rotation, etc) for a minor DPS increase (and a complicated gameplay of a build on hard fight with mechanics to deal with is not always good idea. )
Those test to be as accurate as possible would need factual datas.
We end up at one of my posts with
Build A : 100 DPS, easy to play, easy to find
Build B : 120 DPS, but hard to figure out and far harder to play.
Both build are good, and top players would prefer B, but casuals would be less efficient (because it needs far more training so game time dedicated to master it) and would be at 80-90 DPS so better go A
Also, there is impact of statistics,
1) you could need X attack speed to swap to this other build, but Y attack speed to have, gameplay wise, a real benefits
2) While X critical chance are enough, for the theoric damages (which are an average so) but too random to be reliable and need far more.
Both case can be feeled a lot thru maths but really need real tests. (not even dummys, but on medium tier bosses) to have a better idea.
For those we should need to be able to do tests and measures outside of "some few bosses" but on most bosses.
Also with the guild perk idea : you will have to be in one of guilds using a tracker to have it, and limited to your guildmate. Adding another restriction above those is, i think not needed.
Alternatively, do you believe these kinds of trackers and stats should be available in game aswell?
This is not a "combat tracker" but battle assistant. and THIS is a thing that should be avoided.
The combat tracker : it gather informations, and display it, as you could display it after putting all them on a spreadsheet. It is just the exact same work, but in a infinitely faster way as if you had to do it yourself
And due to being numbers on numbers around numbers, and graphics, watching it during fight is more a handicap than a help (you lose focus on informations in fight)
Here the guy has visual information that helps him to take decision directly in the fight.
If you played wow, you also learned about boss mods, or weakaura. this video is more to thing like this, where the addon gives information that players know exist, but couldn't have it so fast directly in fight... reducing the need of focus you need yourself. it is literally a battle assistant.
And i have a big critic about combat tracker : as guides, it makes people bad.
You obey your guides and don't understand all, or don't know why this is this build and not another that works.
You follow information of your battle assistant, and you are so unable to really learn the fight, but also how the game works.
Based on current gameplay, it doesn't look like there are even AoE indicators to dodge in AoC (GW2 / FF14 have these).
WoW have some now, but in fact... it was always a thing. a good example in my mind right now would be Aran in Karazhan, at regular timing one after other, he use randomly some skills, one was the fire circle, if anyone go out, all take huge damage. avoid it. only few were targetted. but the game gave the information that it is coming (and being one mechanic at time, no problem to have all people stopping to move for few seconds). Because for each of its skill, Aran had a specific sentence.
The fun include to have enough information to understand, but also react. Maybe FFXIV gives too many hints ? I dislike it in FFXIV but i never manage to tell if, out of my own subjectivity, it was too much or not. For GW2 most of time those kind of information in fight meant to be a little hard (fractals, raid, now hard mode strikes) never felt "too much"
Game needs to gives some hint, not only to discover strategy, but applying it. A thing i HATE on FFXIV (but a friend, really good player) love : the fact that all the fight is scripted, like a music sheet. I prefer things like LA, where bosses have many skills and use them randomly.
On FFXIV, knowing the music sheet is the "call" the game do. (added to visual aoe but for endgame, the real deal is this sheet) while in LA, recognize the visual movement is mandatory. 2 different thing that are needed.
In a game so focussed on conflict between players, I can understand why IS might want to obscure some information and force the player to learn timings and range of skills themselves rather than use a tool to calculate for them in the heat of the moment.
what i will say work in video games and outside : you are always better when you don't have visual support, or assistant to learn your work. Many people in their work are unable to do it if their software is down, but can't even see when the information their sofware is showing are true or not, because they rely totally on it, and forgot (or badly learned) the bare hand method.
To be clear : Tracker is a tool to do measures. it gives informations you can have without it, but... far faster to have it this way. and it remain just information... if you don't know what to do with... it is still useless
Assistant (like in video) are the software that does part of the work for you. Using it too much make you dependant of it. but also remove part of the learning process.
2 totally different thing, 2 totally different subject.
If you are fighting a boss for 10 hours straight that sounds like a pretty hard boss and you would have to be pretty skilled to be fighting it without the boss hp resetting.
By default the boss / adds/ players missing attacks on you won't be read with action based attacks so there is going to be a gap in information. Also The dev taking action against people they find using trackers is also important. When people start getting hard banned they will think twice from the progress they lose.
boss resetting HP : moving the boss outside of its dedicated area...
There is nothing hard about it except if this is where the strategy and difficulty is specifically. but it is a kind of fight amongst lot.
If this is what you think difficult... i am asking a lot about your skill
In full action like BNS, sure... but in such game, the mitigations are not a thing, and the tank is ... anything that can keep the ennemy animosity high... so any DPS can do it. Because then you have to avoid. The path AoC seems to get for the tanking is the traditionnal one. a tank, keep hate on him, use CD to not insta-die, while healers replenish his health bar.
Also... just look at BDO, there are still accuracy / avoid statistics skills have many hits, and some can miss. this is part of mitigation.
And, boss using skills is part of combat log... so if combat log, tracker will get the information as i said.
About devs banning people : you never said how they would know who use it. . . Aside their .exe watch what you are doing out of the game on your computer (which would be a big problem about privacy)
You can fix a leak without the need of a plumber. it would be done poorly, with far more time spent, but still work.
With tracker you can do a bug report with far more informations. The more informations you give to dev, the easier for them to find what is the problem. And so the also needs less time to figure it out (less time on bug, more time on development)
QA team are nothing more than players that are PAID to find bugs... Also, they are not the average players enjoying the game, and laughing when they see this strange bug making the horse able to travel vertically, or discovering their sims can go incest. but their work is nothing more than... playing and doing lot of silly test to try to spot some bugs.
Then when they find the bug, they try to do it again, and again, if they can reproduce it, then, they try in different situation, etc etc... to finally, send them to devs... Because QA are paid for it, their work is not just "found this bug" but gives lot of information (how, when, what setup, etc). But i don't see a problem players spending their free time to do it for free... the result is same, and in both situation, the dev spend less time trying to reproduce it and understand it, faster to fix bug, and faster to go back on development topic.
This is not a "combat tracker" but battle assistant. and THIS is a thing that should be avoided.
The combat tracker : it gather informations, and display it, as you could display it after putting all them on a spreadsheet. It is just the exact same work, but in a infinitely faster way as if you had to do it yourself
Let's say 3rd party tools are allowed. How will IS be able to identify when someone is using a combat tracker vs a battle assistant?
This is why I think it should either be ingame by default or result in a hard ban.
Here the guy has visual information that helps him to take decision directly in the fight.
Wouldn't meters also help someone directly make decisions in a fight? If you have a prolongued fight, between 2 equally matched players and you can see one is healing and dealing damage slightly more 51/49 isn't this giving one person an unfair advantage?
I've seen posts in here requesting access to parse all data. Cooldowns, Healing, Damage, Stuns and more related to combat. Objectively speaking, all of this information is clearly in the game already - just taking a moment to learn each skill will tell you the range, cooldown and estimated damage of their abilities.
The main reason I disagree with access to any meters is purely because of the open world PvP aspect and it being able to assist in real-time decision making.
Game needs to gives some hint, not only to discover strategy, but applying it. A thing i HATE on FFXIV (but a friend, really good player) love : the fact that all the fight is scripted, like a music sheet. I prefer things like LA, where bosses have many skills and use them randomly.
On FFXIV, knowing the music sheet is the "call" the game do. (added to visual aoe but for endgame, the real deal is this sheet) while in LA, recognize the visual movement is mandatory. 2 different thing that are needed.
Yeah I agree, I assume most bosses will have some visual indication of large skils but we'll have to wait until next alpha probably to see for ourselves
Do you think we should be allowed tools to analyze how large their range actually is if they decide to not have AoE indicaters (LA, GW2, FF14, etc)?
To be clear : Tracker is a tool to do measures. it gives informations you can have without it, but... far faster to have it this way. and it remain just information... if you don't know what to do with... it is still useless
Assistant (like in video) are the software that does part of the work for you. Using it too much make you dependant of it. but also remove part of the learning process.
2 totally different thing, 2 totally different subject.
I'm not sure I agree with this. Information is information and if it can be processed real time, it definitely affects any decision making process a person can have. The more information a person can have, the more options they have as well.
Just to be clear, what information do you think should be available using a DPS meter?
I assume it would be name of player, damage per second, possibly different coloured bars to indicate how proportional their damage from each skill was in effecting the DPS value?
In PvP this would essentially show you whether a player has used their burst or not...
With tracker you can do a bug report with far more informations. The more informations you give to dev, the easier for them to find what is the problem. And so the also needs less time to figure it out (less time on bug, more time on development)
In relation to DPS meters, what more information could you possibly need to give?
"When I use X skill, the tooltop says it should be Y but the damage is Z"
I'm not sure I see where the need for a meter comes in, that you wouldn't be able to just visually see.
Could you give an example of what a DPS meter would be able to help with in terms of bug reporting?
I can imagine it helping indentify balancing issues, but even then, I would assume IS have more detailed information than we have since they'd be able to look at damage looks across all characters and classes in the entire active population. Our own benchmarks would be anecdotal or be based on limited scope of players that decided to record their own meter readings.
QA team are nothing more than players that are PAID to find bugs... Also, they are not the average players enjoying the game, and laughing when they see this strange bug making the horse able to travel vertically, or discovering their sims can go incest. but their work is nothing more than... playing and doing lot of silly test to try to spot some bugs.
I think this depends on industry and company. I believe most QA teams are contractors given a list of specific functions and features to test x number of times using various methods.
I agree they will often miss things due to time constraints preventing them from testing every possible variation.
Even if there's an issue with a skill interaction not correctly effecting damage dealt or mitigated, I feel like you'd be able to visually see the discrepency without any additional trackers.
0
akabearMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
My kingdom for a thread lock authority!
This cannot go on my liege!
It`s too much!
Cease this conflict, lock the thread, lock the thread and "begone thy rascals" he says, "begone!"
0
DygzMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
This thread was made to keep the tracker desirers happy. If we lock this thread we will have multiple threads spawn about trackers like the days of old before Starfleet got involved.
Comments
DPS meters are useless. I need to know whether my buffs are working, not whether my "damage rotations are perfect". Any pure "DPS meter" is useless, and no-one should bother making it. That's the "compromise" I'd offer the "toxicity" crowd. Don't include a DPS stat.
This is what trackers are for:
This isn't cheating. This doesn't tell me any of the boss's secrets. (Unless you really thought I wouldn't notice the boss had a knockback ability.)
This is about my own performance. It's not about damage, it's about "did I even notice I failed to do my own basic job?". Don't blame my healer because I fucked up. Don't tell me "git gud" because the Summoner got unlucky. Tell me HOW I failed.
Battles are complex. If your combat system isn't terrible, they're fast, complex, reactive, tactical, and there's a lot going on. Defeat can seem random. Except when you know what happened, out of the thousands of events, actions, and reactions in a given fight.
You shouldn't have to be lucky to see it, or have another group member see it. That just wastes your party's time. I need to know I fucked up three minutes ago and caused that wipe.
This is the point of trackers. They show you how to improve.
My group's got a "tracker" in semi-super-human form. A lot of people don't.
I can agree in the rare occasion changes are reverted a tracker can be useful. Also, not all guides are written by those with trackers. Some guides are literally written from personal experience. Trackers only become mandatory for guides and raid groups when the devs design raids with a tracker. If a tracker hasn't been used, then more often than not a tracker is not required for the encounter - despite whether the encounter is top 10% or top 1%. However, I still think banning trackers is a tad childish.
a. It affects the overall balance of the game, you can see what the class is OP, and it should be nerfed and vice versa
b. On difficult bosses, not only tactics count is the most important !!, you will not kill the boss if someone dps/heal let's say 1/3 of what others do, and by a couple of such people all of them they die.
In general, weak players prefer to live in the shadows, and they are always on "no", the simple solution you do not want, do not use, let others have fun too
In general, human creativity knows no limits and I have always been for "all addons"
you have SWTOR or New World and a lot of other games where the "no" dmg metter is, and a handful of people play there, because no one knows who is playing well, who is playing badly, there is no competition, there is nothing ..
Rage mechanics are boring those are old age to add difficulty, the fight should be difficult from start to finish and allow people to take as much time as they need in their approach unless they wipe.
Yes knowing if a class is broken is important, devs can take care if something is op and they will 100% of their own trackers to use top help gauge things, a player doesn't need that.
SWTOR and new world have nothing to do with it, im sure there is trackers in swtor even if it isn't widely available because that game is based on WoW.
This game doesn't support add on and i do not want all add ons and that is where things lead to and people start pulling out combat assistance and you are fight half human half bot.
On that note: Buff/Debuff/CC trackers are mostly used to align cooldown timers and maximize burst dps. Interrupt trackers are mostly used to make interrupt rotations easier. Maybe this comes across as me having an arrogant and overly simplistic stance on that but I've never seen the need for trackers just for those things. Imho, a player that doesn't notice a change in the flow of the battle, especially after having tried/cleared a boss multiple times, and that is not able to communicate that effectively to his group, is not a top-end player.
Just to clarify: I'm not against those kind of trackers, I'm just saying that I don't see a real need for them. I do, however, see a need for dps/hps meters. Also, yes I love competition and yes I love to theorycraft and yes I love to make guides, so I do have a natural bias towards wanting trackers.
And on a side note: I know there's a heavily negative stereotype surrounding dps meter-users, but imho I wouldn't call most dps meter-users toxic at all. Most of them, in my experience, have been the most helpful and reasonable players I've come across, especially when it comes to helping me improve. Sure there are toxic ones, but you'll always find those kinds of people, dps meter or not.
However: I highly disagree with you on this one. I'd really like to know a devs view on this point.
I don't think anyone here wants that.
i don't play a lot solo games... the last years but i mostly try to get the best of the characters, no one needing tracker for this due to how they are design :
Hollow Knight (testing charms and charms combinaision is fast and information given are small number)
Redid drakengard 3, did nier gestalt, automata and replicant => easy games, you faceroll it, try to push character but when game doesnt resist...
DoS1/2 = optimised a lot, but turn base with not huge quantity of data to read. no need tracker.
Same goes for Pathfinder WotR (and this is needed for this game to have the good builds)
Only souls game : DS3 : was not fan of games, killed all bosses, pushed character for it, just to kill them all... But was really not fan.
I also play a lot on Neverwinter Night 2, persistant roleplay server... but as DoS1/2 tracker is not needing to optimise build, it remains DD3.5 with a "false" real time. I produce lot of build for me friends or ideas, i try to make them as efficient as their concept allow (RP concept of character first so... they are never "perfect")
For me, but also build for friends. I have fun building characters a lot in 3.5 system (old DD or recent pathfinder)
Maybe, incoscious it is my e-peen, but i always loved to find out how to have max efficiency, even before having internet. Always fun to break the game for me.
As lot of players play MMORPG without trying to be top level with their character, i am perfectly fine with it. You don't need to look at solo game to see this. When you don't imprint a competition mindset too deep in the game, lot of people don't care about their efficiency... When i was on Aion, being a game around mass PvP most people try to be as good as possible (with, for limit, the time they wanted to spend in the game) far more than wow. And i also felt less overall toxicity than wow (not only around who has biggest DPS but simple able to clean content or not) but maybe because i had a friend list with really good people...
On FFXIV lot of people just... dropped the idea to do savage content, staying on primal xtrem that are easy content, they try to have enough mastery in their character to make it smooth and stop there.
GW2 is in a special situation.
the builds are not so easy to figure out by themselves, the "talent trees" are not as clear in benefits as other games. . . I always begin with simple mathematics to have base ideas. On FFXIV, it can be enough, tracker being more for combat specific rotation, on WoW it is a good basis but not enough. but for GW2... i didnt manage to have result.
The game itself is ONLY horizontal progress, reaching awakened stuff is just a month of farm (maybe 2 if you don't play a lot) and ... there, you are bis stuff... You bis from the time you got full awakened until today. The endless farm for legendaries gives only QoL benefits and aesthetic.
Also, recent expansion in GW2 show a problem : lot of people doesn't want to step up at all, and it forced Arenanet to hard nerf a wonderfull meta event, that was not so hard when you figure out all mechanics (and the tracker was not the tool to understand it due to how meta event works)
But also, they continue to work in getting their PvE more enticing for all, and THIS will make even "low players" to improve their gameplay (without even trying specifically)
The large difference in GW2 is also a consequence of it, lot of players just don't touch raids, strike of factals. So they can't feel the need to progress, and they don't even go thru harder challenge making them passively progress.
You said solo games, but the best solo games begins to be quite easy, and while you go thru the story, fights becomes more and more technic. but in GW2 people never continue to go find a slightly more difficult challenge that what they are already able to do.
PoE is a hack and Slash in a seasonnal system... and i hate seasonnal system because this will always lead to this problem.
Same goes for Diablo 3... just with a far less complex game to do builds. but the problem is still similar.
Your players want to have higher and higher challenge. (Don't say me that people would play seasons after seasons just for doing the story again and again... ) PoE have really hard bosses (the "ubers" ) D3 has this greater rift system.
BUT the need of extensiv theorycraft in PoE is NOT a consequence of the high difficulty, but the complexity on building a character. With the passiv skill web, the huge amount of affix on stuff, and the gem system.
Sure if the game was easier (lets say to difficulty are boss without their "uber" version) but would the game still have a such activ community ? Not sure honestly, it would be fast boring.
Guides are good tools to skip people all long maths needed to get the top of your characters... Some would absolutely hate doing it. The only problem with guides is, most of time it is a "do it, obey don't think" but in PoE it is not a so big problem (the game is a H&S... closer to single player with eventually coop time)
And because i do currently my second season on POE (did a first with the delve season, and didnt push far for various reason) yes i just took guide... and just due to my habits, try to understand deeper. but don't even need it to progress.
About Tracker for all or hardban :
The matter in "tracker for all" remains some are hugely missusing it. And it generates problem... AND MORE
Some people totally dislike it... The FFXIV/WoW situation result a thing that is for me a problem : some people don't dream to reach summit, just want to do the contents in the range they defined (as "only primal extrem, not savage raid" in FFXIV is real for a large part of community)... But get their data recorded, and uploaded on warcraftlogs/fflogs without their consent, so anyone can see their data, and judge them... For me it is a soft version of "private life"...
A regulation is needed... and the best way to regulate is to find a system to limit this record even when not needed. a game based a lot around grouping with guild/friendlist is a first basis, a good tool but with limits is another one i think.
Hard ban third party :
I said that FFXIV never banned for "kick another due to low parse" but "saying they kicked for this reason". because this is the reality... Third party in FFXIV are forbidden... But even radar, which was a real problem for the hunting system, they had hard time to ban it... really.
Mods are also forbidden, they change gamefiles. But because they don't scan gamefiles... they simply can't ban. Was same for wow before, until a change in the .exe (and people got ban early, then, blizzard didnt flag the modders but can happen any time again).
FFXI... SE was even more dumb, there was a mod making the game far better to watch (reshade) but ALSO added a way to have windowed full screen and other similar QoL. This also was the way for people to mod the game (which was forbidden by itself) most people used it while there, SE had a strict enforcement of rules but... couldn't do it.
For third party, there are many way to have a tracker... some have absolutely 0 direct interaction with game, some simply read game information, and other can even read the information your computer and the server is sharing. The first case, it is impossible to detect it if you don't watch what is happening on computer. Personally, it is a big NO to allow a game to scan my activity on my computer.
Where is the problem ?
Me average for this second league went thru act 1-10 with 4-5 death with my custom build (i always do them squishy because... why have a tough character if you avoid to be hit?!) and spend few days as you said...
In the meantime, some people who was playing their 20th league, that know perfectly the story, and are even bored of it do it in a single day... This is normal.
with each wow xpac some does it in 12 hours, i need around 24h and some people needs far more game time than me. Even worse in FFXIV, where i need less than 48h (not 48h gameplay) while some in my FC needs close to 2 weeks, and 5 time my own gametime to do it... same then i had to raid lead in primal extrem (so not a disaster gameplay wise)
A player with spend months to do all elden ring bosses, maybe never malenia because they abandon after 100th fail. They will needs hours even on their second character to rerun the game with another buid to reach the first major boss and kill it
meanwhile, speedrunners glitchless will do a full boss in some hours.
I don't see any kind of problem.
In fact i think it is better to have PoE this way : each one at their pace. anyone with custom random build can end act 10... I don't see any issue here.
Was called for a long time FFXI... and the community was complaining about it. (not all was hidden also.. but still lot of major informations)
It reached its pinnacle with Pandaemonium Warden and Absolute Virtue...
Fun was not what came to my ears speaking about those boss, or those problems... but a pain in the ass.
(ok... the hours long fight was part of problem... but when after months players still don't understand strategy and devs just gives a really cryptic hint... ... )
We speak about a game where a class was thought as DPS by devs, they wanted it to be DPS, and it ended to be one of the top tank (if not the top tank) for lot of fights...
A really good game FFXI, but... this is also a good example about how devs can be totally out of touch on their own game... And why it is nice to have players able to... check what is happening
You coudl say "devs were bad simply" ... But so what about the C'thun problem? the mistake in some ARR bosses ? Here are example of the early times of the 2 big mmorpg. in a new born, before they reached their peak.
Devs are human, and do mistakes. MMORPG are complex game, with far more risk of mistakes.
Mag7spy will say again "you are not dev, you don't have to check"
The list of game saved by the community doing the work of the developpers is not even limited to MMORPG... i mean, remove modders for skyrim... Not sure Todd "it just works" Howard could still sell new edition of skyrim today without a dedicated community fixing their bug...
And back in 90's and even more true in 2000's ... the huge amount of bug fix in games that came not from devs of various game but from community ?
The emulator for PS3 making some game far better and smooth to play now than before... while also getting from 30 FPS to 60 and from 720p to 1080p ?
NwN1 and 2 still living with around 20 years old with lot of bug fixed but community, or so goes for wolfenstein ennemy territory that recently got to steam and proved to never be dead thank for community improving it.
The history of video game speaks a lot about the community doing the developpers' work...
And after recent fallout4/fallout76, i trust enough bugthesda to make this history continue to grow with starfield.
I also consider that any mmorpg to be released yet, be it from big companies like riot, or from crowd fundings like AoC won't stop this history because i see no way they could not need it...
I'm going to give you my take on this - and you are free to agree or disagree with it.
To me, the real value in a tracker is in using it after the fact to analyze. Using a tracker during combat is of limited use, imo.
This is the reason buffs and debuffs being tracked by a tracker is of use to me. While I can keep a close eye on mine during combat, if I am looking at things after the fact, I want to be able to see when each buff or debuff was active for the whole raid.
Obviously there is no need to see or know this information during combat - I doubt anyone playing content where this kind of information would be of value would have the time to even process it, let alone act on it.
However, after the fact, it is very useful to have.
No one wants that.
I'm confused.
Are you suggesting that games never have bugs, because developers always find them before they get to players?
I ask, because if that is not what you are suggesting, then the comment I quoted above makes no sense.
Either the game can have bugs and players find them, report them and then the developers attempt to replicate, analyze and fix them, or games simply do not ship with bugs.
Which is it you are saying?
This is the comment you make when you attempt to take things out of context to fit what you want to hear.
Imagine being that desperate to hear what you want....Granted you most likely don't play other games so you have no clue of context and only relate it to what you want to hear again.
I'm going to go with what i have said before, you don't need tools you aren't a developer nor are you QA. Stop trying to use that as an excuse to cheat in a game. If you think you need tools to know what was wrong with fallout 76 you honestly are blind or acting stupid on purpose.
Travel 10km with feet = anyone can do. travel 10km in 1h = lot can do it, not all. reduce even more time, and even less people will be able. You are so increasing difficulty.
This goes for fight, the fight have to be hard with difficult mechanics... and be then hardened asking people to still send huge DPS.
Else? Remove any kind of DPS check, and just go a raid with 10 tank, 30 healers, enjoy.
2) you mistake deeply thinking that because of "action gameplay" tracker won't be able to do their work... It exist already for such kind of gameplay on other game.
"buuuut AoC is hybrid"... ok, so part tabtargetting, part action, 2 kind of gameplay where tracker are functionnals... so... yes it is not a matter at all.
2. We have already gone over this, clearly trackers aren't as effective depending on the game and the systems Between trackers not being supported by the developers and action combat trackers will be far less effective.. ..Which will cause people to not care about trackers and make them mostly obsolete except for some try hards needing to desperately hold onto it because they lack actual skill.
There are lot of ways to add difficulty... but if you have no time limit, it will always be easier and far more open to all than with a time limit.
You can add 20kg backpack, i could do it in 10 hours, allowing to do 15 minutes walk, 45 minutes rest. easy.
add more and more difficulty, hard mechanics, that hit hard ? no problem with a team full of tanks and healers it won't be a problem, if the fight was thought for 1hours but i kill it in 10h, i still win.
But if you are sure i mistake, show me example to add difficulty that can replace adding some kind of DPS check ? (and i say replace, it means that adding time limit would be useless to make the fight harder)
I still know no mechanic in anygame that make a time limit useless to make fight harder
Aaaaand don't speak about limited mana for healers... This is... a form of enrage. A soft enrage to be exact.
You have to kill boss before healers run out of mana. the most basic form of enrage
Will ? why do you use future while there are already tracker on action gameplay MMORPG ?
What limit tracker efficiency is how they can gather information.
You want tracker impossible to use ? Remove combat log (there will be one) remove numbers near character when they hit/get hit (there will be) remove displayed life bar and hide any kind of proof when a button for a skill is used. . .
So, a question for you.
If someone does something for a living that you do not do, and they make a comment specifically in relation to the thing they do for a living that you do not do, would you believe what it is they are saying?
For example, if a plumber came to your house and fixed a leak, and said that you needed a new fixture or some such, would you believe what they are telling you?
I'm not sure the single player games you mentioned are fair comparisons since the majority are turn based and inherently mean you're calculating damager per turn which as you said, is significantly easier to calculate rather than needing a meter to record damage over time (DPS).
The only question I'd raise; would you like AoC to have a similar complexity level to PoE and if it does not, do you think it justifies not having a DPS meter?
I mean, based on current gameplay it doesn't look like it'll be harder than Drakengard 3...
Perhaps a compromise could be that only for specific encounters (world bosses/raids) a DPS meter is available to turn on for coordinating rather than for open world.
Alternatively, do you believe these kinds of trackers and stats should be available in game aswell?
DPS meter, skill range trackers, cooldown trackers or AoE indicators. These would all help players to analyze the raw data. But I do think this would be unfun in the long term.
Based on current gameplay, it doesn't look like there are even AoE indicators to dodge in AoC (GW2 / FF14 have these).
In a game so focussed on conflict between players, I can understand why IS might want to obscure some information and force the player to learn timings and range of skills themselves rather than use a tool to calculate for them in the heat of the moment.
If you are fighting a boss for 10 hours straight that sounds like a pretty hard boss and you would have to be pretty skilled to be fighting it without the boss hp resetting.
By default the boss / adds/ players missing attacks on you won't be read with action based attacks so there is going to be a gap in information. Also The dev taking action against people they find using trackers is also important. When people start getting hard banned they will think twice from the progress they lose.
If PvE is to be demanding, which is a very good example of WoW raids Mythic, everyone must know the tactics perfectly and play to the full or close full potential of their class & gear, very often there are people who play poorly, their task is to learn to play correctly, and the raid group must have preview if people are playing well or if they press any keys and do their tactic job, but weak dps or heal etc - and this is incorrect.
there must be preview tools, that ultimately help a lot with balancing the class as well
Regards.
Name me a raid in wow that last 10 consecutive hours for a single fight. And I'm not talking about wipes.
Granted if you feel you got context wrong you are free to correct yourself.
Please answer the question.
Sounds like a lame example, If you are paying someone for professional advice and it is something you don't know much about then it makes sense you take that advice unless they do something that you feel is wrong.
So, in other words, listen to a professional unless you disagree with them.
So, fun fact, Margret has said that the job of CS is far easier when players have access to objective data. We are able to state what issues we see (or think we see) much better, in a way that allows CS to more easily and quickly understand and reproduce. It saves them time and money, and allows them to get to more bug reports more quickly.
Based on this, would you then concede that trackers are a useful tool for bug finding, or are you just going to disagree with someone that actually knows what they are talking about, on a matter where you do not?
You can find bugs without trackers, if you think something is wrong you are free to test skill even more so after a update. If you really cared to do so that is already available to you.
It is very obviously if you have dev tools everything is easier including some elements of gameplay. You don't need tools so you can in turn use that for gameplay.
Trust me I'm well aware you are manipulative you will take any words and stretch it. Now how you are trying to use it to benefit your bias take doesn't really matter. I'd simply ask if they want gameplay to be designed around trackers, if it is fine if it makes some element of the game easier and if they are for that.
Really you are just taking a quote at the end of the day and are just saying the grass is green. Doesn't really help push your point. Also you forget I also work in the entertainment business.
I said CS find it easier to do their job when we are able to provide objective data about bugs.
Also, combat trackers are not developer tools.
It doesn't need it, and it don't seem to take this path.
POE you can virtually do anything you want (still, a build around archery with witch is not so efficient due to starting point ^^')
On AoC, your primary archetype will already define a lot your character.
What i hope is to have 2+ build avaible per secundary archetype in average. (by avaible i mean strongly efficient)
Drakengard 3 bosses have nearly no strategies, (so goes for other Yoko Taro's game)
We currently don't have realy idea of what bosses will be in AoC. the dragons we had in Alpha 1 were not a real difficulty, but could easily wipe raids without a basic structure (having tanks/healer defined, etc)
I think there will be high end fight, because it was said they wanted some of PvE content to be done by a "single digit percent" but there are various way to have this in fact
The first use of tracker is to test and makes various build.
Lets look at pathfinder : there are tons of absurdly strong builds avaible. but we have still to find them out. After thinking "oh, this class, and this one, and this feat and..;" is not enough, after you have to look at some statistics. Mainly your AC, AB, damages outside of the weapon itself, etc.
We will have the same base situation : we have lot of way to do (augment from secundary archetype but also race, and other source... AND the free choice around weapon and thise skill point spent in weapons. and also armor) But even if we have all informations about how the game works, and how the statistics impact character (how many of this to have 1% crit, attack speed or what else) which is what i really hope, due to the real time, there are still some test to do, and measure them... Sometime ideas are good, but makes gameplay too complicated (really short timeframe to refresh buff, complexe rotation, etc) for a minor DPS increase (and a complicated gameplay of a build on hard fight with mechanics to deal with is not always good idea. )
Those test to be as accurate as possible would need factual datas.
We end up at one of my posts with
Build A : 100 DPS, easy to play, easy to find
Build B : 120 DPS, but hard to figure out and far harder to play.
Both build are good, and top players would prefer B, but casuals would be less efficient (because it needs far more training so game time dedicated to master it) and would be at 80-90 DPS so better go A
Also, there is impact of statistics,
1) you could need X attack speed to swap to this other build, but Y attack speed to have, gameplay wise, a real benefits
2) While X critical chance are enough, for the theoric damages (which are an average so) but too random to be reliable and need far more.
Both case can be feeled a lot thru maths but really need real tests. (not even dummys, but on medium tier bosses) to have a better idea.
For those we should need to be able to do tests and measures outside of "some few bosses" but on most bosses.
Also with the guild perk idea : you will have to be in one of guilds using a tracker to have it, and limited to your guildmate. Adding another restriction above those is, i think not needed.
This is not a "combat tracker" but battle assistant. and THIS is a thing that should be avoided.
The combat tracker : it gather informations, and display it, as you could display it after putting all them on a spreadsheet. It is just the exact same work, but in a infinitely faster way as if you had to do it yourself
And due to being numbers on numbers around numbers, and graphics, watching it during fight is more a handicap than a help (you lose focus on informations in fight)
Here the guy has visual information that helps him to take decision directly in the fight.
If you played wow, you also learned about boss mods, or weakaura. this video is more to thing like this, where the addon gives information that players know exist, but couldn't have it so fast directly in fight... reducing the need of focus you need yourself. it is literally a battle assistant.
And i have a big critic about combat tracker : as guides, it makes people bad.
You obey your guides and don't understand all, or don't know why this is this build and not another that works.
You follow information of your battle assistant, and you are so unable to really learn the fight, but also how the game works.
WoW have some now, but in fact... it was always a thing. a good example in my mind right now would be Aran in Karazhan, at regular timing one after other, he use randomly some skills, one was the fire circle, if anyone go out, all take huge damage. avoid it. only few were targetted. but the game gave the information that it is coming (and being one mechanic at time, no problem to have all people stopping to move for few seconds). Because for each of its skill, Aran had a specific sentence.
The fun include to have enough information to understand, but also react. Maybe FFXIV gives too many hints ? I dislike it in FFXIV but i never manage to tell if, out of my own subjectivity, it was too much or not. For GW2 most of time those kind of information in fight meant to be a little hard (fractals, raid, now hard mode strikes) never felt "too much"
Game needs to gives some hint, not only to discover strategy, but applying it. A thing i HATE on FFXIV (but a friend, really good player) love : the fact that all the fight is scripted, like a music sheet. I prefer things like LA, where bosses have many skills and use them randomly.
On FFXIV, knowing the music sheet is the "call" the game do. (added to visual aoe but for endgame, the real deal is this sheet) while in LA, recognize the visual movement is mandatory. 2 different thing that are needed.
what i will say work in video games and outside : you are always better when you don't have visual support, or assistant to learn your work. Many people in their work are unable to do it if their software is down, but can't even see when the information their sofware is showing are true or not, because they rely totally on it, and forgot (or badly learned) the bare hand method.
To be clear : Tracker is a tool to do measures. it gives informations you can have without it, but... far faster to have it this way. and it remain just information... if you don't know what to do with... it is still useless
Assistant (like in video) are the software that does part of the work for you. Using it too much make you dependant of it. but also remove part of the learning process.
2 totally different thing, 2 totally different subject.
boss resetting HP : moving the boss outside of its dedicated area...
There is nothing hard about it except if this is where the strategy and difficulty is specifically. but it is a kind of fight amongst lot.
If this is what you think difficult... i am asking a lot about your skill
In full action like BNS, sure... but in such game, the mitigations are not a thing, and the tank is ... anything that can keep the ennemy animosity high... so any DPS can do it. Because then you have to avoid. The path AoC seems to get for the tanking is the traditionnal one. a tank, keep hate on him, use CD to not insta-die, while healers replenish his health bar.
Also... just look at BDO, there are still accuracy / avoid statistics
And, boss using skills is part of combat log... so if combat log, tracker will get the information as i said.
About devs banning people : you never said how they would know who use it. . . Aside their .exe watch what you are doing out of the game on your computer (which would be a big problem about privacy)
You can fix a leak without the need of a plumber. it would be done poorly, with far more time spent, but still work.
With tracker you can do a bug report with far more informations. The more informations you give to dev, the easier for them to find what is the problem. And so the also needs less time to figure it out (less time on bug, more time on development)
QA team are nothing more than players that are PAID to find bugs... Also, they are not the average players enjoying the game, and laughing when they see this strange bug making the horse able to travel vertically, or discovering their sims can go incest. but their work is nothing more than... playing and doing lot of silly test to try to spot some bugs.
Then when they find the bug, they try to do it again, and again, if they can reproduce it, then, they try in different situation, etc etc... to finally, send them to devs... Because QA are paid for it, their work is not just "found this bug" but gives lot of information (how, when, what setup, etc). But i don't see a problem players spending their free time to do it for free... the result is same, and in both situation, the dev spend less time trying to reproduce it and understand it, faster to fix bug, and faster to go back on development topic.
But isn't this data already available in game without a DPS recording tool?
Is the argument essentially just asking to make it easier and faster to process the data?
Let's say 3rd party tools are allowed. How will IS be able to identify when someone is using a combat tracker vs a battle assistant?
This is why I think it should either be ingame by default or result in a hard ban.
Wouldn't meters also help someone directly make decisions in a fight? If you have a prolongued fight, between 2 equally matched players and you can see one is healing and dealing damage slightly more 51/49 isn't this giving one person an unfair advantage?
I've seen posts in here requesting access to parse all data. Cooldowns, Healing, Damage, Stuns and more related to combat. Objectively speaking, all of this information is clearly in the game already - just taking a moment to learn each skill will tell you the range, cooldown and estimated damage of their abilities.
The main reason I disagree with access to any meters is purely because of the open world PvP aspect and it being able to assist in real-time decision making.
Yeah I agree, I assume most bosses will have some visual indication of large skils but we'll have to wait until next alpha probably to see for ourselves
Do you think we should be allowed tools to analyze how large their range actually is if they decide to not have AoE indicaters (LA, GW2, FF14, etc)?
I'm not sure I agree with this. Information is information and if it can be processed real time, it definitely affects any decision making process a person can have. The more information a person can have, the more options they have as well.
Just to be clear, what information do you think should be available using a DPS meter?
I assume it would be name of player, damage per second, possibly different coloured bars to indicate how proportional their damage from each skill was in effecting the DPS value?
In PvP this would essentially show you whether a player has used their burst or not...
In relation to DPS meters, what more information could you possibly need to give?
"When I use X skill, the tooltop says it should be Y but the damage is Z"
I'm not sure I see where the need for a meter comes in, that you wouldn't be able to just visually see.
Could you give an example of what a DPS meter would be able to help with in terms of bug reporting?
I can imagine it helping indentify balancing issues, but even then, I would assume IS have more detailed information than we have since they'd be able to look at damage looks across all characters and classes in the entire active population. Our own benchmarks would be anecdotal or be based on limited scope of players that decided to record their own meter readings.
I think this depends on industry and company. I believe most QA teams are contractors given a list of specific functions and features to test x number of times using various methods.
I agree they will often miss things due to time constraints preventing them from testing every possible variation.
Even if there's an issue with a skill interaction not correctly effecting damage dealt or mitigated, I feel like you'd be able to visually see the discrepency without any additional trackers.
This cannot go on my liege!
It`s too much!
Cease this conflict, lock the thread, lock the thread and "begone thy rascals" he says, "begone!"