Greetings, glorious adventurers! If you're joining in our Alpha One spot testing, please follow the steps here to see all the latest test info on our forums and Discord!

Trying to stop DPS meters won't do anything

MarzzoMarzzo Member, Leader of Men, Kickstarter, Alpha One
In WoW, almost everyone has a DPS meter. Some people use it to improve. Some use it to analyze others trying to improve them. And some use it as a benchmark if a player if worth having. A few do not care about it.

The problem with stopping the dps meter is that no issues get solved from stopping it. The DPS meter is a shortcut to judge a persons skill. It is one of the fastest way to see if the player is serious, efficient, knows how to use his class etc. But, it is by no means the only way.

Tryhard players, which are the ones that kick people and judge you based on your dps from meters, do not need the tool to judge and kick you. There are other ways to determinate a persons skill that will be used instead.

For example, a good player or tryhard can judge another persons skills by these simple clues:

- Simply by the way the person moves. Effective movement, stopcasting, backpeedalin and positioning. When I tryharded in wow, it took less than 3 seconds to judge the other persons skill just by the way they moved their character towards me or around me.
- The build. Obviously there will be many meta builds that everyone will copy and paste. But 1 single offmeta pick and a tryhard will kick you or not invite you.
- Your spell order/priority. Don't wanna follow the meta rotation of your class? Get kicked.
- Not using abilities at the right time. Forgot to pop your cooldowns when things got hard in a dungeon? Too slow to CC a certain mob? Always being the one who is slowest to interupt? Good bye.

The point is, the dps meter is just a tool to see the numbers a player puts out. It is one factor of many that tryhards use to judge if they want you in your group or not. Removing the DPS meter will just make people get kicked from other less obvious factors, because honestly, if you suck at the things above, your dps most likely sucks too.

If there are leaderboards in PVP with numbers, you will get kicked if you underperform in comparison to others anyways.

Now comes the argument for dps meters
A DPS meter, interupt meter, acitivity meter, CC tracker, or whatever else, is a tool which gives a player a clear view on what they are doing wrong.

Getting kicked because your Mage does 58% less damage than another Mage with worse gear atleast gives you a reason for why you are kicked. You might use the dps meter to see what the other guy was doing and learn from him.

Getting kicked with the only explanation being, "git gud, scrub" is a lot worse.

Bonus tips from a 10+ year wow guild master:
If the group you joined kicks you for your sligtly lower dps than avarage, you do not wanna play with those people, they are idiots and tryhards.

Try to ask the group you are joining if they are doing a chill run or a tryhard run. Do not ask to join a tryhard group expecting them to go easy on you because you are the main character in your life story.

A blocked DPS meter will not hide your skill. People will find out. So do your best to find people that want to improve with you and learn togheter. This way, you won't get kicked for underperforming based on your class avarege.




«134567

Comments

  • NoaaniNoaani Member, Intrepid Pack
    You are basically saying some of what I have been saying for years here.

    A toxic player will be toxic, DPS meter or not.

    There are two specific points I'd like to add to this.

    The first is that Intrepid can not stop combat trackers. Simple as that.

    The second is that if Intrepid made combat tracker use a punishable act, all that would do is drive actual objective discussion about classes out of official channels.

    This has many side effects - the first of which is that players can't discuss class balance with developers. Without numbers, that is simply not a discussion that is possible. You can discuss class feel, but nothing else.

    Another major side effect this will have is that new players to the game, ones that simply want to look up a build and run with it, will have no way of knowing if a given build is good or not. If players see a post of a build, they will be reluctant to discuss any potential issues with it as such discussions are not possible without objective data, and objective data would prove that you have a combat tracker - which is punishable.

    It is also worth pointing out that if combat trackers were limited to use within your own guild, then the notion of them being toxic would simply disappear.
  • LalliLalli Member, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
    noaani wrote: »
    The first is that Intrepid can not stop combat trackers. Simple as that.

    Can you elaborate more on what you mean for combat tracker?
  • Undead CanuckUndead Canuck Member, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
    edited May 2020
    How can they not stop it? All they have to do is show words instead of numbers. You did a little damage. You successfully hit. You got a critical! How to you track that?
    If they just don't show or log combat numbers, you are out of luck.
    They have already said that the API for the game is under discussion. So you would have to use logs. What if the logs weren't helpful?
    Don't you think that @Steven Sharif and Jeffrey and team have not thought about these things?
  • NoaaniNoaani Member, Intrepid Pack
    Lalli wrote: »
    noaani wrote: »
    The first is that Intrepid can not stop combat trackers. Simple as that.

    Can you elaborate more on what you mean for combat tracker?

    It is a better term to use for what most people call a DPS meter- or, at least a fully featured one.

    Most such programs do far more than just measure DPS. They measure healing, they measure incoming damage, they tell you who used what ability and when they used it - both friend and foe.

    Basically, they tell you every single thing that happened in an encounter, and display it in many different ways (graphs, charts, lists etc).

    What they don't do - at least inherently - is provide any input back in to the game other than the ability to copy/paste selected results in to chat. No UI additions or clutter, no overlays, no click to heal.

    Google Advanced Combat Tracker if you want to see what I'm talking about any more than that, it is the combat tracker that is most flexible in terms of the games it can be used in.
  • MeowsedMeowsed Member, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
    How can they not stop it? All they have to do is show words instead of numbers. You did a little damage. You successfully hit. You got a critical! How to you track that?
    If they just don't show or log combat numbers, you are out of luck.
    They have already said that the API for the game is under discussion. So you would have to use logs. What if the logs weren't helpful?
    Don't you think that @Steven Sharif and Jeffrey and team have not thought about these things?

    People will just have to spend more effort reverse engineering the game. Instead of measuring damage in "HP", people will just find a reliable damage source/HP pool and measure everything against. "X spell is equal to .75 fireballs." "Y monster has 34 times as much HP as a lvl 1 kobold." Eventually, with enough data composed just of "how many times did I have to use X skill to kill Y enemy", it is possible to reverse engineer the damage value of every skill, and HP value of every enemy.

    Just like in reality where we didn't know the basic units of mass or distance, so we just invented "meters" and "grams" and then measured everything in comparison to that. And now you can easily look up the size and weight of a bajillion naturally occuring animal/plant species (arbitrary numbers, which have just been painstakingly measured and catalogued).

    So as long as our clients have a minimum amount of information (what skills get used, and when things die), and Intrepid doesn't randomly change the power of skills and monsters all the time just to fuck with our data, then "damage" can be reverse engineered and DPS meters will be possible.

    If Intrepid seriously wants to fight that information war, then the game will suffer MASSIVELY in the crossfire, because nothing in the game will be reliable anymore. If we can't rely on monsters and skills to have consistent power levels, then every encounter is just a huge question mark. If we can't rely on animations to depict certain skills going off at a certain time, and enemies dying at a certain time, then the game would be unplayable.
    Mega troll frmr1cq9w89im2.jpg
  • NodoffNodoff Member, Phoenix Initiative, Royalty, Kickstarter, Alpha One
    I can't understand the mindset of someone who wants to ban DPS meter usage. I love them, if for no other reason than tracking my own progression and skills. They also give me something more to strive for when I'm in PVE situations, since I have a readily available meter by which to judge myself, and see how I fair against other people. If someone with the same class and gear as me is blowing me out of the water in terms of DPS, I can readily see it, and then ask them for build tips.

    11wn1c3qmy20.gif
  • BadPotatoBadPotato Member
    edited May 2020
    I overall dont like having too much things on my screen. Watching someone whose screen is covered by spreadsheets and icons with seeing absolutely nothing on the background is awful. Keeping the UI nice and clean is one of the things I look forward in game design. If I am doing a good job with DPS or healing I don't need a spreadsheet to show it to me, you can still easily compare it without add-ons.
  • NoaaniNoaani Member, Intrepid Pack
    How can they not stop it? All they have to do is show words instead of numbers. You did a little damage. You successfully hit. You got a critical! How to you track that?
    If they just don't show or log combat numbers, you are out of luck.
    They have already said that the API for the game is under discussion. So you would have to use logs. What if the logs weren't helpful?
    Don't you think that @Steven Sharif and Jeffrey and team have not thought about these things?
    It's like anything in terms of IT.

    You have one group of people spending many thousands of dollars (or millions, in the case of some DRM) working out a way to prevent people doing a thing, and the people that were doing that thing spend 30 seconds on coming up with a completely different approach to doing that same thing. That then requires the original company to reinvest in finding ways to prevent the thing again - which then results in another 30 seconds spent coming up with a third means of doing it.

    Each method the developers of the product introduce to prevent a thing that people wants actually takes something away from the people trying to use their product as the developers intended, and so is bad for everyone involved. It cost the developer time and it cost the players money and freedom with the product - but the people that want to do the thing the developers didn't want people to do - well, people will always be able to do it if that is what they want to do.

    Look at the movie industry. The single most effective thing they have ever done to combat piracy is not some DRM, it is nothing to do with region locking - it was simply by releasing content at the same time world wide. People were telling them that they WILL watch the content the day it is released, and if the company will not release it in their region for them to watch in a legitimate fashion, they will watch it in an illegitimate fashion.

    A similar trend can be seen with computer games. Steams popularity drastically dropped the number of torrents available from various sources.

    Game developers spent millions of dollars on various DRM schemes, some of them were invasive to the point it made the games unplayable. Yet these games still managed to be cracked - and often times the illegal download of a game was better than the paid version as it didn't contain the DRM making the game unplayable. In the case of Steam, it was as much about convenience as it was about release times (this is why piracy will go back up now that other games platforms are splitting the game market - same can be said for streaming services).

    I know talking about movie and game piracy seems a but out of place in a discussion on combat trackers in an MMO, but when you think about it, they are a similar thing. The developer of the content want to restrict use of the product in some manner. Some people are ok with that, some are not. Those that are not will do what is needed to be able to use the product as they want.

    In all cases, a means to completely prevent the players from coming up with those work around's has been made blatantly obvious to the content developer, and in all cases the content developer has remained steadfast in their belief that they are right, and that users of their content will obey their rules.

    Also, just for your information, neither of the two that I know of that are being made now (and I can say, as of yesterday, both back in active development) use combat logs or are expecting to have access to any form of API. If Ashes had combat logs, we would all simply use Advanced Combat Tracker - it's getting close to 15 years old now, but it is still the best combat tracker out there, and it is very simple to port it to any game that produces logs.

    If players have any feedback at all from the game, then there will be a combat tracker for it. If players have no feedback at all, then I don't think the game would do that well - people like to have at least a basic idea of what is happening.
  • NoaaniNoaani Member, Intrepid Pack
    edited May 2020
    BadPotato wrote: »
    I overall dont like having too much things on my screen. Watching someone whose screen is covered by spreadsheets and icons with seeing absolutely nothing on the background is awful. Keeping the UI nice and clean is one of the things I look forward in game design. If I am doing a good job with DPS or healing I don't need a spreadsheet to show it to me, you can still easily compare it without add-ons.
    Ok then.

    Explain to me how I, as a raid leader, figure out which of my 40 raiders was the one that accidentally did damage to one of a group of 25 mobs that were CC'd?

    If I wasn't watching the specific mob at the specific time, I wouldn't even know what ability was used - let alone what class or what character.

    A combat tracker will tell me this, so that I can then question that guild member, ask them why that particular ability that my combat tracker told me did damage to the CC'd mob was used, and then work out a way to make sure that doesn't happen again (most likely just not using that ability again).

    This sort of thing doesn't even need to be the result of an AoE ability, it could be a damage proc, a proximity proc, there are a number of things it could be.

    People that say "I don't need a combat tracker to do what I do" invariably don't raid at the high end - and the high end is where the argument FOR a combat tracker exists.

    If you don't want a combat tracker in the parts of the game you play at, I am more than happy to not argue that point. That is why the suggestion I have been making for over a year on these forums for a combat tracker is to have it as a guild perk, in a manner where it is only guilds raiding end game content that would want to pick it (which means your guild would have the option to take something you consider to be more useful).

    Additionally, the combat tracker that guilds are able to chose only works on people in that guild - meaning you can only track the combat of people in your own guild, and only if your guild has taken that option.

    That way, players that are in situations where they don't want a combat tracker can be in a situation where they don't have one, and they can say with confidence that no one else in their pick up group will have one either. However, those in guilds that want them are able to have them.

    This is the only way that players not wanting them are able to safely assume that people in their pick up groups won't have one running - as if they are not a part of the game, they WILL be developed by third parties.

    In well over a year of suggesting this here, no one has actually come up with a negative consequence of this specific suggestion. It hurts no one, it gives the tool that some people want to them, but in a way where misuse of it is essentially eliminated.

    Essentially, this suggestion offers the result that everyone wants.

    The current plan, where Intrepid don't implement one and so third parties do, is literally the result that no one wants - not even the players developing those combat trackers.
  • BadPotatoBadPotato Member
    edited May 2020
    noaani wrote: »
    Explain to me how I, as a raid leader, figure out which of my 40 raiders was the one that accidentally did damage to one of a group of 25 mobs that were CC'd?

    If I wasn't watching the specific mob at the specific time, I wouldn't even know what ability was used - let alone what class or what character.

    A combat tracker will tell me this, so that I can then question that guild member, ask them why that particular ability that my combat tracker told me did damage to the CC'd mob was used, and then work out a way to make sure that doesn't happen again (most likely just not using that ability again).

    Do you really think that this game will be a copy of WOW and you will have those situations where you CC a mob group? Its not tab target and only using combat tracker to put blame on someone whom you weren't watching is easy by looking at the person the mob is aggroed at or asking your other raid members. Its not that hard to talk to others instead of using outside programs for this small problem.
    I am not against it, but there is absolutely no good reason to have combat tracker in games.
    I will say that combat trackers only provide you with a clear fact to tell others that one of your raid member is not paying attention or wanting to participate.
    Easy solution to prevent that is to have reward based on participation during combat to keep afkers, gold farmers and people who punch the boss once during a fight from getting any decent loot.

    P.S: Just keep those Jenkins out of your raid groups, easy

  • NoaaniNoaani Member, Intrepid Pack
    edited May 2020
    BadPotato wrote: »
    noaani wrote: »
    Explain to me how I, as a raid leader, figure out which of my 40 raiders was the one that accidentally did damage to one of a group of 25 mobs that were CC'd?

    If I wasn't watching the specific mob at the specific time, I wouldn't even know what ability was used - let alone what class or what character.

    A combat tracker will tell me this, so that I can then question that guild member, ask them why that particular ability that my combat tracker told me did damage to the CC'd mob was used, and then work out a way to make sure that doesn't happen again (most likely just not using that ability again).

    Do you really think that this game will be a copy of WOW and you will have those situations where you CC a mob group? Its not tab target and only using combat tracker to put blame on someone whom you weren't watching is easy by looking at the person the mob is aggroed at or asking your other raid members. Its not that hard to talk to others instead of using outside programs for this small problem.
    I am not against it, but there is absolutely no good reason to have combat tracker in games.

    I absolutely think it will - though I feel it worth pointing out that making use of CC is not copying WoW. EQ did this long before WoW, and have consistently done it better, to the point where EQ has CC specific classes, where WoW has CC as a sideshow.

    Ashes will have support specific classes. One of the more active things support classes do in combat is provide what CC is needed. As such, I not only expect Ashes to have more CC required than WoW, but I also expect it to have a much deeper system around that CC - though maybe not as deep as EQ.

    You also usually can't tell who broke CC on a mob. The CC itself generates a lot of hate, and 9 times out of 10 if a mobs CC is broken, that mob will run at who ever CC'd them. That other 1 time out of 10 usually goes to tanks with either radiant hate abilities or AoE taunts that don't break CC.

    The only exception to this is if a DPS player is literally targeting the mob that should be CC'd and is continually attacking them - as opposed to a single accidental hit on them.

    People do this in pick up raids, but not in guild raids - which is what I am talking about.


  • noaani wrote: »

    I absolutely think it will - though I feel it worth pointing out that making use of CC is not copying WoW. EQ did this long before WoW, and have consistently done it better, to the point where EQ has CC specific classes, where WoW has CC as a sideshow.

    Ashes will have support specific classes. One of the more active things support classes do in combat is provide what CC is needed. As such, I not only expect Ashes to have more CC required than WoW, but I also expect it to have a much deeper system around that CC - though maybe not as deep as EQ.

    You also usually can't tell who broke CC on a mob. The CC itself generates a lot of hate, and 9 times out of 10 if a mobs CC is broken, that mob will run at who ever CC'd them. That other 1 time out of 10 usually goes to tanks with either radiant hate abilities or AoE taunts that don't break CC.

    The only exception to this is if a DPS player is literally targeting the mob that should be CC'd and is continually attacking them - as opposed to a single accidental hit on them.

    People do this in pick up raids, but not in guild raids - which is what I am talking about.

    Combat tracker wont save you from pick up raids, just because you know who pulled that mob and fucked you over for up to 30 minutes of the time. (due to having to find a new member, get that member to that location within a dungeon without teleporting) You are complaining about a completely different problem, of finding a reliable raid members, that isn't associated with having or not having a combat tracker.
    At this moment in development, we haven't seen any type of spell or ability that will stun a mob/player for extended amount of time, combat at this moment reminds everyone of GW2. You are making assumptions that Ashes active-tab target will have exact combat system like WoW or EverQuest.
  • NoaaniNoaani Member, Intrepid Pack
    edited May 2020
    BadPotato wrote: »
    noaani wrote: »

    I absolutely think it will - though I feel it worth pointing out that making use of CC is not copying WoW. EQ did this long before WoW, and have consistently done it better, to the point where EQ has CC specific classes, where WoW has CC as a sideshow.

    Ashes will have support specific classes. One of the more active things support classes do in combat is provide what CC is needed. As such, I not only expect Ashes to have more CC required than WoW, but I also expect it to have a much deeper system around that CC - though maybe not as deep as EQ.

    You also usually can't tell who broke CC on a mob. The CC itself generates a lot of hate, and 9 times out of 10 if a mobs CC is broken, that mob will run at who ever CC'd them. That other 1 time out of 10 usually goes to tanks with either radiant hate abilities or AoE taunts that don't break CC.

    The only exception to this is if a DPS player is literally targeting the mob that should be CC'd and is continually attacking them - as opposed to a single accidental hit on them.

    People do this in pick up raids, but not in guild raids - which is what I am talking about.

    Combat tracker wont save you from pick up raids, just because you know who pulled that mob and fucked you over for up to 30 minutes of the time. (due to having to find a new member, get that member to that location within a dungeon without teleporting) You are complaining about a completely different problem, of finding a reliable raid members, that isn't associated with having or not having a combat tracker.
    At this moment in development, we haven't seen any type of spell or ability that will stun a mob/player for extended amount of time, combat at this moment reminds everyone of GW2. You are making assumptions that Ashes active-tab target will have exact combat system like WoW or EverQuest.
    Let me get this straight.

    In your situation (pick up raid, someone breaking CC), your options with a combat tracker are to see who broke the CC, then you attempt to educate them on how to participate in the raid. If - and only if - that fails, you then remove them from the raid to attempt the encounter without them. And then if - and only if - that fails, you have to look for another person to replace them and potentially wait for them to get to you.

    Right, that is your appropriate course of action if you have a combat tracker in that situation.

    Now, without a combat tracker, what cause of action do you have?

    First of all, you don't know for sure who it was that broke the CC. So you then either just keep trying hoping that this mysterious person stops, or you make a guess as to who it was and educate them one on one as to what is going wrong. If - and only if - that fails, you then remove them from the raid to attempt the encounter without them. And then if - and only if - that fails, you have to look for another person to replace them and potentially wait for them to get to you. Then, all going well, you managed to actually somewhat randomly pick the right person right at the start - if not, you are back to trying to figure out who is at fault again.

    Neither situation is perfect, but neither situation is a result of a combat tracker. However, it seems blatantly obvious which of the two situations is better for everyone involved - and I simply fail to see how you would argue the opposite.

    As to Ashes combat being somewhat similar to EQ/WoW. I'm going to first off touch on how different those two games are. Tab target is about all they have in common - but in the same way that "Fun Kids Planes Game" (a real game) and Microsoft Flight Simulator X are both flying games.

    In both cases, one is made for adults, one is made for children.

    Right, now on to why I expect Ashes to be somewhat similar to these two games that are not themselves all that similar.

    First of all, my reason for thinking this is because this fits in with the description of combat we have been given, the examples of combat we have seen, and the experience of combat from Alpha 0.

    Oh wait, that wasn't first of all, that was all of it...

    Now, it is obvious that these things will change before launch, but they won't change so drastically as to not be able to be easily compared to EQ and WoW - the tab target component of combat in Ashes will likely fall somewhere between these two games, based on literally everything we have seen, hear, read and experienced about it.

    There is no reason to think otherwise.

    Edit; I should also point out that I am advocating for a combat tracker that is guild based, which would mean pick up raids don't have access to them anyway. I personally think it would be better if they did, but I also believe that compromises are usually a good thing.
  • noaani wrote: »
    BadPotato wrote: »

    At this moment in development, we haven't seen any type of spell or ability that will stun a mob/player for extended amount of time, combat at this moment reminds everyone of GW2. You are making assumptions that Ashes active-tab target will have exact combat system like WoW or EverQuest.

    As to Ashes combat being somewhat similar to EQ/WoW. I'm going to first off touch on how different those two games are. Tab target is about all they have in common - but in the same way that "Fun Kids Planes Game" (a real game) and Microsoft Flight Simulator X are both flying games.

    Um what? I never said that Ashes is similar to EQ or WoW. I said that you are assuming that there will be problems like in WoW or EQ raids from the start.
    I am stating that combat of Ashes mostly remind everyone of Guild Wars 2.

    Lets assume (like you are) that the raids will be similar to the combat presented (GW2). In GW2 there was no mechanics that made you wonder who pulled who. There was no off side mobs that could be CCed for long period of time during large raids. Also there was no need for combat tracker at all.
    Guild Wars 2 is the best example of a game with no combat tracker and no one have any problems with it due to similar gear score and difficulty of each raid boss (requiring all members participating) I would agree that GW2 and Ashes will be completely different in economic and overall game play standpoint, however combat vice it is the best comparing candidate.
    During raids in GW2, you clearly know who is not paying attention and who is not following basic strategies.
    Combat tracker will not stop you from getting random trolls in your group, and seeing that you want combat tracker only for guild activities to pressure your members into doing as good as you. From a hardcore raider, it is a good thing, I would agree with you for having it for guild activities. However, it is absolutely not required for dungeon or raid activities to do your best.

    Please read my comments carefully and understand the idea correctly.

    At this point in the game, where we know nothing about the skills and abilities of each class. We aren't even sure of the combat system for now and how far it would tilt towards active or tab target or both. If it is like GW2, there is no need for combat tracker as Steven said, you got the best example out there still in good shape from release date in 2012 till today.
  • Overall this whole entire discussion is too early to look into. We don't know if there will be situations like noaani is mentioning or could this be more similar to GW2 combat and raiding. Guild Wars 2 is the best example on the market at this moment that restricts users from any third party add-ons and says "use at your own risk of ban" when you do use any kind of tracker.
    Talking about dps tracker before we even know the spells and mechanics of the raids is just a waste of time in general, nothing said here will be implemented yet.

    However, I do think that discussing this closer to the release date or after actual Alpha testing will bring more evidence and facts towards why exactly someone would need to track their progress.
    If player base thinks that is required, make it as simple as possible within the game, limiting it to only your information or allowing guilds to look through their members progress.
    Having a public combat tracker will just bring more toxicity between players due to blaming each other over who is hardcore and how isn't, and will allow other 3rd party add-ons to be implemented illegally.
  • MeowsedMeowsed Member, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
    edited May 2020
    BadPotato wrote: »
    Guild Wars 2 is the best example of a game with no combat tracker and no one have any problems with it due to similar gear score and difficulty of each raid boss (requiring all members participating)

    ArcDPS was the common DPS meter in GW2 when I played it. Yeah, it was third-party and technically forbidden. And yeah, it wasn't really necessary. But at least I can say anecdotally that it helped me improve my build and DPS in some of the harder Fractals. And I expect that a lot of raiders used it as well. I didn't raid in that game, so idk for sure, but I caught wind of at least a little bit of discussion about in Fractals.

    And I noticed some elitism as well, but not tied to DPS meters. Some groups just wanted to make sure your gear was Ascended/Beserker. Some groups wanted to have proof that you've cleared the content before (typically using a title or unique reward that only comes from that content).

    Oh and of course, the usual PUG shenanigans. Newbies mixing with Veterans and not getting along. People getting exasperated that their teammates can't do mechanics and whatnot.

    My point is, there was definitely a DPS meter available to GW2 players (and it was marginally useful), and there was definitely some toxicity/elitism (but not a lot), and for the most part those two things weren't connected at all.
    Mega troll frmr1cq9w89im2.jpg
  • NoaaniNoaani Member, Intrepid Pack
    edited May 2020
    BadPotato wrote: »
    Um what? I never said that Ashes is similar to EQ or WoW. I said that you are assuming that there will be problems like in WoW or EQ raids from the start.

    Actually, this is what you said.
    BadPotato wrote: »
    You are making assumptions that Ashes active-tab target will have exact combat system like WoW or EverQuest.
    And I was defending my stance that I think Ashes combat will have similar (though not exact) combat systems to WoW and EQ.

    I'm happy to pay more attention to what you have to say, but maybe you should pay more attention to what it is you say.

    That said, you didn't address the bulk of the post. So I'll reiterate it here for you.
    Let me get this straight.

    In your situation (pick up raid, someone breaking CC), your options with a combat tracker are to see who broke the CC, then you attempt to educate them on how to participate in the raid. If - and only if - that fails, you then remove them from the raid to attempt the encounter without them. And then if - and only if - that fails, you have to look for another person to replace them and potentially wait for them to get to you, in bold, so you know it is the important part of the post and the one that I would like you to focus on rather than focusing on some other semantic detail because you can't answer it.

    Right, that is your appropriate course of action if you have a combat tracker in that situation.

    Now, without a combat tracker, what cause of action do you have?

    First of all, you don't know for sure who it was that broke the CC. So you then either just keep trying hoping that this mysterious person stops, or you make a guess as to who it was and educate them one on one as to what is going wrong. If - and only if - that fails, you then remove them from the raid to attempt the encounter without them. And then if - and only if - that fails, you have to look for another person to replace them and potentially wait for them to get to you. Then, all going well, you managed to actually somewhat randomly pick the right person right at the start - if not, you are back to trying to figure out who is at fault again.

    Neither situation is perfect, but neither situation is a result of a combat tracker. However, it seems blatantly obvious which of the two situations is better for everyone involved - and I simply fail to see how you would argue the opposite.


    Honestly, I am ready and willing to hear why you would rather put yourself in the second situation over the first, and remember, this is a situation YOU came up with as to why combat trackers are bad, not one that I came up with.

    All I am doing is asking you to defend your pre-established position.

    Edit; and yeah, as leonerdo posted above, GW2 is a really bad example of a game to use to suggest a developer should have the stance of not having a combat tracker. Their stance is almost identical to Intrepids right now, and yet GW2 had a combat tracker within months of launch (it was rudimentary, but it was functioning while I was playing G2W2, and I only played it for a few months).

    They went from banning people caught using it to outright allowing it - which is the path Ashes will take.

    Your argument is on if it is needed or not, this is not the point. The point is that players will have one, and so it is in Intrepids best interested (and the best interest of all players of all Intrepid games) for them to take this simple fact in to account now, and make the best policy they can now so as to mitigate the undesired effects that they way to avoid.

    They are in a position to do that now. Come beta 2, if they still have the same policy, that option will be lost to them, third party trackers will be released, and then anyone that wants one will have one.
  • BadPotatoBadPotato Member
    edited May 2020
    noaani wrote: »
    BadPotato wrote: »
    Um what? I never said that Ashes is similar to EQ or WoW. I said that you are assuming that there will be problems like in WoW or EQ raids from the start.

    Actually, this is what you said.
    BadPotato wrote: »
    You are making assumptions that Ashes active-tab target will have exact combat system like WoW or EverQuest.
    And I was defending my stance that I think Ashes combat will have similar (though not exact) combat systems to WoW and EQ.

    I'm happy to pay more attention to what you have to say, but maybe you should pay more attention to what it is you say.

    That said, you didn't address the bulk of the post. So I'll reiterate it here for you.
    Let me get this straight.

    In your situation (pick up raid, someone breaking CC), your options with a combat tracker are to see who broke the CC, then you attempt to educate them on how to participate in the raid. If - and only if - that fails, you then remove them from the raid to attempt the encounter without them. And then if - and only if - that fails, you have to look for another person to replace them and potentially wait for them to get to you, in bold, so you know it is the important part of the post and the one that I would like you to focus on rather than focusing on some other semantic detail because you can't answer it.

    Right, that is your appropriate course of action if you have a combat tracker in that situation.

    Now, without a combat tracker, what cause of action do you have?

    First of all, you don't know for sure who it was that broke the CC. So you then either just keep trying hoping that this mysterious person stops, or you make a guess as to who it was and educate them one on one as to what is going wrong. If - and only if - that fails, you then remove them from the raid to attempt the encounter without them. And then if - and only if - that fails, you have to look for another person to replace them and potentially wait for them to get to you. Then, all going well, you managed to actually somewhat randomly pick the right person right at the start - if not, you are back to trying to figure out who is at fault again.

    Neither situation is perfect, but neither situation is a result of a combat tracker. However, it seems blatantly obvious which of the two situations is better for everyone involved - and I simply fail to see how you would argue the opposite.


    Honestly, I am ready and willing to hear why you would rather put yourself in the second situation over the first, and remember, this is a situation YOU came up with as to why combat trackers are bad, not one that I came up with.

    All I am doing is asking you to defend your pre-established position.

    I will keep this short and simple for you to understand.

    As I have said multiple times, combat trackers are not required or essential for you to play the game.

    Why choose the second option over the first? Because that is how it is with people you do not know. If you don't want to deal with randoms destroying your raid and trolling, find a guild or a team that you rely on. It will keep people from going around solo, good or bad.
    Pointing fingers at one specific person will not benefit anyone in any situation and will just cause drama and toxicity no matter the situation. Educating one person at a time is a waste of time, I would say it is just a poor decision instead of reminding the whole entire group to be careful not to use aoe/multiple target spells to break CC.
    Once again, I have never said that Ashes is like WoW or EQ. I do not know where you got that from. Here is your quote previously

    "I absolutely think it will - though I feel it worth pointing out that making use of CC is not copying WoW. EQ did this long before WoW, and have consistently done it better, to the point where EQ has CC specific classes, where WoW has CC as a sideshow."

    Quoting leonerdo's message previously, combat trackers were never part of GW2 official agreement and are not permitted in game. Those who use it are not permitted to talk about it. Many people did not use combat trackers in raids due to that (few guilds that I was in before doing dungeons hardcore and in public groups too) I agree that public grouping in GW2 was extremely difficult, but that is the whole entire point of the guilds and grouping.
    GW2 had many self dps checks ingame in PvP and PvE without the use of trackers or in-raid addons. People practiced their combos in training arena vs npc class trainers and dummies. Many people made use of that instead of using illegal add-ons.

    My defence in this is that You do not know if there will be situations like that in the game, you have not played Alpha 1, nor did anyone else. Making assumptions about this is not a fact like you are making it.
    This is not tab target game, every swing will hit multiple enemies. If you believe that people can keep away from targeting a mob accidentally, you are wrong. Of course you cannot stop untraceable add-ons from popping up here and there but people who really want them would use them. Keep it that way, "use it at your own risk" but don't cross into something that everyone should have to play well.

    So tell me exactly why you want to have combat tracker except for pointing fingers at trolls and "self min-maxing" because you can easily check your rotation dps with in-game dummies.
  • NoaaniNoaani Member, Intrepid Pack
    edited May 2020
    BadPotato wrote: »
    As I have said multiple times, combat trackers are not required or essential for you to play the game.
    This is not the argument. They will exist, essential or not.

    You can make this claim all you want, it is not worth arguing, as it won't change a thing.
    Why choose the second option over the first? Because that is how it is with people you do not know. If you don't want to deal with randoms destroying your raid and trolling, find a guild or a team that you rely on. It will keep people from going around solo, good or bad.
    Pointing fingers at one specific person will not benefit anyone in any situation and will just cause drama and toxicity no matter the situation. Educating one person at a time is a waste of time, I would say it is just a poor decision instead of reminding the whole entire group to be careful not to use aoe/multiple target spells to break CC.
    Let's break this down again, but this time, we'll start again right from the top.

    So, the situation is that we are in a raid, and someone is breaking the CC on a mob - one of many that are CC'd as per the encounter design.

    Your first answer was to just follow who the mob aggro'd. That doesn't work as mobs don't always go to the person that broke their CC.

    You also mentioned something about rewarding players based on contribution - which I didn't address due to how much work would be involved in that when you consider Ashes has support specialist classes (it is hard enough to balance how much of a reward should go to the tank vs vs the healers without also trying to factor in the DPS. Trying to also balance that with support whom offer assistance that can't always be quantified seems like a exercise in futility).

    You also suggested asking your raid. That doesn't work as more often than not, people do not realize it is them that is doing something wrong - at least not something like this (speaking from experience, this exact situation is something I have dealt with at least a dozen times as raid leader).

    Your next point is that combat trackers won't help you in raids at all, which is blatantly false. As I then pointed out, in a pick up raid, the solution to dealing with this problem when you don't have a combat tracker involves every single step that is in the solution to dealing with this problem if you do indeed have a combat tracker. However, when you don't have a tracker, there are additional steps involved, and there is no guarantee you have the right person.

    Your next answer was to suggest that people should simply not bother with pickup raids. Something I find somewhat offensive, and that is as someone that doesn't do pickup raids (groups yes, raids no).

    Then you said something about how pointing the finger at someone is never the answer. This is a point I 100% agree with. However, it leads me to ask the question - if you send someone a whisper saying "ability *** that you are using is breaking the CC on the mob and causing us to wipe. What is *** from and can you do anything to prevent that?" is not pointing the finger.

    What your argument here is about is not a combat tracker. If that raid leader did somehow manage to see that this was the player that was breaking the CC on the mob, they would be in the exact same position as if they had looked it up on a combat tracker. So, the combat tracker is not the thing you are questioning here, but rather, you are questioning the quality of leadership on the raid.

    That is a valid discussion to have, but it has no relation to combat trackers.

    Your information on GW2 is at best out of date.
    ArenaNet authorizes the use and development of 3rd Party tools under the banner of a "DPS Meter". "DPS Meters" is defined as the collection and processing of combat related data in order to develop a statistical and visual representation of that data. This combat data maybe collected from anyone inside of your immediate social group. Social groups are defined as including the player character, and current party and/or squad.

    This is where they stand now - and have done for over three years (as far as I understand it).

    They started out not allowing anything like this, but soon realized that they couldn't stop it.
  • BadPotatoBadPotato Member
    edited May 2020
    I see, overall my idea still stands "I am not against it, but there is absolutely no good reason to have combat tracker in games" Just because you only have one example of where combat tracker is useful to you, doesn't mean it will happen many times and to the point where people need it during public grouping.
    noaani wrote: »

    Then you said something about how pointing the finger at someone is never the answer. This is a point I 100% agree with. However, it leads me to ask the question - if you send someone a whisper saying "ability *** that you are using is breaking the CC on the mob and causing us to wipe. What is *** from and can you do anything to prevent that?" is not pointing the finger.
    When it gets to the point where specific set of skills trigger off CCed mobs, words will spread and people would be mindful of ABC skills that trigger that and this. That has happened in many games where some skills would do more harm than good, all you have to do it point it out.

    I have played games with combat tracker, playing them without. True, my knowledge on GW2 info is about 3-4 years old, due to me heavily playing during the beginning of raiding in that game. Doesn't change the fact that no one required it to point a mistake out in raid environment or made discussions about it during gameplay.

    Because you keep repeating the same scenario without providing me with any other factual use of combat tracker doesn't put the idea into position of "We have to allow everyone to use it" Why do people want to get rid of social aspect of this game? What I mean by that is, you may be a good leader who would point that out to your member, not everyone are like that out there. Others would kick with no questions or explanations because they saw red flag on their tracker.
    noaani wrote: »
    You also mentioned something about rewarding players based on contribution - which I didn't address due to how much work would be involved in that when you consider Ashes has support specialist classes (it is hard enough to balance how much of a reward should go to the tank vs vs the healers without also trying to factor in the DPS. Trying to also balance that with support whom offer assistance that can't always be quantified seems like a exercise in futility).

    Based on contribution could be just activating the skills during the fight. It does not have to be only DPS done or heal/tank done meter of contribution. If you use skills consistently during the fight, you get 100% of the reward. It is not a hard system to implement and can be seen in multiple mmo games.
    noaani wrote: »
    Your next point is that combat trackers won't help you in raids at all, which is blatantly false. As I then pointed out, in a pick up raid, the solution to dealing with this problem when you don't have a combat tracker involves every single step that is in the solution to dealing with this problem if you do indeed have a combat tracker. However, when you don't have a tracker, there are additional steps involved, and there is no guarantee you have the right person.

    Your next answer was to suggest that people should simply not bother with pickup raids. Something I find somewhat offensive, and that is as someone that doesn't do pickup raids (groups yes, raids no).

    That is partly correct, combat trackers should not be essential need for those in raids. For example, there is no player in WoW who doesnt run without combat tracker. I am not comparing the games, just pointing out that it is essential need for players in that game. Is that really that good? What exactly does it provide for regular DPS or a healer in a raid?

    New fact for you:

    For example, healers will never use that combat tracker for the same of improvement, nor will tanks. If you dont have enough heals or defense - you would know right away with a wipe.

    Now DPS - you look over to the stats and damage done. Ok, you are number 15 out of 40, there is how many classes planned in the game? Oh yeah, 64 (had to look it up) with around 25 full dps specs and probably 29 co-dps/support specs. If most classes will be decent and balanced to play (and not have only 5 classes like Archeage), there will be a lot of differences. Would a mage-summoner that is ranked 15 in dps be comparing to rank 1 ranger-summoner? Or rank 2 mage-fighter? (keep it simple with class names)

    Would DPS tracker put somewhat good classes into a position of choosing to minmax or be always rank 15 DPS? Would it keep players from recruiting those classes into their groups? Sure thing combat tracker is not the main reason that problem would pop up, but it will be something that people would look over without even knowing the class and say if it is decent or bad to have in a raid.
    I am siding with more of a casual player side here, however keeping every single class viable is something I would want to see instead of taking mage-fighter that does 5% more dps than mage-summoner just because you want the easiest raid run.

    My next answer is suggesting that if you believe "your example of CCed mobs/trolling or having inexperienced players in raid" is a huge problem that you continuously run into, you shouldn't run with PUGs. I have done difficult content with PUGs before, I am not against it. But you for sure know that once inexperienced player gets into your raid, you will spend a lot of time figuring their skill set and mechanics out from scratch. It is unavoidable thing. I just never seen or got into situations "example of CCed mobs being trolled" like you did before, so I do not think that it is a huge problem in games (played mmos for 10 years).

    I played solo and was a raid lead for about 4 years in RIFT, AA, WoW, Tera, B&S (some others I dont remember anymore) and know that it might be frustrating to the point of wanting to know who exactly is messing this all up. But I never had to use a combat tracker to determine that sneaky guy because it is really not that sneaky the second time around.
    noaani wrote: »
    What your argument here is about is not a combat tracker. If that raid leader did somehow manage to see that this was the player that was breaking the CC on the mob, they would be in the exact same position as if they had looked it up on a combat tracker. So, the combat tracker is not the thing you are questioning here, but rather, you are questioning the quality of leadership on the raid.

    Exactly my point. Having the "CC on the mob example" is not the reason why exactly you would want a combat tracker. If you seen it, or someone else seen it and payed attention, you would end up on the same point with or without the tracker. It is just depends on the quality of the leadership of the raid. Then whats the point of "must have it in the game or have it allowed because I have to have it to succeed"?

    Question for this discussion still stands:
    "What is the valid reason people want a combat tracker?"
    If there can be a combat dummy for you to practice on to min max your class dps and
    To keep people away from toxic "your numbers are bad compared to me so you are bad player" (anti-noob/anti-average class) position of in the game.


    For now, I would still be on the side where if developers think that having no combat tracker available for everyone is okay, then there is no need for it. If people really want it, they would do it either way, like I guess, in GW2. Off to sleep

  • NoaaniNoaani Member, Intrepid Pack
    edited May 2020
    BadPotato wrote: »
    What is the valid reason people want a combat tracker?
    Ability to objectively quantify effectiveness of classes.
    Ability to objectively quantify effectiveness of buffs.
    Ability to objectively quantify effectiveness of builds.
    Ability to objectively quantify effectiveness of gear.
    Ability to objectively quantify the games combat systems and mechanics.
    Ability to objectively discuss these things with other players.
    Ability to objectively question developers when things are not as they should be.

    That is all before you even get in to combat. Each of these is essential for a healthy game, if that game is to embrace the concept of high end play.

    None of that can be done without a combat tracker. In each and every case, you need to exchange the word "objectively" with "subjectively", and that makes all of it essentially worthless to even try.

    It is perhaps worth pointing out that GW2 raids - especially the early ones, were not designed at all using the same paradigm as any other game. Other games base things off of the trinity, GW2 didn't even have a trinity with which to base it off (they do now - and coincidentally, combat trackers are considered essential on a raid level now - individuals need not have them, but someone in the raid does).

    Essentially, the first few waves of GW2 raid content were designed in a class agnostic manner.

    Ashes will have a trinity+1 system (the +1 being support classes), and so both class build and combat will be more akin to EQ/WoW than to GW2 from 4 to 5 years ago. We have also been told that the specific makeup of classes in your raid will matter.
    For example, healers will never use that combat tracker for the same of improvement, nor will tanks. If you dont have enough heals or defense - you would know right away with a wipe.
    This is actually untrue.

    Both tanks and healers will use a combat tracker to test various builds, to objectively decide how they value one stat vs another, where the cap (both hard and soft) is on a given stat, and what the shape of that curve is from the soft to hard cap.

    Tanks and healers rely much less in combat trackers while in actual combat, but rely on the information they provide even more than DPS classes.

    Anyone that considers a raid wipe to be a valid way to prove a build doesn't work shouldn't be tanking raids. They should know their build before they get to the raid.

    As to your general notion of class balance, or not taking a class because it doesn't perform as well...

    First of all, lets analyze the situation you have now outlined. A raid that is picking one class over another, because the first class does 5% less DPS.

    Before we do anything else, we need to come to terms with what kind of a player would drop one person from the raid for what amounts to around 0.155% of the raids over all DPS. For a person to care about a number this small, they have to be some kind of special. This kind of special person is not excluding someone because of that 0.155% of raid DPS, they are excluding them because they think it makes them either look and/or feel cool. As such, they will do this regardless of whether they have the numbers to back it up or not.

    However, lets keep running with this situation. Lets say one class is 5% behind in damage to another class, and at some point, one raid leader decides to take a player with a higher DPS class than this player. We'll also assume that the difference in DPS was the actual only reason for this, as unlikely as that is.

    The first thing to say is that the raid leader had objective data, and in a purely data driven world, made the right decision. Now, this may suck for the person that got left out, but if that raid leader had one raid spot left and two people wanting to fill it, then one of those two was always going to be left out.

    Again, not a function of the combat tracker. The only thing the combat tracker did was provide the raid leader with objective data to make the decision about which one to leave and which one to take. Surely players being able to make such decisions objectively is better than forcing players to make such decisions subjectively - especially when you consider the fact that the existence of a combat tracker does not prevent the raid leader opting to make the decision here subjectively - all it does is enable the option of an objective based decision.

    However, lets go even one further. So there is a class that does 5% less DPS than a similar class, and offers nothing at all in return to make up for this (no additional utility or survivability).

    Without a combat tracker, players absolutely will suspect that this is the case. However, suspecting something is the case and having no way to actually objectively prove it to be so is all but meaningless.

    As soon as you are able to objectively prove this is the case, then you are able to take it to the developers and ask them what's up. I have seen many situations where players have figured out something isn't working as intended, or balance is not where it should be, or that the RNG of the game is off balance, taken these issues to the developers, who then silently fixed the issue in the next patch. These things are only possible if the open use of a combat tracker is allowed.

    I can't think of a single game I have played where this has not been the case - and I am including GW2 here.
    Exactly my point. Having the "CC on the mob example" is not the reason why exactly you would want a combat tracker. If you seen it, or someone else seen it and payed attention, you would end up on the same point with or without the tracker.
    Except without the tracker, you are only guessing if you have the right player.

    Remember, as I pointed out several posts ago, it is not always possible (let alone probable) that you will actually see who it is that did the thing wrong.

    What you are essentially saying here is that you think it is ok for players to make assumptions as to who it is that screwed up, and that is better than them being able to know who it is because pointing fingers is bad - even though the raid leader would take the same action with the player he knew was causing the issue as he would with the player that he thought was causing the issue (based on combat tracker being present/not present, obviously).

    I mean, the thing you want to avoid (finger pointing) happens in both cases. The difference is with a tracker, you know you have the right person. Without the tracker, you may have the wrong person and so have to point your finger at someone else only a few minutes later.

    And lets not get in to the possible situation with trolls on raids. The player breaking the CC may well be doing it on purpose. It's the internet, people are like that.

    Such a person would likely also be smart enough to only do it when another specific player is in the raid. Thus, since you have killed the encounter in the past with this player, you have no reason to suspect they are sabotaging the raid and so give no thought to the idea it could be them. Then you notice that it only happens with this other player is on the raid, and so come to the false but understandable conclusion that it must be them.

    This kind of thing doesn't happen in any game that I know of, but that is only because every game I have played or talked to people about has a combat tracker that works for it (as Ashes will), and so it is a theoretical situation that should never come up - until you get in to a discussion about why a combat tracker isn't needed.
  • MeowsedMeowsed Member, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
    @noaani I think @BadPotato has agreed (at least once in all of those paragraphs) that combat trackers can be helpful for some people. And that those people will use combat trackers "at-their-own-risk" if necessary.

    So I'd like to shift the discussion more towards the social climate that they give rise to. I'm sure y'all have some wild theories on that.

    (Note I'm going to use "DPS meters" and "combat trackers" interchangeably. There are subtle differences between the terms, and my word choice is intentionally provocative.)

    Personally I'm worried that Intrepid's current course of action is the 2nd worst possible course** if they want to have a good social climate around combat trackers. Currently, they're villainizing anyone who uses DPS meters. They are saying that they do not want DPS meters in their game because it makes people toxic. I'm paraphrasing of course, but it's what everyone is going to hear.

    So eventually everyone will fall into these camps:
    1) Reasonable people who don't give a fuck about DPS meters and will play the game how they like, without any regard for them. (Like the people who wisely avoid posting in these debate threads.)
    2) People who use combat trackers smartly, but have to fear a ban if they ever talk about it in-game, which stifles some good use-cases in addition to stopping toxicity. Mostly I'm concerned that they can't openly converse with and help group #3.
    3) People who don't know how to use DPS meters responsibly and never got properly introduced to them because of their taboo reputation. This group can include assholes who use DPS meters as superficial, dick-measuring tools. And it can also include newbies who want to use them but are scared to even install them.
    4) People who think that DPS meters are evil tools and will refuse to use them, even if they might help. They might even make some erroneous logical leaps like so: "DPS meters are banned. -> People shouldn't be measuring DPS. -> High DPS is not important in this game. -> I don't need to put any effort into DPS." (Extremely few people actually think this way, but it's a possibility.) I'd never use these slurs on an individual, but the words "snowflake" and "snitch" come to mind.

    If Intrepid allows combat trackers in the open, then people in group #2 are allowed to set good examples of how to use combat tracker, and people in group #3 can learn and be acclimated to their usage more quickly. Additionally, it removes the wind from the sails (or "hot air", or "ammunition") of group #4, and hopefully we end up with more members of chill group #1.

    Intrepid doesn't necessarily need to provide combat trackers first-party (but that would give them even greater control over the situation.) All they need to do is stop villainizing DPS meters and dividing the community further.

    **
    The worst case is the course which WoW took, where combat trackers and Deadly Boss Mods became so powerful that it warped the design of high-end encounters. And then Blizzard continued to crank out raids which were only possible with addons, WHILE continuing to crank out sub-optimal classes/specs which weren't strong enough for those raids. The entire situation was essentially a trap for new players and created an artificial divide between how raiding worked in LFR vs. how it worked in Heroic/Mythic. (Please correct me if I'm wrong about that. I didn't play much WoW, but I've heard an awful lot about it.)
    Mega troll frmr1cq9w89im2.jpg
  • BadPotatoBadPotato Member
    edited May 2020
    Good afternoon, @noaani and @leonerdo
    Quick go over my thoughts again from last night (for you and for myself) and state what I believe combat trackers bring as a positive into the game.

    1. Combat trackers are beneficial for hardcore raiding groups to distinguish and compare their power in a raid environment (specifically that, because otherwise you can use dummies for dps checks and buff checks outside mechanics)
    2. Combat trackers are making a life of a decent and determined on success leader of a guild/raid to point out the mistakes of his fellow members and PUGs
    3. Combat trackers make it easier to find out the mistakes of developers on balancing each class individually and will be easier to send information for the fix if required.

    Negative opinions about combat trackers if they were accessible to everyone.


    1. Combat trackers will be the main excuse for veteran players to look down on new players or inexperienced players. Some people might help each other out like you said @noaani, but there will be lots who do not want to deal with "bad players" and get rid of them to continue in PUGs or Hardcore guilds
    2. It provides somewhat new/unexperienced in the game raid leaders from taking certain players into their group for not having the required dps (as you said some classes could be more supportive/tanky) Once the game comes out, no one would really know what is good or bad. Lazy leaders would just judge by numbers in dps stance of things.
    3. Overall siding with @leonerdo's breakdown of each player group, there will be players like 1,3,4 groups who oppose or not use combat tracker for its purpose given above that will result in 1 and 2 negative scenarios.

    Ways to negotiate.

    1. Combat trackers and (add-ons in general) shouldn't be something that everyone have to rely on, as @leonerdo mentioned in the spoiler section on the last post with WoW allowing add-ons and combat trackers to the point where it got out of hand due to lots of mechanics and unbalance in classes. @noaani mentioned that in GW2 today, one person should have a combat tracker to keep the raid on point but individual players do not require it.
    2. Combat trackers should be available for those who really wants or needs it for successful raiding (guild leaders/hardcore raiders) either restricting players from continued use of combat tracker if not required in basic levels of dungeons and easy/medium difficulty content. @noaani looking back at the idea of allowing it for guild use only.
    3. Maybe making a combat tracker an in-game option, which is unlikely, but it will prevent people from making any kind of add-ons and breaking the terms of use of the game without breaking away from one group of people. Once they allow 3rd party programs, it will transform into WoW UI crumble.
    4. If they will still stand on the point of keeping all the 3rd party programs banned, it is still going to impossible to track all combat trackers. It will bring the community of those who use it to the minimum (because those who need it will know how to use it quoting @leonerdo with group #2) with "use at your own risk" as it was in GW2 few years back. Eventually changing that statement later on, with higher difficulty content coming out, like ArenaNet if it is required.

    Personal concerns.

    1. Keeping the game clean off add-ons overall, in my opinion, keeps the game difficult. Allowing one thing will open that bottle that will start leaking other add-ons. Keeping the bottle tightly closed for now, I feel like is okay.

    noaani wrote: »
    Remember, as I pointed out several posts ago, it is not always possible (let alone probable) that you will actually see who it is that did the thing wrong.

    What you are essentially saying here is that you think it is ok for players to make assumptions as to who it is that screwed up, and that is better than them being able to know who it is because pointing fingers is bad - even though the raid leader would take the same action with the player he knew was causing the issue as he would with the player that he thought was causing the issue (based on combat tracker being present/not present, obviously).

    What I said about this was
    "Educating one person at a time is a waste of time, I would say it is just a poor decision instead of reminding the whole entire group to be careful not to use aoe/multiple target spells to break CC."
    and
    "When it gets to the point where specific set of skills trigger off CCed mobs, words will spread and people would be mindful of ABC skills that trigger that and this. That has happened in many games where some skills would do more harm than good, all you have to do it point it out."
    If you are in that situation, as an experienced leader and gamer, you would know what might have caused it. Instead of looking for a specific person and either finding him or not, you would know that spell A or B or C might have caused this situation.


  • NoaaniNoaani Member, Intrepid Pack
    edited May 2020
    @leonerdo and @BadPotato

    I agree 100% with everything that leonerdo said in his post - even about the terms DPS meter and combat tracker being used interchangeably. I can't really even think of anything to add to what he has said, to be honest.

    As for Badpotato above, I'll go over the three main points you bring up, and my specific thoughts on each.
    BadPotato wrote: »
    bring as a positive into the game.
    They also make it possible for players to post accurate, objective build guides for players, and to tune them for solo, small group, full group and raid play.

    Everyone that looks up information on the game in order to attempt to be better at it stands to gain if combat trackers are approved in one way or another. It may only be raiders that have a need to run them in combat, but everyone gains when the information out there is both objective and peer reviewed.

    Anyone can throw up a build, and anyone can come along and decide to use that build. However, if objective peer review is possible, these builds, once posted, get scrutinized - a process that only actual good builds survive.
    BadPotato wrote: »
    Negative opinions about combat trackers if they were accessible to everyone.
    1, while people may use combat trackers here, it isn't the cause. If a veteran player is going to look down on a new player in any manner, they will do that with or without a combat tracker. A combat tracker isn't even going to make it easier for them to do it, allow them to do it to more people, or make it any worse for the people that they do it to.

    As such, the presence or absence of a combat tracker in this situation is neutral.

    2, if you are a new raid leader, you will go out and look for information. That information may be from other raid leaders, it may be from forum posts, it may be from a number of sources. It is unlikely to be from previous first hand raiding though.

    Once this new raid leader has obtained this information, it will pass through their brain and come out the other end as a means of how they want to run their raid. If they are the kind of raid leader that thinks the appropriate thing to do is to exclude the classes that this information tell them are weak on raids, they will do that.

    The difference between if a combat tracker exists or not in this situation is that if it exists, that new raid leaders information is likely accurate. If they do not exist, that information is likely not accurate. However, the existence of a combat tracker has no bearing on if this player will exclude one class or another, and so once again their presence or absence is neutral.

    Essentially, my stance on these two specific points is that combat tracker or no, they will both still happen with the same frequency. They rely on the person having data, but they will exist whether that data is objective or subjective, and subjective data will always exist.

    While it is obviously unlikely, this is actually a point I would really like to see @GMSteven address in relation to his stance on combat trackers - what makes him so sure removing objective data will prevent the issues he is trying to prevent, when those same issues will be present to the same extent if the only data available to these players is subjective. I mean, his game, his call - that doesn't mean we can't ask him to defend his position if we (or some of us) think the call is incorrect based on the reasoning he has given (though, asking him to doesn't mean he has to - again, his game).

    I find it worth pointing out again that Ashes absolutely will see less of this behavior than other games out there (especially WoW), but this is not due to the game not having a combat tracker - as it will have one by launch. Rather, it is due to the fact that people need to maintain friends and positive contacts in game. Every experienced player know's that todays new player is tomorrows experienced player, and you want experienced players on your side in a game like this.

    If the positives can only happen in the presence of objective data, but the negatives will happen whether that data is objective or subjective, it seems to me that there is no objective negative aspect to having a combat tracker.

    The only negative left - one that you didn't bring up as I don't believe it is possible to believe the above are negatives along with this - is the fact that people believe the above are negatives.

    While the points you make are not actual, factual negatives against combat trackers in my opinion, there is absolutely no doubt that many people believe they are. This is purely subjective, but nonetheless is something that needs to be taken in to consideration as much as any objective fact.

    However, dealing with the fact that people believe these things to be true should be handled in a different manner to how you would handle things if they were indeed true.
    BadPotato wrote: »
    Ways to negotiate.
    I completely agree with every point you make here.

    The single best thing Ashes could do is to make a combat tracker in game. It is unlikely, but is the only way to achieve the desired outcome Steven has stated (no division in the community based on who has a tool and who doesn't). They can restrict this in many different ways, and indeed the implementation I have been suggesting for over a year now is simply a way to implement an in game combat tracker in a manner that will appease raiders to the point third party combat tracker developers don't bother with their projects, yet allows those I talked about above whom believe the negatives of them to exist will not have to deal with them at all.

    As to that last group - people that do believe the negative aspects of them - adding a limited combat tracker in to the game really is the only way to ensure that they will not have to deal with one.
    BadPotato wrote: »
    If you are in that situation, as an experienced leader and gamer, you would know what might have caused it.
    The numbers make this imporbable.
    The game will have 8 base classes.
    We can assume 20 abilities per base class - it may be more, it is unlikely to be less.
    Each ability has at least 3 potential augments from each of 8 secondary classes, as well as the possibility of augments social groups, and potentially other mechanics as well. It is safe to assume that there will not be less than 27 potential augments for each ability.

    This means that there will be at least 4,320 unique abilities in Ashes at launch.

    Experienced raiders are not going to want to try and remember the details of them all, let alone how they interact with each other.

    All they will know is what they others they are able to communicate with have seen.

    I should also point out that the reason such things do eventually become common knowledge is because people first see them on a combat tracker and then pass that objective information around. Top end raiders are reluctant to spread subjective data.
  • MeowsedMeowsed Member, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
    edited May 2020
    Welp, I think that covers everything. We did it, boys! We solved world peace DPS meters.

    I'm kidding obviously. It's not really an issue that can be solved compIetely. But I do think it was a worthwhile discussion. I wonder if anyone will read it all though ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
    Mega troll frmr1cq9w89im2.jpg
  • BadPotatoBadPotato Member
    edited May 2020
    leonerdo wrote: »
    Welp, I think that covers everything. We did it, boys! We solved world peace DPS meters.

    I'm kidding obviously. It's not really an issue that can be solved compIetely. But I do think it was a worthwhile discussion. I wonder if anyone will read it all though ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

    @noaani and @leonerdo, yap pretty much every single point discussed from a standpoint of veteran gamers. I don't really have anything else to add up on positive and negative sides of this discussion. Does this bring more positive to the game is just depends on individual player's opinion and view of it. There is no factual negative nor factual positive of combat tracker. It helps people out who are hardcore and efficient at the game and it is unwanted/unneeded by those who are casual. Very good discussion @noaani, you have mentioned many decent ideas to contradict my points, and thank you for your information and standpoint on this @leonerdo.
    Once again, it is a bit too early to discuss add-ons in the game, and that's it for me.

    Edit: Also if you can look into my previous made post of the game development right now going around with rng and looting and see in what aspects game can improve in this point of development. I would love to hear your opinion on it @noaani if you are interested.
  • NoaaniNoaani Member, Intrepid Pack
    edited May 2020
    BadPotato wrote: »
    It helps people out who are hardcore and efficient at the game and it is unwanted/unneeded by those who are casual.
    I would disagree with this one point.

    All other points aside, the ability for players to discuss balance issues objectively with a game developer is a factual positive for everyone involved - the players in the discussion, the developers, and most importantly (imo), the players that don't even know the discussion is happening yet still benefit from the results.

    Casual players benefit when veteran players assist developers. Every casual player that has played any MMO would have at some point benefited from a combat tracker, as at some point (likely a dozen or more times a year) in that game a veteran player would have used a combat tracker to point an issue out to a developer, who would have then fixed it.

    Developers will have all of that information, yet they won't even have 1% of the time to spend going through it looking for issues as the general playerbase would spend - if that data were made openly available to them. Due to this, if it is only developers that have the data, there will be things that get missed.

    Even if all the potential positives didn't exist, yet all the negatives did, this one point trumps all of them as far as I am concerned.

    Yes, it is an opinion as to how useful this is. However, the fact that this happens is not an opinion - even if casual players do not know it happens.
  • noaani wrote: »
    BadPotato wrote: »
    It helps people out who are hardcore and efficient at the game and it is unwanted/unneeded by those who are casual.
    I would disagree with this one point.

    All other points aside, the ability for players to discuss balance issues objectively with a game developer is a factual positive for everyone involved - the players in the discussion, the developers, and most importantly (imo), the players that don't even know the discussion is happening yet still benefit from the results.

    Casual players benefit when veteran players assist developers. Every casual player that has played any MMO would have at some point benefited from a combat tracker, as at some point (likely a dozen or more times a year) in that game a veteran player would have used a combat tracker to point an issue out to a developer, who would have then fixed it.

    Developers will have all of that information, yet they won't even have 1% of the time to spend going through it looking for issues as the general playerbase would spend - if that data were made openly available to them. Due to this, if it is only developers that have the data, there will be things that get missed.

    Even if all the potential positives didn't exist, yet all the negatives did, this one point trumps all of them as far as I am concerned.

    Yes, it is an opinion as to how useful this is. However, the fact that this happens is not an opinion - even if casual players do not know it happens.

    Was just stating that finding out the imbalance or best possible builds for dps/heal/tank can be done without use of combat tracker (with dummy or in-game functions). It helps those who are min-maxing for sure, but there are many games without combat tracker that have veteran players talk about balances and issues of weapon or class.

    What I mean by that is not having a combat tracker doesn't stop min-maxers from min-maxing in my opinion. There will always be those who will use forums, communications, watch guides of others, compare hit numbers with one another or how fast they kill something or how efficient their class is (example of Black Desert or even min-max non-mmo game Monster Hunger World) and having combat tracker helps a lot, but is not required to see issues or success.

    That is my standpoint on that best class finder or imbalance shower with a use of combat tracker. It makes it easier, but is not required to do so at this point in our knowledge of the game.
    Example of Ashes Apoc, you for sure know that some skills and weapons are OP and need balancing just off how fast you kill someone and I am sure that it doesn't have a combat meter to tell you that info.
  • NoaaniNoaani Member, Intrepid Pack
    BadPotato wrote: »
    Was just stating that finding out the imbalance or best possible builds for dps/heal/tank can be done without use of combat tracker (with dummy or in-game functions). It helps those who are min-maxing for sure, but there are many games without combat tracker that have veteran players talk about balances and issues of weapon or class.
    I honestly don't know of any MMORPG's without a combat tracker - and very few MMO*** in general. Some are hidden, but if you know the kinds of people that make them, you know where to find them. What is true with them is that in the absence of end game PvE content (Archeage, BDO) they become somewhat less useful. However, they still exist for both of those games.

    Discussing things with a developer isn't always about balance - in fact, it usually isn't. More often than not it is about bugs.

    I remember a game where a player proved to the developers that their RNG system was completely biased against the first and last numbers in any range. They had a 50% less chance of showing up than other numbers, thus a generating a random number between 1 and 3 100 times would generate 2 50 times and both 1 and 3 only 25 times each.

    I remember a game where an ability had a listed range of x to x+30, but after 1,000 casts, it was proven that the actual range was x-15 to x+15. It was a mistake, and one the developers would never have picked up on.

    Both situations would only ever have been noticed with a combat tracker, and both were fixed fairly quickly.

    These kinds of things happen all the time - this is why veteran players need access to data.
  • ppl who don't want dps meters are usually trash and they were previously kicked from raids because they were underperforming. they dont want this system in games so they can hide their bad performance and they get carried in raids.
Sign In or Register to comment.