Combat logs 1.2. Parsable outside of game.

[Dalwhat]

Parsing is by far the best way for a player to guage his or her own performance and develop strategies for improvement. Those people who are whining on about how parse programs are a form of bullying don't seek to improve and will probably leave the game in a couple of months anyway. They are the same people who will be demanding the right to raid gear even though they only pve. In the meantime they will be vociferous out of all proportion to the amount they play and appear greatly offended should anyone disagree with them.

[RealAeiouy]

I completely disagree.

 

We use DPS meters constantly among classes in Rift for this very thing.

 

I've spent hours with new 50 warriors and Rogues at the practice dummies with us talking over their spec, their rotation, what consumables they are using.

 

I've helped people increase their DPS 50% in one afternoon.

 

My guild leader has pulled me up in channel and said our new guy is off on dps from where he should be with his gear, would you mind spending some time at the practice range with him and help him figure some things out?

 

It creates a sense of mentoring between veterans and new guys, and it creates a sense of cooperation between veterans.

 

 

So this system works perfectly. He can still parse the data and share it with you. Works fine for your needs.

[-Fritz-]

personally i think DPS meters and the like are a bane on the community, so im glad that at least its difficult for people to be elitists.

 

 

for every reason someone tries to justify their need of combat logs, i have 100 memories of some random noob spamming chat with DPS meters every single kill.

 

for every excuse i have a memory of some elitist ***** who didnt care that you had to take of your infant child or disabled parent so your numbers were low right there, you get the kick because the meters and their kill speed > ALL.

 

 

 

the bottom line is anything you put in the game is going to be abused

 

i would personally live in a world where people got to know each other and made friends...

 

than live in a world where your performance and value is determined by a cold and heartless meter.

[RealAeiouy]

How is gear score different from requiring no blues or greens? It's a measuring stick that happened to be easily implemented and understood. Yes, it was abused. But it wasn't abused any more than looking if someone had all greens.

 

The community will create standards and begin to enforce those standards. Minimum gearing level has existed since the beginning of MMOs and has not changed in this game. It is just more obfuscated because the information is not available quickly.

 

Again I question your mmog experience if you think minimum gearing requirements were always a part of mmogs. Outside of elite raiding guilds it was not normal at all and for quite a while.

 

I have played extensesively with logs and without logs and there is no doubt that meters with logs provides the worst overall gameplay environment.

 

I understand not having a meter of what everyone is doing is more challenging and possibly difficult but I do not mind that challenge.

[Outboard]

recount was a valuable tool written to perform a specific task

 

the problem with it is the same problem that gearscore had,

 

once in the hands of the masses people will abuse the information they now see and will make erroneous decisions and claim the they have the information to back it up

 

 

2 simple examples of this happening in the game at the moment -:

 

1. people judging how well geared someone is by the amount of life they have, obviously if someone has 6K hp they are not geared for hard mode raiding , but there are some that reverse that and see someone with 28K hp and immediately think they are well enough geared to raid WITHOUT INSPECTING THEIR GEAR
   
2. People inspecting people and seeing pink items in most slots immediately thinking they are raid ready without considering where the gear comes from or how suitable it is for the job at hand
   

 

although it is true that there will always be idiots and and no matter what information they are given it will be no use to them, the problem comes when they are given tools and can then claim they have proof from the tools

 

a real time combat parser like recount is invaluable to someone that knows how to use it and uses it for what it is , in most cases at raid time the dps having recount would be counter productive, all racing to get more dps then each other ignoring things such as what is cc'ed , tank getting agro, and standing in the fire.

 

The feeling I get from what I have seen of the devs is that they play the game , they all play other games as well and have all developed other games , they are aiming to make this a great game to play for as many people as they can , the raiders , the guilds , the puggers , the questers , the role players, the lore freaks and the bads and are working to introduce tools in ways that reduce or eliminate the negative aspects ( of course time and budget constraints get in the way , such is the nature of computer programing)

[RealAeiouy]

I'll put it this way, if I am tanking and you are healing, I'm already seeing everything you do to me. You don't decide if I see the green text on my screen. I just want it in a more presentable fashion so I can actually analyze it and figure out if I screwed up, the healer screwed up or we were just under geared.

 

Again, this will be an external tool. How will an external combat parsing tool negatively impact your game play?

 

This is where learning to play comes in. People played for years without meters and play tor without them now. If you need a meter for you and your group to troubleshoot what is going wrong you should just disband.

[dcgregorya]

couldnt they just have made a checkbox ingame "share/dont share logs" ?

 

I play a dps, its my job to try to outperform the others. Other then not standing in fires, and making my tank not use to many of his taunts So why shouldnt i be able to compare it in game? Hell even just for bragging

 

If they made that then more likely than not it'd be mandatory for Ops.

 

Personally, I've cleared all the HM content - starting probably next week with the NiM content and I can tell who in my guild is good DPS and bad DPS. A combat log parser will let me help out people who need and want help - people who want to get into the HM raid groups and such. It's a fine solution without allowing annoying dictators or people endlessly self-promoting.

 

See the problem with tools like Recount is that they, much like the PVP Leaderboards, cause people to stop playing like a team and start mindlessly tunnel visioning on their rotation. People are less inclined to stop DPS to run over and pop a clutch knock back or CC or pick up off tank to position the boss or what have you because they'd rather sit still spamming damage so they can come out #1 in damage in a failed boss fight.

 

In PVP now you see it where people spam weak AOE's instead of taking out objectives and healers because all that the idiots in the Ops chat talk about is how so and so got such high DPS in their last match.

 

No thanks. The way this works now, I can try out different things, self progress, upload and share my logs with guildies without being subjected to "TOP DEEPS" over chat/vent every time we down some random trash in an Op.

[spoonguy]

If you disagree, that's fine. However, discussion takes more than a single word and a rolling eyes smiley.

 

No, I just wanted to roll my eyes at the post in general, but there is a minimum character count... Your post wasn't an invitation to a discussion but a statement, presenting opinion as fact... I'll not be dragged to that level if I can help it ... hence.

 

[rhirne]

They are trying to be carefull with the combat logs. They know people want them (I want them if nothing else for myself) but they don't want people using them to judge people before judging skill. Just because I can put out 200 dps, doesn't mean I have any skill in using my abilities properly - it just means I can output 200 dps.

 

I'm not saying that in some cases, wanting DPS / DEF / etc... is not a good thing; but using it soley to judge someone is something I do not like seeing people doing. To me (and apparently to BW and many others) skill > all. Too many times people look at your gear, or your DPS, or something similar and just assume "ohhh, I don't want them cause they will be bad" and not even take the time to look at skill.

 

I was once in a guild who swore up and down I could not Tank certain mobs cause I was "too low level" and "wasn't properly geared." Needless to say, my day came and they saw my Skill > All. I was then used as a main tank - even though I "wasn't properly geared and too low level."

 

For those saying combat logs are not needed - they are. When used properly, you can determine where the problems are, who took too much damage, who wasn't doing their job, etc... not for saying "ohh you just plain suck." When you lose a battle, the logs can say "hey Jedi Knight.. You are taking too much damage too fast, we need to mitigate that somehow. How about the Shadow slows down on DPS abilities and help the Sage out and try and keep Force Shields and damage reduction abilities up on the Knight to help. The fight might take a little longer, but we will also last longer."

 

BW doesn't want us to get into the situation you get into with many other MMO's. Going into a fight saying "We need to take 2 capitalists, 3 socialists, and 4 Australians into the battle in order to win" and that's what EVERYONE does. That just excludes others from those battles forcing them into certain classes in order to play. They want us playing off of skill, and not some number. And I'm OK with that

[RealAeiouy]

What if you are bad and can't improve but don't want anyone to know?

 

As opposed to what if your are bad and can't do content without a combat meter? Are you failing at content now?

[RealAeiouy]

I've seen it.

 

I haven't seen a terrible amount of outright rude behavior from it, but I've seen mountains of "implied" statements arising from it.

 

I have witnessed a metric ton of times where fellow group/raid members got tunnel vision from focusing on the meter though - and then the linking of meters. Had a guildie one time that would post a meter to guildchat after every single boss kill, even if he was in a pug.

 

 

 

Most of the people I know who have extensive experience with and without meters see the real bad they bring games and the communities.

 

It seems a lot of people who demand meters have little experience playing without them. Although this game has been out long enough to prove they are completely unnecessary and the gameplay community is better for it.

 

Being able to get combat data is useful for guilds but outside of that it is only harmful to gameplay and community.

[dmanlong]

Web based Combat log parsers have the ability to work in real time. If you are not familiar with "World of Logs" go check it out. There is no reason to have an in-game DPS meter as it generally does not give the true story. If you are intelligent enough to understand the value of combat metrics and be able to separate the good information from the poor information then a web page parse will be the right tool.

 

Bio-ware has made the correct decision here. If you can't understand why then you probably should not be evaluating performance anyway. Leave the logs to those of us who are smart enough to know the difference.

 

please check out the out of game WoW combat log tool before you complain about not having a LOL recount. This will give you a general idea of what to expect.

 

http://www.worldoflogs.com/

[RealAeiouy]

I just want to see if im number one on the list, in realtime, ingame.

And the mandatory bragging link after a fight in /ops ofc

 

I think they should have meters and give medals worth gold and special points for players that focus on dps over everything else.

 

Also you should get a server wide announcement when you top dps in a group and an announcement plus a piece of unique epic gear when you top dps in raids.

 

Also they should have a crafting tree make baked goods so players have to give the top dps a cookie which will then be exchanged for elite gifts. If you don't have a cookie you can't join a group.

[Alexbeav]

Just FYI for all you 'hard cores' out there. Folks are not 'afraid' of having their performance scrutinized by DPS meters, it's not fear at all.

 

What a majority of the detractors are against is the little dictators of a pug yelling about .02 less deeps, the screaming vent raid leader, and the toxic swill of community poison that usually forms, when overly competitive types, bully other players who have a different style of play.

 

No one is going to use DPS meters to 'help' anyone improve. That's just not how it works now. Don't fool yourselves, you all know it's no longer any kind of teaching, or improvement tool.

 

It's rarely used as it's intended to be...ever.

 

Whoa, you should write drama !

 

If you are in a guild/group and you have a raid leader screaming at you for not pulling 0.02% DPS, you are free to walk away from that noise.

 

And since you're so sure that no one will be using meters to help others, I dare you to come see how we do things in my guild.

[Knewt]

Lol no. It makes no sense that a character can detect and log all combat around them with 100% accuracy. That makes no sense as game feedback.

 

The half arsed / half baked combat logs are holdovers from MUDs where mmog devs were too lazy to do them right.

 

Again it makes zero sense from a game play or a playability perspective to capture everyone's data. You should learn how to play the games not the combat logs.

I know how to play the game, thank you. You are not getting the point I am trying to make. There is nothing in this external combat log that has any impact on playability of the game. Having a personal combat log will not suddenly make the game play differently.

 

The point of adding downloadable combat logs is to allow number crunching. The largest segment of the gaming population that uses these numbers are raiders. They've implemented a tool but only did it half way. An Ops team will now need to compile 8 or 16 different logs to get the information correctly. It is a poor implementation. If they are going to implement this feature, make is so it records what happens to the entire Ops team rather than just an individual. That way only 1 (or 2 if there is a distance issue) logs are required. I still won't be able to see what you are doing unless we are in a FP or Ops together. I will only be able to see it after the fact since I will need to upload the log to an external parsing program. They are not adding in game DPS meters or the capability for an add-on to parse the combat log in game.

[Mineria]

Web based Combat log parsers have the ability to work in real time. If you are not familiar with "World of Logs" go check it out. There is no reason to have an in-game DPS meter as it generally does not give the true story. If you are intelligent enough to understand the value of combat metrics and be able to separate the good information from the poor information then a web page parse will be the right tool.

 

Bio-ware has made the correct decision here. If you can't understand why then you probably should not be evaluating performance anyway. Leave the logs to those of us who are smart enough to know the difference.

 

please check out the out of game WoW combat log tool before you complain about not having a LOL recount. This will give you a general idea of what to expect.

 

http://www.worldoflogs.com/

 

^ Finally someone who knows how to properly use combat logs.

 

Meters visible in game take to much attention and focus from some players, not to mention the annoying parser log spam some do in party/raid chat windows when a boss is down and loot is sorted out.

[Knewt]

Again I question your mmog experience if you think minimum gearing requirements were always a part of mmogs. Outside of elite raiding guilds it was not normal at all and for quite a while.

I question your experience. Players adhering to minimum gear requirements have existed since MMOs were started. The heavy emphasis on it is relatively new, but the requirements always existed.

 

I have played extensesively with logs and without logs and there is no doubt that meters with logs provides the worst overall gameplay environment.

I respect your opinion. I believe the exact opposite. I enjoy number crunching and tweaking my performance based on real numbers.

 

I understand not having a meter of what everyone is doing is more challenging and possibly difficult but I do not mind that challenge.

That's nice, but unrealistic when they are implementing combat logging. Most guilds that are raiding current content will require people to send their individual combat logs for parsing. Why make it more difficult for them?

[Holden_Dissent]

As opposed to what if your are bad and can't do content without a combat meter? Are you failing at content now?

 

Maybe he meant personally.

[Knewt]

No, I just wanted to roll my eyes at the post in general, but there is a minimum character count... Your post wasn't an invitation to a discussion but a statement, presenting opinion as fact... I'll not be dragged to that level if I can help it ... hence.

 

It was a statement of my opinion. Have we gotten so far away from discussion that every opinion needs to be qualified with "in my opinion?" This is a discussion forum. I am expressing my opinion. If you want to discuss why you think I am wrong, feel free to do so.

[Shadinaxx]

Pure and simple:

 

From an RP standpoint: in the army or any other job market (but since we are talking combat, let's go with army) you get "parsed" with your dmg, aka "accuracy" at firing a weapon you are trained in, if you cant hit the target, they tell you to practice more, but they wont take you on special missions that require a 99% hit rate.

 

From a min/maxer standpoint: Combat logs help you to tell whether or not the mod that has +5 to your main stats is performing better than a mod with a +5 to power when you are a) above 2k main stat, or b) above 1500 power to answer the question "is there a mark to which diminishing returns kicks in?"

 

From a casual gamer standpoint: I wanna go get a dessler turbo mount, but I dont know if anyone will take me. (With combat logs)= I can do a sustained a 2300 dps on a stationary target. (without combat logs)= uhhh, I do good

 

Dueling for skill is the worst idea and funniest idea I have ever heard, there are too many variables to factor in for that to be accurate, and god help your people if that's something you actually do, lol

 

Privacy of your performance only tells me that you have something to hide. If you suck, that's "OK", you just have to wait your turn unless you can improve. If you cant do either, then dont join a guild, for the love of god. Save your credits an "BUY" a slot when guilds start offering that.

 

All in all, I do have to commend bioware for listening to the masses crying about no combat logs. Now, they have given the crybabies their time, and I think this is a good step towards a happy medium. We get our logs, the tinfoil hats get their privacy, but now the tinfoil hats arent invisable, so we can see them an avoid them

[Mephane]

I welcome this change, particularly the fact that it is self-only and no random jerk can boot you out of a PUG FP because he thinks you're not doing enough DPS to meet his "GOGO FAST GO!" attitude, heh.

 

I only hope the combat log can also be turned off completely, I would prefer to not use it most of the time in order to save a bit of performance in terms of hard drive access, heh.

[Matte_Black]

Personal, downloadable logs are a half-baked, half-assed way to implement combat logs. If Bioware is going to implement combat logs that can be saved for offline parsing, they need to go all the way and let me see everything from everyone.

 

They pretty directly do not want that.

 

The devs spoke in the summit about wanting to give players a parsing tool for personal use and not a tool to be judged by. The arguments for and against are well-established but, SWTOR took a pretty definite stance and it even seemed to meet with a mostly positive reception in the room.

[wifeaggro]

Again they devs got something right. I just gained a little ( a little ) more respect for them.

 

There will be combat logs with everything your toon does. These logs can be downloaded to disk. Guilds or who ever from there can get the information they need.

 

This goes a long way for uniqueness of your character. BioWare's philosophy is that you should have some degree of privacy for your toon. Not everyone wants or need to run the "optimal spec" in order to do lower tier flash points and operations.

 

For those high end world first types (used to be me) they will have all the tools the need to further their progression.

 

you dont need combat logs for this content . its so damn easy with only 4 actual roles that mirror each other across 16 classes its pretty ridiculous. everyone mash before b4 enrage timer its not really rotation based.

[Raeln]

Yes, hours.

 

That's part of being in a progression guild that knows what's going on and uses the right tool for the right job. Instead of just saying "your dps isn't good enough to roll with us", we help folks to maximize their characters. In the end, we all progress faster and have excellent retention.

 

I know about being in a progression guild. I've been there.

 

I still think you are exaggerating on the time that you've spent at the training dummy helping others but it really doesn't have anything to do with this topic.

 

There is nothing so cryptic about DPS'ing TOR that requires "hours" at a training dummy to figure out.

[Killowatt]

People who think these logs have to be done outside of raids and not real time are incorrect..unless read on.

 

It should be similar to Rift where as you can have ACT and the like running outside the game with an overlay of the group/raids dps.. unless of course BW blocks other logs from being accessed.. then of course all logs will have to be compiled off line. But I'm sure someone will make a parser where it is a data dump for a guild so everyone is parsing to it at the same time.. and then it spits out the data real time in an overlay.

 

Either way with logs coming it's a matter of time until we have real time meters.

Edited March 6, 2012 by Killowatt