PLEASE VOTE: Give Us Real Combat Logs

[Quraswren]

NO we are NOT getting them.

 

we don't get a combat log. We get some kind of ridiculous oog parser for whatever personal information we want to look at outside of the game.

 

which is just hilarious and sad at the same time.

 

That's not entirely true.

 

You get a personal, in game combat log you can look at all you want to and adjust/tweak your stats or rotations all you want to. In game.

 

You want to compare yourself to someone else; that's when you have to go out of game unless you simply want to discuss it over Vent or Voip. I guess you could type it as well if you really wanted to.

Edited March 7, 2012 by Quraswren

[mufutiz]

 

Unfortunately, we cannot prevent the immature griefers from playing, so the fallback position is to limit the tools available for them to ply their griefing. One knuckle head in a PUG can disrupt and destroy the groups progress and enjoyment. Let's not make it any easier for them to do so.

 

I can tell you right now, this might not be a dealbreaker on its own but you can add it to the list of things that will ultimately make many players cancel their subs or not renew them.

Especially the pve crowd who, yes, will want to use them for parsing and dps meters but combat logs are important for many players, especially those who got used to them for more than a decade from other MMOs.

 

I for one was completely trusting Bioware to get it right with the combat logs, I believed them when they said personal logs were coming.

 

And now? They made a fool out of me because what the hell am I going to use an oog parser for? They said "Combat logs are coming" and now they have to say "What is coming is not a combat log at all, guys. Sorry for the confusion earlier. We coded some utter bullcrap together though that has no practical use whatsoever and will supply you with it instead of combat logs like EVERY OTHER MMO IN EXISTENCE TODAY."

 

I feel like I am getting trolled but the fact they are serious with that crap is so much worse than trolling... Honestly, I care less every day about those "immature griefers" Moving on to greener pastures soon, looks like.

Edited March 7, 2012 by mufutiz

[Faefrost]

No, I like the idea of keeping the logs personal. Yes there were some great benefits to being able to see everything in WoW. But it sadly became vastly abused to the extent that it was used as a frequent tool for harrasing and ruining the game for others.

[Blotter]

You live in world that doesnt exist, trying to build utopia doesnt work look at the real world today, hows that going? help bad players get better, hiding how bad they are doesnt help them or their group. Neither solution will get rid of the a-holes youll always have to live with them.

 

A. "Bad" players will have their data to look at...whoever might qualify as "bad" in your myopic self-satisfied worldview....so they will be perfectly able to self-evaluate and try to increase their performance.

 

B. If they want your help, they will ask for it and are perfectly able to share their data with you if they so choose, but I would suggest they find someone else without an attitude problem.

 

C. If they want your smug, conceited opinion in the first place, I pity them. Are you trying to prove that we can't get rid of a-holes by being one yourself? Sorry, but "some people are a-holes and you can't get rid of them" is in no way an excuse for giving said a-holes tools to be even bigger a-holes.

Edited March 7, 2012 by Blotter

[Ichikitsune]

I agree that recount and such can be an annoyance (people linking their numbers to brag) but the good outweighs those few negatives. I would be perfectly happy with only combat logs for exclusive all guild runs, but bring the word pug into the picture and the realtime data is vital to determine how this previously untested player is performing.

 

I have no problem with combat logs and said as much, I think what is happening is people confusing combat logs with addons like Recount. World of Logs is realtime, it's no use to be in a middle of boss fight, trying to RL and tell someone how to improve their class at the same time. If you can do that all that once, good for you but I can't digest that much info in the middle of herding cats and keeping them alive. After a fight, I alt+tab and go to WoL and then digest the new player so this is not some major change for me. That's where I hope it all leads to eventually a WoL for this game and honestly if you were to bring in a pug to a guild run and you know your team it's becomes real apparent if the pug is good or not with or without an addon.

[Andryah]

I can tell you right now, this might not be a dealbreaker on its own but you can add it to the list of things that will ultimately make many players cancel their subs or not renew them.

 

I for one was completely trusting Bioware to get it right with the combat logs, i believed them when they said personal logs were coming.

 

I understand, but from my perspective Bioware DID GET IT RIGHT.

 

And frankly, if it makes many of the immature abusers quit, that is a good thing. They can go grief in another MMO.

[Caladax]

Why can't you do this with the system they are implementing? Take on the first boss, enrage timer hits, take a 3 min break and have the new guy send his log. You compare to other DPS that have been raiding in your group before and you have your answer.

 

Well, we're not sure how exactly it will work, how good the online parsers will be, or how soon you get your report from bioware. Assuming your method there, then yes, you can do it with their system, in a roundabout, pita way. Similar to how their "no combat macros! ..except for people who buy special keyboard" works. You can have the functionality that should be in game, just without the convenience of it being in game.

 

You actually have dps meters right now: go to karagga's palace with an op, on the first boss, tell everyone but one dps to not attack, heal people through damage, and see how long it takes for the dps to do, say, 200k damage.

 

It's not good, it's inconvenient, it's inaccurate, and few people will bother with doing this.

 

I would be fine with a toggle for people who don't want to share their combat info, but I don't understand why people would want this added inconvenience of having people request their logs from bioware, having them forward them to you, and inputting them into online parsers.

 

The reductio ad absurdum might be if combat logs were available, but you had to send a registered letter, and a self-adressed, stamped envelope to bio in order to get them via snail mail. Yay inconvenience?

[TKMaster]

Apparently you are one of the people he referred to in his last sentence.

 

Kid i've been a top guild tank for 12 years running, EQ, EQ2, WoW, SWG, Rift, now TOR, but when ppl compare a game to real life....well, you ppl need to get a real life.

Edited March 7, 2012 by TKMaster

[Andryah]

And now? They made a fool out of me because what the hell am I going to use an oog parser for? They said "Combat logs are coming" and now they have to say "What is coming is not a combat log at all, guys. Sorry for the confusion earlier. We coded some utter bullcrap together though and will supply you with it instead of combat logs like EVERY OTHER MMO IN EXISTENCE TODAY.

 

OOG parsers are excellent. My first exposure to them was ACT in Rift. I'm totally cool with getting personal logs and parsing them out of game in something like ACT. In a windows based OS, it's a non-issue.

Edited March 7, 2012 by Andryah

[Andryah]

Well, we're not sure how exactly it will work, how good the online parsers will be, or how soon you get your report from bioware.

 

There are very mature and capable parsers in the MMO space on the internet. All they require is access to the log file. In fact, they are much more robust and feature oriented then anything you could ever code into an MMO.

[Ashmodee]

I for one would like to see a DD meter in TOR.

 

Now, I know alot fear it turns to an Elitist tool. Easily avoided, make it personal only.

Eventually ONLY available to the Leader in Ops, but that's not the most important imo.

Having it available even as personal only would be something I'd like, cause it'd let me analyze my damages, skill by skill and so on, and improve my OWN gameplay.

 

I don't care for the "show-off" part much.

 

OH, and please, if you make it avail, make sure results can't be linked on Team/Ops chat... kinda fed up from idiots posting it after every single hit they take

If it comes as a Team/Ops compare tool, only the Team/Ops leader should be able to link it... if not noone

Edited March 7, 2012 by Ashmodee

[Vydor_HC]

The reductio ad absurdum might be if combat logs were available, but you had to send a registered letter, and a self-adressed, stamped envelope to bio in order to get them via snail mail. Yay inconvenience?

 

The process is not complicated at all. Enable log, turn on parser and that's it. The parser will read the log file as it's updated and give you the results on the fly.

[Blotter]

Well, we're not sure how exactly it will work, how good the online parsers will be, or how soon you get your report from bioware. Assuming your method there, then yes, you can do it with their system, in a roundabout, pita way. Similar to how their "no combat macros! ..except for people who buy special keyboard" works. You can have the functionality that should be in game, just without the convenience of it being in game.

 

You actually have dps meters right now: go to karagga's palace with an op, on the first boss, tell everyone but one dps to not attack, heal people through damage, and see how long it takes for the dps to do, say, 200k damage.

 

It's not good, it's inconvenient, it's inaccurate, and few people will bother with doing this.

 

I would be fine with a toggle for people who don't want to share their combat info, but I don't understand why people would want this added inconvenience of having people request their logs from bioware, having them forward them to you, and inputting them into online parsers.

 

The reductio ad absurdum might be if combat logs were available, but you had to send a registered letter, and a self-adressed, stamped envelope to bio in order to get them via snail mail. Yay inconvenience?

 

And there's the rub. You start from the faulty premise that it "should" be int he game. Guess what? BW decided that it SHOULDN'T because it does not fit their design vision for the game and they made a decision to help avoid the judgmental nonsense from some people and because hey want you paying attention to the game, not meters, learning to raid and beat the bosses by playing and observing the game and the encounter instead of playing elitist MMO accounting nerd. Don't like it? Don't play it. You'll have every opportunity to "review tape" after the encounter just like people do in other "sports" in order to evaluate your performance from the previous game and make adjustments for next time. There's absolutely zero reason that's not sufficient to meet the needs expressed by people arguing for combat logs. The only reason people want them in real time is because they think they shouldn't have to learn by trial and error, like everything else in life and any real game is learned, and that they should be given a tool to immediately figure out, based on the game's underlying mechanics, what went wrong with taht wipe 20 seconds ago. Lame. If you're "hardcore," you don't need that kind of crutch.

Real "hardcore" is being willing to tough it out and figure it out without peaking beyond the 4th wall...and you know what? Real "hardcore" guilds will accomplish it just fine with the way BW has decided to offer combat logs.

[Andryah]

I for one would like to see a DD meter in TOR.

 

Now, I know alot fear it turns to an Elitist tool. Easily avoided, make it personal only.

Eventually ONLY available to the Leader in Ops, but that's not the most important imo.

Having it available even as personal only would be something I'd like, cause it'd let me analyze my damages, skill by skill and so on, and improve my OWN gameplay.

 

The Ops leader part is a bad idea, because in the world of PUGs, a whole lot of the douche bags that we are concerned about grab and use the Ops Leader role. It would get abused alot. Now, if they set it so that it only worked if everyone in the Op is in the same guild (that could be easily codable) then I'd be fine with that because guild social protocols generally prevent the DBs from being present for long.

[Thorkir]

I vote yes. We do need combat logs. For crying out loud, even STO has one, and they're F2P now. You cannot truly know what goes wrong (and what causes it) in a raid without a combat log. From my experience, those that are against combat logs are also against addons, macros, and in general, against improvements to the game.

 

I also support addons for the purpose of helping raid leaders lead effectively. Combat macros would be extremely beneficial for healers, but since that's outside of the scope of this thread, I won't get into THAT argument.

 

The Ops leader part is a bad idea, because in the world of PUGs, a whole lot of the douche bags that we are concerned about grab and use the Ops Leader role. It would get abused alot. Now, if they set it so that it only worked if everyone in the Op is in the same guild (that could be easily codable) then I'd be fine with that because guild social protocols generally prevent the DBs from being present for long

There will always be idiots in PuG groups. Asking the developers to restrict development because stupid people are stupid isn't a good idea.

Edited March 7, 2012 by Thorkir

[Drewser]

Really? you think that is a good solution rather than just putting in real combat logs that every mmo has had for the last 13+ years?

 

 

Yup, I see no issue with it since it is a compromise for both sides. I wouldn't be opposed to a toggle either.

[OddballEasyEight]

No thank you. Self combat logs are perfectly fine.

Having combat logs that others can read is only there for two reasons.

 

1: to blame whoever happened to do the least damage after a whipe, for being the weak link (not always true anyway)

2: to show off your e-peen

[mufutiz]

I understand, but from my perspective Bioware DID GET IT RIGHT.

 

And frankly, if it makes many of the immature abusers quit, that is a good thing. They can go grief in another MMO.

 

nobody is going to quit. The community in this game already blows anyway. Nothing is changing whatsoever.

 

The only guys that might quit are the few remaining hardcore PVE guilds. Good job, alienating the players who will stress and test the new pve content so it can be polished and balanced before the bulk of the playerbase hits it...

 

swtor is the only MMO on the market without a combat log. I mean think about that for a moment. It's a travesty.

 

I am probably just getting desillusioned by what this game really is. I came here expecting a great MMO with a team behind it working hard to make it the best MMO on the market. Instead I got... SWTOR. I kind of feel robbed tbh. Yes the leveling experience was nice enough but I could just play an offline game with an even better storyline and without the grind instead...

 

As far as MMOs go beyond just nice voice-overs and cutscenes... Even WoW starts to look awesome again to me, I haven't played it for almost 2 years after getting burned out from raiding but SWTOR kind of makes me think about buying the expansion, something that was completely out of the question before I played swtor.

 

If that was your intent, Bioware - job well done! You reignited my love for MMO's, even though yours had to fall short for that to happen.

Edited March 7, 2012 by mufutiz

[Lheim]

http://www.darklegacycomics.com/46.html

[lollermittens]

Voting for real combat logs.

[mufutiz]

No thank you. Self combat logs are perfectly fine.

Having combat logs that others can read is only there for two reasons.

 

1: to blame whoever happened to do the least damage after a whipe, for being the weak link (not always true anyway)

2: to show off your e-peen

 

again - there are no personal combat logs.

 

that was a lie.

 

all you get is a useless parser you can use to check your combat data outside the game. It's entirely meaningless.

[Blotter]

I vote yes. We do need combat logs. For crying out loud, even STO has one, and they're F2P now. You cannot truly know what goes wrong (and what causes it) in a raid without a combat log. From my experience, those that are against combat logs are also against addons, macros, and in general, against improvements to the game.

 

I also support addons for the purpose of helping raid leaders lead effectively. Combat macros would be extremely beneficial for healers, but since that's outside of the scope of this thread, I won't get into THAT argument.

 

 

There will always be idiots in PuG groups. Asking the developers to restrict development because stupid people are stupid isn't a good idea.

 

1. We're getting combat logs. You'll get all the information you just said you needed but not during the raid in real time. Sorry, BW decided you get an EZ Mode cane instead of EZ Mode crutches.

 

2. Equating addons and macros with "improvements to the game" is YOUR opinion and merely an baseless premise from which you start, as opposed to a well-argued and supported conclusion. Neither you nor anyone arguing for them has stated why they are actual "improvements" as opposed to merely "conveniences that make it easier to win than having to actually play the game to play the game and learn by trial and error."

 

3. As for this statement: "There will always be idiots in PuG groups. Asking the developers to restrict development because stupid people are stupid isn't a good idea"...let me fix that for you....

 

"There will always be wipes when learning a raid boss. Asking the developers to give us a tool for cheating and looking at the underlying mechanics of the game in stead of having to learn how to defeat the boss like a real gamer isn't a good idea."

Edited March 7, 2012 by Blotter

[mufutiz]

1. We're getting combat logs. You'll get all the information you just said you needed but not during the raid in real time. Sorry, BW decided you get an EZ Mode cane instead of EZ Mode crutches.

 

We are NOT getting a combat log.

 

when people talk about combat logs, and what EVERY other MMO on the market understands by "combat log" is a real time combat log that works similarly to a chat window.

 

when you die you click on the roster and are able to retrace what the **** just happened.

 

that's a combat log.

Edited March 7, 2012 by mufutiz

[Drewser]

again - there are no personal combat logs.

 

that was a lie.

 

all you get is a useless parser you can use to check your combat data outside the game. It's entirely meaningless.

 

That statement makes it pretty clear that you don't know what you are talking about.

[Caladax]

And there's the rub. You start from the faulty premise that it "should" be int he game. Guess what? BW decided that it SHOULDN'T because it does not fit their design vision for the game and they made a decision to help avoid the judgmental nonsense from some people and because hey want you paying attention to the game, not meters, learning to raid and beat the bosses by playing and observing the game and the encounter instead of playing elitist MMO accounting nerd. Don't like it? Don't play it. You'll have every opportunity to "review tape" after the encounter just like people do in other "sports" in order to evaluate your performance from the previous game and make adjustments for next time. There's absolutely zero reason that's not sufficient to meet the needs expressed by people arguing for combat logs. The only reason people want them in real time is because they think they shouldn't have to learn by trial and error, like everything else in life and any real game is learned, and that they should be given a tool to immediately figure out, based on the game's underlying mechanics, what went wrong with taht wipe 20 seconds ago. Lame. If you're "hardcore," you don't need that kind of crutch.

Real "hardcore" is being willing to tough it out and figure it out without peaking beyond the 4th wall...and you know what? Real "hardcore" guilds will accomplish it just fine with the way BW has decided to offer combat logs.

 

I guess I'll repeat myself.. the functionality will be there! It will simply be inconvenient. You are arguing for inconvenience. You're arguing for time delay on information, not the lack on information. You're arguing for temporary ignorance, and for delays, and workarounds, and stopping in the middle of raids to go review logs online, instead of just having it built into the game.

 

I never said I was hardcore. I know that hardcore players will be accessing logs, just as they'll be using macros. All the inconvenience does is punish the players who can't be bothered to go to such lengths outside of the game to get information and functionality inside the game.

 

I don't know who you're appealing to with "real hardcore will blah blah". As I said, there already are very inconvenient damage meters in the game. I guess a real hardcore might use them.

 

As for meters being a crutch, you've got it backwards. Not having meters is a crutch for the very poor players to use to stay under the radar and not have to improve their play.