The hypocrisy of hardcore raiders and ""difficulty""

Ralphie2449

For anyone who follows FF14 they know by now how the world first team cheated using zoomhacks to make it easier to see the entire arena and deal with the mechanics, literally memes are everywhere. Along with some images of other cheating addons that show mechanic damage zones before they happen.

Which later lead to Yoshi P., the main dev in charge to issue a great statement revealing the hypocrisy of many hardcore raiders

"The ultimate raid series is the most difficult battle content within FFXIV, and we release this content after testing that it can be cleared without the use of any third-party tools. However, if the presumption is that this content will be tackled and cleared with the use of third-party tools, then any reason to develop high-difficulty battle content seems to be lost. It’s very difficult for me to understand as a gamer what the meaning behind using numerous third-party tools to compete to clear first would be."

This is something I have been saying for a long time, the devs meticulously create an encounter with the tools available in game, if you are limited to a 3rd person view, the fight is DESIGNED to be cleared in 3rd person view and more often than not, in order for an encounter to be mathematically clearable it is tuned in such a way that if mechanics are done flawlessly or with a very small room for error to be realistic, you are able to clear it with most combinations of classes.

Yet what do we see by even low end ""hardcore"" raiders? Do they go in and simply keep tackling the encounter until they have mastered the mechanics?

Of course not, even if we ignore the addons which sometimes are a giant advantage, they will first obsess over abusing the most broken and meta builds or items(which the devs did not intent to be broken) in order to reduce the difficulty and then even obsess over having the most mathematically optimal combination of classes/builds in order to further reduce the difficulty so clearing it without ever truly mastering all the mechanics like the devs intended.

Proving that it was never about "difficulty"

And the thing is, in FF14 there's no actual money prizes involved, they are doing all this just for epeen reasons, now just imagine the rampart cheating that would happen if money was involved xD

But hey, keep telling yourselves you are just doing it to be "efficient" lol

cameltosis

Different people have different reasons for raiding.

For some, its the challenge and fun

For others, its the social

For yet others, its the story or unique visuals

For some, its for the "status"

For others, its for the rewards.

For many of us, its a combination of the above.

Just because some raiders cheat, doesn't mean that many others don't cheat. Its also no surprise that those aiming for world firsts are the most likely to cheat. Coming first was their aim, not the method or the fun.

Vrika

There are sadly always people who cheat. It happens in every game.

But you're now completely confusing cheaters who use third party tools to cheat to people who use the best strategy. Cheating is when you use a third party tool to edit the game, or when you abuse a bug. Whereas people who use the best (allowed) addons, best build and best skills are simply good players playing the way devs intended them to tackle the hardcore raids.

Ralphie2449

Vrika said:

Whereas people who use the best (allowed) addons, best build and best skills are simply good players playing the way devs intended them to tackle the hardcore raids.

So in your view, you believe that the devs intended that certain items and classes are broken and do like 10%-20% more dps putting them clearly above the rest balance wise.

And that they also tuned said encounter with only that specific combination of broken classes in mind knowing full well it wouldnt be mathematically possible to clear without said comb, hence intended for the encounter to only be beaten by a combination of broken classes and items they intended to be broken xD

Kyleran

Ralphie2449 said:

Vrika said:

Whereas people who use the best (allowed) addons, best build and best skills are simply good players playing the way devs intended them to tackle the hardcore raids.

So in your view, you believe that the devs intended that certain items and classes are broken and do like 10%-20% more dps putting them clearly above the rest balance wise.

And that they also tuned said encounter with only that specific combination of broken classes in mind knowing full well it wouldnt be mathematically possible to clear without said comb, hence intended for the encounter to only be beaten by a combination of broken classes and items they intended to be broken xD

Of course not, it just shows players are smarter, more clever and understand the game's design flaws better than the developer.

Maybe SQNIX just needs to hire smarter developers and playtesters.

Vrika

Ralphie2449 said:

Vrika said:

Whereas people who use the best (allowed) addons, best build and best skills are simply good players playing the way devs intended them to tackle the hardcore raids.

So in your view, you believe that the devs intended that certain items and classes are broken and do like 10%-20% more dps putting them clearly above the rest balance wise.

And that they also tuned said encounter with only that specific combination of broken classes in mind knowing full well it wouldnt be mathematically possible to clear without said comb, hence intended for the encounter to only be beaten by a combination of broken classes and items they intended to be broken xD

The devs intended for smart players to gain advantage by choosing best build, equipment, skills, buffs, etc. for their situation. Making choices like that and being able to mold your character to fit your aims has always been an important aspect of RPGs.

Of course the devs don't actually want one choice to be that much better than the rest. In modern MMOs their aim is to make the choices have nearly equal power, so that you'd be choosing playstyle rather than ability to tackle a challenge. One combination of choices being significantly more powerful than other combinations is just a side-effect that happens when they give us those choices, not their aim. But whether it's the devs aim that that combo is more powerful or just side-effect of giving us choices, looking through all of the choices there are and picking the best one is important part of RPGs.

The_Korrigan

Your post history is amazing, OP.

That's a lot of assumptions, blind generalizations and unfounded statements, and this new thread is more of the same.

Where does that obvious hatred towards anyone who plays differently or who is better than you at a video game come from ?

Xiaoki

Yoshi-P only has harsh words for "cheaters" using third party tools when it's exposed to the public.

These people are using these mods every day in every raid and Yoshi-P turns a blind eye to them.

This exact same thing happened before, May of last year the "race to world first" for Dragon Song Reprise.

It will keep happening because Yoshi-P is too scared to fully ban all mods.

mekhere

Ralphie2449 said:

For anyone who follows FF14 they know by now how the world first team cheated using zoomhacks to make it easier to see the entire arena and deal with the mechanics, literally memes are everywhere. Along with some images of other cheating addons that show mechanic damage zones before they happen.

Which later lead to Yoshi P., the main dev in charge to issue a great statement revealing the hypocrisy of many hardcore raiders

"The ultimate raid series is the most difficult battle content within FFXIV, and we release this content after testing that it can be cleared without the use of any third-party tools. However, if the presumption is that this content will be tackled and cleared with the use of third-party tools, then any reason to develop high-difficulty battle content seems to be lost. It’s very difficult for me to understand as a gamer what the meaning behind using numerous third-party tools to compete to clear first would be."

This is something I have been saying for a long time, the devs meticulously create an encounter with the tools available in game, if you are limited to a 3rd person view, the fight is DESIGNED to be cleared in 3rd person view and more often than not, in order for an encounter to be mathematically clearable it is tuned in such a way that if mechanics are done flawlessly or with a very small room for error to be realistic, you are able to clear it with most combinations of classes.

Yet what do we see by even low end ""hardcore"" raiders? Do they go in and simply keep tackling the encounter until they have mastered the mechanics?

Of course not, even if we ignore the addons which sometimes are a giant advantage, they will first obsess over abusing the most broken and meta builds or items(which the devs did not intent to be broken) in order to reduce the difficulty and then even obsess over having the most mathematically optimal combination of classes/builds in order to further reduce the difficulty so clearing it without ever truly mastering all the mechanics like the devs intended.

Proving that it was never about "difficulty"

And the thing is, in FF14 there's no actual money prizes involved, they are doing all this just for epeen reasons, now just imagine the rampart cheating that would happen if money was involved xD

But hey, keep telling yourselves you are just doing it to be "efficient" lol

What a cute post. You finally understand a crypto gamers perspective.

You stated, "Proving that it was never about "difficulty"<---crypto wasn't about difficulty either. It was about SQL injection and theft. 

Those players are your hacker and crypto crowd. Watch your back and play em back. Think like your enemy.