You don't get mages, orcs, goblins or health bars hovering above people's heads either.
In real life you don't get a DPS meter
If you aren't worried about numbers you shouldn't be playing a game that depends on them so heavily.
Just because it's on a PC doesn't mean the end user needs to want to swim in numbers.
There are others ways of "measuring" dps threat and heals. IE did you beat the encounter? if not, what was observed that could be improved...basic stuff. Really don't need to involve meters. IMO it pollutes the whole scene.
Have you played WoW without DBM? Yeah most people couldn't handle the fights. Shit AVR pretty much raiding for you and people still had trouble in ICC. Same with this game. "Hey get this debuff run out of the group." Sounds really easy because it is. Well, I still wipe on the first boss in RD because some moron won't notice he has it and sits in the group killing everyone.
DPS and threat meters are good for meta gaming. Especially earlier on in the games life cycle. Knowing what gives the best damage output is crucial to being good at end game. You can't just face roll and pretend you're going to be a top guild.
You're right, there is no NEED for meters. But if I want to do the most DPS I can possibly squeeze out, having a real number to go against helps a lot. Why does having a DPS meter hurt the casuals (who, let's face it, aren't going to go nearly as in depth as "hardcore" players)? It doesn't. It just offers a tool for people who want to use it. I'd love to know that my rotation is optimal, not just guess that I am a beast because I downed a boss.
So what if everyone is getting out of the bad spots on the floor and appear to be doing everything right? What is your troubleshooting steps then, keep wiping to the boss and wondering why raid awareness isn't getting you past it?
It's my opinion that if you think a game like this doesn't need damage meters, then you either don't run any dungeons or raids, or you're running with such an elite group that your numbers don't matter.
Last time I checked, playing a game meant doing something entertaining and having fun. Continue on to my reply to smack's post.
Thank you. Basically, if my group/raid survives, then we had enough dps/heals. If my group dies, then we didn't. These games are open-ended... there's no penalty for "losing" once or twice. I'd rather just enjoy the moment than worry about whether or not I'm gonna see an epic drop.
Yes. I played WoW when everybody was already established and basically to get in a group you needed to submit your resume with DPS/HPS ability, along with a full unabridged list of what mods/add-ons you ran to ensure you were doing your job to its fullest potential.
It wasn't long after that that I sold my account and never looked back.
It's a game, people, not a job. I may play it somewhat religiously right now, but that's because I love the environment and the challenge of exploring a new world. I'm not there to be YOUR DPS servant, and I don't expect you to be mine. Play the game. Enjoy the challenge. If you don't want me in your group because I don't know my DPS down to the 5th decimal place? I don't give a shit. Move on.
"Enjoying the game" and "seeing how much damage I am doing" are not mutually exclusive concepts.
If you don't kill the boss because of a lack of DPS how would you ever actually know where the problem lies if you cannot see how much DPS is being done?
Yawn. Strawman arguments.
Don't get me wrong... I'm all for optimizing my gameplay. I look at item stats and piece together gear that gives me the best primary stats I'm looking for. I use ability combos that I have learned give me the best combination of efficiency and survivability possible. But I don't go out of my way to optimize my play style around anyone else's, outside of the ability that Rift gives in allowing me to choose roles as needed. But as I said, I'm not going to give a rats ass if I do .000001 or 1000 less DPS than optimal provided my original goals are met.@SunnyD
Some of us enjoy meta gaming, doing the hardest content available, striving to be the best on the server / world. Just because you don't have fun optimizing your gameplay, doesn't mean I don't. This game isn't my job, but I still put forth some thought into it. I'm sorry if you want to casually stroll about enjoying the occasional boss fight. I play for end game content and PvP.
Who cares? Roll a new group and try again. Your breed sounds like my son, who requires a win in a game in order for it to be fun. Cheat codes are used if they have to be in order to achieve that. Yay, fun.
IMO, DPS meters and the like are for lazy players. If you can't figure out how to do effective DPS, healing, or whatever without a meter to help you, well....
Again with the strawman arguments. If I am looking to do raids with my guild I am not going to "roll a new group" endlessly until we manage to get something that works.
Right. We should also take away the health bars from players and mobs as well because they are simply for lazy people.
As I said, must have "I WIN BUTTON" otherwise not having fun. Strawman on fire!
So can you actually come up with decent argument as to why the game shouldn't allow add-ons or are you just going to stamp your feet and make things up?
Can you come up with a decent argument why they should allow them? Seems like all the ones you've provided thus far are in the same category as mine: opinion. I'm quite content with the game's facilities as is; you're the one that seems to be stamping feet.
Yep. With DPS and threat meters available to the community, it takes a lot off the developers from having to put in massive work to find out what to balance. The players will do all the work for them. Add-ons are for player customization. If the developers truly feel their game is perfect and doesn't need any extra features, they are mistaken.
The last thing I want (yes, I said *I* want) is my peers balancing the game, because then it turns into WoW where everything is biased by the loudest whiners out there. Then PvE gets thrown all to shit, and it becomes unenjoyable.
The devs have logs from every single piece of damage made. Let it be their game to make, and ours to play.
DPS, threat and healing are critical aspects of these games. Not having any way of measuring them is just absurd.
Thank you. Basically, if my group/raid survives, then we had enough dps/heals. If my group dies, then we didn't. These games are open-ended... there's no penalty for "losing" once or twice. I'd rather just enjoy the moment than worry about whether or not I'm gonna see an epic drop.
Yeah, lets keep this as far from WoW as possible so it dies out after a month and a half... Great idea.
What is on the test server may not actually be what is on the live server. After this patch do some end game on a sab and see where they stand.
And is there any mods that function like Recount and Bagnon? Are mods even available for this game? If so, someone please port DBM over. I am tired of horrible people.
But that's my complaint about these kinds of "flexible" class systems. If the best combos for each class type are balanced, and everything else sucks, you end up with only 4 classes.
Can you come up with a decent argument why they should allow them? Seems like all the ones you've provided thus far are in the same category as mine: opinion. I'm quite content with the game's facilities as is; you're the one that seems to be stamping feet.
I'm sorry but while it's fun to see the data from the parsers at times, that should never be the focus of a game. Whatever happened to playing for the fun and challenge? I'm sure the build I have is subpar for maximum DPS output. Guess what? I don't care. I play to have fun.
I don't mean to deride your play style but your train of thought is exactly what was wrong with WoW.
Everything was about what gear you had. Don't have the proper gear? Sorry, you can't join us. You'll drag us down on our raids. I've seen/heard of so many smaller guilds lose players because the person was only interested in the smaller raids to gear up so they could join a larger guild. Contrast this with the game I preferred which was EQ where skill was far more important that what gear you had. Gear helps but if you suck at your class, you'll still suck with better gear. A person with lesser gear but who is skilled will be noticeably better than one who is better geared but suck.
Hell, I played an enchanter in EQ and while I wasn't close to being the best geared enchanter I can honestly say without trying to boast that I was better skilled than a lot of those "better" enchanters. In EQ when you joined a raiding guild, you weren't judged on your gear but your performance during your probationary period. After a few raids the rest of the guild could tell if you sucked or not and that's what will (and should) determine if you get in or not. We had some wonderful players join our guild in EQ back when I was playing who had completely crap gear when they first joined. Contrast this with a game like WoW where so many of the players are fixated on maximum DPS or healing ability that the player's gear is more important than their skill.
I always hated DPS meters in WoW. It eventually becomes a competition to be higher the the rest and people start doing stupid shit to get that extra hit in giving healers more work, or instead of throttling your own dmg for whatever the reason the situation is there you keep pushing it.
Competition is good, but people go overboard and ruin it for everyone else.
Some people might do yes. So don't play with them.
You're missing the point. Once they become prevalent, the "hardcore" faction of elitist players like yourself will start to segregate the community between the haves (dps meter) and have-nots, as already mentioned. It will ruin the community experience and cause those of you that would normally group with anyone to only group with those that present their "tuned" DPS resume, which is what I already pointed out several posts back. It will fracture the community and make the game that much less enjoyable because then it simply becomes a raid gear grind for those of you that think that there's an end game and that's what it's about. If my experience in WoW taught me anything, once this happens it makes the server community suck because then the average player has to deal with the whole DPS meter shit and min/max myself to death just to get a group. The server community is just that... a community, not a DPS club.