I hope they never release a DPS meter

With no boss enrage timers, what would be the purpose of dps meters?

Survive boss abilities = win.

Amazing concept.

People have been using them since at least EQ1.

It would also make for a pretty boring fight.

In the example I cited, there was a single fight (Vale) that hinged on DPS. The rest of the zone was about tactics and coordination. Crowd control and management.

If you'd like I'll run you through the Planes of Power? Vex Thal? Temple of Veeshan? And point out how often in EQ the fight was not about straight up burn him down DPS.

The damage meter doesn't tell you anything important. It never did. Guilds beat content through teamwork and tactics. DPS has its place, and if your guild is even worth a damn, its officer or class leader knows how to train the DPS to do their job in the encounter.

No, you don't need a damage meter to raid. You never did.

As far as raid healing goes, google search The Quon and The Purple Club.

Just because some idiots would use the tool incorrectly doesn't mean the tool should be banned (yes, the examples you talk about are all incorrect usages).

As someone earlier said, just because someone could misuse a hammer and kill someone we don't go and outlaw hammers.

A patent disregard of the intended use of a tool should never warrant the outlawing of said tool.

Want some good examples of where DPS meters help?

Al'Akir Heroic - Did a spark die too soon? Too late? If the former, who was attacking the spark? Were there too many DoTs on it? If the latter, who wasn't attacking the spark when they should be? Alternatively, the sparks are dying but you can't push the boss into his last phase because the Healers go OOM from too many Rain stacks. Why? Are people taking avoidable damage and thus making them work overtime? Or is the DPS too low? If the latter, how much more do we need?

Nefarian Heroic - An add gets off his cast in P2. How many interrupts were used on the add? Someone dies to an Electrocute in P3, why? Did they use CDs? Did the Healers not get him to 100% HP in time?

Omnotron Heroic - Someone got pwned by Arcanatron, why? How many interrupts did he receive? Did one miss or did a DPS just fail? A slime made it through to the Raid and one shot the Healers. Why? How many DPS were hitting the slimes? Someone pops a shield and wipes the Raid. Was it a DPS being silly and not swapping quick enough? Was it a mis-rallied pet?

These are just a few examples from the top of my head where meters can be used PROPERLY to diagnose what went wrong and caused your Raid to wipe. This is what they should be used for.

Totally agree.

To the OP: I'd be happy to team with you any day.

To anyone who disagrees with the OP: Please do not team with me.

I know what I'm doing, and I don't need a meter to see if someone does.

Not really. In EQ 1 they just saved their combat log as a .txt file and used a simple program or spreadsheet to parse the damage stats they wanted.

They didn't start appearing as in-game add-ons until later.

Again, you haven't been keeping up with the times. Almost all Warcraft bosses have an enrage timer, and the point of the enrage timer is to make DPS accountable. You still need coordination, you still need interrupts, you still need crowd control and you still need buffs/debuffs. You still need to stay out of the fire.

But you also have to make sure you're killing that guy as fast as you possibly can, or your group wipes. It's fun, it's challenging, and it's impossible without knowing what you're capable of.

Obviously. But for this game? There's none of that which requires a DPS meter. You don't need it to beat anything in this game.

Mostly people requesting it in this game just want to know what buttons to push in which order.

Which all they'd need for that is a combat log.

Something I do support them adding to the game. But then, I think people who really want to know what buttons to push in which order should do the hard work and the math themselves. Put some effort into things.

Otherwise, it's ... as I said ... lazy.

100,000 credits says you have no idea what you're doing, and are a bad trying to hide your badness.

There have been parsers with in-game overlays that more or less do the same thing. But this is all semantics anyway. All I want is a combat log in the first place, anything else is fluff.