Damage Meters Please

Gee...this topic comes back from the dead every once in a while like an old-school vampire.
Basically, it is a matter of trust. I spent hours sifting through parser data, comparing notes and exchanging ideas on rotations and energy management. We 'taped' our operations and analyzed the vids together with our guildies. In the end we came up with new ideas on how to squeeze some extra DPS out of our chars without being negligent about boss mechanics. Eventually we developed a sense of trust. We could trust each and every member to be as prepared as they could possibly be for an encounter. Anyone new to the team had to submit him-/herself to the same rigorous system of inquiry and improvement. Parser data helped but it was our mutual respect for each other as gamers which enabled us to do better as a team.
A system like recount relies on anything BUT trust. Such a system basically postulates that there are always some who don't 'pull their weight' and that there is a simple and quick method to identify them: A very basic DPS-count forced down the throat of MMO veteran and newbie alike. The end result is a caste of recount dictators and a brainless army of recount slaves. No room for fun, no room for innovation, just an enormous peer pressure to conform to a streamlined 'server solution'. Those who deviate in the slightest get discarded. Who has time for new players, right?
On second thought: Let 'em have it! This game is a broken dream as it is. Might as well let in the devil.

Play with people who use it correctly instead. There are plenty of them out there, and most in high end progression know how to use recount for more than DPS. It's PuG leaders who tend not to know what they are doing.

This proves my point a little more, though that's not what you wanted to do. In that job, they'd have a boss/manager/supervisor (ie, Raid Leader) watching said employees, and if Bob wasn't doing his job, or was slacking that bad, his *** would be gone.

One way to get these tools in a more positive light is to stop calling them damage meters. They are useful for far more than just seeing damage. And my hard mode EC guild does not throw people out based on damage. We're far more critical on unecessary deaths. We use Mox and Ask Mr. Robot (and dpsmeters.com when it existed) in constructive ways.

All that being said, we primarily use it to analyze boss damage to the player and for learning the names and average damage of those boss abilities. What I would like is something like Recount Death Tracker, which showed you the last few hits the player took before dying. I found it really difficult to analyze this sort of thing without a proper tool.

Quote: Originally Posted by Taorus

Because any tool can be abused. This tool has been used many times incorrectly.

??? so we should all suffer because there are a few idiots out there????

Well to be fair YOUR saying we should all suffer despite the idiots out there that will use it wrongly

Why is your veiw so much mor eimportant then the other sides?

I say no to damage meters as seen first hand how stupid people get around them and met a few players in game that already try to spout numbers like the bible and them with a damage meter would be a collussal disaster!

They not required, good groups work togather and figure it all out with out the meters

Come on Georg Zoeller ... help a brother out.

Those that know how to use them are not the problem, the idiots that don't are. There are more Idiots than those that know how to use a damage meter.