Two things I hope to see on loot..
I want to see realistic drops. I should not kill a rat and get a breastplate and a staff. Doesn't make a lot of sense. I would prefer to see all trash mobs to drop materials that can be used in crafting to make the gear you need. I would rather have a raid dragon drop a scale that I can get crafted into a breastplate than have it just drop the breastplate. This is personal preference and I know some people don't want that level of immersion, but I do like it.
I want the mob to be holding the weapon if it is going to drop. If I see a skele (or VS) with a sword, I know if I kill them I the sword will drop.
Isaya said:IMHO any raid mob should drop raid items. And more than one type item. I have limited time raiding and there were many people really upset when 3-4 groups of people would kill a raid mob only to find 1 rare iten drop so they were always a big didcussion of who was to get the item. I also remember when our small guild joined a larger guild in eq1. We went to plane of fear and started clearing it out. we were there fora few hours when a vermiculated chest dropped. I was the only druid who had not gotten this item yet. But when the item dropped it was held there by the guild leader while we waited for a druid who was not even in the raid to get there so he could give it to him. This to me was so unfair. When I asked why it was given to a person not even in the raid I was told he was in the guild longer than me and was next in line.
Needless to say my stay in the new guild was short lived.
I know this is different than a raid boss but it is an example of what happens when drops are so rare that it takes a long time to get the drop again.
I have been in those guilds... had a guild where a rogue had the dagger already, but even though I had more DKP the raid leader gave the next drop to him so he could put one in his off hand as well. :p Loot distribution is a really hard topic in a lot of ways. Especially in a game where you can trade everything even after you use it. I hope I can find a good fun group to play with for this game. I have always liked the smaller family style guilds. Where everyone hangs out... everyone worries about each other... yeah, no server firsts... but I'd rather get their slow with people I enjoy being around than racing with people who I do not consider friends.
Rubezahl said:Two things I hope to see on loot..
I want to see realistic drops. I should not kill a rat and get a breastplate and a staff. Doesn't make a lot of sense.
Boss Rat that killed many adventurer could have a stash of Items that they used. It's is a fantasy game after all. I get your point however and stay reassured they explicitly said what you just said there word for word.
Higher level non-humanoid mobs dropping actual loot doesn't really bother me much. What I would consider a big problem with having any sizeable portion of drops from raid zones (and higher/highest tier group dungeons) be crafting mats to make powerful items is that it means those crafted items then are very likely to be tradeable. Part of the allure and call to getting involved in the more difficult content is getting the reward that is otherwise unavailable; the prestige that comes with people seeing your equipment and being wowed, knowing the only way to get it is to have conquered X content personally. Obviously not ALL raid drops need or even should go that route but I think most of the best of the best armors and especially weapons should (also not saying they should be way better than tradeable drops, some just a little and others just a little more than that).
I actually agree with Iksar, here. If raid zones drop 90% crafting mats and 10% actual loot, it won't take long before the people doing the raiding start flooding the market with the crafting mats - and then, you have tons of people running around in raid-level gear without actually having step foot into raid-level content. Not only does that cause all kinds of social issues (people feel like raiding rewards aren't worth it, or like other people didn't earn their gear), but it also effectively devalues *any* other gear, looted or crafted, in the game. Why go try to get the sword from the dungeon when you can just buy a raid-level sword for cheap?
So, while I'm in favor of crafting mats being a component of raid rewards - I don't think they can be common enough to have them make up the bulk of the rewards. Ideally, when that crafting component drops, it should be just as rare and special as any finished piece of loot that might drop.
Yes I would want Raid Bosses to drop at least a couple pieces of decent gear equal to their difficulty with a small percentage chance for dropping a rare top quality piece of gear.
But I would hope instead of Pantheon having a preset of high level persistent Raid Bosses that lend to farming, they would only exist for say a week to a month for adventurers to kill,
then be replaced by a new raid boss who has taken over from his deceased predecessor. This would allow for new mechanics/abilities for the raid boss which would lead to new weekly or monthly challenges to raiders. Because honestly after 10,20,50 times killing the same raid boss with the same mechanics gets really boring really fast. And this little thing would be a more realistic behavior for Terminus the world versus Terminus the Game world. Just the act of constantly killing new raid bosses in a dungeon over time would lend itself to additonal storylines and add to the history of Terminus. It would feed nicely into your progeny with stories of your victories over the cruel dictators in the dungeon keep near your village.
But I digress. Sorry for jacking the thread. Yes Raid Bosses should always drop loot.
quite difficult topic for me.
in my opinion raidboss should always drop something. it's very disappointing if you manage to down one and the drop is just...meh. the raid accomplished something and should be rewarded therefor at least somehow with something useful.
i like the currency system mentioned in this thread, where i might get not an item but a currency with which i can buy some armor at a vendor.
i also kind of dislike the random mechanics of loot. if there is no warrior in the raid, the raidboss will guaranteed drop something warrior-only. I dislike when loot is just wasted because you didnt bring all classes or everyone has the item already. just thinking out of the box here: why cant it be that when you slay that raidmob "bigbadbat" in the basement of a haunted castle, that a friendly npc spawns and offer your group some rewards to choose from? Like a jailmaster offers your raidgroup 2 items out of 20 from his weapons cache? the raidleader can then choose for his group and distribut the loot as he wish.
grinding the same bosses over and over and praying that they finally drop the item needed seems wrong to me. the challenge should come from getting to the mob and killing him and not the luck in the lootdistribution.
I do not remember ever being involved in a boss raid encounter without a single decent drop and I would have a problem devoting hours to a raid that had that potential. That said, I also wouldn't want the other extreme where raid gear is dropped too often rendering a given area obsolete in a short time. The raids I remember from EQ (planes, dragons, giants, etc) seemed to have that sweet spot with just enough loot to keep us coming back...
Jexx
Nandor said:... just thinking out of the box here: ...
It's easier than that, and doesn't affect the economy. Repeatable quest to kill, quest item granted after kill, turn in quest, get no-sell, no-trade item for your class/role. If you already have a/the reward? Go and sacrifice it for one of many buffs, for yourself or someone else, or sacrifice it to advance the guild you're in.
The best part? Such a system can exist in parallel / conjunction / at the same time as the historically proven-to-be-toxic static competitive loot system, to alleviate all that tasty toxicity. ;)
It seems a composite method may work well here ....
1. Make drops fall into 3 categories: (example %'s)
60% Crafting
15% Faction/Quest
25% Items
2. Each category should have a breakdown, based on type: (example %'s)
45-60% [-1 Tier Gear] [Tables: Uncommon-Rare]
25-35% [ = Tier Gear] [Tables: Common-Uncommon]
15-25% [ = Tier Gear] [Tables: Uncomon-Rare]
3. The quantity will be adjusted based on loot 'power' vs 'mob' power
With lower tier loot giving twice (or other multiple) number of items.
Thus, when the boss falls there will be:
Crafting components (bits of hide, scales, horn etc),
Much of it will be slightly 'lower' than mob's tier, but some equal and potentially rare..
Faction/Quest reagents (parts for epic quests, high-end hand-in gear for factions etc)
Again, half will be slightly lower tier than the boss, but more plentiful.
Item drops (Weapons/armour/misc gear)
By varying the breakdown of loots and allowing 'slightly lower' value loot (but perhaps more of them, or rolling higher (more chance of rares) on the loot table) in the mix - this should stop the market being swamped with either crafting components or 'top end' gear.
Not a perfect solution by any means, but perhaps by using some lower loot tables in addition to the regular one, and having a breakdown/split between types of drops (crafting, quest/faction, items) there would always be something useful dropped. Thus, if your preferred item did not drop - perhaps you can use the crafting components to have a variant of this made (or upgrade your item closer to the power of the item you sought)
[You could even ring-fence a single (or 1-2) guranteed 'top end' pieces with the rest being spread across (potentially) 3+ loot tables!]
PS: In answer to the question about players having themselves a raid-level item made for themselves (via crafting) without even seeing the mob in question, well - this begs the question: is the intention for all raid-level items to be no-drop? If not, then selling/trading the items (rather than crafting components) is an equally simple task.
Evoras, likes mobs to drop body-parts but acknowledges a crafting component glut is not good!
My only problem with raid bosses dropping craftable materials is it shouldn't ever trivilize raid drops. I am a hardcore crafter and I never want my items to be better then content that require 2 groups or more to complete. Maybe I am in the minority, but that is just my feeling on that subject. As far as raids bosses and the "trash mobs" leading up to the bosses there should be rare chance of drops on trash and for the bosses themselves should drop something that is useable by someone in that raid. Nothing like a drop that no one can use, so they sell it to people not in the raid for some kind of in game currency (currently krono in EQ).
I'm rather done with raid loot tables. It was always an unfair mechanic and meant having to do the same few dumb raids twenty times in order to get "geared up" for the next tier. Rift did this better by effectively giving everyone DKP to spend on the items they find useful.
A nice middleground would be crafting materials that can be made into multiple items for various classes. Instead of 20 items on a loot table, maybe 5 crafting materials that each can be used to make 4 different items.
Potential downside is that crafting would basically become mandatory for the whole raiding playerbase, which could blow.
I would love to see something like that where players have some flexibility/control over what could be made with drops that are still gated behind RNG. I think it's perfectly fine if crafters become necessary to make a bunch of the items too. Any serious raiding guild will have an abundant supply of crafters anyway.
I've said it before but it probably bears repeating. I'm a crafter, I'm a raider, and I'm a filthy casual - meaning, I have a full-time job and am making an honest effort at dating, in addition to this hobby ;)
So what I would like to see:
For bosses:
- About 1/3 of drops should be finished items. There can be a variation in quality between items (rare/ultra-rare), but if the boss drops 3-4 things every time you kill it, one of them should be a finished item so someone gets that immediate gratificaiton.
- About 1/3 of drops should be "repairable" items. These are things like broken swords, and so on. The idea is that a crafter could take this item, along with some materials, and restore it to its former glory. Because of the extra interaction needed, these items could be equivalent to "ultra-rare" drops.... but of course, fixing them should require "ultra-rare" materials... or, even quests to get those "ultra-rare" materials.
- About 1/3 of drops should be crafting components. These are things that a crafter can use in a variety of recipes to make a really nice item. These shouldn't be as powerful as the repairable items, but the advantage to these is flexibility. That crafter isn't confined to just making a sword - they could make a staff, or a bow, or a mace, or an axe.. or possibly even a shield or a piece of armor. So the person who wins the dropped component, could go and get something really nice made that suits their class.
For non-bosses:
- Very rarely dropped finished items, lesser quality than boss loot, but still really nice.
- Rarely drop crafting components, again, less powerful than boss loot, but still nice.
- Rarely drop quest components (if it makes sense - like the EQ planar armor quests)
My goal here is to try to accomplish the following:
1) Insure that raids have meaningful rewards
2) Promote a way for crafters to interact with adventurers at raid levels, without taking away the desire to raid for drops
3) Insure that every encounter players fight is worthwhile - so that it's not just a speedbump between players and the boss.
All of that sounds great. Ultimately I just want crafting to matter, and always matter. Tying it into a portion of raid drops guarantees that it stays relevant. I may or may not really like crafting, at least assuming that the rewards for it are worthwhile.
I'm getting a little off topic here. :)
Liav said:That doesn't sound like DKP to me. What am I even reading?
LOL, yep..some guilds had dkp as more of a guideline and factored in all kinds of fun ways to work around thier systems or have it appear they were dkp, but were merit based... when you apply to a guild you gotta read the fine print!!
I would be happy if bosses would minimally drop "something" - with that something being (minimally) a common loot table for that boss... with a chance to drop something nicer. I think some of their loot (in all categories of common, rare, ultra rare) should be common across some classes - with perhaps something specific for SOME classes (but not all on each boss).
The combination of loot shared across some classes along with the specific loot for some classes would provide the potential for drops for all classes.
I like the idea of crafting items dropping - BUT - I would have different grades of crafting items too... for common drops, those crafting items could be used to make stuff for anyone. For rare / ultra-rare, I think I would put a limitation on it such that those crafting items can only make items useable by someone who killed that specific boss.
I don't think bosses should be loot pinatas. A boss shouldn't drop something for everyone every time you kill it - rather, I think it should drop enough things (common / rare / ultra-rare) for a lesser percentage of the raid... perhaps 20 - 25%. Meaning if a raid of 20 people went, then at MOST 4 or 5 items would drop, and those items will typically be common loot with the chance to include rares or ultra rares.
Raid boss common drops would still be a little nicer than things you would get in other areas of the world.
Nasotha said:I'm rather done with raid loot tables. It was always an unfair mechanic and meant having to do the same few dumb raids twenty times in order to get "geared up" for the next tier. Rift did this better by effectively giving everyone DKP to spend on the items they find useful.
No, no, a thousand times no.....
DKP is a bad idea. An even worse idea in an "old school" MMO. DKM is basically a holdover from the "Everyone's a winner" mentality that they are pushing in school now days.
What about Quest updates? If the quest is to kill the raid boss, and you kill the raid boss, should everyone who participated in the kill get the quest update?
If the answer is yes, then.. If the quest update requires an item to turn in, should everyone get the item AS the update?
vjek said:What about Quest updates? If the quest is to kill the raid boss, and you kill the raid boss, should everyone who participated in the kill get the quest update?
If the answer is yes, then.. If the quest update requires an item to turn in, should everyone get the item AS the update?
Quest updates I like as long ass the mob in question is a part of a quest line, or maybe killing it triggers a quest.
