I've had an idea boiling in my head since I woke up this morning, and need to share it with the community! I'm sorry if this has already been discussed somewhere, or is even available in another game. I was not able to find it.
One of the biggest problems I see in current games is the availability of information - you always know what you're going to get. You know that if you go to this one named mob it's the only place to get a certain item you're looking for and you start farming it until it drops your item. After you get the item, you're done with that mob and move on. I have an idea of how to get rid of this problem, at least to a certain extent.
Loot Types
What if the loot tables were much larger and items weren't limited to a specific mob? What if there are "loot types" such as "web", "bone", or "blade" that related to the specific mobs such as spiders, skeletons or orcs? Mobs could have multiple loot types, such as orcs having "blade" and "leather". The items would have a certain hidden level and could drop on any appropriate mob throughout the world that had that loot type table.
Here's an example - let's say the named spider in Halnir that we didn't get to see on stream is level 30. That spider would have like an 90% chance to drop a "web" type item in the range of 26-34 and a 10% chance to drop a web item outside of that range let's say 24-25 or 35-36. Now the thing is there could also be a spider way over on Reignfall or in Wild's End that could also drop these same web items. It would be greatly more exciting when you get a certain drop you've been looking for (or even an unheard of item) rather than farming the same mob for a specific item.
Loot from all mobs instead of just named
Continuing on the web-based items from spiders, maybe they don't even just drop off of named mobs. Wouldn't it be cool if these items had a small % to drop off normal spiders? I'm talking really small like 1% to drop a magic item (which of course has a large loot table of all level-appropriate web magic items), whereas a named mob would always drop a magic item. Or maybe even named mobs would have a 90% chance to drop 1 special item, and a 10% chance to drop 2. Variability is key.
One of the biggest concerns with open-world MMOs is that when you're looking for an item there' s one place to get it. Everyone who needs that item is looking to get a specific camp that allows them to get the item. With a "loot type" system there would be many places in the world that has a chance to drop a certain item which moves away from the single-camp system. It might be harder for an individual to get a certain item, but for the server as a whole the relatively same amount of that item would get into the economy.
Loot Rotation
Another thing to throw onto this is rotating loot in and out so that you never know what you're going to get. Imagine you're looking for a weapon upgrade so you head over to the orc encampment in Halnir's Pass. You start killing orcs hoping to get the certain sword that your friend got last week or you read about on a community site such as pantheon101. All of a sudden a new axe drops that you use that you've never seen before. How cool would that be?? Also if an item was rotated out then it would have so much more mystique going forward as it couldn't be found anymore. People would still be hoping to get it, but eventually the community would realize that item is of the past.
Two concerns with the system proposed by the OP.
Firstly, if you could get "boss" quality items from landscape mobs there would be little incentive to do dungeons. Maybe once on the first character to see what it was like. And reduced incentive to do dungeons means reduced incentive to group which runs a bit contrary to the game's objectives.
Secondly, it would be a lot harder for people exploring and questing in level-appropriate areas if higher level people - maybe *much* higher - farmed the trash mobs for low percentage drops. Few things are less fun than being in an area appropriate for your level but being unable to do much because higher level people keep taking the mobs and killing them so fast you can barely get a few an hour before the high levels get them.
I have no problem with the proposal on the surface and I agree with the reasons used to support it - but I am quite afraid of the consequences.
Named mobs would still have much higher chance of dropping items (in the example in OP I said 100% for named, and 1% or less for normal), so there still would be reasons to search, kill and even camp nameds. The items of that type would just have very small chance dropping off normal mobs too. And of course there are always options such as maybe on trash mobs it could only drop items of that type up to its level and not be able to drop items slightly above level such as from a named.
In regards to higher-level players killing all the low-level trash for very small chance of low level magic items, I just don't see that being viable for the higher-level player. They should have better things to do and if they don't then that's a problem in itself.
I'll be honest. I dont say this often. But this isn't a bad idea. The one downfall that I can see, is that it creates a large RNG style loot system, which can be very frustrating. If I know that the best weapon for me drops off of the ice orcs. I have (want) to camp Ice orcs until the rng gods favor me with that 2 handed axe.
I would be ok with this style system for trash mobs, and lesser mobs (similar to random wow green items). But in s game that is supposed to be challenging to level up, I would want to know that named A can drop my item. I would be ok if names had like 4 or 5 items on their loot table (like wow) and maybe they were no drop, too provide less incentive to farm them.
I've had similar thoughts about loot, and like this idea in general. First, regarding powerful gear dropping from normal mobs: I've played games where powerful items can drop from random enemies (with a very small drop %), and I always thought that was cool. As to whether it would cause problems to have dungeon quality items drop rarely from random mobs, I don't really see how it would as long as the drop % was very small. But I'm not an expert on that sort of thing, so I'll leave it in VR's capable hands.
I definitely also like the idea of shared loot tables. I don't see why a particular item couldn't drop from an orc in one part of the world and a ratkin in another and maybe a zombie somewhere else. It would definitely make farming more fun in my opinion, and I would think it would go a long way toward freeing up camps as well.
I don't think it's a bad idea at all. However, there still should be unique drops from named mobs to balance it out and insure that those encounters feel meaningful and special.
Here's what I would propose:
- All mobs in a zone have shared loot tables based on their type (ie orc, spider, etc).
- Every mob (even the lowliest orc foot soldier) has a very small chance to drop something from that shared loot table.
- Bigger/tougher mobs (Orc Lieutenants, Spider Matriarchs) get a higher chance to drop something from the table.
- In addition, those bigger/tougher mobs have secondary loot tables that are shared with other mobs of their caliber (the loot table is still shared, but only between other mobs of the same general difficulty).
- Named mobs get all of the above, and have a chance to also drop items unique to them.
In this way, players are incentivized to seek out those tougher and named opponents, but even just fighting the normal mobs can be rewarding.
That said - I'm not so sure that I want to see globally shared loot tables. It doesn't make sense to me that an orc in Reignfall might drop the same "special" item as an ice bandit in Whitethaw. There should be some distinctiveness in items based on where they come from :)
It was talked about in at least one of the "Cohh" streams, the aspect of uber magic item dropping randomly from a level 1 grass snake.
And the answer was no. Not happening. No one was a fan of ultra rare uber weapons and gear dropping from ultra common low level npcs.
What they did say is it may be possibly some semi-rare component, germane to the type of entity it came from, could drop. Something that could be traded/sold, that might be used in crafting could drop from a snake, spider, wolf, etc. Such as high grade scales, silk, pelts.
You saw this in EQ1 and more in Vanguard.
And 1% would be a pretty high probability if you start doing the math on how many players killing endless numbers of said spiders and so forth.
I think most people that never played a pure skill based game like original EQ1 and original (pre-KDQ) Vanguard were, do not understand the idea of NOT getting gear by RNG or farming.
I do not expect in Patheon you will be able to RNG or farm your way to anything of significant value.
Pantheon is not being designed to be a farm-to-win, or RNG-2-win game.
This is the one underlying aspect that so many late-comers that only grew up playing WoW, DBGs EQ and other more millennial friendly MMOs do not seem to get. Pantheon at it's core is about skill. And only skill will be rewarded.
I understand the system proposed, but I'm not a fan. Part of the reason that attracted me to Pantheon was the same reason I really liked Everquest and Vanguard (to a lesser extent). Not only was the loot rare, memorable, and meaningful, but the mobs that dropped them also became that way. It wouldn't be the same (to me) if a Shin/Tal/Zol Bok/Dar/ Froglok Knight, Shaman, Crusader, etc. could drop the short sword of the ykesha versus the named Ghoul Lord.
I "liked" that not everyone had rare gear in EQ and wearing crafted (Banded) armor well into your 20s and even 30s without any stats other than AC wasn't uncommon. I don't want to see the loot pool saturated, especially early, give the game a chance for expansions as I want to repel mudflation as long as possible.
And, Vanilla WoW had a similar system to what your propsing - WoW didn't group droppable epic items by mob type, but in Vanilla WoW at least (didn't play much past BC), there was less than a 1% chance to obtain an epic drop (purple), same for the blue (rare?), green (uncommon?). I can't really remember the percentages or the items due to the reason I dislike the system - it ends up creating too large of a loot pool where all items become watered down. I realize Blizzard was the developer for Both Diablo and Warcraft, and the system reminds me more of Diablo than a MMORPG.
It's not a "bad" system, it just isn't something I would want in a game world where I want loot to be memorable and meaningful.
Yeah that's very true about uber magic items shouldn't be dropping off level 1 snakes, and under this idea they wouldn't. A level 1 snake could potentially drop a maximum of level 6 equivalent item, which might be "Dryscale Gloves" that have 2AC and no additional stats since they're trying to keep stats down as best as possible. Maybe this system of trash mobs having a very small chance at dropping level-appropriate, mob-appropriate loot was determined to only be applied in dungeons, or maybe after a certain level. Maybe the % changes depending on zones, where dungeon trash mobs are at 0.5% drop rate of item, whereas outdoor zones such as Halnir's Pass it's at 1%. The options are endless.
The idea is that specific items aren't contained to 1 mob on the entire planet of Terminus, although surely there would be instances where it's appropriate that certain items are only found on certain mobs. It could also be conceived that maybe the % for normal mobs could be as low as 0% (although I personally really enjoy the idea of trash mobs having a very small chance of dropping a level-appropriate, mob-appropriate magic item) but the snake boss in Wild's End and a different snake boss somewhere else could both drop a "Poison Stained Fang" or "Darkscale Boots" other items that were attributed to a mob that could drop "snake" or "scale" items.
One thing to keep in mind is that animal type creatures in Pantheon won't be dropping armor or weapons of any type at all. In one of the streams it was brought up about how in EQ you could kill a snake and he would drop a rusty sword or something. Brad and Joppa quickly jumped in and said that animals like this will not drop anything that they wouldn't actually use. So a snake isn't going to wear armor or use a weapon, so it's not going to drop anything like that when you kill it.
When it comes to more intelligent creatures or races that do use these kinds of things, it will also come down to if a normal generic member of that race is going to be walking around with a fancy unique item. Yes it's possible that the Gnoll guarding that tent might have a fancy weapon, and it might even be possible that he has a magic weapon, which is why he is the perfect guy to guard the gnoll stuff in their tent. But if this Gnoll is walking around with a Epic Sword of Doom... there is no way he's the grunt who guards the tent. He's gonna be famous in the Gnoll community and will be known by name. Hense the concept of the "Named NPC". He's not 'a Gnoll Guard', he's 'Fred the Doomwielder' or whatever they call him.
Of course once players start looting the Epic Sword of Doom off poor Fred, there are going to be multiple copies of Epic Sword of Doom running around. But in the Lore side of the game there is a certain expectation that there is really only 1 Epic Sword of Doom. You can't have lots of different entities around the world all wielding their own Epic Sword of Doom, or it wouldn't be signifigant, the weapon itself wouldn't be named. It would just be called a generic magic sounding name to designate it's more than just a fancy sword, such as 'A Spellblade'. These kinds of magical swords might be common enough that your gnoll guard might actually have one and as such it could drop off various guard type enemies of various races around the world. Sure not every guy guarding a tent has a Spellblade, but some will and it could drop randomly.
Yet whenever you have a named Item... it usually coincides with a named holder of said item. George the quick who owns the Shield of Quickness. Giggles the Clown who owns the Boots of Enormous Length. No randomness to be found here. Unless you are talking about the randomness of where you might find George the Quick. He could show up in many different places, I mean he is pretty quick, but he's the only one who will have that Shield.
worik said: Loot Rotation: All of a sudden a new axe drops that you use that you've never seen before.
There is a little bit of merit to this kind of concept, where a named guy might actually have new loot and stop dropping his old loot and instead his old loot might be found on a different named guy somewhere else. Perhaps the human warrior Captain Chuckles had the sword known as 'The Tickler' but he lost it in a game of chance and now the Ogre named "Major Pain" has the sword. Meanwhile Captain Chuckles had a new magic Axe made called 'Gambler's Ruin' to remind him not to bet his fancy magic weapon in games of chance. Major Pain on the other hand used to have a Mace called 'Torture' but now that he has 'The Tickler' he gave 'Torture' to his Elf mistress 'Legolass' who happend to lose her 'Bow of Homing Missiles' and is glad to have a replacement weapon. The 'Bow of Homing Missiles' is yet to turn up anywhere yet, but I'm sure whoever found it is going to make a name for himself...
As long as there is a plausible explaination of how the loot might change hands, this could be possible for them to do. I don't know if I like the idea of specific loot never appearing again though. If you had items drop and then removed them from dropping ever again, this can make players feel like they aren't getting the full value of the game because they weren't able to get the item before it stopped dropping. Also, you can't encourage people to play your game if they know that they have totally missed out on items that won't drop anymore. They will feel like 'all the greatest items don't drop anymore' and will feel less inclined to start up playing.
I loved named mobs with specific loot, and I loved camping. I hope there is lots of both in Pantheon. I'm open to additional forms of gameplay, but not at the expense of the connection one gets to an area/zone/level/group that, imo, is really only provided when there's a traditional camp. /shrug
A few points:
Brad made a statement at one point (using the fbss as an example) saying that they would itemize the world in a way that there will not be only 1 loot option for a sought after item so that the following statement is not a concern:
worik said: if you go to this one named mob it's the only place to get a certain item
Also, random, rare world drops are fine, but as a couple people mentioned, camping named spawns is part of the draw of an open world game. You also have to understand that random, rare drops on more general, non-named, mobs have to have such a low drop rate that instead of camping one named mob for 10 hours and getting lucky to get the drop you want you might have to camp random, un-named, spiders for 100 hours. It takes a lot of the knowledge out of it and adds a large luck factor. Someone just killing spiders who is not camping a specific item is likely to end up with the item instead of someone who is specifically seeking the item because the drop rate is so low it is more about luck than rewarding a player who knows what to kill.
The item rotation idea would either lead to a known rotation that is tracked and some players know what the loot drops would be for the current rotation, or else it would be completely random and, again, simply reward luck. That doesn't keep people playing. There needs to be something players can work toward. A goal to attain item "X". If the drops are random in an unknown rotation there is nothing for players to try to attain when they log in.
Finding ways to combat the static camps for 1 single mob that no other group can get to is always something I'm a fan of. However, I don't see your idea working and here's why:
Like others said, Having magical items dropping off lowly nothing mobs creates an issue. Not only are people getting things they probably shouldn't be but you're now flooding the market with more items.
I actually suggested something awhile back to instead of having 1 static spawn spot/area for named, to have them be able to spawn from any of their type in a zone. For instance, let's use everyones favorite zone from EQ, Guk. If the Lord, Frenzy, Assassin/Supplier, etc had the ability to spawn in place of any undead melee mob then you don't need to be in any 1 certain spot for them. Same with the casters having arch mage/scribe/etc. This means you just need to be in the zone killing things to have the chance.
But it makes things a lot more RNG which a lot of people don't like either
Enitzu said:I actually suggested something awhile back to instead of having 1 static spawn spot/area for named, to have them be able to spawn from any of their type in a zone. For instance, let's use everyones favorite zone from EQ, Guk. If the Lord, Frenzy, Assassin/Supplier, etc had the ability to spawn in place of any undead melee mob then you don't need to be in any 1 certain spot for them. Same with the casters having arch mage/scribe/etc. This means you just need to be in the zone killing things to have the chance.
But it makes things a lot more RNG which a lot of people don't like either
This is something I have been wanting as well. I am ok with having a "camp" that you can pull too, but I would love to see all named mobs have random spawn locations so you can't camp a scpecific name. Anyone in the right area has a shot at it. Predetermined spawn loactions are just too fake for me.
This was briefly touched upon here: https://www.pantheonmmo.com/content/forums/topic/8469/lieutenant/
Not a fan of ultra rare "zonewide" loot tables, but would accept ultra rare racial or npc type loot tables. I am a fan of global or regional racial or NPC type loot tables. Also, i am a fan of zonewide random spawn points for named. Kill spiders long enough and eventually a rare "something" shows up randomly. Kill enough "Black Rose" mobs and something rare randomly shows up (Lore: Recruit has a rare family hierloom blade).
Generally I think the unique loot should come from specific bosses, that was part of what made camps/items so memorable in EQ. However I wouldn't be against lesser versions being low % zone drops, or certain zones/dungeons where most all the drops are very low % lottery drops from different mob types similar to places like City of Mist in Kunark.
For example:
Lord Thorne of the Black Rose drops "The Black Thorn" dagger: 7-19 damage/1.8 delay with +2 STR/DEX, +1 AGI.
As a very low % drop from Black Rose lieutenants in the zone players can get a "Rose Ripper" dagger: 6-16 damage/2.2 delay with +1 DEX/AGI.
Iksar said:Generally I think the unique loot should come from specific bosses, that was part of what made camps/items so memorable in EQ. However I wouldn't be against lesser versions being low % zone drops, or certain zones/dungeons where most all the drops are very low % lottery drops from different mob types similar to places like City of Mist in Kunark.
For example:
Lord Thorne of the Black Rose drops "The Black Thorn" dagger: 7-19 damage/1.8 delay with +2 STR/DEX, +1 AGI.
As a very low % drop from Black Rose lieutenants in the zone players can get a "Rose Ripper" dagger: 6-16 damage/2.2 delay with +1 DEX/AGI.
I am all for this idea, as long as killing rats does not allow me to get the random loot. I want to know that i have to kill Black Rose NPC's for this dagger.
I also think it depends highly on the loot. EQ had many exampls of "zone" drops or of a table shared by a large group of mobs. Think bronze armor, or fine steel weapons, for example. The Sarnak Earring of Station was a level 60 quality item that dropped in 5 different zones. I think iconic items should drop from specific encounters, but having other variables involved for other loot has already been done and sounds fine to me.
I was ok with the sarnak earring or the see invis bracer because you killed sarnaks for them. What made me mad was items that dropped zonewide like Seb Beserker Cloak. Why was that not just put onto Trak's loot table or given to a boss or given to golems only?