Thebeefe

The only case that would work in is with Tokens, but even then you go into off-specs etc. And although the idea is good in principle, locking out loot sort of takes away fromt he randomness that the idea of boss loot was built on.

 

orcsgotbooty

It also cuts down on the terribly itemized pieces that noone in the raid even wants. Including whats been mentioned numerous times, the multitude of daggers that get sharded the very first time they drop. The only dagger anyone is interested in is the illidan one, and thats only for the ember proc (yay for mages, resto shaman, and warlocks taking melee weapons).

On the topic of badge loot, why is there a weapon for basically every class/spec besides prot wars and prot pallies?


The main problem I see with this is those who are sitting out. In my past situation the melee group was rather cramped, an enhance shaman who was there ALWAYS then 2 dps warriors, 3 rogues, and two ferals looking for a spot. Non 100% attendance made it not much of a problem, but some nights we had more melee than slots, the majority of the time everyone just switched out for whichever boss loot was needed from, and everyones very considerate. If each boss drops these badges, people being sat for farm content are going to have a much larger bone to pick.

 

caelus

I personally wont enjoy the game as much if it wasn't RNG based boss loot. Eventhough I've been attending many raids for a single piece of drops but after 15 kills it still hasn't showed up. I may be frustrated at this, but if its simple badge rewards, I wouldn't enjoy it as much.

 

Angeron

I'd like to hear more input from sp raiders on how nice/terrible the Item+sunmote turnin is. If they implemented a similar scheme for weapons(daggers hahahahahahahahaah) and offset items like the ABSOLUTELY SHITTY pvp necks from twins (seriously, let's give PVErs a season 1 level item dropping from the second hardest fight currently accessible) this could be a very good change? You could implement it in such a way that the gear swaps wouldn't just sit on a vendor, it had to be 'quested' like the naxx armor, or some similar situation like that, and it would solve the problem of seeing triple vanquisher and illidan dagger dropping 10 kills in a row.

Though I can hide my cold gaze, and you can shake my hand and feel flesh gripping yours, and maybe you can even sense our lifestyles are probably comparable; I simply am not there.

On your server, causing econo-trauma.

 

Enova

Personally, I rather like the feel of good, old fashioned random loot; somehow, it keeps the game fun, and it makes for showing off. However, it stops being funny when, say you're DEing the same thing over and over again, while something half the people in the raid want. I could give you hundreds of anecdotes about that, but I think we've all had our share. So, let's assume you've been farming BT for a year, and have yet to see enough of certain drops. How do you fix that? Well, say after you complete the 'kill Illidan quest' AND are exalted with Ashtongue Deathsworn, you get a one time quest where you pick one or two pieces of loot you always wanted. For the sake of argument, let's say one generic ring/neck/cape/trinket/weapon pick, depending on your path (assassin, arch mage, restorer and protector) and maybe one non-tier armor class specific loot (i.e dps mail/healing mail/pally plate/warrior plate). Of course, similar quest to kill Archi, awarding the same choice from the respective instance. Ideally, not 9/10 of your healers will go for Memento, because of an unlucky streak, leaving the next 4 ones that drop to be disenchanted A bit of communication, personal priorities and planning ahead should ease the loot distribution for everyone. Not everyone will value the same items equally. As a caveat, the higher ilevel items from the end bosses may or may not be included on the selection list, depending on how steep the reputation grind is tuned to be. The inherent problem I see to this is that it only works well with reputation based instances; this would leave, say Gruul's lair uncovered, unless for some reason you could find a reason to link a quest do a different faction reputation. Also, this would most likely turn the game into a 'grind exalted and move on' fest so perhaps these changes could be introduced retroactively, as a nerf, of sorts.

On a different train of thought, the idea of tokens isn't really bad. It's the actual way they're put into the game that I'm displeased with. It's been said before, but it makes absolutely no fucking sense that the guy that sells tier 4/5 is safely in Shattrath, showing the goodies off. It also makes no sense that the tier dropping bosses would just have some uncrafted armor bits on them; the tier bosses are supposed to be high ranking bastards among bastards. So let's say Archimonde wouldn't drop 'Helm of the Forgotten ... ' but 'Archimonde's Shattered crown/cowl/helm', which, aside from being a nice, shiny trophy, still retains some of his power. Except it's broken and you can't tap into that power; you need someone to unlock it for you, for whatever modest turn in (1x Arcane Tome/Fel Armament or 1x Bolt of Cloth or heck, 1xChromaggus' Right Head, if you please, depending on how long a time sink you want the respective level of raiding to be). Same 'deliver X token to Y NPC' mechanics, a whole new feel. In theory, anyway...
Of course, it makes sense that the tier 6 vendor or turn in quest, or whatever, should at least be in the Night elf base in Hyjal, or in some danger. Maybe, but it's way out of place to have to go to MH every time you need to get a token. So let's say he's conveniently Ad'al instead, and it would still make more sense than what we have so far. You bring proof of your deeds, and it just so happens he can salvage something


As for further alternatives to raid gear? Badges are perfect system for that. However, it's flawed in that you basically need to backtrack content to get badges. Nothing wrong with that, but the ones who have the time and the guild to clear MH/BT each week, kill 4 bosses in Sunwell, and still squeeze in a weekend Kara and ZA are the ones who least need the badges, as opposed to those who are even now struggling with Solarian or HKM. So, how about limiting the number of badges a week a character can earn to say 40 (seeing as a Kara clear yields 25)? In theory, this should encourage people to get the fuck out of Kara already and do a heroic or two to get their last 3-5 badges. Now, this goes against some of the suggestions for tiered badges, but let's take this further and assume they make the really powerful ilevel 141+ items cost 200 badges, while an ilevel 115 would only cost 40. The idea behind this - unless it's really a massive error of judgment on my behalf - is that badge loot is supposed to be an alternative to raid earned gear. But a hardcore raider that only really needs a few upgrades will probably already have a healthy stockpile of badges handy, and is willing to spend them for even the smallest upgrade. By contrast, someone who's not as keen on min-maxing will be quite content with a level 115 or 128 item for that slot, both of which offer better value per effort.

As for what this badge loot should be? A bit weaker than the raiding option? A bit better than the raiding option? Personally, I think it should be a niche somewhere between two or more of the best raid drop options. Let's take, for example, physical dps cloaks for someone in mid tier 6 content, who still hasn't managed to upgrade his [Drape of the Dark Reavers]. His only options are [Thalassian Wildercloak] and [Shadowmoon Destroyer's Drape]. Now, one's purely agility based, the other is rating based. Either would be a massive upgrade, but let's assume he could chose an ilevel 141 badge cloak with a dash of agility, a dash of + hit rating or a dash of + haste. This would somehow kill the proverbial two birds with one stone; firstly, it would provide a good, decent alternative to some elusive and/or highly contested piece of gear, and it would also stop everyone who's spent enough time farming from looking like clones.

 

Sebalot

With all the data Blizzard can collect and crunch, I have no doubt they know exactly how player raid activity is affected by how much drops they get. Intuitively I suspect people tire of the game the more complete their gear sets is. So while having bosses drop badges may be practical for players it would most likely lead to players being finished with dungeons faster due to fewer items being disenchanted.

I think in general the game is fine as it is. Badgegear and 10-man raid drops are good for filling gaps while 25-man raid drops is where a raider gets the majority of the gear he needs. I think Blizzard has done a better job with balancing reward with effort in PvE than they have with PvP gear.

Personally I like the anticipation of seeing if the items I can use will drop. Sometimes they never do and sometimes they do at once. If I could buy items with some raid currency it would probably end up feeling boring.

 

Boneitis

With how long it takes blizzard to create a new dungeon and patch it into the game, speeding up progression is probably not something they are interested in. And I mean speeding it up for everyone. Those people who are always "months behind" get the helping hand but they have to stretch out cutting edge content to keep the top guilds interested.

I expect a lot more sunwell type gates in WOTLK but I also expect a LOT more badge loot and many more options to convert unwanted items into desired items. However I don't ever see random loot going away, this game is based upon the "maybe I'll get it next time" metric from the end raid all the way down to level 1 quest drops.

 

Ukerric

But players like random.

They just don't like random that never yields the reward.

It's basic skinnerian theory. A random reward works far better at hooking than a fixed reward... if you end up with the reward in a "reasonable" time frame. That's the clincher; after a while people stop fussing about the reward that doesn't come and turn to other activities. Be it PVP Arena farming to get a good weapon, or - gasp - stopping raiding and going to another game.

Which does suggest an hybrid system. All bosses drop random loot "as they used to". They also drop a token/badge/whatever. That token/badge yeilds ANY item from this boss table - you just require, say 2 to 3 times the number of kills in badges. If boss drops 3 items in a raid of 25 (1 chance in 8), then his drops require 20 badges from the boss to purchase. You either get lucky with the random (/cheer) or you fail and finally get it.

It can be expanded to a full zone. Early bosses loots cost 30 badges, mid-boss loots costs 60 badges, end-boss loots costs 100 badges. (I can see the outcry "but you can buy Illidan loot without killing him?"... ok, so you name the loot from badges differently, and you color it a drab color - see he purchased his loot from badges instead of getting it from the boss)


One of the thing that really causes problem with loot is the Diablo-esque set system. Without the set system, you'd probably have far less problems with loot allocation (and the randomness therein) than you'd get in an EQ-esque system where every loot stood on its own. Let's face it: the token system was invented because every "major" piece of loot had a set bonus and class restriction on it. If you removed those (and added more cross-stat usefulness), you would need less tokenization because the random would give people more chances at upgrades - even if small.

 

orcsgotbooty

The best and easiest? way to fix this is to only have the badge vendor sell items from bosses the player has killed (flagged like attunements)

 

Roywyn

In T1/T2, you had the item drop directly. And everybody cheered about Stormrage/Nemesis combination drops.
But you also got your reward right away, and had something to show.

In Z'G/RA'Q/T2.5, you had a token drop, which required some reputation and some pointless combinaion of coins, bijous, scarabs and two (!) different kinds of idols to turn in.

In T3, you had a token drop, which required some additional scraps of your armour type and some crafting mats fitting your armour.

In BC, you have a token drop that can be turned in directly.


I think the general consensus is that the Z'G/A'Q coins and stuff were pretty whacky.
Every class had diffent flavour thingies for different items, and the only effect was that someone had to make yet another bank alt to collect and distribute these otherwise completely pointless tokens.


In T3, the Wartorn Armour Scraps were okay. They made sense, there was 1 type for each armour class.
The additional materials also alright, especially from a lore point of view. There was some whine that rogues had to pay more money than other classes, but required less materials.

From a lore perspective, that was fine. But the armour scraps still just were ends in themselves.
They only dropped in the Instance, were needed to complete other token drops, and were plenty enough that there never was a shortage. It only added overhead for someone to collect and distribute them.

For the other crafting materials, there were some random outcries that it would be too expensive for people to get their T3 sets.
It wasn't that expensive, but the point is there. You pay to wipe and learn the fight. You get a drop. Then you pay again to actually get an item from it. You'd nag your guild bank (or the scrap looter of the night) for scraps, nexii, port to the AH for the materials, nag someone for a cloth/salt/hide/arcanite transmute and fly back to turn it in.

Fun? Annoying? Your call.


The current token system picks a good compromise. You loot your token, port out to turn it in, and get summoned back.
You get less random loot, and it's nearly instantaneous.

Lorewise, these token can be nearly fully functional, and just require some adaption from a wizard (the turn-in vendor) to make it fit the player.
I mean, all other boss drops are fully functional as well, why should suddenly the token item be broken and need complete fixing?


I didn't mind the reputation requirements for Z'G/A'Q gear, actually. But then again, they're in the same league as the armour scraps, a random inconvenience.
It made trash and wiping a bit more rewarding though, knowing that you'd need some chunk of rep to get your tokens, and it prevents random selling to people who might be regarded as not deserving these items.

I really don't want to go into this argument, just hinting the possibilities.


I'm quite happy with the current itemisation with sunwell tokens/turn-ins.
Some turn-ins for exotic weapons would be nice. Feral DPS <> tanking staff, paladin tanking weapon <> caster weapon (or warrior tank weapon if you want to keep turn-ins limited).
A dagger <> sword turn-in, dagger <> axe turn-in, and a fix for daggers itself (2 out these 3 *winks).
There are itemisation issues (i.e. full-leather kits being the best for 6 physical DPS classes, the caster cloth turn-ins being always worse than the direct drops due to spirit, etc.), but it allows for some exotic gear that can be turned into something that more than one class/spec wants.


As far as the "one item that never drops" goes - these are mostly itemisation issues.

DST is the best trinket for half a dozen classes for 3 or 4 raid tiers even after being nerfed heavily twice.
Shadowmoon Destroyer's Cape is a big step up because the other cloaks from the previous tiers had roughly the same power. (I.e. well designed item after 2.5 tiers of sidegrades.)
Skull of Gul'dan and Memento of Tyrande as the first raid drop trinkets that people would actually spend DKP on.

It's easy to yell "Item X never drops" when the actual issue is the lack of meaningful alternatives in the previous tier(s).
No one would cry after Shadowmoon Destroyer's Capes if the Malchezaar/Magheridon(/Kael'thas) cloaks were not that badly itemised.


Okay, that has become pretty long, in essence:
- Token loot beats random loot.
- Token + additional stuff => item is nice lore-wise, but often just an unnecessary annoyance.
- Token + rep => item has it's pros and cons.

- Token turn-ins allow for some exotic item drops (without being auto-sharded).
- Itemisation issues are the actual reasons for many demands of more token loot/loot of choice.


Being human, I like some randomness and excitement about loot.
It's like being invited to a surprise diner. Getting surprised is nice, but getting a steak as a vegetarian definately isn't.

The Blue Bar and you - the complete Fire Mage 2.4 mana compendium: http://elitistjerks.com/658230-post3191.html

Rate-my-WotLK-spec! If it's not listed here, it's probably not worth it: http://elitistjerks.com/846078-post4020.html

And [Timbal's Focusing Crystal] doesn't proc on AM.

 

Macblade

People persist in arguing that a random system means that it will inherently take longer for you to get your gear. This is simply NOT TRUE. As someone above pointed out above, in Skinnerian terms, the difference is simply a fixed schedule of reinforcement in which you get one piece of gear every 8 weeks versus a random schedule of reinforcement in which you get a piece of gear, on average every 8 weeks but in practice get your first peice of gear in 4 weeks, your next in 12 your third in 1 week and your 4th in 15 weeks.

Also, arguments about lore and whether the lore is better because the NPC is standing in Shat or at the back of an instance or requires you to turn in additional mats or only requires a token are really pretty far from the original point of the topic.

Like people above, I would be interested to hear from more people about how well the SP trade in's work. Specifically, has anyone run into problems with it yet, with clear imbalances showing up already? I'm just curious if the system actually does work better or if it is simply that none of the bosses have been farmed for that long so the problems haven't shown up yet, or are just starting to show.

As my vote, I think the best system mentioned so far is some sort of combination between tokens (either zone specific or not) and rep. I like the addition of rep as I think it provides a good reward for the time spent killing trash and it also guarantees that players have spent at least a certain amount of time in the instance. (Us rogues were fighting over the chance to kill trash in BT for the rep trinket.) On top of this system I think a RNG loot table with mostly goody items would satisfy the craving that people have mentioned for the element of "what will the boss drop this week." Even hardcore raiders like the showy/prestige items that add nothing to the game in terms of min/maxing. I think that it would be pretty cool if bosses had more Bear/Ember type mounts and or even a set of prestige city clothing. I would love to farm Keal if I knew that I would get the item that I wanted for sure within a certain time period and on top of that had a chance at a just-for-show Keal's Robes and/or mount.

 

winkiller

I'd love to see something like this:
We kill Morogrim Tidewalker, he drops the following:
[Serpent-Coil Braid] - no Mage wants it, given to a Rogue who can turn it in to get [Warp-Spring Coil]
[Razor-Scale Battlecloak] - no one wants it? OK, let a Healer get some T5 healing cloak.

Maybe additionally pay 50g or something, would fix many problems.

Of course this only works with "new" bosses, where you can spread out the loot accordingly to difficulty.
And it wouldn't solve a lack of for example T5 helmets/chests when you can't kill Vashj/KT

 

Sahael

In response to the call for SWP comments - The sunmote + item turnin for new-item is a fairly good system. In the beginning it creates some headaches because some people have to compete dkp-wise with someone they didnt in the past, but over all, it means everyone gets their stuff slightly faster. The only complaint that carries over from the t6 instances is that there are still poorly-itemized drops where no one wants either the item or the one it can be turned into (but that is a separate issue from the sunmote exchange system).

As an aside - the pvp necks from twins are on their own loot-table (you always get one of them), separate from the PVE gear, so it isnt really that much of an issue. Its silly yes, but I doubt anyone is angry about it.

 

orcsgotbooty

It isn't so much that people hate the extra neck (which is just a void anyways, yippe?), its that it makes no sense, imagine if top pvpers (lets say 2200+) randomly got a piece of t4 gear (in addition) once every few purchases of pvp gear. Sure an extra void crystal is nice, but it still makes no sense.

 

Exilon

Great ideas here on a system that seems in need of an overhaul. Personally I would miss boss encounters if the RNG was removed - there is that old die-hard D&D guy in me that wants to roll the 20... but at some point you are going to wear out your 5-man group trying to gear for Kara if your tank's shoulders don't drop on your 30th run of "X" instance. I think sharding the entire instance could be reduced (not removed) by assessing the party makeup on zone-in and replacing class gear that is not needed with gems/pots or other useful items. It keeps progression paced but does not stall it entirely, nor bypass it by letting you purchase let's say your entire D3 set only in a different color. This would be more important for smaller guilds working their way into raiding. There are definitely diminishing returns once you hit the Raid level runs as you cover more of the classes.

 

Mano

a) this would screw up runs with changing members royally. Why should I replace the mage who disconnected/got kicked with my hunter, when now nothing can drop for me?

b) Assuming any of the hybrid classes in the party, how would you exclude anything except stuff which has a hard coded class requirement? E.g. let's say we have a shaman in the party. He could be elemental and thus want +dmg cloth/leather/mail/shields/weapons. He could be enhancer and interested in leather/mail melee stuff, maybe also hunter items (I think Hunter D3/D4 was quite OK for an enhancer). He could be resto and interested in cloth/leather/mail/shields with +heal, provided they don't have much SPI. Or much funnier, he could be resto but gathering his melee stuff or vice versa.
There are only pretty few possiblities to shrink down the drops, and its from top side down. No pala -> no dmg/heal plate. No warrior/pala/dk -> no plate. No pala/dk/warrior/shaman/hunter/ -> no shields/plate/mail. Etc.
Considering most stuff isn't class bound (though certainly better for one class than another), this would only reduce the drops by half if not less. And would lead to c)

c) It would probably be possible to "guarantee" certain drops by opening the instance with the right group. Blizzard would have to explicitly proof loot tables against this. (e.g. 5 clothies open the instance, this means only cloth, wands, off hand stuff can drop but no shields, ranged weapons, relics, 2h weapons except staffs. , leather, mail, plate. Then switch in the normal crew for the run. Imagine a loot table which had a plate chest, a wand, a melee trinket, a leather girdle and a caster staff. Bingo, you now have a 50:50 chance of getting your wand instead of only 20%).
Much of this could certainly be overcome by creating the loot only on attacking the boss. But that would go against their current concept of loot generation and might still be open for exploits (e.g. 5 clothies atacck boss and reset/wipe. Does his loot get reset also?) And yes, this sounds illusionary, but who wouldn't help their MT get the tanking sword from Mecha hero like this, if it was possible to game the game design?

d) from where would the enchanters (and the rest also) get their (higher level) enchanting materials?

e) what would happen if a boss had nothing eligible on one of his loot tables? No drop at all?

f) I like the idea that any boss drops *something* which can be used by some party member. Like potions/ flasks/gems, maybe other crafting materials. This is basically the idea behind the Primal Nethers and the badges.


Any proposed new loot system has to somehow give answers to a) - e) and probably a few more questions

 

rayijin

*** WARNING, ANECDOTAL STORY BELOW ***

Do you still remember your first amazing epic?

For me, it was the damned azuresong mageblade. I say it with love love and contempt.

For three months, I made 100% attendance to my guild's raids. I climbed to the top on DKP as others bought items or missed raids.

And yet still, it didn't drop. Twelve raids in a row.

I finally take a day off from raiding. Guess what? It drops! I'll never forget that.

*** END ANECDOTAL STORY ***

Now, why do I make this story? Because you always remember your losses, or the item not dropping, more than actually getting it. I honestly don't remember when I actually got it after that. I remember it being a bitch to get.

That is why it's addicting. It's the same in gambling. Take sports gambling for instance. People remember their losses far, far better than the wins. It's those losses - that damned loot NOT dropping - that makes you want to go back.

Would tokens take out "frustration"? Yes. But until that frustration reaches a breaking point, it's a good thing for Blizzard.

Making everything tokenized would also take out most of what makes raiding - and getting shiny epics - addicting.

 

Hirashin

Not sure if it has been mentioned before, but why not "tokenize" old raid content?

I'd absolutely love to run AQ40 for a lame meteor or tentacle trinket. Sure, it would remind me of the old days of running ZG with 20 people just for 2 enchants, but why not? You could get thoe deathknight alts geared up nicely I'd imagine.

 

Exilon

These are all great points. I didn't expect to solve the loot issues in a paragraph - and I don't know to what extent the zone can or possibly could dynamically know party makeup to account for party changes during a run. All I was trying to figure out was a way to take the "breaking point" frustration out of RNG in an instance while still keeping the loot drop somewhat random. Shards/essence will still come from the same in-party class item dropping more than once (Like my Oblivion shoulders dropping from Murmur 4-5 times).

Can the system account for hybrids? Perhaps if the system broadly decides druid in party = drop ele/enh/resto gear. Not perfect, but if overall it cuts loot tables down by even 20% that's going to help with the pace of certain instances. Maybe I am wrong, maybe just leave it the way it is but add a token and require loot drop + (x) tokens to trade in. Point being, RNG is fun, but could use some tweaking. Removing the RNG in favor of tokens everywhere would just be pushing the game in the wrong direction for me.

 

kalbear <