Guild Wars 2

I’ve been reading a lot of topics and foruns about MF on GW2, and it looks like MF is not worth it at all, i mean, a gear only for MF. I already have a gear for PvE and dungeons, my main gear, and i was thinking in doing a gear only for MF, but all i’ve read till now just convinced me to not spend money and time on a MF gear.

So, is MF really works in this game? I know that MF only works on mobs.

rng is rng even with magic find. it helps to increase your chances of better loot.

its the same as buying 2 tickets to the lottery instead of 1. you increase your chances but its still random if you win anything at all.

and a 0.01% chance for something increased by 100% to 0.02% is still extremely low chance.

Magic find is indeed useless on gear for the sole reason of losing almost 40-50% of the total damage you could be putting out. However, passive magic find boosts such as food, boosters and banners are definately worth using since you can easily reach 100% magic find without the use of magic find gear.

100% magic find is basically double the chance to recieve rares and exotics, even tho that chance is still extremely low. You are correct about magic find only affecting monster drops, and it does NOT affect loot in heavy bags, mystic forge, or chests of any sort.

… MF gear comes in two different flavors.. One will have Power, Precision, and Magic Find. The other will have Power, Condition Damage, and Magic Find.. Saying that you are loosing damage because of your MF gear is not correct. You will loose some of your defensive stats (toughness and vit) but not your attack stats. I would say it is worth it if you are looking into a long term farm with them.. And not every item that you are going to be farming for will have anywhere near a .01% chance to drop.

Ethros.1453:

… MF gear comes in two different flavors.. One will have Power, Precision, and Magic Find. The other will have Power, Condition Damage, and Magic Find.. Saying that you are loosing damage because of your MF gear is not correct. You will loose some of your defensive stats (toughness and vit) but not your attack stats. I would say it is worth it if you are looking into a long term farm with them.. And not every item that you are going to be farming for will have anywhere near a .01% chance to drop.

He’s refering to difference between berserker and explorer – crit dmg% versus MF%.

Anyway. My personal preference is not to use MF gear, but then again, I don’t “farm”.

aophts.9862:

I’ve been reading a lot of topics and foruns about MF on GW2, and it looks like MF is not worth it at all, i mean, a gear only for MF. I already have a gear for PvE and dungeons, my main gear, and i was thinking in doing a gear only for MF, but all i’ve read till now just convinced me to not spend money and time on a MF gear.

So, is MF really works in this game? I know that MF only works on mobs.

There is a hidden luck stat on each character which matters much more than MF.

Articluna.4509:

Ethros.1453:

… MF gear comes in two different flavors.. One will have Power, Precision, and Magic Find. The other will have Power, Condition Damage, and Magic Find.. Saying that you are loosing damage because of your MF gear is not correct. You will loose some of your defensive stats (toughness and vit) but not your attack stats. I would say it is worth it if you are looking into a long term farm with them.. And not every item that you are going to be farming for will have anywhere near a .01% chance to drop.

He’s refering to difference between berserker and explorer – crit dmg% versus MF%.

Anyway. My personal preference is not to use MF gear, but then again, I don’t “farm”.

Even if he is referring to that difference, the amount of damage lost isn’t as great as he implies. If your farm setup doesn’t have crit, explorer is great. If you do want crit damage increase, you can probably make up for it in your traits. Remember, a farming setup is all about damage. No one is going to put 30 deep in a heal power/vitality trait unless it has a massive influence on your damage.

Indeed, I believe (no stats yet) that MF does increase your chance to get higher QL loot the amount it says it does. While I wasn’t drowning in rares, I have farmed a number of times with 150+ MF and not … the difference was noticeable.

I use to run around with a fully MF geared thief in DE like the recent southsun living world or orr and i have to say that i do notice the difference. Not much in rare drops, not really in exotics too since the chance is so low that MF doesn’t really help.
But there is a imo big difference in t6 drops instead of t5, and that’s totally worth it.

Plus, MF gear is really cheap. You don’t need exotics. You won’t be running dungeons with it due to the poor defensive stats or the low critical damage output. You’ll basically run full MF in situations where killing is not an issue, mobs average lifespan is like 3 seconds..you hit them with an aoe, and loot. That’s what MF is for, imo. And it works, pretty kitten well too.

Recent Southsun farming made me believe that MF (really high that is) might be helpful. I got plenty of exos, minis and T6 stuff there but, on the other hand, it could just be the event itself that had increase drop rate of event specific exos and minis. Sufficient to say that Settler’s jewelry prices were sometimes lower than avearage rare GS on TP.

I was totally down on MF and quit using any, ever, after the various loot nerfs a while back.

However during the Southsun Event, with the 200% settler boost, I heard too many reports of great results from guild mates I trust. So I broke out my old exotic Mad Kings with full Scavanger runes, made a 30% Golden Lotus and the Two 10% rings, and the rest of my old green MF trinkets and back piece. With Omnom bars and guild boosts I was at 412%+ depending on current weapons and Luck stacks. It made a BIG difference.

Post Southsun at 212%+ it is slightly noticeable, but still not worth the performance and survival sacrifice. I still prefer the kill speed and feel of my regular setup. I am still looking for spots where high MF seems to gives loot increases approaching pre loot nerf results, but I think they have missed nothing in their campaign to kill all the fun of reasonable farming.

aophts.9862:

I know that MF only works on mobs.

What’s the problem with that??

My Ranger just got one complete set of exotics this week with 50% MF (about all you actually ever * need * on a farming alt since we noticed back in beta how MF% seemed to work AGAINST you at any point above 63% as if it had its own D.R. built in) …and STILL has more Toughness, Prec, Vit, and 5000+ more HP’s than my “dungeon master”-Guardian not even including how much additional damage the Pet can soak up. (or avoid entirely by pulling things my Guardian could never dream of pulling).

If someone tells you they’re sacrificing Survival for MF%…. they’re doing something wrong
And this doesn’t even begin to figure in those ridiculous Magenta “ascended” items that we NEVER NEEDED IN THE FIRST PLACE. (Rly, how much easier do ppl need a game to be?)

If you see a user on the forums with the name “Vol”, check out his signature. Those are the exotics he’s seen drop using magic find with his guardian character.
I aspire to be as efficient as he is and he will tell you that MF really does work.
I’m sure the only reason that Vol hasn’t posted thus far is that he’s always having to come into the same kind of thread and say the same kind of thing.
Seriously though, it really does work. Take it from a person that never gets the really good drops of exotics or even rares. I still get T5 and T6 mats on my MF warrior and that is really worth it to me. Even the rare MF gear is affordable so give it a try and see if your mats don’t increase. Mine did.

Ok, so, how much MF do i need for good loot? Like rares and lodestones? 100%?

aophts.9862:

Ok, so, how much MF do i need for good loot? Like rares and lodestones? 100%?

Like… an impossible to achieve amount. You can run around with 300%+ right now and get shut out from decent loot in 20 minutes or less because of DR.

To get guaranteed loot? Probably like 2000% which won’t happen for like 2+ years.

Look at my sig for your answer

That being said though, there is nothing worth farming anymore. So MF up until about a week ago was worth it.

Vol.5241:

Look at my sig for your answer

That being said though, there is nothing worth farming anymore. So MF up until about a week ago was worth it.

^this

After Southsun there is no place worth farming anymore, unless you want to farm Moas or Bandits in Queensdale.

I’ve spent like 3 hours in Orr yesterday and found only 5 active DEs where 2 of them were stuck/bugged. I was so bored and frustrated that I did HotW p3 with guildes which resulted in bags FULL of blue junk and 1 core.

Not so long ago ANet had its hands full with DR/loot problems. Now maybe loot/drops are better but there are no mobs to farm. The usual farming DEs Jofast/Peni/Shelter seems to activate once per hour or less. Heck, when I did Peni and some walls were trashed by mobs there used to be immediate escort mission after that. Now nothing for like 30 mins then pop, event which got stuck after 1 min.
Orr has become really sad place if I may say so.

So yeah… like I said: anything over ~63% just plays straight into Anet’s D.R. game now :p

It’s funny how I knew this the first month of release and it’s come full circle once again. I guess I shoulda put it to more practical use by playing the TP more often so I’d have screenshots that more people would believe. …too bad I hate speculation with a burning hatred that will never be quenched.

In more practical application? I guess it just means ya only need ONE set of pure-kick*** gear now and only 2 Ascended trinkets with double MF% infusions?? ….that’s kind of a shame b/c I’m one of those ppl who just likes having 2 different sets of gear to look more ‘believable’ in the Environment I’m in or just for Themed/Aesthetics reasons in general. …there’s nothing more Immersion breaking than running into a chick in a bikini in Frostgorge (and NOT seeing really pointed nips… FIX your boob physics ANET!)

I’m still learning on this MF/DR thing … how does 63% MF or more play into anet’s DR game?

Yea I don’t understand why we have MF yet have a DR it’s illogical

From personal experience, I don’t seem to get any more rares with lots of MF than if I don’t have any at all.

kahzee.6042:

Yea I don’t understand why we have MF yet have a DR it’s illogical

It’s based on the theory that DR operates on a quota system.

i.e. You are only allowed 10 rares in a 1 hour period. Once you hit 10 rares under 1 hour, your drop rate will decrease by 50%

With a high enough MF , you will get more rares than someone with 0, but you will hit the quota faster so your drop rate is reduced.

Not sure how that guy came up with a specific MF% though.

Vol.5241:

Not sure how that guy came up with a specific MF% though.

At launch we had 100 guys in our guild all trying out different MF values in pretty much identical content reporting their results all together. That exact number by my estimates is a margin of error downgrade I use on pretty much everything involving RNG. (b/c floating point isn’t a “real number”, and the entire formula for it has been flawed from the start going all the way back to the 70’s because of how & where it defaults itself to and how it utilizes the cmos clock in a flawed way). …though there’s also the perception element.

Anet apparently won’t tell us if there’s “Streakbreaker” code going in either direction which leaves us with basically nothing to go off of here. ….well nothing that is but their most common drop %‘s from the first game which most things here look to be following the same pattern on. I think the “rares per hour” explanation is too simplistic to be what’s actually going on though. It doesn’t match the older patterns either. I tend to look at the market itself and how supply of mats & ectos and & Exos seems to still be in surprising abundance compared to the things that only power-gamers go for (precursors, lodes, etc…). So Before making any theories, look at the Macro level and also consider that Anet tends to misplace a lot of Decimals too…

So it’s 63% MF a real thing or not? I’m going to think that based on how most other stats are linearly with their effects, MF does too.

I tihnk you have to do ALOT of statistics to confirm any relationship with DR and MF or chance for rares relation to MF. The only thing I believe … you have to get as much MF as you can and farm as fast as you can with it.

Obtena.7952:

So it’s 63% MF a real thing or not? I’m going to think that based on how most other stats are linearly with their effects, MF does too.

I tihnk you have to do ALOT of statistics to confirm any relationship with DR and MF or chance for rares relation to MF. The only thing I believe … you have to get as much MF as you can and farm as fast as you can with it.

Lemme tell you this. I run with 50-65% MF for ages (banner/food/3% on trinket) and had plenty of rare/exo drops. Everytime I tried to make my MF higher I could almost hear when DR hit me.

It is all my personal perspective but could be true.

Obtena.7952:

So it’s 63% MF a real thing or not? I’m going to think that based on how most other stats are linearly with their effects, MF does too.

I tihnk you have to do ALOT of statistics to confirm any relationship with DR and MF or chance for rares relation to MF. The only thing I believe … you have to get as much MF as you can and farm as fast as you can with it.

Operative fallacy underlined. What you’re not aware of here atleast from my observations… is the that the core mechanic of their DR actually seems to MONITOR your KPM somehow. So is my “number” real? Absolutely not. In theory the number is actually supposed to be atleast the Margin of Error (3%-8% higher) higher. …which is where Anet probably assumed they had it set. But like I said; they’re prone to misplaced decimals and overconfidence in their own past history of infallible Netcoding. Am I inferring that even mere nanoseconds and routing miscalculations could be part of those wide margins of error?? …. yes, …yes I am.

Nor am I asking you to take my word on it. All I’m saying is don’t be so hasty to chock it all up to the most obvious stats. What you assume is working for you, may actually be working against you. Pay closer attention to those things and try other methods first.

People make the same mistakes all the time when it comes to Aggro Calculations too.

While I have no evidence whatsoever to claim this, I would find it REALLY hard to believe that there is some function in the game that would penalize you for surpassing some MF value because the idea that anyone shouldn’t surpass some value if they don’t want to be penalized goes COMPLETELY against the existence of the stat and how we build our characters.

I can only hope that DR is based solely on a players duration in a defined ‘area’ to prevent them from monopolizing specific spots. Maybe how you describe it IS what is happening, but it’s so unbelieveable to me when I see how other stats in the game are handled.

These beliefs (yes, it’s pure faith) lead me to think the best approach for farming with MF gear is maxed out MF in a short time to avoid whatever DR scheme is implemented. I can only say with certainty that I definitely can tell the differences between my various levels of MF when I farm, even for hours in a specific spot like Dwayna temple.

I’m not even sure at this point that DR is about duration or specific areas. It may be sophisticated enough to kick in after a certain ‘value’ of drops. That wouldn’t actually be too hard to put in place.

Now who sounds crazy? …go ahead an stand in one spot for 2 hours, then kill whatever is near you expecting it to drop nothing at all. How does that make sense? …We actually used to foil the old DR in Gw1 by just doing this… waiting about 5 minutes in a single spot BEFORE we started farming & re-farming it. Switching Alts sometimes helped too. 0_o

If you want to see some more interesting results, don’t just AOE everything at once, even if it balls up on it’s own. Finish them off one by one further spans apart, then watch as more l00t tends to drop. People who follow your line of logic would never notice something weird like this, they’d just immediately do whatever it takes to equip the highest power MF+Zerkers stuff b/c they think everything’s going to be perfectly linear like a Blizzard game or JRPG…

Obtena.7952:

I can only hope that DR is based solely on a players duration in a defined ‘area’ to prevent them from monopolizing specific spots. Maybe how you describe it IS what is happening, but it’s so unbelieveable to me when I see how other stats in the game are handled.

Doubt it. The DR seems incredibly harsh – or areas are bugged.

Yesterday, I started the game, equip my MF gear (~100%) and oh look, Golem Mark II is about to start. What loot do I get from 3 or 4 containers I attacked? 2 yellows, many greens and blues, ingredients and bags. It was like loot heaven in a very short period. Even without the rares, the loot was good.

When the golem is done (got crap from the chest of course) I see that Melandru has started. I jump to Orr and start to kill the countless Risen spawning as they move to the beacons (and of course fight the mandatory invisible mobs at the second beacon). What do I get? Barbs. Spikes. Bones. Grey gear. A blue or two. That is all. Seriously, it was like night and day in terms of loot. Its just not possible to be THAT unlucky to get grey crap from 9 out of 10 looted bodies. Especially not event mobs.

My only conclusion is that DR hit hard and fast from the moment I entered Orr, based on the fact I had already found 2 rares in a very short time period in another zone (10 minutes) :/

I think your conclusion should be that RNG is still at play, even if you buff MF. Your sample size is WAY to small to say anything about DR relation to MF.

Obtena.7952:

So it’s 63% MF a real thing or not?

It’s not a real thing.

It’s based on assumptions and anecdotal evidence.

Obtena.7952:

I think your conclusion should be that RNG is still at play, even if you buff MF. Your sample size is WAY to small to say anything about DR relation to MF.

Tired of seeing sample size scapegoating all the time. Give it a rest please.
There’s an obvious pattern. There’s ALWAYS been an obvious pattern. And there actually used to be a time when the Devs were honest and forthcoming about those patterns and let out info on how the DR actually worked…

It’s not scapegoating at all. Sample size is a REAL factor. Killing something 10 times and saying the results are significant is a joke.

There isn’t an obvious pattern … MF and DR affect the same variable so any tests you make to determine their effects on getting loot in the uncontrolled ingame setting are confounded; you can’t reasonably say a result is attributed to one or the other, or a fraction of each.

We don’t actually have the one piece of information we need to test assertions regarding MF; DR reset time. If a person knew the DR ‘reset’ time, they could devise a real experiment, factoring it out and determine the drop rates for different amounts of MF on the various difficulties of mobs but it would take a hell of a long time. Only this will tell you anything.

Obtena.7952:

It’s not scapegoating at all. Sample size is a REAL factor. Killing something 10 times and saying the results are significant is a joke.

That is true. But if a scenario goes like this:

Day 1: Get 2 rares within 15 minutes of joining the game, then only get crappy greys for 1h+
Day 2: Get 2 rares within 15 minutes of joining the game, then only get crappy greys for 1h+
Day 3: Get 2 rares within 15 minutes of joining the game, then only get crappy greys for 1h+
Etc and so on

… You dont start to see a pattern? Really? I repeated the same thing in WvW yesterday. I had 74% MF then (started shifting to some berserkers since I use it in PvE, heh) and had no queue, so I joined quickly upon launching the game. Guess what I got from the FIRST NPC I killed? Yep, a yellow. Guess what I got 10 minutes later from like the 3rd or 4th player kill (hey it was a slow evening)? Yep, ANOTHER yellow. Guess what I got the next hour I played (which included jumping zones)? Absolutely nothing. No more yellows, barely any greens. Bags and greys and blues aplenty. And hell, that’s even rare for WvW, I often get greens on my zero MF characters which almost never get rares.

I still dont think MF is useless, I just think the DR and RNG swinging from full blast to down the kittenter is messed up.

Dawdler.8521:

… You dont start to see a pattern? Really?

I see anecdotal evidence. Really.

I hate to be “that guy” But truth be told.
I have been playing since pre beta, and the “MF is bunk” topic has been heard more then a few times So IF I may shed a bit of wisdom, and light on the subject.

MF does help, it works, its operating as designed.
I run a full MF find set for most all game play, say WvW or High tier dungeons, and SpVp.
The difference when I farm Orr for t6 or SS for t6, is this parse info.

Without MF gear, DPS gear
drops from 500 kills( farm run 25mobs, 11 min run):
lower tier mats= 111 (average) t6= 33 average

With MF gear,
drops from 500 kills( farm run 25mobs, 11 min run):
lower tier mats= 223(average) t6=87 average

now, my basic math skills may be a bit rusty but that’s a huge % towards mats. Sure I don’t cover rare loot drops or exotics. But that is what I have been running for farming t6 mats.

Keep in mind now, there is and anti-bot, kill your farming on the world map, built into the game. So if you find that you have spent more then say 1hr in the same location, and your drops seemed to have been nulled. Switch spots, either SS or Orr and do another hr in another zone if you are dead set on grinding it all out.

Another thing to consider, is the level of mobs you kill for mats. ATM I farm Orr level 81-82 mobs for mats, either events ect. They usually have a higher chance of dropping better. If you farm low end get low end.

Also, contrary to popular belief it DOES effect chest drops from world bosses.

I hope this helps.

The problem is, there is no evidence, prove, that MF really works. Some people say it works others don’t. Guess i should just forget acquiring a Mf gear and just use food and count with the boost from the guild. About the MF gear, i wouldn’t use this kinda of gear as my main, or in the dungeons. it will be a alternative of course.

But i gotta say, one of these days i got 4 rares from a chest in a event, frozen maw i think. Then for the rest of my gameplay, like, 4 hours or something, even in events like Claw and Shatterer, didn’t get any yellow nor green, just blue. Also, MF really affects chests? WTf

Dawdler.8521:

Obtena.7952:

It’s not scapegoating at all. Sample size is a REAL factor. Killing something 10 times and saying the results are significant is a joke.

That is true. But if a scenario goes like this:

Day 1: Get 2 rares within 15 minutes of joining the game, then only get crappy greys for 1h+
Day 2: Get 2 rares within 15 minutes of joining the game, then only get crappy greys for 1h+
Day 3: Get 2 rares within 15 minutes of joining the game, then only get crappy greys for 1h+
Etc and so on

… You dont start to see a pattern? Really?.

I see a pattern but I don’t see enough trials to give me the power to conclude anything statistically significant. I CERTAINLY don’t see anything that convinces me that MF is a factor for DR kicking in.

Obtena.7952:

Dawdler.8521:

Obtena.7952:

It’s not scapegoating at all. Sample size is a REAL factor. Killing something 10 times and saying the results are significant is a joke.

That is true. But if a scenario goes like this:

Day 1: Get 2 rares within 15 minutes of joining the game, then only get crappy greys for 1h+
Day 2: Get 2 rares within 15 minutes of joining the game, then only get crappy greys for 1h+
Day 3: Get 2 rares within 15 minutes of joining the game, then only get crappy greys for 1h+
Etc and so on

… You dont start to see a pattern? Really?.

I see a pattern but I don’t see enough trials to give me the power to conclude anything statistically significant. I CERTAINLY don’t see anything that convinces me that MF is a factor for DR kicking in.

I don’t mean to cut down your thoughts on this or come off as neg., but have you tried jumping zones? The drop rate resets and you can keep farming to hearts content. If you stick to the same zone the DR always kicks in, keep in mind that it is an “anti-farming/botting” script. So, in short change the terms, and keep making gains instead of camping one zone knowing full well DR is in effect, and getting crap lootz. As an example, I farmed tonight for a full 3 hrs. Swapping zones, got 16 rares, 2 exoctics, and an ample supply of t6 mats just by noting the grey drops, and swapping zones. Even went as far as cashing in on 1 free guest server transfer to make sure well, DR would reset. And made 12g in sales of stuff I didn’t plan on using. Just some insights. Happy hunting!

OoK~

aophts.9862:

The problem is, there is no evidence, prove, that MF really works. Some people say it works others don’t. Guess i should just forget acquiring a Mf gear and just use food and count with the boost from the guild. About the MF gear, i wouldn’t use this kinda of gear as my main, or in the dungeons. it will be a alternative of course.

But i gotta say, one of these days i got 4 rares from a chest in a event, frozen maw i think. Then for the rest of my gameplay, like, 4 hours or something, even in events like Claw and Shatterer, didn’t get any yellow nor green, just blue. Also, MF really affects chests? WTf

There are a couple options for ya, 1: aquire your own set, and stat track with a spreadsheet and compare the #’s Like I have been doing to see if there is an impact. 2: Believe the post on a forum and decide from what you have read to be true and accurate, or untrue and unaccurate.

To answer the question on MF “effecting” chest drops. Again, yes it has a significant impact on chest drops, breaking down items into materials. There is even rumored belief that it effects mystic forge results. But, I personally have only stat tracked chest drops, and mob farming, as there is more work vs. gold involved in those processes. I hope this helps.

OoK~

+1 to affecting chest drops… (running every temple & bonus events around them… every night, last 2 weeks, averaged NO rares or only 1 or 2 in the all of the chests combined without any of my MF% gear on the first week. Averaged 5-8 extra Rares per night the following week with the gear on… this included Cores <— consistently I might add).

If other players aren’t seeing the same results then it might be due to them doing the Bosses with their combat gear on and expecting to get away with switching to their MF% just to pop the chest. …that wouldn’t really be fair risk vs reward, now would it?

Vol.5241:

kahzee.6042:

Yea I don’t understand why we have MF yet have a DR it’s illogical

It’s based on the theory that DR operates on a quota system.

i.e. You are only allowed 10 rares in a 1 hour period. Once you hit 10 rares under 1 hour, your drop rate will decrease by 50%

With a high enough MF , you will get more rares than someone with 0, but you will hit the quota faster so your drop rate is reduced.

Not sure how that guy came up with a specific MF% though.

how much MF r u running? i’ve been doing cursed shore for weeks now and i only found 1 exotic so far.. i’ve been running with 98% MF

ilr.9675:

+1 to affecting chest drops… (running every temple & bonus events around them… every night, last 2 weeks, averaged NO rares or only 1 or 2 in the all of the chests combined without any of my MF% gear on the first week. Averaged 5-8 extra Rares per night the following week with the gear on… this included Cores <— consistently I might add).

If other players aren’t seeing the same results then it might be due to them doing the Bosses with their combat gear on and expecting to get away with switching to their MF% just to pop the chest. …that wouldn’t really be fair risk vs reward, now would it?

Um… I don’t see anything of the sort… cough
-incoming investigation on chest loot drop being affected by MF %
1st rule of MF, don’t talk about MF.

Joking aside, even though the whole idea of chest loot being affected by MF has been debunked by Anet, I still see it.
However, the only evidence I have is anecdotal. My sample size is far too small. In other words, it’s all in my head.

Dr reset on 14.00 GMT +2 When it happens my chest use-ley contains exotic with tons of rare’s.

MF only effects loot tables. It’s not THAT complicated, but basically, MY gear just makes you get less whites and junk. -__-’ That’s just from my own experience.