Guild Wars 2

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/crafting-backpacks-new-leveling-items-and-more/

“Finally, since we believe that, especially for newer players, good rewards mean things you can play with (and not just things that may happen to valuable on the Trading Post), we’ve made it so that you’re more likely to get loot that you can use. It’s still possible for a warrior to get a new staff to sell or for mesmers to find a rare rifle, but it’ll be a bit less common than it was before. We’d rather that leveling players found things that felt like an immediate and useful upgrade or gave them a look at a new weapon and a chance to expand their skill set, and this seems like a good way of doing that.”

I think this change can have a huge effect on the ore/cloth/leather commodities, assuming that profession loot is also applied to armors. If it’s only applied to weapons, I don’t see a big change.

So if it is feature is applied to armors, I think the long-term implications for these commodities are as follows

-Cloth – price will drop but still have moderate value. The reason why cloth is expensive right now is because it is an item that cannot be farmed. The price is boosted by the supply of this item while also have a moderate level of demand. With this change, supply will most definitely increase, but this commodity will still be limited by world drops.

Leather – price will stay the same or drop. While leather behaves like cloth in that it cannot be farmed, the price is depressed because of the lack of uses of leather.

Ore – price could rise slightly/stay flat. Ore right now is in a good spot because it has high demand and high supply. Initially, this change would reduce the supply of ore due to a reduced pool of world drops. However, any increase in price would be quickly met with an increase in supply from gathering ore

Any thoughts, concerns?

edit: I re-read the blogpost and it’s suggesting that this may only apply to non lvl 80’s, so the impact may be insignificant

I agree with your assessments.

Cloth is going to drop in price while Leather and Ore will remain unchanged.

Playing a light armor character will become more profitable, at least in the short term , if this extends to armour drops. Makes up for having to spend a lot more on ascended armour crafting?

Vol, I can only assume you are basing your predictions on the popularity of professions played. I am not challenging your predictions, I think the logic is sound, just wondering where your data comes from.

The impact may be small but still fun to discuss as long as we make sure not to incline players towards speculating.

edit: Our base line for armor type variety drop rate is also important. Should we assume the variety drop rate is even now?

Farmers are going to start using light armor classes in order to increase their cloth drop rate. They will sell their cloth and compete with other farmers and players which will drive down prices.

Prices are currently high because targeting cloth drops is difficult which means that supply is barely meeting demand. This change makes it easier to target cloth drops by altering your playstyle which will increase the amount of cloth entering the market.

The popularity of classes among non-farmers will play a role, but it won’t be as significant as the role played by people who are willing to change their class to get loot.

Psientist.6437:

Vol, I can only assume you are basing your predictions on the popularity of professions played. I am not challenging your predictions, I think the logic is sound, just wondering where your data comes from.

The impact may be small but still fun to discuss as long as we make sure not to incline players towards speculating.

edit: Our base line for armor type variety drop rate is also important. Should we assume the variety drop rate is even now?

I didn’t factor in class popularity because I don’t have the class splits and it would also make things really complicated. But yes, warriors and guardians I’m confident are the top 2 and they are also very good at farming, so their farming efficiency alone could in theory make up for the drops for mesmers and ele’s (since they are both bad at farming)

I think this is also going to affect the bag market. The value of lower tier bags are largely boosted by the price of cloth, so if cloth prices take a hit Tiny, Small, and possibly Light bags will fall with it.

mtpelion.4562:

Farmers are going to start using light armor classes in order to increase their cloth drop rate. They will sell their cloth and compete with other farmers and players which will drive down prices.

Prices are currently high because targeting cloth drops is difficult which means that supply is barely meeting demand. This change makes it easier to target cloth drops by altering your playstyle which will increase the amount of cloth entering the market.

The popularity of classes among non-farmers will play a role, but it won’t be as significant as the role played by people who are willing to change their class to get loot.

I disagree with the last statement. Or at least with your ability to weigh “significant” based on our current knowledge. Even if we assume armor is included with the changes in drop rate variety, the change would have to overcome the current disparity in farming efficiency among professions.

I am not really sure, if prices will be affected at all. For that we need to know how many players play each armor class. But it seems that light armor classes will get the pricier armor loot drops but then again, they have to pay the most for ascended armor.

Classes that use pricy weapons (GS, Staff, Sword, Dagger) also get pricier loot but their precursors are expensive as well.

Vol.7601:

Psientist.6437:

Vol, I can only assume you are basing your predictions on the popularity of professions played. I am not challenging your predictions, I think the logic is sound, just wondering where your data comes from.

The impact may be small but still fun to discuss as long as we make sure not to incline players towards speculating.

edit: Our base line for armor type variety drop rate is also important. Should we assume the variety drop rate is even now?

I didn’t factor in class popularity because I don’t have the class splits and it would also make things really complicated. But yes, warriors and guardians I’m confident are the top 2 and they are also very good at farming, so their farming efficiency alone could in theory make up for the drops for mesmers and ele’s (since they are both bad at farming)

I don’t understand not factoring in profession popularity. The proposed change will effect supply based on profession. If there are more warriors and guardians and they are the most efficient farmers then we would expect to see the supply of ore to increase and the supply of clothe to decrease. As mtpelion describes, we would not expect to see an increase in the supply of clothe until dedicated farmers convert from warriors and guardians to elementalists and mesmers. Even then, the change in drop rates would have to overcome the disparity in farming efficiency between those professions.

I guess I don’t completely agree with your logic.

I think this is a case of where more information or clarifying information would help avoid irrational speculation. The information could only come from Arenanet et al. Could we have clarification on only the following?

Will the planned change in how items are assigned include armor?

Imo, if only weapons are effected, it will be difficult to measure any change in supply of wood or ore.

Psientist.6437:

I think this is a case of where more information or clarifying information would help avoid irrational speculation. The information could only come from Arenanet et al. Could we have clarification on only the following?

Will the planned change in how items are assigned include armor?

Imo, if only weapons are effected, it will be difficult to measure any change in supply of wood or ore.

We need to know whether it affects armor (I’d bet it does), is active at level 80 or only sub 80, and how much more likely are you to get useable gear over non-useable gear before we can engage in any meaningful speculation.

Finally a downside to Vol op guardian who has more loot then others, and now he doens’t like to loose his advantage.

On a more serious note, is this panic thread really necessary? The post implies it’s only for lowbies, wich would make this by far not so bad.

This is a big deal for the economy, presuming it would affect armor drops. They really should clarify whether or not Elementalists (40% high value weapon types, expensive armor) will get much better drops when farming for cash than Engineers (0% high value weapon types, junk armor) under the new system.

Also remember that heavy and medium classes require a lot of cloth for armorsmithing / leatherworking as well, to the point where light armor drops are better for their respective classes even without looking at the TP…

I get what you are saying but you seem to be assuming more light players will be playing / farming than heavy classes…..where did you get that idea / data from? I would tend to think the opposite (I’d be willing to be there are more Warriors than Necros and Mesmers combined).

Now the idea that hardcore farmers will eventually go for the money generating professions is possible, but whether or not that number of players would out supply the general player population remains to be seen.

Also, the idea that some professions should get “better drops” than others is rather absurd if you ask me. What any one profession “needs” to be “geared up” has no bearing on this change (IMO).

Brother Grimm.5176:

I get what you are saying but you seem to be assuming more light players will be playing / farming than heavy classes…..where did you get that idea / data from? I would tend to think the opposite (I’d be willing to be there are more Warriors than Necros and Mesmers combined).

Depending on the how the numbers play out when this goes live, it is safe to assume that some portion of farmers will ask themselves:

Would I rather make 42c per gear item looted or 2s20c per gear item looted?
Everything else being equal, they are going to switch to a light armor class.

This is why we need more data!
I’d really like to know how likely “more likely” really is.

It’s a very dangerous thing in my opinion (especially with the current state of Ascended crafting).

All Ascended armors require lots of Damask (3 per insignia, at the very least).

This will keep silk at a premium. (It’s 100 silk per Damask, while it’s only 50 thick leather per Elonian leather)

Reducing silk drops to just light armor wearers is a very bad decision.

Even if it’s just “pre-80”, that still means that light armor professions will have a much easier time leveling than others. (As their gear will be worth more, especially once salvaged.) This results in an imbalance of wealth to light armor wearers.

Minos.5168:

It’s a very dangerous thing in my opinion (especially with the current state of Ascended crafting).

All Ascended armors require lots of Damask (3 per insignia, at the very least).

This will keep silk at a premium. (It’s 100 silk per Damask, while it’s only 50 thick leather per Elonian leather)

Reducing silk drops to just light armor wearers is a very bad decision.

Even if it’s just “pre-80”, that still means that light armor professions will have a much easier time leveling than others. (As their gear will be worth more, especially once salvaged.) This results in an imbalance of wealth to light armor wearers.

This change is going to result in an overall INCREASE in the supply of cloth because farmers are smart enough to use light armor classes for their farming character (if this change is significant enough to have any impact at all, why would you waste your time farming on a heavy or medium when you could be increasing your loot value by 5-30 TIMES simply by swapping toons?)

Increased supply + stable demand =

Anyone?

Minos.5168:

It’s a very dangerous thing in my opinion (especially with the current state of Ascended crafting).

All Ascended armors require lots of Damask (3 per insignia, at the very least).

This will keep silk at a premium. (It’s 100 silk per Damask, while it’s only 50 thick leather per Elonian leather)

Reducing silk drops to just light armor wearers is a very bad decision.

Even if it’s just “pre-80”, that still means that light armor professions will have a much easier time leveling than others. (As their gear will be worth more, especially once salvaged.) This results in an imbalance of wealth to light armor wearers.

if it is more profitable, people will start playing light armor for farming, and it will balance out. In fact this mitigate the imbalances in certain markets.

However, as i said in another thread, it will work better if the job drop is selectable, and not bound to your current class.
The lack of control of supply is a big reason for many prices, more player control of supply could lead to lower prices.

I would even expand this drop change to other types of things,

however i recognize nothing is going to change now, they dont have enough QA time regardless, whatever happens is now set in stone. Really wish they would talk about some of these things ahead of time.

mtpelion.4562:

Minos.5168:

It’s a very dangerous thing in my opinion (especially with the current state of Ascended crafting).

All Ascended armors require lots of Damask (3 per insignia, at the very least).

This will keep silk at a premium. (It’s 100 silk per Damask, while it’s only 50 thick leather per Elonian leather)

Reducing silk drops to just light armor wearers is a very bad decision.

Even if it’s just “pre-80”, that still means that light armor professions will have a much easier time leveling than others. (As their gear will be worth more, especially once salvaged.) This results in an imbalance of wealth to light armor wearers.

This change is going to result in an overall INCREASE in the supply of cloth because farmers are smart enough to use light armor classes for their farming character (if this change is significant enough to have any impact at all, why would you waste your time farming on a heavy or medium when you could be increasing your loot value by 5-30 TIMES simply by swapping toons?)

Increased supply + stable demand =

Anyone?

its not really an increase, its making the supply more elastic, which imo is overall a good thing, especiaslly when its mutually exclusive, leather may just go up 1 copper!

the main problem is feeling forced to play a certain class, if it doesnt work for level 80s, its going to make hitting 80 kind of suck for farmers.

Phoebe Ascension.8437:

Finally a downside to Vol op guardian who has more loot then others, and now he doens’t like to loose his advantage.

On a more serious note, is this panic thread really necessary? The post implies it’s only for lowbies, wich would make this by far not so bad.

I would not consider this as a panic thread, but as a thread played at the general tone of natively exuberant economic ecosystems.

The Tyrian economic landscape changes frequency and shape frequently and there are few genuine, negative ramifications to excessive risk taking behavior.

Virtually, literally speaking; information is as important to the virtual Tyrian economy as it is to any real world economy.

I am not trying to be tactless or competitive, but if we approach the virtual Tyrian economic ecosystem with RW intent and definitions, we encounter the effects of time-gated information.

phys.7689:

mtpelion.4562:

Minos.5168:

It’s a very dangerous thing in my opinion (especially with the current state of Ascended crafting).

All Ascended armors require lots of Damask (3 per insignia, at the very least).

This will keep silk at a premium. (It’s 100 silk per Damask, while it’s only 50 thick leather per Elonian leather)

Reducing silk drops to just light armor wearers is a very bad decision.

Even if it’s just “pre-80”, that still means that light armor professions will have a much easier time leveling than others. (As their gear will be worth more, especially once salvaged.) This results in an imbalance of wealth to light armor wearers.

This change is going to result in an overall INCREASE in the supply of cloth because farmers are smart enough to use light armor classes for their farming character (if this change is significant enough to have any impact at all, why would you waste your time farming on a heavy or medium when you could be increasing your loot value by 5-30 TIMES simply by swapping toons?)

Increased supply + stable demand =

Anyone?

its not really an increase, its making the supply more elastic, which imo is overall a good thing, especiaslly when its mutually exclusive, leather may just go up 1 copper!

the main problem is feeling forced to play a certain class, if it doesnt work for level 80s, its going to make hitting 80 kind of suck for farmers.

Any significant change in the supply aperture of any resource would be caused by organized, targeted farming and the force multiplier of profession specific drops for armor could be considerable. If armor is included in the drop schedule then organized, targeted farming with any profession could more easily target supply constrictions.

I have a difficult time weighing that force multiplier as a pro or a con, especially if I include the benefit to new players or players lvling for lvling sakes. I would weigh whether or not including armor in the drop schedule would increase the overall production of ascended gear. If yes, I would include armor.

There are a coupler factors that need to be considered:

1. Does the number of people who reroll light armor characters to farm completely offset the decrease in drops from medium and heavy armor classes? I suspect probably not.

2. Does this effect level 80 characters? OR, does this change effect level 80 gear. It may be tied to the gear, not the character level. i.e. level 80 drops stay the same, but drops from low level zones are skewed.

3. How will this impact lower tiers of cloth? cotton and wool are both mostly generated from people leveling new characters I suspect. This could have a bigger impact on those materials than the higher tiers.

I’m inclined to agree with mtpelion here. I don’t think this will affect prices much at all; if anything, it might help bring cloth prices down. My programming background tells me that, logically, these changes would affect characters of all levels (it’d be the simplest to implement), although that does seem to contradict what the blog post says. We’d need to wait and see after getting more information.

Shorter version of the original post:

• Changing drop rates for loot is going to affect market prices.
• It’s really hard to predict by how much or how quickly this will take place.

The net effects depends on metrics to which we have no access:

• How frequently does “gear” drop now? How frequently will it drop after patch?
• Are the results for armor alone currently 33%|33%|33%? How much will it be after?
• Is the effect the same at all levels? Is it different at L80?
• Does it affect all loot tables? Or just bags? Just foe drops?

And the list goes on.

I’m sure Vol is right, that this will throw the current equilibrium into disarray, but as much as I love to speculate, I don’t think we have enough data to even guess.

This has more benefits that mere economical.

Those that go around with warriors will get a wider variety of drops, and mostly heavy armor.

This means more people may choose to play with anything other than the typical warrior when going around in PvE, it’ll may profession choices a little bit more even. For example, someone who wants cloth will probably elementalists, as they have less weapon variety and cloth armor.

After some time of people using professions that will give them drops they are aiming for, prices become slightly more event between the salvaged materials, and professions become even with them.

The thing is… how long will it take until any noticeable effect, if any at all?

MithranArkanere.8957:

This has more benefits that mere economical.

Those that go around with warriors will get a wider variety of drops, and mostly heavy armor.

This means more people may choose to play with anything other than the typical warrior when going around in PvE, it’ll may profession choices a little bit more even. For example, someone who wants cloth will probably elementalists, as they have less weapon variety and cloth armor.

After some time of people using professions that will give them drops they are aiming for, prices become slightly more event between the salvaged materials, and professions become even with them.

The thing is… how long will it take until any noticeable effect, if any at all?

Once we have confirmation of how the new drop schedule operates, we will see an effect. Markets will react immediately to bring the current value of resources closer to expected future value. The market will likely over-compensate though.

How quickly we see ‘real’ changes to supply, depends on the effects of organized farming.

Now that we have confirmation that this will be relatively minor , does anyone wish to change their opinions?

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

Now that we have confirmation that this will be relatively minor , does anyone wish to change their opinions?

If the change isn’t noticeable, then the impact also won’t be noticeable.

I kind of wonder why they are bothering to implement such a system if the impact is so minor as to “not be noticeable”.

Now that we have confirmation that it will affect level 80 characters, I’m much more concerned about the system.

I put very little weight on community management saying ‘it will not be noticeable’ in a backlash thread. That is his job.

They just confirmed that going forward Elementalists receive better drops than Engineers. This is a problem, and saying ’don’t worry, it’s not that much better* does not make it less of a problem.

What is the intention here?

Ensign.2189:

Now that we have confirmation that it will affect level 80 characters, I’m much more concerned about the system.

I put very little weight on community management saying ‘it will not be noticeable’ in a backlash thread. That is his job.

They just confirmed that going forward Elementalists receive better drops than Engineers. This is a problem, and saying ’don’t worry, it’s not that much better* does not make it less of a problem.

What is the intention here?

Elementalists only receive better drops until the price of Silk declines.
As long as Silk is more valuable than leather or ore, farmers will use light classes to farm which will improve supply.

The degree will depend on the actual ratio of impact, which has not been shared with us.

From Stephanie Lo Presti’s response, I gather that the increase to profession specific loot in the loot schedule will be very small, a percent increase that is only intended to benefit the lvling experience. At lvl 80 the percentage will be well below the comparative farming efficiency of professions, and it sounds as though Arenanet et al intends to make sure that plays out.

I am more interested in what she means by
“We’ll keep monitoring the changes to kitten its affects.”

mtpelion.4562:

The degree will depend on the actual ratio of impact, which has not been shared with us.

Well, assume in the worst case that 100% of loot drops were class specific. A lot of the materials you get come from loot bags and salvage materials, which, presumably, would not be class based. So even in this sort of worst case, the degree can only be so large; how many weapons and armors do you really find compared to the bags / scraps / raw materials?

Still, it isn’t even so much about the amount, as ‘elementalists get better drops than engineers and thieves’ is really, really toxic design.

My expectations:
Cloths will slightly rise in price. There are three classes which use it for armor, but nobody uses it for weapons.
Leathers will rise in price. There are three classes which use it for armor, and only two weapons which use it.
Woods will stay steady. There’ll be very little difference from how the material works right now. It’s only available on weapons, but it was already only available from weapons, and every class uses it.
Ores will go down in price or stay steady. It’s used in a lot of weapons and used for 2 class’s armors.

The Leatherworking backpiece will be mega cool, to encourage people to help drain the market of Thick Leather.

When I hear profession specific, I hear weapons and armor. So lets say the double the weighted chance of items our profession can use Vs those we can’t. So for armor instead of 1/3 of a chance to get a piece the right weight it’s now 50% (one of three to two of four). Even tripling the chance only moves it up to 60% (three of five). Impact on weapons would be even less. Weapons wouldn’t be as slewed since there are a number or professions that can use each and there’s a lot more weapon types.

The problem if any will come from profession imbalance. More players playing one profession over another so the items that are class specific for those classes would drop, overall, less.

Lets say the player breakdown for each armor weight is 50/30/20; heavy, medium, light. Even if the distribution is modified so it’s doubled, 2/3rds your weight, 1/6th each of the other two, let’s see what happens.

So for heavy it’s 10/30; 5/60; 5/60.
Medium it’s 3/60; 6/30; 3/60.
Light it’s 2/60; 2/60; 4/30

Sum it up with common denominators 25/60; 19/60; 16/60 Vs 20/60 across the board. And that requires favoring appropriate weight 4 times as each of the other two. Only a difference range of 25% more to 20% less overall.

Now I don’t know the distribution of professions across the player base. So this is a SWAG. Now unwanted ones thrown on the TP will impact supply but most prices there have more to do with value of salvaged mats, crafting cost and forge fodder than actual supply and demand.

mtpelion.4562:

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

Now that we have confirmation that this will be relatively minor , does anyone wish to change their opinions?

If the change isn’t noticeable, then the impact also won’t be noticeable.

I kind of wonder why they are bothering to implement such a system if the impact is so minor as to “not be noticeable”.

exactly, this is really foolish. Why waste time making virtually unnoticeable changes? what a waste of dev time/blogposts if this is the case.

phys.7689:

mtpelion.4562:

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

Now that we have confirmation that this will be relatively minor , does anyone wish to change their opinions?

If the change isn’t noticeable, then the impact also won’t be noticeable.

I kind of wonder why they are bothering to implement such a system if the impact is so minor as to “not be noticeable”.

exactly, this is really foolish. Why waste time making virtually unnoticeable changes? what a waste of dev time/blogposts if this is the case.

One big complaint about loot drops is that most of them are only good for salvage/sell and of no direct use to the player. Any nudge towards giving the player more items that his toon can equip is a step in the right direction. They can adjust the rate later, but it needs to be established in order to study its effects. A small change will have less disruption than a big change.

Sarrs.4831:

Cloths will slightly rise in price. There are three classes which use it for armor, but nobody uses it for weapons.

Clarification: every class uses it for armor, with the amount increasing as you progress to higher level and gear tiers.

tolunart.2095:

phys.7689:

mtpelion.4562:

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

Now that we have confirmation that this will be relatively minor , does anyone wish to change their opinions?

If the change isn’t noticeable, then the impact also won’t be noticeable.

I kind of wonder why they are bothering to implement such a system if the impact is so minor as to “not be noticeable”.

exactly, this is really foolish. Why waste time making virtually unnoticeable changes? what a waste of dev time/blogposts if this is the case.

One big complaint about loot drops is that most of them are only good for salvage/sell and of no direct use to the player. Any nudge towards giving the player more items that his toon can equip is a step in the right direction. They can adjust the rate later, but it needs to be established in order to study its effects. A small change will have less disruption than a big change.

I agree 100% tolunart, this change will make it more efficient to equip any character with gear, up to an including Ascended armor.

tolunart.2095:

phys.7689:

mtpelion.4562:

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

Now that we have confirmation that this will be relatively minor , does anyone wish to change their opinions?

If the change isn’t noticeable, then the impact also won’t be noticeable.

I kind of wonder why they are bothering to implement such a system if the impact is so minor as to “not be noticeable”.

exactly, this is really foolish. Why waste time making virtually unnoticeable changes? what a waste of dev time/blogposts if this is the case.

One big complaint about loot drops is that most of them are only good for salvage/sell and of no direct use to the player. Any nudge towards giving the player more items that his toon can equip is a step in the right direction. They can adjust the rate later, but it needs to be established in order to study its effects. A small change will have less disruption than a big change.

i actually would like some change that gave a more elastic supply, however if it is actually unoticeably small, it doesnt seem worth the effort.

phys.7689:

i actually would like some change that gave a more elastic supply, however if it is actually unoticeably small, it doesnt seem worth the effort.

There are no numbers in the statement, so it’s pure speculation at this point how “small” it is or what effect it will have. However, it’s easier to turn up the faucet later if you need more water than it is to empty an overflowing sink because you started out with too much.

For example, there is speculation that light armor classes could get substantially more cloth salvages from this system, leading to greater popularity as farming toons. Too much could easily have unintended effects like crashing the cloth market while causing shortages of other materials.

But a slight increase is unlikely to cause problems and if the devs believe that players still aren’t getting enough useful equipment they can increase relevant drops more easily than they can take them away once they have already happened.

It will affect the prices but not that big.

Supply of cloths will not increase because first of all, while cloth wearers will get a boost on getting silk scraps, the other 2 will decrease their chance on getting one.

Unless almost everyone makes light armor classes for farming because clearly that is what anet wants by implementing this changes.

This will increase the supply of silk scraps however, because of the number of new light armor classes the demand will also increase.

Ores however will decrease in demand but not in supply since light armors can easily mine the materials from nodes.

Basically what they are doing is givng light armor classes an advantage when it comes to farming scraps.

Since everyone is drawing conclusions based on a complete lack of facts, I’ll play too. I think Profession-influenced loot will work just like Magic Find:

• At first, everyone will claim buffs/nerfs, but no one will actually collect any data for weeks.
• The first people who do will fail to compare apples to apples, since that’s difficult when doing multiple runs and since different builds collect loot at different rates.
• When people finally have useful data to present, most people will misinterpret it and there will be another huge whinge/whining-fest.
• John Smith will attempt to explain what we’re seeing, and people will accuse him of lying and falsifying evidence.
• The actual result will be that new players leveling up their characters won’t have to buy as much on the TP (or sell as much) and hardly any of us will notice, because the difference between any two runs of AC will be negligible.
• A handful of players who regularly chain grenth, melandru, and arah will see some differences, and then realize that it’s still better to run Guardians, because auto-attack loot stick generates far more loot than anything a mesmer can do.

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

• A handful of players who regularly chain grenth, melandru, and arah will see some differences, and then realize that it’s still better to run Guardians, because auto-attack loot stick generates far more loot than anything a mesmer can do.

I wonder about people who keep forgetting this fact. Cleave damage matters. The simple problem is that 2/3 light armor class have terrible cleave and aoe abitilies

loseridoit.2756:

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

• A handful of players who regularly chain grenth, melandru, and arah will see some differences, and then realize that it’s still better to run Guardians, because auto-attack loot stick generates far more loot than anything a mesmer can do.

I wonder about people who keep forgetting this fact. Cleave damage matters. The simple problem is that 2/3 light armor class have terrible cleave and aoe abitilies

I think this is the most realistic counter to any argument that light armor classes will become the default farming class. Any small selective drop advantage given to light armor classes is overwhelmed by the general drop advantage of heavy armor classes. As well the market will work to erase any long term advantage.

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

Since everyone is drawing conclusions based on a complete lack of facts, I’ll play too. I think Profession-influenced loot will work just like Magic Find:

• At first, everyone will claim buffs/nerfs, but no one will actually collect any data for weeks.
• The first people who do will fail to compare apples to apples, since that’s difficult when doing multiple runs and since different builds collect loot at different rates.
• When people finally have useful data to present, most people will misinterpret it and there will be another huge whinge/whining-fest.
• John Smith will attempt to explain what we’re seeing, and people will accuse him of lying and falsifying evidence.
• The actual result will be that new players leveling up their characters won’t have to buy as much on the TP (or sell as much) and hardly any of us will notice, because the difference between any two runs of AC will be negligible.
• A handful of players who regularly chain grenth, melandru, and arah will see some differences, and then realize that it’s still better to run Guardians, because auto-attack loot stick generates far more loot than anything a mesmer can do.

Wrong! Necro tags as great as guardians.

I played both and honestly no difference on tagging mobs i still make around 30-40gold per hour on both classes. Guardian is more like easy mode because you have autoattack while using necro you have to play a little bit wiser.

But when patch comes necros will yield more gold because of the stupid system.

loseridoit.2756:

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

• A handful of players who regularly chain grenth, melandru, and arah will see some differences, and then realize that it’s still better to run Guardians, because auto-attack loot stick generates far more loot than anything a mesmer can do.

I wonder about people who keep forgetting this fact. Cleave damage matters. The simple problem is that 2/3 light armor class have terrible cleave and aoe abitilies

Whereas the medium armour classes are the absolute best farmers, to make up for all that leather?

Its funny how people still think heavy and medium is still as good as light armor after the patch hits.

Stop lying to yourselves / playing blind. Anet already announced the new mechanics. No matter how hard you try to counter it, the fact that it was stated that light armor users will get more light armors than the other 2 is already enough of a statement that says kitten medium and heavy classes.

Light armor have the cleaves. Elems have auto attack fire staff, dagger, aa water dagger, fire staff number 2 etcetc lots of aoe potential. Necros have marks. Never played mesmer. But currently the most classes i see running around in zerg tagging mobs are

Necros, guardians, elems, rangers and engineers. Sadly after patch, it will be down to elems and necros

gobax.6185:

Its funny how people still think heavy and medium is still as good as light armor after the patch hits.

Stop lying to yourselves / playing blind. Anet already announced the new mechanics. No matter how hard you try to counter it, the fact that it was stated that light armor users will get more light armors than the other 2 is already enough of a statement that says kitten medium and heavy classes.

Light armor have the cleaves. Elems have auto attack fire staff, dagger, aa water dagger, fire staff number 2 etcetc lots of aoe potential. Necros have marks. Never played mesmer. But currently the most classes i see running around in zerg tagging mobs are

Necros, guardians, elems, rangers and engineers. Sadly after patch, it will be down to elems and necros

Fact is: we don’t know what it will be like. What we have to date is speculation based on absolutely no information. Heck, no one has yet presented the “before the patch” data that we could compare, so I doubt we’ll even know after the patch what exactly has changed.

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

gobax.6185:

Its funny how people still think heavy and medium is still as good as light armor after the patch hits.

Stop lying to yourselves / playing blind. Anet already announced the new mechanics. No matter how hard you try to counter it, the fact that it was stated that light armor users will get more light armors than the other 2 is already enough of a statement that says kitten medium and heavy classes.

Light armor have the cleaves. Elems have auto attack fire staff, dagger, aa water dagger, fire staff number 2 etcetc lots of aoe potential. Necros have marks. Never played mesmer. But currently the most classes i see running around in zerg tagging mobs are

Necros, guardians, elems, rangers and engineers. Sadly after patch, it will be down to elems and necros

Fact is: we don’t know what it will be like. What we have to date is speculation based on absolutely no information. Heck, no one has yet presented the “before the patch” data that we could compare, so I doubt we’ll even know after the patch what exactly has changed.

uhh data is highly overated, you dont need data to know understand x is in 2x+5>15. They laid out the formula, you will get more proffesion usuable gear from drops, more is means more. The degree is not that relevant.
If you are an engineer, all your proffession specifc drops are cheap. you will make less money. You can debate how much, but if it does what it says it does, you will make less.

The only thing i will say is unknown, and probably needs more data, is how the market will adapt to this change over time. Its theoretically possible that they could balance out changes with drop rates, but that seems less likely the less noticeable the change is. Kind of odd when you think about it.