Guild Wars 2

Again , what you are trying to do is to Min/Max the game. These people could have a ulterior motive to using magic find gear, what if they need yellows to dissect and get ectos?

I’ve said this one too many times, but stop trying to min/max the game. There are more to dungeons than just speed runs.

Another form of gear inspection. Don’t want/need in GW2.

moonjo.9831:

Another form of gear inspection. Don’t want/need in GW2.

EXACTLY. Thank you.

You said it yourself, swiftpaw, MF matters in a group because it effects group performance negatively. But so does low gear rarity, unoptimal build types, bad trait allocation, class, and even mf food buffs. Its not a brazen assumption at all; your say mf is the leading problem, but your argument encapsulates min/maxing all of a characters stats when its not “optimal”.

You already have a choice, its called join a pro guild with as much scrutiny as you and only do runs with them. There’s no need for you to impose discrimination on other people’s ability to play; doing so is selfish.

Kashien.6278:

Again , what you are trying to do is to Min/Max the game. These people could have a ulterior motive to using magic find gear, what if they need yellows to dissect and get ectos?

I’ve said this one too many times, but stop trying to min/max the game. There are more to dungeons than just speed runs.

I am not trying to do anything, I am letting you know that the simple fact is. this:

1.) Magic find does not improve performance.
2.) By taking magic find you sacrifice one of your 3 stats that could be beneficial to your performance.

No idea why that is so hard to understand..

Poaches.1967:

You said it yourself, swiftpaw, MF matters in a group because it effects group performance negatively. But so does low gear rarity, unoptimal build types, bad trait allocation, class, and even mf food buffs. Its not a brazen assumption at all; your say mf is the leading problem, but your argument encapsulates min/maxing all of a characters stats when its not “optimal”.

You already have a choice, its called join a pro guild with as much scrutiny as you and only do runs with them. There’s no need for you to impose discrimination on other people’s ability to play; doing so is selfish.

OMG THANK YOU!!!!! what i’ve been trying to say this whole freakin time!

HERE

and HERE

Poaches.1967:

You said it yourself, swiftpaw, MF matters in a group because it effects group performance negatively. But so does low gear rarity, unoptimal build types, bad trait allocation, class, and even mf food buffs. Its not a brazen assumption at all; your say mf is the leading problem, but your argument encapsulates min/maxing all of a characters stats when its not “optimal”.

You already have a choice, its called join a pro guild with as much scrutiny as you and only do runs with them. There’s no need for you to impose discrimination on other people’s ability to play; doing so is selfish.

I have never said it is the leading problem. It is a problem though. You cannot say it is not. That is all I have ever argued. That it is a problem because it affects performance. Of course those other things affect performance too, but that’s not what this thread is about.

I am not imposing discrimination, I just do not want the falsehood that Magic find does not affect performance spread around.

For the record I am not in a ‘pro guild’ and if you read my earlier posts you would no I don’t discriminate as I took my guildie in a full magic find set for many runs and let him figure out it was a bad idea.

All this talk about performance seems to be like min/maxing to me.

Kashien.6278:

All this talk about performance seems to be like min/maxing to me.

It’s not about min/max.. whatever that even is. I am just letting you know it does make a difference if you are wearing magic find or not. What you decide to do with that information is up to you. As for me, unless it’s arah path 4, I don’t much care.

You can say all you want about min-maxing.

Right now its just magic find.

But then people are going to find the ratio between toughness and vitality and if vitality wins out, then anyone with toughness will be deemed “noob” and ostracized. If toughness wins, then anyone with vitality will have the same thing happen to them..

There is just no making you people happy until you can point and laugh at someone for having terrible gear/ playstyle.

You elitist pricks make me sick. You just cant have fun with a game, you have to min/max it and make it boring and tedious to do the same thing over and over, to find the most “optimal” stats, and gear.

Then when everyone is “optimal” you call for change and nerfs and banhammers, There is just no making you happy. You wont be happy until magic find is removed from dungeons.

Well, what about Farmers? Hmmm. Easiest way to get gold items is in dungeons because of improved loot tables. What you are trying to do…. is selfish.

Kashien.6278:

You can say all you want about min-maxing.

Right now its just magic find.

But then people are going to find the ratio between toughness and vitality and if vitality wins out, then anyone with toughness will be deemed “noob” and ostracized. If toughness wins, then anyone with vitality will have the same thing happen to them..

There is just no making you people happy until you can point and laugh at someone for having terrible gear/ playstyle.

Well I have to say I don’t do any of that, I certainly don’t single people out and laugh at them or what have you. But we cannot lie about magic find. It does affect performance. I don’t expect any of that ostentation, rather I hope people understand the implications of taking magic find on their set over a set with 3 stats that souly affect performance. They can make their decisions under that understanding.. As my guidlie did, even at the cost to his team on many a night. it could have been avoided if he just knew about it to begin with.

swiftpaw.6397:

Kashien.6278:

You can say all you want about min-maxing.

Right now its just magic find.

But then people are going to find the ratio between toughness and vitality and if vitality wins out, then anyone with toughness will be deemed “noob” and ostracized. If toughness wins, then anyone with vitality will have the same thing happen to them..

There is just no making you people happy until you can point and laugh at someone for having terrible gear/ playstyle.

Well I have to say I don’t do any of that, I certainly don’t single people out and laugh at them or what have you. But we cannot lie about magic find. It does affect performance. I don’t expect any of that ostentation, rather I hope people understand the implications of taking magic find on their set over a set with 3 stats that souly affect performance. They can make their decisions under that understanding.. As my guidlie did, even at the cost to his team on many a night.

Yep. Min/Maxing. There’s just no getting through to you. You know best. Right? You know what is best for your guildy. And so he blindly follows you into the wild blue yonder.

I love how you think that it hinders performance.

Kashien.6278:

swiftpaw.6397:

Kashien.6278:

You can say all you want about min-maxing.

Right now its just magic find.

But then people are going to find the ratio between toughness and vitality and if vitality wins out, then anyone with toughness will be deemed “noob” and ostracized. If toughness wins, then anyone with vitality will have the same thing happen to them..

There is just no making you people happy until you can point and laugh at someone for having terrible gear/ playstyle.

Well I have to say I don’t do any of that, I certainly don’t single people out and laugh at them or what have you. But we cannot lie about magic find. It does affect performance. I don’t expect any of that ostentation, rather I hope people understand the implications of taking magic find on their set over a set with 3 stats that souly affect performance. They can make their decisions under that understanding.. As my guidlie did, even at the cost to his team on many a night.

Yep. Min/Maxing. There’s just no getting through to you. You know best. Right? You know what is best for your guildy. And so he blindly follows you into the wild blue yonder.

I love how you think that it hinders performance.

I never told my guildie that his magic find set was the issue, I let him figure it out for himself. I think you are becoming rather irrational. I only advocate that people understand that magic find lessens performance and that they could be doing something better. Had my guildie been told about it, he would have saved alot of time and money from repairs by choosing to craft the right set in the beginning.

Totally pointless.
If player can work as a team and at least listen what others say you can finish any dungeon even with guys with all blue equip.

If player can’t work as a team, don’t listen what you say on chat, and play their own solo way, every dungeon will be hard, even with all non-mf exotics and the best known build.

Personally, I never looked at any build site, never feel i have to optimize my build. I play like i like even if it’s not the best and most optimized play. Maybe because i play for fun and not for perfection.

+1 Mapokl. Thats exactly what GW/GW2 is about.

If your looking for perfection, leave this game. And go to a different one to judge. We do not need you here spoiling this game. Bye Bye.

I’d like to be able to see my own Magic Find %, but I don’t want to be able to view other players’. Why would that be helpful? Each player gets their own loot table.

Alright, we all know that the stats on your gear make so much difference, having MF gear on must tank your perfromance. Obvious, right? Lets look at the numbers.

I will assume full level 80 exotic gear and ignore runes. I don’t have all my spreadsheets handy, so I have to rely a bit on the wiki—I may be off a little due to either wiki error or my misinterpretation of wiki content.

A level 80 will have 916 in the 4 basic stats and 1400 trait points. This is a total of 5064 stat points. This is before gear.

You get one major and two minor attributes, with the minors being worth a total of 696 × 2 = 1392. We’re at a total of 6456 now.

The major stat, which is Magic Find in the two exotic MF sets, contributes 1001. Actually, it is less in this particular case, but let’s not quibble, we’re mathing a worst-case analysis.

This means that MF drops your effective stats by about 13.5% I ignored food buffs. As best as I can tell from the wiki, this is in full MF gear, but not including armor runes.

This is a significant hit, if you look at it in the abstract. If you build around it, however, it isn’t quite as dire.

There is a very viable guardian build that is very heavy on the support that really only calls for condition damage as a stat—others are nice, but really, the damage just isn’t there regardless of gear.

Toughness and Vitality are only needed if you take a beating. Support players tend to be the most adept at avoiding damage, so in this case, they aren’t that necesary. The guardian’s natural regeneration and mitigation potential are also second to none.

Guardians that want to inflict condition damage are not beholden to crits. So precision doesn’t make any difference.

Critical damage, power… not for this build.

Healing Power is useful, so we’ll earmark that one.

Boon duration cannot be had on gear, but is very valuable for this build. Condition duration less so, but is also not available on gear.

So far we can consider:

• Vitality / Condition Damage / Healing Power
• Condition Damage / Vitality / Power
• Condition Damage / Precision / Toughness
• Magic Find / Power / Condition Damage

Of these four viable gears:
The second is the most readily available.
The fourth is what we’re assuming the player already has.

What did they actually give up from the stats that matter to this build? 1001 condition damage is replaced with 696 condition damage, for a loss of 305 points (4%).

Conclusion
This means that the best-case for a player wearing MF gear is effectively a 4% reduction in stats. Consumables can offset this loss, and I see many people run dungeons without consumables, or under-leveled consumables. These people deprive the group of at least as much as some people that go in full MF gear.

4% reduction in damage output is being downed once every 4 minutes and immediately rezzed. Don’t talk about “more likely without toughness/vitality” because my glass cannon elementalist can stay standing through a dungeon.

4% is asking your group to stop for 30 seconds once an hour.

I know we’re looking at a best case justification on the worst possible numbers. We’re also looking at a very trivial downgrade. What is a 15% loss—the case where you really need that stat that was replaced by MF?

Being killed 5 times in a dungeon is about a 15% loss (very difficult to geta firm value when you look at variable distances to run from waypoints, etc.)

A 2 minute break for your group is a 15% loss.

So, all things considered, there are far worse monsters than somebody who knows what they are doing and wears MF gear.

Fildydarie.1496:

Alright, we all know that the stats on your gear make so much difference, having MF gear on must tank your perfromance. Obvious, right? Lets look at the numbers.

I will assume full level 80 exotic gear and ignore runes. I don’t have all my spreadsheets handy, so I have to rely a bit on the wiki—I may be off a little due to either wiki error or my misinterpretation of wiki content.

A level 80 will have 916 in the 4 basic stats and 1400 trait points. This is a total of 5064 stat points. This is before gear.

You get one major and two minor attributes, with the minors being worth a total of 696 × 2 = 1392. We’re at a total of 6456 now.

The major stat, which is Magic Find in the two exotic MF sets, contributes 1001. Actually, it is less in this particular case, but let’s not quibble, we’re mathing a worst-case analysis.

This means that MF drops your effective stats by about 13.5% I ignored food buffs. As best as I can tell from the wiki, this is in full MF gear, but not including armor runes.

This is a significant hit, if you look at it in the abstract. If you build around it, however, it isn’t quite as dire.

There is a very viable guardian build that is very heavy on the support that really only calls for condition damage as a stat—others are nice, but really, the damage just isn’t there regardless of gear.

Toughness and Vitality are only needed if you take a beating. Support players tend to be the most adept at avoiding damage, so in this case, they aren’t that necesary. The guardian’s natural regeneration and mitigation potential are also second to none.

Guardians that want to inflict condition damage are not beholden to crits. So precision doesn’t make any difference.

Critical damage, power… not for this build.

Healing Power is useful, so we’ll earmark that one.

Boon duration cannot be had on gear, but is very valuable for this build. Condition duration less so, but is also not available on gear.

So far we can consider:

• Vitality / Condition Damage / Healing Power
• Condition Damage / Vitality / Power
• Condition Damage / Precision / Toughness
• Magic Find / Power / Condition Damage

Of these four viable gears:
The second is the most readily available.
The fourth is what we’re assuming the player already has.

What did they actually give up from the stats that matter to this build? 1001 condition damage is replaced with 696 condition damage, for a loss of 305 points (4%).

Conclusion
This means that the best-case for a player wearing MF gear is effectively a 4% reduction in stats. Consumables can offset this loss, and I see many people run dungeons without consumables, or under-leveled consumables. These people deprive the group of at least as much as some people that go in full MF gear.

4% reduction in damage output is being downed once every 4 minutes and immediately rezzed. Don’t talk about “more likely without toughness/vitality” because my glass cannon elementalist can stay standing through a dungeon.

4% is asking your group to stop for 30 seconds once an hour.

I know we’re looking at a best case justification on the worst possible numbers. We’re also looking at a very trivial downgrade. What is a 15% loss—the case where you really need that stat that was replaced by MF?

Being killed 5 times in a dungeon is about a 15% loss (very difficult to geta firm value when you look at variable distances to run from waypoints, etc.)

A 2 minute break for your group is a 15% loss.

So, all things considered, there are far worse monsters than somebody who knows what they are doing and wears MF gear.

I wish i could hug you right now.

“BUT WAIT!!!! Imagine if they DIDNT use the magic find gear, how much BETTER they would be.”

^^^^^ That is optimizing. and that is min/maxing. and has no place in any of my groups. If you want groups like that, make them yourself. Dont force it on others. That, is being selfish.

Love what you posted fildydarie

Fildydarie.1496:

Alright, we all know that the stats on your gear make so much difference, having MF gear on must tank your perfromance. Obvious, right? Lets look at the numbers.

I will assume full level 80 exotic gear and ignore runes. I don’t have all my spreadsheets handy, so I have to rely a bit on the wiki—I may be off a little due to either wiki error or my misinterpretation of wiki content.

A level 80 will have 916 in the 4 basic stats and 1400 trait points. This is a total of 5064 stat points. This is before gear.

You get one major and two minor attributes, with the minors being worth a total of 696 × 2 = 1392. We’re at a total of 6456 now.

The major stat, which is Magic Find in the two exotic MF sets, contributes 1001. Actually, it is less in this particular case, but let’s not quibble, we’re mathing a worst-case analysis.

This means that MF drops your effective stats by about 13.5% I ignored food buffs. As best as I can tell from the wiki, this is in full MF gear, but not including armor runes.

This is a significant hit, if you look at it in the abstract. If you build around it, however, it isn’t quite as dire.

There is a very viable guardian build that is very heavy on the support that really only calls for condition damage as a stat—others are nice, but really, the damage just isn’t there regardless of gear.

Toughness and Vitality are only needed if you take a beating. Support players tend to be the most adept at avoiding damage, so in this case, they aren’t that necesary. The guardian’s natural regeneration and mitigation potential are also second to none.

Guardians that want to inflict condition damage are not beholden to crits. So precision doesn’t make any difference.

Critical damage, power… not for this build.

Healing Power is useful, so we’ll earmark that one.

Boon duration cannot be had on gear, but is very valuable for this build. Condition duration less so, but is also not available on gear.

So far we can consider:

• Vitality / Condition Damage / Healing Power
• Condition Damage / Vitality / Power
• Condition Damage / Precision / Toughness
• Magic Find / Power / Condition Damage

Of these four viable gears:
The second is the most readily available.
The fourth is what we’re assuming the player already has.

What did they actually give up from the stats that matter to this build? 1001 condition damage is replaced with 696 condition damage, for a loss of 305 points (4%).

Conclusion
This means that the best-case for a player wearing MF gear is effectively a 4% reduction in stats. Consumables can offset this loss, and I see many people run dungeons without consumables, or under-leveled consumables. These people deprive the group of at least as much as some people that go in full MF gear.

4% reduction in damage output is being downed once every 4 minutes and immediately rezzed. Don’t talk about “more likely without toughness/vitality” because my glass cannon elementalist can stay standing through a dungeon.

4% is asking your group to stop for 30 seconds once an hour.

I know we’re looking at a best case justification on the worst possible numbers. We’re also looking at a very trivial downgrade. What is a 15% loss—the case where you really need that stat that was replaced by MF?

Being killed 5 times in a dungeon is about a 15% loss (very difficult to geta firm value when you look at variable distances to run from waypoints, etc.)

A 2 minute break for your group is a 15% loss.

So, all things considered, there are far worse monsters than somebody who knows what they are doing and wears MF gear.

A good analysis and I agree, there are worse monsters. But when taking people who you have never played with, I can understand why people would be a little weary as you need to be a good player to account for the sacrifice. As you say, you play a glass cannon ele but don’t get downed because you are a skilled player, I wish that was the case for every glass cannon ele I see. How many pugs are going to have this best case scenario? It’s hard enough these days just to get a decent player for a hard instance when my friends list is full of people who are busy.

Also I might add, that if you die at lupicus even once, it’s a long run back and has an immediate affect on your team as you are not there to help them. Leading to a higher chance to fail and then having to start over.

The real issue here:

This means that MF drops your effective stats by about 13.5% I ignored food buffs. As best as I can tell from the wiki, this is in full MF gear, but not including armor runes.
This is a significant hit, if you look at it in the abstract. If you build around it, however, it isn’t quite as dire.

How many people are going to build around it or even know how to do so?

swiftpaw.6397:

A good analysis and I agree, there are worse monsters. But when taking people who you have never played with, I can understand why people would be a little weary as you need to be a good player to account for the sacrifice. As you say, you play a glass cannon ele but don’t get downed because you are a skilled player, I wish that was the case for every glass cannon ele I see.

But this is my (and Kashien’s) point. My gear is not what determines my contribution, it is a summation of so many factors that asking for this little snippet of information is encouraging shallow, biased attitudes. It tells the novice that “you need to watch out for these people.”

Group with a person. If you feel they are not pulling their weight, either have a talk with them or boot them outright, but base this decision on their actions, not a theory-crafted conjecture based on one little number.

Edit:
Well, building round it is the 4% number, ideally. So The range of penalty spans 4%-13.5%. The 4% is trivial, the 15% numbers I gave I think are pertty fair and represent not building around it.

300 points is the equivalent of putting 30 points in a trait line where you only really benefit from one of the stats offered, if you want to look at the 4% in a different light. Many people pick traits that seem to help them, but ignore the stats involved, sometimes with great detriment.

My point was not that MF is necessarily ideal, but it is a small part of a larger whole, and it is the whole, not a part, that should be judged. The loss of effectiveness can be mitigated very effectively through immeasurable (player skill) means.

Fildydarie.1496:

swiftpaw.6397:

A good analysis and I agree, there are worse monsters. But when taking people who you have never played with, I can understand why people would be a little weary as you need to be a good player to account for the sacrifice. As you say, you play a glass cannon ele but don’t get downed because you are a skilled player, I wish that was the case for every glass cannon ele I see.

But this is my (and Kashien’s) point. My gear is not what determines my contribution, it is a summation of so many factors that asking for this little snippet of information is encouraging shallow, biased attitudes. It tells the novice that “you need to watch out for these people.”

Group with a person. If you feel they are not pulling their weight, either have a talk with them or boot them outright, but base this decision on their actions, not a theory-crafted conjecture based on one little number.

You cannot know the quality of a pug player. Which is why people would judge based on MF. Myself I take them regardless, despite all this talk about me being this horrible person, and if it is an issue I do say something. But as I have said before, when it comes to Arah and etc, I cannot make these allowances unless I know for a fact they are built around that set.. which I cannot because it’s a pug.

Lyer.1905:

What they should do is attach a certain value on the gear you have equipped. Say, an exotic is worth than an uncommon. To make things easier, they should just sum up the totals of the gear and have it be displayable to other players, so people know who they can invite safely.

Invite Safely??? I have never been threaten or my toon kill by inviting. What has cause me headaches is players wanting to skip content or they think their way in the only way to do the dungeon. Some of my fastest dungeons have been inviting non-level 80 that have little knowledge of the path we are about to take.

My personal favorite was a PUG that wanted to do story mode on Sorrows Embraced, but 3 left because it was to hard. We got stuck at Kudo and because of the a bug we got stuck with the fire golem and the next golem out at once. .The reason the 3 left the group was we did not have the right classes and equipment. However we remaining two figured it out and finished the dungeon alone.

my point is if players put on their thinking hate they can figure out how to overcome any dungeon challenge with any build and equipment.

I hope they never put this feature in.

My point was not that MF is necessarily ideal, but it is a small part of a larger whole, and it is the whole, not a part, that should be judged. The loss of effectiveness can be mitigated very effectively through immeasurable (player skill) means.

Magic find is not ideal. That’s pretty much all I’ve been saying here, Kashien has been throwing all these wild assumptions around about being selective and etc, my only argument is that you are better off taking another stat. As I have said though, I cannot know a pug’s level of skill, so it is understandable why people would want to know thier MF level.

The less you are built around the MF sacrifice you make there, the more of a performance sacrifice you are going to make. People cannot know who is running what, but that is not what I am saying here.

All I have said is that there Is a difference. Kashien would have everyone think there is not. And people who think there is not a difference caused by magic find, they are less likely to try and build around it to compensate for that 13.5%, or to try run something else.

I’m just saying that your trying to min/max the game. Alot of games have been ruined by people “optimizing” everything.

You know why you dont want that, because then there would be no individuality anymore. Everyone would run the same cookie cutter builds and get the same gear with the same stats and everyone would look(well, not with transmutation stones) and act the same.

It makes for very boring play.

But by all means, if you want to be so selective, that you can only have fun when everyone is doing what YOU want, then create your own groups, and kick the people that do not abide by your rules.

Whatever would you want in a dungeon that would necessitate the need for magic find really? It doesn’t affect chests, which drop the only things (runes/cores/lodestones) worth anything in a dungeon. Sure, you can get a yellow, but unless you’re doing something like CM, you’d probably be fighting less enemies than your daily orichalcum ore run.

I’ve had plenty of party members that could be naked and outplay other party members in full exotics, and contribute much more to a swift dungeon run.

That said, a skillful person with higher stats will improve their performance, just as an unskilled person with higher stats will improve their performance. I don’t see how anyone can argue that someone will be just as effective wearing magic find as they are when the same person is wearing their actual armour set.

Personally, I put on my magic/gold find set (and food) for particularly easy parts of dungeons that give out lots of loot, and then just for those parts. Once that money giving champ is dead and we move on, I put my real gear back on so that we can finish the dungeon quickly and reduce the potential for anyone going down.

Fildydarie.1496:

Stuff

This is some truly impressive handwaving, but it is just that: Handwaving. Power affects performance for every build that uses a weapon, even those focused on condition damage. The same goes for Toughness and Vitality. But I’ll play along with you and won’t dwell on those, except to say that they are most certainly not irrelevant.

The “4%” effectiveness drop is a laugh. If you’re going to call Power, Precision, Vitality, and Toughness all irrelevant, you can’t then add them back into the total only when it’s favourable to your position.
You can say that you’re losing 13.5% of your total stat pool.
You can say that you don’t care about anything besides Condition Damage, in which case you’re losing 30% of that.
You can’t say that your four primary stats are unimportant when it comes to tallying up your losses, but suddenly they count again when it’s time to compare your losses in one stat to your total stat pool. That’s just dishonest.

To be very charitable to your point, let’s use a different metric that at least consistently ignores all of the stats you say to ignore: Actual condition damage. With 996 CD (696 from equipment, plus 300 from traits), Bleeding will deal 92.3 damage per stack per second, Burning will deal 577 damage per second. With 1301 CD, Bleeding will deal 107.55 damage per stack per second, and Burning will deal 653 damage per second.
You are effectively losing ~11.5% of your damage from Burning, and ~14% of your damage from Bleeding. I don’t know what build you mean, or Guardian particularly well at all, but if we say you’re keeping a constant 10 Stacks of Bleeding and permanent Burning on an enemy, that’s around a 13% reduction in efficacy.

And you can’t neglect Runes. A full set of Condition Damage runes will add 183 Condition damage, if you use six of the same rune, or 211 Condition Damage if you don’t care about the sixth rune’s effect and want to maximize CD. In comparison, Magic Find runes will add only 50 stat points, and your choices are only between Vitality and Power (irrelevant, by your reasoning).

You’ve now got 996 Condition Damage, compared to a possible total of 1512.
Repeating the calculations from earlier for the percentage of Condition Damage you lose, you’re now down by 18% of your Burning damage, 22% of your Bleeding damage, and ~20.5% of your total condition damage.

So in effect, you have lost:
- 15.3% of your total stats (taking Runes into account)
- 20.5% of your main source of damage
- Every single point of Healing Power that you could have obtained as a secondary stat, since it’s not available in conjunction with Magic Find; even you yourself said that Healing Power is significant enough for this build to be useful.
– 696 stat points worth of another secondary stat, the equivalent of essentially 7000 Health.

And I should also point out one other thing: Very few people use Magic Find on Exotic equipment. Exotic equipment with Magic Find as a stat only gives 3% per piece, which is the same as Masterwork equipment. Masterwork Accessories give 6% MF each compared with 8% on Exotics, but in both cases, the Masterwork equipment costs about 2-6 Silver per piece, and the Exotic version costs 1.5-2.5 G per piece. I’m skeptical that a player seeking to maximize their Magic Find would drop an extra 15G on Accessories for a gain of 10% MF, and I’m very skeptical that one of those players would drop an additional 15G on Armour and Weapons with Magic Find, for a net gain of zero MF – but any player seeking to maximize their efficacy through useful stats will outfit themselves with Exotics ASAP. I’ll leave that point alone, since there’s no way to prove it one way or another, but it shouldn’t be entirely brushed aside.

Conclusion: Your conclusion is bunk.

If you are undergeared, you probably are still earning gold/tokens to gear up; eventually everyone wants to wear exotics, especially that they’re quite easy to get.

If you are running MF set in a dungeon, you are consciously, by choice, sacrificing not only the major stat on your gear, but also give up all defensive stats (no tough/vit along with MF), running not only a glass build, but even one not dealing considerable damage.

You’re consciously, by your own choice, kittening yourself in terms of raw effectiveness, influencing the team. You are rude as hell, putting your own greed and possible personal gain over your party members.
If you’re running a suboptimal build or using a suboptimal weapon set for your profession, another party member may tell you ‘hey, you should try running X instead of Y, you’ll see you’ll do better in dungeons’. Thing is, if you’re running something suboptimal and it’s not MF, you’re probably doing it unknowingly, whereas using MF shows your independent choice.

For a very long time in my forum crusades i haven’t met a person with such moot, silly and ignorant arguments as Kashien. Wishful thinking about your stats and outright ignoring everything everyone else says won’t justify your poor choice of gear for end-game PvE.

Crater: I have no points in vitality or toughness on my elementalist. She is the exact thing that people are talking about when they say ‘glass cannon.’ But, she doesn’t die, because I don’t let her. There are survival skills that aren’t stats—there are dodges, and traits, and knowing what-the-kitten you’re doing when you go into a place. If I don’t take a hit, toughness is, but the very definition, irrelevant. If I take so few hits that I can regenerate it incidentally, we’re in teh same boat. In both cases, extra Vitality is just as irrelevant, because I do not use it. It is that simple; skillful play and a competant group negate my need to soak hits. Thats all. It can be done. I’ve done it. Q.E.D.

Now, I didn’t say everyone is in that boat, but I said it can be done. This is all about judging the quality of a player by the gear they wear. One coutnerexample is all it takes to disprove the hypothesis. I think it is pretty clear that a player is far more than the sum of their stats. Playstyle, reflexes, traits, knowledge—they all matter too.

I broke out the numbers because people insist it is debilitating to a player to bring MF gear to a dungeon. Numbers don’t lie. It is no more debilitating than many common actions, even if you want to step up the penalty for considering runes. Just because people can suck doesn’t mean you have to promote a culture of prejudice against people that wear a certain stat, when they can be just as or more productive than members of a group wearing the ‘right’ stats. That is what this is about; people wanting the tools to promote prejudice.

Quick question – have you ever been to Arah explorable with that glass ele?
You will change your mind about extra tough and vit as soon as you try it out.

drkn.3429:

Thing is, if you’re running something suboptimal and it’s not MF, you’re probably doing it unknowingly, whereas using MF shows your independent choice.

This is the very essence of the min/maxer at its worst.

I do not play the way you do (the hypothetical you, that is), because I want to have fun, and I don’t think that greatswords are fun. But you’re telling me that a graetsword is better than sword and board. Or focus is superior to a shield. You say you are right, but I can tell you that it is less fun for me. I might boost my damage by 10% doing it your way, or my survivability, but if I am not having fun, why am I even playing the game?

Guild Wars 2 has no content that demands 100% from everybody. At best, top-tier content asks for 80% of what a player is capable of, and a portion of what a player brings to the table cannot be measured in stats, as it is the highly-subjective skill. I choose how much I bring to the table, but when you start nitpicking gear, you’re talking about adjusting a data point that is relative to my personal capability; that may be higher or lower than another player, why should I have to not only carry a weaker player, but earn the same reward for doing some of his/her job too?

Should we ban norn and charr because they are large targets and make it difficult for people to observe their surroundings? This is quite clearly a drain on the performance of other players—I know that I’ve missed some boss cues because a charr was standing in the way. They made a choice that penalizes not themselves, but everybody around them, so by your logic, they should be excluded.

drkn.3429:

Quick question – have you ever been to Arah explorable with that glass ele?
You will change your mind about extra tough and vit as soon as you try it out.

No, but one place where she doesn’t work does not mean that she is not viable in other places. I use her as an example of what is possible because people are positing that toughness and vitality have an inherent value because they must be used in any content.

‘They made a choice that penalizes not themselves, but everybody around them, so by your logic, they should be excluded.’

They also have the choice to change their build so that they do not affect others around them, comparing them to charr and norn doesnt make sense as those people do not have a choice.

Well I prefer to die 1-2 times more and run dungeon 5 minutes longer, rather then play with some people that rush trough everything and spam about calculations of optimizing.

You can write whole book about min/maxing for all classed etc, but I and I think many other players don’t really care about it. I will still play warrior with shield even if i lose that 4 or 15% of whatever.

Of course people with totally random equip who don’t even know what they want to do, are bother. But that’s it. If somebody play glass cannon ele but know what to do, and how he/she want to play it, I see no problem.

As for your problem, go create/join some guild with min/maxers. There you can fast run with the most min/maxed optimized people and remember every corner of dungeons and debate about how turning 30° on second turn in CoF is 0.2 second faster then turning 45°.

I’m making this a separate post, because it’s mostly aside from whether and to what degree Magic Find hinders your efficacy. There are tons and tons and tons of posts in this thread along the lines of “So, what? If Magic Find makes you worse by [x], then what about [y]? That makes you even worse!” Where [y] is, among other things: What if the player isn’t good? What if he only has Masterwork equipment and not Exotic, what if you’re doing a sub-80 dungeon and he’s only at the level limit instead of being level 80? What if he isn’t totally perfect, are you going to be an elitist and kick him from the party? etc etc.

But that’s not what people are saying. It’s not simply about who will be the absolute, tip-top, most min-maxed super effective player possible. Magic Find is a unique problem that stems from several underlying issues – and fixing even one of those issues fixes the problems people have with Magic Find. All of the other slippery slope issues that have been brought up in this thread fail to meet the requirements that make Magic Find a problem to be addressed. They are, in no particular order:

1) Magic Find significantly diminishes your effectiveness, and consequently that of the rest of the party.(1)
Why is this part of what makes Magic Find a problem? If a player does something ii) that benefits themselves, they iii) do it on purpose, and iv) the rest of the party doesn’t know about it, but it doesn’t detract from the party’s effectiveness, there’s obviously no problem – this describes, for instance, opening a chest after a boss fight.
Would fixing this fix Magic Find? Yes. Obviously, if Magic Find gear had the same efficacy as stat gear, we wouldn’t be having this discussion.

2) Magic Find gear has a benefit for the player who uses it (to the exclusion of the rest of the party).
Why is this part of what makes Magic Find a problem? If a player i) drags down party performance ii) on purpose iv) without the rest of the party being able to see it visibly, that is a problem. But it’s an unlikely one, because in contrast to the current implementation of Magic Find, there’s no incentive for a player to do it. For instance, coming into a dungeon with equipment ten levels below your level. The only reason to do that is so that it costs less to repair your armour – but you’ll be downed and defeated so often that you’re unlikely to save any money.
Would fixing this fix Magic Find? Yes. If Magic Find were averaged over the entire party, two things would happen: First, there would be less incentive for an individual player to wear MF gear without telling the rest of the party – 150% MF would be only result in a 30% MF bonus to the player wearing the gear. Second, it would reward all party members equally; if I’m wearing MF gear, and you have to pick up the slack for me, then it’s only fair that you receive part of the increased drop rate, right?

3) Using Magic Find Gear is a conscious, intentional decision.
Why is this part of what makes Magic Find a problem? When a player i) degrades party performance ii) to their own benefit and iv) it isn’t immediately apparent to the rest of the party, but they’re not doing it on purpose, it can try your patience, but it isn’t fair to hold it against a player who doesn’t know better. This best describes players who aren’t familiar with a dungeon, don’t understand the game mechanics fully, who just aren’t good at the game, etc. I find teaching to be fun and social
Would fixing this fix Magic Find? Yes. In this case, ‘fixing this’ amounts to removing Magic Find entirely. No MF, no problem.

4) There’s no easy way for other players to know that you’re using Magic Find gear.
Why is this part of what makes Magic Find a problem? If someone i) is doing less than their utmost best to support the party, ii) while receiving some personal benefit for what they’re doing, and iii) is doing is on purpose, but this information is available at a glance to anyone who looks, there are no problems with it – if you can know, right off the bat, that another player is doing this, you are free to say “Yes, I’ll help you out with that goal” or you can say “No, I’d rather take someone who’s doing their best to help”.
Would fixing this fix Magic Find? Yes. This is largely the issue we’re discussing, and being able to see another player’s MF score would solve every problem I have with it. If you’re worried this would turn into an elitist kick-frenzy, as all players with even a hint of Magic Find are turned away from every party at the door, consider this: How many times have you seen a party kick someone for using a weapon with a Sigil of Luck, or Magic Find food?(2)

(Footnotes wouldn’t fit:)

(1)I’ll refer to my last post for a fairly specific rebuttal of the “It’s not that bad!” defense, but there isn’t really much to debate here: With Magic Find gear on, you lose your primary equipment stat, which amounts to roughly 30% of your equipment’s stat budget. Of the stats that are left, you only have one of two options, and they are purely offensive stats, which prevents you from running most any sort of effective defensive character.
This issue hold constant all other variables, like “What if the player is better?” “What if he takes a bunch of pee breaks?” “What if he’s blind, a tornado is hitting his house, and he hasn’t cleaned the gunk out of his mouse’s rollers in six months?”. A worse player doing these things while running stat gear may be less effective than a better player running MF gear, but that worse player would be even worse if he was doing it while wearing MF gear, and that better player would be even better if he was using stat gear.

(2)Two very major sources of Magic Find are visible to the rest of the party. When you use, say, Chocolate Omnomberry Cream, or any other consumable that raises Magic Find, that status effect is displayed to your entire party. The same is true when you put a Sigil of Luck into your weapon. Both of these are cases where you trade effectiveness for Magic Find – other level 80 Food is capable of giving you 170 raw stat points, or bonuses like a 40% reduction in Stun duration, Might every time you kill an enemy, etc, and a Sigil of Luck gives 15% MF but prevents you from getting the 250 Power that a Sigil of Bloodlust will give you. Again, this trades your own (and your party’s) effectiveness for MF – but other party members can see that you’re doing it, and are free to request that you use food that contributes to the party.

swiftpaw.6397:

‘They made a choice that penalizes not themselves, but everybody around them, so by your logic, they should be excluded.’

They also have the choice to change their build so that they do not affect others around them, comparing them to charr and norn doesnt make sense as those people do not have a choice.

Rerolling is always an option, too. Just because it is harder doesn’t make it less possible. Rediculous? Yes, but I find the original concept behind this thread no less rediculous.

Crater: Having a 2-year old does more to my effectiveness than MF gear ever did. It was a conscious choice, and I could get a baby sitter, but it is a conscious choice not to. She might be 2, but she knows how to open the refrigerator and get me a soda, so I derive benefit from her, but my group mates do not. Nobody knows about her unless I say something. How is this any different? Why are we not looking to resolve this?

I go back to my point that measuring MF on a player is being done in the absence of any assessment of that player’s capabilities. This means we are not taking measures of where that players capabilities are relative to where they could be, but we’re taking an absolute measurement of where they fall relative to other people on this scale. This is the basis of prejudice and antisocial behavior, not cooperation and teamwork, far more so than the act of wearing MF gear is.

Fildydarie.1496:

Crater: Having a 2-year old does more to my effectiveness than MF gear ever did. It was a conscious choice, and I could get a baby sitter, but it is a conscious choice not to. She might be 2, but she knows how to open the refrigerator and get me a soda, so I derive benefit from her, but my group mates do not. Nobody knows about her unless I say something. How is this any different? Why are we not looking to resolve this?

Find an example within the game. I’ve given you the same respect, and I think you should reciprocate.

Seriously guys, try Arah explorable with MF – or any glass build – and then we’ll talk. I assume that you’ve done all other routes of all other exp dungeons if you’re talking about ‘that one place i will be less effective’…

But i think the main problem lies in different approaches to having fun in dungeons, as it then goes to different expectations from the teams.
Some people find fun in completing dungeons, aka having successful runs with a decent team, with everyone bringing to the table everything they can – and it’s fine if some of them can bring less, but they put in everything they have. Then there are people who find enough fun in just playing a dungeon, and they also seem to enjoy – or at least don’t mind – wiping or doing something 20 minutes longer for no real reason.

That second attitude gets changed into the first one quite often when a person has played through enough dungeons to know how they work, what is worth using and is considering their in-game time more valuable than when everything was new and fresh. It’s not really about min/maxing everything – it’s about not willing to waste your time for something that can be done faster, easier or with better results, especially once ‘casual and usual’ runs aren’t fun anymore after having done AC for the 300th time.

This is where people consciously kittening the party effectiveness have no place – although the first few dungeon runs are exciting and challenging enough regardless of gear, team composition or anything like that.

Bringing MF into an SE2 run is like bringing 4 necros to AC3, although you could relog onto a different profession – fully geared, prepared and so on – but you insist on bringing the necro regardless of the fact that it makes the whole run much harder and slower, possibly even impossible at the burrows.

brilliant idea, i want to kick magic find griefers from my dungeon farm groups.

I don’t know why people are so dumb. Two stats versus three stats, of course three is better. Also MF gear has lower numbers as well. If you compare exotic MF ring versus an exotic ruby ring, MF ring has 29 less power and no crit damage boost. I will not take anybody that wears MF in my dungeon group ever. What is so hard to see that if you have two people of the same skill level and same level of gear, the person without the MF will perform better.

Here’s the break down:

-stacking MF will reduce your other stats
-without MF in a previous run, maybe that party member wouldn’t even have that awesome exotic chest piece.
-this game is not about min/maxing
-optimize yourself if you want, don’t exclude others by gear/stat inspection

Seras, the list will be complete with:

-if you don’t like leechers using mf, don’t take them to your party
-if you look for a puggie, ask them for their armor and if it’s mf, feel free to kick them

If one side of the argument is ‘free to run what they want’, the other side must be somewhat able to cater to their own wishes as well.

Obviously, the person kept wiping in a dungeon and blaming it on MF gear.
You do know that many people run with gear that is 10+ levels lower than them?
Even run with blue and green gear.

With MF gear, you still do a lot of damage.
To be honest, I do more damage with my MF gear than with my power toughness and vitality gear. And yes, condition damage does very well in there.

I could have a different stat that has healing in it, however, there’s no reason for me to heal my group since they should be capable of healing themselves.
That’s one “Wasted” stat since it’s weak and not really used to actually always help a group when the normal default is good enough.

Not everyone is running with decent runes in their armor.
You can get the MF from the runes and leave the 18% MF from the armor out.

Again, OP just wiped and wiped over and over and wants something to blame.