Guild Wars 2

Shufflepants.9785:

ZudetGambeous, the arguements you’re making are only tangentially relevant here. Others in this thread are not merely claiming that the current loot distribution mechanics are not optimal for increasing player fun and enjoyment. They are specifically claiming that there are mechanics in the game code that specifically reward some players consistently and consistently fail to reward other players. They believe that their accounts are cursed to have lower drop rates than other players. Some think that the system is merely accidentally broken, but other’s have put on tinfoil hats and believe that ANet has done this intentionally.

I can agree that having some kind of streak-breaking pseudo-random algorithm for loot drops would be more amicable. But that is not the discussion at hand and probably belongs in its own thread so we do not drown in tinfoil.

Good idea. Imma go work on one. :P

So, all we have to do is make a new account – we’ll get tons of precursors because Arenanet is only giving good, expensive loot in large quantities to new accounts. All our money problems would therefore be over and we could afford anything we want in the game. Am I really understanding this correctly?

Just a flesh wound.3589:

tolunart.2095:

IndigoSundown.5419:

tolunart.2095:

I hear they are working on an expansion. Radical changes to how loot is distributed would probably be implemented with the expansion, or put off until after it is released. In either case they probably won’t announce it ahead of time because it would disrupt players doing things now if they knew they could wait a few months and get a guarantee of better loot.

Fair points. On the other hand, I don’t think they’re going to do anything. After all, they’re “fixing” the precursor issue with masteries, and there’s very little else in the game that’s worth much of anything.

Yep. When people complain about not getting good loot, they almost always mean “I haven’t gotten the precursor I want yet.” Or more recently, “I haven’t gotten access to the beta yet.”

The arguments they use don’t even make sense, for example where this person is claiming that accounts that are played more get worse loot than younger or less played accounts and accounts should sit for at least two months to start getting good loot again.

Chuck.8196:

Source
No it will not get bad loot. It will get good loot less often than a new account. There will be plenty of good stuff just less of it.
Do you understand?

no it doesn’t have to sit. BUT If you would like to see an improvement in your loot, then you may allow it to sit. How long is required for improvement is unknown. i know 2 months for is enough though.
Do you understand?

So, it’s still plenty of good loot but less of the good loot unless you let your account lie fallow.

I have no idea how a game would handle loot rolls with a ‘decaying’ (my term) RNG that turns into ‘non decayed’ RNG after an account sits for a couple of months.

my hypothesis makes plenty of sense.
probably the same way other games have had say “resting exp”. How can you gain exp without playing the game? The same way you could recharge your loot tables by not playing for a time. instead of exp OMG passive magic find buff bug. that we dont know yet. just maybe. Of course there’s not statistics or studies that you demand to see to show other wise right? The more you play the more MF you get that affects RNG to give you a higher chance at lower tier loot. That is how magic find works. Is it not? . 500% of .01 is a lot more than 500% of .0001. Simple math will tell you that. Why are you denying something that you’ve never tried?

Astralporing.1957:

VincentDW.9376:

Brother Grimm.5176:

Just to correct, a perceived problem IS a PR problem, not necessarily a REAL one.

That’s exactly my point. In the business sense, it doesn’t matter whether the source of a customer’s dissatisfaction is “real” or “perceived,” you still have a dissatisfied customer, and telling them that they are just imagining things usually doesn’t make them any happier (even if it’s factually true).

Oh, but it does have a significant difference. If the problem is real, you can fix it, but if it’s only perceived, no amount of fixing will do, because there’s nothing to fix in the first place.

VincentDW.9376:

To take an extreme example, it doesn’t matter whether Brand X apples actually contain poison, or if people just mistakenly think that they do, the result is the same.

Again, it does matter – if the apples really contain poison, then you can act to remove it and announce it. If they don’t contain it, this won’t work. And if there were people thinking the poison was real, even when nothing actually suggested it, and didn’t believe any assertions that it wasn’t true, then no amount of proof would make them stop believing (because you cannot use reason to combat irrationality). And addressing those irrational fears beyond the very basic announcement that they are not true would not be a smart move, as it would only seem to give them validity.

You can still “fix” something that wasn’t a “real” problem in the first place to address PR concerns, and it happens all the time. To quote a famous example from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thiomersal_controversy, “The CDC and AAP reasoned that despite the lack of evidence of significant harm in the use of thiomersal in vaccines, the removal of this preservative would increase the public confidence in the safety of vaccines.”

Ultimately, perception matters more than fact.

While I do not actually believe in all the conspiracy and all at first….. I’m starting to have doubts.

Yesterday, I brought a friend to AC story mode. He is new to the game, joined around 2-3 weeks ago. His character is lvl 44.
During the run, which is his first dungeon run ever, he got an Emberglow. Not a very expensive weapon, selling for around 3.5 gold, but the fact is, it has a ‘very small chance of dropping’ in a few dungeons.

Lvl 44. 1st dungeon. Gets lvl 80 exotic . Very small chance of dropping.

I’ve gotten an exotic out of dungeons maybe 3-4 times in a year.

So, is RNGesus really trolling, or is something going on here? Too many reports of the same situation all over the place…

Well there seems to be an uptick in getting exotic drops in the last week or so. I too rarely get them and I got three in the last week to 10 days. And I don’t “grind”, just do DEs and an occasional boss. Probability is a strange mistress. Populations also get runs of good luck, not just individuals.

I don’t understand how the RNG drops really work. I also, as yet, haven’t got a portal drop – but it doesn’t bother me. I’ll console myself with the hundreds of gold, mats, and items I got along the way. shrug Plus, SW heaving with people is really fun.

What does bother me is people getting like 10 portals. That’s just annoying. :-D

It doesn’t seem unreasonable to feel that “RNG is borked” when there are people looting a beta portal within 15 minutes and people who’ve farmed for 30+ hours and never seen one drop. ’Nuff said.

JackSpacer.4320:

Just buy a new account. You’ll get dozens of precursors. Mine did.

Dozens? Pics or it didn’t happen for realsies lmao.

Mal.1670:

It doesn’t seem unreasonable to feel that “RNG is borked” when there are people looting a beta portal within 15 minutes and people who’ve farmed for 30+ hours and never seen one drop. ’Nuff said.

If something is dropping randomly but rarely, why can’t it do as you describe? Isn’t that how random things drop?

Just a flesh wound.3589:

Mal.1670:

It doesn’t seem unreasonable to feel that “RNG is borked” when there are people looting a beta portal within 15 minutes and people who’ve farmed for 30+ hours and never seen one drop. ’Nuff said.

If something is dropping randomly but rarely, why can’t it do as you describe? Isn’t that how random things drop?

Exactly. While everyone has the same chance when a reward is determined, it doesn’t mean that over time everyone will get the same number of a particular item. It’s a mathematical certainty that they won’t.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/RNG-Conspiracy-Conundrum/page/2#post5033417

They can’t reveal the exact nature of the RNG because then people would find ways to exploit it. But there ARE people many of us know who are infamous for getting frequently good drops disproportionate to the drops of the people they are playing with. I know someone who plays alongside the rest of us in WvW who pings ascended drops frequently.

So if RNG ISN’T tied to account-specific data, but certain individuals ARE still getting disproportionately better drops, then we should look at other things that can be connected to that persons gameplay that aren’t account specific that might figure into the RNG.

It could be anything. it could be some nuance of the way they time their skills or chain them or something about how they move around or the odd specifics of their armor or weapons creating the RNG input. It could even be relevant to their ping and how that effects communication between the servers and their client.

If RNGeesus favors certain people, there are a LOT of things you would have to dissect about that player and the way they play the game to figure out what is getting them better drops.

Mo Mo.1947:

They can’t reveal the exact nature of the RNG because then people would find ways to exploit it. But there ARE people many of us know who are infamous for getting frequently good drops disproportionate to the drops of the people they are playing with. I know someone who plays alongside the rest of us in WvW who pings ascended drops frequently.

So if RNG ISN’T tied to account-specific data, but certain individuals ARE still getting disproportionately better drops, then we should look at other things that can be connected to that persons gameplay that aren’t account specific that might figure into the RNG.

It could be anything. it could be some nuance of the way they time their skills or chain them or something about how they move around or the odd specifics of their armor or weapons creating the RNG input. It could even be relevant to their ping and how that effects communication between the servers and their client.

If RNGeesus favors certain people, there are a LOT of things you would have to dissect about that player and the way they play the game to figure out what is getting them better drops.

I used to tease the guy I played with by pinging precursors and legendary weapons as drops. Never got any of them of course. I just pulled the code off of wiki, copied and pinged it. (I know Legendaries don’t drop, but I wasn’t trying to actually convince him I had gotten these things, just teasing him).

Pings mean nothing.

There are a lot of people who like to “wind up” those around them post boss event just that way. Downside of having those codes published. Same with shopped screen shots of inventory and bank slots.

JackSpacer.4320:

Just buy a new account. You’ll get dozens of precursors. Mine did.

If every new account get dozens of precursors, why didn’t I got a single one as I started the game? A friend of mine bought a second account a few weeks ago, no precursors too.

If the theory that every new account get tons of high valuable loot were right we all must have gotten tons of high class loot as we started. I didn’t and I am sure must of us didn’t.

In my playing gw2 since launch one thing I’ve noticed least active players receive the rarest drops, in 3yrs of playing I’ve never got anything worth more than 10g with over 3k hrs spent in game if u want good loots be inactive my gf account played 1 a month gets lots of expensive drops consistently

sarasvatri.6871:

Astralporing.1957:

Yes, in my opinion there should be streak breakers, or other methods of negating the “low outlier” experience. That is however not because RNG is broken (since it isn’t), but because it is working right (which has some negative consequences).

This is the most interesting bit I’ve gotten out of any of these posts.

That was also a result, a few months ago, when A-Net asked in the forum how the random number loot distribution should be made better.

It is Ok, that some people get more “lucky drops” than others and feel lucky.
But on the “low outlier” side should be made some adjustements, because there seem to be too much people that feel “unlucky” and that they can nothing do about changing their bad-luck in the game.

And: A perfectly working random number generator is not unfair by itself, but neutral. But applying “random distribution” to some aspects of the game, makes the game in this aspects, to players that want to achieve something, feel grindy and unfair.

Imo , a conspiracy is too much to presume.
If we consider , for example, that the RNG system in GW works on a 32 or 64 bit Mersene twister algoritm, there is nothing there that can be suspecterd fowl play except the data base library where from the actual drops gets selected, and we know for a certain fact that accounts/players do not have a individual account linked library as it is a universal one.
The only way a 32 or 64 bit Mersene twister can be influenced is by outside actions as:
- DR kick in (and I wont develop how that one works as we know) that is the only thing that has direct imput in the algorithm
- number of players that recive loot from the pool data library, that has indirect imput in algorithm
- area/location (that has direct imput into algorithm, by the designated loot table distributed to the library for the specific area* see instances with specific drops, etc).
-events (see above).
-player actions (a player who use MF alot obviously has more chances than a player who uses MF ocasionaly, etc).
RNG algorithms with big pool data/library are basicly impossible to control. The amount of numbers alocated that decides what drop you get it passes thru too many mini-prng codes thus making it impossible to control w/o direct imput into data coding (ex: modifying library or narrowing the arrays/possibilities ).

Just my 2c about this 2 weeks escaladated conspiracy theory discussion generated by the kitty cat maguma beta portal key ;p
Sorry for bad english but is not my mother’s language:D

We don’t have enough challenging content in GW2. Making things less RNG or require kittentones of tokens would cause huge inflation. Solution -> wait for HoT. If there’s enough of very challenging content, we’ll be getting 60% droprates for killing bosses only 10% of the gw2 population can beat. #HOPE

ZudetGambeous.9573:

why do we have a purely random system? What’s so great about purely random? Why is that the status quo? Wouldn’t a semi-random system which broke both bad and good streaks be better? everyone would get lucky sometimes but no one would be super rich from drops or super poor from lack of drops.

This is the status quo because it keeps people grinding. Its this basic reason why Anet will not divulge their RNG, why they will not give a concrete answer and why its very highly unlikely that they would bother to set up a system that favored anyone.
If it is truly a random system, it keeps people grinding the same content as they try to get xx amount of mats or a specific item. Look at the Silverwastes during the beta key drop as an example of this.
As soon as a real pattern is revealed, the grind will stop. People will know their chances or if they are being favored or neglected. If you know your account is being neglected (beyond the superstition in this topic and with actual facts), would you continue to use it? Would you recommend to friends that the account you paid for is forever kitten ed to bad drops? Would online reviews speak highly of such a system? Would this game be recommended by anyone to pay for what may be a forever crappy account? Such a system would do far more damage to the game than any good, especially if it were revealed by Anet to actually exist.

Anets generic answer is all you’re going to get and probably answers the question most fully.
“It’s working as intended”
Its working to keep people grinding, keep people guessing, because even with superstitions people still grind for those drops since they don’t know for sure whats going on. These people are active and logged in, and that translates into numbers that make the game look good.

This is why RNG exists as it does in pretty much every MMORPG. It creates the illusion of content through repetition.

MrRuin.9740:

ZudetGambeous.9573:

why do we have a purely random system? What’s so great about purely random? Why is that the status quo? Wouldn’t a semi-random system which broke both bad and good streaks be better? everyone would get lucky sometimes but no one would be super rich from drops or super poor from lack of drops.

This is the status quo because it keeps people grinding. Its this basic reason why Anet will not divulge their RNG, why they will not give a concrete answer and why its very highly unlikely that they would bother to set up a system that favored anyone.

I do not share your pessimistic view.

Actually, a few months ago, A-Net started a CDI and asked the players about the RNG, if they liked it and how the players think it should better be changed.

Other CDIs from that time resulted in some developments/changes. So I assume that the RNG system will also be changed in the near future in somes parts (to the better…).

Sister Swiftspell.1869:

Again this is also poor reasoning because it takes hypotheticals to form theory so as to establish a solid basis, which is what these threads are about and what you seem against.

We generally don’t create new, more complicated theories to explain something that fits neatly within already existing, simpler one. It’s only when things start to happen that do not fit that new theories are needed.

Theories are not equivalent to each other simply because they exist. Especially when they are created in vacuum, with no data suppliet that would show how they interact with reality. RNG conspiracy theories are not based on data, but merely on anecdotal “evidence”.

And, to quote mysef again, some are not even hypothetical, they are just plain dumb and are based on pure wish-thinking and lack of understanding.

Zok.4956:

I do not share your pessimistic view.

How is it pessimistic to assume the supposedly random drop system is actually random? Or to know what its primary function is?

Imagine an event like the Vinewraith or Tequatl without RNG. You go once, get exactly what you want……whats the point of going again?
With RNG, one or two people get the awesome drop each time, inspiring the others on the map to keep coming back for more and trying again and again.

Its not pessimistic, it’s realistic. And truth be told, I think the system works fine as it is. It serves its purpose in multiple functions.

With the beta portals, people need to understand when and where the RNG kicks in. People that got the drops where already selected before they entered the zone.

the RNG just determined how long it would take for them to get the Portal drop.
So people that grind hours and never got a portal, well thats because you wasnt on the pre-selected beta list that Anet had set up before hand. ..
—————————————————-

As for loot in the game, some accounts are flagged to get better drops than others more often. Especially newer accounts, because new players tend to quick mmos faster than the vets, in any mmo this is the case. Even in other mmos give loot based on account variables.

The problem is that Anet cant come out and say this openly because it would negatively affect the community which is the opposite of why the the drop system is designed this way.

MrRuin.9740:

And truth be told, I think the system works fine as it is. It serves its purpose in multiple functions.

The point is that human beings do not like to be constantly disappointed. With the loot distribution and the random chances that we currently have, the fast majority of the player base is constantly disappointed. Personally I don’t care for the economy of this game. If I wanted to play an economics simulation, I’d have chosen to do so. I could live with either a more reliable (“fair”) loot distribution than the current RNG or with better drop rates, even if it floods some markets.

I had one precursor drop for me in the almost 3 years I play now. While it felt great at that moment, I realized that it is nothing you can rely on or aim at. That is the reason why ANet will finally install the Precursor Collections. And IMO this is a great way to do it for other commodities as well. Rather than have one huge RNG gate with a minute chance of getting the roll, the collections consist of a lot of RNG gates with a way better chance for the roll, so you can advance in steps.

Knighthonor.4061:

With the beta portals, people need to understand when and where the RNG kicks in. People that got the drops where already selected before they entered the zone.

the RNG just determined how long it would take for them to get the Portal drop.
So people that grind hours and never got a portal, well thats because you wasnt on the pre-selected beta list that Anet had set up before hand. ..
—————————————————-

As for loot in the game, some accounts are flagged to get better drops than others more often. Especially newer accounts, because new players tend to quick mmos faster than the vets, in any mmo this is the case. Even in other mmos give loot based on account variables.

The problem is that Anet cant come out and say this openly because it would negatively affect the community which is the opposite of why the the drop system is designed this way.

Would you enlighten us with proof for your claims? And if you don’t have any, would you kindly mark your speculations as such rather than disguising them as facts?

Halvorn.9831:

MrRuin.9740:

And truth be told, I think the system works fine as it is. It serves its purpose in multiple functions.

The point is that human beings do not like to be constantly disappointed. With the loot distribution and the random chances that we currently have, the fast majority of the player base is constantly disappointed. Personally I don’t care for the economy of this game. If I wanted to play an economics simulation, I’d have chosen to do so. I could live with either a more reliable (“fair”) loot distribution than the current RNG or with better drop rates, even if it floods some markets.

I had one precursor drop for me in the almost 3 years I play now. While it felt great at that moment, I realized that it is nothing you can rely on or aim at. That is the reason why ANet will finally install the Precursor Collections. And IMO this is a great way to do it for other commodities as well. Rather than have one huge RNG gate with a minute chance of getting the roll, the collections consist of a lot of RNG gates with a way better chance for the roll, so you can advance in steps.

Its still RNG that encourages grinding of the same content, whether its one large one or multiple small ones, it still serves the same purpose.
Though, I agree, it works in a better way. I like the way the luminescent armor unlocked via the Silverwastes, for example, with some items you purposely collect and some are RNG based. It hardly redefines anything, but does refine it into a cleaner system, where there’s still the RNG serving its function but at the same time the player feels like progress is actually being made toward something.

MrRuin.9740:

Zok.4956:

I do not share your pessimistic view.

How is it pessimistic to assume the supposedly random drop system is actually random? Or to know what its primary function is?

I meant your view of how A-Net thinks and why they did or didn’t do/change things.

MrRuin.9740:

Its not pessimistic, it’s realistic.

Thats what every pessimist says.

with my rng i am just seying i am giving up trying to get portal becous of my rng seims to by just got ad all it last day i can try but it seims no luck and i see soom in guild with 5portals and and most guild has it and it seims i am the only one soo soon as it comes done to rng i just give up i realy realy realy hate rng and sorry for my bad wriding i am dylexic and it not joke just seims rng and people hate dylexic generalsy soo trolls can go where the suns dont shine

It’s common knowledge the RNG is completely dependent on how much money you spend on the Gem Store.

/S

nikdik.1934:

It’s common knowledge the RNG is completely dependent on how much money you spend on the Gem Store.

Again, I am quite sure that unproven claims to decry someone are not exactly covered by freedom of speech.

Maybe the best discussion would be why don’t we see these claims in other MMO’s.

I know in WoW they drop rate of individual pieces of gear is in the 20-30% range so you almost always get what you are looking for within 4-5 runs, and if not you get tokens to just buy the gear after 5 runs.

The problem lies in how GW2 is set up, and I think it needs a serious overhaul to be fixed.

Astralporing.1957:

Neural.1824:

The fact is that from a business standpoint, Anet has a lot to gain by gaming the system, and doing so is not illegal.

Problem is, i have yet to see a “rng conspiracy” thread where the suggested way in which drops were supposed to be manipulated would be sensible to Anet. There’s always the “???” step before “Profit!” one, with no explanation whatsoever why Anet would profit.
Also, while the lack of understanding of the nature of both programming and rng is indeed present on both sides of debate, it is glaringly evident on the side of conspiracy theorists.

TL/DR: No, RNG conspiracy theory side cannot prove their ideas not because they can’t present enough data to make it obvious, but because 90% of those theories have only passable connection to reality (and i am being generous here).

sometimes there is no difference is data wise from one situation to the next.

Heres what will happen with real random
at the end of the day you will have some people who were luckier than others, and win more often, this is an expected conclusion.
heres what will happen with fake random
at the end of the day you will have some people who were luckier than others, and win more often, this is an expected conclusion.

the main difference? real random events, are really random, so people are more likely to accept that no sinister force is working against them.

fake random is not really random, so people dont want accept no sinister force is working against them. Because really it isnt random, its now fate. Its a set pattern that essentially has bias against them, whether it be because of the voltages passing through something, some function of key presses, the time and date or alignment of the stars, the native rythym with which you kill. It is actually a known, predictable quantity, and it is by design, not a fair pattern that it will generate.

and the last peice of the puzzle?
in real life random chance is just about the worst way to achieve anything the majority of the time. In this game, random is built in to everything. Even if there are in real random, people fated to be unlucky, they can just avoid random events. Not really possible to do that here.

Astralporing.1957:

Sister Swiftspell.1869:

Again this is also poor reasoning because it takes hypotheticals to form theory so as to establish a solid basis, which is what these threads are about and what you seem against.

We generally don’t create new, more complicated theories to explain something that fits neatly within already existing, simpler one. It’s only when things start to happen that do not fit that new theories are needed.

Theories are not equivalent to each other simply because they exist. Especially when they are created in vacuum, with no data suppliet that would show how they interact with reality. RNG conspiracy theories are not based on data, but merely on anecdotal “evidence”.

And, to quote mysef again, some are not even hypothetical, they are just plain dumb and are based on pure wish-thinking and lack of understanding.

anectdotal evidence is not necessarily incorrect evidence.

infact, its correctness or not has nothing to do with whether it is anecdotal or not.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anecdotal_evidence

When i took engineering classes, my teacher told me it was bull to do an experiment, get results that dont match the theory, and not try to explain them.
Things like, i think the instruments were bad, or this is freak occurence are not acceptable scientific explanations.

now this doesnt mean you take anectdotal evidence as law, but it also means that dismissing it because it is anecdotal alone, is actually non-science.

the person citing anectodal evidence actually has more claim to being scientific/correct than the person with no evidence.

Depends on perception. Exotics are good loot, there’s no arguing that. They’re better than rares, masterwork, and fine drops. Their player-assigned value is irrelevant. Most players complaining, zudet, if there was a system that implemented a “streak breaker” for those that got nothing higher than a rare for 10 hours. Why? Because such a system would likely be along the lines of “this is an automatic success for an exotic roll, standard rolls for type/quality/etc.” Which means they could drop an exotic after 10 hours, but because it sells for maybe 60s, they’re kittening it’s not “valuable.” Perception is what makes this such a bad discussion.

Afterall, is it “I’ve never had an exotic worth more than 10g but I’ve gotten exotics worth less (and I’m never going to bring those up)” or is it “I’ve never had any exotics period”? There’s a massive difference.

Additionally, there’s also the issue of when streak breakers would take place. Top and bottom 25%? 30%? 5%? Variable? There’s a lot of….elasticity I guess, in drops. Afterall, even within exotics you’ve got “typical” exotics, Named exotics (Drognarr’s shortbow, Eir’s shortbow, etc), and then Precursors (a step above Named). However, we dont know how the loot system actually attributes your odds of dropping them. We dont know if it’s EVERY exotic at once on a table if you “roll” an exotic, or if you’re rolling exotic, then rolling the “quality” of exotic, then the specifics of the exotic. Those two differences are important. One treats precs the same as say, an exotic rampager’s tribal bow of accuracy. The other treats them differently.

If they’re treated the same, then it’s sheer luck someone’s always getting precursors, nothing to do with their account. It also makes it immensely difficult to “break” that streak as the system sees a precursor as no different than any other exotic. If they’re treated differently, then it gets easier, but by no means easy.

Aidan Savage.2078:

Depends on perception. Exotics are good loot, there’s no arguing that. They’re better than rares, masterwork, and fine drops. Their player-assigned value is irrelevant. Most players complaining, zudet, if there was a system that implemented a “streak breaker” for those that got nothing higher than a rare for 10 hours. Why? Because such a system would likely be along the lines of “this is an automatic success for an exotic roll, standard rolls for type/quality/etc.” Which means they could drop an exotic after 10 hours, but because it sells for maybe 60s, they’re kittening it’s not “valuable.” Perception is what makes this such a bad discussion.

Afterall, is it “I’ve never had an exotic worth more than 10g but I’ve gotten exotics worth less (and I’m never going to bring those up)” or is it “I’ve never had any exotics period”? There’s a massive difference.

Additionally, there’s also the issue of when streak breakers would take place. Top and bottom 25%? 30%? 5%? Variable? There’s a lot of….elasticity I guess, in drops. Afterall, even within exotics you’ve got “typical” exotics, Named exotics (Drognarr’s shortbow, Eir’s shortbow, etc), and then Precursors (a step above Named). However, we dont know how the loot system actually attributes your odds of dropping them. We dont know if it’s EVERY exotic at once on a table if you “roll” an exotic, or if you’re rolling exotic, then rolling the “quality” of exotic, then the specifics of the exotic. Those two differences are important. One treats precs the same as say, an exotic rampager’s tribal bow of accuracy. The other treats them differently.

If they’re treated the same, then it’s sheer luck someone’s always getting precursors, nothing to do with their account. It also makes it immensely difficult to “break” that streak as the system sees a precursor as no different than any other exotic. If they’re treated differently, then it gets easier, but by no means easy.

10hours? I only got a few exotics in 9 MONTHS on my main account playing 8+ hours a day.

I know its been stated in the past, but the biggest issue with with RNG is in this game is that it applies everywhere to all the things “equally”.

Since playing harder/higher level content doesn’t actually reward you with anything of substance given the way Anet has structured rewards in this game, it makes those people that have put so much time and effort into the game even more furious when they have yet to see any high end drop (precursor, etc) when doing this high level content, while their friend who just bought the game can run out into Queensdale one day and kill a moa by the farm and get Spark.

It leaves many players with the feeling of “why bother”, and that is patently bad for the game and the players in the long run, but great for Anet and NCSoft in the short run for the exact reasons that the OP stated.

I gave up on getting any drops on my account that were worth over 20 gold, and the 3 that HAVE dropped for me (which at most were worth 20 gold), came very far apart in my time playing this game since beta.

I help my wife get her level 6 mats because her luck is marginally better than mine and she wants a particular legendary, but I game up on the idea of having one ages ago, and I may still not craft one in the xpac just on principal alone.

nikdik.1934:

It’s common knowledge the RNG is completely dependent on how much money you spend on the Gem Store.

Bull Skritt!!!

I have over 7k hours played and the only pre I got was venom and it sold for 30g then.. When I worked on my legendary I had everything done but the pre for months and finally threw in the towel and bought gems to convert to gold so I could finally finish my legendary. I’ve wasted more gold in the MF trying to get any pre and have never gotten one out of there either.. I’ve purchased several finishers, toys and countless other things from the gem store.. I farmed for a portal to beta over 60 hours before realizing that I was just never going to get one..

It is what it is but I can tell you some players are just luckier than others and it has nothing to do with how much money you’ve spent or how many hours you’ve played.

briggah.7910:

nikdik.1934:

It’s common knowledge the RNG is completely dependent on how much money you spend on the Gem Store.

Bull Skritt!!!

I have over 7k hours played and the only pre I got was venom and it sold for 30g then.. When I worked on my legendary I had everything done but the pre for months and finally threw in the towel and bought gems to convert to gold so I could finally finish my legendary. I’ve wasted more gold in the MF trying to get any pre and have never gotten one out of there either.. I’ve purchased several finishers, toys and countless other things from the gem store.. I farmed for a portal to beta over 60 hours before realizing that I was just never going to get one..

It is what it is but I can tell you some players are just luckier than others and it has nothing to do with how much money you’ve spent or how many hours you’ve played.

I was joking… :P

Has there not been several times where the player base has raised issues, Arenanet have sworn blind that there is no issue, that players are mistaken. Only upon more pressure, investigated and found out that players were actually right?

Items that never actually drop because some one hit a few extra zeroes in the drop rate percentage, DR that got stuck in a perma on state for some people and so on.

RNG could be working fine, if random numbers are being selected without repeating . Thats’s it.
It doesn’t mean it’s properly selecting from the correct ranges of all the loot tables and properly calculating MF, and dr. it could be broken and not selecting a proper roll because that table is broken. How do we know the SKU version (discontinued as stated by ANET) doesn’t have some break in its code. They don’t use that version anymore so what’s to say they’ve tested it compared to the new version. Alot of things could be wrong. Bugs/broken doesn’t exist until someone identifies it and says something. Then it becomes “known”. So just because they say something only makes it true from their perspective. Saying " RNG works as intended" is only a theory.

Just a flesh wound.3589:

Mal.1670:

It doesn’t seem unreasonable to feel that “RNG is borked” when there are people looting a beta portal within 15 minutes and people who’ve farmed for 30+ hours and never seen one drop. ’Nuff said.

If something is dropping randomly but rarely, why can’t it do as you describe? Isn’t that how random things drop?

It doesn’t seem very random when certain accounts are getting multiple portals. that seems more fixed.

Cactus Brawler.7415:

Has there not been several times where the player base has raised issues, Arenanet have sworn blind that there is no issue, that players are mistaken. Only upon more pressure, investigated and found out that players were actually right?

Yes. In all those cases the playerbase either supplied some data, or was mostly united in asserting that the problem does exist.
There were also multiple cases where a group of players raised concerns, claiming that the problem was highly visible to the point of obvious (even when other players pointed out that there’s nowhere close to enough data to confirm that) and Anet’s check confirmed that the concerns were groundless.
Just look at all the “nerfed ecto droprate” threads after every big patch.

Basically, if there is a problem that affects the game in a visible way, then it is possible to show it using data. If you can’t, then the problem either doesn’t exist at all, or has only a minimal impact.

John.8507:

Just a flesh wound.3589:

Mal.1670:

It doesn’t seem unreasonable to feel that “RNG is borked” when there are people looting a beta portal within 15 minutes and people who’ve farmed for 30+ hours and never seen one drop. ’Nuff said.

If something is dropping randomly but rarely, why can’t it do as you describe? Isn’t that how random things drop?

It doesn’t seem very random when certain accounts are getting multiple portals. that seems more fixed.

no, if there weren’t accounts with multiple portals, it would seem fixed.
Just assume 10k population, 100 tries, set chance (1% will do just fine to illustrate what i am talking about) and try to calculate how many people on average should get 0, 1, 2, 3, etc portals. The results will be illuminating, trust me.

John.8507:

Just a flesh wound.3589:

Mal.1670:

It doesn’t seem unreasonable to feel that “RNG is borked” when there are people looting a beta portal within 15 minutes and people who’ve farmed for 30+ hours and never seen one drop. ’Nuff said.

If something is dropping randomly but rarely, why can’t it do as you describe? Isn’t that how random things drop?

It doesn’t seem very random when certain accounts are getting multiple portals. that seems more fixed.

Why would it be fixed? You ONLY need one to be in the beta.

Astralporing.1957:

Cactus Brawler.7415:

Has there not been several times where the player base has raised issues, Arenanet have sworn blind that there is no issue, that players are mistaken. Only upon more pressure, investigated and found out that players were actually right?

Yes. In all those cases the playerbase either supplied some data, or was mostly united in asserting that the problem does exist.
There were also multiple cases where a group of players raised concerns, claiming that the problem was highly visible to the point of obvious (even when other players pointed out that there’s nowhere close to enough data to confirm that) and Anet’s check confirmed that the concerns were groundless.
Just look at all the “nerfed ecto droprate” threads after every big patch.

Basically, if there is a problem that affects the game in a visible way, then it is possible to show it using data. If you can’t, then the problem either doesn’t exist at all, or has only a minimal impact.

No in all the cases the player base does not provide data. Some, maybe. it’s not the players job to provide the data. When there is a recognized growing concern its the companies responsibility to disperse it. also multiple cases where a group of players raised concerns, claiming that the problem was highly visible to the point of obvious (even when other players pointed out that there’s nowhere close to enough data to confirm that) were proven to be true and there was a problem.
ANET will not tell you if there’s a problem. because people would instantly flock to exploit. No one is going to tell you how loot works in games.
As for BETA, all the applicants have already been chosen. player base has been narrowed down to those who sign up for the news when it was distributed. Signing up after didnt work.

Astralporing.1957:

Cactus Brawler.7415:

Has there not been several times where the player base has raised issues, Arenanet have sworn blind that there is no issue, that players are mistaken. Only upon more pressure, investigated and found out that players were actually right?

Yes. In all those cases the playerbase either supplied some data, or was mostly united in asserting that the problem does exist.
There were also multiple cases where a group of players raised concerns, claiming that the problem was highly visible to the point of obvious (even when other players pointed out that there’s nowhere close to enough data to confirm that) and Anet’s check confirmed that the concerns were groundless.
Just look at all the “nerfed ecto droprate” threads after every big patch.

Basically, if there is a problem that affects the game in a visible way, then it is possible to show it using data. If you can’t, then the problem either doesn’t exist at all, or has only a minimal impact.

John.8507:

Just a flesh wound.3589:

Mal.1670:

It doesn’t seem unreasonable to feel that “RNG is borked” when there are people looting a beta portal within 15 minutes and people who’ve farmed for 30+ hours and never seen one drop. ’Nuff said.

If something is dropping randomly but rarely, why can’t it do as you describe? Isn’t that how random things drop?

It doesn’t seem very random when certain accounts are getting multiple portals. that seems more fixed.

no, if there weren’t accounts with multiple portals, it would seem fixed.
Just assume 10k population, 100 tries, set chance (1% will do just fine to illustrate what i am talking about) and try to calculate how many people on average should get 0, 1, 2, 3, etc portals. The results will be illuminating, trust me.

those were cases where the problem was universal.

its highly unlikely that if a problem exists with random its universal.
most accounts will likely fall within the average experience.

all tests will show expected results, with a standard deviation, the problem lies when that standard deviation hides an error, it is extremely hard to identify it.

I am wondering why no dev is replying here. Would like to get an answer on why some players have 2-5 portals in a freaking day and others get nothing at all over a whole week.

Not kittened off that I have to farm or didn’t get a portal but this RNG thing is broken for sure and no dev comes to give info to us. for their own sake they should just reply and get over with it

Halbarz.3854:

I am wondering why no dev is replying here. Would like to get an answer on why some players have 2-5 portals in a freaking day and others get nothing at all over a whole week.

Not kittened off that I have to farm or didn’t get a portal but this RNG thing is broken for sure and no dev comes to give info to us. for their own sake they should just reply and get over with it

Let me introduce you to Trait posts 1 and 2.

If THOSE posts barely got replies I can promise you this will see even fewer since this topic goes right to the core of Anet functionality.

yolo swaggins.2570:

Now I am not saying Anet is doing this, but the thought of it happening is nowhere near conspiracy material. It is real. It can happen.

The fact that something can happen, is physically possible, does not mean that it is not conspiracy theory material for some to claim that it is happening.

Halbarz.3854:

I am wondering why no dev is replying here. Would like to get an answer on why some players have 2-5 portals in a freaking day and others get nothing at all over a whole week.

Not kittened off that I have to farm or didn’t get a portal but this RNG thing is broken for sure and no dev comes to give info to us. for their own sake they should just reply and get over with it

Because the player base for beta has already been selected. The ones that signed up for the newsletter were thrown into the “qualify” loot table. Then a selection of those is chosen and they mark the account. For that player to receive they just have to farm maguuma waste. They’ll keep getting some until its over. So many will not get one because they weren’t selected from the “qualify” table. this is why some have farmed a couple days and have multiple. And others will farm there until it ends and get nothing. If it was really random that would select from the overall player base, not by signing up for a newsletter. Some would say “tin-foil hat” but those are skeptics who try to post as much as possible. Nothing is random when your in a controlled group.