Guild Wars 2

Today I spend about 25 gold on armor/runes/accessories to get my mf around 170. I used to run with 0 mf and only an omnomberry bar for its 30% to mf.

When I was running 0 base MF I was getting loot off of every 2-4 mobs I kill. It was standard for me. Once I put on the 170 base MF and added the omnomberry bar and a guild mf banner, my drop rate was clearly altered. Instead of every 2-4 mobs dropping some sort of loot, it became every 10-15 mobs dropped loot. I was asking in /shout if anyone knew what was going on, but no one could seriously answer me. To top it off, the items dropped were no different than what I usually got with 0 MF.

After a few hours in Orr doing DE’s and killing Jormag and his mobs and the Gnawls near him for a few hours, I just gave up. It was an obvious waste of 25 gold on my end.

My serious question for everyone is this. Is magic find seriously bugged in this game, or is there some sort of rule set when it comes to MF gear? How things are right now just doesn’t seem right, so if it’s not a bug and is working as intended, why is it like this?

MF is completely borked beyond belief at this time. For some it works, for others it actually decreases drop rates. I’ve noticed the same on all of my toons that I added MF too.

Does nothing for me but waste a slot for better stats. The developers are responsible for magic find and its choice to be implemented and the failed game mechanic that encourages bots and farmers/gold sellers.

Well if an item has say 4% chance of dropping and you have 170% MF the drop chance is roughly 10% instead.

It’s just not worth having.

I also think there is a hidden factor, like say. A mob has maybe a 10% chance to drop something, if he drops something there is a 4% chance its mastercraft, 2% rare and 0.2% chance for an exotic. That means that MF doesnt effect wether or not the mob drops something, it only effects what he drops if he drops something.

Then it probably goes from highest rarity (orange) to lowest (grey), rolling the dice for each.

It doesn’t work in open world, it barely works in dungeons, they specifically cut it off from working on the plethora of chests in the world, it progressively gives your worse items the higher the percentage goes, they should just take it completely out of the game at this point.

From what I understand, magic find doesnt increase the chance of loot you get. It increases your rate of getting rares and exotics. If a mob has a %30 chance to drop loot, and a %.25 chance of dropping a rare from that %30 chance, and you have 100 magic find that will go to %.5 from %.25. I may be wrong but this is how I understood how magic find works.

Toons?
Looney Toons?
Warum bringen die immer Warner Brothers ins Spiel?

besides looking at your gear to see how much MF you have on it, how can you see the total MF you have? (buffs, gear, etc total)

Personally I have found it gives me more Blues/Greens/T5-6 Crafting mats, but I dont see an increase in Rare or Exotics. That is running around the same as you.

I am not using any MF and I am getting greens, blues, t-5, t-6 mats on a continual basses. Yesterday a regular mob dropped 2 green tridents. Both the same.

I also get a yellow or two from dragon fights most times. So i would say that MF is a waste of time for now.

I was getting a lot of greys and junk loot, and I wasn’t even getting the higher tier crafting mats in the areas I go. Just the normal stuff at a greatly reduced rate

I have a magic find set. I use it a lot, when I’m in cursed shore event farming. I notice drastically good drops when I’m running with a party, while I have my magic find stuff together. I got 6 rares from one event, and in an event like Plinx, I average 3. I use a lot of magic find, over 200 with boosts.

My question is, for people who complain about it being a waste of a stat. If I wasn’t using magic find, I’d be using toughness. What does toughness do? Makes me harder to kill.

That’s nice and all, except that I’m using a ranged weapon, with 4 party members, and 15 other people. I could be totally naked, jump into an enemy mob, and STILL never die, because constant rallying. It’s good for farming, but I never use it in dungeons, fractals, World vs World, or anything else other than strictly farming for money. Why do I use it when I farm? Because I don’t need any kitten toughness when I have 30 people around and the enemies pose not a single threat.

That being said, I don’t think magic find has any place in dungeons and stuff, unless everyone agrees that it’s okay for that person to use it.

You know what I find curious is that when I played GW1 (which was a lot) I would hope against hope to have a BDS (coveted weapon) drop from chest. While the chance was remote, you always knew there was a possibility.

Playing GW2 and seeing the discrepancies that exist between skills/traits/runes/sigil etc. Where what’s indicated seemingly doesn’t occur or where things are vaguely defined it could really mean anything, has got me thinking.

Mf on paper may state ‘increases a player’s chance to receive uncommon loot from dead foes’, but does it?

It’s pushing into conspiracy theory stuff but honestly maybe it’s just general competence. Can we be sure that the number crunching that’s done at ArenaNet is up to scratch?

If The Lost Shores was any indication, what ArenaNet says is not always what happens.

As a thief using MF gear, it stats me in power and precision. It doesn’t increase the damage I do as much as you might think, and it makes me a marshmallow for damage. Even in a group, I out DPS nearly everything, and I always seem to draw the most hate from mobs. When I’m not using my MF gear I use Prec/Tough/Cond Dmg gear. I can literally solo groups(9+) of equal level with little problem and in short time. I still draw a lot of agro, but it’s not as bad when I can death blossom a group of mobs 3 times for a 9 bleed stack eating away at them for 100+ a tick AND have toughness to take much more damage.

I ran for another 2 hours last night with my mf gear. It’s still proving to me that magic find is broken and is actually giving me LESS drops with no significant increase of rarity.

Yesterday I spend a total of 3 hours in my normal gear and 4 hours in my MF gear. In that time I found the following when I was jotting them down for this test:

Normal gear (3 hours 0% base MF/30% from food):
2 rares
9 greens
14 blues
about 42 crafting mats

MF gear (4 hours 170 base MF/30% from food – total 200):
0 rares
7 greens
12 blues
around 30 crafting mats

Seriously something wrong with those numbers

What magic find really does:

1. Lowers your overall drop rate.
2. lowers the % of equipment you get.
3. increases the % of fines, salvageable, and bags you get.

Random MF is random…

In my experience, it does increase the drop chance. I remember doing a dozen plinx runs while getting just crap material, when I was still getting gear. First run with MF gear – 2 yellows.

But then again, I’ve also killed a dozen dragons in my MF gear and gotten the same crappy blue/green crap every god kitten time. Getting pre-legendary from dragons? I cant even get rare

I think you can only get the ‘pre-legendary’ weapons from chests at dragons, and chests are not affected by MF

Graill.8596:

Does nothing for me but waste a slot for better stats. The developers are responsible for magic find and its choice to be implemented and the failed game mechanic that encourages bots and farmers/gold sellers.

Wrong. MF doesn’t encourage bots and gold farmers. People who give them money do.

Zatria.5783:

Graill.8596:

Does nothing for me but waste a slot for better stats. The developers are responsible for magic find and its choice to be implemented and the failed game mechanic that encourages bots and farmers/gold sellers.

Wrong. MF doesn’t encourage bots and gold farmers. People who give them money do.

Its the Gem store prices that encourage people to turn to 3rd party websites. When 100g costs roughly $100 what do you expect people with limited time to do? Grind? Noooopes! They would rather risk it and get 100g with $20 instead. If the Gem store prices were more realistic more people would go there instead.

Absurd Gem store Prices →People use 3rd party sites→More people get Hacked→People get better prices from 3rd Party websites because more people got hacked.

And the vicious cycle continues. Why? Because people don’t like Gem store prices.

i have a theory that if MF goes over 100% the values become Negative effectively destroying your loot.

SneakyErvin.3056:

Well if an item has say 4% chance of dropping and you have 170% MF the drop chance is roughly 10% instead.

this ^^

and you’re not gonna be able to see an improvement from 4% to 10% just by ‘guessing’. now if you have a BIG sample size of both ends with MF and without. im talking about 1,000 to 10,000 sample size. THEN you would see the improvement.

but you gotta write it down and keep track. you blasting through 10 mobs and getting mad cause you didn’t get any loot isn’t gonna do anything

Kyosji.8961:

Yesterday I spend a total of 3 hours in my normal gear and 4 hours in my MF gear. In that time I found the following when I was jotting them down for this test:

Normal gear (3 hours 0% base MF/30% from food):
2 rares
9 greens
14 blues
about 42 crafting mats

MF gear (4 hours 170 base MF/30% from food – total 200):
0 rares
7 greens
12 blues
around 30 crafting mats

Seriously something wrong with those numbers

I hope you and the OP have raised support tickets, its the best way to get anet to look at it.

Dawdler.8521:

Random MF is random…

In my experience, it does increase the drop chance. I remember doing a dozen plinx runs while getting just crap material, when I was still getting gear. First run with MF gear – 2 yellows.

But then again, I’ve also killed a dozen dragons in my MF gear and gotten the same crappy blue/green crap every god kitten time. Getting pre-legendary from dragons? I cant even get rare

Just FYI, magic find gear has no effect on chests. It only affects drops from kills, and dragons are not technically a drop from kill. Same thing happens with dungeon bosses…sorta since they now can have drops to go with their chests.

I have found that MF gear actually reduces and lowers the quality of my drops

Rezzet.3614:

i have a theory that if MF goes over 100% the values become Negative effectively destroying your loot.

I have wondered this too.

Dante.1508:

Rezzet.3614:

i have a theory that if MF goes over 100% the values become Negative effectively destroying your loot.

I have wondered this too.

I think it’s that way as well. The only time I’ve ever come out of this terrible bubble is by inflating my mf all the way up to 250% which required all kinds of buffs from everything including the store. I wouldn’t recommend it.

The luck buff by itself seems to have serious issues so that’s out of the question too.

my best suggestion is get a good armor and simply focus on getting 5 superior sigils for 50% MF then 4 trinkets for 16% so you can keep your amulet for stats and use omnomberry bar 40% extra MF for a total of 90% MF and 40%(+15% more if you used 6 scavanger runes) gold from kills boost without sacrificing your armor.

Yep i never use mf and constanly pick up stuff while my friend constanly complains that he doesnt get any decent loot with his mf gear. There deffinitly is something not right with mf at the moment.

probably im correct about my earier post having over 100% makes the values negative i ll attempt having only 80% MF vs 130% MF and see how it goes. in about 6 hours if the hard drive doesnt crash the installation again -.-

Yep, it has worsened me as well.

I added 3 medallions of traveler (from memory that is what its called), totalling 9% MF.

So, I decided to go to Orr for a change (I hardly go there because of the obvious reasons). Here comes the fun part, in 2 hour run…

- 100+ Porous bones
- More whites than before
- Several sequences of no drops per 4-7 mobs (at one point it took me 14 mobs in a row to get a drop!)
- 3 greens
- 5 blues
- 1 rare gem

Seriosuly….

If MF works the way I think it does then it not only works as it meant to (i.e. increase chance to get rarer loot), but also increase the chance of getting crap or nothing.

It feels like it decreases some of the middle categories, which results in increasing the lowest ones at the same time.

This is beyond BS…

Has anyone seen any posts from ANet about how MF works? I was disgruntled all weekend about this issue.I played all day saturday with my MF gear on and again I had low drop rates, and on top of that not a single rare and very few greens compared to whites and blues. Sunday I spent the day with my normal gear, easily killed twice as much, and had 3 rares, a very good amount of greens and blues, and tons of crafting mats.

This is obviously busted.

Ath.2531:

Zatria.5783:

Graill.8596:

Does nothing for me but waste a slot for better stats. The developers are responsible for magic find and its choice to be implemented and the failed game mechanic that encourages bots and farmers/gold sellers.

Wrong. MF doesn’t encourage bots and gold farmers. People who give them money do.

Its the Gem store prices that encourage people to turn to 3rd party websites. When 100g costs roughly $100 what do you expect people with limited time to do? Grind? Noooopes! They would rather risk it and get 100g with $20 instead. If the Gem store prices were more realistic more people would go there instead.

Absurd Gem store Prices ->People use 3rd party sites->More people get Hacked->People get better prices from 3rd Party websites because more people got hacked.

And the vicious cycle continues. Why? Because people don’t like Gem store prices.

That is just promoting gold buying which isn’t the core philosopy of the game. If gold was dirt cheap to buy also, it would just depreciate the worth of gold and increase the price of everything in proportion to that.

Kyosji.8961:

Has anyone seen any posts from ANet about how MF works? I was disgruntled all weekend about this issue.I played all day saturday with my MF gear on and again I had low drop rates, and on top of that not a single rare and very few greens compared to whites and blues. Sunday I spent the day with my normal gear, easily killed twice as much, and had 3 rares, a very good amount of greens and blues, and tons of crafting mats.

This is obviously busted.

Isiah Cartwright on magic find:

http://kotaku.com/5960951/?post=54336345

Also, GW2 wiki acknowledges that there is currently a fault on mf that makes it reverse on certain cases. Dunno what.

projectcedric.6951:

Kyosji.8961:

Has anyone seen any posts from ANet about how MF works? I was disgruntled all weekend about this issue.I played all day saturday with my MF gear on and again I had low drop rates, and on top of that not a single rare and very few greens compared to whites and blues. Sunday I spent the day with my normal gear, easily killed twice as much, and had 3 rares, a very good amount of greens and blues, and tons of crafting mats.

This is obviously busted.

Isiah Cartwright on magic find:

http://kotaku.com/5960951/?post=54336345

Also, GW2 wiki acknowledges that there is currently a fault on mf that makes it reverse on certain cases. Dunno what.

Yes, but I can never trust a wiki to give me correct answers since anyone can edit anything

If I don’t gear completely in MF gears in Orr, I get no loot (or just a few whites now and then).

Maybe if you have a lot of MF you already hit DR before you start farming….

Nu, just noodling around in centaur lands earlier in MF gear, I got a bunch of rares, an exotic, greens, blues, like 100 bags etc. Came out to four gold for three chains.

It just sounds like it bugs out for some.

Kyosji.8961:

projectcedric.6951:

Kyosji.8961:

Has anyone seen any posts from ANet about how MF works? I was disgruntled all weekend about this issue.I played all day saturday with my MF gear on and again I had low drop rates, and on top of that not a single rare and very few greens compared to whites and blues. Sunday I spent the day with my normal gear, easily killed twice as much, and had 3 rares, a very good amount of greens and blues, and tons of crafting mats.

This is obviously busted.

Isiah Cartwright on magic find:

http://kotaku.com/5960951/?post=54336345

Also, GW2 wiki acknowledges that there is currently a fault on mf that makes it reverse on certain cases. Dunno what.

Yes, but I can never trust a wiki to give me correct answers since anyone can edit anything

Or you can think about it this way: it is the most accurate representation of a collective observation. Because, just like you said, anyone can edit it, and had I not agreed with it, I would have changed it.

Sokina.8041:

I have a magic find set. I use it a lot, when I’m in cursed shore event farming. I notice drastically good drops when I’m running with a party, while I have my magic find stuff together. I got 6 rares from one event, and in an event like Plinx, I average 3. I use a lot of magic find, over 200 with boosts.

My question is, for people who complain about it being a waste of a stat. If I wasn’t using magic find, I’d be using toughness. What does toughness do? Makes me harder to kill.

That’s nice and all, except that I’m using a ranged weapon, with 4 party members, and 15 other people. I could be totally naked, jump into an enemy mob, and STILL never die, because constant rallying. It’s good for farming, but I never use it in dungeons, fractals, World vs World, or anything else other than strictly farming for money. Why do I use it when I farm? Because I don’t need any kitten toughness when I have 30 people around and the enemies pose not a single threat.

That being said, I don’t think magic find has any place in dungeons and stuff, unless everyone agrees that it’s okay for that person to use it.

Lucky you. those sound like my drop rates pre Nov. 15th patch
Must be nice not having the perma DR bug..

projectcedric.6951:

Kyosji.8961:

projectcedric.6951:

Kyosji.8961:

Has anyone seen any posts from ANet about how MF works? I was disgruntled all weekend about this issue.I played all day saturday with my MF gear on and again I had low drop rates, and on top of that not a single rare and very few greens compared to whites and blues. Sunday I spent the day with my normal gear, easily killed twice as much, and had 3 rares, a very good amount of greens and blues, and tons of crafting mats.

This is obviously busted.

Isiah Cartwright on magic find:

http://kotaku.com/5960951/?post=54336345

Also, GW2 wiki acknowledges that there is currently a fault on mf that makes it reverse on certain cases. Dunno what.

Yes, but I can never trust a wiki to give me correct answers since anyone can edit anything

Or you can think about it this way: it is the most accurate representation of a collective observation. Because, just like you said, anyone can edit it, and had I not agreed with it, I would have changed it.

Point taken.

MF doesnt do anything, i told that to many players , they ran around with crap DPS and defense just for MF.

If MF would be so great, ANet wouldnt sell any Gems…

Hmmmm last night i decided to pick up rune of scavenger and used omnomberry bars…Farmed orr for about 3 1/2 hours and I got about 15 rares idk what you guys are doing wrong but I got multiple back to back rares and TONS of blue / greens

Mindx.9610:

Hmmmm last night i decided to pick up rune of scavenger and used omnomberry bars…Farmed orr for about 3 1/2 hours and I got about 15 rares idk what you guys are doing wrong but I got multiple back to back rares and TONS of blue / greens

What was your total MF? I’m starting to think the issue arises after 100%

KingClash.3186:

Sokina.8041:

I have a magic find set. I use it a lot, when I’m in cursed shore event farming. I notice drastically good drops when I’m running with a party, while I have my magic find stuff together. I got 6 rares from one event, and in an event like Plinx, I average 3. I use a lot of magic find, over 200 with boosts.

My question is, for people who complain about it being a waste of a stat. If I wasn’t using magic find, I’d be using toughness. What does toughness do? Makes me harder to kill.

That’s nice and all, except that I’m using a ranged weapon, with 4 party members, and 15 other people. I could be totally naked, jump into an enemy mob, and STILL never die, because constant rallying. It’s good for farming, but I never use it in dungeons, fractals, World vs World, or anything else other than strictly farming for money. Why do I use it when I farm? Because I don’t need any kitten toughness when I have 30 people around and the enemies pose not a single threat.

That being said, I don’t think magic find has any place in dungeons and stuff, unless everyone agrees that it’s okay for that person to use it.

Lucky you. those sound like my drop rates pre Nov. 15th patch
Must be nice not having the perma DR bug..

You know, I think you have something here. I started having loot issues after the Karka update.

I am over 100 and have no issue.

Im surprised players still use MF gear, I think its crap

Past few days I just started a Warrior and decided to make it a MF set.. and BANG, I’ve got dyes more often than before. Also got some really cool ones, like Midnight Ice. I can’t believe it works like a placebo. For me, MF is the real deal.

Um, dye type has nothing to do with your MF gear. It’s RNG.

Full exotic MF gear, 5 pirate and 1 scavenger rune, MF Food Buff, and full stacks of luck sigil for over 3 hours in Cursed shore doing events. A month ago I was swimming in rares and the occasional exotic with this setup…..I take a break and now..nothing..not one rare..not one exotic… wtf anet get it together..
(yes I realize the DR would have kicked in at some point over the 3 hours..)

My Theory (2c)

i) Based on a brobability roullete you can obtain the following rarity items: white, blue, green, yellow, orange. This means that you technically have a 1 in 5 chance to get any rarity item. Although this ratio is adjusted with the higher the rarity the less % out of 100% of getting it.

ii) However this is further split because each mob has it’s own set of possible items it can give: bag of items, scraps, different crafting items, armor, weapons, and nothing.

iii) Hypothetically speaking based on chance out of 100% you could get the following distribution of items:

- 10% nothing
– 10% scraps
– 20% crafting items
– 20% bag of items
– 30% armor/weapons/items
– 10% others

iv) When hitting on the ‘20% armor/weapons/items’ this is split up based on the rarity. Lets assume that this 20% is now 100% roullete.

- 45% white
– 35% blue
– 15% green
– 4% yellow
– 1% orange

Therefore in effect to get a yellow/orange item you have the following brobability: 5%/100% X 20%/100% = 1/100 = 1% chance

v) When ever getting the ‘20% armor/weapons/items’ this is also split up into the following categories which can have their own percentage probability:

- Trinkets/items
– Weapons
– Armor
– Other

So effectively, as per point iv), getting a weapon is also split up and therefore have a much lower % than say an item. Then we also have the fact that there are differnt items of the same rarity which can be influenced on several factors as described below.

vi) Naturally the distribution percentages can differ and other variables can play a part in this. The above distribution values can be affected by the following:

- player congestion per zone
– zone level currently in
– TP wanted/selling item ratio
– other

Conclusion

IMO, the best way to increase your chance of getting better items is to kill mobs in zones of low traffic and ones that can only drop few different items.