Guild Wars 2

wildcode.5403:

Geotherma.2395:

I hope the luck for others improves, and I’m not rubbing in my drops. You can easily make far more daily if you do more than what I do which is just grind lol.

While I understand that you do not see an issue, please understand that others, including myself, have trouble even making 40s per hour chaining events, jumping zones, etc. While I make my money primarily from harvesting ori/ancient wood/omnomberries using 5 different characters at times, it is impossible for me to make the same amount of money any other way.

When your nodes are on CD for gatherables, do you do penitents, maw, dragons etc? That’s all I really do. For the price of things in game, doings things steady and all, I personally think around 1g an hour is a fine amount. The best exotics (non shiny crap..) are only 1-30 gold really. I had an 80 in a week just grinding and doing story/events, and a full exotic top set in 2-3. I do play much more than others but by comparison to other MMO’s I feel like I could play casually and still feel rewarded. I will say that I tend to get a lil bored, but that’s mostly because I do not do dungeons or wvw. Soon though, when I have more time. I’d love to have a grinding partner though, feel free to come guest

I can play an hour and a half in Cursed Shores and literally discounting crafting mats (one to two tier 6 if I’m lucky, the rest has paltry value) which I all keep make only 5 – 30 silver. That includes coin from events. Item drops are mostly whites, a few blues, rare greens and since Nov. 15 only two yellows not including junk yellows like Putrid Crap. I have never had an exotic drop other than map completion or the Karka event, ever. If that ain’t broke I don’t know what is. Fix it.

There is a huge gap between player perception through actual experiences and the dev statements. I am not saying which, if either, is right but that gap must close otherwise this game will hemorrhage players while the devs remain (publicly) in denial. Either way the gap must close. Edit: It will take a lot more than rhetoric and spin to achieve that. Most players are becoming very astute in discerning spin and rhetoric for them to sneak by instead of real changes.

Anecdotally, DR will not stop bots … it may thin out a few of the less committed bots but not all … it does is chase real (but maybe more casual) players away leaving a higher concentration of more resilient bots. Just a personal opinion.

Oldbugga.7029:

There is a huge gap between player perception through actual experiences and the dev statements. I am not saying which, if either, is right but that gap must close otherwise this game will hemorrhage players while the devs remain (publicly) in denial. Either way the gap must close.

Anecdotally, DR will not stop bots … it may thin out a few of the less committed bots but not all … it does is chase real (but maybe more casual) players away leaving a higher concentration of more resilient bots. Just a personal opinion.

What you say should be common sense to them, but they do not seem to have any interest in logic or sense. They also seem to have no interest in us, whatsoever. To me, it seems they are just waiting this out, hoping it just goes away. Well newsflash, Anet: this is not just going to go away if you ignore it. You either fix it, or you deal with what comes, and it will come sooner or later. And when it does, don’t pretend to be all shocked and befuddled. Though I am starting to wonder if you’ll even have to pretend to do such a thing.

I’m entirely too annoyed to truly address the latest direction this thread has taken. I will say, a crash course in PR is sorely needed, among other things. Realize the age of the first generation gamers playing your game, and adjust accordingly, i.e., I am not twelve, lacking in intelligence or common sense, nor that easily placated.

It’s hard to have public relations when you refuse to have any sort of relations with your public. Well, other than insulting them and insinuating that they’re delusional, pathological liars without the intellect to understand what’s really happening to them (it’s just bad luck, you see).

Worst thing for them now would be to close the thread and claim it as solved.
IT IS NOT!

On the other side I have hope they won’t do that because Colin posted he will update us.

There are also a lot of questions remaining.

It’s not done by saying “there were no changes”. Not really.

Please communicate more with us, tell us (the affected player) whether we can hope for an improvement with that loot/ DR situation that we are experiencing or NOT. Regardless if you have intentionally changed something or not. It’s happening, it’s affecting some players. Players that want to play your game.
:-(

Thanks.

If every dev upped loot just because some people had bad luck.. we might as well have 1 mmo, that allows you to use godmode commands and infinite loot. So we can beat it in a month and own everything. This is the least difficult, easiest farming, simplist grinding game I’ve ever played in 15 years. They gave you an answer, they did not nerf anything. Then on top of that JUST to please people calling them names and garbage, they said they would continue using resources and time and money on making sure there is nothing wrong. So instead of working on content, working on bugs that matter, they are working to appease the tin foil hat crowds from rage-quiting over ignorance. Seriously, threads like this are a reason some people never look at forums. No respect for peoples work, namecalling, and conspiracy theories, might as well call this GW2 forums-Jerry Springer style.

Geotherma.2395:

If every dev upped loot just because some people had bad luck.. we might as well have 1 mmo, that allows you to use godmode commands and infinite loot. So we can beat it in a month and own everything. This is the least difficult, easiest farming, simplist grinding game I’ve ever played in 15 years. They gave you an answer, they did not nerf anything. Then on top of that JUST to please people calling them names and garbage, they said they would continue using resources and time and money on making sure there is nothing wrong. So instead of working on content, working on bugs that matter, they are working to appease the tin foil hat crowds from rage-quiting over ignorance. Seriously, threads like this are a reason some people never look at forums. No respect for peoples work, namecalling, and conspiracy theories, might as well call this GW2 forums-Jerry Springer style.

Here is the easy to read child’s version:

NO ONE in this thread has asked for “upped loot” only the equivalent loot the majority of players are apparently receiving. I truly do not know what is so difficult to understand about that. Closed mind is closed.

Geotherma.2395:

If every dev upped loot just because some people had bad luck.. we might as well have 1 mmo, that allows you to use godmode commands and infinite loot.

Um, I’m not asking for MORE loot, I’m asking for the same quantity/quality I got when I levelled my first two characters. Loot HAS changed for me since then for the worse in both quality and quantity.

Read this thread properly, it is about “changed loot” not more loot.

I am probably going to earn an infraction here….well i have had them for much less I can tell you.

In the past I have been highly critical of the Blizz devs (WoW and D3) in their forums about communication inadequacies similar to what the ANet devs are demonstrating not only on this topic but on many others including bugs. Lately, (WoW especially), I have been greatly impressed with their openness and straight talking about developments for characters and in game adjustments. I invite the GW2 devs to have a look at the Blizz forums/blogs/tweets and see for themselves how it really does work.

Most players in GW2 (I think the overwhelming majority), want the best for the game in the same vein as the devs. The devs should be confident enough to be honest in their communications with players. Of course there will be times where the players disagree with what the devs are doing, but the game’s design is not a democracy and the devs can tilt it whichever way they like. What I am saying is, by adopting a similar approach with honest, open communication, they will take many more players with them as the players a) understand the devs direction; b) can trust the devs statements thru proven delivery of what is promised; c) avoid the ‘x-files" syndrome (that really was insulting and shows a culture of disrespect for the players’ opinions) which has actually been created by ANet’s communication issues; and d) most will cooperate with the implementation of changes.

I also fail to see why communications seem to avoid mentioning the elephants in the room, like their desire that we use the TP more proactively but appropriately…….for goodness sake “out it”…we are not “phobic” to honesty…we do understand business principles..they are not “dirty words”.

It is essential though that communications be honest…no deception through ambiguities, deception through omission or half truths. With 2+ million players, spin and rhetoric will be quickly exposed as exactly that ( as is currently the case). It might seem clever in the devs meeting room BUT it will be quickly exposed in the “wild” and will only alienate the client base.

/stating the obvious off…but it seems it has to be said
/crusade off

I have to say that for me—-a person who never saw a rare drop til 3 weeks ago and never had an exotic drop ever. (except or map completion)—-today my drops were better. For a while. I got a few GREENS. Of course vets and champions were not dropping diddley squat, (one did…but it was blues)

I said I would be happy for a yam and vanilla tho, and I actually ran allllllll the way to haranthi again, and got THREE YAMS.

I also got 10 vanillas. But I had to run to Brisban 3 times to do it over the course of the day, logging off, going to other zones, etc.

So, I am happy. Not convinced it is all hunky dorey and fixed, but happy. Yams and Vanilla. mmmm mmmm mmmm

It’s called random number generator for a reason. It is digital luck. The closest we can get to in a game. Flame all you like, but clearly YOU want loot because person B is getting it and you are not. Only way to make it “equal” would be to simply give every mob X amount of items dropped every time. You cannot change “luck”, you can simply in this programming get better chances with MF. There is no way for the gaming world to get “their fair share”, this is not communist russia. If you want more loot work harder. And for the people who said they cant make more than 40s an hour, I just vid myself making 38s in 5 minutes on complete crap loot. I’ll continue a daily vid of different places for people to see. You can flame, and troll, and complain, and call me anything you like. But fact is, you work hard, you get loot. You want everyone to have “equal chance”, then everyone has to play the same amount of time in game, hit the same amount of mobs, play on the same server, play at the same location with same gear/items, mf. Oh yea, and every mob would have to have 100% chance to drop item a,b,c. If you know how to program it better than do it, otherwise less namecalling and more “proof” than just “oh I didn’t get any yellows..”. because while everyones qq’ing on this forum people in orr are /map chatting about 2-3 golds and yellows. Maw people talking about a decent yellow. Goes on and on. So anyway, to be continued, back to making vids.

Launch til 15th November = everything was fine, decent loot (sometimes bad luck, sometimes good luck)
after 15th November = loot suddenly decreased (most of the time very bad luck)

-.-

Navi.7142:

Launch til 15th November = everything was fine, decent loot (sometimes bad luck, sometimes good luck)
after 15th November = loot suddenly decreased (most of the time very bad luck)

-.-

Navi I would be honored to have you and anyone else follow me around the map for a day killing mobs and doing event. Seriously, no insult intended. I would love a few grinding partners for maybe 1-2 hours, we can kill lots of stuff and get loot. Maybe I can be someones good luck charm for RNG who knows.

Playing since the first day of headstart and never getting an exotic drop in the open world goes beyond the law of averages. You cannot chalk that up to “bad luck”. Sorry. Also, people didn’t notice this happening until after the Karka/Southsun Cove patch back in November. I hardly think all of these people having loot issues since that day can be considered a coincidence. And while Mr. Johanson and his team looked into the loot tables, I have to wonder why they went that route when people have always said it was diminishing returns. It was called a “DR bug” from the beginning. Maybe they should have checked there, first? But what do I know, right? I’m just a brainless consumer with delusional tendencies, with a penchant for making things up. Oh, I also wear a tinfoil hat. That’s just adorable, really. Typical.

Colin: you’re insulting our intelligence mate.
What kind of disingenuous response is this in any case?

I am very disappointed in your response. I falsely thought you and your team were looking to better your communication with the community.

ColinJohanson.2394:

We’ve completed verifying every update from the november release, and there were zero changes to anything what so ever that would have negatively affected loot in any way/shape/form.

I’d like to point out that if you were serious about the, as you guys call: “perceived” lower drop rates, you would have very quickly noticed that not a single poster questioned any changes regarding droprates between Noverember and now. It has been clearly stated that whatever happened, happened on or before the November update. By investigating anything after that, you’re looking at a completely wrong data set. I am stunned at this, to be honest. Start taking it seriously, please.

ColinJohanson.2394:

We can officially confirm this as an X-files level conspiracy at this point.

So we are all dreaming right? Your statement discredits your whole “investigation” even more.

ColinJohanson.2394:

We’re in the midst of evaluating every loot table in the game and running massive random roll evaluations table by table, as well as evaluating every system game wide that causes a player to qualify for items to determine if any issues exist in those systems from launch.

Past performance is a great measure of future performance. Sorry, but I’m not going to hold my breath here. I’m now convinced that we won’t ever see an honest response on this issue.

ColinJohanson.2394:

Will update again when we have another round of concrete information.

I know you guys are busy, so once again, I won’t be holding my breath for a quick response.

I do however feel your priorities are not entirely where it should be: As I understand, building a strong base for the continued health of the game, is your number one priority, right? And that includes content like living story and a multitude of other additions to the game, including those new chests which spawn in place of corpses. In my humble oppinion: those changes only weaken your base, when other bugs remain. Addressing existing issues, perceived or not, and communicating it to your player base, would benefit you much more than introducing more bugs in new content.

I’m going off topic here, so I’ll end by asking you guys to man up and try to be moe honest with sensitive issues like the droprate. I’d be much happier, if you told me in my face to f..off and accept the current droprates. This dodging of the issue at hand is what irks most players in my opinion.

Anyway…

./end rant

When I started the game and was farming Orr, loots were nice: I was seeing yellow very often, green were very common and I had a large quantity of blue. It lasts for weeks/months. Then, one day, I didn’t drop yellows anymore. it was rare for me to see a green. Then I started fractals. Drops were nice, I was seeing yellow often and green were very common… It lasts until fractal 9-10. Then one day, I didn’t drop yellow anymore and it was rare to see a green. Then I started CoE, I was seeing yellow often and… Same story again. But when I came back in Orr, it was still full of porous bones and 2-3 blue…

Champions and Veterans drops are garbage.

The “perceived” buff that was patched in to these mobs really shows what a low base they must have been coming off.

I have never had green or higher drop off a Champion (dragons/dungeons excluded obviously)

Anyone remember Wi Flag in Asheron’s Call? It was an aggro problem, but it followed the same dev communication cycle. First they vehemently claimed nothing was wrong. Then after the kittenstorm has gotten out of hand they were forced to investigate. After over a year they finally found the problem, but by then it was too late – most of the affected players have quit the game by then.

Geotherma.2395:

If every dev upped loot just because some people had bad luck.. we might as well have 1 mmo, that allows you to use godmode commands and infinite loot. So we can beat it in a month and own everything. This is the least difficult, easiest farming, simplist grinding game I’ve ever played in 15 years. They gave you an answer, they did not nerf anything. Then on top of that JUST to please people calling them names and garbage, they said they would continue using resources and time and money on making sure there is nothing wrong. So instead of working on content, working on bugs that matter, they are working to appease the tin foil hat crowds from rage-quiting over ignorance. Seriously, threads like this are a reason some people never look at forums. No respect for peoples work, namecalling, and conspiracy theories, might as well call this GW2 forums-Jerry Springer style.

Ya know, guy, I’m happy harathi catapults launch rares at you. Im happy mobs fall over and shower you with gold and Items. I’m happy you are a very rare, blessed, golden child of gaming.

It’s enough that you are one of the very few people with no “perceived” loot issues posting on this thread. We get it. Post after post. Congrats.

But that isn’t enough? You now need to talk down to people, label them as ignorant, blah blah blah whatever. You stated your bliss with the drop rate, why make it a crusade?

I started this game after Nov 15. I don’t know what the drops were prior. I do know what they are now. I do know that Champions/Vets do not drop anything for me most of the time, in spite of a “guarantee” to do so listed in the Nov patch notes. I do know that I can kill mobs for 3 hours and not see enough craft fines to make one insignia. I do know that there is absolutely no reward for risk.. in fact, often there is a penalty.

I’ve only played MMOs for 10 years, and I personally have never seen common vendor trash loots doled out so miserly. I’ve never had a bad streak of RNG effect all characters equally and so I very much doubt it is just RNG.

Im not asking for the world. Just a small gain, and the ability to craft items by gaining the components myself. I do not see that as asking for “godmode”

Teofa Tsavo.9863:

Erasculio.2914:

We get on average one topic per week asking if the drop rate of ectos has been nerfed. Those posters usually employ as “evidence” the fact that in the previous week they got a lot o ectos, but n the current week they didn’t.

I think that’s enough evidence that players are not capable of judging if there’s something wrong with their loot or not. In the end, this topic is somewhat useless – players simply cannot objectiveky know iftheir drops are working as intendedor not.

It is very simple. ANET stated Champions and Veterans should drop loot. They don’t. It isn’t “perception” when you look at a dead Champion you soloed.. and it is unlootable. It isn’t “perception” when most of the Champions and Veterans I kill, mostly solo, drop blues rarely, whites and junk rarely, and nothing predominately.

They state one thing as fact, and then experience in the actual game world, by many many players, says it is far from being fact. Whose perception is skewed?

Blaming other players for a legitimate issue on ANETs side of the fence isn’t very bright, helpful, or constructive. However, at least you managed to be less insulting than Colin was. You just implied we are stupid, instead of delusional.

THIS is the issue i have aswell: Solo/duoing champs have not given me any reward but the information is that i should of. . . . . .so no conspiricy?

Geotherma.2395:

It’s called random number generator for a reason. It is digital luck. The closest we can get to in a game. Flame all you like, but clearly YOU want loot because person B is getting it and you are not. Only way to make it “equal” would be to simply give every mob X amount of items dropped every time. You cannot change “luck”, you can simply in this programming get better chances with MF. There is no way for the gaming world to get “their fair share”, this is not communist russia. If you want more loot work harder. And for the people who said they cant make more than 40s an hour, I just vid myself making 38s in 5 minutes on complete crap loot. I’ll continue a daily vid of different places for people to see. You can flame, and troll, and complain, and call me anything you like. But fact is, you work hard, you get loot. You want everyone to have “equal chance”, then everyone has to play the same amount of time in game, hit the same amount of mobs, play on the same server, play at the same location with same gear/items, mf. Oh yea, and every mob would have to have 100% chance to drop item a,b,c. If you know how to program it better than do it, otherwise less namecalling and more “proof” than just “oh I didn’t get any yellows..”. because while everyones qq’ing on this forum people in orr are /map chatting about 2-3 golds and yellows. Maw people talking about a decent yellow. Goes on and on. So anyway, to be continued, back to making vids.

Oh wow, work harder huh… would you like an extra shovel sir, y’know.. to dig that hole just a bit deeper? I’m not sure who’s more insulting to the unfortunate masses here that contributed to this thread, and the closed one before; you or his highness Colin.

Dude, we started in with the ‘proof’ from very early on in this thread, virtually from the moment it was asked, by an Anet employee, no less. They wanted proof and we’ve given more than we’ve had to. Go back to the start and learn to read.

And here you are, on about luck… and you have the audacity to praise MF, when just about everyone who has contributed to this thread knows full well that it is a broken stat. I’ve had a whole lot more good drops from 0% MF than from my old set and all buffs (over 200%).

So you have the good luck and a fair few rare drops, etc. and can make more than most of the other people in this thread. Hooray for you… do you want a skippy badge, or rather a chest to pin it on? I am utterly fed up with all the people coming in here trolling us and saying we’re delusional and that it’s all in our heads (may as well do, it’s just as insulting). I guess someone like you has never heard the term ‘walk a mile in my shoes’.

It’s quite clear you are not these other people, and they are not you, or they would have far less to whinge about. It doesn’t matter what some people who post in here do, they have either cursed characters or accounts (most likely the latter) where DR has just kittenall over them since very early on. What I’m asking is that DR be canned completely, even on a trial basis, to see how these people with their cursed accounts fair with non-DR drops and take it from there.

As an aside, Colin graced us with his presence to update us as to what was happening. Under no other circumstances has he or any other Anet personnel come in here to converse about DR, lack of drops, etc. I’ve mentioned once before about lack of communication from the Anet people, and more recently OldBugga has made a rather nice contribution augmenting my stance on this.. so in the meantime I won’t expect anything to be done about it.

Teofa Tsavo.9863:

Erasculio.2914:

We get on average one topic per week asking if the drop rate of ectos has been nerfed. Those posters usually employ as “evidence” the fact that in the previous week they got a lot o ectos, but n the current week they didn’t.

I think that’s enough evidence that players are not capable of judging if there’s something wrong with their loot or not. In the end, this topic is somewhat useless – players simply cannot objectiveky know iftheir drops are working as intendedor not.

It is very simple. ANET stated Champions and Veterans should drop loot. They don’t. It isn’t “perception” when you look at a dead Champion you soloed.. and it is unlootable. It isn’t “perception” when most of the Champions and Veterans I kill, mostly solo, drop blues rarely, whites and junk rarely, and nothing predominately.

They state one thing as fact, and then experience in the actual game world, by many many players, says it is far from being fact. Whose perception is skewed?

Blaming other players for a legitimate issue on ANETs side of the fence isn’t very bright, helpful, or constructive. However, at least you managed to be less insulting than Colin was. You just implied we are stupid, instead of delusional.

THIS is the issue i have aswell: Solo/duoing champs have not given me any reward but the information is that i should of. . . . . .so no conspiricy?

ColinJohanson.2394:

We’ve completed verifying every update from the november release, and there were zero changes to anything what so ever that would have negatively affected loot in any way/shape/form.

With 25+ years of experience teaching and practicing software engineering, I have found this (“who changed what when”) to be a decidedly suboptimal (albeit common) way of approaching a problem.

The code is a logical construct that misbehaves now, and it is a matter of logic to find out why it is behaving as it is. For example, veterans and champs give hardly any loot. Using breakpoints or traces, it should be possible to determine which code paths are being followed and which are not. Compare this with what should happen, and you will zoom in on the cause of the bug; that is, the place in the code where it deviates from what it should do.

For example, you might find that the DR mechanism had collected just enough data to kick in for many people around 16 Nov; which has nothing to do with code changes introduced on that date.

We can officially confirm this as an X-files level conspiracy at this point.

This is a rather offensive ad hominem in my opinion.

Oldbugga.7029:

The devs should be confident enough to be honest in their communications with players

Players, on average, are not that smart. There is a good reason why the average player is not a game designer – people usually don’t have the training to understand how to design a game. Any gaming community is also extremelly prone to take any developer statement and turn it around, finding many ways to misunderstand it.

Developers have more important things to do than saying the same thing over and over (so everyone understands it) to a very small part of the player community (forums are almost the definition of vocal minority). Like, working to improve the game.

If developers could say the uncensored truth, I think the reply to most people in this topic would be, “You want a loot-based game, but that’s not what GW2 is. This isn’t Diablo, it’s trying to be something closer to Planescape: Torment”.

Mausler.3748:

ColinJohanson.2394:

We can officially confirm this as an X-files level conspiracy at this point.

This is a rather offensive ad hominem in my opinion.

This is why I asked if he was confirming that there was an issue and they are trying to find the problem, or if he was saying we made the issue up and they are checking just to confirm.

wildcode.5403:

Mausler.3748:

ColinJohanson.2394:

We can officially confirm this as an X-files level conspiracy at this point.

This is a rather offensive ad hominem in my opinion.

This is why I asked if he was confirming that there was an issue and they are trying to find the problem, or if he was saying we made the issue up and they are checking just to confirm.

And as a good example to my point above: Colin’s statement came after saying " We’ve completed verifying every update from the november release", which means, the “X-File conspiracy” is the idea that drops have been nerfed since the November release.

Does this mean that there isn’t an issue with drops? Colin answers that in the following paragraph: “We’re in the midst of evaluating every loot table in the game and running massive random roll evaluations table by table” to see if there’s an issue with drops from launch.

Would it really be worth having a developer stop working on the game to answer a question he has already answered? No. This is why they could not – and should not – reply to every request for communication from players in the forum.

I noticed, and i claim this for a fact, that when more than certain amount of people is farming in a small area, unless you have a team you will not get a single drop!

Tested it with a guild several times. While everyone has a party in 20 man farm, each champion drops at least a blue. As soon as you leave the party and farm on your own, nothing, not even a glob of glooby gloop.

I doubt that is intentional, and I doubt that this is the way you want to make people form parties for. And please don’t tell this is not how its working, because we tested it for several hours and every time a person went solo, that person didn’t get any drops at all.

Turbo Chet.8527:

Colin, either I hope you’re joking or you guys are just afraid to own up about tweaking drop rates. Anybody that has played the game before and after November notices the change in the drop rate. I used to get around 4 rares an hour doing pent / shelter. Nowadays I’m lucky to get even one rare drop an hour. And yes, I am putting the frequency change of events in account as well. It’s like you guys despise the idea of rewarding players.

Interstingly, I reached 80 with two characters, both after Nov 15 and I had NEVER seen the drop rates you’re describing… until 3 days ago. I’m more like 2 rares an hour doing the kharma train now, but prior to this week I got a rare maybe once a week.

I seem to be DR-free at the moment, wondering how best to avoid toggling it back on…

First rule is: Rewards need to be compelling, it’s what keeps players playing.
When designing content, this should take priority, above all else. In gaming, the loot is what you seek, not the journey. Who’d do the same dungeon 50 times if they knew there was no loot inside. Everything ANet does it great, but this is the one area where they stagger, fall down the stairs, and break both legs. It has come up on many occasions, dungeon rewards, personal story rewards, vet and champ drops, open world rewards. Content you work for needs to have pay-off, and as off now there is none.

Oldbugga.7029:

Most players in GW2 (I think the overwhelming majority), want the best for the game in the same vein as the devs. The devs should be confident enough to be honest in their communications with players. Of course there will be times where the players disagree with what the devs are doing, but the game’s design is not a democracy and the devs can tilt it whichever way they like.

After the abysmal ascended fiasco, I really thought ANet was going to step up to the plate. But now we are in the same rut we were in back then. Honestly, if ANet told people they were planning an extra tear around release, none of that would have happened, and a lot of fans wouldn’t have left. I’m just waiting for the next bombshell to go off, which will send the people into outrage.

The devs need to understand, we aren’t frail children who needs to be sheltered from the truth. Conversely, we are all but slavering to have the facts thrown at us. And if the fans will remain and the dark and treated like this, the game will suffer loses.

Part of this problem is it has divided the community into haves and have nots. The have nots are getting hit with the loot issue, day in day out, no matter what they do. For example this past week I have tried dungeons, fractals, running all over the map chasing dragon champions, etc etc etc, and all still hitting me with loot drop issue.

Then you have the haves, who do not see a problem and think we are lieing or demanding better loot when they see the loot as already good, after all they are getting rares quite regularly, and make a decent profit from drops.

This divide generates tension within the community on several levels, including the have nots being jealous of the haves, the haves thinking the have nots are greedy or not playing the game right, the have nots getting insulted by the haves statements, the haves seeing the have nots as whiners.

In the worst cases, those suffering with this loot issue get to a point where they are not looking forward to logging on because they know from their past experiences that they are going to feel unrewarded, and rightly so. I myself logged in today, did the daily, logged off for a while, logged back in and did some WvW, then logged back off, because yesterday I did not do well from loot, and the day before that, and so on. From reading these forums, others have just stopped logging in altogether.

Now, have I tried …, well yes I have. Someone said you make alot in fractals, so I went and did fractals, went up 2 levels and only made 80s total. Someone said do some AC runs, so I did and yes it was a little better than the 2 levels of fractals but I made no where near the same amount as other people in the party. Have I tried going to different events in different areas, well yes, I’m often chasing after dragon champions, running different events in different maps called out by my guild buddies, so I’m not sitting in one area or one event milking it dry. Have I tried magic find, don’t get me started, all I will say is with 122% MF I get less drops, less equipment and more fine crafting material, than I do without MF.

The fact of the matter is, that I did much better with loot prior to Nov15 than I do now. I can be in the same party, doing the same events, tagging the same mobs, and make only a fraction of the amount others in the party make. Again, same party, doing the same thing as everyone else and not see a rare for days while everyone else seems to get one quite regularly.

The haves do not understand this issue and only increase the emotion around this issue with their un-sympethic comments.

Just to add, I’ve done a lot of dungeons, it’s what I enjoy. Not so much fractals though, it’s not really my thing. I don’t do Penitant, because I’d rather play wherever I want, and not force play one area. I do love the dragon fights.

Around launch I’d get one rare per dungeon run, with minimal MF, which was decent. I also received one rare around every second dragon chest.
For the entire January I haven’t received 1 rare for all my dungeon runs, and I’ve done enough to complete two dungeon sets. In December I think I received one. I’ve also done about 10-15 dragon fights and didn’t receive any rares, not once. How exactly is the game working as intended?

While leveling my main, I always had around two rares equipped on my way to 80. Neither my ele nor engi alts had any rares on them. I literally went from blues and greens to exotics. Is this how the game was supposed to be?

I want to get ectos for crafting, and no, I have no interest in using the TP for this. I want to build my characters myself. But with the drops being what they are, I seldom get the opportunity. It’s better to spend tokens, which I’d rather use on exotic gear, buying rares and salvaging them. Is this the way it’s supposed to be?

I’m at a threshold as it is. I love this game so much. It’s been such a great ride, but I just don’t know anymore. I often exit the game feeling I’ve placed a lot into the game, and got so little back. Content building isn’t everything, it means nothing if there’s no rewards to back it up. Since this seem to be a DR issue/bug, then it seems the game is punishing you for playing. I thank Balthazar that I have laurels to look forward to, or I wouldn’t even be logging in any more.

Last night I thought this through and this is a theory I had.

What if the cause of the low drops is MF? What if the drops are intentionally low to balance out the high MF players out there? Imagine the drop rates get improved and the market gets flooded with rares and exotics, it will hurt the game.
In such a scenario I’d say, improve the drops, but remove MF from gear. MF is a stat with the only function of getting more gold. Why would anyone want this on their gear, which is supposed to be about build progression, not cash grabbing.
MF should be removed from gear, and be made solely available through consumables, and another game mechanic. Maybe shrine buffs or a designated inventory slot.

I’m not trying to start a wild fire, but this makes logical sense to me.

Azjenco.9425:

What if the cause of the low drops is MF?

I am going to both agree and disagree.

I agree because in my experience, 122% MF gives me less drops, less equipment, but more fine crafting material.

Now I disagree because a lot of my recent evidence that I have posted here has been without magic find, as in 0% MF.

Oldbugga.7029:

I am probably going to earn an infraction here….well i have had them for much less I can tell you.

In the past I have been highly critical of the Blizz devs (WoW and D3) in their forums about communication inadequacies similar to what the ANet devs are demonstrating not only on this topic but on many others including bugs. Lately, (WoW especially), I have been greatly impressed with their openness and straight talking about developments for characters and in game adjustments. I invite the GW2 devs to have a look at the Blizz forums/blogs/tweets and see for themselves how it really does work.

Most players in GW2 (I think the overwhelming majority), want the best for the game in the same vein as the devs. The devs should be confident enough to be honest in their communications with players. Of course there will be times where the players disagree with what the devs are doing, but the game’s design is not a democracy and the devs can tilt it whichever way they like. What I am saying is, by adopting a similar approach with honest, open communication, they will take many more players with them as the players a) understand the devs direction; b) can trust the devs statements thru proven delivery of what is promised; c) avoid the ‘x-files" syndrome (that really was insulting and shows a culture of disrespect for the players’ opinions) which has actually been created by ANet’s communication issues; and d) most will cooperate with the implementation of changes.

I also fail to see why communications seem to avoid mentioning the elephants in the room, like their desire that we use the TP more proactively but appropriately…….for goodness sake “out it”…we are not “phobic” to honesty…we do understand business principles..they are not “dirty words”.

It is essential though that communications be honest…no deception through ambiguities, deception through omission or half truths. With 2+ million players, spin and rhetoric will be quickly exposed as exactly that ( as is currently the case). It might seem clever in the devs meeting room BUT it will be quickly exposed in the “wild” and will only alienate the client base.

/stating the obvious off…but it seems it has to be said
/crusade off

nicely put
these devs need see that people can see through PR speak
we are not the enemy we are on your side
but the "perceived " x files type comments really are sending us a …….your dismissed message

I don’t doubt loot has not gotten worse. But I also suspect that what ANet believes is acceptable is far below what players consider acceptable. Setting to it ANet’s perception of “way too high” would probably be something akin to “only slightly bad” to most players. Who’s right on the matter is another topic entirely. But the answer is the player.

Plague.5329:

I don’t doubt loot has not gotten worse. But I also suspect that what ANet believes is acceptable is far below what players consider acceptable. Setting to it ANet’s perception of “way too high” would probably be something akin to “only slightly bad” to most players. Who’s right on the matter is another topic entirely. But the answer is the player.

Good point. It’s one thing to talk about player perceptions, but the opposite is also true. ANet’s perception on the matter can also be unacceptable to the player’s. We are supposed to be on the same side, but sometimes the issues feel a bit like us vs. them. I hate that, it feels terrible.

Azjenco.9425:

First rule is: Rewards need to be compelling, it’s what keeps players playing.
When designing content, this should take priority, above all else. In gaming, the loot is what you seek, not the journey.

False. Grinders need rewards, since rewards is what keep grinders playing. Normal players, those who like to play to have fun, value the journey more than the shiny reward in the end.

This is also what is best for the game. What do you think is better – a human player, or a donkey which would run whenever just to get a carrot dangling in front of its face?

There is really no need to keep posting evidence here, since the devs have pretty much made up their minds that nothing is wrong. The majority of us already know that something is wrong, but they devs have already stopped reading. This thread will be closed soon.

Erasculio.2914:

Azjenco.9425:

First rule is: Rewards need to be compelling, it’s what keeps players playing.
When designing content, this should take priority, above all else. In gaming, the loot is what you seek, not the journey.

False. Grinders need rewards, since rewards is what keep grinders playing. Normal players, those who like to play to have fun, value the journey more than the shiny reward in the end.

This is also what is best for the game. What do you think is better – a human player, or a donkey which would run whenever just to get a carrot dangling in front of its face?

What do you think is better – doing content and receiving the very lowest possible rewards, or finishing content and receiving something memorable and worthwhile for it?

I see where you’re coming from, but the only items on my characters that I treasure are my dungeon sets. I pretty much accumulated those from the mandatory token handout. Nothing I’ve picked up thus far has been worthwhile, there is no item I’ve looked at and thought “man, I remember when I got this from that boss, kitten it was a good fight” or “I got this sword from that amazingly insane jumping puzzle”.

But in your opinion, you’ll keep playing even if the game had no drops, because “you have fun and enjoy the journey”. Normally I’d agree with you, but after doing a dungeon 10 times, or done a meta for the umpteenth time, then there isn’t much journey left, and at that time you’re looking for something rewarding as you’re building your character. How exactly do you intend to build your character when the game doesn’t drop any items?

False my buttocks. Story and the experience may be facets of any successful RPG, but so is character growth, optimization, and gear.

SenorMoody.5908:

There is really no need to keep posting evidence here, since the devs have pretty much made up their minds that nothing is wrong. The majority of us already know that something is wrong, but they devs have already stopped reading. This thread will be closed soon.

Agree and I’ll even go further. I feel strung along by the vague comments seeming to agree there’s a problem. I gave them the benefit of the doubt.

Now all of a sudden, they admit that they consider what we are experiencing is intended. This leads me to suspect that the whole point of this thread is to get our data so that they can figure out how to infect the rest of the player base with the issues we face.

I would say for the benefit of those who are not yet having our issues that we don’t post any more loot/drop data. I figure they probably already have the info they need; but in case they still need more we should not oblige.

When this thread was started, I decried the tone of the OP as unprofessional and unnecessary. With the last (almost smirking) post by CJ we can clearly see that the OP was fully intended to goad us and that they have never thought that what they did with the loot and DR was a problem.

Edit: Yes, re-reading this post I can see some tin-foil hat in my comments. I am still disappointed and this is why I’ve not posted much. I’ll give it some time to cool off more.

—> Original post continued…

I couldn’t have said it better than:

Nymphetamine.2103:

Colin: you’re insulting our intelligence mate.
What kind of disingenuous response is this in any case?

I am very disappointed in your response. I falsely thought you and your team were looking to better your communication with the community.

ColinJohanson.2394:

We’ve completed verifying every update from the november release, and there were zero changes to anything what so ever that would have negatively affected loot in any way/shape/form.

I’d like to point out that if you were serious about the, as you guys call: “perceived” lower drop rates, you would have very quickly noticed that not a single poster questioned any changes regarding droprates between Noverember and now. It has been clearly stated that whatever happened, happened on or before the November update. By investigating anything after that, you’re looking at a completely wrong data set. I am stunned at this, to be honest. Start taking it seriously, please.

ColinJohanson.2394:

We can officially confirm this as an X-files level conspiracy at this point.

So we are all dreaming right? Your statement discredits your whole “investigation” even more.

ColinJohanson.2394:

We’re in the midst of evaluating every loot table in the game and running massive random roll evaluations table by table, as well as evaluating every system game wide that causes a player to qualify for items to determine if any issues exist in those systems from launch.

Past performance is a great measure of future performance. Sorry, but I’m not going to hold my breath here. I’m now convinced that we won’t ever see an honest response on this issue.

ColinJohanson.2394:

Will update again when we have another round of concrete information.

I know you guys are busy, so once again, I won’t be holding my breath for a quick response.

I do however feel your priorities are not entirely where it should be: As I understand, building a strong base for the continued health of the game, is your number one priority, right? And that includes content like living story and a multitude of other additions to the game, including those new chests which spawn in place of corpses. In my humble oppinion: those changes only weaken your base, when other bugs remain. Addressing existing issues, perceived or not, and communicating it to your player base, would benefit you much more than introducing more bugs in new content.

I’m going off topic here, so I’ll end by asking you guys to man up and try to be moe honest with sensitive issues like the droprate. I’d be much happier, if you told me in my face to f..off and accept the current droprates. This dodging of the issue at hand is what irks most players in my opinion.

Anyway…

./end rant

Well stated, Nymphetamine +1

There is no point in arguing with other players on this issue.

Those of us affected by this loot issue see that our costs in this gold sink designed game are starting to outweigh our gains because of loot drops.

As a result, my fun level went from a 100 to a 0, while this may not be the case for everyone, it was for those affected the same way in my guild.

When those not affected now eventually get hit with this, and they will, it will probably be a different story.

I refuse to buy gems to convert to gold just to supplement my gameplay in a game that stated during devolpment that it was not going to be designed that way.

I wish the lemmings well that will, because that was probably Anets vision all along.

Open those wallets boys and girls, welcome to the typical MMO standard of today.

I tried to trust that company in Austin, Texas last year and I wanted to trust this company.

I won’t fall into the traps again, enjoy the game though, as long as possible.

Since i feel this is getting nowhere, i want to make a proposition to ANet.

We know you want the DR system on place, and we have problems with it. So my proposed solution is this:
Tone down the DR severity a few notches, to a happy medium where it still provides that safety net to the ingame economy, while letting legitimate farming players gain a decent return for their time.

I can’t speak for everyone, but i would be satisfied with that.

Jordi.6081:

Since i feel this is getting nowhere, i want to make a proposition to ANet.

We know you want the DR system on place, and we have problems with it. So my proposed solution is this:
Tone down the DR severity a few notches, to a happy medium where it still provides that safety net to the ingame economy, while letting legitimate farming players gain a decent return for their time.

I can’t speak for everyone, but i would be satisfied with that.

Using catpcha, or some other sort of “real-person” check at the point where botting is suspected eliminates the need for DR…I think at this point, most people would welcome such a construct. But, of course, DR no longer has anything to with bots, if it ever did, and everything to do with pushing people in to the gem store.

I would be ok with that too.

ColinJohanson.2394:

Just wanted to give a quick update on this topic. We’ve completed verifying every update from the november release, and there were zero changes to anything what so ever that would have negatively affected loot in any way/shape/form. We can officially confirm this as an X-files level conspiracy at this point.

We’re in the midst of evaluating every loot table in the game and running massive random roll evaluations table by table, as well as evaluating every system game wide that causes a player to qualify for items to determine if any issues exist in those systems from launch.

Will update again when we have another round of concrete information.

A couple of things.

Let’s start at the start. More than two months ago, a thread was started, and all threads that resembled the topic were merged into it:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Change-in-loot-parameters-or-a-bug-Merged

It’s a thread in which hundreds of players provided 26 pages of data. The thread got closed, and players were requested by your staff, to again report on the loot they received. Some of these players have done this very elaborately, at your request, and on multiple occasions. They took the time to do it right, because you asked them to do it.

So again, hundreds of players reported to you, this time at your request. Just on the first three pages of this thread, these players were:

wildcode.5403, Nilm.2984, ezd.6359, Narkosys.5173, Sarius.6983, WarMacheen.7124, Banjal.7328, Ajwz.7316, Asuka Shikinami.5462, Etien.4601, Micerbeats.9607, Gordon Shumway.9418, plasmacutter.2709, AnotherJaggens.1396, OmooGlam.5467, Maharunn.4567, America.9437, Incandescent Anon.3819, phaneo.4597, SirNukes.7854, Eldiora.5836, tigirius.9014, Midnight.9205, Darque Intent.1674, Gafgarion.3846, Don Zardeone.8730, Sythus.2396, Bartas.4908, garraeth.3267, ambra.9283, Adelia.9403, Infidel.8657, florence.1674, Kao.5412, Gluttony.2017, Aelaren.3784, Xamon.5783, Errtu.8276, Lighthammer.3280, Northlander.4619, AcFiBu.9624, Essence Snow.3194, Minami Kaori.2548, Tommyknocker.6089, wynnikit.5217, Rorek.3946, Alur.7510, Darkdanjal.3401, Swifter.6451, Master Roland.2349, Gilosean.3805, morphemass.2850, garraeth.3267, Aproposs Of Fire.4056, Blude.6812, PowerCat.5738, ZaxanRazor.6235, Innuendo.8674, Jordi.6081, Cherti.6782, Sir Digby.8160, Hermes.7014, Darkheart.7436, Mala.3861, cargan.5689, Inimicus.7162, stale.9785, Inimicus.7162, tigirius.9014, ATC Alpha.4098, DevorianDevil.6037, Dreed.3714, Aidenwolf.5964, coldfire.3628, Dante.1508, Himei.5379, Mercypsy.9602, Puchbol.9035, bravoart.5308, Cactus Brawler.7415, and myself.

Dear Colin, did you even look at the data they provided? Did you go to their account, and check whether the disturbing information they provided was accurate? If not, why did you direct your staff to ask them to report to you in the first place?

We are not numbers, Colin. We are your clients. Please treat us with the respect we deserve.

Spleen.7836:

When I started the game and was farming Orr, loots were nice: I was seeing yellow very often, green were very common and I had a large quantity of blue. It lasts for weeks/months. Then, one day, I didn’t drop yellows anymore. it was rare for me to see a green. Then I started fractals. Drops were nice, I was seeing yellow often and green were very common… It lasts until fractal 9-10. Then one day, I didn’t drop yellow anymore and it was rare to see a green. Then I started CoE, I was seeing yellow often and… Same story again. But when I came back in Orr, it was still full of porous bones and 2-3 blue…

This has been my experience, too (i.e., the DR mechanism seems to persist beyond reason).

Let’s consider something tangible…end-game content…legendary weapons. While these are the living definition of grind for essentially everyone, what’s that mean to the have-nots? Like Wildcode, who’s situation is even worse than mine, unless I run around and harvest nodes, which is really not my thing, I have a problem making 20-30s in a 3 or 4 hour session of doing events. That’s perhaps 1 ecto…you need ~450 to craft a legendary…Using 3 hours, that is 168 days at 8 hours of play per day. Badges of honor in WvW…I’ve only just started, but after about 6 hours and 57 kills, I have 7 badges to show for it. You can get map completion once per map, so that’s a free 40 badges, you still need 460, most of which will come from kills. If that average stays in place, 49 days at 8 hours per day, then there’s dungeon token, which I would need Arah for the Bifrost, I haven’t done Arah yet, but what is it, about 8/speed clear? I don’t think you the 40/path (Or whatever is it) like AC. Again though, we’re talking weeks worth of grinding. At this point, we’re probably near a year worth of grinding, much more for those who have a life and can’t play for many hours a day (No offense) and still don’t have the precursor. I’ve read one will typically drop over 1000 rares in the mystic toilet before getting a precursor. Will that be even more for one affected by this drop problem…who knows. Now the cheapest rare staff you can get on the TP is about 40s, 1000 of those is 400 gold (Realistically slightly less due to what the forge does return). But for simplicity, since the return rate won’t be THAT good, with the above return rate of about 30 silver/3 hour session, that translates in to, about 168 8-hour days…just to buy the staves, then more untold time at the forge. So, now we’re well over a straight year’s worth of 8-hour days (Several years for an average player), we have the precursor, the gift of battle, hopefully the gift of exploration by then and perhaps the dungeon tokens, perhaps the mystic clovers, but we still have much more to collect/buy…

You see where I’m going with this…for the have-nots, the end-game content is not achievable without sinking vast amounts of money in to the gem store…this is NOT reasonable and is a truly scary stat if this is what is actually expected of players!!!!

13:12 03/02/2013

Champion No drop
Veteran No drop
Veteran 79 Blue Axe
Champion No drop
Veteran No drop
Veteran Tiny Fang
Veteran No drop
Veteran No drop
Veteran No drop
Veteran No drop

I guess the hampster wheel needs fixing.

Forgot to add. I just logged in and played normally. Not farming, not doing something I did yesterday, not chasing bots; just playing the game.