Guild Wars 2

So I decided to buy 200 Greatswords to gamble Mystic Toilet and ended up with only 3 rare GS and -80G. Felt great.

Your experience?

3k+ hours played 1 precursor drop total…

Over 800 rares and 200 exos in the toilet no precursor from it.

It’s why I never gamble in the casinos!

I found it quite hilarious actually.
You’d think I’d get at least something back, but nope.

Well, I’ve had my fair share of both bad and good luck.

A friend of mine threw 100 rare staffs into forge and got 2 precursors. I decided to spend my last 9g on shields and managed to get “The Chosen” on my very last gamble, which sold for around 260g over night.

Though, since then I’ve spent around 400g on forge and had nothing notable. I’ve also opened between 1400-1450 champion bags (not exaggerated, I’ve been opening them in large quantity’s) and only had 2 exotics, both under 3g each. I also only average 2 exotic drops/month with 120% MF.

So, I’ve gone from good to pretty horrible luck.

Casual player, doesn’t waste resources gambling on the MF. Got Dusk while doing the Shadow Behemoth event a few months ago. Pulled a few BL weapon tickets from chests via Personal Story key drops. Knows what “random” means.

And so do you. Pretending that you expect or deserve specific results from a process clearly indicated to be random is pointless. “RNG complaint post, Week 96: random is still random.”

On the other hand, just a week ago, I got Abyss Dye from a level 2 bandit in Queensdale.
Such a mess.

I think the current RNG in place is an outright scam.

tolunart.2095:

The horse is dead.

The horse is glue

OP must not have read the posts of people putting thousands of rares and getting nothing at the end. These are like mount posts. Already discussed to death but still show up anyway

Fought Tequatl V2 almost every day since release. Never got a single Ascended drop, let alone its exclusive skin or mini… while I’ve seen people randomly fighting it once and getting a weapon with stats they didn’t even need.
If that’s not trolling I don’t know what it is.

Okay, I’m sorry, I know not all the lingo in this game.

What does RNG stand for?

Jaymee.1560:

Okay, I’m sorry, I know not all the lingo in this game.

What does RNG stand for?

Randomly generated.

JustTrogdor.7892:

Jaymee.1560:

Okay, I’m sorry, I know not all the lingo in this game.

What does RNG stand for?

Randomly generated.

Thank you, friend!

JustTrogdor.7892:

Jaymee.1560:

Okay, I’m sorry, I know not all the lingo in this game.

What does RNG stand for?

Randomly generated.

Wrong.

RNG = Random Number Generator

Alcubierre.7538:

JustTrogdor.7892:

Jaymee.1560:

Okay, I’m sorry, I know not all the lingo in this game.

What does RNG stand for?

Randomly generated.

Wrong.

RNG = Random Number Generator

It us used both ways in casual chat. I’ve seen people say both.

Mea.5491:

JustTrogdor.7892:

Alcubierre.7538:

JustTrogdor.7892:

Jaymee.1560:

Okay, I’m sorry, I know not all the lingo in this game.

What does RNG stand for?

Randomly generated.

Wrong.

RNG = Random Number Generator

It us used both ways in casual chat. I’ve seen people say both.

I wonder why people call it random NUMBER generator, though… In the other game I play we call it RIG: random ITEM generator, because we get items, not numbers.

Well technically RNG does stand for “Random Number Generator” but for many it is simplified to randomly generated as that refers to the actual results/reward. You throw 4 swords into the mystic forge and the result is randomly generated. You kill a mob and the loot is randomly generated.

my rng baboom was when i first joined champ farming train in frostgorge (few days after that champ update) and in 30min i got a shiny sword skin that i sold. after that rng wasn’t that generous to me.

in the end gw2 rng is somewhat ok for healthy economy (bags and stuff contribute to bigger picture out there), but lack of structured alternatives for obtaining stuff someone needs is a problem.

Mea.5491:

I wonder why people call it random NUMBER generator, though… In the other game I play we call it RIG: random ITEM generator, because we get items, not numbers.

Probably goes back to paper-on-a-table Dungeons & Dragons, where you used dice to generate (sufficiently) random numbers, then compared the numbers to various tables in the rulebooks to determine what happens in the game, including randomly generating loot.

While many games have specific items placed in specific locations (usually for plot purposes), I don’t think I’ve ever played a game that doesn’t have any random encounters or loot. It’s a tradition that goes back around 40 years, making the complaints about it seem all the more useless.

tolunart.2095:

Probably goes back to paper-on-a-table Dungeons & Dragons

Those were the days because if you didn’t have a good imagination the graphics were terrible.

Mea.5491:

JustTrogdor.7892:

Alcubierre.7538:

JustTrogdor.7892:

Jaymee.1560:

Okay, I’m sorry, I know not all the lingo in this game.

What does RNG stand for?

Randomly generated.

Wrong.

RNG = Random Number Generator

It us used both ways in casual chat. I’ve seen people say both.

I wonder why people call it random NUMBER generator, though… In the other game I play we call it RIG: random ITEM generator, because we get items, not numbers.

Because a random NUMBER generator is behind everything in the game that doesn’t have a 100% chance of occurring. It’s what determines what items drop from a mob, a chest, or the mystic toilet, it also determines whether you crit or not, where on the weapon damage spectrum each of your attacks falls, and whether or not any “X% chance” runes, sigils, or food activate their effect.

A random number generator is basically the computer equivalent to dice rolls in tabletop RPGs, except the die potentially has hundreds of thousands of sides (or more).

I’m not going into detail on how many times you have to win the dice roll to get a precursor because, frankly I don’t know how their loot tables work.

Just to be clear, random number generators are part of the code. They’re not a physical generator that converts electricity (or wind, or gasoline) into numbers.

tl;dr: A random number generator is how computers handle “random” and “chance”. Anything random, including a “random item generator” (if that were a thing), has a random number generator determining which of the potential random outcomes actually happens.

P.S. I took one programming course in college, so if anyone else wants to go into more detail, or correct anything I said, and make everyone’s heads explode, feel free.

Terra Dactyl.2047:

tl;dr: A random number generator is how computers handle “random” and “chance”. Anything random, including a “random item generator” (if that were a thing), has a random number generator determining which of the potential random outcomes actually happens.

Yes most people know this. It is that people often simplify it to randomly generated when referring to the final output (the item,coin,etc.). That was what was randomly generated as decided by the random number generator/loot table and so forth. It’s just a simplified way of referring to the process.

JustTrogdor.7892:

Terra Dactyl.2047:

tl;dr: A random number generator is how computers handle “random” and “chance”. Anything random, including a “random item generator” (if that were a thing), has a random number generator determining which of the potential random outcomes actually happens.

Yes most people know this. It is that people often simplify it to randomly generated when referring to the final output (the item,coin,etc.). That was what was randomly generated as decided by the random number generator/loot table and so forth. It’s just a simplified way of referring to the process.

Was talking to the guy wondering why it wasn’t called a random item generator. That’s why I quoted his post, not yours.

I’ve also seen RNG stands for “Random Number Game” or “Random Number God” – i.e. running something over and over hoping to win the Random Number Game while praying to the Random Number Gods.

Someone just can’t admit he’s wrong in this thread.

tolunart.2095:

And so do you. Pretending that you expect or deserve specific results from a process clearly indicated to be random is pointless.

Oh it’s not pretending, I genuinely believe that people who throw hundreds of gold into the forge should get a precursor. Or people that have farmed since the game was released. “Random” to me suggests that there’s an equal chance of all the items in the table dropping. But it’s far from an equal chance, in fact it’s absurdley unbalanced, and I think it should be changed.

The chance of getting a precursor is 0.2-0.5%

i.e. on average you are likely to get 1 precursor if you try it 500 times.

It’s probably less than that. Or perhaps the drop rate for greatswords are just lower than, for example, shields.

tolunart.2095:

“RNG complaint post, Week 96: random is still random.”

Fairly certain the OP didn’t throw 200 greatswords into the toilet because he thought it was the recipe for something. He knows what rng is. His complaint is that the odds of getting anything of any remote value seems abysmal. Getting other peoples’ experiences is a way of gathering statistics, to paint a broader picture of just how abysmally low the probability of getting anything of value is beyond his own experience.

The thing is, the rng doesn’t randomly generate just any number, there is a high and a low. Computers cannot generate infinite possibilities. Therefore, the chances of getting a specific number is 1/x, not 1/?. Thus, we can deduce that the odds of getting something could potentially be figured out through statistics. Granted, the sample you’ll get from a forum is small, but so far the consensus indicates that the chances are abysmally low.

Some people would go on to voice an opinion on just what abysmally low means, that it’s unjustly low, unfairly low, inexcusably low, and so on.

Miku.6297:

3k+ hours played 1 precursor drop total…

Over 800 rares and 200 exos in the toilet no precursor from it.

It’s why I never gamble in the casinos!

5k+ hours not a single precursor drop neither from bosses, chests nor Mystic toilet. Put 4 exotic GSs last time (Not even 1 pearl in the combo), got a Pearl. Wasted loads of money in tryings now I just sell every single rare, exotic and crap I find or salvage, only when I have some LTsalvage kit for free.

Well, RNG is RNG, so I don’t understand why someone can say they have been “trolled” by the randomness of things.

You buy a lottery ticket (or a few tickets) for $5, and then you won $200. You got encouraged, and bough tickets after tickets after tickets till you didn’t realize you spent more than what you’ve won. Is this scenario “trolled” by the lottery? I don’t think so, it’s just…..random.

5k hours means you have played the game for appox 10 hours and 45 minutes every day since release… lol if you can’t afford to buy a precursor you may be doing something wrong.

tomlin.8204:

tolunart.2095:

And so do you. Pretending that you expect or deserve specific results from a process clearly indicated to be random is pointless.

Oh it’s not pretending, I genuinely believe that people who throw hundreds of gold into the forge should get a precursor. Or people that have farmed since the game was released. “Random” to me suggests that there’s an equal chance of all the items in the table dropping. But it’s far from an equal chance, in fact it’s absurdley unbalanced, and I think it should be changed.

Your definition of random isn’t wrong and being called a random number generator might be a bit misleading. My understanding is that there are 100 different items on the loot table but each has a different rate if dropping. A barb has 1/5 chance of dropping while a green has a 1/30 chance of dropping. The RNG rolls for the items on the table and you get the items that hit a 1. No one knows exactly how the loot system in the game works specifically but having blues and exotics having an equal chance of dropping would be a terrible design. Rare items are rare because they drop less often than common items

I wrote a post a long time ago on why RNG implementation in GW2 is outright wrong which is the reason it’s justifiably upsetting so many that get the rough end of the stick.

Short version: random-number mechanics in games were never meant to actually be “random”, they’re just a statistical way to divide the indivisible. In GW2, this is not the case.

Well, remember the BDS staff in GW1? I was running the speed clears for weeks and ended up getting it. The RNG in GW2 seems to be even bigger. But that’s just me.

tomlin.8204:

tolunart.2095:

And so do you. Pretending that you expect or deserve specific results from a process clearly indicated to be random is pointless.

Oh it’s not pretending, I genuinely believe that people who throw hundreds of gold into the forge should get a precursor. Or people that have farmed since the game was released. “Random” to me suggests that there’s an equal chance of all the items in the table dropping. But it’s far from an equal chance, in fact it’s absurdley unbalanced, and I think it should be changed.

You can think whatever you want, it won’t change the way this stuff works.

Going back to old D&D, there were random event tables that had results like this:

% die roll (01-100)

01-75 – Nothing happens.
76-99 – Bad stuff happens.
100 – JACKPOT!

So, there’s a 75% chance that nothing happens, a 24% chance that something bad happens, and a 1% chance that something good happens. In no way is it implied that “random” means an equal chance for all results.

There is an extremely tiny chance for any random method to produce a precursor, and this is completely intentional. There have been players who don’t like this, and have made complaints about it almost daily for fifteen months or so. It’s time to stop pretending you’re surprised when you get the same results after the 99th time you dump 200 swords into the MF.

I think there’s too many RNG sinks / low RNG rate in this game which makes me perceive this system as somewhat of a scam. That’s a part of GW2 I strongly dislike.

Nothing says legendary like stretching your patience and finances to the limit while sitting in the Mystic Toilet.

Nick.6972:

I found it quite hilarious actually.
You’d think I’d get at least something back, but nope.

Isn’t that why we all call it the Mystic Toilet?

Dark Catalyst.1028:

Nothing says legendary like stretching your patience and finances to the limit while sitting in the Mystic Toilet.

That one made me laugh quite hard.

I guess it’s better to laugh at it than cry or rage eh?

Not quite what I expected.
I was expecting something more along the lines of “I tossed in a bunch of daggers and I kept getting Usoku’s Needle”. Every time it pops up you’ll be all then you read the name and it turns into

i have to agree that RNG in this game is a bad joke on us used at every availble opertunity to filter gold and mats from the game so Anet can keep control over the economy and we have a reason to buy gems

i can understand this but i will never like it especialy seeing ive played 5k+ hours and never looted a precursor or crafted one in over 4k rares combined and thats just RNG vs ataining a precursor it gets worse coz we are up against RNG all the time and it is so bad

examples like back when molten weapon tickets where first around i bought 80 black lion keys with gems bought useing real cash and i got nothing worth a kitten

or haloween trying to get myself a greatsword skin and not geting anything worth a kitten in 50 chests worth

or those ocasions where we have had special liveing story containers with chances of rare skins

or when i ran the molten facility dungeon over 200 times trying to get that mini pet or jetpack and got nothing after it all

sometimes im even dealing with RNG on top of RNG like for example i throw 4 greens in the forge see if my RNG is good i get a rare then i wana salvage the rare and get an ecto RNG says no

ive bought in to allmost every RNG lottery going and can honestly say i have never gotten anything good out of any of them i feel like the unluckyest player out there sometimes if it where not for the fact i play so much and am able to generate enough in game gold to buy gems most times i would have nothing
as it stands ive worked very hard for everything i have and RNG has never worked for me when it matters
all in all i still enjoy guild wars but RNG just gets me down every time i have to deal with it i feel like i should have been rewarded with a jackpot item by now on at least one of those occasions mentioned
every time i see some noob with 500 hours played braging they have looted a precursor and i cant seem to catch a break even at 5k+ hours its just seems really unfair from my perspective

This has been talked about a lot. RNG is essentially gambling, you could win big or never win at all. The people I see saying they have tossed thousand of rares into the forge just make me wonder though……who honestly doesn’t just buy a precursor at that point.

I tossed about 400 in before I realized I was never going to win, then I just saved up (which took quite a long time) but eventually I bought my precursor, and my legendary is right around the corner, and it feels somehow satisfying to have worked for it, and not lost out on too much.

Got an anscended weapon chest from a champ in wvw, got fratal hammer from level 12 fratal, couple exotics here and there… so far no precursors st all. One day I will get it.

Grimlock.4102:

This has been talked about a lot. RNG is essentially gambling, you could win big or never win at all. The people I see saying they have tossed thousand of rares into the forge just make me wonder though……who honestly doesn’t just buy a precursor at that point.

I tossed about 400 in before I realized I was never going to win, then I just saved up (which took quite a long time) but eventually I bought my precursor, and my legendary is right around the corner, and it feels somehow satisfying to have worked for it, and not lost out on too much.

i have bought all 4 of my precursors so far but for me its about the 5k+ hours played and investing in every lotery going not just precursor forgeing and still never being lucky

Im Mudbone.1437:

I think the current RNG in place is an outright scam.

to be honest, i’m starting to believe it.

So I was lucky enough to get a Black Lion Key yesterday. Opened a Black Lion Chest and it contained a Magic Find Booster. So really, in the end I was only lucky enough to get more luck.

1360 Rare greatswords flushed.

Having a blast!

Miku.6297:

3k+ hours played 1 precursor drop total…

Over 800 rares and 200 exos in the toilet no precursor from it.

It’s why I never gamble in the casinos!

I put ~4000 exotics in the forge with a result of two precurors, the energizer and dusk.

thefinnster.7105:

Grimlock.4102:

This has been talked about a lot. RNG is essentially gambling, you could win big or never win at all. The people I see saying they have tossed thousand of rares into the forge just make me wonder though……who honestly doesn’t just buy a precursor at that point.

I tossed about 400 in before I realized I was never going to win, then I just saved up (which took quite a long time) but eventually I bought my precursor, and my legendary is right around the corner, and it feels somehow satisfying to have worked for it, and not lost out on too much.

i have bought all 4 of my precursors so far but for me its about the 5k+ hours played and investing in every lotery going not just precursor forgeing and still never being lucky

Well like I said, it’s gambling. You could play for 10k hours and never see a precursor or win any of the other lotteries that the game offers. Complaining that you spent money gambling on an extremely slim chance at the rewards and didn’t win is your fault. Expecting to have a higher chance just because your spending more money in the mystic forge with a 5k playtime record is just silly.

This horse has been beat into a fine paste by now. Everyone everywhere on the forums knows "Someone spent x money and got nothing QQQQQQQ while someone spent a fraction of x money and got lots of rewards. " Scavenger hunts are on the way for those of us unfortunate enough to not win the mystic forge or too poor to afford a precursor.