Guild Wars 2

Today I was discussing with my guild mates some question about magic find. There are few people in my guild who has cap 300% magic find. and few of us who has nearly cap 270%+ And one of guy who has 300% said that just after he reached 300% his drop quality become much worse. Sometimes he spend few days in dungeon/fractals and he doesn’t get any RARE item. I feel like I had better loot when I had ~130-160% mf..

Why there is no information from dev how does mf work.
They said something and there is some info in wiki :
Everytime you kill a monster you roll on a number of tables, inside these tables are different rarity categories. Magic find increases the chances you will get higher categories. For example if there is a 1 in 10 category, and you have 200% magic find you will have 3/10 chances to get that category. This improves not just the rarity of the items you get but can also improve your chances at getting trophies and rare crafting materials like lodestones.

but that is not enought

I’ve often wondered about and noticed exactly the same results.

Drops are still RNG-based, so it depends on how lucky you are that day. Also, keep in mind that +300% of .000001% is still only .000004%.

Hannelore.8153:

Drops are still RNG-based, so it depends on how lucky you are that day. Also, keep in mind that +300% of .000001% is still only .000004%.

I don’t believe this,

As to the OP, im thinking also that the 130-160MF range is the best, friend of mine who has 151% base MF got Zap 6 days ago at a random event in Orr, yesterday he got Tooth of Frostfang at the same random event, ( 2 pre cursors in the space of 6 days from mobs, that has got to be in the 1 in millions of chances ) yet I have 250%+ MF and I haven’t seen an exotic drop in game in months from an enemy, I have several people whom I run events/dungeons/fractals whom all have 100% less MF than me yet seem to get way better drop rates for rares/exotics etc,

Im 100% convinced its account based, and its down to whether your account tagged for luck or not, if it is it doesn’t matter what MF you have the drops are coming your way, if its not, to bad the game is a total grind fest for you and you will never see any rewards for it.

Long story short, I wish I hadn’t invested the 100’s of gold into MF, it doesn’t pay off, get to about 130-150 and stop, as it seems to be the sweet zone.

Consider you buy 4 lottery tickets and another person buys 2 each month and the other person gets way more money back than you and even hits the jackpot once. Would you call that person tagged for luck?

This is honestly just how RNG works: sometimes you get a lucky streak, sometimes you get a really unlucky one. Magic find, as Hannelore said, is only going to help a little bit when it comes to really rare things like precursors, because 300% is only going to take you from 0.0001% to 0.0004%. That sort of difference isn’t going to make a noticeable change in your ultra-rare drops at all.

Ok I Did It’s friend was just super lucky to get two precursors within such a short time. Was it a one in a billion chance that would happen? Of course it was. But that doesn’t mean it could never happen! Look at it this way: thousands if not millions of drops are getting generated every day. If a precursor has a one in a billion chance of dropping, then you’d expect one to drop somewhere in the world once every couple of days. So one random player is guaranteed to get a precursor drop every few days — there’s just no guarantee who.

If you still believe MF is bugged at higher levels, run an experiment: one person with 300% MF and one person with 130% MF go out and kill the same set of mobs a few thousand (yes, a few thousand, MINIMUM) times, and both write down everything that drops. If the numbers don’t look right, send your findings to ANet in a bug report.

2 precursors in a week lucky. I’ve been playing since early access and i’ve only seen a couple of exotics and never come close to getting a precursor

Bosses in dungeons spawn chests, MF has never worked on chests, only the mobs themselves. So for the dungeon chest they’re down here with the rest of us at drop chances.

Loot is RNG. Also you do not know how long someone has been playing and how much loot they have received. Still the drop rate of a precursor is so low that it is just random. I normally get at least 1 exotic every week and couple of rares every day. I have gotten 2 precursors since maxing magic find 6 months ago.

Alex.3907:

This is honestly just how RNG works: sometimes you get a lucky streak, sometimes you get a really unlucky one. Magic find, as Hannelore said, is only going to help a little bit when it comes to really rare things like precursors, because 300% is only going to take you from 0.0001% to 0.0004%. That sort of difference isn’t going to make a noticeable change in your ultra-rare drops at all.

Ok I Did It’s friend was just super lucky to get two precursors within such a short time. Was it a one in a billion chance that would happen? Of course it was. But that doesn’t mean it could never happen! Look at it this way: thousands if not millions of drops are getting generated every day. If a precursor has a one in a billion chance of dropping, then you’d expect one to drop somewhere in the world once every couple of days. So one random player is guaranteed to get a precursor drop every few days — there’s just no guarantee who.

If you still believe MF is bugged at higher levels, run an experiment: one person with 300% MF and one person with 130% MF go out and kill the same set of mobs a few thousand (yes, a few thousand, MINIMUM) times, and both write down everything that drops. If the numbers don’t look right, send your findings to ANet in a bug report.

Noticeable streaks are a sign of bad RNG.

/investigate please

thank you for telling us… I’m glad I started selling blues and greens after hitting 100 MF

You have to understand that, despite what devs are saying, the RNG loot system is buggued in GW2 : there are lucky accounts and unlucky accounts. Magic Find is just added to this base fact, lucky accounts will be even more lucky, unlucky accounts won’t see any differences.

playfuldreamer.1920:

Noticeable streaks are a sign of bad RNG.

That’s not entirely correct. Noticeable streaks at the statistical level are a sign that there’s some trend that isn’t random. Noticeable streaks on smaller scales happen all the time and are a natural result of RNG. If you flip a coin ten times and get ten heads, that doesn’t mean the process isn’t random or that it’s biased.

Hannelore.8153:

Drops are still RNG-based, so it depends on how lucky you are that day. Also, keep in mind that +300% of .000001% is still only .000004%.

I think it goes a step further and MF is ALSO on the RNG table and the higher MF you have the higher the RNG on it, MF and precursers are in the conspiracy theory.

Look at sig. MF works. I have a huge sample size.

SRG.3607:

You have to understand that, despite what devs are saying, the RNG loot system is buggued in GW2 : there are lucky accounts and unlucky accounts. Magic Find is just added to this base fact, lucky accounts will be even more lucky, unlucky accounts won’t see any differences.

interesting insight. Thank you very much for getting your hands on the source code and player database and checking millions of lines of codes.

Antonio Cappello.1806:

playfuldreamer.1920:

Noticeable streaks are a sign of bad RNG.

That’s not entirely correct. Noticeable streaks at the statistical level are a sign that there’s some trend that isn’t random. Noticeable streaks on smaller scales happen all the time and are a natural result of RNG. If you flip a coin ten times and get ten heads, that doesn’t mean the process isn’t random or that it’s biased.

Yeah. This is why I suggested testing the drops at the end of my previous post — if there really is an issue with the RNG, then it should show itself after collecting a few thousand drops. But getting irritated because you haven’t had an exotic drop in a few weeks, or never seen a precursor? That sounds like normal RNG to me.

Our brains are just really bad at grokking randomness; we tend to see patterns where there are none. To expand on Antonio’s coin example: which of the following two sequences is more likely after flipping a coin ten times? THTHTHHTTH or HHHHHHHHHH? You probably chose the first sequence. You’re wrong. They’re actually equally likely.

Antonio Cappello.1806:

playfuldreamer.1920:

Noticeable streaks are a sign of bad RNG.

That’s not entirely correct. Noticeable streaks at the statistical level are a sign that there’s some trend that isn’t random. Noticeable streaks on smaller scales happen all the time and are a natural result of RNG. If you flip a coin ten times and get ten heads, that doesn’t mean the process isn’t random or that it’s biased.

10 heads in a row is unlikely (1/1024). Successful RNG should present at least the appearance of randomness; you should neither feel lucky or unlucky.

playfuldreamer.1920:

10 heads in a row is unlikely (1/1024). Successful RNG should present at least the appearance of randomness; you should neither feel lucky or unlucky.

Which is the exact same probability as any other sequence of ten coin flips (see Alex’s point above). This is how a series of ten coin flips works. It is indeed random, and any exact sequence of ten flips is just as likely as any other.

Alex.3907:

Antonio Cappello.1806:

playfuldreamer.1920:

Noticeable streaks are a sign of bad RNG.

That’s not entirely correct. Noticeable streaks at the statistical level are a sign that there’s some trend that isn’t random. Noticeable streaks on smaller scales happen all the time and are a natural result of RNG. If you flip a coin ten times and get ten heads, that doesn’t mean the process isn’t random or that it’s biased.

Yeah. This is why I suggested testing the drops at the end of my previous post — if there really is an issue with the RNG, then it should show itself after collecting a few thousand drops. But getting irritated because you haven’t had an exotic drop in a few weeks, or never seen a precursor? That sounds like normal RNG to me.

Our brains are just really bad at grokking randomness; we tend to see patterns where there are none. To expand on Antonio’s coin example: which of the following two sequences is more likely after flipping a coin ten times? THTHTHHTTH or HHHHHHHHHH? You probably chose the first sequence. You’re wrong. They’re actually equally likely.

I definitely agree. Spotting trends is something we’re hardwired to do, but that’s the difference between short and long trends. Short trends are natrual (Oh, I’m rolling lots of natural 20s tonight!), while long trends might suggest a problem with the underlying mechanic (I haven’t rolled a natural 20 in three months).

I’m simply suggesting that the appearance of randomness is important to successful RNG, and that I define that success as neither feeling lucky or unlucky—it should simply feel random.

In the case of GW2, I definitely think a long-term test should be done with a control (perhaps an account with unaltered magic find).

playfuldreamer.1920:

I’m simply suggesting that the appearance of randomness is important to successful RNG, and that I define that success as neither feeling lucky or unlucky—it should simply feel random.

But this is part of the problem. Confirmation bias will make it impossible for a system to truly “feel” random to people, because humans just have a terrible ability to grasp what “random” is. There’s no such thing as a system that doesn’t have lucky streaks.

As an anecdotal example, I was running a dungeon with some PuGs the other day. I got an exotic and a few rares out of the deal, and one of the PuGs did not. This, to him/her, was a shining example of why the system isn’t random. If a player can be so woefully incorrect after a single short term trend, how do you design a system that feels random to such a person?

Antonio Cappello.1806:

playfuldreamer.1920:

10 heads in a row is unlikely (1/1024). Successful RNG should present at least the appearance of randomness; you should neither feel lucky or unlucky.

Which is the exact same probability as any other sequence of ten coin flips (see Alex’s point above). This is how a series of ten coin flips works. It is indeed random, and any exact sequence of ten flips is just as likely as any other.

Yes, but this isn’t about statistics so much as it is about perception. Since RNG can’t exactly be random, it has to be built in a way so as to appear as close to random as possible (most RNG accomplishes this stunningly convincingly).

If I sat down with the goal of flipping 10 heads in a row, I’d be disappointed. If I sat down with the goal of flipping the pattern described above, I’d be equally disappointed.

However, if I sat down to simply flip coins and flipped 10 heads in a row, I’d feel incredibly lucky. If I sat down and flipped the second pattern, I wouldn’t notice it was as statistically unlikely.

I just wanted to ask VOL… if your eyes bleed much? LOL That’s a crazy amount of goodies in your bank.

playfuldreamer.1920:

Yes, but this isn’t about statistics so much as it is about perception. Since RNG can’t exactly be random, it has to be built in a way so as to appear as close to random as possible (most RNG accomplishes this stunningly convincingly).

I’m not sure how you could do this. Whenever there is a statistical probability of multiple events occurring, RNG will always produce streaks. Even if all drop rates were normalized, people looking for Specific Item X will still be disappointed and feel themselves unlucky when they don’t get it.

GW2 has broader and more general loot tables, so the chance of getting a specific item is much lower than it would be doing specific activities in some games (where, for example, a boss drops an item out of a list of ten). That’s not the same as saying the RNG feels more random, however, and it doesn’t make streaks any more or less likely. In fact, killing the same boss 20 times and not getting that single item with a 10% drop rate can feel more unlucky than GW2’s precursor system, where at least everyone knows the drop rate is incredibly low.

Antonio Cappello.1806:

playfuldreamer.1920:

I’m simply suggesting that the appearance of randomness is important to successful RNG, and that I define that success as neither feeling lucky or unlucky—it should simply feel random.

But this is part of the problem. Confirmation bias will make it impossible for a system to truly “feel” random to people, because humans just have a terrible ability to grasp what “random” is. There’s no such thing as a system that doesn’t have lucky streaks.

As an anecdotal example, I was running a dungeon with some PuGs the other day. I got an exotic and a few rares out of the deal, and one of the PuGs did not. This, to him/her, was a shining example of why the system isn’t random. If a player can be so woefully incorrect after a single short term trend, how do you design a system that feels random to such a person?

I imagine it would depend on how long it had been since said player was rewarded with a similar drop. If I went months doing the same activity as my peers, watching them loot great rewards while I didn’t, I would feel incredibly unlucky and might question the randomness of the RNG—regardless of its statistical precision. The point is not that the RNG is as statistically random as it can be, it’s whether or not its performance is perceived to be so.

I’m not a math guy; these are numbers beyond my comprehension. I am, however, an experience guy, and in the case of RNG and loot drops, I would hope the RNG is set up in a way to reward players evenly over reasonable time frames.

For the record: I’m not suggesting GW2s RNG is or isn’t random. I’m just making a comment as to the difference between statistical and perceived randomness, if that makes sense?

I love these RNG threads. It’s like watching the human condition fight a clown.

think of it more like you have a 1 in 100 chance to get an item normally. and with 200% magic find then you have a 2 in 100 chance, and 300% magic find is more like a 3 in 100 chance.

MF works great. If Vol comes around he can show you the numbers.

Remember MF does NOT affect chests. You can not use MF in dungeons because you literally only kill like 4 things in dungeons. MF only affects PvP loot boxes and open world drops. If you farm an event with 100+ mobs with 0% MF and then again with 500% MF you will notice the difference.

I think I see what you’re saying, playfuldreamer — that the RNG should be deliberately designed to not be truly random (or close to truly random), but weighted in such a way as to trick the brain into seeing a “random pattern”?

It’s a nice idea. I don’t know enough about designing RNGs to be able to say if such a thing is feasible, but my first thought is that a system like that could be exploitable. At least true randomness can’t be exploited, even if it does lead to a handful of people who end up really really rich or really really poor.

I run over 220% MF with buffs. I drop a exotic and several rares pretty much every day.

Alex.3907:

I think I see what you’re saying, playfuldreamer — that the RNG should be deliberately designed to not by truly random (or close to truly random), but weighted in such a way as to trick the brain into seeing a “random pattern”?

It’s a nice idea. I don’t know enough about designing RNGs to be able to say if such a thing is feasible, but my first thought is that a system like that could be exploitable. At least true randomness can’t be exploited, even if it does lead to a handful of people who end up really really rich or really really poor.

That’s probably what I’m suggesting, yeah. The system I describe is likely weighted so as to limit the possibility of noticeable streaks. But, as you say, you lose statistical randomness in the process.

playfuldreamer.1920:

That’s probably what I’m suggesting, yeah. The system I describe is likely weighted so as to limit the possibility of noticeable streaks. But, as you say, you lose statistical randomness in the process.

I’m not sure how one would implement that either, especially considering players’ goals can vary significantly. I know some people who couldn’t care less about getting exotic drops, but if getting that last green means unlocking a skin they don’t yet have, that would be much more important.

I also believe that with things like confirmation bias, this would just shift the problem elsewhere. A “bad luck” streak of three or four poor rolls can bias someone’s opinion enough to make them forget, for example, their previous string of rares a week ago.

Antonio Cappello.1806:

I also believe that with things like confirmation bias, this would just shift the problem elsewhere. A “bad luck” streak of three or four poor rolls can bias someone’s opinion enough to make them forget, for example, their previous string of rares a week ago.

That’s a good point. There was someone earlier in this thread who literally suggested there was a conspiracy to give some players more luck than others. I’d imagine that when this person examines their drop rates, they are going to be interpreting them in context of the supposed conspiracy, which will make them see a pattern that supports the conspiracy, which will give them a stronger incentive to interpret future drops in that context, and so on. I doubt that creating a “random pattern” RNG will stop people from doing this. It’s just such a strong part of our nature to be awful at probability.

Julie Yann.5379:

I run over 220% MF with buffs. I drop a exotic and several rares pretty much every day.

While perhaps interesting as an anecdote, your post does not offer enough information to be informative.

• How much, on average do you play per day?
• Are all of these drops you’re speaking of from mob corpses?
• If yes, how many mobs, ballpark, do you kill per day to get the exotic and several rares?
• Is this level of result solely since gaining 200+ MF, or did you enjoy similar results before that?

For instance:

• I’ve played for close to 2500 hours since launch; originally, I played for 6-8 hours per day, and dropped off to 1-2 once the LS hit
• 60-75% of my time in game has been spent exploring and doing PvE events (thus, killing lots of mobs – hundreds if not thousands per session)
• not counting reward chests, I’ve gotten two exotic drops in all that time
• both were on the same character (one I’ve played the least of my 80’s)
• my magic find at the times of those two drops were 0% and 10%
• my MF is currently ~70% — the highest it’s ever been — and I notice no difference from when I was running with none.

Alex.3907:

That’s a good point. There was someone earlier in this thread who literally suggested there was a conspiracy to give some players more luck than others. I’d imagine that when this person examines their drop rates, they are going to be interpreting them in context of the supposed conspiracy, which will make them see a pattern that supports the conspiracy, which will give them a stronger incentive to interpret future drops in that context, and so on. I doubt that creating a “random pattern” RNG will stop people from doing this. It’s just such a strong part of our nature to be awful at probability.

My thoughts exactly. Making changes to make the RNG “appear” more random is ultimately arbitrary. Any system that doesn’t guarantee Drop X after at most Y hours is going to be subject to this very same issue. That’s why I don’t think there’s really a viable solution within the RNG system itself.

Note: That’s not to say viable solutions don’t exist. Every method that can be used to obtain an item through a non-RNG source helps reduce that feeling (e.g. if I don’t feel like farming for Item X I can just go get it by doing Event Y). Within the RNG system itself though, I feel it’s not really feasible.

Give someone item Y after X amount of hours guaranteed and it’s called grinding. Make an RNG based system and people cry out that certain people are tagged for luck. They are tagged for luck, just like the guy that wins the lottery. It’s all percentages and probabilities.

Pro Tip: Best way to get stuff in games is still do what you love to do, save up the money and then buy the thing you want.

Iason Evan.3806:

Give someone item Y after X amount of hours guaranteed and it’s called grinding. Make an RNG based system and people cry out that certain people are tagged for luck. They are tagged for luck, just like the guy that wins the lottery. It’s all percentages and probabilities.

Pro Tip: Best way to get stuff in games is still do what you love to do, save up the money and then buy the thing you want.

Indeed. I don’t think there’s any real winning when it comes to designing loot systems. Personally I follow your “pro tip” while playing as well. I set some long-term goals, figure out the parts I can reasonably achieve without wasting my life away, and then work towards them by doing things I find fun in game. Along the way, I inevitably pick up items or materials that I can use to further the seemingly less achievable parts of my long-term goals, and everything seems to work out just fine.

“It’s RNG deal with it” is no longer a valid argument. It’s well known that mathematically speaking complete and utter randomness is impossible, it is also a well known fact that the typical algorithms used by all mmo companies are skewed. So that being said let’s look at the problem.

Not only is there RNG that’s skewed, there’s also other factors probably too many that determine what one gets. They use a DPS system of reward for example still to this day, you have to be grouped in order for your chances to improve, you have to have a MF above 100% and you have to not be currently affected by their invisible DR.

This has been happening to people since before Nov 2012 when they had their economist go through and make certain changes to the way loot works. It’s been a problem for people doing the same things everyone else has been doing for more than a year now. I too have yet to get a rare on just normal runnings and I have been using a booster and food to get me above 130%.

Also, I find it funny that people are actually dishing out the nonsense of “save up your money” uhm, without drops to sell in the TP there is no money. Duh. People can’t even farm enough materials to craft midway through crafting nor can they farm T6 materials to reach 500 without resorting to using TP I’m including an image from another title that did this very same thing. It’s a serious problem.

They need to take some serious time after this patch is over and look at it closely and possibly remove DR which has never kept gold sellers from this game in the first place.

In order to fascilitate better handling of farming for items needed for crafting, they could easily for example get rid of the restrictions on bags actually dropping from mobs since there is a double negative on those items being RNG just to get them to drop and RNG when opening them. It would help crafters out alot if they did this. Here is the image I spoke of. Shortly after revealing this, this game too suffered a loss of playerbase due to the loot manipulation. It’s a very serious thing.

tigirius.9014:

“It’s RNG deal with it” is no longer a valid argument. It’s well known that mathematically speaking complete and utter randomness is impossible, it is also a well known fact that the typical algorithms used by all mmo companies are skewed. So that being said let’s look at the problem.

Mathematically speaking, complete and utter randomness is quite possible, so I’m not sure what you’re talking about there. Take any example of a noise process with a Dirac delta correlation function and you have a noise process that isn’t predictable. Now, the spectral density of the noise function may not be “random”, but that doesn’t mean the process isn’t random. “Random” doesn’t mean “something for which you can’t construct a distribution function.”

As for the rest of your comments, I don’t think it’s of much use speculating on it without hard evidence. Anecdotal evidence is, for many reasons, not terribly useful in determining whether RNG works. Sure, MMOs (and computers in general) use pseudo-RNG systems, but I would be very impressed indeed if you were capable of completing actions in game such that you could actually see the difference. The time scales we’re talking about are miniscule, here.

My own anecdote for this topic is I’ve definitely noticed better drops as I rose my magic find, most noticeably around 100% MF. Most noticeably, I feel like I get more drops, and that I get a better ratio of whites to blues or greens than before (from mobs). I’m not certain how it has affected my rares or exotics, but I feel that it has somewhat increased the frequency I get rares. I don’t really notice a difference when using a MF booster or MF food, but I do feel like Birthday Boosters further help those points.

Yuogtar.4892:

Today I was discussing with my guild mates some question about magic find. There are few people in my guild who has cap 300% magic find. and few of us who has nearly cap 270%+ And one of guy who has 300% said that just after he reached 300% his drop quality become much worse. Sometimes he spend few days in dungeon/fractals and he doesn’t get any RARE item. I feel like I had better loot when I had ~130-160% mf..

Why there is no information from dev how does mf work.
They said something and there is some info in wiki :
Everytime you kill a monster you roll on a number of tables, inside these tables are different rarity categories. Magic find increases the chances you will get higher categories. For example if there is a 1 in 10 category, and you have 200% magic find you will have 3/10 chances to get that category. This improves not just the rarity of the items you get but can also improve your chances at getting trophies and rare crafting materials like lodestones.

but that is not enought

If an item has a 1/10 chance of dropping, +300% MF means you have a 4/10 chance of the item dropping. It does not mean you’ll drop “four times as much loot” like so many people assume. It merely means you’ve got four times the chances of getting X loot than someone with 0% MF. MF never guaranteed drops, it merely increased your chance to get it.

Antonio Cappello.1806:

tigirius.9014:

“It’s RNG deal with it” is no longer a valid argument. It’s well known that mathematically speaking complete and utter randomness is impossible, it is also a well known fact that the typical algorithms used by all mmo companies are skewed. So that being said let’s look at the problem.

Mathematically speaking, complete and utter randomness is quite possible, so I’m not sure what you’re talking about there. Take any example of a noise process with a Dirac delta correlation function and you have a noise process that isn’t predictable. Now, the spectral density of the noise function may not be “random”, but that doesn’t mean the process isn’t random. “Random” doesn’t mean “something for which you can’t construct a distribution function.”

As for the rest of your comments, I don’t think it’s of much use speculating on it without hard evidence. Anecdotal evidence is, for many reasons, not terribly useful in determining whether RNG works. Sure, MMOs (and computers in general) use pseudo-RNG systems, but I would be very impressed indeed if you were capable of completing actions in game such that you could actually see the difference. The time scales we’re talking about are miniscule, here.

There were multiple threads on this evidence less than a year ago, just because people don’t like that evidence because it clearly shows that there is still to this day an issue doesn’t mean it’s anecdotal nor does it dismiss this issue just because people think that it’s proper to restrict items in this fashion. This game as well as all others that have practices the systematic restriction on rewards have had the problem of continuous player loss, don’t think the surge of players coming back during this particular patch will in any way be lasting if the rewards system isn’t addressed properly in the open world. There’s also been evidence of drops being particularly imbalanced when players go to the WvW areas compared to the PVE open world, as well as dungeons compared to PVE open world and yes part of it is to make more money, however, most games that have done this don’t last very long.

There’s also the factor of DR which you ignored in your response, that also factors into the equation and DPS based rewards that most games have used early on but then the developers realized how restrictive these processes are and changed for the better. WoW is a great example of this changing over to a system of currency for rewards completely whereas even for crafting materials in this title one can use currency from completing dailies and monthlies however, even those rewards are still RNG instead of being able to transfer funds by buying these items directly. (the RNG bags from laurels for example)

It’s something they’ll have to eventually look at again because it’s nowhere near where it should be, it’s one of their biggest complaints right now, a lack of rewards does in fact make it less fun for players because most gamers play these games for the carrot on a stick mentality, a sensation of reward from playing. It’s been studied like crazy over the years by psychologists. If you don’t have that reward, you’ll lose players.

All you have to do is look at the gambling industry. If you don’t have tiny rewards to help keep up the image of winning, you’ll lose more money, the difference is gamers expect more minor winnings than gamblers do.

Like I said above, they could easily remove DR on bags dropping, because these already have a double negative, there is already a restriction on bags, they have an RNG when you open them and to my knowledge this opening RNG isn’t affected by MF.

tigirius.9014:

There were multiple threads on this evidence less than a year ago, just because people don’t like that evidence because it clearly shows that there is still to this day an issue doesn’t mean it’s anecdotal nor does it dismiss this issue just because people think that it’s proper to restrict items in this fashion. This game as well as all others that have practices the systematic restriction on rewards have had the problem of continuous player loss, don’t think the surge of players coming back during this particular patch will in any way be lasting if the rewards system isn’t addressed properly in the open world. There’s also been evidence of drops being particularly imbalanced when players go to the WvW areas compared to the PVE open world, as well as dungeons compared to PVE open world and yes part of it is to make more money, however, most games that have done this don’t last very long.

There’s also the factor of DR which you ignored in your response, that also factors into the equation and DPS based rewards that most games have used early on but then the developers realized how restrictive these processes are and changed for the better. WoW is a great example of this changing over to a system of currency for rewards completely whereas even for crafting materials in this title one can use currency from completing dailies and monthlies however, even those rewards are still RNG instead of being able to transfer funds by buying these items directly. (the RNG bags from laurels for example)

I would like to see links to said evidence. The few sources I’ve seen (including drop rate investigations on the wiki) seem to suggest that drop rates are… Well, what they are. I’m not sure how one could find any evidence that RNG isn’t working as intended, given that ArenaNet isn’t exactly providing the exact drop rates for their items.

I’m also dubious about your claims that DPS or group size contribute to drop rates. Again, I would like to see a set of controlled trials (at least a few thousand to ensure statistical accuracy) that could support this. Before you suggest I go looking these threads up myself, I’ll point out that the burden of proof is on you; you’re making the claims, so you need to provide the evidence.

I didn’t comment on the DR because I have no position on that, and it’s not entirely relevant to the question at hand, which is (loosely speaking) whether MF works as advertised. DR sits as a blanket on top of all systems, including MF.

EDIT: The purpose of my selective response to your comments was not to cherry-pick ideas, but to point out that you made an error in your claim that pure randomness doesn’t exist. I don’t really have a position on whether the loot system that currently exists is good or bad, but I have an interest in ensuring that people have the correct understanding of things like random processes.

Ok I Did It.2854:

As to the OP, im thinking also that the 130-160MF range is the best, friend of mine who has 151% base MF got Zap 6 days ago at a random event in Orr, yesterday he got Tooth of Frostfang at the same random event, ( 2 pre cursors in the space of 6 days from mobs, that has got to be in the 1 in millions of chances )

Yes, but does that happen to him every week? Or just that once? If it just happened the one time – or even if it happened a couple of times – then that would be entirely expected for something that is random. So would ‘clusters’, which in this context would be seen as a lucky or unlucky ‘streak’.

The reason people interpret the highest level of MF as not being as lucky is simply because it has plateaued, it’s not increasing any more, and they have become accustomed to the continuous improvement and noticably ‘better luck’ that they experienced all the time their MF was increasing.

Vol.7601:

Look at sig. MF works. I have a huge sample size.

^this
BUT its still RNG and there are a lot of other things that matter. Especially things like MF not working on bags or chests. In addition i observed huge differences between different accounts(MF still has a comparable impact but base drop chance seems to be different from the start).

Greyhound.2058:

Ok I Did It.2854:

As to the OP, im thinking also that the 130-160MF range is the best, friend of mine who has 151% base MF got Zap 6 days ago at a random event in Orr, yesterday he got Tooth of Frostfang at the same random event, ( 2 pre cursors in the space of 6 days from mobs, that has got to be in the 1 in millions of chances )

Yes, but does that happen to him every week? Or just that once? If it just happened the one time – or even if it happened a couple of times – then that would be entirely expected for something that is random. So would ‘clusters’, which in this context would be seen as a lucky or unlucky ‘streak’.

The reason people interpret the highest level of MF as not being as lucky is simply because it has plateaued, it’s not increasing any more, and they have become accustomed to the continuous improvement and noticably ‘better luck’ that they experienced all the time their MF was increasing.

Many of us saw this happening with their previous incarnation of MF when we had to use things like runes/sigils/gear/food/boosters to reach the levels of MF we get account wide today. When some put on enough to be 150% we noticed a large increase in drop benefits, when they put on higher % they noticed mostly whites and greys at the time.

So what I’m seeing from my experience is this. They could fix the problem of wanting people to group (which they stated early on when they made these changes) by putting into events like champions the option to autogroup, and they could remove the DR on bags dropping, and put in place the option to purchase direcly T6 materials from the laurel vendor or even karma vendors and that might help the situation.

We all know they need restrictions on loot to keep the economy stable the question becomes are they using too much.

Does MF work? Yes but it doesn’t do as much as some people expect.
From 0% → 194% now. Drops went from
Common,Fine,Masterwork – all dropped at a similarish rate that it was hard to tell if anything changed
Rare – went from practically never to “rarely”
Exotic – went from practically never to “about 1 per month”

ZudetGambeous.9573:

MF works great. If Vol comes around he can show you the numbers.

Remember MF does NOT affect chests. You can not use MF in dungeons because you literally only kill like 4 things in dungeons. MF only affects PvP loot boxes and open world drops. If you farm an event with 100+ mobs with 0% MF and then again with 500% MF you will notice the difference.

on the wiki it says sPvP loot boxes are NOT affected by Magic Find, where did you see that they were?

Xbon.9086:

ZudetGambeous.9573:

MF works great. If Vol comes around he can show you the numbers.

Remember MF does NOT affect chests. You can not use MF in dungeons because you literally only kill like 4 things in dungeons. MF only affects PvP loot boxes and open world drops. If you farm an event with 100+ mobs with 0% MF and then again with 500% MF you will notice the difference.

on the wiki it says sPvP loot boxes are NOT affected by Magic Find, where did you see that they were?

The boxes from the new tracks that you can complete. Source is from various dev posts such as https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/pvp/pvp/Magic-Find-PvP-Mystery-Chest/3875950