Guild Wars 2

People have been hating on the RNG boxes for the last few living stories, and rightfully so. Boxes were impossible to get without spending money in FF and in SoS, there was a rare chance for a box to drop which had a rare chance at a good item as well as the option to buy with money, which was an improvement. This time, it has improved again. Now you get these boxes from ALL creatures and very often, but you can also buy a better version with real money (the problem before was that there was still a very low chance for the boxes bought with gems to drop anything good).

So far, I have killed about 350 holographic minions ( 50 more than needed for achieve), and with all the boxes gotten from them and some from other creatures, I had 2 weapons tickets, a pair of wings, and 3 holographic risen knights drop. That is really good compared to the previous events where I got nothing. I understand that not all people were as lucky as me, but the fact that the boxes are much much easier to obtain from in game, and that you can buy improved boxes with real money if you don’t want to farm means that people have a greater chance at getting good things.

If you aren’t lucky and you don’t want to put the work into farming chests and you don’t wish to spend any real money (or gold for that matter by buying them off TP), then you won’t get those rewards. You can always get the shattered wings (which look cooler imo) for free from achieves. If you don’t want to do any of those things to get rewards and you still want to get these things, than you probably expect Anet to give you the items just for logging in which is crazy. But great job Anet. Your ability to produce living stories is improving each time a new one releases. Storytelling improved, the missions improved, RnG improved, and the rate at which content is put out improved. Again, good job.

edit: 3 tickets now. just had another drop

You were just really lucky. There are a lot of people who have put a lot of time or/and money into it and have nothing to show for it. No, its not well done. RNG is a horrible system. It needs to stop. I will give praise to the things A.Net has done well, but this is not one of them. It is the opposite of well done, its horrible.

Agree with op. I was really hoping to get one, since I didn’t get one during the southsun event.. And well I got 5 of them xD Really feels good!

it really comes down to luck, guys. In other games, dungeon loot is based off of RNG and sometimes a person would get that item they want from a boss the first time, and others wouldnt get it for 5 runs. At least the RNG only applies to skins and not items with stats. Maybe next time you will be luckier than this time. At least you can still get shattered dragon wings

The RNG system has been steadily improving, but it’s not quite perfect yet. The Dragon Bash setup is good in that it allows people who don’t want to drop money on chests to still have a chance to get them, but it just needs one more improvement; the chance to pay money to skip the RNG altogether.

In my opinion, if the Rich Dragon Coffers had contained a guaranteed Jade ticket, the system would have been flawless. By all means, ANet can bump up the price for the Rich Coffers to compensate; I’d have been happy to pay 1000 gems for a single Rich Coffer if it gave a guaranteed ticket. You can bet that fashionistas who wanted several Jade weapons would have happily shelled out more too.

If you bought the Rich Coffers with cash you got scammed. The original website statement about Rich Coffers was misleading and later changed in bait and switch fashion.

you know what op i think you are corect on this one. i didnt get lucky and didnt get my ticket but i tried and was unlucky. it was nice there were more then one way to try and get tickets with better odds in one over the other. this is the way they should do the skins from now on

Halloween had the best system in my opinion. Chance at a skin, but could be bought on tradepost. This gave people a greater incentive to buy the chests because they could actually make an ingame profit doing so.

The drop rate on tickets is miniscule, and because people are trying for tickets, the market on the risen minis has been glutted. You may have gotten lucky, but anecdotal experience is just that. For every person who lucked out, there are people who’ve opened thousands without getting a ticket, and current drop rate research shows a ticket drop rate of less than 0.1% – which means an average of less than one ticket per thousand boxes.

It is not well done, and has just compounded the anger that has been growing over RNG in general. Well done would be, as Zaxares and Kain have said, having some way of getting them which bypasses the RNG altogether, even if it’s more expensive than what you’d expect to pay going the RNG route.

This RNG is one of the worse things in the game. I have spent HOURS farming boxes and all I have to show for it is an urge to uninstall. I WISH I was exaggerating, but I have opened a few thousands of those stupid boxes and I am lucky if I get a freakin’ cupcake. I didnt get a weapon skin last time, and looks like I wont this time either. Well done Anet. Perhaps I am spending too much time and money on this game.

You told us your story OP … let me share mine.

I got the ’Sooo Life LIKE!" achievement and went well over it. Heck, the first day I had over 300 something coffers (ya know, before the stealth nerf to coffers dropping). The first day of the event I got 7 rich coffers from the GEm Store because the released info made it sound like you were guaranteed a ticket (ya know, before they edited that part hours AFTER the event to make it clear that it was a RARE RICH coffer drop).

What do I have to show for this after all this time?
Maybe 10 Minis, 2 holo-wings (as mob drops, NOT coffers … I’m pretty sure they simply don’t drop from coffers) and a ton of candy/ food.

Never again will I spend money on RNG in this game. That rich coffer deal was a scam if only because they decided to change the wording AFTER the damage was done.

RNG worked out for you … that’s good … for YOU … right NOW. For the people willing to spend Real World MONEY on this? To both support the company/ game AND get something for their investment? Is it good practice to screw over loyal customers? Maybe in the short run … but something tells me that the reason they keep trying to find the “right way” to do RNG is because they know they’re walking a thin line with a time limit.

And the best part is, we see SO MANY good suggestions on how to fix RNG from the players! From “make opening 1000 coffers a achievement that gives you one ticket” to “have a consolation ticket for people who buy 5+ rich coffers and don’t get anything” to “make the rich coffers actually greatly favor the player so that they should realistically have a good chance of getting one or more skins from the gem coffers” to just flat out “allow people to buy these skins on the gem store”.

No, it’s not done well…

Reivaxe.1358:

And the best part is, we see SO MANY good suggestions on how to fix RNG from the players! From “make opening 1000 coffers a achievement that gives you one ticket” to “have a consolation ticket for people who buy 5+ rich coffers and don’t get anything” to “make the rich coffers actually greatly favor the player so that they should realistically have a good chance of getting one or more skins from the gem coffers” to just flat out “allow people to buy these skins on the gem store”.

You forgot: “allow people to get one guaranteed weapon skin for completing achievements”.

Story sharing time! :P

Ok seriously though, gratz to the op and all ppls lucky to get their stuffs thru RNG. It feels good and quite grankly it even feels like this time the mechanics are done just right. I get the feeling because for the southsun weapom ticket, my story was that I logged in, run southsun with the 200% MF, and in less than 5 minutes got a crate.. ONE crate, opened it and guess what? Weapon ticket! That was fun and everything seemed right!

But dragon bash? I got hordes of those coffers! HORDES! Got on a MF banner, and started opening them by the HUNDREDS (yes i know pl opened thousands, but this is only one of my SEVERAL coffer opening sessions). Did that sevral times and the most significant thing I got out of it is 3 minis. So i tried the rich coffers. A few of them to boot, just for starters. Guess what? BARELY that much of an improvement over regular coffers, no minis and NO WEAPON TICKET.

So yeah, RNG… having had both sides of the coin experienced per se, I’d say this: Allow option for people to TOTALLY avoid RNG. Stop trying this casino crap. I’m seriously getting bored of it. I’m not asking to abolish it completely (though id be happy if they do but thats not likely is it??) but enough of an opt out for ppl that dont want to bother to keep trying to be lucky.

I’m one of the unlucky ones. But that said, I don’t mind the RNG in the normal dragon coffers, but I disagree entirely with the rich coffers being sold for money. If people sink $800 into this (which I read from one forum poster that they did) then it’s gone way beyond rational. I know they don’t HAVE to, but that’s not the point. It’s not like the lottery – you pay £1 a week for the lottery. I’d pay £1 a week to ANet for the current chance to get a Dragon skin ticket. But £10, £20, £30 in a couple of weeks for nothing? Fine, leave it as RNG, but don’t charge people for it. Or, if you are going to insist on charging, make the chances significant. Yes, they were significantly higher, but anything is significantly higher than 0.04%. 1.24% is far too low to allow (not even ask) people to spend money on.

I like the RNG boxes this time around, and NO I did not get a weapon ticket. I’ve only opened 400ish so far, but the fact that they drop so often is a big plus. (EDIT: the coffers dropping often, not the tickets)

I really like the idea that 1000 coffers gives a guaranteed ticket via an achievement. Only problem is that people will whine thakittens grind and say that Anet is making the game grindy, etc. etc.

Well good for you, I opened over 500 and still nothing.

I did get a ticket from the normal ones (opened about 700 up to now) but I do not think it is well done. This is temporary content, so you need to be lucky and on top you need to be lucky now , not in a month. I do not mind RNG in other games, where I can farm the boss/mobs until I get the desired drop. But RNG on temporary content, with no alternative way of obtaining the item is not well done at all, unless the drop rate is high, which is not the case here. It means you can farm all you want but still not be able to get your desired item EVER, because the content will disappear.
If the tickets were tradeable, or the gem boxes were 100% it would had been very well done. As it is, no.

No, RNG is horrible and always will be, at least until some more light is shed on why some people can consistently get horrible drops while others very very consistently get amazing drops with little effort. If it was spread evenly where some people got good occasionally, some got bad occasionally, but overall they had success, then you could say RNG was working as intended. But when people repeatedly, and consistently get horrible luck with drops, and it’s always the same people, something is amiss. I know so far I’ve opened about 500 of the open world chests and about 50 of the gem store ones and have nothing to show for it other than consumables. No tickets, no minis. Yet a friend of mine, who is notorious for his good luck, opens 150 open world ones and gets the mini and 2 tickets, opens 50 gem store ones and get 4 tickets. This is the norm for him. This happens every RNG event. And the bad drop rate is the norm for me too. RNG has and always will be a bad system.

Nay of the Ether.8913:

No, RNG is horrible and always will be, at least until some more light is shed on why some people can consistently get horrible drops while others very very consistently get amazing drops with little effort. If it was spread evenly where some people got good occasionally, some got bad occasionally, but overall they had success, then you could say RNG was working as intended. But when people repeatedly, and consistently get horrible luck with drops, and it’s always the same people, something is amiss. I know so far I’ve opened about 500 of the open world chests and about 50 of the gem store ones and have nothing to show for it other than consumables. No tickets, no minis. Yet a friend of mine, who is notorious for his good luck, opens 150 open world ones and gets the mini and 2 tickets, opens 50 gem store ones and get 4 tickets. This is the norm for him. This happens every RNG event. And the bad drop rate is the norm for me too. RNG has and always will be a bad system.

I can’t really say that if I ever seen the same people over and over being unlucky. Me, im one of those mix results kind; dragon bash very unlucky, southsun superbly lucky. That said, i think its a poor mechanisms that prevents us from getting our goals (yes a goal we set for ourselves be it skins or stats) simply because of luck/chance.

evrey 1 here has a real point . I have played since early relase I have over 3k hrs in the game and I jhave farmed chest in every event to never recive a skin. so during southsun I lvld a toon 1 to 80 never receving 1 crate and only seeing maybe a dozen total ppl post that they got 1. so this event I bought chest and farmed these as well again to have opened well over 3k chest and have only gotten 1 mini. I could understand if u made the gem store an excat way to get them but u get nothing from gem sales so I don’t understand y anet would promote gem sales as hard as they do so yes ur rng is the most broken of any game ever played . I wish u would start putting some effort into these patches and stop all the dumb gring and find for nothing . wait maybe u could make us spend money on stupid races that cost many ppl several gold just to get a dumb acheviment.

TLDR version of OP’s post: I got my tickets, so RnG boxes were done well.

I admit the RNG was handled much better this time. no idea what the gem stores improved rich coffers are like but at least I know its a step up from the regular RNG chests we can find for free. Now I’m not so mad if I go thought a few 100 and get nothing because it didn’t cost me anything.

and for anyone who didn’t deal with the RNG up to now. imagine having to buy all those and still get nothing.

After 15+ hours of farming holo’s and 5 gold spent on the TP, I finally got a ticket. Hey ANET… dragonbash is bad, and you should feel bad. A reward for the lucky instead of those that play your game and spend money on it is BAD.

I bought about 75 chests from the TP and got 2 tickets. I did a bit of farming of projectors and opened about 500-600 chests and got 2 more. I did buy some of the chests on the TP about 200 of them. I got no wings so far. But I never got anything in the previous ones. Not even the one you got for finishing flame and frost because I hate dungeons. My bad there but I stood on my principles.

So this system was much better. But I did enjoy the Halloween PvE area very much and wish every event had a area like that. I got Dawn there but a lot of good it will do me as I won’t do the dungeons to get the tears.

On account luck:

I can’t find the article now, but there is some precedent for accounts being lucky or unlucky due to a bug in the RNG. For one of the platforms (I can’t remember which) it had been known among the community for some time that some accounts were lucky and some were unlucky. The unlucky ones tended to get things like monsters crossing whole maps and fields of players to attack them – I think there may have been something about loot in being an unlucky account too, but I don’t recall the details..

The company swore blind that there was no such curse, but eventually one of the employers was persuaded enough to go rooting it out on their own time. Turned out that some obscure bug had made it so that not only were account numbers (randomly generated and hidden from the players) part of the RNG seed, but the way it interacted with other mechanics in the game’s decision mechanics meant that situations could commonly and easily arise where a particular player was guaranteed to receive aggro because they were playing on a ‘cursed’ account, regardless of any other consideration that should influence aggro.

IIRC the aggro bug essentially boiled down to the program populating a table with players arranged in order of account number, with each player having a particular range of values weighted according to how much threat they had offered to the enemy. Thus, a possible table that could be formed by a group of 5 fighting a particular enemy could be as follows:

Account #0126: 1-72 (hanging back and being reasonably careful to avoid aggro)
Account #2353: 73-199 (being up in the monster’s grill)
Account #3198: 200-312 (acting as the healer, and the monster doesn’t like healers)
Account #5631: 313-365 (a rogue-type using skills to divert aggro)
Account #7286: 366-577 (someone valiantly trying to draw aggro and tank)

In theory, the system would then be supposed to roll a d577 to determine who got attacked, with #2353, #3198, and #7286 being the most likely target. The bug, however, was the system always rolled a virtual die of the same size every time – let’s say for this example it was a d100. Then #0126 would have a 72% chance of being attacked, #2353 would have a 28% chance, and the other players weren’t even in the running as potential targets.

Now, I’m not saying that something similar is the case here, but there is precedence for some accounts to be luckier than others due to a bug in the mechanics.

I have been EXTREMELY fortunate with the RNG boxes across the last 3 events. Spent around 2000-3000 gems per living story chapter on RNG and received 3 fused tickets, 3 sclerite tickets and now 2 jade tickets. Each subsequent time I have expected my luck to run dry, and don’t expect a single ticket but they still drop for me. Maybe the acc based luck theory has some merit? who knows.. but on the flip side, after 1000hrs play ive still never pulled an exo worth more than 3g so you win some, you lose some

Count yourself lucky OP. I’ve opened f******* hundreds of those coffers and still no tickets, or wings. I’ve gotten 1 Risen knight pet so far.

Opened about 5100 coffer and only got 1 ticket after my 3750th coffer… so most people were really lucky, i feel like people who wants the most a ticket don’t get one easely and people who doesnt want one or don’t care get one super easely

generalraccoon.3857:

Nay of the Ether.8913:

No, RNG is horrible and always will be, at least until some more light is shed on why some people can consistently get horrible drops while others very very consistently get amazing drops with little effort. If it was spread evenly where some people got good occasionally, some got bad occasionally, but overall they had success, then you could say RNG was working as intended. But when people repeatedly, and consistently get horrible luck with drops, and it’s always the same people, something is amiss. I know so far I’ve opened about 500 of the open world chests and about 50 of the gem store ones and have nothing to show for it other than consumables. No tickets, no minis. Yet a friend of mine, who is notorious for his good luck, opens 150 open world ones and gets the mini and 2 tickets, opens 50 gem store ones and get 4 tickets. This is the norm for him. This happens every RNG event. And the bad drop rate is the norm for me too. RNG has and always will be a bad system.

I can’t really say that if I ever seen the same people over and over being unlucky. Me, im one of those mix results kind; dragon bash very unlucky, southsun superbly lucky. That said, i think its a poor mechanisms that prevents us from getting our goals (yes a goal we set for ourselves be it skins or stats) simply because of luck/chance.

See for you, I would say the RNG was working reasonably as intended. Pretty much what one would expect from this kind of system. But when people spend hundreds of hours farming or tons of money/gems and never get anything to show for it repeatedly and it’s always the same people, something is wrong. The same applies in reverse, those who spend little time farming or just a chance toss of gems into the hat and wa-la they get the magic golden ticket…every time… I have offered to let the devs play on my account as long as they need to to determine what I’m saying is true, but that’s not ever going to happen. I participated in that 100+ page thread about the bad drop rates but it went nowhere. We did get some better crafting mat drops, that’s about it but pretty sure those are on an actual fixed loot table, not the RNG machine.

Nay of the Ether.8913

See for you, I would say the RNG was working reasonably as intended. Pretty much what one would expect from this kind of system. But when people spend hundreds of hours farming or tons of money/gems and never get anything to show for it repeatedly and it’s always the same people, something is wrong. The same applies in reverse, those who spend little time farming or just a chance toss of gems into the hat and wa-la they get the magic golden ticket…every time… I have offered to let the devs play on my account as long as they need to to determine what I’m saying is true, but that’s not ever going to happen. I participated in that 100+ page thread about the bad drop rates but it went nowhere. We did get some better crafting mat drops, that’s about it but pretty sure those are on an actual fixed loot table, not the RNG machine.

Maybe it is working as intended for me, but i still say it’s one kitten poor implementation anyhow :p Down into the Aetherblade contents, dragon bash still around and no ticket still. not that i really want it, which is abt the only reason and not fuming like mad yet I’d mind RNG less if it were a permanent content, like precursors… yeah, id sure mind that less…. id still be a bit buggered by the system… but less so

zallis.2138:

So far, I have killed about 350 holographic minions ( 50 more than needed for achieve), and with all the boxes gotten from them and some from other creatures, I had 2 weapons tickets, a pair of wings, and 3 holographic risen knights drop.

I have opened over a thousand of those boxes so far, and while i have about 10 holo risen knights, i am yet to see any weapon ticket (or wings). The RNG here is really, really bad, and the fact that some people did get lucky doesn’t really change that.

Sorry OP, but you just got really lucky. There are a lot of people that have yet to see any sort of weapon ticket. Either way, its a horrible system and there are threads upon threads explain exactly why it is bad.

I have gotta loads of dragon boxes, and after my bf got a weapon ticket he even started sending all his boxes to me, so I currently have 2 player’s worth of boxes coming in and gotten 0 tickets.

Some of you are just really lucky.

I have opened a crazy amount of these chests and have nothing but candy and nearly 2 stacks of fireworks to show for it.

RNG is simply RNG, those who it favors do not have a problem with it, the rest….do, and for good reason.

I would have to estimate anywhere between 2000-3000 chests I have opened and no wings, no tickets, no nothing. (well probably like 13 risen knights…wooo)

At least by my personal counts, I’m almost sure they increased to a 20d for this patch. I get candy, candy, candy… Earlier I had more food items and several tickets in the mix.

I think this is the best iteration of RBG boxes yet.

2 things I would change:

1. Make rich coffers more expensive and give them a much better chance at a ticket (500 gems, 50% chance for example)

2. make the ticket sellable on the TP, instead of account bound.

Still no tickets for me, but guildies are all getting at least one, left right and center. (none of us are actively collecting the coffers, just randomly opening them as we get them) Whats not to “love” abt frakkin RNG huh?

Zallis,yes the boxes were fine this time

I wish they got rid of “random” and “chance” for what is simply just weapon / gear skins. They had the right idea with dungeon gear, even if it was a grind, hell, you could get all skins you wanted. I don’t really care if something is “prestigious” or “unique”, I play the game to get the gear I want, not to look or even care what others may have.

That “better version with real money” is a scam! It’s much better to buy regular coffers in the TP.

The sky pirates armor is a much better way to sell items.

I wish they could’ve sold the Aetharblade Rapier in the gemstore… Sooo disappointed!

Onshidesigns.1069:

That “better version with real money” is a scam! It’s much better to buy regular coffers in the TP.

The sky pirates armor is a much better way to sell items.

should make it so as much ppl avoid the rich coffer in gemstore thing, even those that convert gold to gems. but yes the sky pirates armor is a nice thing. a bit high in price, but hey i can live with that

Agree. Got a single ticket and sold the rest. Heard mixed reports on the rich coffers but imho the discounted 5 should have a guaranteed ticket. That’d make it perfect.

Now to put all old tickets in Black Lion Chests.

RNG boxes are terrible and you should feel bad

hundreds upon hundreds of boxes, probably around 600 coffers… no ticket

and that is considered small compared to the THOUSANDS people have opened and gotten nothing. I personally know someone who opened around 2800 and got zero tickets.

while yet I know someone else who opened 10 coffers and got a ticket, at that point he just sold the rest of the coffers he got.

it’s just luck, but luck on such a tiny tiny chance that it’s silly. They should have just made it tied to achievements or made it so that you are guaranteed one ticket somehow.