Q:
Question about Drop vs Damage
In the past I have noticed little difference in the amount of damage you do and the number of hits you get in to the loot you get. (coming from a clerics, defensive guardian here).
The general consensus seems to be:
You get more loot the more you tag (just hit, damage doesn’t matter as much)
You get more loot if you are in a party with others. (Mobs your party members tag count as your tags, so you can get loot from them as well)
Making Nomad gear will make you a defensive powerhouse for sure, but make sure to use area attacks to tag as many things as possible, and bring some friends with you. Pick something with an offensive stat for your trinkets and you won’t notice any difference.
First, ANet has never definitively addressed this question (neither in GW2 nor in GW1), so we can only offer you our observations. Here are the things that seem to affect whether you get loot or not (and this does not address the quality of the loot you get):
- Some foes never drop loot — story instance foes and some champs (that are added for scaling purposes only).
- RNG — that is, loot-bearing foes don’t always drop loot for everyone; there’s an element of chance.
- First-to-hit — the chances that you get loot seem to increase if you are the first to tag a foe, especially when there are a lot of other players.
- Amount of damage — this is the one you asked about. There doesn’t appear to be a set number and it also appears to vary with the amount of foe health. So, one glancing hit can be enough for a “trash mob” but usually not enough for a champ.
- Party membership: party member seems to benefit from each other’s damage. So, if Bob gets in the first hit on a boss and Carroll does a single super-crit hit and Ted is able to hit consistently for ok damage, then maybe Alice can get away with a single hit, with everyone getting loot from that foe. There’s no consensus about how much this really matters in the end — probably a lot less than advocates claim and probably a lot more than critics think.
Or put another way, to increase your chances (all things being equal): get there early, do substantial damage, and be in a party. Your stats will ultimately have little direct impact.
The damage you need to do to “tag” an enemy varies based on the enemy and is likely based on a percentage of their total health not on a flat number. When your in a party the parties total damage is what determines weather you “tagged” the enemy although you still have to hit them at least once. There also seems to be a cap on the number of players that can get loot, this number seems to be around 50, I believe anet mentioned this is a programming issue and not intentional.
“Tagging” is binary, you do and you get a loot roll, or you don’t and you do not get a roll. The amount of damage you do does not matter as long as you “tag”, it also does not effect loot quality.
ANET is very unlikely to answer your question they are very careful about what they say publicly.
The following is my opinion.
You should not use nomads gear, it is very selfish and places a higher burden on the players playing with you. If you are concerned about your survivability you should wear soldiers gear.