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Puddles404
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re: Bori's Raid loot suggestion, or Holy crap a wall of text.

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I usually preface my raid suggestions with the whole "I don't raid so disregard this" and I don't think i've every clarified why my personal stance is so against the concept of raiding, I figured i'd offer up some suggestions along with a little backstory for you all.

I've been playing MMOs since the grand old age of 13. I'm now 28. You name an MMO, chances are i've played it or at least tried it. You could even delve into the vast wasteland that is Korean FTP MMOs and there is a good chance i've experienced most of those. I've been in more guilds/alliances/organisations than you could count on a mutant Punjabi kids toes. I've been involved in a lot of AAA launches over the last 6 years or so, some of the standouts being Warhammer Online, Aion, Rift and the much maligned WoW. The one thing that i've discovered in all my MMOing is this.

Raiding destroy kins/guilds and it destroys people. I know that statement sounds a little alarmist, but there is a logical train of thought that took me there and i'll attempt to recount that particular railroad trip to you.

There is a chronic obsession in MMOs over the "end-game". "End-game" usually only accounts for about 5% of a games content. To top that off, "end-game" is also a moving target. Every update/expansion shifts re-assigns that 5%. Compounding the problem, every update/expansion reduces the % of the game that is considered "end-game". So what we have is an already small and continuously shrinking periodically mobile obsession point.

Now, the way raids seem to be designed is so as to offer 1/4 of the people a reward for successfully completing it. So you have 75% of the people working for something that they may not actually get anything. Something that is constantly expounded to them by the MMO culture as being the most important part of the game, the aforementioned obsession point.

Mix the 25% success rate with a dash of obsession and a dollop of entitlement (which is reasonable considering people are actually investing time/effort) and you have a very combustible mix of what I like to think of as loot-envy. Loot-envy leads to loot-rage and loot-rage leads to the dark side.... woops, got distracted. Loot-rage leads to awesome activities like lashing out at your kin-mates/guild-mates, people sabotaging raid runs out of spite and the pinacle of loot-rage inspired activities, the coup d'état where sections of a kin/guild will solidify into cliques or even attempt the wholesale relocation of parts of a kin/guild.

Loot-rage can effect even the most mild mannered and chilled people. I in the past, have suffered from loot-rage and i'm probably the most laid-back person in the kin. Raiding brings out the monster in me, and it does the same to almost everyone i know that plays MMOs.

So, that's my backstory. I'll get to the suggestion part another time as i have an appointment to go to now.

To continue my wall...

So, suggestion time. I know it's being considered and discussed but here goes my suggestion.

The premier raid of the day (using OD as an example) will usually be run by the same people every time it is run, at least until it's figured out how to complete it. The people doing it every week are probably going to be going through a nightmare time trying to figure tactics out and any changes to the raid makeup are only going to be a setback to learning the process. This is why having OD as an "invite only" thing is a good idea, however that will create the impression of exclusion and cliquing. So, why keep a ladder for a raid that has a very limited roster of players involved in running it. When a space needs to be filled, it may not be the same person filling it every time, and if you are keeping a ladder that is just going to causes bloat to the ladder and make it look harder to climb than it actually would be. So, with the same people involved every week, what is the value of keeping a ladder?

The previous raid of the day (use DN as an example, as BG never really gained the traction that DN did) will be run less frequently as the main focus of the "end-game" obsession will be OD. Also, a larger variety of people will be involved in the running of DN as the tactics and strategies are already worked out, causing actual bloat to a ladder system. Actual bloat as opposed to implied bloat can lead to increase in loot-rage, as people who enter a raid expecting to get a chance of loot are superseeded by others on the list that they didn't expect to be in front of them. To top this off, the gear that you can acquire is no longer "end-game" and is inherently devalued by that perception. So, with the gear gained being sub-standard to the OD gear and with large amounts of people being included on the ladder, what is the value of keeping a ladder?

So, what am i suggesting? No loot system. That is correct. Any player that enters a raid should have a 1/X (X = number of members in the raid) chance of gaining something useful from that raid. I understand that the perception under a ladder system is that everyone does have a chance due to passing on gear etc, but that is artificial as those people passing are only doing so to guarantee a chance at a later reward. This is something that also remains true under a free-roll or DKP system.

The concept of gear as rewards through raiding is an immediate one, as opposed to crafting or through skirmish marks where effort over time = reward, so why reward people for trying repeatedly when the intention is to reward immediate success? This is why most MMOs have a Master Looter setting. In most cases, people who lead a raid regularly do so and those leaders should be able to remember or be able to tell at a glance who already has what, or who got the big shiney last time. The problem with the fairness of a free-roll system is with the random element introduced by a dice roll and the main reason for that is the use of the /roll 100 command. If there were 100 people involved in the raid, that would make more sense as it allows more room for individual results, however with only 12 people running a raid, why would you introduce such a large variable (and thus increase the chance of a random butt-kick?) into something that only needs a minimal variable, one high enough to cover the volume of people in the raid. This eliminates much of the facet of bad luck viewed in free-roll systems. The random element depletes further as you consider people passing on gear, so effort over time still = increased chance of loot but it is more relevant to the immediate situation rather than to previous raiding ventures.

Up next on Bori's loot rant corner, DKP systems or, Sleeping with the Devil.

Oh, and PS to those that didn't know. My wife is pregnant again!


Last edited by Puddles404 on 2011/08/08 9:12 pm; edited 1 time in total


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Andismak
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re: Bori's Raid loot suggestion, or Holy crap a wall of text.

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Woo hoo Bori congrats that is pretty exciting news. Hopefully we get to meet you both in October.

And we are hopeing to cover this raid loot thing before it gets bad. not wait until kinnies are furious with each other. And i would like to point out the enormous generosity of people in this kin who are using their ladder positions to take loot even though they dont want it or need it to keep the ladder rolling. We do have a pretty relaxed attitude towards loot here maybe that is why we need the change Happy.


thanks Bori hugs Andi Happy
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