Jump to content
  • Sign Up

Drop Rates


Lacuda.8543

Recommended Posts

Hello, can we get an official site indicating item drop rates? There is no reason to keep them secret, unless someone is doing something dubious like actively changing them on the fly to suit market demands...

I ask this because in the first week of the Halloween event, on average per 1000 trick or treat bags, one of the new infusions would drop. People were getting them left right and center and the trader got flooded and their prices kept going down.Now, trick or treat bags are cheaper than that week, yet many of these infusions have begun increasing in price. This shouldn't correlate if drop rates had remained the same.Not to mention it is extremely unethical to classify items like the Ember Infusion or Gift of the Spider in the same category of rarity, considering the latter drops at a much higher rate.I don't think any player enjoys not knowing the odds of a drop they are trying to farm. Other, older titles can do it, so why can't GW2?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 54
  • Created
  • Last Reply

@"Blocki.4931" said:They (and myself as well) prefer if players researched it themselves.

Players who research it themselves without the help of API released drop rates tend to have highly skewed and inaccurate information.For examplehttps://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1C-IraCHPgdEMwv35HG7IMOpLPTtxyuT3bG_jAIdiYaU/edit#gid=703377890this guy opened 100,000 bags and got results which made zero sense.

Considering players tend to buy gold with money and then use that gold to buy boxes to get items, it's essentially gambling. Drop rates are legally required in several countries as a result.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's interesting that the OP recognizes that player perceptions are skewed and yet insists in the initial post that the drop rates have changed. Currently available data on 100k ToTs shows 8 polystat infusions per 100k bags.

If that is the true drop rate (and of course, with such a 'small' sample size, it's unlikely to be), then there's over an 8% chance that someone will get one opening just 1k bags.

The OP has seen the same data, it's consistent with their preconceptions, and yet the OP insists that the results make 0 sense.

In fact, the market values of these rare drops are entirely consistent with what we've seen in this game in the past. A new shiny drops randomly with low probability from a common item. Prices start high and drop a lot, skewed by initial buy/sell offers. Initially, people try to get more and more and then the next group panics that the higher prices won't last, and start undercutting each other, driving market values down. If the drop rates are modest, this cycle continues. If they are super low (as is the case here), then buyers (and speculators) will panic in the other direction: better get mine now, before they run out; prices rise.

Towards the end of a festival, we tend to see falling prices, with the biggest drop after the last day. During the off-season, prices will slowly rise, hitting their peak values some 6-10 months later. Generally, in future years, the prices tend to decline, with this year's cycle a bit lower than last, next year's cycle lower still.

In other words, we're seeing exactly what we should reasonably expect to see.

edit: fixed typo regarding the amount of ToTs opened by @sutgon.5402 (100k, not 10k)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Considering players tend to buy gold with money and then use that gold to buy boxes to get items, it's essentially gambling. Drop rates are legally required in several countries as a result."Gambling" in that context is a legal term. It is whatever relevant authorities deem to be gambling. Not every game of chance is considered gambling, even under the most draconian rules. It's a complete non sequitur when discussing Halloween in GW2.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

an we get an official site indicating item drop rates?Almost certainly will never happen. ANet's feeling, for the last 12 years, is that it's more fun if this is left as an exercise for the community. I don't entirely agree, but it's a matter of style rather and principle; there's no specific logic that dictates that one way is better than the other.

There is no reason to keep them secret, unless someone is doing something dubious like actively changing them on the fly to suit market demands...ANet barely has time to manage the initial drop rates before introducing items. Moreover, ANet has shown distaste for even the idea of micromanaging any aspect of the economy: they don't like it and they know that they aren't that good at it (although, to be fair, economists would say it's all but impossible to do well).

There are reasons to keep rates secret: it's more fun (for a lot of people) to shroud things in mystery.And publishing rates isn't likely to make much different in the choices most of us make: people simply aren't that good at stats or making decisions based on data. (If they were, no one would ever buy Exclusive Dye Kits from the gem shop.)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@Illconceived Was Na.9781 said:There are reasons to keep rates secret: it's more fun (for a lot of people) to shroud things in mystery.And publishing rates isn't likely to make much different in the choices most of us make: people simply aren't that good at stats or making decisions based on data. (If they were, no one would ever buy Exclusive Dye Kits from the gem shop.)

Great comments. (My day job is calculating and presenting numerical analysis to business leaders and they generally don't get stats - decisions are based on feelings)

I don't want ANet to share too much of their game code/rules - it's there for the players to discover.

Being secret also creates market opportunities, if it was too certain the prices would quickly converge on expected values (net of transaction costs) and minimise profit.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@Illconceived Was Na.9781 said:

an we get an official site indicating item drop rates?Almost certainly will never happen. ANet's feeling, for the last 12 years, is that it's more fun if this is left as an exercise for the community. I don't entirely agree, but it's a matter of style rather and principle; there's no specific logic that dictates that one way is better than the other.

There is no reason to keep them secret, unless someone is doing something dubious like actively changing them on the fly to suit market demands...ANet barely has time to manage the initial drop rates before introducing items. Moreover, ANet has shown distaste for even the idea of micromanaging any aspect of the economy: they don't like it and they know that they aren't that good at it (although, to be fair, economists would say it's all but impossible to do well).

There are reasons to keep rates secret: it's more fun (for a lot of people) to shroud things in mystery.And publishing rates isn't likely to make much different in the choices most of us make: people simply aren't that good at stats or making decisions based on data. (If they were, no one would ever buy Exclusive Dye Kits from the gem shop.)

There's fun in keeping it a mystery? Cool. Good for you.Then release the official drop rates and don't look at them if you don't want to. If you want to look at numbers yourself and do all that, that's your thing. Not everyone has the time for it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@Blocki.4931 said:Besides don't they already tell you whether something is rare or not? Given there are a possible million other things you'd imagine people understand that something is actually rare or not

Nah, they lump them all together and say the Ember Infusion is just as rare as the Gift of the Spider, even though player evidence will disagree dramatically.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@"Illconceived Was Na.9781" said:It's interesting that the OP recognize that player perceptions are skewed and yet insists in the initial post that the drop rates have changed. Currently available data on 10k ToTs shows 8 polystat infusions per 100k bags.

If that is the true drop rate (and of course, with such a 'small' sample size, it's unlikely to be), then there's over an 8% chance that someone will get one opening just 1k bags.

The OP has seen the same data, it's consistent with their preconceptions, and yet the OP insists that the results make 0 sense.

In fact, the market values of these rare drops are entirely consistent with what we've seen in this game in the past. A new shiny drops randomly with low probability from a common item. Prices start high and drop a lot, skewed by initial buy/sell offers. Initially, people try to get more and more and then the next group panics that the higher prices won't last, and start undercutting each other, driving market values down. If the drop rates are modest, this cycle continues. If they are super low (as is the case here), then buyers (and speculators) will panic in the other direction: better get mine now, before they run out; prices rise.

Towards the end of a festival, we tend to see falling prices, with the biggest drop after the last day. During the off-season, prices will slowly rise, hitting their peak values some 6-10 months later. Generally, in future years, the prices tend to decline, with this year's cycle a bit lower than last, next year's cycle lower still.

In other words, we're seeing exactly what we should reasonably expect to see.

Strongly disagree. First 5000 bags I opened I got 4 of the new poly infusions, 3 of the old infusions and those were in the first day or two of the event. I earned hundreds of gold just from buying, opening and selling. Looking at the stat sheet provided those drops should be nearly impossible.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@Haleydawn.3764 said:

@"Lacuda.8543" said:Interesting, arenanet.

You don't pay any more than the value of the expansions to play the game. You
choose
to spend more on a whim.

You don't have to shop at a business, you choose to do so. If they said you can't ask the manager a question because you already asked a clerk, you'd call BS.I was told the second post location would be a better spot to post. So I went with it.Or is customer service dead?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@"Inculpatus cedo.9234" said:You can peruse the Forum Code of Conduct via the 'Legal Documentation' link below.This Sticky may prove helpful, as well: https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/12118/how-to-communicate-with-the-forums-team-appeals-pms-e-mails#latest

Good luck.

I'm literally on there right now trying to find anything that lets customers speak to them directly.I don't like forums because sometimes you just want to ask the company itself a question, ya know?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's a nice gold farm but trick or treating in Tyria is just the opposite of the happy, easy, overindulgent celebration for all that is real world Halloween. I don't know what the drop rates are, but just imagine how horrible trick or treating would be in the real world if the drop rates matched those in game.

Now nevermind the candy corn, peach tarts, etc. That's a trick. Infusions are the treat here; they're the real candy. (And tattered bat wings, but they're a bit chewy.) The rest is cigarette butts, smacks to the face, broccoli and tofu. Thousands of neighborhood kids going block to block getting nothing good at all. There's a tofu vendor somewhere that will let you buy single gumdrops for maybe a thousand tofu chunks. And then one kid screams over a megaphone how they just won sweet sweet candy for life and literally starts glowing...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@Lacuda.8543 said:

an we get an official site indicating item drop rates?Almost certainly will never happen. ANet's feeling, for the last 12 years, is that it's more fun if this is left as an exercise for the community. I don't entirely agree, but it's a matter of style rather and principle; there's no specific logic that dictates that one way is better than the other.

There is no reason to keep them secret, unless someone is doing something dubious like actively changing them on the fly to suit market demands...ANet barely has time to manage the initial drop rates before introducing items. Moreover, ANet has shown distaste for even the idea of micromanaging any aspect of the economy: they don't like it and they know that they aren't that good at it (although, to be fair, economists would say it's all but impossible to do well).

There are reasons to keep rates secret: it's more fun (for a lot of people) to shroud things in mystery.And publishing rates isn't likely to make much different in the choices most of us make: people simply aren't that good at stats or making decisions based on data. (If they were, no one would ever buy Exclusive Dye Kits from the gem shop.)

There's fun in keeping it a mystery? Cool. Good for you.Then release the official drop rates and don't look at them if you don't want to. If you want to look at numbers yourself and do all that, that's your thing. Not everyone has the time for it.

Also, not going to say I'm speaking for everyone, but I would hazard to guess that the majority(a majority being over 50%) don't really care about the actual percentages of the drop rates, they just know they might get something. There's another factor you might not have considered here...and someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but I do believe your Magic Find percentage affects the bags WHEN they drop, NOT when you open them(don't ask, it just works), that will affect the rarity of items from the ToT bags as well.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@Lacuda.8543 said:

@"Illconceived Was Na.9781" said:

an we get an official site indicating item drop rates?Almost certainly will never happen. ANet's feeling, for the last 12 years, is that it's more fun if this is left as an exercise for the community. I don't entirely agree, but it's a matter of style rather and principle; there's no specific logic that dictates that one way is better than the other.

There is no reason to keep them secret, unless someone is doing something dubious like actively changing them on the fly to suit market demands...ANet barely has time to manage the initial drop rates before introducing items. Moreover, ANet has shown distaste for even the idea of micromanaging any aspect of the economy: they don't like it and they know that they aren't that good at it (although, to be fair, economists would say it's all but impossible to do well).

There are reasons to keep rates secret: it's more fun (for a lot of people) to shroud things in mystery.And publishing rates isn't likely to make much different in the choices most of us make: people simply aren't that good at stats or making decisions based on data. (If they were, no one would ever buy Exclusive Dye Kits from the gem shop.)

There's fun in keeping it a mystery? Cool. Good for you.You mean, "good for the community." I'm not sure I entirely agree that it's more fun, as I wrote above.

Then release the official drop rates and don't look at them if you don't want to. If you want to look at numbers yourself and do all that, that's your thing. Not everyone has the time for it.It's a lot of work to publish such numbers. It's not in the least clear that it's worth the effort since the number of people who will actually look and make decisions based on that data is small, perhaps tiny.

In effect, your argument is: "I want it, so they should do it." Whereas ANet's argument is, "we think the status quo is fun and haven't seen a compelling argument about it strong enough to change our (collective) mind."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@Lacuda.8543 said:First 5000 bags I opened I got 4 of the new poly infusions, 3 of the old infusions and those were in the first day or two of the event. I earned hundreds of gold just from buying, opening and selling. Looking at the stat sheet provided those drops should be nearly impossible.

Again, you understand that player perceptions are skewed yet you insist that your perceptions are not. I'm glad you scored big.But those odds aren't anything close to nearly impossible, just incredibly rare. Given how many people are opening 5k bags, it's unlikely that I am going to get great drobs, but it's pretty likely that someone will. That someone just happened to be you.

When you have data on 100k bags, publish that and we can reevaluate the hypothesis that @sutgon.5402's data is problematic. Until then, we can only establish that you were lucky.

adding@sutgon.5402 has been a reliable publisher of drop rates for years. It would take a lot to consider the hypothesis that we should reject their verifiable & documented data, especially based on a single claim by a single player, which in turn is based on a mere 5k containers. And especially since there's no math to back up the claim of "nearly impossible" results.

Every researcher makes mistakes, so it's not impossible to accept the idea that the 100k ToT data might be missing something (despite the

' to help validate the numbers). It's just going to take more than extrapolating from a data set 20 times smaller.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

@Zaklex.6308 said:

an we get an official site indicating item drop rates?Almost certainly will never happen. ANet's feeling, for the last 12 years, is that it's more fun if this is left as an exercise for the community. I don't entirely agree, but it's a matter of style rather and principle; there's no specific logic that dictates that one way is better than the other.

There is no reason to keep them secret, unless someone is doing something dubious like actively changing them on the fly to suit market demands...ANet barely has time to manage the initial drop rates before introducing items. Moreover, ANet has shown distaste for even the idea of micromanaging any aspect of the economy: they don't like it and they know that they aren't that good at it (although, to be fair, economists would say it's all but impossible to do well).

There are reasons to keep rates secret: it's more fun (for a lot of people) to shroud things in mystery.And publishing rates isn't likely to make much different in the choices most of us make: people simply aren't that good at stats or making decisions based on data. (If they were, no one would ever buy Exclusive Dye Kits from the gem shop.)

There's fun in keeping it a mystery? Cool. Good for you.Then release the official drop rates and don't look at them if you don't want to. If you want to look at numbers yourself and do all that, that's your thing. Not everyone has the time for it.

Also, not going to say I'm speaking for everyone, but I would hazard to guess that the majority(a majority being over 50%) don't really care about the actual percentages of the drop rates, they just know they might get something. There's another factor you might not have considered here...and someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but I do believe your Magic Find percentage affects the bags WHEN they drop, NOT when you open them(don't ask, it just works), that will affect the rarity of items from the ToT bags as well.

Hmm not quite sure what you mean here.Loot from bags is determined when it is opened. Regardless of Magic Find.ToT bags are not affected by Magic Find. Not many loot containers are.You should read the wiki page about magic find before posting ‘rules’.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

In an ideal game drop rates should be disclosed. There is simply no reason not to. As in all things the more you know the better. This just leaves an issue of effort todo so and the want to have it.

I can understand people wanting to be surprised on what they get. However beware not to get caught in getting used to not having. This is a very real issue for game development, where players get used to bad design in a game and start thinking its fine or even good. This if course makes QA a nightmare as all of your playerbase is oblivious/adapted to a problem that will push away new players who are not used to it.

Secondly for players to predict these levels of odds is nearing an effort of futility. Predicting probability when the odds are high is easy. When the odds get lower and lower the needed ammount of data gets exponentially higher. As such mentioned, 100,000 tot bags are not enough to get an accurate probability on tot bags. We have already reached a point where user testing is not possible. Additionally we just don't have enough users doing testing on all the hundreds of drop boxes out there. There is simply too much data to process for the few generous players who do so.

There is enough room for both ways in this system. The drop rates can be placed discreetly. Such as through the api where they can in turn be placed on the wiki. Anyone who wants to go into gw2 blind won't be using the wiki, while those who want the information should be well traveled on the wiki. This would also make it much easier on devs as no ui or game patch would be needed.

I really hope anet considers adding the drop rates in the future.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...