0.9.10 Information and News

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zeto wrote:

(before someone says it's not the same as individual loot... if you extend the time limit to infinity, it's the same)

WHOA! Now THAT gives me an idea! How about this: When starting a game, you can set a "loot timer multiplier", which is a real number anywhere from 0 (pure FFA) to 9999 (pure individual loot, for all practical purposes). The default of 1.000 behaves exactly as the new timed allocation system does. This covers all three systems--FFA, timed allocation, and individual loot--with a single number, and also allows customization for all sorts of variations on timed allocation to suit everyone from the young-and-quick to the old-and-slow.

Would this not essentially give everyone the ability to play the way they want?

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Minioneer wrote:

Would this not essentially give everyone the ability to play the way they want?

I pick 1,000. You pick 9,999. We party. What happens when loot drops?

Wouldn't your choice effectively impose itself upon me?

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WhiteBoy88 wrote:

That's why I see the timed system as a balanced compromise. Certain items are individualized (but visible) for a very short time before going FFA. It's a mixture of the two systems, not being wholly one or the other. If you're not paying attention, you'll miss out on whatever may have been allocated to you, which keeps the competitive aspect in play.

It's like individualized loot, but without the allowance of laziness.

Apologies in crediting your quote to someone else.

Now, on to the reply:


What's the point in this, though?

Please, let me elaborate on what I mean with the question.


Those who want FFA are just going to wait until the timer runs out, unless they see something they SURELY want. That probably won't change their behavior, right? They'll grab their orbs or build-specific items as soon as they can, and leave the rest.

The thing is, that slows down the play. Let's assume for a minute that stopping to pick up an item isn't a problem (because in my experience, it usually isn't). But won't having to wait for timers to run out be more of an issue? I mean ... will we even KNOW that there's loot waiting on a timer? Or do we risk seeing nothing, running off screen, and THEN our special item becomes available? That would really suck, right? Because then *nobody* would have it.

For the FFA crowd, this solution doesn't change a whole lot, but is maybe unnecessarily annoying.


For the instanced crowd ... is this even a solution at all? You *still* have to race over to the items before the timer runs out, right? Or else you're at the same risk of someone else grabbing it.

If their insistence is that loot only be dropped for one person, and never available to the others, then does this accomplish that well enough to appease them for the most part?


If it does, then maybe you're right, and maybe this is a good compromise. But it still seems having an option would be better. And yeah, I know that in general it's better to limit options or else there'd be a thousand of them. But in this case, will the compromise solution work? Or just piss everyone off?

Of course, there's no way to know that yet.

But it just seems weird to me that I didn't see people complaining about the issue before, and now everyone is up in arms about it, LOL.

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Minioneer wrote:

WHOA! Now THAT gives me an idea! How about this: When starting a game, you can set a "loot timer multiplier", which is a real number anywhere from 0 (pure FFA) to 9999 (pure individual loot, for all practical purposes). The default of 1.000 behaves exactly as the new timed allocation system does. This covers all three systems--FFA, timed allocation, and individual loot--with a single number, and also allows customization for all sorts of variations on timed allocation to suit everyone from the young-and-quick to the old-and-slow.

Would this not essentially give everyone the ability to play the way they want?

In addition to wuweird's question, I wonder if just having a thing that says "enable instanced loot" would be a whole lot easier anyway.

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zeto wrote:

I actually prefer it because it's reasonably fair without breaking game continuity (one world.)

It's also a massive pain to share loot with party members in a fully allocated system... I much prefer this, so I can be like, hey look it's an item I don't want but that my partner might... I'll just leave it and they can actually go get it.

The fact that items can drop in a fully allocated system and I can't see them at all, breaks one world continuity for me.

I think the only real question I have is whether this timed system is really different enough from a slowed-down FFA system.

As one who is simply used to FFA (maybe that is a part of my bias, admittedly) and, even as a ranged character, doesn't have issues (usually) grabbing what I really want, my concern is that all we'll see is a slower game progression.

I suppose I'm okay with that, if it'll be a good enough system for the instanced guys to feel okay about too. :)


Is there an advantage with the timed system that I'm not seeing?

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videogeemer wrote:

What's the point in this, though?

This thread explains the system and should answer a lot of questions.

Basically, GGG doesn't want to change the system from FFA. The timed allocation system is intended to alleviate the valid complaints against FFA, being distance to items and latency. If you're paying attention, you can get the loot that the game temporarily allocated to you. If not, it quickly goes FFA and someone else can grab it. It's still FFA at heart.

The timers are very short. There's not likely to be an issue of them slowing down the game play. We're talking 1 second plus the time needed for the selected character to travel to the item. This can still be altered based on feedback, anyway. I suspect there will be a lot of feedback both ways, but I believe GGG will be against lengthening the timers significantly (as that would turn the system further away from being FFA).

Love the update for the most part, but I think not having personalized loot is a huge mistake. Games that have personalized loot like Diablo 3 have no problem with their trading economy. A lot of people who do not want personalized loot say it's because people won't be giving others gear that would be good for them because they won't be picking it up. This is completely untrue. On D3, I pick up gear all the time for classes I don't play because I know people who could benefit from these items.

I honestly won't be playing with randoms in the game because of the FFA loot system, even with the timer. It's just not worth losing amazing loot because you couldn't get it fast enough. It's really anti-fun, which game mechanics shouldn't be. I'm all for game mechanics that increase tension, but not for aspects that are so important for replayability purposes. Loot is a HUGE part of the game, and it makes or breaks your character. Leaving getting loot that can help you progress further into the game up to chance is not how I want to play this game.

I would love to see personalized loot as an OPTION. Where is the harm in letting people choose how they want loot to work? Let the purists stick with the FFA and let the people who don't want to have to constantly fight over loot go the personalized route. I say this because I've played this game with randoms, and things like orbs and scrolls are items that EVERY CLASS wants. Even with timers, A few people in every party will be getting the short end of the stick with these very crucial items.

Please consider an option for personalized loot. I really hope GGG is considering it. FFA loot is the one thing I do not like about this game. Games like Diablo 3 and Torchlight 2 are doing it right GGG, and they aren't suffering! Don't get left behind!

I feel FFA loot is the way to go, but at least this system doesn't flood the market with 6 individual drops per mob when there's a full party going.

Look at other games - Torchlight 2, Diablo 3, Sacred 1-2 and others (99% MMORPG games), they have no FFA system, but game process in any way doesn't suffer from it, all are happy, all run in the company.
Why to invent a bicycle? - it is simply chosen the most successful decision.

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WhiteBoy88 wrote:

We're talking 1 second plus the time needed for the selected character to travel to the item. This can still be altered based on feedback, anyway. I suspect there will be a lot of feedback both ways, but I believe GGG will be against lengthening the timers significantly (as that would turn the system further away from being FFA).

GGG expects me to decide in one second whether I can put an item to better use than the rest of my party, while combat is still raging around me and other items are dropping? I can see that the travel time adjustment increases fairness in FFA looting, but I have no idea what an extra one second is supposed to accomplish.

Not that this is an issue for me anyway. As I've said before, if GGG is indeed as dead-set against individual loot as you claim, I hereby relinquish my PoE account. Seriously, it's that important to me. If I can't log in tomorrow, I'll know why and do my best to forget PoE.