Looting -- The official thread for discussing the loot system. Updated 18th March, 2013.

"

Planetsurvival wrote:

Lets fastforward to a future with forced FFA loot:
Non-FFAers will try to maintain white lists and black lists.
Before a public Non-FFA party get going theyll check if everyone is whitelisted, and kick all non-whitelisted and all blacklisted.
Yet PoE being F2P makes such lists very unreliable.

How does this sound? Fractured community? Hateful social setting?

I know i wont be around if this is the future of PoE:

PartyLeader: "Ok let me check the whitelist and blacklist... hmm *kicks 3 party members, 2 not being whitelisted at all and 1 being black listed*"
PartyLeader: "LF3M Whitelist only"

This reminds me of Warcraft 3 and the Dota TDA league. Because having people leaving/being assholes in Dota was a huge enjoyment killer, players were forced to create a group of their own just to be able to enjoy the game. Players had to have so many ranked games played in Warcraft 3 to get let into the clan and follow certain rules. A whitelist and bots were made to check every game before it started to kick people not in the TDA league. This pretty much left all the public games into only having shitty people and you could rarely get a game where someone didn't leave or purposely ruin the game if you weren't in the league. Fast-forward to now where LoL has recognized the problem of its predecessor and implemented into the game leaver detection and a tribunal system to punish toxic players.

Players were forced to spend hours to develop whitelists and bots just to make a tolerable community for a game. Then if you wanted to host a game you had to download multiple programs and set them up just to play a game. Even then you were still at the whim of the creators of the bots and whitelists just to be able to actually enjoy a game.

This was in like 2006, and the game was completely free and there was 0 competition for MOBA type games at the time. Its now 2013 and there are a lot of other competing ARPG games. Not to mention if some community member managed some work around to the FFA loot problem in public games (a whitelist of some sort) I would much rather donate money to them then the developers of the game.

Planetsurvival, I agree with your assessment of the current loot system, I find it frustrating and damaging to the community. I feel that at it's core it's a great feature but it is implemented wrong. I have collected and created a list of suggestions. Some are extreme like 6 but implementing a few would make most people happy while keeping with the developers vision. And if any changes are made or options added then suggestion 7 would be a must.

"

wrathmar wrote:

I don't think an 999 second timer is a good idea. The current system has strengths that should not be discarded. I think adding to the base timer and making it flexible based upon surviving monsters is the best way.

What are these "strengths" to which you refer? What are the benefits of an FFA loot system?

"

Right now it is very easy to share loot that you do not want. Removing the timer or extending too far will slow down the pace of loot allocation and team building.

Team building is a social activity that extends well beyond the sharing of loot. Indeed: if anything, removing the timer would *enhance* a player's capacity to share his loot with other players, rather than seeing it snatched up before anybody can speak a word about it.

In fact, I'll raise: it is currently *impossible* to "share" loot items with other players. Either you pick them up, or they become a grab-bag, every-man-for-himself whorl of chaos. Right now, the ONLY way to ensure that item X goes to player Z is to PICK IT UP, thus guaranteeing its destination, and hand it to him later. And while that's not mechanically difficult, it's irksome to be forced to do that in the middle of the combat fray.

There's a scenario that's perhaps not being considered. Imagine not a two-player public game, but a larger game, with three, four, even six players. You're pretty sure most of these players are REDS, but you have a sneaking suspicion that maybe there's perhaps one jolly fellow in there somewhere -- player Z -- with whom you'd like to engage in a team-building exercise. And we'll say, arbitrarily, that he's an archer. I love being arbitrary.

You: Hey, look, a rare bow dropped. Say, Player Z, would you--
REDS: ZOMG RARE BOW OM NOM NOM *slobber*
Player Z: Eh.. what bow?

Thus whatever opportunity for sharing, bonding, team-building, or whatever other pseudo-social activity you'd best prefer is once again torn to kibble by the presence of others. Worse: this scenario will repeat itself EVEN IF YOU EXTEND THE LOOT TIMER. It doesn't matter if the loot timer is five seconds or fifty. At some point, I have to stop what I'm doing, type something to player Z, wait for his response. And he has to stop what he's doing and respond. And all the while, combat is going on around me. All the while, REDS are snatching up the rest of the loot. And we have to HURRY to come to an accord regarding this one stinking piece of loot, before the timer, whatever length it might have, ticks away and the bow bursts into flames -- either because a RED snatches it up or, as you (sarcastically?) suggested, it self-deletes.

Where's the fun in that again? I may have missed it.

"

I agree with Chris assessment that a fully instanced loot system would be bad for the game. I along with others have presented suggestions that would reduce player frustration while preserving this core mechanic.

Bad in what sense? What would be "bad" about giving players the opportunity to enjoy the game together? Why do you feel so confident that my play experience is somehow LESSENED by being given the opportunity to merge my already solo game with others'?

Let me repeat that, because it's very, very important -- fundamental, in fact -- to my point: GREENS ALREADY PLAY SOLO. Right now. We NEVER, EVER play in public games. Right now. All we're asking for is the opportunity to play solo together. How, precisely, does that ruin the game for us?

The self delete suggestion has a hint of sarcasm but would be interesting in a race league.

"

There's a scenario that's perhaps not being considered. Imagine not a two-player public game, but a larger game, with three, four, even six players. You're pretty sure most of these players are REDS, but you have a sneaking suspicion that maybe there's perhaps one jolly fellow in there somewhere -- player Z -- with whom you'd like to engage in a team-building exercise.

This is an excellent point that is hard to argue against, but I'll try. Once you reach end game or are playing thru lower levels for the 10th time you get to a point that you're melee toon does not care what happens to that rare bow. With an instanced loot system or infinite timer if you wanted to share you would have to pick it up have to send the message and have to trade. If the loot system is adjusted in a way that loot camping is no longer rewarding the Reds will be on the front line with the Green while you archer fried can hang back to pick up the loot once the extended timer has expired. Or if you are looking out for your fiend you will have time to grab it if others are camping

Extending the timer will affect current player behavior. If you have to wait 10-15 seconds to grab loot that you don't need you may miss a drop of something that you want.

Planet, you really shouldn't be arguing for or against until you play in some public games and try to make it work for you. Your writing style due to that fact makes people that have played this and are arguing for, throw out your argument.

Also, this topic needs to die. It was clearly stated in that PM awhile back that Chris and his team like this style of play and that they feel it is working as intended.

They will be much more likely to implement the style you want if you show that after OB you literally cannot play the game in the style it is, and there is enough support for it that they need to change the game before full release. Enough meaning more support then the currently 75-100 people out of the couple thousand playing this game or ten thousand at OB.

Keep in mind, FFA+Timer is the devs fix for what they feel should be full FFA. This game is their vision, and you should try to make every possible concession to play the game the way they intend before throwing it all out the window and demanding change.

It boils down to you are demanding a playstyle change without actually putting forward any work yourselves to try to make the current system work for yourself. All I keep reading is "people are ass hats, make it non competitive so I don't have to pay attention to drops".

They understand fully that you want them to make more money by betting on "casuals", but again this is their vision and should be treated as such. Think about things you think you made perfectly in your vision, and have some guy that whittles a different way say that you are doing it all wrong and to start over on that perfect shoe you made.

"

Jackel6672 wrote:

Planet, you really shouldn't be arguing for or against until you play in some public games and try to make it work for you. Your writing style due to that fact makes people that have played this and are arguing for, throw out your argument.

Also, this topic needs to die. It was clearly stated in that PM awhile back that Chris and his team like this style of play and that they feel it is working as intended.

They will be much more likely to implement the style you want if you show that after OB you literally cannot play the game in the style it is, and there is enough support for it that they need to change the game before full release. Enough meaning more support then the currently 75-100 people out of the couple thousand playing this game or ten thousand at OB.

Keep in mind, FFA+Timer is the devs fix for what they feel should be full FFA. This game is their vision, and you should try to make every possible concession to play the game the way they intend before throwing it all out the window and demanding change.

It boils down to you are demanding a playstyle change without actually putting forward any work yourselves to try to make the current system work for yourself. All I keep reading is "people are ass hats, make it non competitive so I don't have to pay attention to drops".

They understand fully that you want them to make more money by betting on "casuals", but again this is their vision and should be treated as such. Think about things you think you made perfectly in your vision, and have some guy that whittles a different way say that you are doing it all wrong and to start over on that perfect shoe you made.

/popcorn till Xaxyx responds. i just love reading his post

"

Jackel6672 wrote:

This game is their vision, and you should try to make every possible concession to play the game the way they intend before throwing it all out the window and demanding change.

I feel this is a very fair statement. An important one.

I've played in pugs, and my FFA loot problems are what brought me onto the forums to begin with. But yeah, I agree that it's critical for people to have as much familiarity with a subject as they can before they start agitating for change or casting ballots on it. A lot of modern democracies are broken due to things like that.

"

Xaxyx wrote:

GREENS ALREADY PLAY SOLO. Right now. We NEVER, EVER play in public games. Right now. All we're asking for is the opportunity to play solo together. How, precisely, does that ruin the game for us?

Not exactly right, I consider myself green and I play pubs at end game... but only the "Loot by name" type. It usually works good when there are genuinely nice people in the group, even got people to give me the GCP and the unique I'd missed cause it droped off screen. I've done the same too...

Despite this, I leave pubs as soon as I'm leveled enough. The FFA item quantity bonus yields too much clutter, and no way I'm clicking Z all the time to see what's going on, the necessary "item pick-up key" is enough work thank you.

Also, I fear it will be harder at open beta for greens to find genuinely "green" games. This community currently has a high proportion of dedicated fans, probably older more mature people and with money to donate to a free game. So the proportion of people who are likely to act "nice", is much higher now than it will ever be. When the flood gates open, this will get diluted something fierce.

"

"wrathmar wrote:I don't think an 999 second timer is a good idea. The current system has strengths that should not be discarded. I think adding to the base timer and making it flexible based upon surviving monsters is the best way.

"

What are these "strengths" to which you refer? What are the benefits of an FFA loot system?

For me changing the loot to instanced would be like going from one extreme to the other. I feel that there is a number between 1 and 999 for the base timer that will make most players happy. Changing the length of the timer should change player behavior.

Strengths of the Timer
1. It’s unique
2. You can see what others get
3. Keeps the pace of co-op going
4. Easy to share loot that you do not want

"

wrathmar wrote:

"

"wrathmar wrote:I don't think an 999 second timer is a good idea. The current system has strengths that should not be discarded. I think adding to the base timer and making it flexible based upon surviving monsters is the best way.

"

What are these "strengths" to which you refer? What are the benefits of an FFA loot system?

For me changing the loot to instanced would be like going from one extreme to the other. I feel that there is a number between 1 and 999 for the base timer that will make most players happy. Changing the length of the timer should change player behavior.

Strengths of the Timer
1. It’s unique
2. You can see what others get
3. Keeps the pace of co-op going
4. Easy to share loot that you do not want

Kind of a system like:

When opening up your instance to parties, have a setting that says "Choose your drop timer: Default, +1, +2, +3, +4, +5". The plus #'s meaning that is the amount of seconds added on to the default timer. I believe that would be fair to everyone, so long as its information placed on the board when joining said party.

I am really not sure how hard it would be to code this though. If it would take any significant amount of time, due to it being per instance and not global as it is now. It it takes longer to code and implement it would be less likely to be implemented.

I feel it might not be enough for most of the people arguing for instanced though.

edit:
Also, anything higher then 5 I fear would slow the pace of parties down to a crawl. It would be up to the party creator and the people joining to determine how they want to proceed at that point.

I basically said what you just said, which I realized after writing this out.