Don't Remove MF from the Game; Just Cut it in Half

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reboticon wrote:

You guys do realize that all the math in this thread is useless, right? It doesn't account for diminishing returns, and they are an unknown variable anyways.

Patch 9.9
-Diminishing returns now applies to the rate that Increased Item Rarity affects magic, rare and unique items (it affects the less common ones more).
-Increased Item Quantity stats now also have diminishing returns. This allows us to have higher initial values and lets us balance the extreme cases so that their rate of item gain is high but not abusive.

I think it's pretty obvious I did not realize that.

Frankly, I find that hard to believe. I've played a zero-IIQ/IIR melee character, and I'm currently playing a 100IIQ/240IIR summoner; it honestly feels like I'm getting about more than 7 times as many rares and uniques as with my duelist. Both were played until low maps, so there was plenty of Docks farm time on both; I don't believe the sample size is overly small. Perhaps IIQ and IIR are currently bugged, as in the diminishing returns isn't working?

In any case, assuming the diminishing returns are working as intended, it would be nice to have some numbers; I eagerly await a dev response.

Also: my suggestion is still perfectly usable with diminishing returns removed. After all, hidden mechanics are something this game could do without; we'd prefer to have items say what they mean in terms of the effects they provide, and do away with lazy diminishing returns systems.

From my own experience (roughly 17.5 days /played on this MF character) with farming and messing with the numbers, Diminishing Returns hit SIGNIFICANTLY after 75-100IIQ, and 200-250IIR. I have the occasional odd run where I get maybe 1 run from a map, but its usually 15-30+. I did many runs with higher and decreased clear speed, and these numbers seem to be the sweet spots.

As much as I hate it, the game is balanced around party play, not solo. In party, all it takes is 1 dedicated MF toon with cull to rake in the rares for everyone. I believe this is the way GGG intends it to be (look at all the other ways they punish solo), and I don't think it will change. The difference in clearing 75+ maps as far as time in a party vs solo is incredible.

What I'm getting at is I think you guys are misdirecting your efforts. The game needs far better tuning for solo. It's pretty balanced and nothing is a problem for party play. Almost every thread on the forum with a problem is from someone who solos. I'm not saying they shouldn't solo, I solo almost exclusively, I'm saying that all these problems really fall under that.

FTR- I bought a heartbreaker skean last night purely to try out group MF culling. Even as the only one with MF, no one could make it a floor of lunaris without having to portal out to drop off loot, and since it allocates randomly, everybody raked it in.

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ckay27 wrote:

On another note: If we are going to drop so many pointless, unsellable uniques, please let us vendor a set of uniques (8-9 items roughly alc each if you eventually sell them) for like 8 chances or something? Can trade that for 2 scours/regret/alc. Seems fair to me.

You can already do that. unique + rare + blue + white of the same base = 5 chance orbs.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

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reboticon wrote:

You guys do realize that all the math in this thread is useless, right? It doesn't account for diminishing returns, and they are an unknown variable anyways.

Patch 9.9
-Diminishing returns now applies to the rate that Increased Item Rarity affects magic, rare and unique items (it affects the less common ones more).
-Increased Item Quantity stats now also have diminishing returns. This allows us to have higher initial values and lets us balance the extreme cases so that their rate of item gain is high but not abusive.

I think it's pretty obvious I did not realize that.

Frankly, I find that hard to believe. I've played a zero-IIQ/IIR melee character, and I'm currently playing a 100IIQ/240IIR summoner; it honestly feels like I'm getting about more than 7 times as many rares and uniques as with my duelist. Both were played until low maps, so there was plenty of Docks farm time on both; I don't believe the sample size is overly small. Perhaps IIQ and IIR are currently bugged, as in the diminishing returns isn't working?

In any case, assuming the diminishing returns are working as intended, it would be nice to have some numbers; I eagerly await a dev response.

Also: my suggestion is still perfectly usable with diminishing returns removed. After all, hidden mechanics are something this game could do without; we'd prefer to have items say what they mean in terms of the effects they provide, and do away with lazy diminishing returns systems.

Why the hell would there be diminishing return on 100/240?

It says "Extreme cases" 100/240 is not "extreme" ;-)

on standard before i got banned with my other account i did have a 125/600 character, remember, the unique flask exists... but yah no matter how they change that, it would nerf that character


and eventually someone will get the perfect gear which enables that mythical 195IQ/525IIR build... and that is truly game breaking but because of how expensive it is to acquire that, we're talking 500+ exalts yah... he should be rewarded not punished

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Angryweasel wrote:

Why the hell would there be diminishing return on 100/240?

It says "Extreme cases" 100/240 is not "extreme" ;-)

100/240 means 6.8 times as many rares and uniques; to put that type of advantage in perspective, that's more benefit than 1200% magic find provided in Diablo 2. 100/240 might not be the "extremiest" case possible in PoE, you could do much worse, but 100/240 is still undoubtedly has an extreme effect on the game.

If all GGG did with its diminishing returns in patch 9.9 was nerf the 150/400 stackers, while keeping the 100/300 stackers pretty much untouched... then they have an almost completely ineffective diminishing returns formula.

The only thing against this are reasons on GGGs side. I think they don´t want to touch IIQ because of fearing a inflation of orbs. A base increase of IIQ/IIR in the overall playerbase of non-dedicated MF´ers could yield in increasing the general outcome of recipe gained currency and droped currency.

GGG seems to think that´s a bad idea. edit:Specialy when you look at all the changes they made, alch recipe, DR, MF on chest weapons and so on

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

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Angryweasel wrote:

Why the hell would there be diminishing return on 100/240?

It says "Extreme cases" 100/240 is not "extreme" ;-)

100/240 means 6.8 times as many rares and uniques; to put that type of advantage in perspective, that's more benefit than 1200% magic find provided in Diablo 2. 100/240 might not be the "extremiest" case possible in PoE, you could do much worse, but 100/240 is still undoubtedly has an extreme effect on the game.

If all GGG did with its diminishing returns in patch 9.9 was nerf the 150/400 stackers, while keeping the 100/300 stackers pretty much untouched... then they have an almost completely ineffective diminishing returns formula.

I don't think you understand how they meant "extreme cases"

Extreme cases would be a very high amount which is very hard to get 150/400+

You can without a problem get 100 IIQ 200 IIR and you can get it quite cheap as well so everyone can get it if they want.

When you make a character you have to plan for some sort of MF in the build. MF is actually a big part of endgame play and it's a fault to build a character without any MF what so ever if you want to be successful in late game. It's just part of the balance really.

DPS/Survivability/Utility/MF

You need to think of all those 4 areas when building your char building it without 1 of those can seriously hinder your chars success.

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Angryweasel wrote:

Extreme cases would be a very high amount which is very hard to get 150/400+

This is, at a minimum, 13 affixes; most likely more, since maximum values are hard to get. That's about as much work as getting all elemental resistances to 75. It is not a trivial task.

If you want to make an argument that end-of-endgame characters should have some degree of IIQ/IIR stack, I actually won't disagree with that; all kinds of ridiculous expectations of made of players' gear at that point. But the beginning of the endgame — Merciless and the very low maps — shouldn't put that kind of demand on a player. Right now, if someone with zero IIQ/IIR farms Docks, there is a huge difference between that an a IIQ/IIR stacker... too big a difference.

Let's not pretend I'm one of those "remove all MF" people; I'm advocating something far more moderate. I want IIQ and IIR to still matter; the problem is only that they currently matter too much. Currently you can "2 out of 3 isn't bad" DPS/Survivability/Utility in the early endgame, but MF is flat-out required.

+1. Love this idea!