Loot drop frequency and group size

Many in game have stated that the more people in your group, the less chance there is for greens etc to drop. Is this true? I'm asking in the hopes of dispelling rumors, and/or learning a bit more about how things work.

My interest is as follows:

I head a guild of real life friends. We like to hunt etc together. That said if the rumor is true then by going in larger groups are we hindering some that cannot play as often to get there chance at in game perks (loot)? I'd like to speak to my group with the facts and not just guess or spread more rumors.

Thanks in advance.

The drop rate is the same, but the odds on it being for you are less.

I have played for 14 months now, have farmed Sorrows Furnace hundreds of times and can tell you that there is no correlation of drop frequency to group size. You stand a better chance of getting the good drop in a smaller group (1/2 in a 2 man group, 1/4 in a 4 man group, 1/8 in a 8 man group) but that is as far as it goes.

Perhaps the better phrasing of your initial statement would be, "the more people in your group the less chance of a green to drop FOR YOU."

Okay makes sense. See we don't have time to "farm" like some do. If we can hunt once a week, as a group, it's a lot. So to be honest to them I would have to say the chances of getting anything special would be reduced. Is that accurate? And by special I mean green. As they seem to have "perfect" stats.

No, the chances are the same. However, the odds on it being specifically for any one individual go down.

Funny I solo'd ssskai quite a few times trying to get his sword for my tank. All I get are naga skins or...... nothing actually. I guess he's either been farmed to death or the game hates me =[

My Sweet Revenga, I have hunted (I don't like the term farming lol) him approx 150 times (not exagerating) over the last month or so. I have gotten 2 swords. I share your pain. Lol Others swear they get em every trip. (I don't beleive them by the way ROFL).

dont farm too much or you might triggered the anti farming code.

GW claims they have no problem with farming (except bots). Has that changed?

i solod sskai a dozen or so times and never got the sword. i happened to be doing a quest with 7 henchies and it dropped for me. its all random

Agreed it is somewhat random. BUT, if loot drops were truly random, we could loot an IDS outside ascalon. So there are rules, etc.. but in general it's random.

Depends on your understanding of the issue. GW doesn't mind ppl farming, but they do mind if ppl farm too much, as it would mean spoiling the economy. You'll know if you farmed too much when a tooltip informing you of it comes up. It'll notify you that the drop rates have been reduced.

The drop depends on the monsters. I think each creature probably has a set of percentages on what can be dropped. Green items just has a very small percentage. Those who get them often are just plain lucky.

I a team of 8, when an item of note drops, there is a 1/8 chance of it being asigned to you.

That chance is always going to be 1 in 8 regardless of what your team is made up of.

Only by reducing your team size do you increase the chance of a drop being asigned to you.

The mis-conception occurs because in a full team of real players every member can SEE the drop, with a hench team you dont see the drop! so it seems as if the drop rate is less, when in fact its not.

If you are with a real team however, there might be a better chance of you aquiring someone elses drop.. they may give it away, sell it for cheap, trade it for cheap or they may simply forget to pick it up.

There is absoloutly no way for you to aquire a henchmans drop... (damn they must have SO much loot by now)

Can anyone confirm this "tooltip" notification on excessive farming? Either with a screenshot or from ArenaNet? I have never heard of anyone seeing this.

there is plenty of threads with screenshots of the farm code message.

If search was only working, I could find them too.

Thats exactly why I gave up on Sskai farming. =P

I never farm. Sometimes I take a full group of henchies through a map just for fun and take down all the bosses. I get a green maybe every fourth time I do that. If I don't need it, I trade it to some friend for something I do need. Same with chest stuff, nice gold, hang on to it and trade it for a gold that I need. As a result, I've got excellent quality weapons for all my characters.

This upcoming weekend, I might try a few chests, but I doubt I will find anything better than what I already have.

I've gotten two green drops in Cantha. With hench - seven of them. I'm stunned because I've never picked up green with hench before.

I think I must be one of the unluckiest players out there. I have only seen one green ever after playing for months now and it went to the other player I was with. It was a low level dagger set from shing jea island.

I must have killed a lot of bosses by now both with "real" people and henchies and never see greens. WTF?

i have personally gotten BOTH the first message and the followup message going after exp and leaving the drops on the ground.

you have to work like a bot to get even the first message