LOOT SCALING NERF – Ruining the Fun

So you want something you don't need, yet you don't want to work a little harder for it.... Wow, just wow. Anything else you would like for them to impliment for you to make your life easier???

Loviatar, I'm gonna set you straight on terms.

Income =/= wealth.

Wealth is the 878 platinum player "randomguy" could potentially have in the bank. Wealth is the <40 plat I personally have perpetually had in the bank. That would imply "randomguy" has approximately 22 times my peak wealth.

Income is the 700 gold that Lyra got in 19 minutes. That's very different.

This modification (or nerf as the case may be) affects income.

Income can have an indirect relationship on wealth, because as "randomguy" buys stuff, his wealth will go down, and not be replaced as fast by lowered income.

But if he simply stops buying things, then his wealth will still grow. Or if he modifies his expenses to suit his new income, his wealth is not affected. What does he care, he already has bank, and has bought his suits of ascended armor.

There is no direct relationship that is implied in your Dev quote, but there is another one that is more important.

Segue to reality, which is! (da dum ching) "If income is halved, then the value of accumulated wealth is effectively doubled". Huh, that doesnt sound so good for Mr. casual player who has....nothing? But it sounds awesome for Mr. big bank.

For me, who does not have a cushion like "randomguy" with his plat and plat, well thank goodness cuz I could care less what my characters look like. I have max cheap armor and that is all I want or get, because I have better things to do than farm.

For "randomguy", who presumably already has the costly armors and weapons, this is merely an inconvenience, since he does not need to make costly expenditures now. Or even if he does, he ought to spend it, because in a few years it will all go away like a big puff of smoke. (poof)

I believe your Devs mistake is not intentional, merely a substitution of terms that is incorrect.

So lets recap, and nail this one into the coffin.

For those who already have big bank, their gold goes farther. Bad bad bad. We are here to dilute wealth? Wrong way!

For those who do not already have big bank, their gold goes farther but it is equally harder to get. They are in a similar situation to pre-change. Bleh bleh bleh status quo.

Oh Noes! ANet (as usual) has good intentions but bad execution. All ANet has done is given those with lots of gold an increase in their buying power. It does not help the average casual player.

Thanks!
TabascoSauce

Economics 101: items are only "worth" what people are willing to pay for them. People are willing to pay exactly what those gold items are worth.

[QUOTE=Loviatar]Sorry, but quotes from A-Net aren't relyable at all.

A-net seems to think that just playing the game gives one enough cash, and then nobody wants anything. In A-Net's eyes, we seem to be pets who don't need anything. If a pet gets spoiled, you just punish everyone until everyone is equal again.

THERE IS A REASON WHY PEOPLE WANT TO MAKE CASH TWICE AS FAST!
Playing through the game gives one NOTHING except a minimum amount of gold and lots of skillpoints.

Rewards: SUCK
Selling an item that's worth alot... market SUCKS
Playing in a team of 8... drops SUCK
And now, farming monsters for whites SUCKS.

Only farming stuff like ecto's is still profitable, and guess what? That's what the hardcore farmers do.

A-Net should open their eyes and see that we don't WANT to play the game 16 times with collector's weapons and armor. We want to enjoy stuff like keys, title hunting and cooler armor, too.

And A-net backstabbed us by telling us they IMPROVED things for us, but actually they made it WORSE.

Casual players ALSO used to farm. We don't farm stuff like ecto's, and we don't farm hours long. But still we did the occasional run just to get a little cash. Why? Cause A-Net doesn't wanna give us cash in any other way.

And with the exemption list, people are STILL making more than 8 times as much as cash. Too bad these are the hardcore farmers, and me, as a causal gamer, can't farm these things.

The Loot scaling is a failure, and it only affects casual players. Hardcore farmers have their drops exempted, and bots farm more, and sell their gold for WAY more euro's/dollars than before.



Ohh, and thanks for driving the prices UP with the lootscaling -.-

At least A-Net woke up just in time to add the Exemption list that kept things affordable. (And with affordable I mean I can buy it after a year of doing missions and quests, so I finally have the 100K and 125 ecto's for that cool sword, or 15000K for titles.)

Tweaks are fine....throw a mesmer in a normally 55 monk farmed area....that's a tweak. Loot scaling isn't a tweak and Hard Mode still allows the top players to earn 10x the amount of gold that the casual player does. The wealth discrepancy was not solved.....not by a long shot. Furthermore, the economy was not out of balance before the update. Ecto at 8-10k is not breaking the economy. 5k for average greens and 40-60k for the high demand ones seems about right. Again though, loot scaling didn't address these problems at all....Hard Mode is what dropped the prices.

Wrong, the rich are still making a decent amount by farming Hard Mode and even if they're making less, prices for practically everything have plummeted so the rich can now spend less too. The rich stay rich! The casual player wasn't buying high end gear to begin with so they're not benefiting from the price decreases. The casual player is buying the fixed price goods like skills, armor, runes, crafting weapons, etc. Those prices have remained constant but as illustrated by someone else, they can't sell their occasional rare gear for a good price so the casual player has less gold. That, and less white and coin are dropping as well. The poor stay poor.

Again, try to confine your response to Loot Scaling, not the benefits of Hard Mode. Loot Scaling means people GET LESS which doesn't increase supply and lead to price drops. We would be seeing the exact same effect on the economy had they not introduced loot scaling at all......maybe even a steeper decline in prices. Loot Scaling was not necessary in the slightest.

So unaccountability is OK with you? I'm not denying that they have, for all practical purposes, absolute power but I tend to be very wary of any group that wields that power in such a heavy-handed manner. Certainly blind support and worship when you're having things taken away is not a wise strategy. Complaining, although possible futile, at least lets em know that there is a threshold for abuse (for lack of a better word).

Right on one account (although it doesn't matter) and completely wrong on the other. Bots may have less gold now but since everything costs less they still make out the same as before. Let's say you're a bot guy and you're selling 1000k at $50 before Loot Scaling ever took place. After Loot Scaling you're being forced to sell 1000k at $100 because like you said, they have to work harder for their gold. However, your customers aren't stupid and they see that the prices of pretty much all of the expensive gear has been cut in half, if not more, so they only need to buy 500k to be happy. So as a bot guy, you're making the same amount you did before Loot Scaling. Reality is that you're making more because your bots are farming in Hard Mode out of Bergen Hot Springs and other places so you're still hauling in practically as much GW as you did before but selling at a higher price.

Your second point is flat out wrong. Human players break even or worse through partying. It'd be one thing if they bumped up the drop rate for 8-man parties but they just kept it the same or made it worse. You get no benefit from being in an 8-man party.....at best you get the same as pre Loot Scaling. I cannot understand rejoicing at the fact that someone is able to maintain their meager existence at the status quo. Do you thank your boss every day for not cutting your salary?

Is it me or do people not understand that it should be you have to work towards getting something instead of it being handed to you and that 15k armor is not a necessity.

No, we should NOT have to work.

This is a GAME.

G A M E

game =/= work
Besides now the crazy amount of grind is needed I wouldn't even call it work anymore.

And A-Net themselves said they want to make vanty accesable for casual players, so yeah.

15K isn\t necessity, but it IS nice to have. I think saving the world from the titans, shiro and a friggin god is enough work for my characters. they should get 100K per beaten story IMO.
Don't get me wrong, I don't want stuff for free, but I don't want to farm for a year long just to buy a 15K armorset.

The way it was before, it was perfect. You invested time, and got income.

Been playing some HM missions with guild/alliance today. Together with a vanq on starters island Factions I was able to make about 10K in a couple of hours on my mesmer.
There must be a mistake here, since A-net doesn't wanna give us cash in any other way than farming. I must report this fast, so they can nerf it.

Furtermore, I had some fun with my monk bringing Koss and my two monk heroes to Bergen and take a small tour to visit some undead.
That's a 4 man party and the build was not very good (took ages to take the groups with 2 monks out). Nevertheless, I made a couple of K that way and got a ranger hero a nice gold bow. And it was fun to do.
The only not so fun part was that Koss can't tank. He keeps running around.

When I would have left the groups with monks alone, the gold/hour rate would go up fast.
Since this can be considered 'farming', so I don't need to report this.
However, it did net me a fair amount of cash, which is not possible because there is this loot scaling. I must report A-net that my income is too high, I'm not supposed to make that kind of gold.

On income, this is true.
On spending, this is partly true. Merchant items require the same amount of gold. Prestege armor still is 15K/piece.
However, the trader prices did come down.
That's the stuff you put on your armor and the crafting materials for the armor.
When a player is starting the game today, he will be facing the same prices on most items as everyone before him. Except the traders prices, which are lower. This gives the starter an advantage over the longer player, so he's of better.

[QUOTE=the_jos]Been playing some HM missions with guild/alliance today. Together with a vanq on starters island Factions I was able to make about 10K in a couple of hours on my mesmer.
There must be a mistake here, since A-net doesn't wanna give us cash in any other way than farming. I must report this fast, so they can nerf it.

Furtermore, I had some fun with my monk bringing Koss and my two monk heroes to Bergen and take a small tour to visit some undead.
That's a 4 man party and the build was not very good (took ages to take the groups with 2 monks out). Nevertheless, I made a couple of K that way and got a ranger hero a nice gold bow. And it was fun to do.
The only not so fun part was that Koss can't tank. He keeps running around.

When I would have left the groups with monks alone, the gold/hour rate would go up fast.
Since this can be considered 'farming', so I don't need to report this.
However, it did net me a fair amount of cash, which is not possible because there is this loot scaling. I must report A-net that my income is too high, I'm not supposed to make that kind of gold.[/quote[

GFY that you get good loot. I don't get good loot. IMO, you're kinda selfish if you wanna keep the lootscaling just because you get good income, and you don't want other people to get this.

Ohh, and HM doesn't do it for me cause I'm not so good. I just die in HM, and don't have cash for proper equipment there.

Vanquishing is not farming. Drops while vanquishing and doing missions/quests are all based on LUCK.

When farming, you get about the same amount of cash everytime. Don't compare mindless grinding for hours with farming, which can be done in a matter of minutes.

(and btw why go with 4 man? 6 man gives you the exact same drops, anyway. Except for the extra 100 gold you get from raw gold coin drops)

No, the thing driving trader prices down is NOT the loot scaling but it's the EXEMPTION list.

Ever noticed how all trader things were EXEMPTED? They were as they were PRIOR to the loot scaling, and their prices go down. Another hint that making things drop MORE drives their price DOWN, and making things drop LESS drives price UP.

Also, how do starters have an advantage? Making a new character is harder than ever now. These days I have to farm for 3 weeks if I wanna buy 1.5K armor and max dmg weapons for my newly made chars.

Gw is like RL = you have to work hard to get what you want.

If you want to own a car its easy, if you want to own an Aston Martin or a Ferrari its more difficult but you can LOL if you eat pizza everyday + no holidays + ........

Or you have to be clever and make the good choices because you have a LIMITED amount of time at your disposal.

Again I think that you have to focus on ONE MAIN character which will help you to level up the "secondary" characters.

You cannot have the butter + the money from the butter + the dairywoman.........

Or you have to leave GW, and move for WoW = +15$ per month.

Make up your mind, think about it, have a good night and the following morning you decide. You will feel better.

In Gw like in RL you have to make choices. Its the only way to grow up.

..and it does not strike you as being funny that you can get that worky-feeling for free when you go to work?

Thanks!
TabascoSauce

As usual you make a good point, but at least you get paid for that worky-feeling when you go to work lol.

In GW for me anyway it was like, "You saved the world once again, enjoy that 1.3k you have in your storage". Ok maybe i'm over exaggerating here, but it can feel that way at times.

That's also a way of viewing it.
Probably makes me about as selfish as most people that don't like the loot scaling

Translation: I want to make that cash in a short period of time and not in in several hours.
Hence, the casual farmer argument and not the casual player argument.

For me, in normal mode, income in high-end areas has always been between 2-3K/hour.
That's steady, but takes a long time to gather.

You are right about that.
However, the exemption list cannot be considered without loot scaling.
If the average income of players would have stayed high, there would have been no reason for prices to go down.
There is the supply side from players to the trader, which is affected by the exemption list.
There is the sell side from the trader to the player that is affected by loot scaling (people take longer to get the gold for their armor, therefor lower demand on that side). Both influence the price.

Again, that depends very much on where you start.
You start in Tyria. That continent has bad income compared to Factions and NF, I've mentioned that in an other post already.
But in Tyria are more posibilities to get collectors armor, specially when you don't get an Ascalon -> Beacon's -> Droks run, but you play the story line.
Again, this requires some investment in time, which probably was not worth it (you could make 1000s of gold easily in a small amount of that time) before, but is now.

However, I think most new players start with Nightfall atm.
It was hard to get my second copy of GW-P in store a couple of months ago, so they probably don't start there.
Nightfall nets about 9K on quest and mission rewards on the starters island, which is more then enough for max armor and some skills.

The max damage weapons on new characters are hand-downs from my other characters and their heroes.
When you first start the game, you don't have that advantage, but for me the white and blue drops always worked.
Collectors weapons were also good.

Well, no. The people who don't like the loot scaling are screwed by A-Net. The people who don't like the loot scaling are casual players, and while A-Net said they'd IMPROVE things, they made things WORSE.

We're not being selfish, I want the loot scaling to go back so that me and all the other casual players can get cash too, without spending all my game time on farming. If you DO like the scaling, you obviously don't want casual players to get cash.

[QUOTE=the_jos]
Translation: I want to make that cash in a short period of time and not in in several hours.
Hence, the casual farmer argument and not the casual player argument.

So everyone who wants to open a chest now and then, or buy 15K armor, and want to work on that cash by farming are immediately farmers?

I want to make that cash in a short period of time because I DON"T PLAY THAT MUCH. If I had 12 hours per day to spend, it wouldn't be a problem grinding for an hour or 6. But I only play 2 hours a day, and mostly less. To buy stuff I want, i HAVE to farm.


For me, in Normal Mode, I get about 700 gold per day (in 2 hours). And that's when I'm lucky. When I get good drops, I sometimes get a little more than 1K, but that's about it.


Sure it can be considered without the loot scaling. Just see how it was before the scaling. If the average income of players would have stayed high, at least we could buy armor and skills.

To bring down weapon prices, A-net could've done OTHER stuff like make keys cost less and make golds with good stats drop more often. Them, casual players would benefit as well, and not only the people farming these rare weapons.

The exemption list does nothing except make things liek they were before the scaling. HM, however, makes these things drop slightly more. Combine this with alot of farmers who now farm for the exempted items, and the prices will lower. Even if the loot scaling was not here, the prices would still drop.



So in order to get a little cash (which can only be done once, btw, so after doing these quests and missions there still is no way of making quick cash), we gotta start in Elona?

Let A-Net balance that out first then, before changing all our skills so that we gotta buy new skills to replace.

In my opinion, there should be a place where one can make good cash if he invests a little time in it. And make a top amount of cash something can be worth. Like rare materials cannot be worth more than 10K. That way, the economy is way better for casual players who don't want to grind for days, but DO want to do 1 farm run so that they can buy some nice stuff, too.

Technical not possible, but....
How about lootscaling kicking in after let's say 5K/day, account based?
That would mean someone solo-farming could get the cash for 15K armor in about two weeks play. Or a green weapon (maybe two). Or 70 skills. After the 5K, people are set back to scaled droprates. Meaning they still get drops, only it takes more time/luck to gain large amounts of gold.

Would this be a fair alternative?

It sure helps because...

There is already such a place... well, several places. The unlocked Buried Treasure, Treasure Chests and "Do Not Touch" signs in Elona. Visiting all of the locations will get you 20 or 30K (or at least they used to, I haven't visited them for a couple of months). And they reset periodically so you can do them again after a month or so.

They haven't reset for me in months, and last time I opened them, the best I got was a goldy with crappy mods and 800 gold. Combined I got a little cash, but it doesn't matter if it takes months and months for them to refill.

BTW the 5K-limit is a good idea imo. Or other things like this. Maybe you can do quests or missions, and as a reward, the lootscaling can be removed for a while.

Or just remove the lootscaling in Normal Mode only, so that people farming in HM aren't affected.

I approach this whole loot-scaling thing very simply...

I play games to relax and have fun. If I wanted to work tediously to gain more wealth by increasing my income so I can buy cool things... or do the stuff I want... I would do it in real life by getting a second job (oops... sorry... forgot that I already have two jobs). Guess it sucks to be me and have to work double to make what others get in half the time. Anyways... if I wanted to work... I would do it in real life.

I want to play and have fun. I don't find doing an hour of playing for barely any reward other than experience points (which mean zilch in this game) and a bit of gold is really so interesting. What has kept me playing are the weekly events... otherwise, like all my other friends... I'd no longer be playing.

Sure... it's not "necessary" to have a lot of wealth and cool stuff in the game. But... it's a lot of fun collecting wealth and cool stuff in the game. It's a feeling of accomplishment.

The moment I feel I'm working too hard to have fun... that's when it becomes no longer fun. Loot scaling is bringing down the fun factor.

If you're making 1k/day, you can still get a full 1k set in ~1 week.

Arguing that this is a game is irrelevant. Games are supposed to provide a challenge and one of the long term challenges of this game is acquiring ascended armor. It took me half a year to get my 1st 15k set and that was back in the old days, entirely with groups. So yes, it may take a long time, but it's better that way. What would be the point of fow if everyone had it?

And you don't need to be hardcore to farm solo. I wish people would stop assuming that. Patience =/= Hardcore. If you can spend all of your 2 hours a day farming, you have a lot of patience, but it does not make you hardcore. If you're so impatient that you cant even finish a single farming run then you're honestly playing the wrong game. If you want a game with instant-win, go play Dynasty Warriors on easy mode.

Hmm. I don't visit them for months at a time anyway... but in the past some of my guild-mates reported successfully revisiting them once every month. Personally I've always made between 20 and 30K by visiting them all.

1K/Day = Waste Of Time.

Why say that the game should require alot of work , its a game for gods sake and alot of people cant play hours on end.

Anet need to get their act together and relised there doing more damage than good. Its not as if botters had a major affect on the market anyway , especially not when you can identify them easily. Anet are ruining the game right now and its not a discussion about that so ill leave that. What I will say is people should be able to get the armor they want and skills and everything else with no limits because they have a job or school or whatever other obligations.

"""" It took me half a year to get my 1st 15k set and that was back in the old days"""""""

Then you wasted half a year , it was possiblt to get enough for full 15k in the 'old days' in 1 day with the numerous farming options. What anet have done thou is take away these options and well because new plays have very limited accses to the gold routes now there will be a gap formed. Its not like you can say 15k is for elite players anymore because so many people have already got it and the loot scale update is too late.

FoW armor should be dis-regarded , I never spent time getting it and never will but thats my choice but I still should have the choice to get it if I wanted.

Basically the way to make the game next to perfect again is to :

1- Remove Loot Scale.
2- Open up factions and nightfall missions so there is no grind to do quests.
3- Offer increased rewards in all types of the game , you shouldnt have to farm to make money.
4- Make the henchmen and hero ai in hard mode elite so you dont have to rely on other people to get the areas done quickly.
5- Offer some new challanges before eye of the north , its 2 months away , people will get bored and find something elsr to play and when they do they probably wont come back.

If you want to disagree with how anet have made the game worse over time , look around you. The servers contain much less people than they use to and its hard to find real people to do stuff with.

I belive that people should be allowed to play the game anyway they want , without have a obligation to do something else to be able to continue to play the way they want but anet dont agree , 1k mission reward in HM? Thats 1 skill and for a new player that isnt ready for HM thats not even possible to get!.

Tweaks are fine....throw a mesmer in a normally 55 monk farmed area....that's a tweak. Loot scaling isn't a tweak and Hard Mode still allows the top players to earn 10x the amount of gold that the casual player does. The wealth discrepancy was not solved.....not by a long shot. Furthermore, the economy was not out of balance before the update. Ecto at 8-10k is not breaking the economy. 5k for average greens and 40-60k for the high demand ones seems about right. Again though, loot scaling didn't address these problems at all....Hard Mode is what dropped the prices.

Wrong, the rich are still making a decent amount by farming Hard Mode and even if they're making less, prices for practically everything have plummeted so the rich can now spend less too. The rich stay rich! The casual player wasn't buying high end gear to begin with so they're not benefiting from the price decreases. The casual player is buying the fixed price goods like skills, armor, runes, crafting weapons, etc. Those prices have remained constant but as illustrated by someone else, they can't sell their occasional rare gear for a good price so the casual player has less gold. That, and less white and coin are dropping as well. The poor stay poor.

Again, try to confine your response to Loot Scaling, not the benefits of Hard Mode. Loot Scaling means people GET LESS which doesn't increase supply and lead to price drops. We would be seeing the exact same effect on the economy had they not introduced loot scaling at all......maybe even a steeper decline in prices. Loot Scaling was not necessary in the slightest.

So unaccountability is OK with you? I'm not denying that they have, for all practical purposes, absolute power but I tend to be very wary of any group that wields that power in such a heavy-handed manner. Certainly blind support and worship when you're having things taken away is not a wise strategy. Complaining, although possible futile, at least lets em know that there is a threshold for abuse (for lack of a better word).

Right on one account (although it doesn't matter) and completely wrong on the other. Bots may have less gold now but since everything costs less they still make out the same as before. Let's say you're a bot guy and you're selling 1000k at $50 before Loot Scaling ever took place. After Loot Scaling you're being forced to sell 1000k at $100 because like you said, they have to work harder for their gold. However, your customers aren't stupid and they see that the prices of pretty much all of the expensive gear has been cut in half, if not more, so they only need to buy 500k to be happy. So as a bot guy, you're making the same amount you did before Loot Scaling. Reality is that you're making more because your bots are farming in Hard Mode out of Bergen Hot Springs and other places so you're still hauling in practically as much GW as you did before but selling at a higher price.

Your second point is flat out wrong. Human players break even or worse through partying. It'd be one thing if they bumped up the drop rate for 8-man parties but they just kept it the same or made it worse. You get no benefit from being in an 8-man party.....at best you get the same as pre Loot Scaling. I cannot understand rejoicing at the fact that someone is able to maintain their meager existence at the status quo. Do you thank your boss every day for not cutting your salary?

[QUOTE]what you really want is a PVP type character insta equipped with the best of vanity items without bothering to play the game to get them.
if you are so bored (ALL OF YOU) of playing the game why dont you have the brains God gave a rhutabaga and take a break?

i gave you a quick easy low level normal mode lead you by the hand farm run that gives you at least 6 times that not counting steel/dyes/collectables/hides to trade for fur

that was confirmed shortly by another poster who had similar results.

that proves it is you not the game.

right.........one run for what you consider nice stuff which starts at 15K armor and then gets expensive.

Ok - if this argument is going to continue, can we at least keep it sensible?

First, loot scaling as it was first introduced is no longer present in normal mode. I keep trying this out with several solo runs a day in different areas. I keep getting drops from EVERY SINGLE KILL after the first 5 in each area. In those areas where I have to use a few heroes, drops are comparable to what they were BEFORE loot scaling was introduced. This has been without exception for at least the last 7 days. So arguing about loot scaling as a broad concept is pointless.

Secondly, Loot scaling DOES still exist in Hard mode. So there might be some point in arguing about whether or not it should be removed from hard mode too. In my opinion loot scaling is fine in hard mode as the better drops make up for it and I make a lot more money in hard mode. Sure, the rare great drop seldom happens but I make most of my money off of the better salvage materials and mods that drop in HM.

Thirdly, Anti Farm Code does exist in that the first 5-8 kills in any area will yield very little. You may argue that this should be changed. Frankly, other than being irritating when the loot you want drops only close to the entrance (such as the gargoyle skulls in the Barraden Estate Catacombs) I don't have a problem with this and I think it does add some barrier to bots. So I think it is fine to leave it.

Fourthly, Anti Farm Code does exist in that multiple kills at once yield far less loot. I have tried this out too and when I use a farming build that uses AoE damage I get about 1/6 to 1/4 the loot I do with single kill damage. Again, this has been consistent over multiple attempts in the last 7 days. I suspect this is what is still affecting people the most, rather than loot scaling. So it might be worth while to argue about whether this should be removed. It might be argued that AoE damage kills faster and therefore yields comparable loot in a the same amount of time as single kill. It probably is an effective way to prevent bots as many of them use AoE damage to farm. Still, I think this form of Anti Farm Code is unfair to those with caster builds. It is much harder for them to use single kill damage and their lower armor forces them to kill many mobs as quickly as possible to protect themselves. I do think it is unfair to penalize them in this way and that this form of AFC should be removed or dramatically changed.

(As a matter of fact, anti-AoE code may be even worse than I have experienced. I tend to stay away from the AoE damage types when choosing Heroes and henchies. So I am probably getting the max drop rate in a full party. But if the lower AoE drop rate applies to a group of 8 as it does to soloing then, not only are you getting 1/4 - 1/6 the drops to begin with but your heroes and henchies will take 7/8 of what falls. That would mean that people with this style of play would be receiving only 1 drop in every 20 kills at the very best - and probably worse than that most of the time-especially if their heroes/henchies are also using AoE damage.)

Fifthly, arguing from extremes is pontless.

Accusing those who want Loot Scaling/Anti Farm code removed of wanting everything to be handed to them, is just plain silly. Most these people want a challenge but feel the present challenge is too steep, especially when just starting out. And they have a point. My build works great for killing things one at a time and so I get a ton of loot. But, as little loot as I get when I go AoE, I can imagine that a caster character would be horribly frustrating to play at the start. Just because they think the present challenge is too much doesn't mean they want the game to be a cake walk either.

By the same token, accusing those who have done well under loot scaling/anti farm of being hardcore framers who just want to keep the value of their own gold high is also groundless. In most cases they have found a system that works well for them and just don't understand how hard it might be for another player with another type of character to get the same amount of wealth in a similar time period. I'm not a hardcore farmer (other than for a short time 2 or 3 weeks ago) but I have made a ton of money just by grinding for lightbringer/friend of the Kurzicks in hard mode. Had I not experimented with farming AoE, I would not have realized how pathetic the drops are for that form of play.

In any case, if ANet is going to listen and continue to improve the game, we need to keep in touch with reality and not debate situations that no longer exist or accuse others of attitudes the do not have.

Yeah you do actually. You want 100k for completing the story?? So what if 15k armor is nice to have, work for it. Set a goal and work for it. It's not that complicated... I invest less time than I did into playing before loot scaling thanks to life and I make more money now...You may not be able to put 2+2 together so I'll just spell it out. Loot scaling is helping.

Edit: Even 11:40 is too early to be awake and typing haha.

Please read Alas Poor Yorick's post as I think its a great place to start a discussion from, and I agree with all his observations about the current state of Anti-Farming mode (except for the stuff about HM because I haven't played HM yet).

I'd also add a sixth point:

6 - If you are going to make claims about the effect of loot scaling on the economy then please make an effort to separate it from the effect of HM on the economy. They are two different things, and we could have HM without loot scaling and I'm pretty sure that we would still see an economic effect. I've read far too many posts that say something like "I love loot scaling, because I'm playing in HM and getting much more money now".

And maybe a seventh point:

7 - If you have opinions about how other people should play the game then keep them to yourself. ANet's opinion about which play style they are trying to support with loot scaling is pretty much the only one that matters. And they claim that they want to support solo farmers (I use the word claim because, frankly I'm somewhat skeptical about it).

/pandora'sboxopened


Did more runs in Factions last night... income over 2 hours in Ferndale...
350g and 1 Steel Bar

That is 2 hours guys... I killed 2 bosses and about 40 Dredge/Oni...
the mobs were big and tough too...

Let's see.... 2 hours divided by 450g (assuming 1 steel bar is 100g value)...
that is 3.75g a minute...

That is seriously pathetic.

Let's just do some speculative math:

1,350g after 6 hours....

2,750 after 12 hours...

See the grind insanity?

Maybe I am cursed but seriously... I am not the only one having these horrible drop rates...

A sensible factor would be 1k an hour at least for the area and difficulty.

I do play GW for the fun and trying to earn skills and save for special armors runes etc... now with 4 active characters... I can't even afford to keep 1 up to date with everything....

You have to remember each character is PvE... each has heroes, each need runes, weapons, inscriptions, etc....

I feel I am being forced now to play hard mode with old inactive characters JUST to be able to get a drop, tome, something, worth some decent value that can be sold so I can send the money BACK to my dead broke active characters I am trying to play Factions and Nightfall with...

Up until this point everything in GW was great... the income was modest but worked well... grinding was a major necessity to just afford the basic items or skills... now it requires over 3 times as much time just to do it...

I do not have 3 times as much time to invest just to make decent income to "survive". Some of us are not farmers. Some of us are not in large guilds. Some of us are obviously plagued with the omen. Some of us just want to play the game and not be required grind and play in hard mode before we even get the 3 main normal campaigns completed.

Loot Scaling isn't all about me...

It is about US. Either we contest this in debate for Anet or we suffer and be in debt from now on...

I don't know why people persist in thinking that 15k armor and guild hall npcs are necessary in gw. The quests don't give you tons of cash, no, but they do give you enough to get what you need.

For a second I thought this thread might be about how loot scaling ruined the fun of solo farming. I'm one of those strange people who found certain types of solo farming fun, even if they weren't the most profitable. There was just something about seeing all those items lying on the ground for you (even if they were all crappy whites).

On the other hand, solo farming bosses is much more fun without the anti-farming code.

But this thread was not about fun. It was about making money that isn't necessary. So really, this thread should be named "loot scaling nerf - ruining my greedy ambitions".

One funny thing about loot scaling: it made money worth more, thus making the rich richer. Thanks anet!

Vanquished Maishang Hills last night, with a full party of heroes and henches. Remember the intent is to vanquish, not gold farm.

Result, 2 gold drops, few purples. Salvage produced a Superior Death Magic and a Radiant Insignia(both critter drops), which sold for 1.750 plat combined to the merchant. ID'd all the whites, merched everything (there was nothing really worth keeping).

Profited almost 4 Plat in what for me took about two hours (with interruptions). Also got over 3000 Luxon faction, thanks to the priests Blessing of the Luxons, which was a nice bonus. Faction can, as you all know, be traded for sell-able items if gold is your pure intent.

There were only three chests found that run, and I got lucky and retained two lock picks. Sadly, this run had bad chest luck... only one gold (a less than ideal Jade Wand, which ID'd for 426 gold).

Added to storage 1 steel and 2 monstrous fangs, courtesy of loose-toothed Naga.

[QUOTE]PATHETIC BEYOND .........

*you have been playing for 1 hour*

empty inventory except expert salvage kit and zero gold at start

normal mode/lowlands vermin/fill inventort sell except a few expert salvage for steel

1 (ONE) HOUR

2.4K GOLD/SALES
5 STEEL OUT OF 14 TRIES (AXES ONLY)
2 BROWN DYE
3 GREEN
5 ORANGE AND I HATE ORANGE
2 RED
1 PURPLE
5 FURS FROM 23 CHAR HIDES
CARVINGS/SKULLS/FOR EVENTS LATER

ONE HOUR .....no complaints here

usually less steel dyes are average

Is it so smurfing hard to understand that we might want nice looking armor and weapons too without having to play 24/7? We don't need them? Why not remove them altogether then? Seriously... Getting neat stuff is a part of the game that we enjoy, we shouldn’t be deprived of it because we aren't leet enough. You say you can still make money? Then you must be playing a different game, because the money I am making is a joke. There was no reason for this change. It didn't help anyone, and it didn't make the game more fun.

Well then that begs the question: What are you doing wrong?

One bit of help I can offer is this... ID everything, even your whites. You can double the merch value if you do, and it costs only 5g per ID.

There is your problem - that is pitiful, in fact that is so low I can't see how you do it. Even in hard mode and the hench/hero I can do *nothing* and have a kill rate well over 4 times of that (and that is totally irrelevant of my skills - anyone can grab hench and set a flag). 120 minutes and you kill *42* creatures - one per ever 2.8 minutes? I'm assuming a group of 8, I hope you do not tell me that is your solo farm run (that's not a terrible solo farm kill rate but you are not in an area that is worth a crap in farming).

Given the rate you *should* be killing things at and how much you are making per mob you *should* then be making about what I normally do in just playing the game.

What is a steel bar? Isn't that something from runescape?

If you're not making 10k/hour (with loot scaling) you have some serious issues. I suggest you check out the farming sub-forum here on Guru. Lots of profitable places to farm there that can easily net 10k/hour (and that's not even including rare drops that you can sell to other players).

I'm not going to deny that there are ways to make money out there. Opportunities exist for all walks of life to make money from the casual gamer to the hardcore elitist. Likewise, arguing about necessity vs desire in a video game is rather absurd.

What seems like a definite no-brainer to me though is the fact that Loot Scaling:
1. Helps no one or at best helps the very rich by increasing the value of their gold.
2. Hurts a wide variety of players from casual types to solo AoE farmers.
3. Does little in the (futile and neverending) fight against bots.
4. Was completely unnecessary and has hurt the fans of this game much more than it has helped (if it can be said at all that is has helped in ANY way).

Please tell me where I'm wrong in any of the above. Please demonstrate how having stuff taken away from you or other types of players has a net positive result (ie does more good than harm).

[QUOTE=Loviatar]Well yeah, if possible I'd like armor and skills to be free. And what's wrong with that? My characters friggin save worlds and they don't even get a nice reward? At least the game would get FUN if I could get things like keys, skills, event items etc. And it wouldn't be a brainless grind.

You should understand that we're not all rich. That doesn't take away that we don't want anything.

And I'm not bored, I'm just angry cause A-Net ripped me off in saying that they'd improve things, but actually made things worse.

Ohh so it's my fault that I'm not getting any drops? It sure as hell doesn't give ME 6 times the amount. I'm not getting sh!t while farming now. Only clearing the way from bergen to Toa in HM gets me about 2K, but that also costs me about 2 hours to do.

[QUOTE=Loviatar]Nice stuff are things like keys, event items and skills. I don't want 15K armor in 1 farm run, I don't need it, either. Especially after the loot scaling buying 15K armor is just stupid, cause you'll never EVER make so much cash again.

The point is, it's good for you that you have cash and 15K armors and everything. And that you can make cash easy, GFY.

But I can't. Why? Cause A-Net keeps nerfing everything I do. Buying skills sucks now cause it's way expensive, and A-Net keeps changing them so I need other skills again. Buying weapons is worthless. I don't care for super rare skins, and I don\t have 100K + x ecto (Yes the price is still over 100K + ecto after the scaling)

Most farm runs (if not already nerfed) still cost me too much to buy for skills, runes and weapons required for the run. And the simple runs like trolls sometimes don't give me ANYTHING (that's right, 0 drops).

Personally I'm just glad I got my FoW right before loot scale hit. Now I don't have too many other armor grind targets left.

Back when I was going for my first set of 15K (15K kurz), I farmed shiroken. Now this never got me any crazy golds aside from two non-perfect diamond aegises. What it did give me is money, in white items, soulstones, and keys (I still have ~30 keys from back when I farmed). This run was both boring and frustrating at times, since Shiroken seem to be experts at interupting the 1/4 cast time of PS and SB. However, doing this for 30min-1hr a day (if that), I was able to get 15K in 2-3 weeks. I feel this is reasonable. This farm actually took effort (bots couldn't do it, too much timing involved), was decently profitable, and was moderately fun.

If I now went back and did that (assuming no spirit bond nerf) it would take months to get 15K. Months to get roughly 120K (this was before amber really plummeted). This is completely unreasonable. Months of farming everyday, even casually, should be roughly the amount of time it takes to get FoW, not 15K.

One could argue that hard mode offsets this slightly. However the rewards for vanquishing and HM missions are generally utter crap. It's only the hardcore farmers that make money in HM, not the people playing through the game normally (which is what I assume ANET is trying to encourage).

As for whoever mentioned the skill tokens idea, I'd personally do almost every quest in the game if that was implemented.. Why? Most quest rewards are utter garbage. 150g and some exp? Sometimes no gold. Prophecies quests are especially useless (other than the skill quests). Why would I go through the trouble of a quest when the reward is 300xp? ANET claims skill quests led to lack of diversity in builds, but I disagree... my prophecies toons generally have many more skills than their factions/nightfall counterparts. More skills = more diversity. And with the skill token system, ANET gets the best of all worlds... quests with rewards people actually want, free skills for casual players just for playing the game, and diversity in skills since players can choose which skills to trade their tokens for.

[QUOTE]as i said.........given on a plater

i am not rich i just spend withi my means and after over 2 years it adds up.

i have never sold a big drop for big bucks ever.

i give away or merch or salvage

here is what i got this morning in one hour of that kowlands vermin hunt fron my earlier post

i have one 15K armor for my favorite character and i spent 5k on a factions +5 wand as well everybody else and their heroes get hand me downs
what special things do you need to kill things in normal mode in the lowlands?

4k = 1/2 Hours. WoW. I didnt Relise it was that bad.

Theres a few way to get a better pay such as aforge runs netting 10k at least every 20 mins . But its about having to do something you dont want to do. Glad I bought Everything ill ever need when I made like 4k in 2 minutes .