Looting

@Guerrilla - RG wants a grief free game as well. This is why there will not be Open PVP and instead be voluntary and mission based. People will not have to play offline to be "free of any player 'grief' or harm", and will have many online play options.

 

Guerrilla, there is a wild difference between RPing and griefing in games where it's all open-loot and such.

I had my fill of playing UO for over 10 years, which includes pre-Trammel. I'm not really looking for a successor to that, complete with constant competition between groups, and the constant threat of a bunch of people steam-rolling me while I'm playing because I decided to wander out by myself to go do something.


What I want is a role playing experience that is accessible for everyone and doesn't provide for scenarios where certain groups are at an advantage or disadvantage and can basically rain on everyone elses' parade.

Thankfully, that seems to be the plan here, so I think we're good to go.

 

@Arkhan ? It?s also realistic.

It depends on the loot. It's pretty quick to pick up a sword laying on the ground, but taking chainmail off of a dead body will require some time. So will searching all the pockets to find those reagents, that dagger hidden in his boot, etc. A speedy guy running in may be able to snatch a couple of things from the body before the guy with the crossbow gets there, but he won't be able to search and loot everything.

The problem with LOTRO's style of loot is the monster becomes more valuable solely on the number of people involved in killing it. If I kill a basic non-boss orc by myself, I get a set chance at certain items. If two people kill that same orc, they both get the same chance at certain items, effectively doubling the amount of wealth generated from that kill. If a fellowship of 6 kills that same single orc, its 6 times the amount of wealth generated than if I killed it by myself. The amount of gold that flooded into the game after this change is ridiculous...but it works in LOTRO because it's not really a game that has a robust economy. You can't control the amount of wealth entering the system with LOTRO's loot system, and that will be really important in a game like SotA that will have a robust economy as a design goal. An orc is only wearing one helmet after all, it doesn't make much sense for 6 people to all win his helmet after killing him.

Need/Greed/Pass, Master Looter, Free for All, Randomize, etc are all options that some people love and others hate. Implement a bunch of different looting policies and let the groups that form decide which one to follow. That way everyone gets the system that they like. You may like Master Looter with your core group of friends, but prefer NGP for pick up groups. Flexibility is the key here.

 

It would be neat if the looting system had timers for what you're looting based off the difficulty of the thing you are removing, but it would also still lead to frustration because it's not realistic.

It's "realistic". The best stuff will probably be fast to grab. So, the system is already flawed. You could have the timer be based off of the worth of the item, but that's flawed too because it would take longer to take the fancy sword than it would to take off all their clothes. Not realistic!

It's mighty simple to go loot someone else's things and take off into the sunset, but the realism becomes skewed when it's suddenly not as simple to shoot that person in the back of the head and get your things back.

Combat in RPGs is never really realistic. It's game-like, because realistic combat is not really fun. You get stabbed once in the stomach and bleed out and die while the Orc who stabbed you plays cat's cradle with your intestines.

That wouldn't be very fun or heroic.


If people want realistic looting, well, the combat should be realistic too. You get shot, you stumble around. You limp along like a goon, leaving a trail of blood, and then take one bolt / arrow to the back of the head and you flop over and die. Your last visions before darkness will be someone retrieving their things off of your twitching corpse.

I don't really see that happening, because it would basically kill the enjoyment of the game. So, again, why feign realism with the looting?

The way I see it, the people claiming it's realistic have never actually tried stealing things from someone. It's not a simple task.

Go try dragging a deer away from the hunter who actually killed it. Assault him when he tries taking his own things back. Let me know how that goes.

The realistic consequences to stealing are also far higher than what a game would present.

Try stealing the hunter's equipment while he's tending to the deer. Shoot him while you're at it when he tries to stop you! Sure, you'll "get away". You'll also likely be caught and put in jail before you know it.

That's realistic.

So unless there is some serious criminal prosecution in the game, complete with wandering bands of guards who go out into the wilderness, wanted posters, and a running tally of all known in-game criminals, all that "realistic" looting is going to do, is lead to a giant highwayman/vigilante justice disaster, like UO.

The guards in UO were about as useful as screen doors on a submarine.

 

@marthos

The looting system used by LotRO (and GW2, and WoW when it comes to world bosses and LFR, and Spiral Knights for everything except components, and Diablo 3, etc) doesn't cause widespread inflation for a few reasons:

- It can increase the amount of loot and gold dropped by a NPC that is being faced by a group of players, but that doesn't really multiply the amount of loot on the game as a whole, as without that "multiplication" the extra players would simply be each battling an individual NPC.

- It decreases the time required to get rewards when in a group, but mainly the combat time and the downtime between fights (less suffered damage, fewer uses of combat resources per player); the time required to find a new target and move to it stays the same.

- Even with the strong incentive to play in groups most players still stick to playing alone. Blizzard, for example, is adding up to 30% more gold and magic items for playing in a group in an attempt to get more players to join groups, because even with all the advantages and convenience already in place (such as instantly transporting to party members) most players still play solo.

It does inject some extra loot and gold in the economy by making the rewards higher for players that play as a group, but the upsides - no loot drama, no efficiency based reason to avoid grouping - IMHO more than make up for any potential failing, and by a quite wide margin.

 

I want the loot system with the least drama. If that means everyone has a fair shake at rolling on loot, or everyone is rewarded equally in some way, i'm sooooo very happy with that.

There's no reason to bring in 8th grade nonsense like drama over loot into this game. Give everyone a fair shake. that is what was most frustrating by far with a ton of MMOs...

I helped kill that big thing? I'd like to get something to show for it. I'd be much more inclined to let a bad RNG roll dictate what I get instead of some guy getting their first, or some guy rolling on everything regardless of whether they want to use it or not.

If you truly want to get people to work together and be friendly, remove all this loot drama nonsense and treat everyone fairly.

Frankly i'd never want to play 'Shroud of the CLICKED HERE FIRST LOSERS SUCK IT'

 

I got an idea.
http://eprmarketing.com/marketingblog/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/Dumbing-Maze.jpg

 

@kenjitamura - Without binding systems, the economy crashes and progression is ruined. Binding seems annoying until you consider the true consequences of removing it. The game I play most frequently these days is SWTOR. I wouldn't mind if items were bound to my legacy, so I could share gear I've acquired with my alts.

SWTOR has a fine loot system all around.

1. No one can steal your loot. Your loot is instanced to you or your group automatically.
2. You only need to click in an area, and you can loot multiple mobs at once.
3. You're not frozen during the loot phase. You can do whatever you want while the loot dialogue is up.
4. Groups can have a master looter hand out loot to the group, or have everyone do need/greed rolls. Both can be exploited (someone always clicking need, or the master looter just keeping everything for themselves). But if I see that, I put the player on ignore and then I never end up in a group with them again.

 

@enderandrew

Binding is not done to preserve the economy. Rather, binding is done to restrict how much the economy can affect progression. Games with binding want the players to earn the hard to get gear themselves by facing challenging content, instead of just farming for gold and purchasing it from someone else.

An example of a game without binding where the effects of the economy on progression went out of control is Diablo 3. The easiest, fastest way to progress there is not to attempt to get the items you need yourself; rather, it's to just grind as much gold as you can and purchase the items you need from the AH. In fact, many players, and even developers, have said that the amount of item trading for gold that happens in Diablo 3 effectively damaged the game, making it less fun to play.

 

@Silent Strider - Many games don't allow crafters to make the absolute BIS gear, because it can only be obtained by raiding. If I get an extra piece of gear I can't use from a raid and sell it, then anything below that (the crafting economy) is adversely affected.

But as you stated, Diablo 3 doesn't have binding and the economy ended up as crap.

There is no incentive to play the game properly and attempt to get gear properly.

 

Binding cripples the economy rather than preserve it. If your gear is bound to you, why have crafters? And if dropped loot is of better quality than crafted gear, again, have crafters?

As many have indicated, it would be far better to perfect your character than it would be to perfect your gear. In truth, your skills are what are bound to you. Gear should be cheap and readily available. Your skills are what you need to hone and cultivate.

 

@Owain - Well said. There wont be any need for crafters if they cant make the best gear that everybody use. Just look at UO after Age of Shadows were released with it's insurance and boss loot that was 10 times as good as the gear crafters made.

Gear should be cheap and easy to get from your local crafter.

 

@Owain - Without binding, there is far more extra gear in the game sold cheaply, which kills crafting. Because of binding, people rely on crafters.

Every game with binding has a healthy economy. Diablo 3 removed binding and is blasted for having a terrible economy. I'm sorry, but the proof is in the pudding.

 

There goes looting, stealing and any kind of criminal system.

 

@Ara, depends on how looting is handled, something about which we know next to nothing right now. If you sell goods to an NPC, does the NPC resell them, or do the disappear, as they did in Ultima Online? If you loot another player, is the loot intact, or is it damaged and useful only for salvage?

Once we know more about how looting will work in SotA, get back to me.

 

@Owain, @enderandrew

Binding, by itself, neither cripples nor preserves the economy. It merely reduces the economy's scope by reducing, or in extreme cases removing, the influence the economy has on progression.

Not being tied with progression does not necessarily kills the economy; in a well done economy there are more things to be traded than just progression-related gear.

I do agree that binding usually runs counter to the kind of easily replaceable (and lost) gear Owain desires. Binding typically means the player himself must go earn the gear he will use, instead of just getting it from a crafter. And forcing the player to acquire his gear himself is often associated with the gear being hard to get to the extent losing it would be a huge setback, perhaps even enough to get many players to quit the game over it.

 

To me binding would destroy any type of criminal system.
If you don't want to be killed or looted hopefully there will be a setting for that.
But for those of us whose settings allow that, what fear would there be if everything is bound to us?

 

I would think there should just be multiple options on how to divide loot when creating the group or party. Split loot on %dmg dealt, most damage dealt gets all, or maybe even the option to have party leader takes all. The latter could be great for certain guild functions. Would be silly to just give us one way of doing it.

 

@rschultzy80

How I react to grouping with strangers according to how the loot is split:

- Need before Greed with loot rolls: I group if it improves my efficiency significantly, otherwise I prefer to play solo due to how much I dislike loot rolls on top of the random loot.

- Master Looter: On top of the increased efficiency requirement, I flat out refuse to join any group if I don't completely trust the master looter. And if I see first hand a player abusing his master looter benefits I will henceforth refuse to ever be in the same group with him again, even if he isn't the master looter anymore. I don't want to deal with dishonest players.

- Performance-based looting, "fastest clicker", free looting, etc: I will not join groups. I don't like competing for loot against players that are supposed to be my allies.

- Individual loot tuned to be close in efficiency to soloing: I group whenever invited, but don't go out of my way to look for a group or to stay in a group. Individual looting removes the looting drama, making grouping far more pleasant for me.

- Individual loot done in a similar way to GW2 and LotRO (i.e., tuned to always be at least as efficient as soloing, and quite often far more efficient): I join groups as often as I can, actively looking out for them and changing my plans for the current game session to stay with a group. This kind of looting system combines an increased looting efficiency when in groups with a removal of loot drama (as some WoW devs described, the system is intentionally made so, if players get angry, they get angry at the game and not at each other); in other words, there is no reason to avoid grouping unless the player just wants to be left alone.

 

<i>The looting system used by LotRO (and GW2, and WoW when it comes to world bosses and LFR, and Spiral Knights for everything except components, and Diablo 3, etc) doesn?t cause widespread inflation for a few reasons:</i>

I can't speak for the other games, but for LotRO inflation is a huge problem. In Moria you could get high-end gear for under 100 gold, now you're looking at closer to 700-800 gold. I don't try to farm gold, and I'm swimming in thousands of gold now thanks to the new system. Perhaps its the entirely the system, and LotRO implemented it poorly though.


<i> It can increase the amount of loot and gold dropped by a NPC that is being faced by a group of players, but that doesn?t really multiply the amount of loot on the game as a whole, as without that ?multiplication? the extra players would simply be each battling an individual NPC.

- It decreases the time required to get rewards when in a group, but mainly the combat time and the downtime between fights (less suffered damage, fewer uses of combat resources per player); the time required to find a new target and move to it stays the same. </i>

Put these two points together to find where the inflation comes from. Multiply the loot by the number of players involved and decrease the time to kill. Yes the travel time remains the same, but with the mob density in LotRO that is not really an issue. For a fun experiment, spend 10 minutes killing critters solo. Then group with 2 friends and spend 10 minutes killing critters in that group. You will see a significantly higher amount of wealth gained in the latter scenario.

<i>
It does inject some extra loot and gold in the economy by making the rewards higher for players that play as a group, but the upsides ? no loot drama, no efficiency based reason to avoid grouping ? IMHO more than make up for any potential failing, and by a quite wide margin.</i>

I agree with this point for a game like LotRO where the economy is a distant after thought. Their new loot system does work quite well for the gear-grind style of game. Does it really matter that you can farm 6 hides at once in a group in LotRO vs just 1 hide solo? Not really. In a game that has economy as a main bullet point, this system would be too easily exploitable.