An introduction: you can call me Doctor Loot

[RedOrm]

A: about roman numerals:

1. I find them very helpful. blah blah IV is not as good as blah blah VII
2. I find it a little boring to just number them that way....

I don't have any idea what a solution would be.

I would think a good naming system would go a long way here?
Fictional example:
Light I (1d6 light damage) would become Iridicent
Light II -> Glowing
Light III -> Shining
Light IV -> Starry
Light V -> Lunar
Light VI -> Solar
Light VII -> Luminescent
Light VIII -> Brilliant
Light IX -> Incadescent
Light X -> Termic Lance

While not as straightforward, it sure would be more evocative, and most people should be able to figure out that Shining is better than Iridicent, and not as good as incandescent.
(and yes these particular names sound better as prefixes, but how else could you find a Brilliant Longsword of Greater Ghostbane? :P )

Greetz,
Red Orm

[patang01]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

Level range is irrelevant when the cap is 28 and it's way easier and cheaper to find a random item

Take dreamvisor and deadly and accurate. Dreamvisor is level 25 (EE) with 5 in damage and to hit.

At that level you can find 7-8 of 7-8. Sure you don't get some of the other features like a yellow slot and the ghost touch but that has very little value at those levels.

Plus named items with random permutations are awful. Especially since they're terrible to begin with. Like the longsword and the morningstar from the xpack. Terrible loot. Or the latest greatsword. What's the point of trying to get a EE item when it either has a random feature on it or it's subpar to other standard loots (like ESoS).

Take a look at lordmarch and those items. They're special. They're unique.

[sirgog]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

Weapons - Named weapons and raid weapons are a very mixed bunch. Most random lootgen is better than that Study in Sable greatsword, but no random loot comes close to even the classic Sword of Shadow (much less the Epic one).

Jewellery - Deadly and Resistance on jewellery are better than 90% of raid loot at pretty much all levels.

Bracers - Random loot is the ONLY place to get healing amp in this slot. (Edit: I stand corrected, there's a totally obsolete HOX bracer set that can fill this role, but legacy lootgen items are the only place for 10% (for characters wearing a TOD ring for 20% and PDK/Claw for 30%) or 30% (unquestioned best-in-slot for every melee toon not wearing PDK gloves). Also the legacy lootgen is better than any alternative for 20% in this slot.

Armor - Nothing in present random loot is even remotely useful; in MOTU there were some great situational armors, however.

[myliftkk_v2]

Happy Friday, everyone. I’d like to introduce myself as a bit of a new dev face on the forums. First, it’s about time I quit lurking, and second, I’m putting on an additional hat on the DDO team. What hat is that? In a word: loot. I’m here to listen to you and to keep my eyes on the big picture. Yes, that includes avoiding Ghostbane-situations.

So in the name of listening rather than blathering on and on, I’d like to ask you all a few questions as a sort of pulse-check on the state of loot. Go on and fill up the thread – I’ll check back in after the weekend (and a bit today, as schedule permits), with head-nods, follow-up questions, and answers where necessary.

- Aside from the diversity issue, what are the biggest problems with random loot, today?
- What weapon and equipment types do you feel are underserved in named and in random loot?
- I’d love to hear about some of the non-named loot your character’s are currently wearing.

(In the future, I’m planning some similar question sessions about named loot and named loot systems, BTW.)

Lack of diversity is my big issue atm. There were a bunch of interesting affixes that got whacked in the recent updates and those should be returned. All affixes should be added to Cannith crafting as that would cause an absolute reniassance in crafting in DDO.

It always stuck in my craw that the CL of clickies doesn't increase as the loot gets more powerful. It was ridiculous to pull a ML20+ item that had a clicky on it that was CL1-5. Really, what value was that to anyone, anywhere? Now, you risk sunsetting the Shroud clickies at some point, but I'd like to see higher level Epic content drop clickies that actually belong in Epic content.

As regards whether random loot should be powerful, yes, when stars align and you make a great roll on the loot tables, you should get something to be envious of even amongst the most well geared toons. Otherwise why bother looting a chest in the first place, for the plat? People ran the Shroud incessantly and the pack doesn't drop a single piece of rare raid loot. It's the customization they're after, something I think is a much better design than eGH or any of the comm upgrade business. Again, part of the value there was consistency. You knew what you're getting using Shroud crafting versus trying to gain loot through rare drops. That to me is the trade off. Raid loot should be consistently good, though preferrably customizable like Shroud, but not universally awe-inspiring. I do agree that the commonality of the current random loot, both giant pools of useless ghostbance, and deadly or accuracy x are problematic just because of the frequency of the drops. Dramatically increase the affixes choices and the % of random loot which overpowers raid loot will decrease.

Trinkets, by an large are completely neglected as are many other types mentioned. Armor is way over-representing in every pull and reward list. Amazingly, turning on or off class based rewards seemingly has no impact of the types of weapons or equipment dropping ime.

I use things like the following:

Health +10 Belt of Dodge 10%
Health +9 Belt of False Life +40

[Scraap]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

Shroud, LoB, and Dragontouched spellpower spring to mind as prime examples of effects that are outdated before completion that I don't even have to check my inventory for, which to my mind at least is the real question that needs answering. (The less said about the canith crafted hatchet job, the lower my blood pressure.). Same vein, see seal/scroll/shard itemization.

Might help focus the feedback if you specified how many levels you expected us to hold on to something named, and how many levels you anticipated us being by the time we got the items if we were say... TR3 to give the most time spent farming, in terms of what the definition of "same level range" is, exactly.

If you actively want us throwing out loot after 2-4 levels regardless of how long it takes to acquire... well, at least we'd know enough to better judge the intent, regardless of agreement.

[rapter3]

Let me welcome you to the forums! We as the players enjoy having honest and open communication with the Devs,and would love to more often. I don’t post to the forums often but couldn’t help myself when I saw this topic. I hope some of the information from the players is taken to heart.

Aside from the diversity issue, what are the biggest problems with random loot, today?

Retributive Armor! Absolutely, and incredibly pointless and irritating to deal with. Personally, my characters like to wear specific guards, and it is highly annoying to search the AH and have to hover over every piece of armor just to find the guard I want.
And I would really like to see “burst” items make a comeback. I miss Flaming Burst, and Icy Burst, and I REALLY miss Force Burst.
As has been stated already, random loot making named loot pointless but also, Named loot making other named loot pointless. As newer content is released there is the issue of newer loot, making older loot obsolete. Although I understand waning to make new loot “bigger and better” this also means that older content will be run less often, which in turns means that content will be purchased less often as well. There needs to be some system of updating old named loot, to make it keep up with new loot.
Now what I think has to be balanced though is not making named loot so powerful that it becomes the “you have to have this item or you aren’t a viable character” item. I am all for having some awesome items, but it’s hard enough to PUG with the HP/SP requirements that are imposed sometimes.
Also to echo some of the other posts, the inefficiency of searching the AH/choosing lot rewards. I rather enjoyed potency I,II,III, etc. It made it searching much easier. Now I understand that not having such a naming system allows for greater flexibility in random loot, so I'm not saying we need to go back to the roman numerals, but an easier way to search would be appreciated.
I know I have a lot for this section, but please bear with me. Another issue I see, is a lack of damage suffixes. My DPS toons(not saying that others don’t), really don’t care much about having parrying or vertigo on my swords/handwraps/other weapons. For the most part, if I want a damage suffix, I’m basically stuck with either Pure Good or Lacerating/bleeding. I would really like to see more damage suffixes instead of utility.
And as one more side note, I would love to see Night’s Grasp on more items. I really like the effect, but rarely see it.

- What weapon and equipment types do you feel are underserved in named and in random loot?

My rant in this part is not shared by a lot of players, but please hear me out. Handwraps are underserved in the game, and here is my reason why. Arti’s and druids have destroyed the handwrap market. For a long time now, it has been rather difficult to find decent random handwraps, and then with addition of the Arti dog, good handwraps disappeared rather quickly to become collars. Then once again with druids, handwraps disappeared even faster for more collars. Now the only real solutions to this problem are more random collars, allow other weapons to also be crafted to collars, or do away with collars all together and simply allow handwraps to be equipped as –is. It makes sense to me to be able to simply tie the handwraps around the dog’s neck. The latter would allow resale instead of simply taking said handwraps completely off the market.
As far as named loot, there is not near enough named Scimitars in game currently. There are several at lvl 15-17, but that is a long time to wait for a decent named sword. With the new enhancements for elves and rangers, scimitars are incredibly useful, but irritatingly rare.


- I’d love to hear about some of the non-named loot your character’s are currently wearing.

I wear deadly of accuracy items a lot. I have to disagree with the opponents of the items. The items “helps” to make up the increasing difference in damage between melee and ranged/caster. Melee has largely become cannon fodder for the ranged/casters. Seriously, when a caster can deal in the 10’s of thousands of damage with a single spell, the difference is a bit too disparing. The items also allow some of us who play less than “normal” builds to help keep up in damage while playing with some of the other options available.
Also wear a lot of Speed items. Yet another item that needs a way to distinguishing them apart from each other.

[Livmo]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

I like to compare similar items of similar level. In my world I would expect a L27 random to be more powerful than a L20 named. You ask a very valid question. Are people comparing apples to oranges?

I see less variety in loot drops, but have not encountered random loot being more powerful than named per se. However, I've noticed there are some raid items that could use a refresh to compete with the deadly/seeker randoms. And in general. Perhaps I see it as the raid loot has not kept up with the times.

[voodoogroves]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

Some are just bad, and out of scale with what lootgen can provide ...

Dreamvisor

Anything with spell focus. Used to be +2 was about the best you could get; +3 by 24 or 25 was rare. Wearables or holdables.

Many epic weapons are plain flat-out not as good as lootgen.

HoX / VoD ML18+ loot. The bracelet is fun - but the SP revamp (that dropped potency) essentially made it irrelevant. Now it's an ML 20 that if the stars align, might be as good as ML 16 or so lootgen.

Anything with Nightmare, that was once balanced by only coming on named items, may be suck but the lootgen is probably better than the named items. Same with Lifestealing - as the original items seemed to be balanced based on rarity and crit profile. Staff with life stealing? Sure, drain away. Keen Rapier with Lifestealing? ****, have to change lifestealing now!

*************** when changes are made to lootgen, not doing a full enough pass on the named items leaves them lagging. You guys managed to update some of the named items, but left many of the raid items un-updated. Luckblade got a pass, but the Helm of the Moranon did not. Is it better than a tapestry turn in now?


You also have left-hand/right-hand situations with new named loot and loot changes ...

Spell focus again ... now +4 drops in heroic loot (named items you get from running a chain on normal). The important thing here is that you may say "but it only does that, takes a slot" but many builds really are built to do ONE THING REALLY WELL, and that makes these the item to snag. It would be nice if raid gear from heroic raids was as relevant as those easily farmable heroic items.

When the last item update was going on, several items were skipped because they were used by some players. The thought was to leave them, as maybe they were blananced. Within one more update (essentially), they were leapfrogged. Bloodstone? Hell it wasn't prime for a long time, now it's replaced by random loot that comes on just about any slot - and you can get it at a higher ML with augment slots. Necklace of Contemplation ... accuracy when it was rare was neat - but everyone is rocking deadly now. Gloves of Ogre power ... are worse than lootgen, and certainly worse than mastercrafted lootgen.



Plenty are bad because "lots of stuff on one item" is only useful if one of them is "reason enough to slot it" ....

Most of the Fens epics/related. They suffer from the thought that stacking lots of stuff on something makes it awesome. It doesn't, if it doesn't do one "thing" well enough to slot. INT 6 ML20? Not worth wearing for a fly-by level. Wear your heroic INT 6. INT 6 + concentration plus a +1 DC to a school doesn't make that INT 6 at ML20 or the +1 to a school (which lootgen has at +3) worth it for the consolidation.

Most spell power items that are unfocused. Iron Beads = good. Shamanic Fetish ... not enough in that slot.




Serous players itemize for
(a) key abilities / benchmarks - heavy fort, key stats, saves
(b) best adders for their core abilities - DC boosters, stat boosters that drive important stats, etc. ... they will seek the best in slot. One small step down with extra stuff may be a consideration, but big steps down are noise, regardless of what is added. 90 radiance spell power at level 28 is not something anyone who wants to zap things is going to aim for. It may be useful on some build where that's way down the priority line, but they wouldn't build for it.
- damage (deadly, artifact, seeker, etc.)
- DCs (spells, tactics, etc.)
- attack speed
- spell lore on key elements

Then players ....
(c) fill out utility - resistances, immunities, true seeing
(d) secondary abilities - SP for secondary elements

No one builds just for C and D. Too many named items look like they are aimed for that. Compare to a CHA 10 of Resistance 10 item. Freaking laser focused, with a best- or near-best casting stat and resistance. That's better than any CHA 8 of resistance 6 with two open slots for anyone who wants their CHA to be high. That evocation focus (4 or 5) is much more useful than the enchant 2, necro 2, INT 6, 3 slot item ... for the evoker. The savant doesn't build for generic spell lore 6% - he builds for element lore 16%. If he's got 6% in the off element, bonus - but his first priority is being good at the thing he wants to be good at.

It's ok that random loot can scale to this. It's lame that named loot doesn't, or is junked up with things that make it not really useful to anyone trying to be really good at something.

And not all named loot has to be good. Hell the VON necklaces have sucked for years ... but right now so many of the named items are in those categories.


Random thought:

Give the proposal FoS posted about tying some abilities to the ML of the item (XdWhatever based on ML of the item) ... any thought to an update on many abilities of items and tie them back to ML? That would allow them to scale, and maybe solve some of your junk-item problems ...

[RedOrm]

Might help focus the feedback if you specified how many levels you expected us to hold on to something named

This. My Gloves of the Master Illusionist are ML26, and while I love the +10 Int they give, they are BTC, which I hate, and more importantly they are decidedly weaker than the random ML28 +10 Int +10 Resistance goggles I also have. Was it really the intent to use these gloves for only TWO levels??
Yes the gloves also have an augment slot and some sort of other boost, but even then they simply don't compare. Had they been BTA I at least could have passed them to an alt after hitting 28, but no such luck, so they are doomed to languish in the bank or get vendored (and yes there's a +11 version. There's also +11/+9 versions of the random goggles, and once the cap goes to 30 I'm sure we'll be seeing +11/+10 or even +11/+11 random stuff).
These gloves would have been absolutely BRILLIANT if Turbine had NOT included +10's in random loot, but... They did.

Giving them a second augment slot might save them, especially if you also add a +10 resistance augment to slot in there (to be found in chests, not already in there!): this would make them slightly more powerfull that the random goggles, while also being slightly lower level -and thus more desirable and worth farming for.

Greetz,
Red Orm

[Livmo]

When the last item update was going on, several items were skipped because they were used by some players. The thought was to leave them, as maybe they were blananced. Within one more update (essentially), they were leapfrogged. Bloodstone? Hell it wasn't prime for a long time, now it's replaced by random loot that comes on just about any slot - and you can get it at a higher ML with augment slots. Necklace of Contemplation ... accuracy when it was rare was neat - but everyone is rocking deadly now. Gloves of Ogre power ... are worse than lootgen, and certainly worse than mastercrafted lootgen..

So true on those Gloves of Ogre Power! I get a chuckle every time I pull a pair. These need some love badly!

[dunklezhan]

I like to compare similar items of similar level. In my world I would expect a L27 random to be more powerful than a L20 named. You ask a very valid question. Are people comparing apples to oranges?

I see less variety in loot drops, but have not encountered random loot being more powerful than named per se. However, I've noticed there are some raid items that could use a refresh to compete with the deadly/seeker randoms. And in general. Perhaps I see it as the raid loot has not kept up with the times.

I would not necessarily expect the Elite version of that same L20 item (so L22 presumably) to be much, if any, worse than that same L27 item however, and I would certainly expect that if that L20 item came from a raid it should also be a lot better. Elite and Raids are clearly a lot tougher and usually you need multiple runs to get that one thing, sometimes a lot more than 'multiple' if you see what I mean, if there are scrolls and such involved. Randoms are just that - random. They could drop in a L28 casual where you're running on autopilot at cap, very little effort involved. Named, in my view, should remain viable gear for a lot longer when compared against random loot. I say this as someone who does not have any truly hard/grind to get named items except, sigh, the Bloodstone. The point being that named loot getting significantly better does nothing but put me at further disadvantage, except maybe it would give me another few levels use use out of the very few raid items I have. And I would still be in favour because it's entirely fair.

[Thumbed_Servant]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

Not current, but I remember this random-overpowering-named started easily with MotU.

The Epic Ornamented Dagger got put by the wayside by most anyone that had farmed Crystal Cove to get one. Simple random generated loot would have better Potency on it than the Ornamented Dagger, and while the dagger has other enchantments on it, the Potency is the core enchantment that makes it worthwhile.

[rakhtal]

Bracers - Random loot is the ONLY place to get healing amp in this slot.

What about Levik bracers?

[Ungood]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

Just to give a small example of the larger problem.

Minos Legends - Heavy Fort, Colorless Slot, ML11
Loot-Gen - Heavy Fort - ML 9, + Colorless Slot +2 ML, = ML 11

Ok, now, pause and ponder this, what was once the best helm in the game can be equaled by Loot-gen.

Now if you pull a major luck roll and get Masterful Caftsman, or Cursed, your Heavy Fort + Colorless Slot is ML 10 and the only thing making it ML11 is the Vitality Shard. That means Loot-Gen coming out today, better then what was once one of the most recommended and sought after helms in the game, and I kid you not when I say people would buy passes and the pack itself, just for that helm.

One of the best head slots, Wrecked by the New Loot Gen system.

If I really wanted to kill the whole thing, I could just get a Dual Slot loot-gen item (level does not matter for a helm, level 1 or 28 is irrelevant), Disjunct it in the Cannith Crafting hall, and add heavy Fort gem (ML 8) and Vitality +20 (ML 11) and I can have up to 2 more abilities to the helm, beyond what the Minos gave, or one really good one, like say... +5 resist or Greater False Life (+30 HP), thus giving me a far superior helm then one of the best known named helms in the game.

This is why the whole "new Loot-gen" system was very bad for the game as a whole, it destroyed many years of what was an established loot principal, it invalidated soo much soo quickly, it really, warped the game, and to be honest, I would not try to fix the new loot gen, I would re-set the system back to what it was right at the turn of MotuD, and build from there.

[Kadriel]

Take a look at lordmarch and those items. They're special. They're unique.

This sums it up for me. It is not only about power, but about uniqueness. Most of the current named loot have random-gen equivalent... Worse - in a min max game, it is much easier to find a "pure" something random gen with what you want then that piece of named (sometimes raid) loot with that.

As stated by many: if you want deadly of acuraccy why would you go with a EE dreamvisor if you can find better random-gen at the same level, or the same benefict at a much lower level. You loose the "extras" but again, this is a min max game.

This makes 90-95% of the named/raid loot replaceable or vendor trash. See the "revamp" to old named loot: adding slots that can only provide bonus about half of the top tier ones of the same level didn't help them AT ALL IMO.

Look at things you can't get anywhere else or at very least one of the bonus should be at least +2 (price mod) higher than random loot at that level. I'd much rather the former myself

[Kadriel]

This is why the whole "new Loot-gen" system was very bad for the game as a whole, it destroyed many years of what was an established loot principal, it invalidated soo much soo quickly, it really, warped the game, and to be honest, I would not try to fix the new loot gen, I would re-set the system back to what it was right at the turn of MotuD, and build from there.

Also this^

[FoggyKnight]

I would love to see Druids be able to wear Hide armor. I forget why it was not put in, but they have medium armor proficiency and can't wear most medium armor in game due to it being 99% metal and therefore against their oaths. Light armor does not cut it when trying to aim for not getting hit. I don't want to have to splash monk to gain protection.

[Golddragon87]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

Weapons and to a lesser degree armor are what people walk around in and show off to their fellow players. People do not want to be seen holding a randomly generated weapon, it looks bad. Often times if I see a weapon that possesses one of the 3 or 4 base weapon skins for random items I assume it it is a newer player that has just not farmed out something better yet. A named item is a trophy of sorts that shows to others your accomplishment of acquiring such a "rare" item. Admittedly the logic is extremely flawed but many players still hold to it. If it is not named they do not want to be using it because random gen is "noobish". This is pretty universal in every MMO. People want their "1337 W4@P0N5" to be unique and special. So best in slot always has to be some kind of unique named or crafted (shroud style) weapon. Because of this mind set you will see many people using named weapons long after Random Gen starts dropping superior versions.

Best recommendation I have is make a lot of named items with many unique enhancements (Shroud crafting anyone?). If their is no "Obvious best in slot" item and every quest drops named items that each have their own merits then more of a variety of quests will be run to acquire them. It is the best way as a developer to use player psychology against them and encourage a variety of quests to remain desirable even in end game content.

[MeliCat]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

I was somewhat horrified to see level 15 gloves with +8 con with them. After all efforts we went to get just +7 stat items from level 20 raid loot items and epic items. And random loot gen +2/3/4/5 for DCs for spell schools? For casters a couple of fairly ordinary two handers are now better than a level 25 raid fully upgraded item? Deadly is just an amazing thing to just casually toss in as random items. It is that alone that makes me wonder if whoever made that decision plays regularly and possibly never raids.

I guess you're now catering to the non raiding crowd now? I spend maybe less than 5% of my time raiding and I'm in one of the most serious raiding guilds on the server. But someone out there came out with "Oh less than 5% of players raid" implying that no efforts or thought to what raiding contributes should be given any weight. But I do wonder where that comment came from. Because after all this uber loot... and making our characters uber... there is *no where to try them out*.... cos... there is *no real end game*....

[Ungood]

I was somewhat horrified to see level 15 gloves with +8 con with them. After all efforts we went to get just +7 stat items from level 20 raid loot items and epic items. And random loot gen +2/3/4/5 for DCs for spell schools? For casters a couple of fairly ordinary two handers are now better than a level 25 raid fully upgraded item? Deadly is just an amazing thing to just casually toss in as random items. It is that alone that makes me wonder if whoever made that decision plays regularly and possibly never raids.

That is pretty much the largest failing of the Loot-Gen system, is that it was designed by someone that had played the game, and in that regard, I really expected them to know better then to do what they did.

[sirgog]

What about Levik bracers?

I stand corrected, although Levik's are definitely weaker than the MOTU bracer possibilities (whichever you need of 10, 20 or 30%, with Heal 13/15 or Superior Parrying/Parrying 8 or some other effect that fits your character better; possibly with one or two augments depending upon the suffix).

[sirgog]

Also for the record. I do not mind some named items being obsoleted by lootgen (such as the Dream Visor); this has always happened from time to time in DDO, with the Invaders Holy/Cold Iron weapon coming to mind. It was one of the best named weapons in the game when heroic Lailat was endgame but a few updates later, Transmuting weapons were introduced and they just outclassed the old weapon. (Transmuting was nerfed to Metalline later; Transmuting broke all DR when it was introduced).

Shadowfail just went too far with this approach because of your desire to introduce +11 stat items and all the other super-high numbers on new gear.

[bsquishwizzy]

Regarding named items:

While we're at it, restore the old Terror Greatsword to its original prominence. A weapon that both aggros AND fears? Idiotic.

They nerfed the PK on it, and I have no idea why. It was a GREAT pre-epic trash-beater that had a specific niche. Then they came out with a similar random lootgen weapon, and made having Terror pointless.

It is a named weapon. It should have some prominence. It should be more powerful than a random loot item. Give it a set of teeth again, and people will run that set of quests to get it, and unsurpress it.

The decision to nerf that weapon was almost criminal...

[Mryal]

Happy Friday, everyone. I’d like to introduce myself as a bit of a new dev face on the forums. First, it’s about time I quit lurking, and second, I’m putting on an additional hat on the DDO team. What hat is that? In a word: loot. I’m here to listen to you and to keep my eyes on the big picture. Yes, that includes avoiding Ghostbane-situations.

So in the name of listening rather than blathering on and on, I’d like to ask you all a few questions as a sort of pulse-check on the state of loot. Go on and fill up the thread – I’ll check back in after the weekend (and a bit today, as schedule permits), with head-nods, follow-up questions, and answers where necessary.

- Aside from the diversity issue, what are the biggest problems with random loot, today?
- What weapon and equipment types do you feel are underserved in named and in random loot?
- I’d love to hear about some of the non-named loot your character’s are currently wearing.

(In the future, I’m planning some similar question sessions about named loot and named loot systems, BTW.)

Welcome sir.
My theory about random loot.And about loot in general.Loot in DDO does not follow the natural level your character really has in any way, see, in DDO, our 'fake' level range is currently 1-28.That leaves very little room for creativity in any way, and forces you guys to keep releasing more and more powerfull items so they seem appealing, and quickly outdating what was done before (Deadly goggles annyone?).

The thing is, your true level in DDO is Current level + Number of heroic lives * 20.
What does this means? we should have level 40 gear? no, absolutly not.We can, however, create things like :
<DNT TBD Sorc life item loot> : this gives you +10 stacking elemental spellpower for each sorcerer past life you have.

OR

<DNT TBD Monk life item loot> : this gives you +1% stacking dodge and max dodge bonus for each monk past life you have.

And so on...Make these to be added in addition to item sufix/affix rarely.Just a thought.Im sure theres a lot more to think on this subject

[HatsuharuZ]

I was somewhat horrified to see level 15 gloves with +8 con with them. After all efforts we went to get just +7 stat items from level 20 raid loot items and epic items. And random loot gen +2/3/4/5 for DCs for spell schools? For casters a couple of fairly ordinary two handers are now better than a level 25 raid fully upgraded item? Deadly is just an amazing thing to just casually toss in as random items. It is that alone that makes me wonder if whoever made that decision plays regularly and possibly never raids.

Well said!

[Zeez]

Dear Santa, all I want for Christmas is an Epic ring of spell storing or at least some of the rare Seal/Shards to actually show up in chests.

The Pale Green Ioun Stone is stupidly rare. 7 Ransacks total and not 1 drop. Would like a 20th reward option on quests for stupidly rare items like this.

Id love some sort of trade in system where I can trade 10 of the crappy horrid seals/shards from a pack for the 1-2 semi decent ones.

Whatever happened to soul-stealing, exceptional and insightful items, Convalescence, Various Spell power on helms and rings?

Most of all I'd like a working game. One with less bugs, crashes, memory leaks and outages for preventive and corrective "Maintenance."

[oradafu]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

Not sure about all the raid loot, but the one that I know for sure is that Reaver's Fate Raid weapons are weaker than at level (and lower) Paragon weapons. I haven't bothered to check the weapons from other raids, but I'm sure the results are the same for all of them, except for Shroud. Here's two random examples compared to things I found in the auction house:

* A fully upgraded Dreamspitter is a level 14 +5 Quarterstaff with a base damage rating of 8.93; a +2 Impact II Quarterstaff of Ribcracker II is a level 12 +2 Quarterstaff with a Base damage of 9.90.
* Cloudburst is a level 14 +5 Greatsword with a base damage rating of 13.20; a +2 Frost Greatsword of Destruction is a level 12 +2 Greatsword with a base damage of 13.75.

You'll be able to compare other random weapons with raid weapons better than I, but I'm sure you'll see the same results: seemingly weaker randomly generated weapons are doing more damage than raid weapons. The raid weapons should be doing more damage and they should be comparable to weapons that are at least 4 levels higher.

[Livmo]

Here are some xbows that I have in my golf bag. 2 are pre-update and one is post update. I'm level 25 and I like all these xbows. I have many more. These were easy examples. Can anyone tell which one is post update?

http://i.imgur.com/B9LPHYo.jpg

[Sethvir]

A list of effects, where random lootgen is actually better than named gear, raid gear, set-bonus-gear

- natural armor
- deadly
- accuracy
- speed
- protection
- resistance
- false life


all the caster related stuff i cant cover, cos i only did a few melee lifes after my long hiatus, so im not in the know about those.



- natural armor
# was only available on raidgear (raidgear cos of shards onyl available in raid adq - seal of th earth ml11 +3 natural armor, epic ring ml20 +6 natural armor)
# now ml9 +5 on random available
# highest named is still epic seal of earth with a mere +6, random at that level can provide +7 and if there were any pure ml20 random gen items availabel it would go even up to +9
# to boot it, +5 natural armor was only available as lvl 12 ranger (spell) or ranger active past life feat at char level 12

- deadly
# was not available as such. several item - SETS(!) did sport some damage boosts which all were at least ml18 or ml20 on epic named
# now at lvl 7 we have deadly 4 available, which is the same amount we formerly had at ml18/20
# see also dreamvisor

- accuracy
# was lowest on ml 9 bloodstone available (+6), the epic version (raidgear cos of shards onyl available in raid) sported a whooping +8
# cos of seeker random lootgen effect not being able to be created as single effect on anything beyond ml13 items, it actually doesnt surpass named items / raidgear
# the problem here is, the value of the effect is still lower, so u get the same effect as on the raidgear PLUS other desired effects like deadly/speed.
those extra effects value is also very low so the at the same ml, u get basically 2(!!!) desired effects while the raidgear has only 1

- speed
# basically the same as seeker, and even though the attack speed boost is not as big as on the named items, its as almost as good as the named one and ppl chuck
haste pots like candy anyway, its mostly used cos of teh runspeed and the extra attackspeed in case u forget to use a haste pot
# jorg collar ml13 Melee Alacrity 11%, Striding +25%, Colorless Augment Slot, random lotgen ml13 speed 5 colorless slot (attackspeed 5%, move speed 25%)

- protection
# ioun stone ml5, BUT to make use of it at lvl 5 u had to upgrade it AND TR (not counting stability), icy rainment ml14 +4
# with the devalueing of ioun stones (sure pick on 3rd completion of even casual runs of dd) and the severe lowering of the value in crafting, even the ioun stone
is no longer worth much anymore (crafting ml is 9, with masterfull craftmasnship ml7)
# now the ml24 white flawless dragonscale variants sport a +7 value (+8 on a doble upgraded version = 13 comms of heroism needed ...),
+6 (2 better than rainment) are already available as random lootgen as low as ml17 and even with a augment slot (+7 prot +7 con ml 22 ....)
# random lootgen at ml24 can go to +8 and again, with an additional effect to top it (which is still desireable)
# kundarak wardin bracers ml9 +3, epic ml20 +5

- resistance
# best available on raidgear or any named/set-crafted (dragontouched) is +5 ml20 or ml16
# random lootgen provides +6 at ml11(!!!), even if u cant fit in a high deadly value item, a deadly 2 of resistance 6 item is only ml15,
get a resitance +6 pure item with a slot and ur at ml13 and its much better than anything else at ml16/20

- false life
# mainly minos legends (ml11) and tod necklaces/belts (ml18), cos these items have a very good second effect or even a set effect on top
# now random gen stuff ml11 +25 false life with a yellow slot, any disjuncted ml5 item with green slot and colorless/yellow outshines the minos/sets (crafting)
# any ml11 false life +20 with a green slot is as good as minos

- dodge
# the most sought after item, the chattering ring ml9, got a big nerf wuth the changes to dodge, but even then it was STILL a sought after item.
and not cos of that extra spot on it, and definately not cos of the malus to move silently
# now u get +6% dodge at ml 9 with a curse (minus 1 on a stat)
# if dodge would be able to be the single effect on items past ml1, u basically would get dodge 8% at ml15 (icy rainment 8% ml14)

- magi ( bonus to sp)
# named items were the pearl of power I-X, power X being same as magi and ml9 ( they were realy realy valuable)
# random lootrgen now ml5 magi with a curse



final comment:
i already hear the BUT's, that many of the effects i mentioned on named/raid-gear have also additional effects on those items, contrary to random lootgen that is pure. AND i think thats the biggest problem turbine seems not to understand. Some ppl already mentioned it, ppl build mainly to be strong at a certain point. In regards to that, a pure random gen item with lower/same ml than named/raid-gear that has some extra that doesnt count for that purpose, is simply better.
A monk rather has +8 con +8 resist cloak than envenomed cloak with 7 con and 5 resists, cos the poison guard on that cloak is just fluff and doesnt serve him any purpose. An even the extra slot might often enuf not be good enuf to make the decision for the envenemed cloak ( beside the hassle to get that thing).

[Livmo]

I was questing tonight and for melee I went out with the Nightmare. It's still my favorite although it barely neg. levels now. I pulled the other 2 items tonight from Schinn. Unlike like my earlier xbow post, which was all random loot, this post shows a named epic and 2 random loots of roughly similar levels.

http://i.imgur.com/Ma4AXiH.jpg

[Livmo]

I pulled these bracers in Schinn tonight as well, but when I equipped them my HP went down. I prefer my set that I got from commendation trade-ins. Doesn't make sense to re-work my gear to fit in these bracers. I also use the Arkat's Cord and bracers from GH. Drat I was gonna put them on AH, but forgot!

At level, or around level it would seem the names stuff seems better. Keep in mind tho this is based on my experience in-game and 1 out of how many that play on that particular server doesn't seem like much of a sample size : ) )

http://i.imgur.com/RlL9B1E.jpg

[CarpeNoctu]

I would think a good naming system would go a long way here?
Fictional example:
Light I (1d6 light damage) would become Iridicent
Light II -> Glowing
Light III -> Shining
Light IV -> Starry
Light V -> Lunar
Light VI -> Solar
Light VII -> Luminescent
Light VIII -> Brilliant
Light IX -> Incadescent
Light X -> David Hasselhoff

Just a minor correction... No need to thank me.

[Flavilandile]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

We are always talking at constant Quest/Item Level when we talk of how powerful items should be.

A LVL 28 Named Item should be more powerful than any similar random loot item of the same level.

So if you have a +7 Improved Holy Greatsword of Greater Good ML 28 as Random loot, your named Sword of the Holy Wrath should be better than that ( +8 Greater Holy Greatsword of Exceptional Good with one or two augment slots. ( and it should stay ML 28 ) )

This is how it should scale :

Random loot < Named Loot < Raid Named Loot.

Raid Named Loot being the most powerful items for a given situation.

As a consequence : Random loot found in a quest/raids of a given level should be less powerful than Named Loot found in quests/raids of the same level.

[lyrecono]

- Aside from the diversity issue, what are the biggest problems with random loot, today?
The constant tinkering by someone that doesn't know what (s)he's doing requiring constand fixes to repair the game.
The inabilety to listen to their paying customer base on lamania to fiz it
E.G. Nightmare effect (U14, random loot), Ghostbane (U19), equiping lv 28 items at lv 1(U19) etc

Worthless pre/sufixes (U19)
needles nerfs (vorpal/smiting/etc, i dont remember the Update)


- What weapon and equipment types do you feel are underserved in named and in random loot?
Random, not much, i see most weapon types drop in chests
Named, i seem to be missing named wraps, shields, orbs, non metal druid gear, dps type 2handed gear, repeater Xbows.
Anything to deal with the hyper deflated mob hp and saves, with all the lag, its hard enough to switch weapons all the time, i'm not switching between trip, sunder, stun and finaly dps weapons every other mob, its anoying and slows us down (it's an action MMO, remember?)
2handed weapons need a boost, the (epic) Sword of Shadow has been around for so many years but we still havent seen anyting come close to it's dps besides Skybreaker. Either lower mob hp in EE or give us better tools to deal with them.

And! no more random stat stuff on named items, if you do want +8 or +3 exep stats on dragon helms: let us choose to change/upgrade them with heroic coms (U17?)


- I’d love to hear about some of the non-named loot your character’s are currently wearing.

Main: a deadly resistance item, thats it, even for the +10 stat stuff, i prefer named loot, it has a name, a story, it required effort to get, its reliable.
Compaire it to going to a club/bar, would you pick up the first floosy you meet up with and show her to you parent/friends, only to hear that half the town had the same one? Or would you court the perfect partner, spend effort and making sure (s)he fits your life
same with named items, would you proudly link your ghostbane of fail weapon or your Esos that took time and effort (and just like in real life, your sanity) to create. one that fits your build.....

[Derana]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

I agree with most of those that posted to this question. I think this is mostly about clothing and accessory than weapons. What I know and experience myself is that casters face weapon problems like that the Twilight (+120 Impulse and a self chosen other ability, i took +120 Devotion on my Evoker fvs) sit there at 120 while random loot goes up to 144. Its not nice to have 138 Impulse slotted in ur Twilight to reduce the power difference... While these random loot items are 144 and ML28, people rather use the twilight because of the planar focus of erudtion buff that works only with citw weapons. But they are losing 24 spell power which is a lot and should not happen at all with those citw weapons being the best raid weapons in the game right now. The Celestia is broken (was mentioned before somewhere) but other than that i think most weapons are vendor trash right now because all the good affixes are taken out.

The real problem are, as i and others said already, accessory and clothing items. Seeker/deadly 10 is just too good and should not b in the game... really good stats should be on named/raid loot that makes ppl play the game. Another example how screwed up loot is, is this Guardian's ring, granted end reward, so lets call it random loot because of that, i think from What goes up. the ML19 heroic and the ML27 epic version BOTH give 24 prr. Before u19, the best prr items were the EE bastion shield (12 prr) and then the EE bulwark (15 prr). I paid a lot of money for these shields, they are ML25, just to have them outshined by a somewhat random loot end reward ring that is given to me on any difficulty, heroic or epic casual whatever and i could use it 6 levels earlier than my EE shields. This happened to all named items at some point. If this random loot ring gives 24 prr, my bulwark should give at least 30 but the upgrade never happened and should not happen. If any1 wanted such a ring in the game, it should have been EE named What goes Up loot and nothing else but surely not a granted end reward. Same goes for all these other granted end reward items there: +5 Evocation DC Epic necklace, +4 Evocation heroic necklace version. Both have more than the current Twilight ML23 with +3 Evo focus. There are granted end reward bracers (i think it were bracers, or gloves, from whe) that give like 20% kinetic lore, spell pen 4... Those are all really good items and they are just given out like candy, outshining everything. combined with the seeker, deadly... only the Consuming Darkness ring is better on EE with +12 seeker.. However, What goes up takes long to finish on EE, so its not worth the effort considering u can get +11 seeker from random loot.

Either way, I hope that cleared it up a bit..

[QuantumFX]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

Anything that is a +1 Weapon of Elemental Touch with a red slot. You can Cannith craft all of them. Bump them up to Element 1 at least.

Chaos Band: It’s basically a ML:9, Cursed +4 INT ring with a yellow slot. I can Cannith Craft that without the cursed penalty. Either bump it up to +6 INT *or* do +5 INT and drop the Will save penalty.

Locus of Vol: It’s basically a ML:13, Cursed +5 WIS necklace with a Yellow and Colorless slot. Once again, I can Cannith Craft that without the Taint of Evil. Bump it up to +6 at least.

[Drelak]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

I strongly feel that lvl 9 Red Fens set item stat boni are useless at lvl 9. Random loot has better.

On unrelated note, there seem to have been significant reduction in underwater action items in random loot lately.
Thus I actually took Bubble belt from Sorrowdusk isle end reward list, even though there were lots of other nice options for lvl 10 rogue.

[karl_k0ch]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.
If I do gear planning, I usually do it for a character who's at cap. That's where the character will spend most of his or her time anyway. (This might change with ETRs being available, but until I have the commendations for this, it will be next year.) Because I plan with level 28 in mind, I'm not fazed by minimum level - I just pick what's offering the best bonuses for this slot. That doesn't necessarily mean that I am looking only for ML 26/27/28 items, as DDO has a history of raid items being viable way beyond their minimum level, for example Shroud items (ML 11) or the ToD (ML 18) sets, which both have been in use even when the cap was 25.


Take deadly, for example. Dream Visor on HN/HH/HE/EN/EH/EE has a +1/+1/+2/+3/+4/+5/+6 Competence Bonus to attack and damage at level 12/13/14/23/24/25. From random loot, I found a ML 11 Deadly +4 of Accuracy +2 item, i.e. a damage and to-hit equivalent of the ML23 Dream Visor is available at level 11, just as a ML 11 plain deadly +6 item, which matches the damage bonus of a ML25 item.

Resistance +6 is ML 11, too. Epic Envenomed Cloak is ML20.

Fall of truth items have +8 stats and are ML25. You can find random loot with a +9 stat and a useful attribute at level 24 (thanks to MC or Curses).

[sephiroth1084]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.
The items from the Fall of Truth raid with stat bonuses all go up only to +8, while random lootgen can commonly be found with +9 to a stat, a decent second effect and one or two augment slots, +10 to a stat can be found uncommonly, and even with a decent second effect (+10 stat of +8/9/10 Resistance are up on the AH for not unreasonable sums), rarely these can be found with an augment slot, and +11 stat items can be found as well. When the end game (Epic Elite) has such outrageous saves on the monsters that anyone specializing in an ability (such as spells) that allow a DC, the highest stat bonus you can get is one of the more important considerations on loot. And this is just looking at one facet.

As others have mentioned Deadly of Accuracy items surpass the EE Dream Visor in heroic levels, and at the same level you can get the EE Dream Visor (with considerably effort), you can find Deadly VIII of Accuracy VIII with one or two augment slots littering the AH. I've stopped putting most on the AH at all, because they are so common that they don't sell unless they are exceptional (highest deadly + suffix available at that level with an augment slot or two).

Level 1 (or 2?) gear with Lore (spell critical) chance at 14% (there was a screenshot floating around the forums this weekend) beating out the lore effects on basically every single named item in the game, but especially totally trivializing Arcane Lore (such as on the Epic Blue dragon armors).

Weapons aren't the problem here so much, because all of the best named weapons have improved base damage and critical profiles, as well as multiple effects lumped on them, while lootgen weapons don't get those luxuries, so they can't compare, whereas when you're looking at accessories, missing an extra effect or two for strictly better bonuses is often a no-brainer in favor of the latter. Armor is in a similar category as weapons, because even with the combat system changes, AC just isn't important enough to warrant equipping some junky lootgen with +8 more AC than a named armor with 5 worthwhile effects on it.

All of this serves to illustrate why simply rolling back/reintegrating the weapons tables isn't a sufficient fix, since the bigger problems exist on accessories (helm, necklace, goggles, cloaks, belts, gloves, boots, bracers). Random armor is basically useless, so that's worth dealing with, and random weapons are mostly useless, with a few semi-good combos, but are outclassed by even fairly old named items.

Besides, if you deal with the other stuff first, we can continue to have hilarious Ghostbane threads.

[Derana]

This. My Gloves of the Master Illusionist are ML26, and while I love the +10 Int they give, they are BTC, which I hate, and more importantly they are decidedly weaker than the random ML28 +10 Int +10 Resistance goggles I also have. Was it really the intent to use these gloves for only TWO levels??
Yes the gloves also have an augment slot and some sort of other boost, but even then they simply don't compare.

i'm not sure if dev's understand enough that people tend to stick to their named loot. If i finally got that rare named (raid) loot, i dont wanna throw it away 2 levels (or rather one or two updates) after for some random loot item just because it offers better stats. I kept my Epic Abishai set till U19 because only then I was finally (but sadly) convinced that its better to have 10 dex/10 dodge bracers than the +3 cons bonus from the full abi set. So i changed my gear completely and switched to the Epic White Dragon Bonus + the upgraded Gauntlets of Immortality, ML24 Cloak of Night and dropped all of the Abishai set completely. The random loot, the +10 dex bracers started it, not the named loot. And while people called me silly for keeping the set, i just rly liked it, it took me effort to get it and it didnt bother me pre u19 to have 1 stat missing when max to stat was +8 but now with +10/11?

[Dandonk]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

I have deadly of accuracy goggles that are ML 17, and unbound - that have better combat bonuses than EE Dream Visors. And please don't tell me about the spot bonus. As for the ghost touch property - everyone and their mother has this elsewhere, and is rarely needed in any case. As for slots, you can find better slots in randgen than the single one on the Visors.

There are now randgen +6 resistance items (have a ML 9 one), a bonus formerly only found on high level loot.

[voodoogroves]

I have deadly of accuracy goggles that are ML 17, and unbound - that have better combat bonuses than EE Dream Visors. And please don't tell me about the spot bonus. As for the ghost touch property - everyone and their mother has this elsewhere, and is rarely needed in any case. As for slots, you can find better slots in randgen than the single one on the Visors.

There are now randgen +6 resistance items (have a ML 9 one), a bonus formerly only found on high level loot.

That's like a ML20 or 24 augment too.

[voodoogroves]

I pulled these bracers in Schinn tonight as well, but when I equipped them my HP went down. I prefer my set that I got from commendation trade-ins. Doesn't make sense to re-work my gear to fit in these bracers. I also use the Arkat's Cord and bracers from GH. Drat I was gonna put them on AH, but forgot!

At level, or around level it would seem the names stuff seems better. Keep in mind tho this is based on my experience in-game and 1 out of how many that play on that particular server doesn't seem like much of a sample size : ) )


You pulled out one of the (the?) most useful Eveningstar sets, and a fairly junk set of bracers ;-)

Ideally those named items would be something you put on at their ML and wear for a few levels - so yes, they should be useful compared to higher ML items if you're trying to do the same thing. If named items (those ML20) are only good in your mind until you get to ML21, I think that's another variance.

[nibel]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

It mostly have relation to we being able to access Protection, Resistance, and other stats that were only acessible on epic levels by heroic. Resistance +6 was a rare thing and well-sought. Now you can find ML 11 cloaks with it. This kinda shadows old items with proper numbers, like the Stormsinger Cloak (http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Stormsinger_Cloak).

Sure, this specific cloak still is worth wearing if you are a bard because of being one of the few items with Anthem on it. But you are not equiping it for the resistance bonus. You probably will have resistance in another slot.

The same can be said for most (http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Ghost-Waking_Cloak) epic (http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Giantcraft_Siberys_Compass) items (http://ddowiki.com/page/Kardin's_Eye) with (http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Death's_Locket) resistance (http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Bracers_of_Twisting_Shade) +6 or +7. By epic levels you can easily find +8 or +9 to equip before 28, and make the full jump to +10 or +11 at level 28.

You can make the same paralel with items with seeker, sneak attack damage/deception, fortification, etc.

Dream's Visor is a unique example in the same vein of the Nightmare enchantment becoming acessible by random loot. It used to be a unique enchantment, and turning it into a general enchantment made the named item lose value by proxy. Think like if you made Madstone Rage or Transform Kinect Energy into the random loot tables, the raid items with those properties will instantly lose all their value.

[Ungood]

I was questing tonight and for melee I went out with the Nightmare. It's still my favorite although it barely neg. levels now. I pulled the other 2 items tonight from Schinn. Unlike like my earlier xbow post, which was all random loot, this post shows a named epic and 2 random loots of roughly similar levels.

You only pulled those two weapons, and quite crappy weapons at that, and you want to compare them to raid gear? Gosh, while it;s bad enough that loot gen can surpass raid gear, you want every freaking piece of it to be better?

[/QUOTE]


I pulled these bracers in Schinn tonight as well, but when I equipped them my HP went down.

Not surprised those bracers suck, no slot, nothing, come back and talk when you pull something not so half-backed. Like i said before, it's bad enough that loot-gen can beat raid/named gear in close level ranges, you are prancing off that every bit of loot-gen needs to do it..

[Silken-Akira]

Dear DOCTOR LOOT,

Just wondering if you will be in the DOCTOR WHO Special as his new nemesis?

Otherwise +1 for the initiative.

[Bolo_Grubb]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

Ok so this is not random loot but a case of lower level loot being better then older, but higher level loot.

http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Drow_Maul_of_the_Weapon_Master

Vs

http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Giant%27s_Fist_%28Level_17%29

Yes I know the drow weapon has a higher damage rating but the level 17 Giant's fist has +10 to stun, +10 to sunder and a red augment slot. Making a better choice for a blunt spec THF fighter 5 levels lower then drow weapon.

The dream visor used to be a nice piece of loot to try and work into your gear set up. Random items with Deadly have made the dream visor useless.

[Archetype]

We should never feel like this with our NAMED lootz:

Bilbo: "Sweet! My first named weapon."
https://encrypted-tbn2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSRFYM7fffe0wtCedc8hFDZIekP4n4Gm 8DfSAu2gYxrTvQM1N2i

YEARS LATER:

Bilbo: "This is STING! Take it, if you like. It glows blue when orcs are about."
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSDi0iKZNikt3DC7T-PuB9ZHN5XeP-efaeVIj766OaLLlNns6o5


Frodo: "Um, yeah, about that. See I pulled this sweet randomgenloot sword from some wight chest recently. And since it's +10 Epic BodyfeederIX CosmicIX FinesseIX Holy BurstIX KeenIX MetallineIX ParalyzingIX ScintillatingIX SolarIX Vorpal IX.....of GhostbaneXX, well, Sting would be a bit of a downgrade dude. Thanks but ...pass."

https://encrypted-tbn2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQRm0GrbBr5S6T1U1aGXmnrjdasW6FaF bOgs9ZGeTzK_OIfzcxmWQ

[Miow]

It mostly have relation to we being able to access Protection, Resistance, and other stats that were only acessible on epic levels by heroic. Resistance +6 was a rare thing and well-sought. Now you can find ML 11 cloaks with it. This kinda shadows old items with proper numbers, like the Stormsinger Cloak (http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Stormsinger_Cloak).

Sure, this specific cloak still is worth wearing if you are a bard because of being one of the few items with Anthem on it. But you are not equiping it for the resistance bonus. You probably will have resistance in another slot.

The same can be said for most (http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Ghost-Waking_Cloak) epic (http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Giantcraft_Siberys_Compass) items (http://ddowiki.com/page/Kardin's_Eye) with (http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Death's_Locket) resistance (http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Bracers_of_Twisting_Shade) +6 or +7. By epic levels you can easily find +8 or +9 to equip before 28, and make the full jump to +10 or +11 at level 28.

You can make the same paralel with items with seeker, sneak attack damage/deception, fortification, etc.

Dream's Visor is a unique example in the same vein of the Nightmare enchantment becoming acessible by random loot. It used to be a unique enchantment, and turning it into a general enchantment made the named item lose value by proxy. Think like if you made Madstone Rage or Transform Kinect Energy into the random loot tables, the raid items with those properties will instantly lose all their value.

I'll have to check my character...but by geez i think i pulled a lower than min lvl 11 +6 resistance ring...i will check and get back. Just seems so powerful....

[Drus-the-Axe]

Jeez, reading this thread it's like...like...hell I'm stunned speechless I can't even think of an analogy.

I see 15 pages of discussion, with (maybe!) a half dozen posts total for heroic, non-EE, non-endgame players. Dr Loot, please remember the heroic levels aren't just for casual players.


I've been playing DDO since the month before F2P. I've been VIP for years. I like DDO. I've played on almost every server. I have some 30+ toons over the years. I have some "bad" builds bcause I like flavor or just a little variety and change of pace. I've run every single class, though not all to 20 (bards and barbs were especially irksome pre-Enhancement pass). And I've TR'd maybe 5 times.

I own MotU and Shadowfel expansions. I've run some Wheloon and more Eveningstar, but it's fair to say the vast bulk of my time is heroic. It's a toss up - I spend about half my time in the 1-10 range and the other half mostly at level 10-20 (despite not taking many toons to 20, given the greater XP needed and often lack of quests and parties (**** you Otto)). I prefer PUGs, and finding groups can be all too often harder than finding Arthur's Grail. I've bought TP with real cash as well as a long-standing VIP with earned points (and almost always spent on Tomes, classes and races, and the rare bell or cake; I think I've bought pots twice). I usually run quests on elite, because I'm good enough with a party, but also run hard and normal as appropriate. BB is a nice perk for 2nd+ lives but not a necessity for most of my play (esp at levels 1-10, given how easy it is to level w/o hitting anywhere near every quest).

So I'm not a casual player. Far from it. But I'm also by and large not an epic player. I like perks, but I'm not anal retentive about min-max'ing. This may make me that rare unicorn on the forums, but I suspect I'm far from rare.

It's all well and good to improve the epic experience. But 'the loot problem' runs across all levels, not just epic levels.


A few specific comments to the original query:

I absolutely agree, at same level it should be random loot < named loot < raid named loot. That gives players goals to strive for. The current implementation strongly favors random loot, with lots of negative long-term consequences.
To the earlier comment re Red Fens named loot, it's been a long-time DDO 'feature' that running a quest at level N will net named loot mostly designed for levels <N. That's always been irksome, running a quest and pulling a neat item - that's pointless to equip because you've already leveled past it's usefulness for better options. If you want 1st life toons finding gear for 2nd+ lives it makes some sense, but that's probably not the intent and doesn't seem beneficial overall. I'd be happy to see Turbine improve this, but at least the "pulling named loot at level is usually underwhelming" is nothing new.
Crafting improvements would be nice, but not necessarily the ability to craft anything. Lacerating is sweet, but crafting it would be very hard to balance worth a ****. And game balance is critical to fun and long-term longevity.
Trinkets have always been rare. I can live with that
Collars seem non-existent of late
Why does my pure-Wiz or pure-Sorc always seem to pull more armor than my warriors? Sure random loot is nice, for variety and occasionally to bank for another toon, but this seemed to get more unbalanced over time. Lately it feels like the loot tables were tweaked (or I've just been luckier) as it's not as whacked as it used to be. The point, I don't need or want every random loot item to be useful to my toon, but variety is the spice of life.
Lacerating. Solar. Crusader. Burst. All those fun names went away in u20. I much prefer them. Keep the same weapon stats, just give them cool names again.
+skill items seems rarer than raid loot. since u20. My rogues and artis are especially pained, as finding +openlock, disable, search and spot gear is rarer than a blue moon of late.
Variety. Everything I pull lately seems to be deadly, accuracy, ghostbane, riposte or a rare other item. Loot is DEADLY DULL now.

[Grecan]

I would think a good naming system would go a long way here?
Fictional example:
Light I (1d6 light damage) would become Iridicent
Light II -> Glowing
Light III -> Shining
Light IV -> Starry
Light V -> Lunar
Light VI -> Solar
Light VII -> Luminescent
Light VIII -> Brilliant
Light IX -> Incadescent
Light X -> Termic Lance

While not as straightforward, it sure would be more evocative, and most people should be able to figure out that Shining is better than Iridicent, and not as good as incandescent.
(and yes these particular names sound better as prefixes, but how else could you find a Brilliant Longsword of Greater Ghostbane? :P )

Greetz,
Red OrmLots of people playing DDO don't have English as their native language (not saying that it's not possible for them to have a better command of the language than native-English-speaking people, but anyway...). So maybe using all those different words to describe basically the same effect in different degrees is not the best way to go. Light I-II-III-IV etc. is simpler imo.


On another note, the items' names should be clear enough that people understand what their effects are without having to read the desriptions.
I noticed Smiting weapons and Improved Smiting have exactly the same suffix (Smiting) - and there are probably more similar examples - that is confusing.
A possible good measure to indicate if some items' suffixes and prefixes are ok or they need to be changed might be the easiness to search for those and compare them with similar ones on the AH.

[daboyz]

I would like to see the loot in chests changed to exclude gems, spell materials, and healer kits and the like. Only poor kobolds and stupid trogs keep loot like that in their treasure chests, and it's only because they can't eat or trade them. I would rather have less junk, and fewer, but better good stuff, especially if I am under the influence of a +2 loot boost that I have purchased from DDO store. I would like to see more good luck items, and healing items, in chests, since these could legitimately be considered treasure by the monsters I am about to slay and skin.

[Singular]

Happy Friday, everyone. I’d like to introduce myself as a bit of a new dev face on the forums. First, it’s about time I quit lurking, and second, I’m putting on an additional hat on the DDO team. What hat is that? In a word: loot. I’m here to listen to you and to keep my eyes on the big picture. Yes, that includes avoiding Ghostbane-situations.

So in the name of listening rather than blathering on and on, I’d like to ask you all a few questions as a sort of pulse-check on the state of loot. Go on and fill up the thread – I’ll check back in after the weekend (and a bit today, as schedule permits), with head-nods, follow-up questions, and answers where necessary.

- Aside from the diversity issue, what are the biggest problems with random loot, today?

Everyone seems to think named loot should be better than random, but I'd like random to be tiered into something like common, uncommon, rare, extremely rare, etc., so that some amazing random items are worth keeping and keeping an eye out for.


- What weapon and equipment types do you feel are underserved in named and in random loot?

1. Random loot:

We're missing everything from previous updates. All the stuff from Menace of the Underdark - that was fun, interesting stuff. The random drops had names and could be pretty powerful. So much more fulfilling that Weapon of Flaming 2 plus Riposte 3 or whatever. Nothing could be less interesting than having chartered accountant named items in a fantasy game.

Why eliminate the previous update's loot? Why not just add to it?

2. Named loot:

I'm not a huge fan of "only one item is best in slot." I like choices. So I'd like to see a variety of "best in slot" items.

Artificers could use a greater variety of crossbows. Currently in Epic we have 3: the Slaver's Hand, Needle and the Trapsmith's (outside of those you can make epic). Once you get Needle, there's no point in using other crossbows. Also, we don't have any named epic Great Crossbows - it would be great if you could come up with a variety of compelling alternatives to Needle.

Arties could also use more rune arms. We only have one epic force rune arm and it's a level 20 one. We need some rune arms from levels 26 and up. It would be nice if they represented all lines of damage, but please make at least another force rune arm.

Khopesh! There are no great named epic khopesh. There are a lot of "oh, I guess it's better than random loot." Currently the highest damage dealing khopesh is the Drow Weapon Master. We need some raid loot named khopeshes. The two-handers have lots of choice (though they could still use more), but twf, not so much.

Additionally, it would be nice if some level 25+ items, named or random, had effects that weren't gimped by having low dc's. You guys made great inroads here, with revamping cursespewing and improved vorpal, improved bannishing, etc. I'm not sure it's enough - there are, for example, no effects that I'd use in EE content for consistent CC output. But in heroic, any paralyzer will do.

3. Item Upgrades:

It would be very, very nice if we could continue to upgrade our "best in slot" items. I'd like to be able to add an augment slot onto any item without one. Allowing players to add augment slots to items would:

- increase personalization of equipment
- extend the life of equipment
- allow older loot to have greater purpose

You could do this in a variety of ways. I'd recommend a tiered, expensive system that required commendations of heroism, but you could also do it with coms of valor. I'd also recommend that only items without slots be allowed to be upgraded thusly, though from a character's perspective, it would be nice to add, say, another red augment slot to Needle (it already has one when fully upgraded; two would be perfect).

For example, some worry that CITW items will be outdated by newer content. Well, if we could add an augment slot to the planar focus trinkets, they'd have greatly renewed life. For my sorc, Twilight and the Planar Focus, erudition is not best in slot, partly b/c the trinket lacks an augment slot, but also b/c Twilight has miserable Lore on it and so cannot compete with random loot.

3a. Upgrading existing items:

It would be nice if we could continue to upgrade our items. As I mentioned above, Twilight just isn't good enough. It needs Lore upgrades and spell power upgrades. Plus, the trinket just isn't great w/out an augment slot. So if we could have one or two more tiers of upgrades, that would be great.

In fact, it would be great on most items - it would keep players running raids, saving up their coms, etc. The flawless dragon armors, for example, only have one blue slot. It would be nice if we could add a colorless, then a yellow, etc. Two augments on this isn't going to make us overpowered, but will give us a bit more to work for.


- I’d love to hear about some of the non-named loot your character’s are currently wearing.

(In the future, I’m planning some similar question sessions about named loot and named loot systems, BTW.)

Let's see...

Sorc: Gogles of Cha +10 (accuracy is the suffix, but I don't use it), Belt of Con:8, False Life: 40. Still looking for better, would like to increase my dodge. I use Twilight and Erudition to bump up my spell points and once I spend it, I swap out to a Magnetism Scepter of Kinetic Lore and a Glaciation Scepter of Cold lore + red augment slot fitted w/impulse (I have electric lore on named bracers).

Artie: Goggles of Deadly 9, Resist 10; Belt of Fortification 120% and dodge 8% w/a colorless augment slot. Everything else is named.

Fighter: Still equipping, but some kind of Deadly item, Fort item, Dodge item. I don't use this toon much, so not a lot of named items.

[Singular]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

Deadly from about level 15 is better than EE Dream Visor, at level 25. Most belts from about level 20 on are better than Arkat's Cord (I recommend adding 120% fortification to it to make it useful).

Any item from pre-19 with Lore on it is basically worthless. Take Flawless Blue Dragonscale and Twilight, for example - each confer Lore of 6%. While they were great when introduced, they are now meaningless because spell criticals were changed and new loot to match. Now any Lore item after about level 12 or so is better.

[Livmo]

Everyone seems to think named loot should be better than random, but I'd like random to be tiered into something like common, uncommon, rare, extremely rare, etc., so that some amazing random items are worth keeping and keeping an eye out for.



1. Random loot:

We're missing everything from previous updates. All the stuff from Menace of the Underdark - that was fun, interesting stuff. The random drops had names and could be pretty powerful. So much more fulfilling that Weapon of Flaming 2 plus Riposte 3 or whatever. Nothing could be less interesting than having chartered accountant named items in a fantasy game.

Why eliminate the previous update's loot? Why not just add to it?

2. Named loot:

I'm not a huge fan of "only one item is best in slot." I like choices. So I'd like to see a variety of "best in slot" items.

Artificers could use a greater variety of crossbows. Currently in Epic we have 3: the Slaver's Hand, Needle and the Trapsmith's (outside of those you can make epic). Once you get Needle, there's no point in using other crossbows. Also, we don't have any named epic Great Crossbows - it would be great if you could come up with a variety of compelling alternatives to Needle.

Arties could also use more rune arms. We only have one epic force rune arm and it's a level 20 one. We need some rune arms from levels 26 and up. It would be nice if they represented all lines of damage, but please make at least another force rune arm.

Khopesh! There are no great named epic khopesh. There are a lot of "oh, I guess it's better than random loot." Currently the highest damage dealing khopesh is the Drow Weapon Master. We need some raid loot named khopeshes. The two-handers have lots of choice (though they could still use more), but twf, not so much.

Additionally, it would be nice if some level 25+ items, named or random, had effects that weren't gimped by having low dc's. You guys made great inroads here, with revamping cursespewing and improved vorpal, improved bannishing, etc. I'm not sure it's enough - there are, for example, no effects that I'd use in EE content for consistent CC output. But in heroic, any paralyzer will do.

3. Item Upgrades:

It would be very, very nice if we could continue to upgrade our "best in slot" items. I'd like to be able to add an augment slot onto any item without one. Allowing players to add augment slots to items would:

- increase personalization of equipment
- extend the life of equipment
- allow older loot to have greater purpose

You could do this in a variety of ways. I'd recommend a tiered, expensive system that required commendations of heroism, but you could also do it with coms of valor. I'd also recommend that only items without slots be allowed to be upgraded thusly, though from a character's perspective, it would be nice to add, say, another red augment slot to Needle (it already has one when fully upgraded; two would be perfect).

For example, some worry that CITW items will be outdated by newer content. Well, if we could add an augment slot to the planar focus trinkets, they'd have greatly renewed life. For my sorc, Twilight and the Planar Focus, erudition is not best in slot, partly b/c the trinket lacks an augment slot, but also b/c Twilight has miserable Lore on it and so cannot compete with random loot.

3a. Upgrading existing items:

It would be nice if we could continue to upgrade our items. As I mentioned above, Twilight just isn't good enough. It needs Lore upgrades and spell power upgrades. Plus, the trinket just isn't great w/out an augment slot. So if we could have one or two more tiers of upgrades, that would be great.

In fact, it would be great on most items - it would keep players running raids, saving up their coms, etc. The flawless dragon armors, for example, only have one blue slot. It would be nice if we could add a colorless, then a yellow, etc. Two augments on this isn't going to make us overpowered, but will give us a bit more to work for.



Let's see...

Sorc: Gogles of Cha +10 (accuracy is the suffix, but I don't use it), Belt of Con:8, False Life: 40. Still looking for better, would like to increase my dodge. I use Twilight and Erudition to bump up my spell points and once I spend it, I swap out to a Magnetism Scepter of Kinetic Lore and a Glaciation Scepter of Cold lore + red augment slot fitted w/impulse (I have electric lore on named bracers).

Artie: Goggles of Deadly 9, Resist 10; Belt of Fortification 120% and dodge 8% w/a colorless augment slot. Everything else is named.

Fighter: Still equipping, but some kind of Deadly item, Fort item, Dodge item. I don't use this toon much, so not a lot of named items.

I agree. I hope there will be some new crossbows and rune arms that are in the L27-30 range. Also, it would be nice if the rune arms had a red/orange/purple augment slot(s) to boost spell power since arties lost some spell power in the Enhancement pass. If you look at the L25 Epic Gianthold rune arms they have 2 slots for auggies, but no place for a red to boost spell power.

http://ddowiki.com/page/Rune_Arm

[DrOctothorpe]

Dear DOCTOR LOOT,

Just wondering if you will be in the DOCTOR WHO Special as his new nemesis?

Otherwise +1 for the initiative.

I have a walk-on cameo, but you do not see my face. That reveal awaits the NEXT Doctor.

:-P

[Leclaire1]

We should never feel like this with our NAMED lootz:

Bilbo: "Sweet! My first named weapon."
https://encrypted-tbn2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSRFYM7fffe0wtCedc8hFDZIekP4n4Gm 8DfSAu2gYxrTvQM1N2i

YEARS LATER:

Bilbo: "This is STING! Take it, if you like. It glows blue when orcs are about."
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSDi0iKZNikt3DC7T-PuB9ZHN5XeP-efaeVIj766OaLLlNns6o5


Frodo: "Um, yeah, about that. See I pulled this sweet randomgenloot sword from some wight chest recently. And since it's +10 Epic BodyfeederIX CosmicIX FinesseIX Holy BurstIX KeenIX MetallineIX ParalyzingIX ScintillatingIX SolarIX Vorpal IX.....of GhostbaneXX, well, Sting would be a bit of a downgrade dude. Thanks but ...pass."

https://encrypted-tbn2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQRm0GrbBr5S6T1U1aGXmnrjdasW6FaF bOgs9ZGeTzK_OIfzcxmWQ

This is my favorite post so far in my history on the ddo forums. +1 Rep. A great point and made with great humor and wit. Bravo!

[DemonStorm333]

I have a walk-on cameo, but you do not see my face. That reveal awaits the NEXT Doctor.

:-P

hmmmmm Peter Capaldi works for turbine I thought being the next doctor would have paid more :P haha guess steven moffat needs to pay him more monies..... ugh I know your under that zygon mask no wounder they returned lol

[mons]

While I agree with just about everything everyone has said (upto the point that I read) about random loot<named loot<raid loot, I think the fact that the last RAID we received was in February of 2012. With that said, the Updates that we do get on a somewhat consistent basis will be rather meh as far as loot would go. If raids aren't going to be released with every other update or even every xpac then the discussion of random<named<raid is pretty much worthless imo.

[ComicRelief]

Dear DOCTOR LOOT,

Just wondering if you will be in the DOCTOR WHO Special as his new nemesis?

Otherwise +1 for the initiative.

I have a walk-on cameo, but you do not see my face. That reveal awaits the NEXT Doctor.

:-P

Of course, we all know that, according to cannon, there are but (2) Doctors remaining, as a Time Lord can only regenerate 12 times.

...except, The Master managed to find a loop hole...
;)

{PS (Off-Topic) - Thanks Cordovan! I finally have my old (slightly modified) 'face' in the fora (sorry, "forums")! Woot!}
;)

[EllisDee37]

I think the fact that the last RAID we received was in February of 2012.The last raid we got was February of this year, not last year. February 2012 was before MotU, which was summer 2012.

[redoubt]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

To your question: I'm using random gen leve 11-15 deadly items over level 20 epic raid gear.

We used to farm the level 4 market place series and the second lordsmarch series to get good twink gear, but now that stuff drops everywhere.

While not named/raid vs random, the new named but not raid items are more powerful than older raid loot as well. Many of the items from the wheloon prison series are better than similar level loot that is raid loot, i.e. shroud crafted items.

I can see how this new and very powerful and easy to get gear helps new players bridge the gap very quickly, so maybe this is actually what you want, but I thought I through out a couple observations on the loot.

[Loromir]

I loved a lot of the random loot that was brought on for MOTU. There were alot on neat effect on those. Things like, Sun's Fry, 1000 suns, etc. Bring back all the random loot that was created for MOTU and add it to the existing loot table. I'm not concerned if they all have a high drop rate, just the opportunity to see those in the chest made each chest interesting.

Riposte, Retributive, Ghostbane, Rapid Strikes are all fine, but drop way too often.

I Liked the imagination and creativity of random loot post MOTU...but imagination went down the drain post Shadowfell when they eliminated all that MOTU stuff.

[Leclaire1]

Regarding random loot that is more powerful than named / raid items: what are the level ranges you guys are seeing this on? There's a bit of a difference between a level 27 random sword vs a level 21 named one... and when those items when found in the same level range content.

Definitely the problem begins with the crappy Sage's, etc. Shadowfell Items and random items similar to them around level 15. Prior to that, I think things are generally speaking in a different place. I've farmed out great HTR gear on my main, and I wouldn't trade almost any of it, esp. weapons, for anything random. Even with the Shadowfail random item bloating from levels 15-20, I still think hard-earned raid gear and other named stuff earned through quests wins out, as it generally should. Its once you get to epic that the wheels fall off, especially with regard to weapons. The CiTW weapons still rule the roost, but random stuff unfortunately destroys other named items, which is really bad. Most of the problem isn't the named items themselves, esp. gear, but that lootgen just destroys them. We need to remember that there are two major goals in building a character other than being social and enjoying content: building a character's nuts and bolts via xp and TRs, and building a character's gearset. When named items aren't worth running a quest for or buying, that part of the game ceases to be fun.


Weapons - Named weapons and raid weapons are a very mixed bunch. Most random lootgen is better than that Study in Sable greatsword, but no random loot comes close to even the classic Sword of Shadow (much less the Epic one).

Jewellery - Deadly and Resistance on jewellery are better than 90% of raid loot at pretty much all levels.

Bracers - Random loot is the ONLY place to get healing amp in this slot. (Edit: I stand corrected, there's a totally obsolete HOX bracer set that can fill this role, but legacy lootgen items are the only place for 10% (for characters wearing a TOD ring for 20% and PDK/Claw for 30%) or 30% (unquestioned best-in-slot for every melee toon not wearing PDK gloves). Also the legacy lootgen is better than any alternative for 20% in this slot.



Some useful case studies here. The Hunter's Greatsword has one unique feature, namely that it is a +8 sword with greater keen, which gives it an extra 2.5 damage dice. Yet a random items could presumably have this, which makes the named item somewhat of a joke. No one will ever use it while random items are better, and it doesn't even compete with other named 2H weapons very well despite being very high level. This is true of most of the non-raid weapons since the pass. They shouldn't beat out raid loot for sure, but as they need to be earned and not gained through luck they should be better than 90% of lootgen and not the opposite.

Yes, the Jewelry is where the transgressions are the greatest. Ughh. Please nerf all the random ****, esp. all the super high seeker, deadly, and speedy stuff. If this came on named items also and not just lootgen it would be good, esp. if the named items had better stuff.

As to heal amp, I'm not against it being on lootgen, but it should also be on more named items as it is now considered essential. All melees shouldn't feel compelled to choose the gloves for it, they should be able to wear other gloves without giving up heal amp entirely. This is where named items need some diversity.


Everyone seems to think named loot should be better than random, but I'd like random to be tiered into something like common, uncommon, rare, extremely rare, etc., so that some amazing random items are worth keeping and keeping an eye out for.


Meh, not totally against lootgen having situational value, and there should be enough utility in it for players to use it until they've farmed named. Categorizing it could be a decent idea. Nonetheless, if this is too difficult I'm personally fine with it remaining vendor trash, as the troll suggested. Name items are earned through dedicated questing whereas lootgen is gained through blind luck. I'm most glad to see the acknowledgement that almost everyone seems to think that named should be better in most cases, and that raid items should be best of all.



I'm not a huge fan of "only one item is best in slot." I like choices. So I'd like to see a variety of "best in slot" items.


I agree, which is why we need more named item diversity in Shadowfell and new content. We also need less coveted things like seeker in grossly high values on lootgen so as to make named irrelevant. Through the High Road pack we had some really interesting stuff. I had to make agonizing choices about whether to equip The Nether Grasps for the high seeker bonus (which was rare then, and has been grossly inflated and made common since Shadowfell) and other perks, the PDK gauntlets, which buffed my Con, gave me my STR bonus in the gloves slot, and gave me coveted heal amp, and the Fabricator's Ganutlets, which gave me alacrity and a very unique set bonus with the bracers. In the bracers dept. I had to choose between twisting shade, which have me lots of good things, the fab bracers for the set bonus and unique infusion ability, and the sunsoul bracers which gave me a needed wisdom boost for saves and superior parrying, and lootgen heal amp bracers. Tough choices like this a very good, and guide us in how we build our characters. In the present day endgame, I just where the unique PDK gloves, which are the only choice, and easily pick up all the other stuff on random ****, or the too-easily earned skirmisher's etc. sets. This ruins the loot game very badly.


Deadly from about level 15 is better than EE Dream Visor, at level 25. Most belts from about level 20 on are better than Arkat's Cord (I recommend adding 120% fortification to it to make it useful).

Any item from pre-19 with Lore on it is basically worthless. Take Flawless Blue Dragonscale and Twilight, for example - each confer Lore of 6%. While they were great when introduced, they are now meaningless because spell criticals were changed and new loot to match. Now any Lore item after about level 12 or so is better.

Interesting how often EE Dream Visor comes up. This is because it is the best illustration of the problems in the system.

In fairness, the 6% lore is universal spell lore, which still cannot be found much on lootgen stuff. Most of the lootgen and other items do have high values, but it is to a specific damage type, whereas the 6 is universal. Still, the above items are hard-earned and higher-level, and a base 9% upgradeable to 12% via comms would be better. It would still give the edge to specific damage lores while making the harder to get arcane lore and bit more powerful.


After all those comments, thanks for reading them and welcome to the forums, Doctor. I appreciate your dedication to fixing this problem and your willingness to listen to the community, and hopefully make all the hours we've put into writing this stuff worthwhile. Thanks again.

[Coyopa]

Happy Friday, everyone. I’d like to introduce myself as a bit of a new dev face on the forums. First, it’s about time I quit lurking, and second, I’m putting on an additional hat on the DDO team. What hat is that? In a word: loot. I’m here to listen to you and to keep my eyes on the big picture. Yes, that includes avoiding Ghostbane-situations.

So in the name of listening rather than blathering on and on, I’d like to ask you all a few questions as a sort of pulse-check on the state of loot. Go on and fill up the thread – I’ll check back in after the weekend (and a bit today, as schedule permits), with head-nods, follow-up questions, and answers where necessary.

- Aside from the diversity issue, what are the biggest problems with random loot, today?
- What weapon and equipment types do you feel are underserved in named and in random loot?
- I’d love to hear about some of the non-named loot your character’s are currently wearing.

(In the future, I’m planning some similar question sessions about named loot and named loot systems, BTW.)



As far as the biggest problems with random loot today ...
1. GHOSTBANE MUST GO! There is no need for it. It is about as worthless an affix as you can get.

2. Bring back Ghost Touch. Ghost Touch of Disruption weapons were *the best* random generated weapons for this niche. I even prefer Ghost Touch of Undead Bane.

3. Personally, I hate the generic "retributive" type affixes. Go back to Fire Guard, Frost Guard, etc. You can still use your I, II, III, IV, and so on, but those should be in the name. If I find a piece of armor with deathblock and a guard on it (let's say Fire Guard for this example), then it should be named +3 Fire Guard II Outfit of Deathblock III.

4. Deadly, Accuracy, and Speed affixes should be removed. They are too powerful and were previously found only on powerful named loot. They should not be on random generated loot. Period.

When it comes to weapon and equipment being underserved ...
I will have to have a think about that and get back to you. Off the top of my head:
1. longswords worth having and using at epic levels
2. spell power weapons that are not your usual caster weapon, such as the kama - I have a druid that uses kamas and have concluded that a good glaciation kama of ice lore (above 66 spell power) does not exist in random generated loot. "Usual caster weapon" are the ones that casters are most often proficient with: clubs, staves, etc.

Finally, as far as what random loot my characters are wearing ...
My characters only use non-named loot while they are leveling. It would be the usual fare of +stat, blindness immunity, fortification, feather falling, striding, and so on. Once my characters reach 20, they put away all their non-named loot and get out the House C, epic (shard/scroll/seal), and other named gear from MotU. I have yet to see a piece of non-named loot compelling enough to dislodge any of my characters' gear at 20+.

[Raliar]

Everyone seems to think named loot should be better than random, but I'd like random to be tiered into something like common, uncommon, rare, extremely rare, etc., so that some amazing random items are worth keeping and keeping an eye out for.



1. Random loot:

We're missing everything from previous updates. All the stuff from Menace of the Underdark - that was fun, interesting stuff. The random drops had names and could be pretty powerful. So much more fulfilling that Weapon of Flaming 2 plus Riposte 3 or whatever. Nothing could be less interesting than having chartered accountant named items in a fantasy game.

Why eliminate the previous update's loot? Why not just add to it?

2. Named loot:

I'm not a huge fan of "only one item is best in slot." I like choices. So I'd like to see a variety of "best in slot" items.

Artificers could use a greater variety of crossbows. Currently in Epic we have 3: the Slaver's Hand, Needle and the Trapsmith's (outside of those you can make epic). Once you get Needle, there's no point in using other crossbows. Also, we don't have any named epic Great Crossbows - it would be great if you could come up with a variety of compelling alternatives to Needle.

Arties could also use more rune arms. We only have one epic force rune arm and it's a level 20 one. We need some rune arms from levels 26 and up. It would be nice if they represented all lines of damage, but please make at least another force rune arm.

Khopesh! There are no great named epic khopesh. There are a lot of "oh, I guess it's better than random loot." Currently the highest damage dealing khopesh is the Drow Weapon Master. We need some raid loot named khopeshes. The two-handers have lots of choice (though they could still use more), but twf, not so much.

Additionally, it would be nice if some level 25+ items, named or random, had effects that weren't gimped by having low dc's. You guys made great inroads here, with revamping cursespewing and improved vorpal, improved bannishing, etc. I'm not sure it's enough - there are, for example, no effects that I'd use in EE content for consistent CC output. But in heroic, any paralyzer will do.

3. Item Upgrades:

It would be very, very nice if we could continue to upgrade our "best in slot" items. I'd like to be able to add an augment slot onto any item without one. Allowing players to add augment slots to items would:

- increase personalization of equipment
- extend the life of equipment
- allow older loot to have greater purpose

You could do this in a variety of ways. I'd recommend a tiered, expensive system that required commendations of heroism, but you could also do it with coms of valor. I'd also recommend that only items without slots be allowed to be upgraded thusly, though from a character's perspective, it would be nice to add, say, another red augment slot to Needle (it already has one when fully upgraded; two would be perfect).

For example, some worry that CITW items will be outdated by newer content. Well, if we could add an augment slot to the planar focus trinkets, they'd have greatly renewed life. For my sorc, Twilight and the Planar Focus, erudition is not best in slot, partly b/c the trinket lacks an augment slot, but also b/c Twilight has miserable Lore on it and so cannot compete with random loot.

3a. Upgrading existing items:

It would be nice if we could continue to upgrade our items. As I mentioned above, Twilight just isn't good enough. It needs Lore upgrades and spell power upgrades. Plus, the trinket just isn't great w/out an augment slot. So if we could have one or two more tiers of upgrades, that would be great.

In fact, it would be great on most items - it would keep players running raids, saving up their coms, etc. The flawless dragon armors, for example, only have one blue slot. It would be nice if we could add a colorless, then a yellow, etc. Two augments on this isn't going to make us overpowered, but will give us a bit more to work for.



Let's see...

Sorc: Gogles of Cha +10 (accuracy is the suffix, but I don't use it), Belt of Con:8, False Life: 40. Still looking for better, would like to increase my dodge. I use Twilight and Erudition to bump up my spell points and once I spend it, I swap out to a Magnetism Scepter of Kinetic Lore and a Glaciation Scepter of Cold lore + red augment slot fitted w/impulse (I have electric lore on named bracers).

Artie: Goggles of Deadly 9, Resist 10; Belt of Fortification 120% and dodge 8% w/a colorless augment slot. Everything else is named.

Fighter: Still equipping, but some kind of Deadly item, Fort item, Dodge item. I don't use this toon much, so not a lot of named items.

I think this is a brilliant idea and mentioned it in my post before, what is so horrible is you happened to get a perfectly rolled "EPIC" item that you had a .0000029999 chance of rolling and it could possibly be the best item in the game. Why would that be so horrible!

[mons]

The last raid we got was February of this year, not last year. February 2012 was before MotU, which was summer 2012.

haha, yeah ill chalk not knowing what year it is to go along with the not knowing what day it is usually :)

[Noctus]

yes, everything post MoTU was fail.

I cannot stress this enough . . . out-dating stuff every update just needs to stop. All armors out-dated by GH stuff, Random Gen out-dating all named stuff after one update, needs to stop NOW.

Nobody I run with cares about obtaining any specific items at this point because we all know you're gonna make it garbage next update.

DDO wasn't like this until after MoTU. People still ran Titan and Reaver at level 20 because there was still stuff worth pursuing.

Relevant loot keeps content relevant. This needs to be tatoo'd on the inside of your eyelids.


I have to agree. The much, much too fast obsolescence of items, combined with the randomlootification of named item abilities. For example Seeker or Melee Alacrity (nowadays known as Speed) was only found on a few named items, making it an intersting effect and these items (as well asthe content dropping them) worthy of striving for to acquire them. Or Nightmare on weapons.

Now you can get it everywhere.

[Jasparion]

I'll have to check my character...but by geez i think i pulled a lower than min lvl 11 +6 resistance ring...i will check and get back. Just seems so powerful....

Im pretty sure mine is ML7 - I have a Resist +6 ring which has Curse (-1 Str) and Mastercrafting on it. Depending on my Str at the time its fine for melee/ranged (if I have an odd number I lose nothing when it drops to an even number), and its always good for casters who really dont much care about Str (beyond not dropping to 0 when weakened).

Its unbound so I can swap it between all my toons.

I think others have provided a huge number of examples of issues with loot. Ive also seen a few provide a very simple and easy methodoloy Turbine should follow:

Raid loot > Named loot > Random loot.

I used to love putting on Chrono gear, then swapping to Red Fens gear, then my Sora Kell gear - plus obviously a bunch of Greensteel. Now I used mostly random loot all the way to 20, with maybe 1 or 2 items of crafted stuff, named items, and a couple of Greensteel items (this is partly my fault because I TR before doing 20 runs so cant cleanse my Greensteel items - the irony here is I will have Completionist before I can cleanse, and I wont be needing the gear because I have Completionist).

I think there needs to be a serious review of Raid and Named items with some serious buffs provided - and not just for newly acquired stuff. It should be back-dated. The horse has bolted in terms of Random items, so I dont think a nerf is going to work.

Of course, this then brings us in to power creep issues with the (obvious) solution from Turbine being higher resists for mobs and a truckload more HP. Sadly this seems to be as far as any rework ever goes...

[nibel]

Interesting how often EE Dream Visor comes up. This is because it is the best illustration of the problems in the system.

I think it is because during the period between eGH and SC, it was a unique bonus to damage, and was traded by dozens to otto's boxes. And lots of people are thinking it was unfair to pay $50 for a piece of gear that is currently useless.

Reminds me the guys that buy a lot of stuff on Diablo 3 RMAH before the attack speed nerf.

[sirgog]

The issue with a hard rule of Raid > Named > Random is that it basically means that every chest is useless unless it has named loot.

DDO has almost always had something you really wanted to see in chests - +1 Vorpals at the 10 and 12 caps, +6 Con rings at the 14 cap, Wounding/Puncturing weapons and Holy/Silver weapons at the 16 cap, Superior Potency 6 kamas in the early days of the 20 cap, +3 tomes in the later days of the 20 cap, and Convalescent of Superior Parrying bracers, Primal of Superior Parrying shields, Obscenity weapons and Primal of Spell Proofing robes at the 25 cap.

This adds to the game as long as the items are rare enough that you don't get them all the time, but not so rare that they are never seen. The 14 cap worked well in that regard - people kept running Prison of the Planes for +6 stat rings and elite Litany for Superior Potency 6 items and for +2 tomes.

The present issue is that the best lootgen combinations are super-common, and they outclass everything that came before. It's not that they are 'just a little bit better', they utterly outclass older gear to the point that the Shadowfail loot changes effectively deleted all of the older raids and all of the 25 cap EE content.


I think that if item power level is measured from 1 to 10, 'random' loot should include items from 1 to 8. Named items from easier content should be from 2 to 9, and named items from difficult content 3 to 10. (I'm counting raid items as named items here - I see no reason to make a distinction based on group size, it should be based on content difficulty).

[Hafeal]

Dr. Lootz:

I would echo sirgog's sentiments.

I would also remind you of my plea for all BtC loot outside of Raids to be eliminated and made BtA.


The issue with a hard rule of Raid > Named > Random is that it basically means that every chest is useless unless it has named loot.

DDO has almost always had something you really wanted to see in chests - +1 Vorpals at the 10 and 12 caps, +6 Con rings at the 14 cap, Wounding/Puncturing weapons and Holy/Silver weapons at the 16 cap, Superior Potency 6 kamas in the early days of the 20 cap, +3 tomes in the later days of the 20 cap, and Convalescent of Superior Parrying bracers, Primal of Superior Parrying shields, Obscenity weapons and Primal of Spell Proofing robes at the 25 cap.

This adds to the game as long as the items are rare enough that you don't get them all the time, but not so rare that they are never seen. The 14 cap worked well in that regard - people kept running Prison of the Planes for +6 stat rings and elite Litany for Superior Potency 6 items and for +2 tomes.

The present issue is that the best lootgen combinations are super-common, and they outclass everything that came before. It's not that they are 'just a little bit better', they utterly outclass older gear to the point that the Shadowfail loot changes effectively deleted all of the older raids and all of the 25 cap EE content.


I think that if item power level is measured from 1 to 10, 'random' loot should include items from 1 to 8. Named items from easier content should be from 2 to 9, and named items from difficult content 3 to 10. (I'm counting raid items as named items here - I see no reason to make a distinction based on group size, it should be based on content difficulty).

[Singular]

I agree. I hope there will be some new crossbows and rune arms that are in the L27-30 range. Also, it would be nice if the rune arms had a red/orange/purple augment slot(s) to boost spell power since arties lost some spell power in the Enhancement pass. If you look at the L25 Epic Gianthold rune arms they have 2 slots for auggies, but no place for a red to boost spell power.

http://ddowiki.com/page/Rune_Arm

Couldn't agree more. It's annoying to have to slot spell power augments onto Needle. And the GH rune arms would be a lot more useful if they had a red augment - as it is, they're basically situational only.


Yes, the Jewelry is where the transgressions are the greatest. Ughh. Please nerf all the random ****, esp. all the super high seeker, deadly, and speedy stuff. If this came on named items also and not just lootgen it would be good, esp. if the named items had better stuff.

Do you really think it needs to be nerfed? I'm enjoying my deadly :)


As to heal amp, I'm not against it being on lootgen, but it should also be on more named items as it is now considered essential. All melees shouldn't feel compelled to choose the gloves for it, they should be able to wear other gloves without giving up heal amp entirely. This is where named items need some diversity.

Totally.


Meh, not totally against lootgen having situational value, and there should be enough utility in it for players to use it until they've farmed named. Categorizing it could be a decent idea. Nonetheless, if this is too difficult I'm personally fine with it remaining vendor trash, as the troll suggested. Name items are earned through dedicated questing whereas lootgen is gained through blind luck. I'm most glad to see the acknowledgement that almost everyone seems to think that named should be better in most cases, and that raid items should be best of all.

If random loot is always worse than named loot, never has a chance to be close or compare, then it's only function is to be vendored. That seems boring to me. I'd like rare, interesting random loot - the way MOTU random loot worked was fun.


In fairness, the 6% lore is universal spell lore, which still cannot be found much on lootgen stuff. Most of the lootgen and other items do have high values, but it is to a specific damage type, whereas the 6 is universal. Still, the above items are hard-earned and higher-level, and a base 9% upgradeable to 12% via comms would be better. It would still give the edge to specific damage lores while making the harder to get arcane lore and bit more powerful.

Yeah. But in a min/max game, who relies upon universal lore? Maybe it's b/c I play a sorc that I specialize my lore items.

The biggest problem with Twilight is that lore cannot be specialized or upgraded on it, making random rods and scepters better choices.

[RobbinB]

A: about roman numerals:

1. I find them very helpful. blah blah IV is not as good as blah blah VII
2. I find it a little boring to just number them that way....

I don't have any idea what a solution would be.



The solution is to axe the new system and go back and expand on the old system, which they had started to do. So frost vs icy burst vs icy blast as a damage example; cursespewing vs improved cursespewing vs greater cursespewing as another example. Make unique prefixes and suffixes by combining one or two interesting prefixes/suffixes and make these show up more rarely, eg. Deset sand = slicing winds + impr roaring / slicing / flaming burst or blast.

The new system with Roman numerals is just plain terrible, especially with respect to damage effects.

[Jasparion]

The issue with a hard rule of Raid > Named > Random is that it basically means that every chest is useless unless it has named loot.

If the alternative is that random loot is better than named and raid loot then I am 100% okay with this. Random loot should be what you use before you can get your named loot. Named loot is what you use before you can get your raid loot. Its easy to get random loot (you dont even need to enter a dungeon for most of it). It takes a bit of effort to get named loot. It takes a lot of effort to get raid loot.

[Codect]

Honestly I'd like to go back to the old magic system, pre-spellpower.

There needs to be more heal amp in the game. New augments?

I'd like you to develop a system to bring old epics back into contention. So many items that used to be hard to get but amazing are now completely irrelevant, collecting dust. Adding in a way to upgrade them to be in line with the higher level cap would be great, it would even add more endgame content if you tied it in with the packs they originally come from.. maybe tweak epic elite on those quests to be in line with current level cap quests and add "greater seal/scroll/shard of xxx" to them. With a scroll trade mechanic of course (any 3 for a specified 1 at trader).

[Scraap]

The issue with a hard rule of Raid > Named > Random is that it basically means that every chest is useless unless it has named loot.

DDO has almost always had something you really wanted to see in chests - +1 Vorpals at the 10 and 12 caps, +6 Con rings at the 14 cap, Wounding/Puncturing weapons and Holy/Silver weapons at the 16 cap, Superior Potency 6 kamas in the early days of the 20 cap, +3 tomes in the later days of the 20 cap, and Convalescent of Superior Parrying bracers, Primal of Superior Parrying shields, Obscenity weapons and Primal of Spell Proofing robes at the 25 cap.

This adds to the game as long as the items are rare enough that you don't get them all the time, but not so rare that they are never seen. The 14 cap worked well in that regard - people kept running Prison of the Planes for +6 stat rings and elite Litany for Superior Potency 6 items and for +2 tomes.

The present issue is that the best lootgen combinations are super-common, and they outclass everything that came before. It's not that they are 'just a little bit better', they utterly outclass older gear to the point that the Shadowfail loot changes effectively deleted all of the older raids and all of the 25 cap EE content.


I think that if item power level is measured from 1 to 10, 'random' loot should include items from 1 to 8. Named items from easier content should be from 2 to 9, and named items from difficult content 3 to 10. (I'm counting raid items as named items here - I see no reason to make a distinction based on group size, it should be based on content difficulty).

I would tend to agree that both frequency and amplitude need to be taken into account (Still waiting to hear what 'appropriate level range' is btw Doc).

I would however disagree on your last point, since it also influences bind status, and the inherent item-sinks that go with it when it comes to evaluating long term frequency.

Unbound to unbound I can see on par within 3 levels of each other up or down situationally. Same goes with BTCoA to a lesser degree. Both eventually reach a shelf-life where someone takes them out of circulation. The former through making them able to stop taking perma-damage but binding them, the latter through folks simply not re-posting them on the shard house.

BTA could perhaps hover around 2 levels difference vs unbound, since while they aren't going to flood the market, they do still have the merit of bringing a new alt, or TR shifting through that range 'up to speed'.

Straight BTC I'd peg at a minimum of a 4 level effectiveness bump vs unbound since those need to be acquired on a per-toon basis vs just dropping by your local auctionhouse of choice. 6-8 if it requires multiple BTC ingredients.

[Ungood]

The issue with a hard rule of Raid > Named > Random is that it basically means that every chest is useless unless it has named loot.

This is not true at all.

I already posted this before on this topic but given what you have just said, I figured I should post this again, just because: Original Post can be Found Here (https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/430627-An-introduction-you-can-call-me-Doctor-Loot?p=5172572&viewfull=1#post5172572)

I would like to take a moment to expound on a few things here.

Often (and I mean pretty much everyone I know in game and mos of the people on this forum) follow the mind set of:

Raid > Named > Loot-Gen

But really, it's not quite as simple as that, because even at the start of the F2P game, Loot-gen still had it's gems, and when Cannith Crafting went live, many people showed what "Stars aligned" random-loot gen could do, and it was not lacking in the least.

But see, loot gen is supposed to be "mostly junk, make-do, with the random rare combo that works wonders", that is what makes it work so well. I admit I liked the multi-effect of Loot-gen, like "Of the Tryant" "Nights Grasp" and the like, some because they followed the theme here in DDO, IE: The Tyrant from Orchard , Nights Grasp from DQ, etc.

It was nifty, and they should have been much rarer then they were in game, and those should have been added to the crafting tables.

Adding them to the crafting tables alone would have changed the game greatly.

The revision to Random-loot, IMO, was a bad move, Random loot did not need to be changed, and it could have been removed from the epic content completely because of the way the com system worked, in short time, anyone could have had a decent named epic weapon and armor, there was pretty much no need for Loot-gen in Evening Star at all, and if they simply added a comm turn in to Ebberon to replace the shard/seal/scroll system, that would have totally fixed all the loot issues at the end game.

So really, the Loot revision was a waste of time, effort, and all it accomplished was annoyed a great deal of players.

But getting back to my main point. Loot Progression:


Raid > Named > Loot-Gen.

To explain this, first you would need to start with a scale, so lets use the simple scale of 1 - 10. 1 being the worst, with 10 being the best. But this is not a scale in raw power, but in Usefulness. How well designed and fitting is this weapon/item.

Loot Gen should scale around a: 1 - 8

Now, what does that mean. Well first off, it's a large gap, and that is because Loot-gen should be volatile, random, from pretty much the worst items in the game to the near the best:

For example: The Mind Jobs like: Axiomatic of True Chaos, Anarchistic Handwraps of Absolute Chaos, Underwater action RR: Warforged, and the like kind of items, these catastrophically bad combos are what make loot-gen, well.. Loot-gen.

On the flip side you have stars-aligned: Where you pull a Holy Silver Outsider bane, or Adamitite of smiting. yes, very rare combos, but when you get them, they are great, they rival anything else in the game, which is again, this random nature of Loot-gen working for you.

This polar extremes of Loot-gen, are what make it, well, what it is. But all in all, Loot-gen should often fall in the middle ground, with means most loot gen should be around a 4 or 5 on the loot Scale, not great, but a serviceable piece of gear none the less.

Named Items Should fall around: 4 - 8

Notice, they start much higher then loot gen, so that means they should be devoid of the worst combos, but that should be a product of being hand designed, but even with that personal touch, there are simply going to be some poor combos, or things that just don't work as well as we would like to think, or just in some cases they don't compete well against what loot-gen/other named items could give within a close level range.

Because named items are hand crafted, tho, this more an issue with how it synergies with existing things then anything else. Case in point, at one time, the only helm worth taking out of orchard was the Minos, because it's combo of stats netted it around a 8 in the usefulness level, where all the other hats, while decent, were around 4 - 6, you could get the same effects on loot gen if you looked hard enough, or in some cases, they just fell short of what the Minos provided.

However, on average Named items would be around a 5-6, slightly better overall then Loot gen, but not massively so, but just enough to make them the constantly more appealing option.

Raid Gear Should fall around a 5 - 9:

Like Named Items, raid gear is hand crafted, planned, and then locked away behind a tiny drop rate and a large scale quest. Because of this, raid gear had this elevated placement as being "What everyone should be striving for", the "end game" gear in most ways.

While sure, there are simply some items that are not that great even in the raid gear list, either because they are just not grand items, like crossbows, or light hammers or the such, other times, they are simply odd combos that don't seem to work that well in function, or in some cases, when pit against what could be acquired from the same raid, or similar raids, it simply does not measure up. In either case, there are lows and highs in the raid gear list.

On average the gear from a raid should fall around a 6-7, better then all the the top end loot gen, better then most of the named, worth going after, but no super powerfully so.

So I guess now the question is, what is a - 10?

a 10 should it's own monster. When I started to play, in 2009, the 10, was the "epic" items, these were augmented named items that brought them to the next level.

In most games the 10 is "what is not made yet" but in DDO, it was hidden behind several layers of raids and quests, like collecting a dozen named items, or more, was what the 10 was.

I proposed a new 10, for the future of DDO (https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/429492-Something-worth-Grinding-For). and I think it is about time something like this was put in, to replace the old epic grind that kept people looking/questing for that "little bit more" and that is what the 10 symbolizes, that "little bit more" that final piece.

Just hoped to expand a bit on this idea of what the scale really was for how loot should work, there is overlap, and overlap is good, as long as it is controlled, as long as it is not situations where something that should not be getting out classed is getting overshadowed.

Good Luck here DrLoot.

[Mithis]

Happy Friday, everyone. I’d like to introduce myself as a bit of a new dev face on the forums. First, it’s about time I quit lurking, and second, I’m putting on an additional hat on the DDO team. What hat is that? In a word: loot. I’m here to listen to you and to keep my eyes on the big picture. Yes, that includes avoiding Ghostbane-situations.

So in the name of listening rather than blathering on and on, I’d like to ask you all a few questions as a sort of pulse-check on the state of loot. Go on and fill up the thread – I’ll check back in after the weekend (and a bit today, as schedule permits), with head-nods, follow-up questions, and answers where necessary.

- Aside from the diversity issue, what are the biggest problems with random loot, today?
- What weapon and equipment types do you feel are underserved in named and in random loot?
- I’d love to hear about some of the non-named loot your character’s are currently wearing.

(In the future, I’m planning some similar question sessions about named loot and named loot systems, BTW.)

1. Random loot to me is just too limiting. I would like to see a loosening of the restrictions on what effects can appear on a piece of equipment. I don't want to see any effect in any slot but adding a low chance of non standard effects would liven things up a bit.

2. Now I know I am probably one of two people who have a thrower build but throwing weapons need some serious love. The only real options from level 10 on are: Crafted, the Morningstar and Spelltouched. Not many people have high level crafters, the Morningstar is good but limited in use and spell touched are random...and thus it is frustratingly difficult to get a decent one.

3. I pretty much only slot random loot with: deadly, speed and high stat bonuses. Preferably with an augment slot.

[LadyKoneko]

First thanks for coming in like a bang.

First I'd like to is diversity.. please even the vendors won't take ghostbane any more.

Scaling.. I really like the idea of the 'same' prefix/suffix getting better at higher levels. Only thing I would add would make the AH searchable for these. Example a few months ago you could search for minute seeing and without having to mouse over till which versions (+1 +5, +13 etc).

Another feature that would be nice would be, being able AT A GLACE till if the item has a slot. Like a small red dot for a red augement, a green dot for green augments.. etc.

Customization is great.. slots allow us to customize the item to the toon/style of play. Green steel/Alchemical/etc allowed this..(pleade god no new mats). Random effects Suck ***. Especially with already rare named loot. Please understand the difference.

[Livmo]

You only pulled those two weapons, and quite crappy weapons at that, and you want to compare them to raid gear? Gosh, while it;s bad enough that loot gen can surpass raid gear, you want every freaking piece of it to be better?


Not surprised those bracers suck, no slot, nothing, come back and talk when you pull something not so half-backed. Like i said before, it's bad enough that loot-gen can beat raid/named gear in close level ranges, you are prancing off that every bit of loot-gen needs to do it..

You embarrass yourself with this post Ungood. The loot gen has a slot. I did not make any statements of fact. I said it seems...

[sirgog]

If the alternative is that random loot is better than named and raid loot then I am 100% okay with this. Random loot should be what you use before you can get your named loot. Named loot is what you use before you can get your raid loot. Its easy to get random loot (you dont even need to enter a dungeon for most of it). It takes a bit of effort to get named loot. It takes a lot of effort to get raid loot.

The game should not reward 'effort' but should reward achievement.

Running Waterworks back to back 30 times on a level 27 character is effort. It is rightly completely ignored by all of the game's reward systems. You will get no XP, no relevant loot to your character - all you will get is the odd consumable. On the flip side, running EE Fall of Truth is a serious achievement for most guilds, and running EH Fall of Truth is an achievement for most PUGs. Both of those should be rewarded, despite being considerably less 'effot' than grinding through Waterworks dozens of time.

Now let's consider Wisdom items. You could run the absolutely trivial EN or EH VON6 chasing a Wisdom item, and get (after too many runs) a +7 Wisdom helm, the Epic Helm of the Mroranon. Or, you could run something that is much more of an achievement - Heroic Elite Bastion of Power or End of the Road - and possibly loot a random lootgen +7 Wis item there.

I feel the person running Elite Bastion on their level 21 character is much more deserving of recognition for their achievement than a person running VON6, especially on EN (which pretty much any twelve people can do even if six of them AFK the whole raid and one falls off the side because they have been drinking too much). Yet the latter has 'raid loot'.

Where raids are difficult enough to remain engaging to high level players, they should have compelling loot. But this exact same statement should apply to six-person content too. Let's kill off the WOW idea of 'raiding is both the hardest and most rewarding PVE content', and go to something more sensible - the hardest PVE content has the best rewards, and sometimes that will be raids, other times it will be 6-player content.


Bind status should also be uncoupled from raid/6-person status and instead the question should be asked "Is this item meant to be exclusive?". If yes - the item should be BtAoA or more restrictive. If no, it should be BtAoE or BtCoE so that the economy doesn't get flooded with it.

[Rhysem]

Biggest problems: Good loot dilution by too many items splitting bonuses. In some other MMOs, having an item with split stats, where the total of the stats is higher than a 'pure' stat item is okay, since everything stacks. In DDO where pretty much nothing stacks, having an item with split stats is usually a waste of a slot -- at least until you get to high enough item levels that one (or both) stats are maxed out.

As examples: a +2 int +7 search item (ML: 9) is pretty worthless compared to a clever +5 item (ML: 9) or +11 search item (ML: 9). A +6 int +5 search has some utility, and a +6 int +13 or +15 search item is ... frankly pretty spiffy (and quite possibly epic-only, though I think with masterful II it'd be heroic leveled).

With the restricted buffs per slot, there's already plenty of gear shuffling game to play, the addition of diluted loot is just an annoyance.


Underserved: Worthwhile loot-gen throwers are rarer than hens teeth. True, most don't really get much use, but at least throwing stars for monks could use a look. There's what, 3 named and 2 crafted and that's it? I realize they aren't "primary" weapons, but they are all monks come with native, so a brief pass would be nice. While you're at it, the stacks of 20 non-returning throwing weapons can just go.


Non-named: Res +4 MC goggles, deadly 5 cursed helm, neck of acc 5, +5 str belt, fort 100% boots, speed 5 gloves, wis +4 ring. Hey, I'm 10. What do you expect?

[Hadesborne]

My major problem is that on my capped Pally, who is pretty much geared to the max, I have recently swapped out 5 amazing named raid loot items and put in 5 ridiculously amazing random loot items that I purchased for a grand total of 200k pp in the AH.
to the list:

http://ddowiki.com/page/Lenses_of_the_Woodsman for Deadly 8 goggles of Intimidate 13
http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Ring_of_the_Stormreaver_Prophecy EH(ml24) for Wise 9 ring of Accuracy 9
http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Girdle_of_Giants%27_Brawn Epic(ml23) for Ogre Power 9 belt of False Life 40 w/ a colorless slot
http://ddowiki.com/page/Epic_Charged_Gauntlets w/ 30 hps in yellow slot to Shockproof +35 Gloves of Seeking 8 with a yellow slot
http://ddowiki.com/page/Band_of_Siberys with insightful charisma +2 added to Charisma 9 ring of Resistance 9

Ok, so maybe 2 or 3 of those items aren't end game items but look at the drastic increases in power here. That kind of increase should NEVER be obtained by swapping out end-game or near-to-end-game items with random loot. I would have expected to have to run 5-10 or more raids for an upgrade like that for each slot. Not anymore though, I just walked to the AH and blew 200k.

You wanted to know what is broken? Stop making us too happy. We WANT to be a little miserable and experience toil and strife and hardship in order to get the much needed upgrades for our build. That makes the sense of accomplishment for getting upgrades that much better. That is how you keep a game interesting.

I played EQ for 7 years and in those 7 years I raided my butt off(60+ people raids, mind you), ruining two relationships. But MAN, it was fun, all because I worked hard for the 10 hp here and 10 sp there more than I had previously. As soon as they started throwing 800+ hp on items you could get soloing/6-maning the game went to ****. Please don't let this happen. Please put those meaningful upgrades on raid/end game named loot and make the difference between EH and EE loot the same vast difference in stats as it takes to complete at that level.

NEVER should I be swapping out named raid loot for random loot that I got in the same quest.

That being said, there are a few stats that I think need help.
Healing amp...we need more options. How about new EE gear/raid loot with better healing amp effects and return some of the small bonuses to random loot.
Slicing etc lines...why not on raid loot and high end loot or even better augs with these additions that drop in raids/EE
Intimidation...more named loot with this effect please.
Perform...throw the bards a bone here man (on meaningful named loot)
Incite...it's getting harder and harder to keep agro off all these great cleaving/master's blitzing(which is a line that needs nerfing, 1500 hp hits over and over? come on) dps classes out there. Put it on Named loot built for the classes/builds that are intimidating (yes, TANKS)
Bane items, why not throw a few more options for bane items or even augs for these effects.
Also, where are my clickies? Really, no new named clickies? Please put more cool clicky effects for named loot that you might want to make situational and no TOOO good, throw a decent clicky on there, POW now it's a decently sought after item.
Profane bonuses on new named items please.
Also, make true seeing stop blindness. Why the hell would anyone with true seeing be blinded EVER?
How about Secret Door Detection with varying levels, since you made the skill check vary.
Armor Piercing...10% doesn't cut it anymore.
On named loot how about some nice combo stats(ie chrono)

Also find something for us to do with our shards/seals/scrolls if you aren't going to upgrade the old epic gear. Give us an option to turn the 4 items in for say a decent augment that coincides with the purpose of that loot(tanking, dps, spellcasting, healing, traps etc) or maybe a new items slot (HELLO EARRINGS ANYONE, good lord) with these small but meaningful upgrades. and make it scale for the difficulty of obtaining these 4 items. And make these (EARRINGS) have multiple small boost stats.

But the REAL issue:
+9/+10 stats random items need help, Someone needs to help them to stop dropping on random items. These Uber stats are better placed on end game named loot please take them off the random loot tables. you want +7 or so sitting there at the pinnacle of random ****, maybe even some +8 for EE random **** MAYBE(meaning roll 100 out of 100 on your loot roll). Leave +9/10 or higher for the end game named. My lower level chars are cringing as I mention it but FACE IT, it's the right thing to do.

Thanks for your time.
Palantin of Kyber
Lvl 28 Paladin

[Ungood]

You embarrass yourself with this post Ungood. The loot gen has a slot. I did not make any statements of fact. I said it seems...





http://i.imgur.com/Ma4AXiH.jpg

You know what I don't see in this loot gen.. That's right, slots. There are no slots shown in this loot gen at all, not even masterful craftsmanship either, so, All you did was compare two pretty shoddy, low end loot gen junk weapons, and when I say junk weapons, I mean these are junk for Loot-gen weapons, there are much better Loot-gen combos out there, and then you seemed to try and draw some comparison between these two trash items to what was once the best bastard sword in the game.

So, what am I left with at this point? Either your statement is, you have no idea what you are posting, looting, or even how to draw any kind of apt comparison or you have no idea what decent loot-gen even is.

Edit: Ah I just noticed the colorless slot on the bracers (with no augment in it mind you), right, poor things, you could not even get a yellow, or green slot? But none the less, they did have a slot, my bad, it does not make them anything less then vendor junk tho, and by vendor junk, I mean vendor junk in comparison to other available loot gen.

[Livmo]

You know what I don't see in this loot gen.. That's right, slots. There are no slots shown in this loot gen at all, not even masterful craftsmanship either, so, All you did was compare two pretty shoddy, low end loot gen junk weapons, and when I say junk weapons, I mean these are junk for Loot-gen weapons, there are much better Loot-gen combos out there, and then you seemed to try and draw some comparison between these two trash items to what was once the best bastard sword in the game.

So, what am I left with at this point? Either your statement is, you have no idea what you are posting, looting, or even how to draw any kind of apt comparison or you have no idea what decent loot-gen even is.

But, yah, someone was embarrassed, but it wasn't me.

TY I was refering to the bracers in the post. No worries, I'm not going to argue with you. I learned a long time ago not to argue with a fool, because often times people cannot tell the difference.

[Ungood]

TY I was refering to the bracers in the post. No worries, I'm not going to argue with you. I learned a long time ago not to argue with a fool, because often times people cannot tell the difference.

As I see it, you either had a point you were trying to make, or you were just trying to gander attention, In my feelings on the matter, I pretty much took you for the latter, and your antics have not shown you to have any point, so, you're entire reason for posting was just to draw attention to yourself for some reason, well, I guess you got what you wanted, which was some attention.

Pity you did not have a point worth supporting with the attention you got.

Good day sir.

[FlaviusMaximus]

...I even prefer Ghost Touch of Undead Bane.


Um...why?

Ghostbane is ghost touch and undead bane combined into one weapon effect. There's no way I can look at that and think it's not better than ghost touch of undead bane.

Ghostbane is a good weapon effect at low to mid levels. The problem isn't with the weapon effect itself. The problem is that a lot of the old weapon abilities disappeared and there seems to be way too many ghostbane weapons out there as a result of the borked loot tables. It's also the kind of weapon effect that doesn't need to be on weapons with a minimum level higher than 14. Keep it around, but don't put it in any high heroic or epic loot tables.



DDO has almost always had something you really wanted to see in chests...Obscenity weapons.

I was obsessed with trying to get Obscenity weapons for almost a year after they came out. Now that the life drain effect has been changed from what it has been in the recent past, this weapon ability does not need to be reintroduced into the loot tables. It's a shame.



...Khopesh! There are no great named epic khopesh. There are a lot of "oh, I guess it's better than random loot." Currently the highest damage dealing khopesh is the Drow Weapon Master. We need some raid loot named khopeshes....

Enjoy the break from khopeshes. They dominated TWF for far too long.

[Saravis]

Um...why?

Ghostbane is ghost touch and undead bane combined into one weapon effect. There's no way I can look at that and think it's not better than ghost touch of undead bane.

Ghostbane is a good weapon effect at low to mid levels. The problem isn't with the weapon effect itself. The problem is that a lot of the old weapon abilities disappeared and there seems to be way too many ghostbane weapons out there as a result of the borked loot tables. It's also the kind of weapon effect that doesn't need to be on weapons with a minimum level higher than 14. Keep it around, but don't put it in any high heroic or epic loot tables.

Ghostbane loses the bane enhancement bonus.
http://i.imgur.com/t35CwNl.png http://i.imgur.com/hikTAiX.png


The level 8 is superior and not just because its a level 8 weapon. With the addition of +1 enhancement on the lvl 6 weapon it becomes level 8, but is only +3 against undead. The level 8 on the other hand is +5 against undead, as well as the bane damage is 3d6 vs. only 2d4 on the lvl 6. While the advantage of freeing up the prefix can be nice, just comparing ghost touch of undead bane vs. ghostbane shows that the former is superior for its level.

[Livmo]

You pulled out one of the (the?) most useful Eveningstar sets, and a fairly junk set of bracers ;-)

Ideally those named items would be something you put on at their ML and wear for a few levels - so yes, they should be useful compared to higher ML items if you're trying to do the same thing. If named items (those ML20) are only good in your mind until you get to ML21, I think that's another variance.

I would like named stuff to last a few levels at least, but I'm not sure what the benchmark is? I think it should be 5 levels, but maybe that expectation is high? I'm still wearing that set, because I'm lazy and it still works for me at L25.

[Ungood]

I have to kinda of laugh at some of the posts I have heard so far, I mean, to the Dev, think back to the time Before MotuD, when things had staying power.

Things like the Minos Legends, ML11, would serve someone well to 20th, and then into Epic content.
Gear like GreenSteel, would last well into 20th, and long into Epic as well.

In fact, a large chunk of Raid gear, from the Sword of Shadows (ML10), Torq, and RoSS, would last a toons life time, not just a few levels. They would serve a player in their heroic incarnate until that player could farm up the means to transform them into their epic form, which would be in some cases, years.

In the face of that kind of staying power of older gear and the game designed around it, a few levels is a joke, it makes it so that a massive part of the game just dies, it's not even worth trying to farm raid gear or even doing the raid if the gear is only going to last a few levels against loot-gen, because with dismal drop rates and timers on raids, by the time you get it, you will have outgrown it, so only the raids that are at the level cap will be worth doing and the rest of it may as well not even exist unless it's just as twink trash.

So all that design work, all that effort to build it all, all that effort to sell it, just flushed down the toilet.

Loot does not need a revamp it needs a roll-back.

[Jasparion]

The game should not reward 'effort' but should reward achievement.

Going to the AH and buying random loot which is vastly better than named items with a 10% drop rate or raid items with an even lower drop rate is my issue. Im guessing you arent disagreeing with that?

And even though a particular raid may be "easier" than a particular dungeon, I dont see many LFMs up for anything these days (often I see none for level 20+ content), so my guess is it is easier to complete an undermanned EE dungeon than an undermanned EE raid.

Mind you, the other day I saw an LFM for Hard Shroud which was level 23 to 28 only. So maybe sometimes it is the players at fault, not Turbine...

[Meetch1972]

Ok, I'd love to see something that makes the raid loot from the "old" raids a little more worthwhile. Items such as Tharnes, Leviks and so on are ok at the raid level, but getting the item often takes the full 20 completions, at which point even a casual player is 5 levels over the raid, and even then it's (is it?) possible that the item doesn't show up on the reward list.

Right now I'm reluctant to login because the gear on my monk which used to be considered pretty darn good around L16 leaves me with a very ordinary AC, amongst other things, and I'm wondering just how broken it will appear if I join a group and learn that something else I've got isn't worth as much to me as I remember.

How about having named items scale one or two of their better attributes for every X levels above the ML of the item? Tharne's goggles would be much sweeter if the spot/search bonus climbed by a point or two every couple of levels of the character wearing it. Or what about adding +1 to the bloodstone every few levels? I'd try to make it scale so that perhaps a named item with ML of say 13-15 falls maybe a point short of the best random gear available in its category at cap.

Meh, just thinking...

[sirgog]

I was obsessed with trying to get Obscenity weapons for almost a year after they came out. Now that the life drain effect has been changed from what it has been in the recent past, this weapon ability does not need to be reintroduced into the loot tables. It's a shame.


Have another look at Obscenity. It's not just a neg level mod, it has many many dice of damage on it too. IIRC it does 5d6 damage to neutral mobs and the rare good mob, and 2d6 to evil. It's still good against neutral mobs with high fortification; if the neg level pops, bonus.

Plus the name is just cool.

[lyrecono]

i see many posts about upgrading old loot,

Be very carefull with that though. Some gear is just good at that level but should be surpassed by better gear at a higher level
A good example of this being a bad idea is the old epic gear that required shards/seals/scrolls and the base item to get.
This type of gear should no longer be relevant at lv 25 let allone 28 and 30 in the future. the best way of dealing with it, is having the epic versions drop in the epic quests and to remove the entire seal/shard/scroll part of it.
At lv 28 the ESOS, Eclaw, Echrono set, EAGA (and many more) should not be relevant. They are lv 20 item and should have been considered as such just a lv 20 item. Having random loot come close to their power at lv 28 is fine, but there should be more powerfull named loot at lv 25-28.

An ESoS should not be the best 2handed weapon out there at lv 28 (not counting quarterstaf buiilds ofc)
all that "old"epic gear should be what it always was, nice lv 20 twink gear, nothing more.
And it's up to the developers to provide gear needed to keep us going.

For a long whille all those half orcs have looked the same, (e)SoS with Epic Marilith Chain/epic red scale,
Now its bladeforged, (e)SoS with (epic) blackscale docent everywhere you look.
We have Armor kits, but having a weapon kit wouldn't work anyway, we need better gear at lv 28 (and lv30 in the future)
The named items in U19 and U20 were terrible and need a make over.

And most of all: stop taking notes from bad designers, Neverwinter online and Dungen and dragons 4.0.
There are good reasons why people have such a distaste for those and play DDO/ Pathfinder (an advanced dungeons and dragons 3.5)

Good luck doc, youre gone need it

[PhotoRob]

A named item is a trophy of sorts that shows to others your accomplishment of acquiring such a "rare" item. Admittedly the logic is extremely flawed but many players still hold to it. If it is not named they do not want to be using it because random gen is "noobish". This is pretty universal in every MMO. People want their "1337 W4@P0N5" to be unique and special. So best in slot always has to be some kind of unique named or crafted (shroud style) weapon. Because of this mind set you will see many people using named weapons long after Random Gen starts dropping superior versions.

The irony is that veteran players all end up using the same few weapons with the same few skins, thus making them neither "unique" nor "special".

In my case, I build characters around a specific concept. If named loot doesn't match that concept, I won't use it - I don't care how good it is. If that makes me a "noob", then I'm *proud* to wear the title.

[RedOrm]

Lots of people playing DDO don't have English as their native language (not saying that it's not possible for them to have a better command of the language than native-English-speaking people, but anyway...). So maybe using all those different words to describe basically the same effect in different degrees is not the best way to go. Light I-II-III-IV etc. is simpler imo.

I'm actually one of those lots of people, english is my third language. And yes, numbers ARE simpler, that's the whole point. Simpler, and boring as all he**.
Which I was trying to counter, as I'm also one of the people who feel that dullness VI of boring VII items are bad for the game. Even David Hasselhoff is better than that :P

Greetz,
Red Orm

[EllisDee37]

At lv 28 the ESOS, Eclaw, Echrono set, EAGA (and many more) should not be relevant. They are lv 20 item and should have been considered as such just a lv 20 item.For a long time (years?) when the level cap was 20, there were multiple level 11 items that were quite relevant for endgame builds.

The "should be"s you've been using are only "should be" in your opinion, not based on past DDO precedent.

[lyrecono]

For a long time (years?) when the level cap was 20, there were multiple level 11 items that were quite relevant for endgame builds.

The "should be"s you've been using are only "should be" in your opinion, not based on past DDO precedent.

i remember,
Stuff like minos legends? greensteels?
Greensteels are lv 11/12 (even lv 8 in the past) but require you to run a lv 17 raid many times to complete and cleanse?

this only shows that the loot design of the last few years has been lacking.
There is a huge difference between shroud crafting and canith raid upgraded gear (the later was too weak for what it gave, the only nice stuff was handwraps and shields)

[CaptainSpacePony]

We sure would like to see gear from Cannith Challenge and crystal cove expanded to higher levels. Level 24 versions sooner rather than later, and eventually level 28s. I understand if the latter takes a while for the Cannith stuff since they challenges themselves stop at lvl 25 (which should also be kicked up).

With the exception of the Mournlode stuff, the Cannith gear is all very nice and most heroic toons benefit greatly by having access to it. I wish it held true through epic content.

[Ungood]

i remember,
Stuff like minos legends? greensteels?
Greensteels are lv 11/12 (even lv 8 in the past) but require you to run a lv 17 raid many times to complete and cleanse?

this only shows that the loot design of the last few years has been lacking.
There is a huge difference between shroud crafting and canith raid upgraded gear (the later was too weak for what it gave, the only nice stuff was handwraps and shields)

It was a bit more board then that and it depended on your toon, but some times, low level items would last a life time very easy, for example:

Minos Legend
Ring of Spell Storing
Torc of Prince Raiyum-de II
Any Greensteel item 11/12
Spectral Gloves
Chattering Ring
Seven Finger Gloves
Kundark Delving Boots.
Beholder Optic Nerves
Belt of Brute Strength.

And this is just a few things off the top of my head, and I am stopping at around 11th, to give an idea that even 9 levels was meaningless compared the usefulness of named/raid gear to the game for many years.

I could get crazy and list really low level items like:

VoM/Mantle (which are 5th level)
Pale Lavender Ioun Stones.

to show that some named items NEVER get outdated, and can last 15+ right into the current epic content.

I could also add in items that are very situational like:

Scarab of Protection,
Bubble Belt
Mummified Bat
Bottle of Air
Ring of Feathers
Visor of the Fleshrender guards
Royal Guard Mask
Ring of the Ancestors

In fact.. I could show you something amazing, ponder this:

Necklace of the Archivist was commonly kept by most casters well into their 20's

That's right, the starting "noob gear" named necklace, was still viable as a part of a players survival kit into the epic content.

See that is what separates great loot design from the trash we have been suffering through with the new system.

When even when you are wearing better.. you STILL keep it.. because it's a handy item to have.

This is not even talking about the fact that most of this gear was not replaced by Loot-Gen, but by other Named items.

There was a lot more going on here then I think you even realized when it came to loot and how it was designed into this game from the start. The original form of this game, gear scores and a constant hamster wheel of BiS every few levels, was not the way this MMO was built, not even close, raid loot, named gear, had staying power, it was worth grinding for, that was why players bothered to grind for it to start with, because they believed it would last them, it would be worth it in the long run.

The fact that FoS tried to transform it into that kind of MMO really warped the entire foundation of the game and the structure of understand that the long standing players had, and in a game this loot centered, that is about the worst thing that could have been done.

I hope the new person realizes this, stops this process, and reverts it back to a system were named/raid items have staying power, where they are worth grinding for, and not just glorified loot-gen.

[Hafeal]

Minos Legend
Ring of Spell Storing
Torc of Prince Raiyum-de II
Any Greensteel item 11/12
Spectral Gloves
Chattering Ring
Seven Finger Gloves
Kundark Delving Boots.
Beholder Optic Nerves
Belt of Brute Strength.


VoM/Mantle (which are 5th level)
Pale Lavender Ioun Stones.


Scarab of Protection,
Bubble Belt
Mummified Bat
Bottle of Air
Ring of Feathers
Visor of the Fleshrender guards
Royal Guard Mask
Ring of the Ancestors



See that is what separates great loot design from the trash we have been suffering through with the new system.



While I agree with you, some re-design of the current loot system is warranted, your list is very illustrative. If you were lucky enough to have any or few of the items on the list above - you were powerful and golden for a long time. But casual players, or perhaps unlucky players, rarely pull those items; in almost 8 years now, I have never pulled a Royal Guard Mask, Beholder Optic Nerves, Torc, or Ring of the Ancestors. Sure, some items like Minos, result from a 'light' grind. I haven't really 'ground' out Shroud since the blade debacle - and that raid, along with all others, is now truly a grind for new players without greensteel.

Part of loot revamp, as I recall, was to make random loot relevant again and to make it so that players didn't feel the 'need' to grind these items and players aren't expected to all have the same equipment. At the same time, if you did get a named item, it would stand out as rare and special. I still think having the items on your list is great - if you are lucky enough to get them. But in no way should loot, like that on your list, be what are wearing above 20 except in an emergency nor should it be a 'requirement' below 20 - giving players moar lootzy options is better imo. Having +20 level loot with some features of named loot is awesome - even spreading out features below 20 is awesome, not everyone should be required to wear Minos; that was bad design.

What I believe I read in this thread is that players who do ground 'named' items want them to be stepped up so that random stuff with similar features is still not as good - at that level range. I can be on board with that - "non-ground out" named loot should be special and stand out. Ground out loot, like Minos, does not need to be as special - it IS the reward to get loot with specific attributes you want without having to get lucky with random loot or pulling a named item.

[voodoogroves]

While I agree with you, some re-design of the current loot system is warranted, your list is very illustrative. If you were lucky enough to have any or few of the items on the list above - you were powerful and golden for a long time. But casual players, or perhaps unlucky players, rarely pull those items; in almost 8 years now, I have never pulled a Royal Guard Mask, Beholder Optic Nerves, Torc, or Ring of the Ancestors. Sure, some items like Minos, result from a 'light' grind. I haven't really 'ground' out Shroud since the blade debacle - and that raid, along with all others, is now truly a grind for new players without greensteel.

Part of loot revamp, as I recall, was to make random loot relevant again and to make it so that players didn't feel the 'need' to grind these items and players aren't expected to all have the same equipment. At the same time, if you did get a named item, it would stand out as rare and special. I still think having the items on your list is great - if you are lucky enough to get them. But in no way should loot, like that on your list, be what are wearing above 20 except in an emergency nor should it be a 'requirement' below 20 - giving players moar lootzy options is better imo. Having +20 level loot with some features of named loot is awesome - even spreading out features below 20 is awesome, not everyone should be required to wear Minos; that was bad design.

What I believe I read in this thread is that players who do ground 'named' items want them to be stepped up so that random stuff with similar features is still not as good - at that level range. I can be on board with that - "non-ground out" named loot should be special and stand out. Ground out loot, like Minos, does not need to be as special - it IS the reward to get loot with specific attributes you want without having to get lucky with random loot or pulling a named item.

Some may - but let me be a bit clearer.

When a named item can drop with a neat ability or a special ML - that's worth hunting for. When the best you can get sub-20 is a +6 stat, then those raid items that provide +6 stat at an earlier ML are totally worth grinding for. Less so with crafting ... and even less so when lootgen now drops 4 levels lower. Those are the things that need to be udpated.

When an effect is rare, but neat, maybe you grind for it. Remember when they changed the attack/accuracy shards in Cannith crafting and borked the ML of all that +4 attack stuff people wanted to craft? My Blindness Ward of Attack goggles went from ML 9 or so to I think 19 or 21. Yep, attack +4 is horibly overpowered ... except that it now drops on ML7 (or mastercraft ML5) gear.

For a time, it was kinda neat that one of the best AC light armors was still dropping from HoX - even after the AC pass. Until it got genericized and now is basically nothing special anymore.

There needs to be bad loot and bad raid loot. Has to be. Part of the problem right now was (I think) a desire to make more "good" loot. It should totally be possible to have stars-align nifty random lootgen.

But we need to have goals to aim for ... grind for ... whatever. If someone does want to grind out a freaking 3 piece Glacial Assault set, the spell power combined should be solid - and not worse than ML16 cannith challenge gear or mastercrafted lootgen. Stat 8 and spell school focus 4 on easy to get heroic-normal gear for ML15 or so was a big shift in marginalizing lots of old loot. In epic levels, the prevalence of resistance 9/10 on random stuff means trying to fit in an augment of finding/keeping that thing with resistance 6 or 7 on it is no longer a decision - grab a 9 or 10. Hell, I keep pulling resistance 6 items ML11 or ML9 in heroic.

It's a different game when you want resist 5 so you decide to build out a set of DT armor or grind for a pair of Boots of the Innocent. Maybe you take that Cloak of the Stormsinger or whatever that has resist 4 on it because it fits in your gear set better. Then you are planning and hunting for gear ... not just going to the AH finding something with resist and a socket on it in the slot you want.


AND, any update doesn't need to be an update to all the old items. Maybe update some, but have some be simply "if you want the new one, you have to run it". People will run it for relevant gear.

My worry is that the cat/bag, horse/barn whatever point has passed. In order to make loot worth hunting for, it now has to be better than U19-20 random and easy to get stuff. Worse still, we don't freaking need it. The heroic loot was already good enough, if you had raid loot it was nice on previous lives but not super essential. Now it really isn't.


=========================

Before we had a cautious approach that tied to cannith crafting and even augments. There were some system-level constraints - physics of ML - and adjustments made around those. There was at least the appearance of a steady hand ensuring we didn't cram +6 stat on really low augments, etc. at early levels, that loot (crafting, augments, named items, loot gen) were gated based on some internal logic - resistance 5 not before X level, attack bonus boosts need to be adjusted, etc.

And all that went out the window. The kinda informal rules they'd stuck to and we'd accepted are just drastically different. They aren't being violated by one or two items (which would make those items unique and desirable for some), but basically all over the place. This isn't power-creep of loot at the end game, this is essentially shifting the ML down of a bunch of abilities by a large degree.

[voodoogroves]

Another thought.

How special is a Minos if Heavy Fort + colorless slot drops on random gear at the same or lower level? If it did, why bother having it, except for the cool look (which is totally overwritten by the plethora of cosmetics-that-aren't-cosmetcs-as-they-provide-real-benefit)? There isn't one on the AH on Gland right now - but since 100% fort can drop on a ML9 item, ML7 master that would mean a colorless slot on any of those would add 2 levels. So, random loot, better than Minos and available in about any slot you want.

And by having I mean "existing" in the game, taking time to code, space in the loot tables, etc.

[voodoogroves]

And another, because hump-day.

When content was added pre-U19, you could have some sort of assurance that while there may be some nifty new things, all of the loot wouldn't be statistically better. We didn't actually need +8 stats at ML8, or +4 spell focus ... or deadly 6 at ML 11, or resist 6 mid-heroic. We got an update with tons of stuff we don't need.

So, maybe it was Ungood that said it.

We don't need a BUFF to all named loot. Yes, current raids need a reason to run them (drop CoV, maybe some update to their loot) - but mostly the game could benefit from a judicious removal of much of the U19/20 loot and scaling it back to be on the same relative level as the rest of the content. We need the random loot to be nerfed back out of crazytown.

I just worry that the cat/bag, horse/barn, whatever moment may be passed.

[Ayseifn]

The game should not reward 'effort' but should reward achievement.

Running Waterworks back to back 30 times on a level 27 character is effort. It is rightly completely ignored by all of the game's reward systems. You will get no XP, no relevant loot to your character - all you will get is the odd consumable. On the flip side, running EE Fall of Truth is a serious achievement for most guilds, and running EH Fall of Truth is an achievement for most PUGs. Both of those should be rewarded, despite being considerably less 'effot' than grinding through Waterworks dozens of time.

Now let's consider Wisdom items. You could run the absolutely trivial EN or EH VON6 chasing a Wisdom item, and get (after too many runs) a +7 Wisdom helm, the Epic Helm of the Mroranon. Or, you could run something that is much more of an achievement - Heroic Elite Bastion of Power or End of the Road - and possibly loot a random lootgen +7 Wis item there.

I feel the person running Elite Bastion on their level 21 character is much more deserving of recognition for their achievement than a person running VON6, especially on EN (which pretty much any twelve people can do even if six of them AFK the whole raid and one falls off the side because they have been drinking too much). Yet the latter has 'raid loot'.

Where raids are difficult enough to remain engaging to high level players, they should have compelling loot. But this exact same statement should apply to six-person content too. Let's kill off the WOW idea of 'raiding is both the hardest and most rewarding PVE content', and go to something more sensible - the hardest PVE content has the best rewards, and sometimes that will be raids, other times it will be 6-player content.


Bind status should also be uncoupled from raid/6-person status and instead the question should be asked "Is this item meant to be exclusive?". If yes - the item should be BtAoA or more restrictive. If no, it should be BtAoE or BtCoE so that the economy doesn't get flooded with it.
In your scenario people are better off ransacking VoN 5 instead of completing if all they want is a +7 wisdom item and that's pretty terrible design. And Elite Bastion is way easier to do compared to VoN 5/6, I have epic loot and destinies that make Bastion cake walk at 21 but trying to get a couple of people to do a VoN sometimes is impossible. Having raids drop better loot is fine, there needs to be some incentive to getting a decent sized group of people together or no one will run it.

[Ungood]

While I agree with you, some re-design of the current loot system is warranted, your list is very illustrative. If you were lucky enough to have any or few of the items on the list above - you were powerful and golden for a long time. But casual players, or perhaps unlucky players, rarely pull those items; in almost 8 years now, I have never pulled a Royal Guard Mask, Beholder Optic Nerves, Torc, or Ring of the Ancestors. Sure, some items like Minos, result from a 'light' grind. I haven't really 'ground' out Shroud since the blade debacle - and that raid, along with all others, is now truly a grind for new players without greensteel.

Part of loot revamp, as I recall, was to make random loot relevant again and to make it so that players didn't feel the 'need' to grind these items and players aren't expected to all have the same equipment. At the same time, if you did get a named item, it would stand out as rare and special. I still think having the items on your list is great - if you are lucky enough to get them. But in no way should loot, like that on your list, be what are wearing above 20 except in an emergency nor should it be a 'requirement' below 20 - giving players moar lootzy options is better imo. Having +20 level loot with some features of named loot is awesome - even spreading out features below 20 is awesome, not everyone should be required to wear Minos; that was bad design.

What I believe I read in this thread is that players who do ground 'named' items want them to be stepped up so that random stuff with similar features is still not as good - at that level range. I can be on board with that - "non-ground out" named loot should be special and stand out. Ground out loot, like Minos, does not need to be as special - it IS the reward to get loot with specific attributes you want without having to get lucky with random loot or pulling a named item.

Well, this really illustrates the main issue here in two ways.

First is the issue of the staying power: These named/raid items are rare, some of them take hundreds of runs of the same raid/quest to get, some of them even might even take a player several Years and perhaps many TR's to finally get.

But a player would only go after then because they had staying power, because they could call that quest done, and know they would not ever need to replace it, not in a few levels, not in their life time, that was what made it worth grinding for to start with.

Now as a point of reference, I own all the items on that list short of the seven finger gloves which I am still looking for, hence why they were off the top of my head.

I did not go after them believing that I would ever replace them, I wanted them because I would never replace them. if I felt that I would replace them in a few levels, I would have tossed them aside like junk, because by the time I could get them, I would have out grown them. There is no place for loot like that hidden behind 1% drop rates in raids that have 3 day timers, and need to be run many times to get what you want, with reward lists every 20 times. That's an insult to players to do that to them.

Secondly: If you want a system where Loot-gen replaces named/raid loot in a few levels, then the system needs to make it so that the drop rates of named/raid loot reflect how worthless they are, IE: Every raid drops a ton of loot, with around a 50% drop rate, no timers, and the like.

Even then, because it is a raid, still, players won't do it, no staying power in the item removes any incentive to go after it.

Case in point: On my monk life, when I made 20th, I figured I would humor myself and epic my Jizd-tet'ka bracers. Ok, well I ran a few of the Sentinels of Stormreach quests, realized this was going to take a long time and thus not worth the grind at all, so, as opposed to doing that, I got a sun-soul set with comms I had from my last TR and tossed the bracers in the trash, because that is exactly what they had become.

Now, I would say the bracers are not in fact Trash, but they become Trash when they are no longer worth the grind. IE: If I can get better or equal for less effort, no matter how good it may have been at one time, it's junk because it's simply not worth going after.

I mean sure, you might have a few people who who would want it, just to have it, like I had Sever, because I enjoy collecting dwarf axes, Sever has to date, never seen combat, it was not worth it to go after it when it first came, it's not worth it, and I only got it because of the novelty. But that is never a motive to bet on when you expect players to buy packs, run content, or keep coming back to play. Novelty wears off quickly.

Personally, revamping the loot dynamic after 6 years of it working in one direction was a horrible decision to make.

If you want to have to get new gear every 3 - 4 levels, there is no shortage of MMO's that will provide that to you, one of the things I loved about DDO was the staying power of named loot, was the fact that it was in fact worth it to go after these items, that my time was not in vain or wasted.

As it stands now.. it was wasted. And that sets a bad mood and feeling with players like me.

[FynWarFyn]

Well, it seems you will have your hands full, even just reading over all these replies. It looks like you will have to balance the rewards for people who strive for Named and Raid loot versus the casual odd hours players who can do with only lootgen and happy about it. But always remember that this is DDO, not a Diablo3 random loot kind of game. It is always better when even the random lootgen made sense where it drops, even a dragon will not keep a dragonbane weapon layng around (either it will destroy it or drop it in a volcano like the One Ring) unless it is a tropy but then it is a Named item not random anymore. Even lorewise random loot is better than completely random loot, it would make people run some quests just for the random loot.

While you are at it, please also review some items or enchants that don't make any sense, like the trinket Kaelth's Touch, it is describe as a ward vs evil but has DR5/evil, which means that evil attack will bypass its DR like a hot knife on butter, so what part of the ward vs evil is supposed to work? Shouldn't it be DR5/good or something similar. There are a few odd items like that, mostly named items I think, can't remember them from the top of my head (unless they got updated but nobody knows about the updates?).

Another thought, yeah more work for you or at least more food for thoughts, maybe introduce a new breed of single unique items with nice enchants for their ML, only one of a kind per server. They can be acquired by only 1 player character at a time on any single server, and will be thrown back into the loot table on several conditions like 3-5 deaths? not logged in for 2 weeks? character is over 5 lvl of ML? timer of 2-6 months max? and they will remember their last 2-3 owners in their descriptions as is "Assisted Mr.X in the defeat of Velah."

[Hafeal]

[named/raid loot]I did not go after them believing that I would ever replace them, I wanted them because I would never replace them. if I felt that I would replace them in a few levels, I would have tossed them aside like junk, because by the time I could get them, I would have out grown them. There is no place for loot like that hidden behind 1% drop rates in raids that have 3 day timers, and need to be run many times to get what you want, with reward lists every 20 times. That's an insult to players to do that to them.

I understand this sentiment and I agree with the drop rate issue. I place this in the context of level caps though - as the game has grown and we had caps (10, 12, 14, 16 etc), loot had staying power because of caps. As the levels have grown though, I never had the expectation that great level 12 gear should be a game lifetime achievement - especially past level 20.

I think the problem is that for those who spent years grinding the gear and now being able to fly through levels in a few weeks, it makes the equipment you worked so hard to obtain seem less valuable.

I am going to focus my inner Chai here a bit and just say we have all known DDO turned Monty Haul many years ago. If anyone really believed their hard earned loot was so unique or worth grinding, I feel they were not seeing what Turbine had done with the direction for loot. To me, the game is completely doable without the named gear. The named gear makes the game easier and that is the reward for those who grind it out. You can be my hero while I pike to grind my xp for my next life. :p


Secondly: If you want a system where Loot-gen replaces named/raid loot in a few levels, then the system needs to make it so that the drop rates of named/raid loot reflect how worthless they are, IE: Every raid drops a ton of loot, with around a 50% drop rate, no timers, and the like.

I agree loot rate drops for 'rare' stuff, especially heroic level items, should have a substantially increased drop rate. I think it would revive some interest in raids. I am not feeling that the devs want to give much love to Heroic level raids atm though; perhaps it is game performance issues, I don't know.

[Singular]

Loot Gen should scale around a: 1 - 8

Named Items Should fall around: 4 - 8


Raid Gear Should fall around a 5 - 9:

On average the gear from a raid should fall around a 6-7, better then all the the top end loot gen, better then most of the named, worth going after, but no super powerfully so.

So I guess now the question is, what is a - 10?

a 10 should it's own monster. When I started to play, in 2009, the 10, was the "epic" items, these were augmented named items that brought them to the next level.

I generally agree with this, but would also like an increasingly less likely chance to have random loot be awesome. That will keep me dutifully looking forward to trash chests. So I'd modify your numbers above to allow random loot to reach or very nearly reach raid gear, but with an exceptionally minute chance of ever seeing that drop.


Enjoy the break from khopeshes. They dominated TWF for far too long.

Just because they dominated for a while is not reason to have so few named ones. The nerfing of twf has made the ESOS the only best in slot sword. That's too boring. We need variety. I'm not arguing to make khopesh the only weapon for dps again, I just want to see more viable choices than "I'm either going khopesh weapon of the blademaster or giving up on khopesh when I get my two ballizarde."

[Singular]

I understand this sentiment and I agree with the drop rate issue. I place this in the context of level caps though - as the game has grown and we had caps (10, 12, 14, 16 etc), loot had staying power because of caps. As the levels have grown though, I never had the expectation that great level 12 gear should be a game lifetime achievement - especially past level 20.

I think the problem is that for those who spent years grinding the gear and now being able to fly through levels in a few weeks, it makes the equipment you worked so hard to obtain seem less valuable.

I am going to focus my inner Chai here a bit and just say we have all known DDO turned Monty Haul many years ago. If anyone really believed their hard earned loot was so unique or worth grinding, I feel they were not seeing what Turbine had done with the direction for loot. To me, the game is completely doable without the named gear. The named gear makes the game easier and that is the reward for those who grind it out. You can be my hero while I pike to grind my xp for my next life. :p



I agree loot rate drops for 'rare' stuff, especially heroic level items, should have a substantially increased drop rate. I think it would revive some interest in raids. I am not feeling that the devs want to give much love to Heroic level raids atm though; perhaps it is game performance issues, I don't know.

DDO is too Monty Haul. You have to spend all that plat on raid timers and expensive mats or you plat-cap. It's crazy but I kind of miss when I just started and couldn't afford anything.

[Singular]

My major problem is that on my capped Pally, who is pretty much geared to the max, I have recently swapped out 5 amazing named raid loot items and put in 5 ridiculously amazing random loot items that I purchased for a grand total of 200k pp in the AH.
to the list:

http://ddowiki.com/page/Lenses_of_the_Woodsman for Deadly 8 goggles of Intimidate 13
http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Ring_of_the_Stormreaver_Prophecy EH(ml24) for Wise 9 ring of Accuracy 9
http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Girdle_of_Giants%27_Brawn Epic(ml23) for Ogre Power 9 belt of False Life 40 w/ a colorless slot
http://ddowiki.com/page/Epic_Charged_Gauntlets w/ 30 hps in yellow slot to Shockproof +35 Gloves of Seeking 8 with a yellow slot
http://ddowiki.com/page/Band_of_Siberys with insightful charisma +2 added to Charisma 9 ring of Resistance 9

Ok, so maybe 2 or 3 of those items aren't end game items but look at the drastic increases in power here. That kind of increase should NEVER be obtained by swapping out end-game or near-to-end-game items with random loot. I would have expected to have to run 5-10 or more raids for an upgrade like that for each slot. Not anymore though, I just walked to the AH and blew 200k.

You wanted to know what is broken? Stop making us too happy. We WANT to be a little miserable and experience toil and strife and hardship in order to get the much needed upgrades for our build. That makes the sense of accomplishment for getting upgrades that much better. That is how you keep a game interesting.

I played EQ for 7 years and in those 7 years I raided my butt off(60+ people raids, mind you), ruining two relationships. But MAN, it was fun, all because I worked hard for the 10 hp here and 10 sp there more than I had previously. As soon as they started throwing 800+ hp on items you could get soloing/6-maning the game went to ****. Please don't let this happen. Please put those meaningful upgrades on raid/end game named loot and make the difference between EH and EE loot the same vast difference in stats as it takes to complete at that level.

NEVER should I be swapping out named raid loot for random loot that I got in the same quest.

Also find something for us to do with our shards/seals/scrolls if you aren't going to upgrade the old epic gear. Give us an option to turn the 4 items in for say a decent augment that coincides with the purpose of that loot(tanking, dps, spellcasting, healing, traps etc) or maybe a new items slot (HELLO EARRINGS ANYONE, good lord) with these small but meaningful upgrades. and make it scale for the difficulty of obtaining these 4 items. And make these (EARRINGS) have multiple small boost stats.

But the REAL issue:
+9/+10 stats random items need help, Someone needs to help them to stop dropping on random items. These Uber stats are better placed on end game named loot please take them off the random loot tables. you want +7 or so sitting there at the pinnacle of random ****, maybe even some +8 for EE random **** MAYBE(meaning roll 100 out of 100 on your loot roll). Leave +9/10 or higher for the end game named. My lower level chars are cringing as I mention it but FACE IT, it's the right thing to do.

Thanks for your time.
Palantin of Kyber
Lvl 28 Paladin

I have to disagree with you here. The loot you had and then replaced is good for level 20 and not super good at level 28. Sorry, but random level 28 gear should be better than level 20 stuff.

I agree with you that the old style of grind needs to be done with. It's too much work to grind out a level 20 "epic" item that is soon shelved in favor of higher level random gear.

It would be kind of funny if they trash this system, return to one before - I'd be annoyed if my Deadly +9 Resistance +10 we nerfed to uselessness and I suspect a lot of people would. The only real fix they have is to move the level cap up, change the drop rates on random loot, and what drops, and hope those items slowly make their way to the discard pile.

[Satyriasys]

-DrOctothorpe

While the problem of random items surpassing named in power is of paramount importance I cannot stress enough how worthless random armor currently is.
It is the one item I never ever even bother to look at it's effects. Random armor is currently like a heavier gem, Just garbage to sell.

Some of the effect options I would like to see on random armor; Strength, Constitution, Dexterity, False Life, Vitality, Death Block, Hide, Move Silently, Balance, Concentration, Speed, DR, Dusk, Dodge, Resistance (saves), Elemental Absorption and Heal Amp.

As far as named loot goes, do not neglect the lower levels. Chains like STK, WW, Carnival, Tangleroot, Sorrowdusk and Threnal should have exciting options in their reward list. Currently most of these are very far behind random loot with a few exceptions (Visor if the Fleshrender is still a great item and used all the way to cap)

I can't see myself using most of these named items even without twinked gear. Random is just too superior.

Think of a new player who goes through these chains looking forward to all the named rewards only to find them inferior to the random junk they are currently wearing, so disappointing.

[donblas]

I have to agree that loot has for some reason become much less varied.

I must declare an interest: I haven't raided and so think that it is ridiculous that I can buy better loot for a few thousand plat than people who spend a lot of time raiding and actually playing the game can get in raids. Also, challenge loot is quite often surpassed by stuff I can find with a few minutes searching on the AH.

That being said my lvl25 ranger uses (in a state of flux so a couple of items overlap):
Deadly VIII Natural Armor 8 hat (with charisma 7 archmagi hat for spell points)
Deadly VIII resistance 8 necklace
Constitution 8 Speed VIII belt
110% fortification Protection 7 ring
Dexterity 8 Dodge 8% boots
Acid resist 40 (overlaps black dragonscale benefit) false life 40 ring

Also uses at least sometimes:
lvl21 +4 banishing rapier of the icy depths
lvl22 +4 banishing rapier of heartseeking IV
lvl23 +6 flaming IV rapier of disruption
lvl23 +4 Holy III rapier of improved disruption
lvl23 +4 Solar III rapier of improved smiting
lvl23 '+4 coruscating rapier of smiting (with festival frost)
lvl24 +5 Acid V rapier riposte V
lvl24 +6 shock IV rapier riposte V
lvl25 +4 improved banishing longbow of 6% rapid shot
lvl25 +6 coruscating longbow of disruption
lvl22 +4 caustic longbow of smiting (with festival frost)

[neain2008]

I remember when there were no min level +6 stat rings in the game. I did not know about it until long after they no longer dropped, but I did not have any issues that some of the people I knew had a +6 STR rings at level 1. Then when the total overhaul hit and those rings suddenly got a min level, I was sad for my friends that lost those rings. I'm not saying that there need to +6 stat rings that you can equip at level 1, but please don't get rid of whats already in the system.

Drop deadly off the lists or make its min level drop higher than it is currently, but please don't go and change whats in our inventory. This goes for all the items that give more bonus than their min level really warrants.

While I agree that the loot tables needs another overhaul and/or rolled back to what it was before (I prefer a mix of the two personally), I would really like if what was in game stayed as it is. Yes that means that there will be a small bunch of min level deadly and accuracy that will get grandfathered into the system and the characters that own those items will have a bit more power than other people who dont have those items in inventory, but that was one of the things I liked about the old loot. There were the occasional gems that were lower than the rest of the items, or slightly more powerful. and looking for your own personal gem was one of the things that made the random loot interesting.

I would however like to see items with skills on them like I have been seeing spell power. If an item has a high enough level to warrant having a single +7 to a skill but has 2 skills on it, both those skills should be at +7 and not one at +5 and the other at +2. That makes it vendor trash for anyone and everyone. If it is possible to get items with 2 skills on it, make it pull from most/all of the entire skill list. that would make it so that i might (with a decently low chance) find a +hide item with +move silently on it, but more often I would find my +hide item with some random skill that i dont use much or at all, like tumble or swim or resonance.

[voodoogroves]

I have to disagree with you here. The loot you had and then replaced is good for level 20 and not super good at level 28. Sorry, but random level 28 gear should be better than level 20 stuff.

A good random item should be good. You should have a chance to pull that gem. Most random loot should be junk.

But a solid, planned and farmed-item (raid gear, etc.) should be good enough to warrant the farming - and that means a multiple-level life span.

[ezmeweatherwax]

Loot is motive. Motive both brings in players and keeps those players playing. Players provide $$$ for your paychecks. Without motive, players stop playing...and paying.
QED

Ungood already said many relevant and accurate things on this topic and made a rather nice list of named loot to demonstrate the "staying power" principle. With your changes, you negated much of the 'work' players had already done and motivated them to wander away from the game out of frustration.

I think the current loot needs to accurately reflect your next wave of content. Truth told, many of us are lingering with TRs like many people linger in a waiting room with an old magazine...waiting, waiting for new raids. The scale of the random-gen loots seem crazy because there is no endgame now with which to compare it. Loot is relative.

Diversity of loot is bad, but you said that in the original post. Yes, it's currently like a Scrabble tile bag with only 4 letters in it, but I'll elaborate a bit on things people miss seeing in that bag. Necessary things like Es and Ss.
-Clickies: invisibility, shield, expeditious retreat, solid fog, etc. Most people only heroic TR at present because you ripped endgame away from them, and clickies are useful to heroic TRs. This is not the place to dignify the epic TR debacle.
-Healing Amp: What are you guys trying to do, torture divines? Healing amp isn't just for the player wearing it.
-Parrying: Saves. Enough said.
-Healing Amp: Survivable toons are good. You can't DPS if you're dead.
-Pure Good & Righteousness. These were fine, they should've been left alone. Breaking DR while leveling is a good thing.
-Healing Amp: Yes please.
-MotU enhancements in general. There was nothing wrong with them.
-Healing Amp: Don't listen to The Raging Wanna-Be Hipster or His Hat on this topic. Please. He's been overruled by popular opinion.

Named loot.
-Needs to be worth fighting for. Don't just give it A Name. If a named item is replaceable by random-gen, or if the best thing about it is The Name, then don't waste your time designing or coding it.
-Relevance. Balizarde for ex...nice base/crit, lovely numbers for a rapier, but dodge on a weapon? Why? Seriously, let's think about this a little more before release.
-Celestias have offered up some much deserved rogue love. I get enough **** from 'Forte on this I'm just going to leave this topic right here. ;)
-Raiding scene has dropped away almost entirely except for CitW items (Pinion, Celestia, Sireth...now negated by the double raid boxes to all toons), FoT for comms, and maybe VoN for SoS...though the latter probably wouldn't be as compelling without the XP slam. DQ, but only because you can ee run it with less than 6 people, and then, only for The Torc. The Torc defines raid loot with staying power. Motive again. The loot people are still fighting for should tell you quite a bit re what will motivate them with upcoming loot.

Cannith challenges named loot.
-There is good stuff here, stuff my TRs wear every life.
-Needs an update for the current 25+ game.
-Updating this w better loot would motivate people to run it. (And buy it).
-While you're at it...update the LoB loot. Bump it to make it relevant to L25+ as well. The prelim work is already there. I'm sure Monk-eys would like to see some new ideas for craftable handwraps.

My toon. I most enjoy my pure assassin rogue that uses fury most of the time. Dual Celestias and a Prowess trinket, or Celestia/Agony, depending. Balizarde/Agony when I shouldn't splash/aoe anything. Yeah, thx for the kukris addition, Turbine team...what kukris? Midnight Greetings for a bump to assassinate, maybe, but the weapon itself is garbage apart from that meager +2. A crappy weapon for a DC bump that is only needed in ee...where you should be doing more dps, not less, thus requiring much weapon shifting. Cormyrian red and a GS. EE treads. The rest.../shrug...the rest is very much 'whatever' w random gen and such. We need new L28 loot to fight for. I'd like more healing amp, but where is the hamp on any gear these days? Why isn't hamp a component of named/raid gear? We need more than outdated rings which are irrelevant apart from a hamp buff itself, if you go that route, and some starter gloves. More dodge selections would also be good...but not on weapons. See: Balizarde fail. Deadly...I like/use it, and its generic name is well-suited for any proper rogue.

For rogues.
-Make assassinate as tactically relevant as a monk's stunning fist or quivering palm in ee 6man by giving us the equivalent, relevant gear to increase DCs. I run a monk and her tactics are lovely, but she is provided with gear by the game.

Ok, let's say you finish with loot. Back to motive. To truly reestablish motive in this game, now you guys need to provide some lovely L28-worthy labyrinths (raids) for us to solve in order to earn named items. But I digress. Fix loot and work in a little love for proper rogues while you do so.....*assassination gear*.

[Scraap]

What I believe I read in this thread is that players who do ground 'named' items want them to be stepped up so that random stuff with similar features is still not as good - at that level range. I can be on board with that - "non-ground out" named loot should be special and stand out. Ground out loot, like Minos, does not need to be as special - it IS the reward to get loot with specific attributes you want without having to get lucky with random loot or pulling a named item.

Actually, in my case, I'd just as soon see random stepped down to the appropriate scale, rather than seeing them crank up named, then crank up quests. (Or worse, crank up named then leave quests even easier so the learning curve is shot to er... kobold.) It's why I remain fairly focused on the notion of hashing out a well understood and generally agreed upon level-range relevance to use as a yard-stick and find the outliers to the curve.

I mean, really, 10 points to a 100 point mob or 100 points to a 1000 point mob changes nothing except the deck chairs.

[Teh_Troll]

Have another look at Obscenity. It's not just a neg level mod, it has many many dice of damage on it too. IIRC it does 5d6 damage to neutral mobs and the rare good mob, and 2d6 to evil. It's still good against neutral mobs with high fortification; if the neg level pops, bonus.

Plus the name is just cool.

With life-stealing nerfed those weapons are still terrible.

[Substitutename]

Cannith crafting cannith crafting cannith crafting.

Let us make augments. Let us make good things. Holy dear god get rid of shards of potential, or at least offer a shard that pumps the level by 5. Or have the loot start at a higher craftable level.

Let us put augment slots on items that don't have them with our craft skills. Including named things.

If you're not going to get rid of them (its a bit late,) let us craft deadly, retributive, improved vorpal, and some of the other new enhancements. Even the semi-named things like sun's fury and of the crusader and the like. Anything available in random loot should be available to the hardworking crafter. Believe me, they earned it already. Crafting should have a payoff, such as enhancing already named loot, as well as providing a toon with the lootgen they want.

Also dear god add buttons for mass deconstruction of items for essences and large amounts of sundering at once. Pleeeeease.

Something DESPERATELY needs to be done about the old seal/shard/scroll epics. They're still some of the hardest-to-acquire items in the game, and only a couple of them are even worth thinking about nowadays. Either they need to rival level cap loot due to the sheer diligence required to obtain them, or the s/s/s system needs to be made much much much easier to reflect their now lower place on the loot totem pole.
(FYI many of the items need to be buffed regardless. In each epic pack, Only about 10-20% of the items are even worth looking at. And that was before the level cap rose above 20.)

Tod rings are also really hard to get, and just fall off the map after two levels. (With exception to holy burst and 20 heal amp upgrades to them. Level 18 raid loot should rival if not outclass easy to get level 20 junk. If not rival named loot. It should still be outclassed by higher level raid loot though.

Lastly, get some more named item representation for various item types. More named khopeshes, more named rings, more named everything! I shouldn't be able to count the number of good epic level named great swords on one hand.

Also ninja inclusion here: MAKE ALL COMMS BTA. ALL OF THEM. Btc is an evil restriction that makes people only run one character. Bta promotes having multiple characters. A player with alt-itis will probably spend more TP as a whole!*. *personal opinion, no facts researched*
Btc should be raid loot and raid loot quality gear only.

I'm sure there's more that could use fine tuning, but these are some of the first steps I'd like to see taken.

Alright loot doctor. The patient is on the table. It's been weighed in and diagnosed. Start doctering. :)

[Substitutename]

For rogues.
-Make assassinate as tactically relevant as a monk's stunning fist or quivering palm in ee 6man by giving us the equivalent, relevant gear to increase DCs. I run a monk and her tactics are lovely, but she is provided with gear by the game.


This this this this x 10000000000

My easy-to make first life monk with crappy tomes and mostly eveningstar gear is a better assassin than my ACTUAL assassin toon, that has MUCH more gear effort put in.

Any monk can hold an antipode, a combat mastery item, a tier 1 LD twist, and a shattering dunrobar ring, and be a CC and assassinating MONSTER. Assassin rogues need some help to stand up to this Goliath that is beating them at their own game. Either mix assassinate DC in with one of the combat tactics, or start throwing some assassinate DC + items with epic-relevant numbers. Bear in mind the monk can get +15ish easily to their ridic ability. Thats not counting any stat gear. Assassins should be able to cover close to the same, also not counting stat gear.

[Livmo]

Cannith crafting cannith crafting cannith crafting.

Let us make augments. Let us make good things. Holy dear god get rid of shards of potential, or at least offer a shard that pumps the level by 5. Or have the loot start at a higher craftable level.

Let us put augment slots on items that don't have them with our craft skills. Including named things.

Right on! I'm hoarding a bunch of double augment items (helm, necklace, bracers, boots, and rings). There would be no reason for me to hoard if I could craft a slot on an item and make it a double. It would be cool if we could upgrade slots via crafting. White to red or some combination thereof.

Likewise the shards of potential are a pain /signed

I did mention in one of my earlier posts that it would be cool if more tomes dropped to trade in for crafting purposes.

[FlaviusMaximus]

Ghostbane loses the bane enhancement bonus.
http://i.imgur.com/t35CwNl.png http://i.imgur.com/hikTAiX.png


The level 8 is superior and not just because its a level 8 weapon. With the addition of +1 enhancement on the lvl 6 weapon it becomes level 8, but is only +3 against undead. The level 8 on the other hand is +5 against undead, as well as the bane damage is 3d6 vs. only 2d4 on the lvl 6. While the advantage of freeing up the prefix can be nice, just comparing ghost touch of undead bane vs. ghostbane shows that the former is superior for its level.

This is a bit of a lopsided example and undermines the point that Ghostbane opens up the prefix slot if the extra pluses on the weapon are to only go to enhancement bonuses.

If I was to handpick an example of a +5 Ghostbane weapon to support my point, it would be a Holy of Ghostbane III weapon. Holy would add 7 to the damage, Ghostbane III would add 7.5, for a total of 14.5. Then, if I was to handpick an example of a Ghost touch of Undead Bane weapon that I wanted to lose in the comparison, I would choose a +3 Ghost Touch of Lesser Undead Bane weapon, which would obviously come out behind (adding 6.5 damage counting the enhancement bonus). Point being that it is easy to choose good examples of one weapon and bad examples of another to prove a point.

It we are to compare the optimal min lvl 8 weapons, it would be the one pictured above alongside a Holy of Ghostbane III. In that comparison the two weapons come out about the same. Now make both a min lvl 10. The Ghost Touch of Undead Bane only gets a +1 enhancement added to it while the Ghostbane weapon can become Ghostbane IV, and it gets more lopsided from there.

Now obviously the advantage that a Ghost Touch of Undead Bane weapon has is that it can be crafted and one might not find the optimal Ghostbane weapon among the random loot gen. While I do craft, I like the ease of picking up the all in one weapon over having to go and get an Undead Soul Gem and needing to craft two different undead beaters (one that bypasses ghost touch and one that doesn't). It's generally the convenience of Ghostbane that I find appealing.

*edit - I'm not entirely sure if Holy exists as a prefix in random loot gen anymore. It could be some type of scaling bonus now for all I know.

[seebs]

Happy Friday, everyone. I’d like to introduce myself as a bit of a new dev face on the forums. First, it’s about time I quit lurking, and second, I’m putting on an additional hat on the DDO team. What hat is that? In a word: loot. I’m here to listen to you and to keep my eyes on the big picture. Yes, that includes avoiding Ghostbane-situations.

Could you do us a huge favor? Could you articulate what you perceive to be the problem with "ghostbane situations"? (My view would be that ghostbane is problematic because it's a +1 enchantment that can't be cannith-crafted except as two separate +1 enchantments.)


- Aside from the diversity issue, what are the biggest problems with random loot, today?

Issue #1: Many modifiers ("of Speed", "Deadly", etc.) have tiers, but you can't tell the tier from item names, making shopping hard. Shopping is hard! Let's do math.
Issue #2: It can be a bit intimidating trying to shuffle parts. Found some nice goggles? Great! Unfortunately that was my natural armor bonus item so I have to swap in my other one, which is a ring, so now I need to get a +con item, oh look I have a belt whoops that was my strength belt, okay, so I put on strength gloves, now I lost my accuracy, oh, good, I have accuracy goggles... Whoops, now I still can't use those nice goggles.
Issue #3: Last I checked, +N outfits weren't able to be destroyed for enhancement spirits. Not a huge deal, really, but still. :)
Issue #4: Lots of items end up with quite a few modifiers, which contributes to the difficulties of #2. Also, a +4 item which has +1 enhancement and three +1 effects is less useful to crafters than an item with a +1 enhancement and a +3 effect, because sharding for crafting materials picks only one effect. So the
Issue #5: The starter gear for vet characters ranges from "curious" to "completely insane". Multiple vet character starting sets have items which are offering no bonuses at all, due to stacking, or just due to being poorly-considered. (e.g., monks get an outfit that can cast mage armor, but has no bonuses, and also get bracers of armor +4).

Not sure #2 is fixable in any reasonable way. Augments help a bit.


- What weapon and equipment types do you feel are underserved in named and in random loot?

I sometimes wonder whether crafting shards might not make an interesting alternative.


I’d love to hear about some of the non-named loot your character’s are currently wearing.

You seem to have a mild case of greengrocer's apostrophe. :)

I have only lowbies so far, I play occasionally but never really get into actively levelling people much. For one reason or another, I basically never go for items that cast spells, I prefer static bonuses. Well, hardly ever. I tend to spend a fair bit of time staring at random items in the auction house, but it's rare that I find a thing I'd actually be able to make use of without a rework. I have on some occasions spent twenty minutes staring at rings to conclude that there's nothing I can buy which would be an upgrade for me... from a ring of protection +1 which is already being overlapped by a +2 deflection bonus from something else. But all the others I can find are stats I don't care about much, or stats that aren't quite as good as some other item I'm wearing. So if I can find a +10 fire resistance ring, but I have +15 fire resist in something else already, that's not helping much. Especially if the other item has some other bonus I don't have another source for...

[DrOctothorpe]

We've heard you all loud and clear regarding raid/named/random loot power, and yes, we agree. Named loot should stick around; raid loot should really stick around; and random loot should fill the gaps. We're digging in on taking theory back to practice here (as well as all the other big issues you invoked), and you can expect more information to make its way here, as we deploy changes based on on-going player feedback to places like Lamannia. Experience tells me that you'll see results slower than you might wish (i.e. within the hour :-P) - but hopefully a little sooner than you're accustomed to. I'll post more clarifying questions here as warranted, and as I mentioned above, another similar thread targeting named loot will be coming around on the merry-go-round.

Thanks, all, for weighing in!

Your 'umble servant,
DrOctothorpe

P.S. And don't let this note stop you from sharing your thoughts here. I'll keep watch as best I can.

[DrOctothorpe]

You seem to have a mild case of greengrocer's apostrophe. :)

I am horribly, horribly embarrassed; so much so that I've gone back and edited the original post. DrOctothorpe does not make punctuation errors... except, apparently, for when he does! I'm so glad you all did not shun this thread on account of that faux pas.

[RD2play]

The idea is simple really, merge cannith crafting and random loot into one system.

1. This would mean all "non named" or "random gen" items are inherently craft able, Thus no more need for disjunction ! nor for shards of potential. (might want to replace them with paragon/epic/epic-paragon "Shards" if balancing is an issue).
2. The affixes/enchantment level should be overwritten or removed, rather than how the system works now.
3. all but the top tier abilities found on "lootgen" should be available with crafting.
4. some rare crafting recipes should have hard to obtain ingredients found in specific adventure packs.
5. the ability to craft material types on weapons/shields/armours, with respective "ores" got adamant just add the others.
6. ability to craft augment-slots to equipment.
7. scale the armour upgrade types like you did with paragon. (i.e. "battle" "plainforged" stuff)

Main positive outcome, your random loot that would otherwise be "awesome-item-of-****why is this here this makes it useless" and be vender trash, will now be ahh it has a nice affix and the other I can remove/replace !. this doesn't mean there wont be vender trash lootgen but hey you need to crunch some for your mats right!

also since the most powerful affixes are still only found in "lootgen" it will still have its "All-stars-align" gems, to make you smile.

[Scraap]

We've heard you all loud and clear regarding raid/named/random loot power, and yes, we agree. Named loot should stick around; raid loot should really stick around; and random loot should fill the gaps. We're digging in on taking theory back to practice here (as well as all the other big issues you invoked), and you can expect more information to make its way here, as we deploy changes based on on-going player feedback to places like Lamannia. Experience tells me that you'll see results slower than you might wish (i.e. within the hour :-P) - but hopefully a little sooner than you're accustomed to. I'll post more clarifying questions here as warranted, and as I mentioned above, another similar thread targeting named loot will be coming around on the merry-go-round.

Thanks, all, for weighing in!

Your 'umble servant,
DrOctothorpe

P.S. And don't let this note stop you from sharing your thoughts here. I'll keep watch as best I can.

Thanks for taking the time to hash out system alterations before we go through another 3 or 4 implementation cycles (It really really is quicker and cheaper in the long run).

Likely more to say on the named loot thing than just amplitude of effects as indicated in this thread (mostly stuck to those to keep close to apples to apples), but that'll wait till you've digested this one fully and are ready for round 2. Short version for now though:

I will ask ya'll to ponder over how it is we've gone from "my barb with no UMD can now teleport!" (royal guard mask) and "If I'm patient and cautions enough, I can save on SP pots!" (torc/con-op) to "here's two more levels, elemental X gains another die". The one system gives us abilities as we level/acquire shineys. The latter really, really doesn't.

[Krumm]

While this thread isn't the best place to suggest this...


Please, oh please, make shard of potentials that are not upgrades for each level. ie Shard of Potential +15.

So that we don't have to make 10 freaking upgrade shards to make 1 ilevel 15 item.

[Aerinsma]

Please don't leave out Cannith Crafting.

[jakeelala]

We've heard you all loud and clear regarding raid/named/random loot power, and yes, we agree. Named loot should stick around; raid loot should really stick around; and random loot should fill the gaps. We're digging in on taking theory back to practice here (as well as all the other big issues you invoked), and you can expect more information to make its way here, as we deploy changes based on on-going player feedback to places like Lamannia. Experience tells me that you'll see results slower than you might wish (i.e. within the hour :-P) - but hopefully a little sooner than you're accustomed to. I'll post more clarifying questions here as warranted, and as I mentioned above, another similar thread targeting named loot will be coming around on the merry-go-round.

Thanks, all, for weighing in!

Your 'umble servant,
DrOctothorpe

P.S. And don't let this note stop you from sharing your thoughts here. I'll keep watch as best I can.

No. Really rare random loot at the highest drop levels should compete with mid range named/raid loot. Remember: variety is the spice of ddo.

Just don't repeat the EE dream visor being replaced by lvl 15 loot gen 1 update later.

Don't throw the baby out with the bath water: good random loot that fills gaps in named loot and opens up more possibilities = good

Lootgen that is better than named loot 10 levels higher = bad.

Please try to find a middle road, and don't nerd lootgen. Just make it more varied, more interesting, and slightly less competitive with the best raid loot. Running lvl 28 quests on EE is out of reach for a lot of players, those who can should be rewarded for it the same as people who grind raid loot. Today, almost every drop from lootgen at that level is compelling, which means it's OP or your raid just really really sucks (largely the case).

I'm not optimistic about how this will go down buti hope you give me a reason to be.

[dunklezhan]

Please don't leave out Cannith Crafting.

This. Very much this.

I said it myself earlier, but it bears repeating, loud and often.

[whereispowderedsilve]

Could you do us a huge favor? Could you articulate what you perceive to be the problem with "ghostbane situations"? (My view would be that ghostbane is problematic because it's a +1 enchantment that can't be cannith-crafted except as two separate +1 enchantments.)


Good question! Hopefully Doc Oct will see it! Cheers! :P! :)! :D!

[nibel]

Oh, another point about random items that I forgot on my first response.

Please, bring back the slot limitation.

We used to be able to only get certain enchantments in specific slots, with "rings" being the blank that accepted anything. Eg, you could only get +Constitution on necklaces and belts, only get Striding on boots, only getting +Search in goggles, and so on. In some ways, it was better for itemization because you knew what you were trading off when you put on a named item. (Eg, if I wanted to use Bracers of Wind since level 3, I lost one possible slot for Strength, Parrying and Armored).

It would also reempower the efficiency of flexible shards in cannith crafting.

Nowadays it seems like you can get any combination of enchantments in any kind of gear. I've seem Deadly on goggles, helms, rings, cloaks, bracers, and gloves. Stats in almost all items (including a +Charisma boots. How? (http://i41.tinypic.com/2s7fmzn.jpg)). Elemental resistance/absorption anywhere as well. It makes itemization kinda... too easy. "Oh, I'm missing +con, but my bracer is discartable. I'll search +con bracers on the AH."

[Hafeal]

This. Very much this.

I said it myself earlier, but it bears repeating, loud and often.

And I keep wondering about what Producer Glin stated on the most recent "Ask the Devs" on DDOcast: that Cannith Crafting needed an overhaul but he could not justify the effort for the result and therefore, don't expect CC updates anytime soon. :confused:

[SisAmethyst]

No. Really rare random loot at the highest drop levels should compete with mid range named/raid loot. Remember: variety is the spice of ddo.

Just don't repeat the EE dream visor being replaced by lvl 15 loot gen 1 update later. ...

This, don't do a 180° back paddling. When we started items with Vorpal for example where quite rare and on the other hand quite powerful as well as Metalline of Pure Good was rare and god like especially as a Harry beater. With the inflation of mob HP and drop rates this has changed however. But it would be nice to have this 'wow cool' effect again when you suddenly pull a random item that really shines out in a chest from which you haven't expected anything special (named loot).

Problem is we even don't have this wow effect any-more with named items. I mean the first time I pulled a spellstoring ring and bloodstone I had a big grin on my face as like on Christmas. Now the drop rate is still insane but I would just shrug as you can find random loot that is better or on a more suitable slot.

[Systern]

We've heard you all loud and clear regarding raid/named/random loot power, and yes, we agree. Named loot should stick around; raid loot should really stick around; and random loot should fill the gaps. We're digging in on taking theory back to practice here (as well as all the other big issues you invoked), and you can expect more information to make its way here, as we deploy changes based on on-going player feedback to places like Lamannia. Experience tells me that you'll see results slower than you might wish (i.e. within the hour :-P) - but hopefully a little sooner than you're accustomed to. I'll post more clarifying questions here as warranted, and as I mentioned above, another similar thread targeting named loot will be coming around on the merry-go-round.

Thanks, all, for weighing in!

Your 'umble servant,
DrOctothorpe

P.S. And don't let this note stop you from sharing your thoughts here. I'll keep watch as best I can.

Okay, it's been 2 and a half hours.... Where's the results?!?!

:D

[Oxarhamar]

I am horribly, horribly embarrassed; so much so that I've gone back and edited the original post. DrOctothorpe does not make punctuation errors... except, apparently, for when he does! I'm so glad you all did not shun this thread on account of that faux pas.

to err is human

much rather have human devs than corporate robots...warforged is ok thou

[Melondrop]

Like everyone else said the problem with random loot is its overpowered compared to the rest of the loot out there.
Me personally i would like to see updates to alot of quest/raid loot tables instead of nerfing random loot.
People would run older content more if the loot was updated every now and then.
Make some really hard to get unique weapons/armor, or make crafters be able to craft unique weapons/armor.
Its always nice to have a carrot to go after, and to have something thats tailored just to you.

There are a ton of crafting systems in the game and quite a few of them could use a overhaul.
Greensteel could use some new effects, or more tiers.
Cannith crafting was supposed to be fun and useful, but its become so convoluted with trying to tie it into the store that its basically useless.

So please add better stuff to existing quests/raids and totally redo cannith crafting so its quicker and easier to make things.

[Hadesborne]

I understand this sentiment and I agree with the drop rate issue. I place this in the context of level caps though - as the game has grown and we had caps (10, 12, 14, 16 etc), loot had staying power because of caps. As the levels have grown though, I never had the expectation that great level 12 gear should be a game lifetime achievement - especially past level 20.

Actually, you are pretty much dead wrong here. DEAD WRONG. I for the longest time had The Blood Stone equipped on my lvl 20, atleast for more than a year of straight grinding, as well as 2 green steel weaps, a con opp neck and a green steel helm. Where is it now? sitting in the bank for when I TR again. It is "kind of" acceptable now that I am lvl 28 for these lvl 11+ items to be outdated, but just 2 levelS ago at lvl 26 I obtained the +8 Epic giant's belt. It lasted less than a month before I swapped it for a random +9 str with 40hp and a colorless slot. And here's the kicker. There were 4 of them in the AH when I bought it for 20kpp. FOUR!!! It wasn't as if the stars aligned just right and I looted this amazing item. It was COMMON. A common item just replaced a rare item of equal level, EASILY.
THERE IS NO WAY YOU CAN TELL ME THIS IS HOW A GAME SHOULD WORK

For years you kept dangling this carrot in front of our eyes, this EPIC loot, like Lucy holding the football out for us to kick. Then you give us crazy random loot and ruin everything, effectively yanking the football out from under our feet right as we are about to kick. Maybe people complained that the epic gear was too hard to get. The solution was simple, up the drop rates on shards/seals/scrolls a bit more. Don't go all BULL IN THE CHINA CLOSET on the system and remove all the old items from relevance. Any 6 year old can do that. They can give everyone everything they want cause it will make them feel better. Listen if we wanted GOD MODE, then games like DUKE NUKEM would still be played all over.

Level cap raises be damned, I want my gear to last 9 levels. I want it to be RARE as hell. I want toil. I want strife. I want a damned sense of accomplishment. If I don't get it, I am sure another game will reward me with these things.

This is your dilemma DDO.

Fix loot or lose customers.
Currently the best way to fix loot is to scale back the random loot BIGTIME. It is the only way to fix this situation. Making better loot faster is just more GOD MODE.
Please disable the cheats DDO.

Palantin of Kyber
Lvl 28 paladin
The Dragon Order of Arcanix

[LightBear]

- Aside from the diversity issue, what are the biggest problems with random loot, today?
It lacks fantasy, linear scaling is one thing not having options is another.
It lacks diversity, both in enchantment types and where it can be found on.
The race restrictions where nice and by passable by UMD, Cursed items cannot be cleansed. Tho Cursed items did not need UMD.
The power to level ratio seems off for a lot of enchantments (like superior stability), most of the times in disfavor of the wearer of such an item.
Some unnamed random abilities go higher then the spell like equivalent.
- What weapon and equipment types do you feel are underserved in named and in random loot?
Trinkets do not appear on the random loot generation list.
Named Armor is never bypassed by Unnamed Armor unless 10 levels or more higher, but by that time there are better named options out there.
Daggers, hardly any reason to use one. But this is more a Class/Feats/Presitige Enhancements/Epic Destiny thingy.
- I’d love to hear about some of the non-named loot your characters are currently wearing.
Seeker, Speed, Deadly, Accuracy, Natural Armor, Doublestrike, Parrying, Deflection, Resistance.



..

[Skavenaps]

- Aside from the diversity issue, what are the biggest problems with random loot, today?
First of all, the name. Really name makes a big diference. lots of named weapons from pnp are just a flaming +1 sword with a proper name.
Second, when i usally dont read the loot window after you deliver a quest, basically cause i know there will be nothing of interest (and cause im normally rushing to farm xp, so check items its usally a waste of my time)
- What weapon and equipment types do you feel are underserved in named and in random loot?
I miss the BIG classics from pnp. Please, just pick the dm manual, and add the items. they dont need to be uber, they just need to be into any d&d game. archmages tunic (with 3 colors), demonic armor (with the proper looks) and so on.
- I’d love to hear about some of the non-named loot your characters are currently wearing.
Deadly are great and a +8 stat wrist of whatever with a slot so i can make my own EE bracelets of endless toil

[Portalcat]

Perhaps a slightly off-the-wall suggestion: add level-appropriate wondrous craftmanship to more, if not all, quest chain rewards lists. It does a lot to make quest chain turn-ins for Wheloon and Storm Horns more valuable and fun after you've already picked up any normal level named loot that would be useful (if there's any).

In general, wondrous craftmanship items were a good idea. They add a smattering of power and excitement to the random loot system without adding any affixes that are systematically problematic.

[RavenAmazing]

I am reading the same exact complaining that has been on this forum forever. Same exact issues, word for word.

The fact that this thread shot to 20 pages deep in 5 days is a clue.

I disagree with 95 % of what is in this thread, however, since I am in that small minority of forumites, I can't help but feel that all you want to do is please the endgamers and elitists with no regard for a casual gamer.

I like the random loot. It allows me the opportunity to complete many quests that I would normally fail.

[Miahoo]

I didn't read all 20 pages. But I'm here to tell exactly what I feel about loot in general.

I had some big excitement capping my 1st toon. Finally feeling epic content, farming the shroud for beaters and gathering loot!

Not much later, the Chrono raid appeared. It was a blast!! Best set in game (and a trinket to complete 2nd best set in game). And farming took a step forward.

Then, the kobolds event came - we got more items, more loot, which was by far better - still not as much as the Chrono set - I was so happy to fill some alts with BtA awesome loot.

Shortly after, we got the Cannith challenges and crafting. Massive farming and grinding for loot started - it was literally "farm for loot", period, no skill involved (nor luck). more runs = more loot. Entire shroud beaters become trash, as the Cannith crafting bring way better boss beaters.

The 1st expansion wasn't too devastating with loot imo - citw farming started.

High road and GH epic appeared, which completely killed the Chrono set farming. But hey! we got some awesome epics now! and the EE Dream Visor is so good!

Well... 2 months later, all the random appears. The Chrono set is a joke, the Dream Visor is now a complete trash!

I'm begging you, stop trashing my gear. My bank is full with gear (which used to be best at that time) I just feel bad to trash out all this hours of grinding and loot drama.

-----------

Rant aside. I think it's great we have someone to take a look at this.

I think the main problem with loot I have now is weapon wise.

Back then I used to carry 7 different sets. Now I have The Sireth, the crit range is too good to be replaced even by a beater or any other weapon.
Same goes with my ranger using the Pinion as a bow and Balizarde for melee.

I'd like to see some variety for good weapons in game. (srsly, most weapons are a complete joke).
More Stunning / Combat Mastery items will be nice.

For your request, my current non-named loot is:
Ring: CON +9 FL +45
Belt: STR +9 Seeker X
Bracers: 30% Healing Amp (Not dropping in game currently)
Goggles: Deadly +8 Resistance +9

[kmoustakas]

Sorries but I am not going to read all 20 pages of posts! I would really like to say what I missed about old loot though: you had wondrous items for every level range!

For example, at low levels you could happen upon riptide items or lacerating items which were awesome and then you had them as a combo riptide of lacerating for an epic-feel good moment! At levels 6-8 you had sun's fury, chaotic (the cursespewing+true chaos), pandemonium items. At levels 10 you had all sorts of smiters/banishers/disruptors. At 12 you had desert sand. For armors you had greater warding which was kinda cool. No matter what level you were, you were always hoping for something to drop for you. Right now, you just hope you get guild renown at end reward and you don't even bother 'examining' every item to see what it does. It will be elemental of random suffix nobody cares, with the small exceptions being keen of bloodletter and holy of ghostbane which translate well to higher levels as well. But that's only because these are good 'combos', they are not great abilities. Just because bloodletter is better than maiming doesn't mean it's good! Because flaming 2 does more damage than flaming burst doesn't mean it's better! Suggestions: bring those back. Elemental of 1d4 or 2d4 or 3d4 or 10d4 being level appropriate is of absolutely no use. But frost and riptide are a great difference: when you chance upon a riptide item, you know you got lucky. When you chance into a min level 10 pandemonium of lacerating you KNOW you got lucky and you got something cool and useful. And when you find +1 riptide of icy depths and then you run to icy kit it, you win!

As far as items and deadly being op'ed goes. Compare deadly to seeking. They have the same numbers: +10 enhancement worth item is +10 damage or +10 damage on criticals. If you can't see that something is wrong there, then there's something wrong with you. And don't forget how seeking +6 at level 9 (bloodstone or even marilith chain at 12) was thought to be one of the best damage options not that long ago.

For reference, right before tr'ing my ranger I was using
Greater convalecence of superior parrying bracers
Deadly +10 of resistance +9 necklace (OP!)
Was looking for health +10 of GFL +50 and ogre power +10 seeking +10 and dexterity +10 of protection or natural armor +10 items but they were so expensive and only on asah so I couldn't buy them so I decided to TR until their prices drop a bit :p

[Qhualor]

We've heard you all loud and clear regarding raid/named/random loot power, and yes, we agree. Named loot should stick around; raid loot should really stick around; and random loot should fill the gaps. We're digging in on taking theory back to practice here (as well as all the other big issues you invoked), and you can expect more information to make its way here, as we deploy changes based on on-going player feedback to places like Lamannia. Experience tells me that you'll see results slower than you might wish (i.e. within the hour :-P) - but hopefully a little sooner than you're accustomed to. I'll post more clarifying questions here as warranted, and as I mentioned above, another similar thread targeting named loot will be coming around on the merry-go-round.

Thanks, all, for weighing in!

Your 'umble servant,
DrOctothorpe

P.S. And don't let this note stop you from sharing your thoughts here. I'll keep watch as best I can.

Careful. You might become a fan favorite if you do as you say :)

[ThomasHunter]

I am also one who loves the new random loot, especially if Turbine is adding back in the U14 affects! That is going to be awesome!

That said, I also understand that named loot should be a bit more fun/special. I really love most of the GH loot and how that was handled. With a tweaking of augments, this could be even better.

As I said earlier, I love pursuing named loot. The commendation turn-ins from U14 with all of the armor sets is still my favorite. I know as a largely casual player, that getting named loot tends to be tough (I'm okay with that). When I get something cool, it's usually months later when in a PUG and no one wants the item!!! (I'm also okay with that!)

What I would love to see is the possibility to upgrade the normal items to the elite items. Maybe another use of the new Commendations of Valor? I use a heroic normal Wall of Wood with my level 23 cleric and I still use it. I was just alerted to the white dragon shield, so will pursue that next. However, I almost certainly will never do that on EE (I really dislike EE questing).

So random loot is good - with bringing back older affects. Named loot is one of the main reasons I love to quest - for that elusive item (I'm still awaiting a first drop of that cool named stuff from U19 - which I am aware that most folks don't like). I don't raid all that often, but the flexibility and power should top off with raid loot (as sad as I am about that, it makes sense in general). Oh yeah, give me more set bonuses to work towards!:cool:

Thank you for your consideration!

[patang01]

Oh, another point about random items that I forgot on my first response.

Please, bring back the slot limitation.

We used to be able to only get certain enchantments in specific slots, with "rings" being the blank that accepted anything. Eg, you could only get +Constitution on necklaces and belts, only get Striding on boots, only getting +Search in goggles, and so on. In some ways, it was better for itemization because you knew what you were trading off when you put on a named item. (Eg, if I wanted to use Bracers of Wind since level 3, I lost one possible slot for Strength, Parrying and Armored).

It would also reempower the efficiency of flexible shards in cannith crafting.

Nowadays it seems like you can get any combination of enchantments in any kind of gear. I've seem Deadly on goggles, helms, rings, cloaks, bracers, and gloves. Stats in almost all items (including a +Charisma boots. How? (http://i41.tinypic.com/2s7fmzn.jpg)). Elemental resistance/absorption anywhere as well. It makes itemization kinda... too easy. "Oh, I'm missing +con, but my bracer is discartable. I'll search +con bracers on the AH."

I'm opposite that; make magical permutations exist on more diverse gear. Making certain permutations only exist in some slots create far more pigeon holing then solve issues of flexibility. I want to be able to find a spellpower ring like before. Or helmet. Or bracers. I don't want to be forced to get it on scepter or shield only.
Or heal amp.

I mean what kind of 'magical' creation logic dictates that only rings can have x and only scepters y? It makes no sense. It's better to add flexibility in order to make random items viable alongside given named items, instead of always looking for the pre-eminent item for a given slot. You'll find a lot less diversity that way and it leads to gold standard items for given slots.

The problem with 'deadly' is that it's one of those that blew other similar named items out of the water AND that there were so few permutations on these items that it seems like everything is deadly of something alongside ghostbane. The problem is not the items they're on (that's a good thing) - is that there are so few things to pull in those slots.

[XavierElanor]

-

5) Power vs. named/raid loot. Some random gen loot is so powerful that it totally eclipses raid/named loot of the same, or even higher level. This is absurd.




1000 times this. In just one update many of the most sought after items became vendor trash. Loot gen items should enver be more powerful than named items.

[Zeez]

One problem with random generated loot is you guys leave stuff behind. You make a system then abandon it. There is a plethora of prefixes and suffixes that were on random gear that has been completely removed.

There was a line of scepters for example. They had an order to them going i'll use Fire for example. Fire Lore/Focus then Fire Mastery then Fire Supremacy. Supremacy was the best of the series and was BtCoE. When you guys updated them the elemental versions you did well (Fire/Cold/Etc) fixing it (after it was pointed out to you.) But the Illusion, Enchantment, Necro ones ended up being left unfixed they ended up being lvl 25 BtCoE 3 DC and 3 spell pen, vs the regular newer ones which have 4 DC at lower level and aren't even BtCoE. I would have liked to see 3 DC/SP for Lore/Focus versions lvl 20-22, 4 DC/SP Mastery lvl 23-24, 5 DC/SP supremacy 25-28.

I would like to see more consistency with loot systems.

[FrancisP.Fancypants]

I'd like to hear more specifics on exactly how random loot is OP over named loot. I'm not challenging the statement, but I'm not seeing the same thing (and facetiousness aside, if everything's ghostbaned, how is that OP?).

To be clear, I've been running my main and one alt for a year and a half now. I only run epic content every few lives on my main, so I'm in a steady TR cycle; as far as the 1-20 game, 'new random' has some teeth, but I don't think it's any more OP than older loot (certainly not as much as lacerating at level 2). My crafting levels are at cap, and while 95% of the recipes are worthless, the others are vital now that we're missing some prefixes.. metalline, PG, 10% alacrity (at level 1, btw), flexible shards. Consolidation is really where the power is, not just a raw + to damage, and plenty of non-epic named gear does this nicely. The standout is seeker gear, for absolutely destroying the value of the Blood Stone; other than that, everything else seems on par considering what's not dropping anymore. It's a lateral shift, if you will. And at-level augments in random gear? Still filler at best, and a total waste of item level.

Bearing in mind that plenty of named loot has always been garbage (woo, wolf whistle. woo), and not speaking for anything past level 23 or so, I don't think OP is the right adjective. Not rare enough, sure, and needing more variety, yes. But strictly OP? Please enlighten me with specifics.

[EllisDee37]

I'd like to hear more specifics on exactly how random loot is OP over named loot.Epic Elite dream visor is demoted to garbage by lootgen deadly.

Anything named with stats or spell power is eclipsed by lootgen stat and spell power items.

[garlor]

- What weapon and equipment types do you feel are underserved in named and in random loot?

heal amp gear, there is only one item with heal amp beyond lvl 20 and is a named shield, so any dps type is ****ed off

[Hadesborne]

I'd like to hear more specifics on exactly how random loot is OP over named loot. I'm not challenging the statement, but I'm not seeing the same thing (and facetiousness aside, if everything's ghostbaned, how is that OP?).

To be clear, I've been running my main and one alt for a year and a half now. I only run epic content every few lives on my main, so I'm in a steady TR cycle; as far as the 1-20 game, 'new random' has some teeth, but I don't think it's any more OP than older loot (certainly not as much as lacerating at level 2). My crafting levels are at cap, and while 95% of the recipes are worthless, the others are vital now that we're missing some prefixes.. metalline, PG, 10% alacrity (at level 1, btw), flexible shards. Consolidation is really where the power is, not just a raw + to damage, and plenty of non-epic named gear does this nicely. The standout is seeker gear, for absolutely destroying the value of the Blood Stone; other than that, everything else seems on par considering what's not dropping anymore. It's a lateral shift, if you will. And at-level augments in random gear? Still filler at best, and a total waste of item level.

Bearing in mind that plenty of named loot has always been garbage (woo, wolf whistle. woo), and not speaking for anything past level 23 or so, I don't think OP is the right adjective. Not rare enough, sure, and needing more variety, yes. But strictly OP? Please enlighten me with specifics.

OK here goes, ill give you an example or two:
The replaced loot: EH Girdle of Giant's Brawn ML24 +8 Str, colorless slot w/ +2 insightful str aug, empty green slot (which I equipped a vitality 25 from the AH in)
The new loot: Ogre Power +9 belt of False Life +40 with an empty colorless slot ML 27. I bought a +2 insightful Str aug from the DDO store for a measly 195 pts (easily gotten with favor) and equipped it.

The girdle I farmed, the new belt I bought for 20k in the AH and there were 4 of them in there at the time so it is common. I know the ML went up, but I farmed the Girdle at lvl 26 and at lvl 27 bought the belt.

The replaced loot: EH Ring of Stormreaver Prophecy ML:24 +8 wisdom, Green Slot w/ +7 sapphire of resistance, empty colorless slot(which I filled with a +7 Char aug).
The new loot : Charisma+9 ring of Resistance+9

The replaced loot: Deadly +6 ring of Intimidate+13
The new loot : Wise +9 ring of accuracy +9

the replaced loot: Lenses of the Woodsman ML20 True Seeing, Competency to Attack +3, Seeker +6, Guile set bonus(never used)
the new loot: Deadly +8 goggles of Intimidate +13 (still looking for Deadly +9 of intim +19, yes it's out there)

the replaced loot: Epic Charged Gauntlets +6 str, +30 Lightning resist, Greater shocking blow (+20 to 120 lightning dmg on a natural 20), Greater Might of the Abashai set bonus(never used)
the new loot: Shockproof +35 gloves of Seeking +8 with a yellow aug slot (currently empty, maybe will fill with insight wis +2 aug)

ok NET STATS after all were swapped:
+1 Str
+15 Hps
+1 Wis
+2 Cha
+2 Resistance
+6 attack
+2 dmg
+5 elec resist
no 20 to 120 elec dmg on a roll of 20
no true seeing

PLUS I was able to not take the +1str enhancement since it made me an odd number for humans and put it towards +6 PRR, the +1 wis brought me even.

I got those upgrades for 200k in about 15 mins at the AH. I am sorry you should be questing for these types of upgrades at that lvl not running to the AH.

[Hadesborne]

imagine if they gave us another slot for items, and you could get an item that gave you these stats for 200k in the AH, how broken would it be. that's is exactly what it was like.

[voodoogroves]

I'd like to hear more specifics on exactly how random loot is OP over named loot. I'm not challenging the statement, but I'm not seeing the same thing (and facetiousness aside, if everything's ghostbaned, how is that OP?).

To be clear, I've been running my main and one alt for a year and a half now. I only run epic content every few lives on my main, so I'm in a steady TR cycle; as far as the 1-20 game, 'new random' has some teeth, but I don't think it's any more OP than older loot (certainly not as much as lacerating at level 2). My crafting levels are at cap, and while 95% of the recipes are worthless, the others are vital now that we're missing some prefixes.. metalline, PG, 10% alacrity (at level 1, btw), flexible shards. Consolidation is really where the power is, not just a raw + to damage, and plenty of non-epic named gear does this nicely. The standout is seeker gear, for absolutely destroying the value of the Blood Stone; other than that, everything else seems on par considering what's not dropping anymore. It's a lateral shift, if you will. And at-level augments in random gear? Still filler at best, and a total waste of item level.

Bearing in mind that plenty of named loot has always been garbage (woo, wolf whistle. woo), and not speaking for anything past level 23 or so, I don't think OP is the right adjective. Not rare enough, sure, and needing more variety, yes. But strictly OP? Please enlighten me with specifics.

It's kinda like the rules when out.

A few updates back "we're adding slots to things, but not to things people use a lot as those still have some value".

So, not slot on the Blood Stone. Of course, in U19/20 Seeker 6 drops in like every freaking equipment location, master crafted and/or with slots.

Resistance 5 (which used to be hard to find on lootgen) now drops all the time. And, in just about any location - with augment slots. Boots of the Innocent? Please, I have a necklace w/ a slot and resist *6* that's the same ML now. And, of course, if you want to use an augment on resistance, that's a blue ML20 ... which now drops at ML9 or ML7 masterwork. Resist 6 used to be only the domain of ML20+, hardly ML11.

Gauntlets of Ogre Power? Gloves of Dexterity? Hell it used to be that good crafted twink or those ML0 rings were better - now lootgen is better by tons. Who wants a +4 stat with no slots at that level?

I talked about the Cannith Attack shards before. Bonus to hit was too strong, so they raised the ML ... and the ABSOLUTE BEST you could get in heroic was a +4 ... and at one point they viewed that as so scandalously overpowered they upped the ML on all those items. My blindness ward of attack +4 went to ML 17 or 19 (master crafted). Now +4 drops on ML7 lootgen (5 masterwork).

I had to freaking HUNT for ages for more INT on my wizard. I came back from a break, hit the AH and immediately updated his INT item. Bonus, at ML25 it's also resistance 8 or 9, which is better than any item had prior to U19/20 (and they go to flipping 10 on resistance now).

Superior False Life *was* awesome. It was only on a few items, you had to really work to fit it into your gear slot. What level does False Life 40 drop on now?

Spell Focus used to be +2 was the best you could get heroic. A few epic items had +3 and those went for crazy plat on the AH. Now, +4s are freaking everywhere ... even dropping in heroic.

Stat+8 items are now ML15 heroic. That idea that the best you'll get in heroic is 6 is gone. Those claw gloves at +6 which were nice, but already had some competition from PDK are kinda blown out of scale. ML20 and a grind? Nah, how about ML15 for +8 any stat and an easy run?



Part of my issue is YES, we did get huge inflation. Sure, some of that is bound to happen - but I'd hope it happens at the high end and not in the middle. Either way, IT ISNT LIKE WE FREAKING NEEDED +8 stat, +6 resist and +4 DC items ... FFS y'all, why the hell did this happen?

[Hafeal]

Actually, you are pretty much dead wrong here. DEAD WRONG.

Well, it wouldn't be the first time, won't be the last. Let's take a look, shall we?


I for the longest time had The Blood Stone equipped on my lvl 20, atleast for more than a year of straight grinding

The only reason you, or anyone else, ground out the Bloodstone is because it was seeker on a trinket - freeing up that weapon to do more dmg than just have a seeker bonus. Certainly, freeing up seeker to other slots is not devaluing your Bloodstone in any way. The fact that you now don't have to wear it to 20 is a positive in my book - even more so that you don't have to grind it out, although that is the one rare loot I seem to not have had a problem to obtain. Go figure.


, as well as 2 green steel weaps, a con opp neck and a green steel helm. Where is it now? sitting in the bank for when I TR again.

Oooook. Well, GS weapons shouldn't be your primary choice above 20, which was my point. However, I still carry my Min II around for certain battles. While it may no longer be my 'main' it still is useful. Let's face it though - a ML 11 item shouldn't be your primary weapon at 27; apparently, at least I think we agree on that
It is "kind of" acceptable now that I am lvl 28 for these lvl 11+ items to be outdated{/quote]


[QUOTE=Hadesborne;5176053], but just 2 levelS ago at lvl 26 I obtained the +8 Epic giant's belt. It lasted less than a month before I swapped it for a random +9 str with 40hp and a colorless slot. And here's the kicker. There were 4 of them in the AH when I bought it for 20kpp. FOUR!!! It wasn't as if the stars aligned just right and I looted this amazing item. It was COMMON. A common item just replaced a rare item of equal level, EASILY. THERE IS NO WAY YOU CAN TELL ME THIS IS HOW A GAME SHOULD WORK

So you picked up a good item that has what, an ML 27? 28? You are at end game - the loot will be amazing. Even random loot. Should it be better than at level Raid loot? No. Might it be better than ML 23 named loot? Yes.

[oradafu]

I'd like to hear more specifics on exactly how random loot is OP over named loot.

Take Shroud weapons and the SoS off the table and you'll find that all Heroic Raid weapons have a lower base damage than random weapons in the same level range. This is because almost all random weapons over the level 10 were made into Paragon weapons that give weapons a +0.5W, but raid weapons were untouched. So even though the raid weapon is a +5 weapon, a random weapon of the same type that is two levels lower and only a +1 or +2 still does more base damage than the raid weapon.

[Bakalakadaka]

- Aside from the diversity issue, what are the biggest problems with random loot, today?

Since U19 I haven't seen a single clickie drop and this is a real problem. These items, in particular Shield, Invisibility and Detect Secret Doors, are incredibly useful but they seem to have just disappeared completely from the loot tables. As a result those that are about are either being hoarded or sold at astronomical prices on the Auction House. Please bring back these clickies plus look at some new ones for other temporary buffs like Bark Skin and Stone Skin and some for healing spells. The Detect Secret Doors also need to be scaled in line with the new detection rules so that higher level ones are available for harder DC doors.

Some better adherence to a character's class and race in quest end rewards would also be really useful. I am so sick of my warforged being offered armour instead of docents (and vice versa) or my fighters being offered spell implements (and also vice versa). Setting the Gameplay option doesn't seem to make much difference and even then it is class only with no racial bias possible.

- What weapon and equipment types do you feel are underserved in named and in random loot?

There seems to be very little weapon & armour love (amour?) for Druids with very few non-metal armour sets being dropped in either name or random loot. This has been a problem ever since armour went through its revamp and hide was dropped. Apart from the Snakeskin Vest, Rakshasa Hide and super rare Leaves of the Forest there isn't a lot of armour about for this class and named scimitars are just as limited.

Banishing TH weapons are also rare as rocking horse manure under about level 24. Having some of these around level 14-16 would be very helpful for facing the demons in the Vale.

Something higher level for killing oozes would be fantastic also. Everbright weapons are not that common so I am stuck with the hassle of smashing away with muckbane for an hour to kill even the smallest ooze.

Metal shields - what has happened to all of the metal shields? Everything now seems to be wood and while its great that druids get something I have to wonder what we are missing out on as traditionally metal shields had higher Dr than wood but since all the metal ones have disappeared it is hard to know anymore.

[oradafu]

Some better adherence to a character's class and race in quest end rewards would also be really useful. I am so sick of my warforged being offered armour instead of docents (and vice versa) or my fighters being offered spell implements (and also vice versa). Setting the Gameplay option doesn't seem to make much difference and even then it is class only with no racial bias possible.


I don't foresee this problem being fixed in Epics.

Players were told in the past that the End Reward based on class only works when there is no named items that appear on the list. I'm pretty sure CoV are going to be considered Named Items, and since they always drop as an end reward when you get 100% base XP in Epics, it probably means that the End Reward based on class won't be working.

This problem would be solved if the CoV dropped in the end chest, but probably can't because CoH and Epic Tokens couldn't drop in the same chest (or at least that was the reason given for not continuing with Epic Tokens with MOTU was released)... or it could also be solved if the CoV used the same mechanism that the Mabar Signets used (but the Devs seem to be allergic to using old mechanisms while they get hot and bothered when creating new mechanisms and systems).

[Bakalakadaka]

I don't foresee this problem being fixed in Epics.

I'm not restricting myself to epics here - Dr Loot was asking a general question and I'm giving a general answer. Personally I'm a bit peeved that too many people are so epic focused and forget that there is a whole pile of content in the heroic tier which is still being played by both new and old players and it needs as much attention as the epic end of the game. The loot changes are a problem across all levels not just the top end.

[oradafu]

I'm not restricting myself to epics here - Dr Loot was asking a general question and I'm giving a general answer. Personally I'm a bit peeved that too many people are so epic focused and forget that there is a whole pile of content in the heroic tier which is still being played by both new and old players and it needs as much attention as the epic end of the game. The loot changes are a problem across all levels not just the top end.

I was just pointing out that the CoV being added to the End Rewards in Epic quests has thrown a wrench into the exact problem that you presented. It was brought up a week or so ago and we had a different Dev act like the mechanism was BS. But the problem with not getting an End Reward based on class is that if there is any item that's Named on that list, then the End Reward list isn't restricted to class, even if you have it designated that way in UI.

[Yamato-San]

- Aside from the diversity issue, what are the biggest problems with random loot, today?

No clickies dropping, no stat +1/+2 tomes dropping, nearly no pure 'rogue' items (search/disarm/escape) dropping.
Banishing/disrupting/smiting weapons below ml 20 are nearly extinct. Everbright disappeared.

And not related to the ghostbane disaster: The "class specific" loot option works well for monks (handwraps) and artificers (repeater), but i would wish for the same adjusted drop rates for e.g. a greataxe kensai or a shuriken thrower.

[Clatterfist]

I can't believe I forgot to say this the first time, but one of the biggest problems with loot right now is retributive damage. Retributive damage is bad. There are quests that involve keeping hostiles alive, and loads of quests and raid that involve killing things at the same time, which means preparing mobs by taking them to a low level of health and keeping them there. Anything with a damaging guard effect undermines your ability to control such important situations and is therefore bad. This is problematic with both random and named loot.

[Twinkly]

Mauls. Seriously, check out the selection of end game named Mauls, and compare it to pretty much any other weapon. There are no good choices.

The game is in dire need of some new epic named mauls.

[Bakalakadaka]

I was just pointing out that the CoV being added to the End Rewards in Epic quests has thrown a wrench into the exact problem that you presented. It was brought up a week or so ago and we had a different Dev act like the mechanism was BS. But the problem with not getting an End Reward based on class is that if there is any item that's Named on that list, then the End Reward list isn't restricted to class, even if you have it designated that way in UI.

Fair enough, but that's just one example of the issue with 'named' items in loot so lets not restrict the fix to something that is only applicable to epic levels - it is a problem throughout and named/token/whatevers are stuffing it up all over.

[Bakalakadaka]

nearly no pure 'rogue' items (search/disarm/escape/[spot])

So true - been so long since I've seen one of these they are nearly mythical. Sick of getting items with 3 or 4 minor boosts on them pushing up the min level when all you want is something to boost a specific skill as much as you can at a reasonable level. I mean what rogue is EVER going to use a CHA +2 SPOT +7 cloak with a yellow augment at level 13 when what you want is a pure SPOT +13 or 15?

Also sick of all the silly combinations - like arrows of ooze bane and bows of riposte - which are just never going to get used. Get rid of the randomiser and only combine effects where they are logical.

[Qhualor]

Mauls. Seriously, check out the selection of end game named Mauls, and compare it to pretty much any other weapon. There are no good choices.

The game is in dire need of some new epic named mauls.

Yes, but give me a good reason to use a maul over my slashing weapon. Often times I can overpower the DR of some mobs and stick with my sword when a lot of mauls can have the same kind of damage effects as any other weapons. The best situation to use them over a slashing weapon is against undead and mobs with adamantine like golems and metal dogs.

[Qhualor]

So true - been so long since I've seen one of these they are nearly mythical. Sick of getting items with 3 or 4 minor boosts on them pushing up the min level when all you want is something to boost a specific skill as much as you can at a reasonable level. I mean what rogue is EVER going to use a CHA +2 SPOT +7 cloak with a yellow augment at level 13 when what you want is a pure SPOT +13 or 15?

Also sick of all the silly combinations - like arrows of ooze bane - which are just never going to get used. Get rid of the randomiser and only combine effects where they are logical.

This.

I did a trapper life a few lives ago on one of my TRs and most of the gear I had to buy from AH because all I ever saw were minor boosts to specific skills in chests and end rewards. It was rare to find that full disable item or full search item at the appropriate level.

The only good thing about weird randomized loot is that the vendor is more than happy to buy it from me.

[oradafu]

So true - been so long since I've seen one of these they are nearly mythical. Sick of getting items with 3 or 4 minor boosts on them pushing up the min level when all you want is something to boost a specific skill as much as you can at a reasonable level. I mean what rogue is EVER going to use a CHA +2 SPOT +7 cloak with a yellow augment at level 13 when what you want is a pure SPOT +13 or 15?


To build upon this complaint (and just a bit off topic), players can only make Cannith Crafted skills up to +13. Those shards make items level 11, in which they are useful for a few more levels, even with the increased Trap DCs in the game. However, Augments for skills lag way behind, with a +11 being level 20. So the trapskill Augments are complete junk at level.

So Trappers have to rely more on named drops that give Exceptional skills to boost those skills, which there are less than a handful. This seems especially true since Update 19 with the removal of some of the Trapper skill boosts for Rogue and Artis and the removal of finding at level +15 skill items, the increase of trap DCs and the destroying the usefulness of Detect Secret Door and Trueseeing...among other things.

[Scraap]

To build upon this complaint (and just a bit off topic), players can only make Cannith Crafted skills up to +13. Those shards make items level 11, in which they are useful for a few more levels, even with the increased Trap DCs in the game. However, Augments for skills lag way behind, with a +11 being level 20. So the trapskill Augments are complete junk at level.

So Trappers have to rely more on named drops that give Exceptional skills to boost those skills, which there are less than a handful. This seems especially true since Update 19 with the removal of some of the Trapper skill boosts for Rogue and Artis and the removal of finding at level +15 skill items, the increase of trap DCs and the destroying the usefulness of Detect Secret Door and Trueseeing...among other things.

Not that it helps for search, but one outlier introduced recently was lowering the total ML for the cannith challenge spare hand down to 13 with masterful craftsmanship for the level 16 tier 3s. Of course, you have to be or have a level... 15? to enter one of the materials-required challenges? A minimum of 25 in a school, and either get lucky, or have enough favor with house C to buy the specialty mats. (Yes, it's convoluted. No, it's not anywhere near ideal. It is however a workaround with a side order of perk for crafting investment.)

[Talon_Moonshadow]

One thing that has always bothered me about loot in this game is armor and shields.
The main purpose of armor and shields is protection.
So IMO, any armor or shield that does not start with "+5" (or +6) after a certain level (about level 8) is useless to me and I consider it vender junk.

Next.
Speaking of armor and shields...lol

Class specific end rewards.

I play a lot of Rgrs.
I get several sets of armor.... and I only need one.... I have no reason carry more than one set, so unless it is better than what I currently use..... well.... IMO I want one end reward option to be armor... not five or six.

Shields... I get almost none now.
What I do get is "light" shields for some reason.
I want heavy shields.
I want guaranteed "one" shield as a class specific end reward.



Why do I get handwraps in my end reward lists all the time?

Why Bastard swords all the time?

Why is the common long sword not common?

Why does my Rgr never get any bows as a class specific end reward option?



stuff like this is annoying.




I miss the random loot options we had before the last change.
Pandamonium, crusader....etc. We had IMO nice random weapons dropping for us.
(had nice armor too actually... too many... but nice.)



Partially off topic.
There was an old metal shield appearance that I liked. Circular with an arrowhead symbol on it.
Shame it will never drop again.
Shame that I find every shield design unattractive. :(




It has been a very long time since I was happy when I opened a chest.. (other than named items which are pretty good.)

[Bakalakadaka]

...players can only make Cannith Crafted skills up to +13...

Cannith Crafting is just not an option. To make this +13 shard you need to have crafting level 88 (or near enough to get a fair chance of success) and that is for a bound one - if you want to make it for someone else you are looking at a ridiculous lvl 138. That's many many many thousands of essences to gain the levels and make the item and then (as you point out) it is only +13 so you are going to want to upgrade it almost immediately.

Cannith Crafting is a complete joke - probably the worst crafting system I have encountered apart from STO.

Bring back the pure loot!

[Hadesborne]

So you picked up a good item that has what, an ML 27? 28? You are at end game - the loot will be amazing. Even random loot. Should it be better than at level Raid loot? No. Might it be better than ML 23 named loot? Yes.

You missed the point. The random belt I got to replace the named giant's belt from EH TOR can drop in EE TOR. Never should random loot from an EE quest eclipse the actual named loot from the same quest on E, EH or EE. Also, you missed the fact that there were 4 of them in the AH. 4!!! So this amazing piece of loot, is common, a lot more common than the EH named giant's belt. You must agree that this situation is wrong.

[oradafu]

Cannith Crafting is just not an option. To make this +13 shard you need to have crafting level 88 (or near enough to get a fair chance of success) and that is for a bound one - if you want to make it for someone else you are looking at a ridiculous lvl 138. That's many many many thousands of essences to gain the levels and make the item and then (as you point out) it is only +13 so you are going to want to upgrade it almost immediately.

Cannith Crafting is a complete joke - probably the worst crafting system I have encountered apart from STO.

Bring back the pure loot!

I agree. But it shows the lunacy that the "new and improved" bland loot system combined with the inflation of needed trapper DCs that came with Update 19, in addition to the neglect and stagnation of the Cannith crafting, the horrible placement of values vs level for skill Augments and the dependence of rare effects (Exceptional skills) and non-class abilities (GH). These loot changes were claimed to help new players, but I don't see how they do anything but hinder new players.

[Hadesborne]

I'm not restricting myself to epics here - Dr Loot was asking a general question and I'm giving a general answer. Personally I'm a bit peeved that too many people are so epic focused and forget that there is a whole pile of content in the heroic tier which is still being played by both new and old players and it needs as much attention as the epic end of the game. The loot changes are a problem across all levels not just the top end.

You don't seem to understand that they have already listened to the casual heroic player. That is what got us in this mess. they have already made it possible for you to be uber without farming for epic weapons. That's is the problem. There absolutely has to be a definitive end game for this system to survive. There cannot be a mudding of the waters so much that 90% of the rare loot is rendered useless because we have been given insane random loot.

We are complaining because we have been striving towards these epic weapons for YEARS, YEARS and YEARS of grinding our butts off, not casually mind you, but intensely in order to get the best gear in the game, to complete our epic items. A system they set in place as THE END GAME. And they go and take the entire system and trash it. They have eliminated the worth of all but a VERY select few epic items. Why grind for them? Why bother? So they will sit in the bank? You wouldn't even use these items when you Epic TR, or after you TR and hit 20 again. Why? Because, there is already ML15 loot that blows the epic loot away. Why did this happen Turbine?

I mean, were you so upset at the complaining by casual players that you go and say F-IT!! I will SHUT DOWN THE SYSTEM!!! Well, that's what happened. On my lvl 20 cleric I no longer run epic quests for the shards/seals. I don't need to anymore. I just run some lvl 17-18 quests for gear. This gear is common and much better. Which is wrong.

[Riffle]

Since the Faerun campaign is becoming more integral will we see more items from FAerun like the white skull mask? Would be an awesome find. There are lots of amazing items in the campaign setting we would love to find on here.

[bcoon1]

Happy Friday, everyone. I’d like to introduce myself as a bit of a new dev face on the forums. First, it’s about time I quit lurking, and second, I’m putting on an additional hat on the DDO team. What hat is that? In a word: loot. I’m here to listen to you and to keep my eyes on the big picture. Yes, that includes avoiding Ghostbane-situations.

So in the name of listening rather than blathering on and on, I’d like to ask you all a few questions as a sort of pulse-check on the state of loot. Go on and fill up the thread – I’ll check back in after the weekend (and a bit today, as schedule permits), with head-nods, follow-up questions, and answers where necessary.

- Aside from the diversity issue, what are the biggest problems with random loot, today?
- What weapon and equipment types do you feel are underserved in named and in random loot?
- I’d love to hear about some of the non-named loot your characters are currently wearing.

(In the future, I’m planning some similar question sessions about named loot and named loot systems, BTW.)


I have read a number of the posts on this thread and have seen some good ideas and some not so good. As far as random loot goes, I say leave it alone. It has always been vender trash and should remain just that, its the anticipation of getting that 1 in a 1000 drop that keeps the game exciting. The only change would be to bring back all of the prefixes and suffixes, this would make everyone happy, including me.
As far as the problem with epic gear being underpowered goes the answer is simple, treat it like greensteel, and make the min lvl for epic items 14 or 15. A person would still have to farm at over lvl 20 to make an item, but could then use that item as a tr to good effect. I also saw the idea of adding a tier to greensteel and epics, I think that would be awsume. A new lvl 25 raid Return to the Shroud with a forth alter would be great, likewise a system to upgrade epics at that same lvl, Supierior epic antique greataxe anyone?

[Qhualor]

As far as the problem with epic gear being underpowered goes the answer is simple, treat it like greensteel, and make the min lvl for epic items 14 or 15. A person would still have to farm at over lvl 20 to make an item, but could then use that item as a tr to good effect.

no thanks. too much power creep there, not that Turbine seems to really care (EPLs in heroics, dumbed down quests, etc). not to mention epic items should be for epic characters, not heroic characters. some of the epic gear is more epic twink gear than anything else, but much harder to get than heroic comparison.

[bcoon1]

no thanks. too much power creep there, not that Turbine seems to really care (EPLs in heroics, dumbed down quests, etc). not to mention epic items should be for epic characters, not heroic characters. some of the epic gear is more epic twink gear than anything else, but much harder to get than heroic comparison.

I believe that you missed the point, or I didn't explain properly. I'm only talking about the old epic crafting system, not all "epics", a person would still need to farm a load of epic quests to get the ingredients, but could use the item at a lower lvl after tr'ing, just like with greensteel. As far as power creep goes, its already happened, as of last update there are now easily soloable lvl 15 quests that guarantee +8 items at completion, most of the old epic crafting items are not that good.

[Talon_Moonshadow]

Roman Numeral notation. Please get rid of this. It may save text space, but it makes the loot bland and dull and is really quite confusing for determination of what exactly it does. :mad:

This.

I hate the Roman Numeral loot.

I really liked what we had before.

[sirgog]

Take Shroud weapons and the SoS off the table and you'll find that all Heroic Raid weapons have a lower base damage than random weapons in the same level range. This is because almost all random weapons over the level 10 were made into Paragon weapons that give weapons a +0.5W, but raid weapons were untouched. So even though the raid weapon is a +5 weapon, a random weapon of the same type that is two levels lower and only a +1 or +2 still does more base damage than the raid weapon.



And still in spite of this, Cloudburst is the best Heroic weapon, hands down, because noone really cares about physical damage when you have a proc that hits 7-8 mobs for 150 damage each.

[Qhualor]

I believe that you missed the point, or I didn't explain properly. I'm only talking about the old epic crafting system, not all "epics", a person would still need to farm a load of epic quests to get the ingredients, but could use the item at a lower lvl after tr'ing, just like with greensteel. As far as power creep goes, its already happened, as of last update there are now easily soloable lvl 15 quests that guarantee +8 items at completion, most of the old epic crafting items are not that good.

no, I understood what you meant and didn't miss the point. that epic twink gear would invalidate GS and some other named loot quite easily, which I also should have mentioned in my post.

[vengfarga]

Couldn't bring myself to trawl all 22 pages of this, but just on the off chance it hasn't been moaned about yet - spot, search, ol & dis dev items at the levels of availability they were before ... i.e., really not cheap for most players but possible if that's what you targeted first, even on a new character on a new account.
As it is, pure Int Rogs are the only ones with a chance. I'm on record several times as being frightfully keen on pure Rog Mechs being given a boost over others, but this has been taken a bit too far. Being the only ones who can hit certain traps and locks on EE SHOULd be enough pay-off for those of us who build our rogues for rogueing first. :p
Assasins, Artis and other 'inferior' trappers (;p) should still be able to gear properly without recourse to named items and ownership of certain packs.

[oradafu]

And still in spite of this, Cloudburst is the best Heroic weapon, hands down, because noone really cares about physical damage when you have a proc that hits 7-8 mobs for 150 damage each.

Fine, you just pointed out the 2nd non-Shroud Heroic Raid weapon in the game that isn't inferior to the generic loot of the same type. So what if Greatsword melees have superior raid weapons? It doesn't negate the problem with Heroic Raid weapons not receiving a boost when Paragon weapons were added.

[Talon_Moonshadow]

I may be the only one to say this but....as a serious casual gamer and some one who spends a fair chunk of change on this game I want my opinions heard. I represent those players who love the game, will spend money on the game but don't have a ton of play tome or play in off peak Horus when groups are hard to come by .

I want ant yo say random loot should be almost as good as named and crafted loot. Almost but not as. I love call the named prefixes such as suns fury before they disappeared. Bring those back and others and don't nerd random loot to oblivion. It's good for those of us who don't have the time or the abilities to raid shroud or do the challenges

I agree.

Grinding should be rewarded, but not so much better that the casual guy gets left in the dust.

There are ways to make named loot very attractive without making it super powerful.

And yes... the old prefixes were great for the casual player. I want those back.






Oh... but actually.. there is some very nice named loot that drops frequently and/or does not require a lot of grinding.
Many newer quest chains offer named loot options very frequently.

IMO, grinding should be rewarded....but not so much as to make other loot obsolete.

[voodoogroves]

And still in spite of this, Cloudburst is the best Heroic weapon, hands down, because noone really cares about physical damage when you have a proc that hits 7-8 mobs for 150 damage each.

Cleaves, Cloudburst, etc. are one of the few things that lets melee pretend to be a caster. Gather, cleaves.

There are still a few very solid items that haven't been eclipsed by lootgen - and those are the ones that offer meaningful special abilities that weren't also marginalized by some other system change (AC, PRR, incoming damage, plentiful SLAs/no need for mana conservation, etc.).

[Livmo]

Dr. Loot,

Please add red/orange/purple augment slots to rune arms.

This will provide more options to offset changes from the Enhancement pass regarding a decrease in arty spell power.

Need to buff spell power with red augments.

Thanks,

Liv

[Certon]

I am horribly, horribly embarrassed; so much so that I've gone back and edited the original post. DrOctothorpe does not make punctuation errors... except, apparently, for when he does! I'm so glad you all did not shun this thread on account of that faux pas.

soooooo.... you're Feather's replacement. Be careful or they'll replace you too... (evil laughter)

[samthedagger]

Happy Friday, everyone. I’d like to introduce myself as a bit of a new dev face on the forums. First, it’s about time I quit lurking, and second, I’m putting on an additional hat on the DDO team. What hat is that? In a word: loot. I’m here to listen to you and to keep my eyes on the big picture. Yes, that includes avoiding Ghostbane-situations.Welcome! I'm always happy to see devs communicating.


So in the name of listening rather than blathering on and on, I’d like to ask you all a few questions as a sort of pulse-check on the state of loot. Go on and fill up the thread – I’ll check back in after the weekend (and a bit today, as schedule permits), with head-nods, follow-up questions, and answers where necessary.

- Aside from the diversity issue, what are the biggest problems with random loot, today?Well, in order of importance:

1. Several key prefixes and suffixes are completely missing. Metalline, aligned, convalescent, greater luck, major luck, everbright, etc. I've led an effort to compile a list of some of the most important ones here (https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/425043-Missing-Affixes-Let-s-Compile-a-List).

2. I cannot tell what a weapon does just by looking at the name. To better explain this, let me give a simple example using everyone's favorite random loot suffix, ghostbane. Two weapons have identical names: +1 flaming longsword of ghostbane. Both are identical in minimum level, which is 10. However one is actually a +1 flaming (I) longsword of ghostbane IV while the other is a +1 flaming IV longsword of ghostbane (I). Now if I happen to desire a longsword that does lots of ghostbane damage and go browsing through the AH for minimum level 10 ghostbane longswords, I have to hover over each and every one to see how much ghostbane I am getting for my buck. This is a waste of time and could be solved by simply adding the roman numeral rating to the weapon name.

3. Some of the new randomly generated items have made old items of exceptional rarity and value obsolete. Some degree of obsolescence is to be expected in an MMO, but this is generally when level caps are increased. As an example, let's look at the new randomly generated Speed enhancement. It combines the functions of the old Striding enhancement with bonuses to attack speed. Suddenly all those named items out there with Striding as one of their abilities have become weaker by comparison. The Speed enhancement shouldn't have gone live without revamping the old named items with the Striding enhancement to replace Striding with an equivalent Speed enhancement. To take the example further, let's look at the Halcyon Boots (http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Halcyon_Boots), a raid item from The Fall of Truth. This item grants a +30% Striding bonus and is minimum level 25. But at level 25, I could now potentially find randomly generated boots with Speed X which grant the +30% movement speed as well as +10% attack speed. Halcyon Boots should have the same bonus, or perhaps the base item should have Speed VIII, the Tier 1 upgrade should include an enhancement to Speed IX and the Tier 2 upgrade should include an enhancement to Speed X.

4. New randomly generated items no longer randomly generate spell clickies. A lot of spell clickies are pretty worthless, but some of them, like invisibility, are incredibly useful.

I could go on, but these are the big concerns... aside from variety of course.


- What weapon and equipment types do you feel are underserved in named and in random loot?Types underserved in named loot: handwraps, kukris, khopeshes, dwarven waraxes, bastard swords, short swords, belts, goggles, and bracers. Also DIVINE CASTER IMPLEMENTS!

Types underserved in random loot: Aside from Armor and Shields (I don't know anyone who uses randomly generated varieties of either), this is harder to pin down since you've broadened the possibilities for many types of enhancements. It used to be the case that you could only find one type of enhancement on two or three types of items. Now they can show up almost anywhere. I will say that items which can hold the accuracy enhancement are somewhat underserved, as accuracy is a rather ineffective use of a suffix. Items which can hold natural armor, protection, and AC bonuses are also underserved in the epic level content, as AC quickly becomes marginalized usefulness in high levels unless you can earn an obscene amount on a tank.


- I’d love to hear about some of the non-named loot your characters are currently wearing.Here's my 28th-level Shadar-Kai pure rogue assassin's standard layout:
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00059_zps996c93b3.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00059_zps996c93b3.jpg.html)
AC is pretty useless on a rogue. This is essentially just a +8 health item because I can't seem to find a better belt at the moment.
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00058_zps87e3ba55.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00058_zps87e3ba55.jpg.html)
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00057_zps5841bce2.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00057_zps5841bce2.jpg.html)
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00063_zps3b66d44e.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00063_zps3b66d44e.jpg.html)
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00064_zps1fb9e190.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00064_zps1fb9e190.jpg.html)
Like the belt, this is essentially just a 120% fortification item because I already get dodge bonuses aplenty from other items. And even this I plan to replace with my Ventilated Armbands from Fall of Truth once I can twist in Brace for Impact, since I can slot a 100% fortification sapphire and get decent enough fortification that way.
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00061_zpsf4801fda.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00061_zpsf4801fda.jpg.html)
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00062_zps3b85d13e.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00062_zps3b85d13e.jpg.html)
Like the belt and bracers, this also serves one function, +8 strength. I don't need the speed enhancement since I have the Blinding Speed feat. Granted, I could free up a feat slot easily enough, but the feat is better and grants other benefits besides. Most of the named boots out there are too redundant with my other items to be of much use.
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00060_zps9f270ed2.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00060_zps9f270ed2.jpg.html)
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00065_zps76059277.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00065_zps76059277.jpg.html)
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00067_zpsfa8427d8.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00067_zpsfa8427d8.jpg.html)
This is just a placeholder until I find a black dragon helm that isn't redundant. Granted the deadly bonus to damage is nice, but its a drop in the bucket compared to the damage I receive from sneak attack. Also resistance +8 is nice as well. This is probably my most decent randomly generated item, but I'll happily drop it as soon as I can find a helm that gives me a bonus to a stat I do not already have.
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00068_zpsb81aefe7.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00068_zpsb81aefe7.jpg.html)
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00066_zps6ecbd297.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00066_zps6ecbd297.jpg.html)
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00069_zps9c5d9846.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00069_zps9c5d9846.jpg.html)
This is my main weapon set, which gets used about 95% of the time.
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00070_zps031f3aa1.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00070_zps031f3aa1.jpg.html)
This is my secondary weapon set, which gets used rarely.
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00076_zpsb5c5cc9b.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00076_zpsb5c5cc9b.jpg.html)
Random weapon set #1. I don't know why I have this. I never use it. I don't usually bother with worrying about bypassing DR.
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00073_zpsd353390a.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00073_zpsd353390a.jpg.html)
Random weapon set #2. I generally only use them to beat down the training dummy.
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00074_zps1dcad45f.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00074_zps1dcad45f.jpg.html)
Random weapon set #3. One purpose: inevitables. Particularly the inevitable at the end of evon3.
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00075_zpsd24f1d7d.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00075_zpsd24f1d7d.jpg.html)
Random weapon set #4. Like weapon set 1, I don't really use it.

So what's the randomly generated stuff I swap to?
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00079_zps645e80c6.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00079_zps645e80c6.jpg.html)
Pretty obvious what this is for.
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00080_zps956dd4d6.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00080_zps956dd4d6.jpg.html)
Since I remembered I had the EE Intricate Field Optics on a bank toon, I haven't actually used this, but it served its purpose for a time. It should probably go up on the AH at this point though. Just sitting in my inventory because I'm lazy.
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00081_zpsbc9fdcca.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00081_zpsbc9fdcca.jpg.html)
Note: This is an OLD randomly generated item I've had for a long time which is infinitely useful. This reminds me of something else which is missing from my list of what is wrong with new randomly generated loot, which I've just added above.
http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/ac185/samthedagger/DDO/ScreenShot00078_zps87800526.jpg (http://s898.photobucket.com/user/samthedagger/media/DDO/ScreenShot00078_zps87800526.jpg.html)
Also pretty obvious purpose here.

So all in all, I don't use a lot of randomly generated items, and when I do, it isn't for much. Only 4 of my 12 gear slots (not counting weapons, quivers or cosmetics) are occupied by randomly generated items, and of those, only 1 serves more than one purpose (i.e. both prefix and suffix add something to my character). 2 of those I have plans to soon replace. The other 2 I will replace if I ever find named items that aren't redundant since named items usually come with augment slots which I can use to get the exact same benefit I am currently getting from the random items.


(In the future, I’m planning some similar question sessions about named loot and named loot systems, BTW.)Cool.

[Bakalakadaka]

Just ran "Through a Mirror Darkly" (heroic) and found myself with an end loot list containing only armour - as a Bladeforged this was a real letdown. Now granted the armour choices were all complete rubbish that nobody would actually use, but it would have been nice to at least be given the option to refuse a useless docent but even that wasn't there.

Apart from doing something about the random loot, can you also make sure that all quest end fixed lists like this contain at least one item which can be used by every race and class so that nobody is getting left out of the chance to refuse something that was not worth the effort of the quest.

[gDra]

- Aside from the diversity issue, what are the biggest problems with random loot, today?
New loot performing vastly worse or better than old loot.
Nobody wants an item with 40% fortification at Lv15, Con+3 at Lv13 or +7 Skill item at Lv17. (recent pulls) Old loot is better.
The prime example of new loot being much better is naturally Deadly. With Epic GH one EE item gave +5, new random loot introduced +10, making the old one worthless.

I understand the wish to create enchantments that scale over a wider range of levels but they have to be kept in line with old loot. Either by adapting old loot to the new standard or ... giving the development of new items more thought.

- What weapon and equipment types do you feel are underserved in named and in random loot?
Random armors/robes don't get much use compared to named ones. Consider adding a 3rd enchantment to them (on higher levels).

- I’d love to hear about some of the non-named loot your characters are currently wearing.
I went to slot some new enchantments from U19 on random loot items since they can't be found elsewhere or imply too much restrictions on named items.
Ring:Fortification 125%, False Life 45
Gloves: Health +9, Dodge+10%
Necklace: Deadly+10, Resistance+9

On one hand I appreciate the way to make random loot more usable (more freedom to slot certain enchantments -> no best-in-slot named item) and also craftmanship, curses and slots make them more interesting, on the other hand hunting for the one named item has its charm. I don't want to be in your hide balancing that.
BTW Augment slots (empty!) shouldnt increase the item level, often the tradeoff is too big.

[moo_cow]

- Aside from the diversity issue, what are the biggest problems with random loot, today?
- What weapon and equipment types do you feel are underserved in named and in random loot?
- I’d love to hear about some of the non-named loot your characters are currently wearing.


-The only problem with random loot is it is better than named loot.... honestly I never cared for random loot back when there was good epic items. Random loot is just used until you can find an epic item to fill the slot.

- ....

- Most characters are equipped with:

- con 10, hp 50
- str 10, seeker 10
- dex 10, dodge 10
- deadly 10, resistance 10
- +10/+11 stats of whatever
- 125% fort of whatever
- healing amp of parrying

I don't carry any random armor or weapons aside from smiting weapons.

[SisAmethyst]

You asked us about an example where random-gen loot outclass named items, and one item I noticed is for example the Cruel Nobility.

Cruel Nobility, which is a ML16 item, has Slicing and Bleed as main attribute as the other both attributes Axiomatic and Unholy are flavour at best or are neglectable in terms of average damage. However the worst part is that it didn't count as Paragon weapon and therefore only has the 1x instead of the 1.5x multiplier. Thus a ML12 random loot gen item already outclass this weapon easily just on raw base damage. Same issue is with Fang of Siberys which is as well ML16 but miss the Paragon flag, however the attributes on this are quite unique.

[Leclaire1]

(In the future, I’m planning some similar question sessions about named loot and named loot systems, BTW.)

Hi Doctor! As the random loot update is now out, I thought I'd take some time to compile a list simply of named loot that could use some basic upgrades in the near future, mostly as regards increased damage dice. There's obviously a lot more to be done in dealing with the named/random loot disparity problems, but one of the most basic seems to be making sure that existing earned named weapons properly scale with random ones, especially with the "paragon weapon" change in U20, which put a lot of older named items behind in the most basic of departments- damage dice. Most of the problems regarding this are with raid items, since as Feather previously communicated a decision was made in the prior named item pass to leave these alone with the exception of Tempest's Spine. Most of these items are decent in themselves but sorely lacking in damage dice so as to allow them to compete with random gear. For convenience, I thought I'd make a list, starting with raid items and then moving on to a few others-

The Titan Awakes

Bereavement
Bravo's Short Sword

(These two could also use an augment slot or two as well, imo, just to diversify them more as offhand options)

Plane of Night (Heroic)

Hammer of Life

Zawabi's Revenge (Heroic)

The Green Blade
Chaosblade (Khopesh's need some love as is, might as well make this worth owning)
Storm (already has extra dice, the benefit of which is negated by paragon weapons, so needs the extra half-step)

The Reaver's Fate

Treason (sad to hear this beauty referred to as garbage now; some extra damage dice will fix it right up though)
Cloudburst (very cool, but needs at least the .5 addition that is not standard to this level of loot)
Tenderizer (the unique damage dice don't put this one as much behind, but without another .5 its not ahead too much of random loot either; it'd also be nice to put a truly worthwhile Morningstar on the map)
Dreamspitter (this is still awesome, but could really still use the extra damage step)

Ascension Chamber

(Generally this is the most worthwhile heroic raid, as the loot is awesome and unique. I think that two weapons here, however, despite being generally awesome, need the extra half-step die increase to maintain their place)

Breeze (esp. with all the staff focused stuff going in lately)
Enduring Conviction

A Vision of Destruction

Divine Vengeance (What an awesome weapon concept. Its ruined, however, by being an ML 18 weapon with only a single damage dice and an average damage of 10.45. Double the damage dice and pallys everywhere will rejoice).

Hound of Xoriat

Bonesplitter (really fun stuff on this generally, and bludgeoning weps need love. Definitely needs at least a half a step increase, and more likely a whole one).



There are also a few adventure pack items that need some work as well, as a few items were either missed in the earlier pass, or were considered relevant enough at the time to stay the same, but are no longer so due to the damage bloating accompanying paragon weapons and such.

Reign of Madness

Fang of Siberys (One of the most interesting and beautiful weapons in the game, which for awhile gave Scimis love. I won't be wielding them again until the dice get the boost appropriate to a ML16 item)
Nature's Vengeance
Watcher's Blade
Earthshatter Warhammer

Harbingers of Madness

Bow of Sinew
Turbulent Epee (Still a good DR breaker, but I don't use it for much else anymore, whereas I used to use them all the time)

The Path if Inspiration

(The slightly increased damage on these weapons used to be great, but became less significant in the first pass , which gave the extra step to lots of ML 6 and 8 weps, and even more son when it became standard on random loot. Keeping the unique values and adding a .5, or better, since these are ML 18, 1[w], would make them much more worth the trouble they are to earn.)

Terror
Death's Touch
Dream Edge


As far as I can tell, these are the weapons most damaged by recent loot changes. Most other items have received a pass which upgraded dice and added augment slots, but these are the items which have to be farmed/earned which are now well behind others, and many are considered **** or niche weapons by players. At least some basic changes in many of these will go a long way towards fixing the problems at least as regards named weapons.

[Thumbed_Servant]

I know this is VERY late to this thread.

Shield clickies...they have always been very useful, either to up the armor class of non shield using toons or to mitigate magic missile damage. I no longer see them dropping, and I for one use them on any toon that isn't able to cast shield or night shield. Can you bring those back Droctothorpe?

[FlaviusMaximus]

I just wanted to say great job and thank you for returning and updating weapon prefixes and suffixes to the loot tables.

Hopefully worn item effects are being returned to the loot tables as well, since effects like "convalescent" are still sorely missed by many of us.

[phalaeo]

Hi there, Dr. Loot!

Please put Convalescent/Parrying back in. That's all I can think of until you put up a thread for named loot.

[Silkenwise]

I’m here to listen to you and to keep my eyes on the big picture. Yes, that includes avoiding Ghostbane-situations.
So in the name of listening rather than blathering on and on, I’d like to ask you all a few questions as a sort of pulse-check on the state of loot.

- Aside from the diversity issue, what are the biggest problems with random loot, today?
- What weapon and equipment types do you feel are underserved in named and in random loot?
- I’d love to hear about some of the non-named loot your characters are currently wearing.



I have a serious problem with the scaling of random dropping loot from Non-Chest items.
By this, I mean loot from things like Piles of Gold, Barrels, and the like.

Just a quick example. When you drop in to fight Garamol in the Subterrane, or when you slay the black dragon in Mired in Kobolds, there are massive piles of gold spread on the ground, which are supposed to be a MASS of wealth hoarded by a top tier boss.

You click on it and get.... maybe twenty platinum !?
Each of those piles of gold should be returning THOUSANDS of GOLD PIECES!

I mean, just LOOK at them. Visually they look like thousands of gold, piled up. And if you compare the value of actual cash pulled from these piles of gold, with just a single base item value on a piece of vendor trash loot from any old chest, they BADLY need scaled up. A junk sword from one of the chests will sell for 300+ platinum to a barkeep by itself, but the massive pile is only giving cash worth a tenth of that?

The entire thing needs scaled up.

Ditto for barrels that drop... copper pieces? That isn't even worth the time it takes to click on to pick it up. Players just leave that rotting on the ground.

[Oliphant]

Most of the old epics are super weak. Salvage all that great material and history.

[FlameDiablo]

2 problems with loot:

1: adq drop rate is terribly low for a single place where can drop like 60 different items (120 if yu consider seal + shard), we should need something similar to scrolls but for seals/shards, maybe not 3:1 but 10:1 is still ok. I'm farming ESSR since 3 years, and pretty bored to do

2: i would like to wear all named, but a lot of random gen atm on my toon, this is exactly what i wear or looking for atm (epic variable lvl):
-- belt: dex, dodge, yellow slot
-- gloves: health, false life, colorless slot
-- bracers: healing amp, parrying
-- helm: (lvl 20 to 24 only) charisma, green slot
-- weapons: (lvl 20 to 22 only) elemental based (combustion, fire lore + devotion in my case)

[Onetunge]

First time I got to run CITW I was utterly disaspoinded. My main is always a dwarf wielding a dwarven axe, and CITW doesn't drop not even one one-handed axe of any kind. Would be nice to add dwarven axe as named loot to CITW raid.

[bsquishwizzy]

A Vision of Destruction

Divine Vengeance (What an awesome weapon concept. Its ruined, however, by being an ML 18 weapon with only a single damage dice and an average damage of 10.45. Double the damage dice and pallys everywhere will rejoice).


You know, a set bonus with the shield you get in those quests (Vengeful Protector?) would make farming that stuff viable again. Like you, I think the concept of Divine Vengence is an awesome S&B pally weapon. But it could be so much more.

The unfortunate part is that from about 18 to maybe 24 it’s slim pickings for shields if you are S&B.

[Captain_Wizbang]

... loot from things like Piles of Gold, Barrels, and the like.
The entire thing needs scaled up.


I don't even bother with them anymore.


Ditto for barrels that drop... copper pieces? That isn't even worth the time it takes to click on to pick it up. Players just leave that rotting on the ground.


Copper pcs is much like the American Penny. ONE state is the reason we still have it. Copper being one of the monetary cornerstones of D&D has become worthless in today's DDO.

As for the intent of the thread, the loot system got fubared when Faerun content got released.

Make Tod sets worthwhile, give GS a +.5 bump, Give DT armor a boost...... I say spend some time to make older named items/sets on a more level playing field. Some of the Epic upgrades are nice, but it wasn't done consistently. Those gaps in development have made a % of older stuff dust collectors.

[Zorzon]

I always liked the idea of item growth. I get a little bored everytime I TR and open my reincarnation bank: lots of items with the same properties and statuses, but each one designed for a specific character level. I think items could have some features that would be automatically unlocked as your character grows in level. Look at Cannith Challenge itens, for instance: there are a lot of variations, each one intended for a specific level range. How about if you wore then at, say, level 4, and they were automatically unlocking upgrades as your level increases? I suppose coding would be painful, but the player´s life would be simplified. That would make farming for lower level stuff alive again, since even weak itens would end up getting strong (the concept would be the same as the flame blade spell: features unlock as you druid´s level increases).

Maybe I am dreaming while i write these ideas, but, anyway, none can blame me for trying.

Best of luck for you all!

[Tscheuss]

I always liked the idea of item growth. I get a little bored everytime I TR and open my reincarnation bank: lots of items with the same properties and statuses, but each one designed for a specific character level. I think items could have some features that would be automatically unlocked as your character grows in level. Look at Cannith Challenge itens, for instance: there are a lot of variations, each one intended for a specific level range. How about if you wore then at, say, level 4, and they were automatically unlocking upgrades as your level increases? I suppose coding would be painful, but the player´s life would be simplified. That would make farming for lower level stuff alive again, since even weak itens would end up getting strong (the concept would be the same as the flame blade spell: features unlock as you druid´s level increases).

Maybe I am dreaming while i write these ideas, but, anyway, none can blame me for trying.

Best of luck for you all!

This sounds like an intelligent weapon/item that could level up with you. Very powerful because of this versatility, and likely a rare named.

[Glascanon]

As a Tank i am still stucked on those Epic Gloves of the Claw. Its the only item i get Enhanced Intimidate from.
Since some Bosses need a huge Intimidation Skill (upp to 108 LOB) to sucsessfully Intimidate them and Intimidate is the most important Skill for Tanks i cant get rid of the enhanced Intimmidate from those Gloves.
But on the other Hand those Gloves are far from up to date in Stats.
I would love to see this Effect on an colorless Argument witch u can get only by making the Gloves Epic and unslott it.
So u still have to farm the Item to get the argument but u get the possibility to slot it in the new Gloves from 3B cove or elsewhere.

[Kawai]

Epic Tiefling Assassins Blade plz.

& chop chop

[Krushemall]

Probably already been mentioned before but I got forum blind after the first 4 or 5 pages - I have to agree some randgen loot drops are as good as or better in some cases than named items or some of the older epic items. You only need run the Wheloon or Stormhorn chains and see the drops you get there besides the selected named items. Have had numerous +10 Deadly / Accuracy items. tons of +10 stat of parrying/50hp/ele res 50 etc etc.... I think the loot tables are just about ok at the moment but I would love to see a return of weapon suffixes like "... of a thousand suns" or ".. of devastation". I have a klhopesh on a bank toon +6 improved cusrespewing khopesh of devastation which is weakening, enfeebling, maladroit, bone breaking and tendon slice 10%....Before anyone says it, yes its level 26 and at epic levels stat damagers are useless, I still cant bear to throw it out - after playing since beta when finding a +5 anything was a cause for celebration let alone soemthing like that.. anyways I digress...

I'd like to see the "loot rewards based on class" option adressed, it seems to work ok'ish in some areas like giant hold but then in others like the high road, stormhorns, wheloon etc it throws a curve ball from left field - I mean my shuricannon (12 monk / 5 wizard / 3 rogue) regularly gets offered greataxes, greatswords, docents, heavy armour.. i.e. anything and everything that is just about completely bloody useless to that build... Oh, and more shurikens... i'm using thunderforged ones at the moment which work quite nicely thankyou, and i also have a selection of very handy ones from the eveningstar challenges (love the spell plague effect, especially as the toon is in shiradi, all thsoe effects going off are just nuts!!)... It would be nice to see some in the general loot table with epic effects such as vorpal, smiting, banishing etc etc...

anyways, thats just my tuppence worth...

see yis in game...

K.

[MangLord]

At epic levels, randomly generated loot seems fine, since everything is so high level that you can easily get a good prefix and suffix. At heroic levels, it falls apart and we're left with several problems.

Before the change, it was possible to build a set of banishing/smiting/disruption weapons starting from level 10 and on. It was expensive, but doable if you watched the AH every day. Now, it seems extremely rare to find a smiting/banishing/disruption weapon lower than min level 14, simply because random lootgen weapons are largely stuck having both a prefix and suffix, instead of just +1 banishing, so an already rare item is all but impossible to get now unless someone auctions their older gear. I really wish I'd hung on to my older weapons to use now.

I also find it strange that named weapons lvl 10+ weren't retroactively updated to 1.5[W] paragon base damage. Even if I pull a Royal Scimitar out of a chest tomorrow, the base damage is identical to the older version, despite being a paragon weapon.

For some reason, it doesn't seem too difficult to open a chest and find a +6 wise necklace or +6 deadly cloak. Why are weapons stuck having both a prefix and suffix? A plain +5 weapon is unheard of now.

I'm incredibly grateful to myself for investing time in crafting when I started playing. It makes gearing up TR lives so much easier. Now if I could craft myself a couple +1 disruption light maces, I wouldn't care much about lootgen items. It is annoying that several craftable shards are totally outdated, namely striding, but I've learned to mail good speed/deadly/seeking items to my mule.

[Glascanon]

Im still waiting for the fix of the Haunted Halls loot!

But the developers seem to prefer spending their time to sell the players new bugs instead of fixing the old ones.

Two of the Items got fixed with the promise that there will be a fix for the other items too.

But it seems that the devs have already sold enough Haunted Halls Packages so there is no need to fix those items anymore.

U already got the bugs right? So fair enough letting us keep the bugged loot.

I did not get what i payed for.

[4tonmantis]

On random loot, we need more leveling friendly rogue gear. I've been leveling through another life and I've had almost no luck finding spot items that are skill capped for min level.

I have pulled so many deadly, speed, poison, and disease pieces.. I don't even pick them out of the chest anymore to vendor.

Not thrilled about the changes to Parrying.

Wish my old named loot was able to be updated.. I will not be re-grinding it and am angry about the fact that it is out-moded.

Maybe people aren't posting good tower shields on the AH on Cannith or maybe they're not dropping.. I dunno.. I haven't seen one in quite a while.

I have a ton of banked Greater False Life, Lifeshield, Bodyfeeder, etc. Please don't retroactively change this stuff.. if you're going to retroactively change anything, make striding items the appropriate speed level instead.

I wish I was pulling less caster stuff on my Pally. I know he has a blue bar but I'm kinda tired of pulling Wizard gear.