Against Demon Queen [Part-1] Shards Drop Rate

[Shmuel]

this would be great. if 1-2 shards total dropped each run it would be worth the effort and with the large number of items in the table would still require significant grind (ie. money for turbine). even if certain high-value items like the spellstoring ring were given 1/2 the droprate of the others

/signed

[bigpapone]

/signed


Need a HUGE droprate% improvement.

[Sydril]

The desert epics need an overhaul for drops.

This quest specifically needs an overhaul for drops.

/signage

[mehlinda]

Epic Against the Demon Queen is a great example of a serious problem with the loot rewards epic system; most of the hardcore gamers I know don't bother with it anymore because there is almost no character progression at all for running the quest. Most of the time no epic scroll drops and even if 1 or 2 drop they are divided among 6 people and the end chest shard droprate is attrocious. You are much better off spending your time in the Red Fens or Vault of Night to gear your characters out because after 30 minutes along with the time it takes to run out to the quest you only have a Dungeon Token to show for it. I want to see a token trade in system where 20 tokens buys you a scroll or seal of your choice or something and 20 raid tokens gets you a shard.

/signed and also I nominate Cersive to be president of DDO or at least Under Secretary in Charge of Epic Stuffs on Thelanis if his ambitions are not so lofty ( Sarcos is not allowed to be on your Cabinet )...

[Beethoven]

/signed

I understand the low drop rate for shards is to keep items speshful. So, I do get the reasoning behind it. The Desert, however, suffers from not only a low drop rate, but also even when a shard drops chances for it to be the one you are looking for is minimal.

In other words, it stacks a low chance of getting a sought after shard on top of a low drop rate for shards - which consequently results in a chance so minimal most people no longer even bother trying (inevitably making a bad situation worse).

Add to that, that other epics do not suffer from a similar long list of possible shards/seals/scrolls; thus making it significantly easier and more attractive to simply run them and it should become blatantly obvious why Desert epics need an overhaul.

The problem isn't only anymore about how easy/hard an/or how common/rare epic items should be, it has become one where the desert is no longer in line with other epics as far as time/effort/grind goes.

ADQ1 is especially bad since the quest is more time and resource heavy than most others including the raid, but less rewarding than the raid. There is no point in running ADQ1 since virtually anything I can get from there I can get from the raid too. The raid has a higher drop rate for items/shards, is faster and shorter, drops epic tokens and on top of it you get raid loot for every 20th completion.

It wouldn't even be hard to address the problem. You could:

* increase the drop rate of shards. Rarity of desert items still would be preserved by how much named loot there is. Or
* open side-quests for epic to spread out the drops some by having the side-quests drop shards for outdoor items in the respective areas they are located. It may not fix the ADQ1 issue, but at the very least would bring the Desert epics in line again with other epics (where you can run a specific quest for a better chance of a specific shard).

[rendet]

/signed

The rediculously easy drop rates of the new epics (post Von) has made doing these and especially ATDQ less desireable

[Thelmallen]

I think it's telling that this thread has been up for two days and we haven't had one person chime in with the ubiquitous "The drop rate is fine I had my epic bloodstone, spell storing ring, set of Chaos blades, Marilith chain and Tourney armor within 5 days of the Sands going epic" posts. That tells me either a) those people are still in a turkey coma or b) the drop rate for the half-a-hundred epic items in the Sands is stupidly low.

This was their flagship epic area, which they've already adjusted once, but the seem to have taken a different angle on the newer epic areas. I think this one deserves similar treatment.

/double signed

[maddmatt70]

Seems like its kind of time for the devs and players to move onto other content. I would rather the devs just release new stuff like they are doing. More stuff like the Epic Chronoscope and Red Fens that get people excited thanks. The desert was a mistake which I think the devs kind of realized and they have been doing a better job with areas like the red fens and Chronoscope.

[maddmatt70]

Just to expand on this. It has been a year since the Desert has been out and now you all want them to double or tripple or whatever the drop rate on items well what the heck did I and others get for questing and farming the darn thing for a year. Especially since most people I know are pretty burned out on the Desert. What I am in favor of is rewarding the people for the grinding they did the entire last year and make it so something like on the 20th epic completion of a quest or raid an item item or shard or scroll or seal drops. If they were going to make a change to drop rates it should have been in the first 6 months the quest/raid comes out.

/Not Signed.

[sirgog]

I think it's telling that this thread has been up for two days and we haven't had one person chime in with the ubiquitous "The drop rate is fine I had my epic bloodstone, spell storing ring, set of Chaos blades, Marilith chain and Tourney armor within 5 days of the Sands going epic" posts. That tells me either a) those people are still in a turkey coma or b) the drop rate for the half-a-hundred epic items in the Sands is stupidly low.

This was their flagship epic area, which they've already adjusted once, but the seem to have taken a different angle on the newer epic areas. I think this one deserves similar treatment.

/double signed

You spoke too soon. One person did say that just after you.

I hope the devs listen to the overwhelming majority here.

[Warinx]

/signed

the amount of junk epics in sands make farming epics from it, much much harder.

[maddmatt70]

You spoke too soon. One person did say that just after you.

I hope the devs listen to the overwhelming majority here.

Nope. What these folks are all saying is we are wasting our time by actually doing the quest the first year. We should just wait a year and then we get rewarded. So waiting gets rewarded - what a bunch of phooey. Its been 3-4 years since the VOD raid came out so lets just give people an 80% chance at the tharnes goggles after 5 runs - I mean man its been 3-4 years so they should get the loot 3-4 times faster at this point so about 5 runs sound good?

[Kza]

Having some completion effect like 20:th epic give a list would be decent. (And since you can run it each day i think that would be enough)

[Krag]

Nope. What these folks are all saying is we are wasting our time by actually doing the quest the first year. We should just wait a year and then we get rewarded. So waiting gets rewarded - what a bunch of phooey. Its been 3-4 years since the VOD raid came out so lets just give people an 80% chance at the tharnes goggles after 5 runs - I mean man its been 3-4 years so they should get the loot 3-4 times faster at this point so about 5 runs sound good?

Just because we have suffered horrible Desert or RR mechanic does not mean future players have to endure the same.
VoD droprates are fine as is. Not sure what do they have to do with the discussion.

[maddmatt70]

It's time to have a look at the desert. Players have put in their good faith effort farming daily for a year. This stuff isn't just 'elusive' or 'grindy', it's badly-designed.

Well you have my respect Anthios88, but I have to say lets reward the people that did the work. Giving people an incentive to wait a year for loot means I quit. If you tell me I should wait a year then invest a bunch of time after a year then I get my loot the same as somebody else that slaved their butt off then I quit. If this proposal is reward the fools that ran Epic Offering of Blood or Epic Wiz king or Epic Dq1 or Epic Dq2 then I am all for it, but it reads as penalize veterans who ran the quests over and over and reward the players that just signed up and have not run it, but now decide to run it. How can you support that drivel I mean seroiusly its been a whole year.

[jkm]

Well you have my respect Anthios88, but I have to say lets reward the people that did the work. Giving people an incentive to wait a year for loot means I quit. If you tell me I should wait a year then invest a bunch of time after a year then I get my loot the same as somebody else that slaved their butt off then I quit. If this proposal is reward the fools that ran Epic Offering of Blood or Epic Wiz king or Epic Dq1 or Epic Dq2 then I am all for it, but it reads as penalize veterans who ran the quests over and over and reward the players that just signed up and have not run it, but now decide to run it. How can you support that drivel I mean seroiusly its been a whole year.

their is just one slight catch to your argument. after 20 VODs you have a 50% chance of getting what you want. there is no such mechanism in the desert epics.

let's take our buddy Zexxi and his pursuit of a thornlord shard.

92 epic ADQs, 75 epic DQ2s - with everyone in the party more than willing to give him the shard if it falls. no shard.

what they need is some form of the 20th run to be put in for epics. whether it be epic token turnins, a special token dropped in the quest that can be turned in, whatever.

[voodoogroves]

So Matt ...

Your argument is ... it is bad but instead of fixing it (which would reward new players and penalize vets) we should obsolete it with newer content.

Is that not the same effective "penalty"? A new player can come on and quickly get the "best" things.... right?

[Strakeln]

It's time to have a look at epic. Players have put in their good faith effort farming daily for a year. This stuff isn't just 'elusive' or 'grindy', it's badly-designed.

Fixed.

[Strakeln]

Just to expand on this. It has been a year since the Desert has been out and now you all want them to double or tripple or whatever the drop rate on items well what the heck did I and others get for questing and farming the darn thing for a year. Especially since most people I know are pretty burned out on the Desert. What I am in favor of is rewarding the people for the grinding they did the entire last year and make it so something like on the 20th epic completion of a quest or raid an item item or shard or scroll or seal drops. If they were going to make a change to drop rates it should have been in the first 6 months the quest/raid comes out.

/Not Signed.

I think your logic is severely flawed, especially when considering the historical pace of correcting problems in DDO. Applying your stance universally would read something like the following:

"If something isn't fixed/changed in the first six months of release, it should be left as-is forever"

I think the reasoning as to why that extrapolation would be a bad idea is self-evident. While it is an extrapolation, I think it applies with equal force to your argument.

Specifically to this topic, in my opinion, excessive grind is never a good idea. Epic crafting has clearly crossed into the realm of being excessive. Flawed scroll mechanics combined with low drop rates and a significant number of items has resulted in a very poor time:reward ratio. Note that having a wide variety of items is a good thing, but nonetheless a significant part of the equation.

[jkm]

I think your logic is severely flawed, especially when considering the historical pace of correcting problems in DDO. Applying your stance universally would read something like the following:

"If something isn't fixed/changed in the first six months of release, it should be left as-is forever"

I think the reasoning as to why that extrapolation would be a bad idea is self-evident. While it is an extrapolation, I think it applies with equal force to your argument.

Specifically to this topic, in my opinion, excessive grind is never a good idea. Epic crafting has clearly crossed into the realm of being excessive. Flawed scroll mechanics combined with low drop rates and a significant number of items has resulted in a very poor time:reward ratio. Note that having a wide variety of items is a good thing, but nonetheless a significant part of the equation.

a lot of the problem is that the devs do a very poor job properly balancing items. if a power gamer went through every item effect/ability in the game and tiered them according to power/usefulness/etc it would look nothing like a dev list.

for example, tier 1 for weapons would be

extremely high base damage
enhanced crit range
enhanced crit multiplier
high damage special effect
stunning 10

ONE of these effects should be nigh impossible to get on favorable weapons (read anything beyond a 19-20x2). yet we have favorable weapons running around that have MULTIPLE from this list. the epic sword of shadows was badly designed when it was introduced in mod 1 (having 2 Tier 1 abilities). yet despite this, the first pass on epic had it add yet 2 more Tier 1 abilities. they then "fix it" by taking away one tier 1 ability and then expand the other further (from 4d6 to 5d6).

if you looked at the dev's tier 1 list it probably has things like deception, maiming, and enfeebling on it.