[Dev Update] Farming and Loot Scaling

[Gaile]

Some players have been concerned about the loot scaling aspect of this week's update. They wonder whether the fact that drops are scaled according to party size will substantially affect their gameplay experience and whether it will impact upon their ability to acquire wealth in the game. We asked the design team for some insight into the design of and the intent behind loot scaling, and found out a lot of interesting reasons for its implementation, including how the changes that have been a point of concern are readily addressed within the very system itself.

The bottom line is that ArenaNet's goal is to make it easier for normal players to make money while redirecting the efforts of the expert farmers to a way to continue to reap rich rewards without having a harmful effect on the overall game economy. The loot has not been scaled across the board. Instead, the loot scaling is selective, and it preserves a means for the high-end farmer to make money.

But let's hear it from the design team itself, with this latest Dev Update:

Why would ArenaNet make changes that impact solo farming?

ArenaNet understands that people enjoy playing Guild Wars in many different ways, and our goal is to make each of those ways fun and rewarding. Solo farming sometimes becomes a controversial issue because it can damage the game for other people. In those cases, ArenaNet tries to keep the game fun for everyone while still providing fun and rewarding play for solo farmers.

A major theme of our most recent update is that the game should be friendlier and more rewarding for casual players, including casual solo farmers, and that the most advanced farmers should differentiate themselves from the crowd not through the amount of gold and common loot that they farm directly from monsters, but instead through the amount of gold that they can get from selling rare items to other players (directly or through traders).

That's a very important distinction. Advanced farmers are always going to earn more money than their more casual counterparts. There's nothing wrong with that. When farmers earn their money by finding valuable items and selling them to other players, they're making the game more enjoyable for everyone. They're facilitating trade, and the gold they acquire from doing so is gold that was already in the game. It's only when solo farming introduces a huge influx of new gold into the economy that it becomes a problem.

Because of the way that Guild Wars loot system worked, solo farming traditionally generated at least eight times as much new gold per participant as playing in a party did. And because solo farmers were motivated to farm only certain specific groups of easily exploitable monsters, they could often generate not just eight times as much, but 10, 20, or 30 times as much loot per hour as everyone else. Even more problematic was that the activity that they were performing was easy for professional gold farmers to automate, so if a single solo farmer could generate 20 times as much loot as the average player, then a network of ten computers running bots could generate 200 times as much loot. This huge influx of new gold caused inflation and made it harder for casual players to afford the items they wanted. In order to contain this problem, ArenaNet periodically added code to prevent monsters from being exploited, for example by adding complexity to the monster AI. But these types of changes made the game less fun for other players.

With the introduction of Hard Mode, we took a look a fresh look at normal mode to see how we could make the game friendlier for normal players. One thing we really wanted to do was to remove some of the advanced AI from normal mode -- things like monsters scattering from AoE, refusing to gather around individual characters, and fleeing or kiting players -- that we had originally introduced to contain botting. But in removing them, we needed to be sure that we weren't reintroducing exploits that would allow professional farmers to destroy the game's economy.

The answer to these problems was to somewhat scale loot according to party size, to bring the direct gold rewards from solo farming more into line with the rewards from other ways of playing the game. But we still wanted solo farmers to have an edge, since solo farming can be a fun way to play and a major reason why people engage in solo farming is to make more money. So we kept the direct gold rewards somewhat better for solo farmer than for people in parties, and then we added new loot which is very valuable to other players and which is exempt from loot scaling, so that solo farmers can farm this loot more effectively than other players and earn money by selling or trading it. Thus, our goal is that solo farmers can still earn as much money as they did before, but they'll have to earn it in different ways. Instead of looking for things to sell to merchants, solo farmers should now be looking for things to sell to traders or other players.

How does loot scaling work?

Without loot scaling, solo farmers received every loot drop, whereas people who played in a party received only a fraction of loot drops. Thus, solo farmers received up to eight times as much loot for killing the same group of monsters. With loot scaling in place, solo farmers still get more loot than people who play in parties, but the gap is less severe than it was before. It is impossible to quantify precisely how much less because it depends on the type of loot farmed and involves some randomness, but here are some rough guidelines:

People who play in normal size parties, including parties of heroes and henchman, will see no difference at all from loot scaling. At the same time, they will notice that normal mode is now much easier to farm, and that the introduction of Hard Mode provides a place they can play where the loot is better than ever before. Thus, people who play the game primarily in parties will simply make more money than they previously did.
People who periodically enjoy farming solo (with no heroes or henchmen) but are casual about it are also likely to see an improvement. They'll find that solo farming is much easier than it was before, because monsters don't have the anti-farming AI that they used to have, and because the game no longer prevents players from repeatedly farming the same monsters over and over. Many types of builds that didn't work in the past, or that haven't been effective since the earliest days of Guild Wars, can now be used for solo farming. Thus, casual farmers will find the game much easier to farm than it was before, and that they can earn more money than before even with loot scaling in place.
People who were advanced solo farmers and who were earning vastly more money through solo farming than through playing the game normally will see the full effect of loot scaling. They will earn less gold and common loot from solo farming than they did in the past. The loot scaling for gold and common loot is not linear with the number of players in the party, and it includes an element of randomness, so while the difference is not easy to quantify, it is by no means a factor of eight. Advanced solo farmers may now earn about twice as much gold and common loot from farming solo as they would if they farmed in a party. While gold and common loot are thus reduced for these players by loot scaling, certain other types of loot are completely unaffected. For example, Skill Tomes are completely unaffected by loot scaling, so they still drop eight times as frequently for solo farmers than they do for people who play in parties. Thus, advanced solo farmers will find that certain types of farming are still extremely productive for them, but they may have to change what and where they farm if they want to earn as much money as they did before. If ArenaNet makes it harder for players to farm, doesn't that drive players to purchase gold for cash from the professional farmers?

ArenaNet's goal is to make it easier for normal players to make money, so that they can buy the things they need without having to purchase gold for cash, and then to redirect the farming activities of the most advanced players so that the way they make money is by selling things to other players rather than by introducing a flood of new gold into the economy.

Here's how we've made it easier for normal players to make money: we removed the advanced AI behaviors from normal mode that slowed down the rate at which people could kill monsters there, we removed artificial barriers to casual farming such as certain farming builds not working or the game penalizing repeated farming of the same groups, we provided somewhat more gold and triple the number of uncommons and rares in Hard Mode, and we introduced entirely new types of loot.

Here's how we've protected the economy from a flood of new gold: advanced farmers and professionals who choose to farm for new gold (as opposed to things they can sell to other players) will only make perhaps two or three times as much gold per hour as normal players, whereas in the past they made at least eight times as much, and by finding specific exploits they sometimes made 10, 20, or 30 times as much gold per hour as normal players.

Here's how we've provided a new way for advanced players to make as much money as they did before: by introducing new items which will have a high demand from other players and thus high trade value, and then by making those items completely unaffected by loot scaling, so that solo farmers still have very effective ways to make a lot of money, but so that they make their money without hurting the game's economy.

Will ArenaNet make additional changes to the loot scaling system?

We constantly monitor the game to ensure that people are able to make good rewards for playing. Originally the list of items that were exempt from loot scaling was limited to newly introduced Hard Mode items. However, after reviewing player feedback and analyzing play logs from the past 12 hours, we've decided to make a broader range of items exempt. We want players who enjoy solo farming to have a wide variety of things that they can enjoy farming. Thus, with today's build, all of the following types of items will now be exempt from loot scaling:

Skill Tomes
Scrolls
Dye
Rare materials
All rare (gold colored) items
All unique (green) items
Special event items

[Aiiane]

Interesting. So actually, contrary to popular outcry, it's still more effective loot-wise to solo.

I'm actually surprised you didn't go all the way and simply make soloing equally rewarding in regards to groups, rather than a logarithmic scaling - but I suppose that news will make some people happy. I'm also surprised you only made the gold change for those soloing - it'd really help more as an across-the-board change, since everyone needs gold for skills and armor crafting, whereas not everyone needs special items.

[Dojo Belok]

Rare materials being exempt from the scaling is a good thing, at least. That makes me somewhat happy.

[Notorious BOB]

Without loot scaling, solo farmers received every loot drop, whereas people who played in a party received only a fraction of loot drops. Thus, solo farmers received up to eight times as much loot for killing the same group of monsters. With loot scaling in place, solo farmers still get more loot than people who play in parties, but the gap is less severe than it was before. It is impossible to quantify precisely how much less because it depends on the type of loot farmed and involves some randomness, but here are some rough guidelines

Then this update is clearly bugged because this isn't what has been implemented.

:sad:

[Aiiane]

Then this update is clearly bugged because this isn't what has been implemented.

:sad:

The sample size is rather small to really say either way as of yet - care to do some actual extensive tests?

[Notorious BOB]

The sample size is rather small to really say either way as of yet - care to do some actual extensive tests?


To be honest Aiiane, I don't even want to log back in, that's how depressed I am by this.

I'm not a farmer but I do work on solo builds and that is now pretty pointless as I see it.

After the update I ran Zelnehlun solo 3 times, killing his entire spider mob each time in Hard Mode.

The total loot for the 3 runs:
2 x spider webs
308 gp
1 x lotus shield (white)

period.

I've also completed 3 full vanquishing runs of Jarin to see the increased loot drops.

Total loot worth talking about:
1 x lockpick
1 x silver dye
1 x gold focus
1 x grape briar blade

period.

With 10 mil + experience points, I don't care about XPs

With 400+ skill points, I don't care about those either

At Rank 7 Sunspear, I'm not fussed about Rank 8

And I already have KoaBD, and that was grind enough for me.

The loot drop nerf is way out of kilter, and like I say is bugged.

Is Gaile stating that there has been as subsequent update? If so, I'm yet to see any change and to be honest, testing it is just so much like sticking pins into my toes.

:sad:

[Dazbog]

I have done the testing after the update and I find that you make more money in a group then solo. What Gaile posted and is saying is wrong.

[Notorious BOB]

OK, given that this has to go down as the worst Negative Playing Experience (NPE) that I've had in 20 years of games design, development & playing, here are some real stats:

Plains of Jarin - Hard Mode - Party of 4 (3 heroes)
Vanquished - kills 210

Loot.

Cash drops = 51

Remainder should be allocatable drops = 159

Drops not covered by drop nerf
Lock Picks x3
Tome x1

Total 4

Remaining drops
low level collectible drops x9
white x13
blue x7
grape x2
gold - zero
green - zero
dye - zero
rare materials - zero

Total allocatable drops 31

Percentage of potential allocatable drops = 31/155 = 20%

Jarin is a 4 party max size so should be 1 in 4, i.e. 25% of allocatable, so actual is 5% below what should be anticipated so this is large enough a difference to indicate a problem.

Like I said, hard mode and the drop nerf are both ill-considered and appear to be either bugged or not sufficiently tweaked.

Also, given that in Hard Mode nothing is below level 22, that not a single gold dropped is also significant.

:sad:

[Kahlan]

I think you two just hit a bad streak. When I vanquished Plains of Jarin, I had all but my last bag full. I got two golds (one from a chest), a lot of purples, 2 or 3 blue, a handful of white, and quite a few collector drops. Of course, this was right before the update, so it may have changed it...oh, and it was me and 3 heroes.

[Heavens Angel]

im thinking the advance farmers will leave after this, its just generally not here who are annoyed but generally the whole community are annoyed with something even if they dont say it. been around a few towns and you can see how annoyed many people actaully are.

and you can say the pvp players are proberlly just laughing at us

[Godlike Satan]

Drops are fine now in my opinion, so what if there's none of that massive pile of white garbage lying on the ground, or the collector items. Rares and gems were falling like crazy for me after the loot fix. I'm happy with the fix.

[NeHoMaR]

ArenaNet wants farmers sell more to people? I agree, but by spamming WTS in towns? because if they really want that type of economy, they must add once and for all the trade house! Please dear developers, go and try to sell something in a town, it's not funny at all!

Now, two questions for ArenaNet developers:

- Are you rolling back some previous changes done to skills because of farming problems?

- Are chests included in that new "loot scaling"? I mean, can I open millions of times the same chest now without reducing my drops to purples?

[Mal Zeth]

Here's what I don't get, if solo loot has been scaled back then how will the "casual solo farmer" be able to afford anything that the "advanced farmer" has to sell? Less loot = less money.

I understand why they did this, getting rid of the bots = a good thing, but I dont know if this was such a good way to do it.

I created a pargaon today out of sheer boredom and frustration at this update (Good skills, very poor looking armor). Now im a guy that HATES playing in PuG's, i dont like having to trust that the other people in my group arent going to suck, so I hech/hero everything. From what I've seen even questing/missioning with NPC's the loot is nerfed big time, when you kill a mob of 12+ lvl 20+ things and all you get is 80 gold there's a problem! i don't expect golds, or grapes every mob, but wtf I do expect SOMETHING! Don't even get me started on green drops, Im getting sick of trying to farm a paragon spear, and you can't tell me that the paragon bosses are over farmed, I've seen maybe 5 ppl trying to sell a paragon green.

Something has to be done about the bots, but this isn't it, your killing our gold vaults here!

[MadFliPPP]

I think we need to consider the random proportions of dropping. As far as the 20% calculation goes, that was over 1 run. I know I have gone with guild groups pre-update and had only 1 drop in a time we CLEARED FOW. Other times i can almost fill my bags, even in a group. The same is true for all areas, you will get different proportions every time.

[Goathands]

I understand why this update happened. I really do.
But at the same time I don't think the devs realize that it's the casual farmer that is most hurt by this. The old farming code didn't effect those of us who might make a run or two every-other-day but it certainly effected the bots and hardcore farmers, maybe not to the scale it should have been, but it did work. I understand that something needed to be done and while I'm happy to see that rare items/materials aren't being effected by the code (thank you for adding the event items into that, by the way) at the same time I don't know why the devs think that the casual player has the time to sit in town and type "wts whatever rare item" for an hour or more until someone finally buys the silly thing. As a casual farmer I can honestly say that any gold I made came from selling back useless white/blue items to merchants, not from any gold items that are well...difficult to get rid of.

Maybe if a better trade system was in place (action house, or similar) I'd see the point but at this time I'm sad to say that my days of "casual" solo farming are at an end. Thankfully I can work on the vanquisher title and make gold that way but overall I'm still not happy to see this change. :\

[Draxanoth]

This game is slowly eliminating the casual players. Where's the new sorrow's furnace? The in and out challenge missions? Now they take away the simple farming for folk who can't afford 20k in runes and thousands to enter UW and farm ecto? Let's face it, there isn't a whole lot of rares and whatnot that fetch a substantial sum. They're going to lose all the people who chose GW over WoW because they didn't need to live inside the game.

[Naluh]

wtf happened to this thread? like 30 pages are gone. Anet censorship? :D

[Mularc Templare]

Actually, proportions of the fourm were lost during the upgrade that happened to the servers recently.

I personally do not understand where all the gripe is coming from. I personally have noticed the opposite effect - it seems the rumoured "henchmen scaling" which was present in GW is gone, and I am starting to recieve items of purple or more worth whilst in a team of full hench and heros. I am even getting gold drops, which is unprecedented to me.

As for those spamming Trade chat, why doesn't anyone use at least the basic addition we were given in the party search update? If more people used this feature to trade, I might even consider buying things off players. An Auction house would be nice, but it's obviously a very complex feature to implement, or is not as high on the prority list as content for GW:EN or the related other changes such as PvE-Only skills, and the mesmer PvE "buff".

I have to also ask. If you are a casual player, who has limited time in the game, why do you have to farm? It's nice to have the 15k armour, the green weapons hanging out your ears, but they are not the be-al and end all. Moreso, if you do want the armour and earn it by playing the game through, selling your drops, selling away that extra green you don't often use, then you'll probably find that last few peices of gold you need.

I for one think this is a step in a good direction. I actually wish that most of the items on the list now exempt from scaling (probably with Holiday items being the one that should be there.) were part of the system. Maybe rediculous prices for single items would stop appearing. I doubt most people will remember times before greens, but building a weapon perfect for your character was a part of character growth (at least in my eyes.) and if you have a bad weapon, you just deal with it until you can find a new one. Oh well, I'm probably in the majority in that ideal.

I'd like to thank Gaile for bringing us this Dev Update, so that we know the rationale behind the descision. I'd also like to thank the Dev team for keeping such a close eye on GW and responding to our requests so well. That is what brings players from other games to GW in my mind.

Thanks for the update once more,

Mularc

[Mal Zeth]

:soapbox:

I'm 100% in favor of getting rid of the farming bots. They are a plague to this game and the honest player. I don't belive that this update was the way to get rid of them. If you wanted to only get rid of the bots then all you had to do was update your farming code to do this:

Player X goes into Zone Y and Kills Mob A over and over for hours on end. Instead of killing the drops as they did, they could/should/need to just limit the ammount of times you can repeat this run. Say after 5 runs Player X triggers the farming code and The mod in said zone drops NOTHING for Player X for a period of time, say 8 hours. Now you have successfully killed bot farming while still allowing the casual player to do a quick farm without the worry of not getting any return on time invested however short the time may be. But the code would have to flag said player and zone together, not just the player since that would hurt the player throughout the rest of their play time in other zones throughout the game.

The reason for the casual player wanting to farm is that sometimes you dont have an hour or more to run a mission, or a zone. Sometimes you just want to spend 10 mins farming some mino's or trolls, or whatever else to just make some quick gold.

As for trying to sell ANYTHING ingame, I aggree that it is a total joke. I think the devs need to try selling something ingame. I don't think ANYONE finds spamming "WTS" in local chat for hours on end fun. How many of you just end up selling your Golds/Purples to the merchants for 10x LESS then what you could make off of it by selling it to another player for the simple reason of not wanting to be bothered wasting the time to do it?

I also find it odd that a dev team who claims to support the solo play style, which imo includes using a party of NPCs would release an update that pretty much FORCES people to party with other people. I, as well as alot of other people around here actually semi-support this idea, it's good to play with other people and im places like FoW/UW/DoA thats the best way to do it. On the other hand, have the devs ever TRIED to get into a PuG to do anything? I know I saw someone in one of these threads say something that was very true. The time it takes to get into a PuG could be HOURS. Take Tombs for example, if you arent a ranger or a necro with the right build, you don't get into a PuG, ever.

I have 3 main charcters that I use, a Necro, An Ele, and a War. Each of these have their purpose. I've done FoW groups and i've seen some very bad builds from people, like a nuker that uses Fire Storm pre-HM Patch. Or the Necro that doesnt Echo SS. Or the War that doesnt understand that all he has to do is stand in the mob and not move. Now Im sure there are going to be people out there that will say "Why don't you just join a guild" or "I just run with my guild mates and we dont have a problem". Well good for you, want a cookie? I created my own guild because I wanted to design my own cape, I've also invested time and money into build and fitting a guild hall for myself. That's something that really attracted me to this game, having my own cape and hall is just a cool idea. I would love to recrute for my guild, but I dont have the time to stand in a town spamming that either. My only other option is to join an alliance, but that requires me to play factions which I personally don't care for.

I don't really know what to make of this change, I guess only time will tell. As for a better market system. Go check out Eve-Online, that's what a market should be, but be forewarned the Dev's in that game cheat, and have admitted to it. The time sink that WoW can be is nothing in comparison to eve. Blah, this is the end because I cant think anymore, too many words!

[casserole]

First of all, thank you Anet for the hard mode. I simply look at it as one more way to play the game, and more playing options is usually a good thing. Second, I appreciate the effort to keep bots from making their presence felt in the game.

I do have one problem with this loot scaling issue and from some of the previous posts it looks like I'm not alone. Let's get something clear, the trading system in GW is famously inept. Not only does the lack of a robust trading system make trading a hassle but it can ruin a large part of the the online experience in some towns as one has to turn off local chat in order to escape trade spam. The lack of an organized trading system has largely contributed to me avoiding trade with others.

Thus, our goal is that solo farmers can still earn as much money as they did before, but they'll have to earn it in different ways. Instead of looking for things to sell to merchants, solo farmers should now be looking for things to sell to traders or other players.


Merchants are not rude.
Merchants do not try to scam or rip off other players.
Merchants are always there and never keep me waiting. They are very convenient.


I shudder at the thought of trying to regularly sell things in town to other players.

I realize that noone is being forced to trade anything to anyone in this game, but let's say then that Anet has "gently" pushed it's players toward trading with each other. This is being done without giving players any kind of an organized trading system, unless you count that trade tab in the town window that everyone ignores. I will be much more accepting of this scaled loot change if Anet insures that the rippled effects of it are addressed as well.

Now, as bad as the trading in GW is, I very much appreciate the fact that coming up with a trading system is a huge undertaking. I do not doubt for a second that any kind of a system that I myself devised would surely be exploited by someone in a matter of days, if not hours, if not minutes. Any kind of a system will be poked and prodded by thousands of players looking for an angle to further their own agenda even at the expense of others. But that is why Anet's employees make the big bucks, because they have the ingenuity to pull off a sound and stable system that we can all use and enjoy! :grin:

[Glacius Cool]

As for those spamming Trade chat, why doesn't anyone use at least the basic addition we were given in the party search update? If more people used this feature to trade, I might even consider buying things off players.

Because the party search is very very limited. 30 characters to tell everyone in Lions Arch all the stuff you have to sell? seriously?
If you've got more than 1 item to sell your party search line looks like this:
Selling Stuff, find me 2 see!

The addition of a trade selection was pathetic at best as the entire thing is too limited to be of use. It was a neat idea but it fails with it's limits. We are absolutely forced to use abbreviations for everything that many players don't know.


As for the loot scaling... and 'better' drops in hard mode. LOL
I ran my warrior to the Troll Cave and got 1 key, 1 key!!!! just one key in normal mode.

My necro on the other hand has all the luck or not...
17 purple hammers, 1 gold hammer, 1 purple staff, 1 purple wand. Those were the drops for 3 days of hard mode.
Chests using the uber breakable lockpicks(FGS I'm better at it in real life) are:
9 purple items, 1 gold offhand, 1 gold wand.

Not a single item of use or anything that could be sold(especially since tyria/cantha doesn't have inscriptions). So all that crap went to the merchant. The only reward for me in hard mode is at the end when you get the money from completing the mission/bonus and for clearing an area, that's it. I make more money doing that then during the entire time previous to getting to the end.

All that was in a party (full for the area).

Today I had slightly better luck and came out with a little more money but still everything went to the merchant.

[Notorious BOB]

Gaile,

Could you please have the Devs look into the supposed 'increased quality drops' that hard mode is supposed to provide?

Since the update I have seen absolutely no evidence that drops have improved, be that 'solo' or with full parties.

As another example, I thought, I know lets try a fresh zone that I haven't been near in a while to see the improvement. So Senji's Corner - Vermin - Hard Mode - Solo

Cleared the zone of all vermin - that 42 level 25 monsters.

Total Drops = 4 white, 3 blue, 7 vermin hides, a couple of GP drops and one assassin tome.

This means that with the 'increased drop quality', that the only drop outside the loot scaling was the assassin tome.

One drop for killing 42 level 25 monsters? This ain't no improvement that I've ever heard of?

So Gaile, either loot drops haven't been changed, solo-ers are really penalised beyond what has been claimed by you or there's a bug.

This is about the 10th test that I've run and they've all yielded the same results.

No response from you other than the party line up to now - how long does this have to go on?

:sad:

[ravskau]

Gaile,

Could you please have the Devs look into the supposed 'increased quality drops' that hard mode is supposed to provide?

Since the update I have seen absolutely no evidence that drops have improved, be that 'solo' or with full parties.

As another example, I thought, I know lets try a fresh zone that I haven't been near in a while to see the improvement. So Senji's Corner - Vermin - Hard Mode - Solo

Cleared the zone of all vermin - that 42 level 25 monsters.

Total Drops = 4 white, 3 blue, 7 vermin hides, a couple of GP drops and one assassin tome.

This means that with the 'increased drop quality', that the only drop outside the loot scaling was the assassin tome.

One drop for killing 42 level 25 monsters? This ain't no improvement that I've ever heard of?

So Gaile, either loot drops haven't been changed, solo-ers are really penalised beyond what has been claimed by you or there's a bug.

This is about the 10th test that I've run and they've all yielded the same results.

No response from you other than the party line up to now - how long does this have to go on?

:sad:

Bob,
What you said.......
I have never used a bot, Rarely sell to humans (because it is such a frustrating experience that takes hours of standing around that could be spent really playing) because most buyers and sellers are such Aholes.
Even since the supposed loot scaling fix......I have seen no increase in purple gold or green drops, and only one tome while vanquishing an area in hard mode with another guildie ,and forget about farming in hard mode.....It just aint happenin, least not for me, in solo mode......Only reason I took time out to farm was to be able to afford normal gameplay. Bob, what DID you use to solo vermin in hard mode????? Thought drop scaling was just applied to normal mode anyhow....
If it gets back to the days when I feel like I am healthy when I get 5P in storage, if I dont see a drop in prices to accompany it Guess I will just hafta find another game to play.....
IGN: Hiarnow Kharnak

[Obsidian]

first of all, i am sorry for my bad spelling.

my experiences so far:

solo uw in normal mode - works like wonders, even my guildies noticed a slight increase in ecto drops. not to mention the non scattering AI

vanquishing with heroes-hench - horrible experience. trying to vanquish a 4 member party map (elonian area) and getting couple of NON MAX white items and a juvenile termite leg from lvl 24 mobs (cant remember the exact lvl but they were high lvl enough) was very, very disappointing.

vanquishing sulphurous wastes - 2 lockpics for locked chests from which i got purples (i dont remember getting a gold from a chest for the last 2 months), some mummy wrappings i believe, a bit of white weapons and gold and thats about it.

farming sunspear points in sulphurous wastes - in a hench/hero team - nothing worth mentioning.. i got a green scythe after my 30th run or so.

doing the same run but with 4 people + heroes - golds drop like mad for everyone

dead sword hard mode solo run - at least 2 golds per run, usually not max since they have never been max at that area, but with very good upgrades. dead sword that drops more than usual (i am guessing that its prices will plummet soon)


just my feedback, i wont make any conclusions.
-------------------

i just want to agree with people who were complaining about the trading system, it is frustrating at best. imagine trying to sell a gold for HOURS in order to earn enough for your ancient chest piece, just to lower the price because you lose your patience, then you see a fissure armor wammo buying it off from you and selling it for 15k more. its ack!! no comment. the game WANTS you to be rude, or else you cant sell anything to anyone. i hate it.

[Revan Bastille]

From a local chat on April 25, Gaile said the following:


"We have no plans to add an auction house to Guild Wars. Perhaps it will be something for GW2. I don't know.

Yes, many players may want an easy way to sell, and they may have that in Guild Wars 2. But from what i understand... we won't be adding an auction house to Guild Wars."

To quote Gaile in her "Farming and Loot Scaling" post (http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/showthread.php?t=10146006):

"The bottom line is that ArenaNet's goal is to make it easier for normal players to make money"

ArenaNet understands that people enjoy playing Guild Wars in many different ways, and our goal is to make each of those ways fun and rewarding.

A major theme of our most recent update is that the game should be friendlier and more rewarding for casual players, including casual solo farmers

ArenaNet's goal is to make it easier for normal players to make money, so that they can buy the things they need without having to purchase gold for cash, and then to redirect the farming activities of the most advanced players so that the way they make money is by selling things to other players rather than by introducing a flood of new gold into the economy.

Thus, our goal is that solo farmers can still earn as much money as they did before, but they'll have to earn it in different ways. Instead of looking for things to sell to merchants, solo farmers should now be looking for things to sell to traders or other players.all emphasis added


The nerf to the gold drops meant that people would be relying on selling to merchants and other players, as Anet intended. The fact that ArenaNet is not planning/going to have an Auction system while saying that casual farmers should still make similar amounts of money is ludicrous, in my opinion. Over the past week, I've become very disenchanted with GW as I watch the titles I've been working for become more and more out of reach (and my required farming time go up). I don't see anything easier, fun and/or rewarding about that at all.

I've never really considered breaking the EULA and making bots to farm, but over the past week, it's become a lot more tempting. (Now, I have not and never would actually make bots, so please don't start reporting me to Anet.) On that note, from what I've seen the number of bots has only INCREASED since the farm nerf, not to mention the increased price of GW gold on Ebay.

I'm not ready to give up on Guild Wars yet, Anet has usually responded to the outcry of their customers. I hope the current lack of info from Anet means they're looking into this and not saying, "This is how it's going to be from now on. Tough luck." If the latter is the case (and I'm worried about GW2), I might switch over to LotRO or another game... or I might just get a real life. ;)

[jmorganmn]

I think that a trade house on every map would be good. One in Tyria, Cantha, and Elona, in the major city. I hate going to an area and have to compete with WTS when I am LFG

[Nanashi]

On that note, from what I've seen the number of bots has only INCREASED since the farm nerf, not to mention the increased price of GW gold on Ebay.

Number of bots increased because they are aware that by setting up a full botting group they can enter HM and probably make 4x their original in game income.

I'm not ready to give up on Guild Wars yet, Anet has usually responded to the outcry of their customers. I hope the current lack of info from Anet means they're looking into this and not saying, "This is how it's going to be from now on. Tough luck." If the latter is the case (and I'm worried about GW2), I might switch over to LotRO or another game... or I might just get a real life. ;)

Well since the last update, items and rares no longer fall under the loot scaling, I think it's unsafe to say they made their choice and stuck with it. By that I mean I think that is pretty much the case right now.

Too many are favoring the new loot system and not worried about these consequences because A) They have what they want now so it no longer applies B) they had alot of money already prior to the nerf.

[satenia]

They'll find that solo farming is much easier than it was before, because monsters don't have the anti-farming AI that they used to have, and because the game no longer prevents players from repeatedly farming the same monsters over and over.

Having farmed two bosses a great many times over the last few days, I'm beginning to question or at least wonder about the anti-farming AI.

I've noticed multiple times, when I would enter an area in HM and only kill a boss and maybe 2-3 adds, then rezone and repeat, that on the first few runs, I would almost always get a gold drop (weapon or scroll) and often also a green, then the drops would decrease as I kept on killing, to the degree where after killing a boss for 10+ times he wouldn't drop anything anymore at ALL multiple times until I went to do something else and came back later.

Sounds very much like anti-farming AI to me... or maybe I just had very very bad luck, however, bad luck going after the same pattern on 100+ kills over multiple days?

Anyone else been experiencing this too?

[Fay Vert]

wtf happened to this thread? like 30 pages are gone. Anet censorship? :D

I was thinking this, but the big thread, with a duplicate OP by Gaile is in CDF here

http://guildwars.incgamers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=449707

[Drafell]

This is a very clever way of limiting the effectiveness of bots in particular, as they previously would rely on Merchants to gain money from selling common loot. They have essentially replaced a large part of the solo-farmers income with low or zero value items which are only of interest or demand to other players. There are many facilities outside the game to sell or market items, such as rpgtraders.net. I wouldn't be all that surprised if A-Net were to implement their own, similar, trade system at some point in the future, either web-based or accessible from in-game. But in all likely hood this will be a feature of GW2 rather than the current Tyrian campaigns.

[truemyths]

I play in a full party most of the time and I see a big reduction in loot dropped.

[grikdog]

I dont know what makes one an 'advanced' farmer is but I totally agree with that farming is no longer fun. I used to enjoy this aspect of the game - now (and I am only speaking to my experience Gaile) it is boring.

How many casual gamers want to spend limited game time standing around Kamadan or Lions Arch hawking gold or green items. That certainly doesnt motivate me to farm.

I have spent lots of time going through the missions and have at least one character of each profession sometimes more - farming was not all I did.

Farming used to be a nice way to unwind and I am only being honest when I say that it is not psychologicaly rewarding to me anymore. The thrill is gone.

From what you have said I really dont think that you (the Development Team) cares that this change has really hurt the game experience for players like me. And maybe if everyone else likes it you shouldnt.

However I hope you dont summarily discount this perspective.

[Notorious BOB]

Gaile - latest test results for you to digest.

Test type: Solo comparison between Normal and Hard Mode drops.
Location : One of the few places where a Ranger can solo HM
Monsters : Level 23 (normal mode) / Level 26 (Hard Mode)
Bosses : None
AFC : Shouldn't have been a factor - zone not visited since before loot scaling update. HM runs done first, NM second.
Number of runs: 10 in each mode

Normal Mode Results:
Monsters Killed 199
Gold Coin drops 11
Gold Items 1
Purple Items 2
Blue Items 7
Collectible drops 10
White Items 14
Materials 6 - 2 of which rare materials
Dyes 0
Keys 0

Total drops allocated to player 51 of a potential 199 or 25.6% (approx 1:4)

Hard Mode Results:
Monsters Killed 205
Gold Coin drops 35
Gold Items 1
Purple Items 4
Blue Items 6
Collectible drops 13
White Items 11
Materials 8 - 1 of which rare materials
Dyes 3
Keys 1

Total drops allocated to player 82 of a potential 205 or 40% (approx 1:2.5)

Almost all of these represent cash drops

Conclusions for this test series

Appreciably more gold coin drops occured in Hard Mode than Normal Mode
There is no appreciable difference in any other type of drops between Normal and Hard mode with the exception of Dyes.
In this test there was no demonstrable differences in drops between Normal & Hard Mode as Anet have stated is the case.


Another few hours of my life I'll never get back! :laugh:

:afro:

[satenia]

Ah well, I really can't get smart out of HM anymore.

Right after HM release, I noticed the increased drop in gold/purple items, even greens when solo-farming a boss. Those drops would decrease as I kept killing (see earlier post), but still be somewhat reliable.

But again a few days later, these drops seemed to decrease again up to the point where I'm now, where I rarely ever get to see all those items that are apparently supposed to be excluded from loot scaling.

To give a very specific example, I've been trying to get a Ritualist Elite Tome off a ritualist boss, I must have killed him at least 60-70 times in HM... and while I got 2-3 greens and a gold or two worth mentioning during the first few kills (which were close to HM release), droprate pretty much hit rock-bottom today and I have yet to see a tome drop from him at all.

So here goes, loot I got from solo-farming a boss in HM in the 20 kills I did today and kept track of:

01.) Nothing
02.) Scroll of Hunter Insight / Stolen Prov
03.) Nothing
04.) 104 Gold
05.) Nothing
06.) Nothing
07.) 10 Fur / Stolen Prov
08.) Yeti Rags (white)
09.) Yeti Rags (purple, worthless Rit rune)
10.) Yeti Rags (white)
11.) Nothing
12.) FoW Scroll (weeee)
13.) Nothing
14.) Nothing
15.) Yeti Rags (white)
16.) Nothing
17.) Nothing
18.) Some Daggers (blue, worthless)
19.) Yeti Rags (white)
20.) Nothing

Together with the boss I always killed 2-3 adds as well, so say 40-60 kills of regular mobs, giving me another 100 gold, 1 worthless gold, 1 purple and 2-3 more white items.

After I've given up for today, I had 1 FoW scroll and 1k Gold (selling everything, minus buying a new salvage kit of 25 charges) to show for.

This is solo-farming, in hard-mode, killing a boss, therefor highest chance to get all the items that are excluded from loot scaling - or so one would think. I call this more than just pathetic droprate, it wasn't like this from start and I wonder what happened or got changed?

I'm aware I only listed the latest 20 kills, but this has pretty much been going the same way with several bosses I've been soloing for the last couple of days. I know you can just have bad luck on a day... but something as consistent as this, sorry, but I don't believe in bad luck anymore. This is nowhere near fun... or any means to make some cash while soloing.

[Spanks]

People who periodically enjoy farming solo (with no heroes or henchmen) but are casual about it are also likely to see an improvement.

Really?, I fall into the "casual" catagory, only farming when I need/want something (my FoW Armour I got after playing and saving ectos/shards for about 18 Months before someone says "LOL casual farmer with FoW")

Anyway, my FoW's not what this posts about.

Before Loot Scaling.(Took this when I did a guide on how to farm Zelnehlun for some guildies), and OK the majority of the stuff went to the merch or I salvaged, but there's still a fair bit of cash there.

http://img530.imageshack.us/img530/4169/prelootxh8.jpg

1st time for ages, on behalf of a couple of people I introduced to the game, who were asking if I could perhaps get them a decent bow, seeing as they couldn't afford to craft/buy one, I thought I'd see Zelnehlun as he's normally good for a Green, and sometimes some other stuff, in case he was being tight and I could give them the means to at least buy a couple.

Obviously not, and I'd like to know where this so called improvement is, as thats crap, and I did 3 runs today, 2 yesterday, and they were all pretty much the same.

No Golds/Grapes/Blues either, and I have to agree with satenia, it's Pathetic.

I ended up buying them the bows, and also giving them some cash so they can at least buy some decent armour + insignias now they're at Consulate Docks, as at the current drop rate, it would be about 2012 before they could afford anything "nice".

http://img523.imageshack.us/img523/1556/borked1nj3.jpg

All I would say is that if people who H/H, shouldnt have to share the loot with the H/H, especially as when it comes to the heroes, we have to fork out to equip them unless we can use a drop on them.

[Obsidian]

Sometimes the drops are like this, sometimes I don't get anything for 15 runs except for a white holy branch or 2 mantis pincers... ah well I guess its all about luck ;)

sorry about screen shot messages, I forgot I could expand the chat window xD

http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y128/sunchica/byzzr.jpg

[La Luna]

Sometimes the drops are like this, sometimes I don't get anything for 15 runs except for a white holy branch or 2 mantis pincers... ah well I guess its all about luck ;)

sorry about screen shot messages, I forgot I could expand the chat window xD

http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y128/sunchica/byzzr.jpg


I have neve ever had anything like that! I bet I could do the same thing you did and get only whites and, blues!:angry:

[Spanks]

I have neve ever had anything like that! I bet I could do the same thing you did and get only whites and, blues!:angry:

I'd expect that farming in HM, otherwise it defeats the object.

[La Luna]

I'd expect that farming in HM, otherwise it defeats the object.

My experience is from farming HM with heros and henchies.

[Spanks]

My experience is from farming HM with heros and henchies.

Thats why you're not getting anything, damn henchies pinching your drops.

[Obsidian]

I have neve ever had anything like that! I bet I could do the same thing you did and get only whites and, blues!:angry:

heh after that day i actually did get only whites and blues lol... and occasional scroll of heroes insight -.-

and yeh, its hard mode. i used to get at least one monk elite tome per lets say 12 runs... now i didn't get one for days and days. did they change something?

[Elite Bushido™]

it had to be somethin today cuz yesterday i made 60k but today i barely even got 10-15

[asxtc]

Am i right in saying that...all the changes have been made in order to prevent a huge flux of gold (from bot farmers) entering the economy, either from bots directly or from "ebayers"?

There has got to be an easier way of stopping a bot from going through its routine (without effecting drastic change for the normal player).

Move a lampost or 2..include a "are you sure you wish to enter this area" Yes/No/random button.
Not a programmer...but there has definately got to be an easier way than tweaking and manipulating the drop rates.

If they were serious about preventing bots...all they have to do is..log onto one of the frequented outposts (just to see how obvious it is to spot one)...and do something about it.
The majority of the playerbase (ie those ppl that you are hoping to buy GW:EN and GW2) would gladly endure even a radical responce....as long as the problem was attacked and reduced ...and not as most players believe:

We are being messed with because ANET dont have the balls to react.

[Notorious BOB]

Am i right in saying that...all the changes have been made in order to prevent a huge flux of gold (from bot farmers) entering the economy, either from bots directly or from "ebayers"?.

No, not really.

Anet originally introduced Anti-Farming Code to reduce the amount of gold that was farmable by bots - causing drops to reduce if you continuously re-entered the same zone and killed a few mobs over and over again - normal 'bot' behaviour.

The loot scaling nerf is something different. It was targetted purely and solely at players, specifically those who play the game in parties of less than maximum size. The smaller the party size, the more the LS nerf will hurt you and players who played solo are hurt the most.

It was introduced because there was an erroneous misconception by some players that GW penalised you for playing the game with H+H or other players by reducing your drops, i.e. dividing them up between the number of people in the party. Anet claim that the LS nerf was introduced to encourage players to 'party up' and to support casual players - basically this is completely bogus.

With the introduction of loot scaling, the Anti-Farming Code was supposedly removed although there is evidence both to support and contradict this statement.

LS had nothing to do with bots or eBay gold sellers - in fact, the LS nerf has bolstered sales of gold on eBay as the gold supply in game reduces and people are forced to purchase gold from 'other' sources in order to buy high-end prestige or vanity items.

Hope this helps

[Drenella]

Quote= A major theme of our most recent update is that the game should be friendlier and more rewarding for casual players, including casual solo farmers, and that the most advanced farmers should differentiate themselves from the crowd not through the amount of gold and common loot that they farm directly from monsters, but instead through the amount of gold that they can get from selling rare items to other players (directly or through traders).

That's a very important distinction." END QUOTE


Now, I agree with the update entirely, it's genius actually. But your most recent update has been counterproductive to your very cause.

The limitations to trading which have been enforced make it a lot harder to sell to anyone in game. I really think you were successful in scaling the game to make it fairer for the casual players while not wanting to make an impact on the more advanced players, but you have destroyed that success by making it harder for people to trade with people.

I have written a number of posts with suggestions on how to fix this issue. The best solution I believe is the introduction of an additional trader/merchant with tabs for say upgrades, tombs, greens and even higher prices for weapons (especially rare skinned ones). It's a bit ridiculous that the same sword that can sell for over 100k can be sold to the merchant for 200g. If you made a trader that bough items at 20-50% of their likely market value, I would definitely consider selling it to a trader rather than trying to spam for a few hours to find someone who has enough money to buy my item. I could do a quick sale, cut my losses and then spend the time earning more items... I don't believe this trader should have a resell option o other players in game because the values of items would be skewed by farming. It would just be comforting to know you can sell an item for a particular amount when you get the drop. (but it would be handy to have a re-buy option temporarily in case you accidentally sell soemthing you didn't intend to)

[Akirai Annuvil]

The limitations to trading
have nothing to do with loot scaling.

Still if we're going to be giving comment about the spam crackdown here, great well done ANet! There are still some people who spam trade in all chat, so I can't wait till the next round :)

[Drenella]

Actually it does, it affects one of the major gameplay balances that the introduction of loot scaling attempted to retain, viz the advanced player's abilities to make profits... but not just limited to advanced players either mind you...

[Xeres]

After trying to deal with the Loot scaling update since it was implimented, I have come to the inescapable conclusion that GW has become dedicedly LESS fun to play (at leaset imo). I was a casual farmer who enjoyed soloing lower level areas. This provided relaxation, enjoyment and a nice bit of loot for the effort. Now, I find what I used to enjoy has now become a point of great frustration.

This update actually hurts the casual farmer more than anything else. My plat reserves since this update have been depleting on a consistent basis. The reward for accomplishment just isn't what it used to me. What is left to do for vetran players other than collect items or deck out their characters. Farming provided the means to do so. No reward for farming = no more reason to play GW.

[Saldonus Darkholme]

After trying to deal with the Loot scaling update since it was implimented, I have come to the inescapable conclusion that GW has become dedicedly LESS fun to play (at leaset imo). I was a casual farmer who enjoyed soloing lower level areas. This provided relaxation, enjoyment and a nice bit of loot for the effort. Now, I find what I used to enjoy has now become a point of great frustration.

This update actually hurts the casual farmer more than anything else. My plat reserves since this update have been depleting on a consistent basis. The reward for accomplishment just isn't what it used to me. What is left to do for vetran players other than collect items or deck out their characters. Farming provided the means to do so. No reward for farming = no more reason to play GW.


I was also very disappointed by the loot nerf: it annoyed my wife so much she all but quit playing. I started a new character to confirm the rumors that a character can get everything he needs just by playing through. (That's in another thread)

One day, while camping in BBS, watching the parade, a real person showed up. We discussed the bots and I asked why they were 55ing it: I've always ran my monk through there and cleaned up, pre-nerf. He informed me that a 55-monk can clean up in hard mode, just by tweaking their skills and running a dervish secondary. I decided to give it a go: WOW!!! I've been doing the BBS/Cursed Land runs with my monk in HM ever since!

I have consistently cleared 7k a run, with at least 3 gold items a run: I had 1 run where I cleared 10 gold items! (Had to show my wife, who immediately told me where to go!! ;P)

If you want to accumulate your wealth again, look me up: I'd be glad to show you the build! It's just challenging enough to keep it fun, and you can clear 7k a run each time!

BTW: a run consists of clearing your way to Cursed Lands, Vanquishing CL, walking out and back in to vanquish it again. When inventory gets full, I salvage all the whites and continue on. I usually vanquish CL twice a run.

Then there's UW smite/ecto farming: 3 runs an hour, 1 ecto average a run. That's 12K an hour.

[Fay Vert]

Anet's anti botting has just established the monk bot as the only effective farmer in town! Could they have been any more inept?

[Saldonus Darkholme]

Anet's anti botting has just established the monk bot as the only effective farmer in town! Could they have been any more inept?

But it's not: I'd say the El/Me UW smite farmer is more lucrative: I'm getting 7K an hour right now in BBS/CS runs, but I can get 3 UW runs an hour, averaging 1 ecto a run for 12K+.

And, with tweaking, you can I-anything, you just have to consider where you are farming.

[woot im a warrior]

But it's not: I'd say the El/Me UW smite farmer is more lucrative: I'm getting 7K an hour right now in BBS/CS runs, but I can get 3 UW runs an hour, averaging 1 ecto a run for 12K+.

And, with tweaking, you can I-anything, you just have to consider where you are farming.

If you have a rit you can get in 4 an hour easily. Rt/W or Rt/Me can both do a run in 10 minutes once you are used to it.

[thesmithy]

to be honest i found the ele/monk to be better in uw running 20 smites together and killing then all in 6 secs seems to be worth it:grin:

[Saldonus Darkholme]

to be honest i found the ele/monk to be better in uw running 20 smites together and killing then all in 6 secs seems to be worth it:grin:

The problem with that, though, is the apparent bug some people have noticed where the game reads multiple simultaneous kills as 1 kill.

AAR, the el/me still beats out the el/mo, imo.

[Fay Vert]

Yup, when I solo UW I kill ALL Aatxes, ALL smites and 6 Dryders, it averages one ecto (sometimes none, sometimes two, rarely three) and takes an hour.

The multi-kill loot nerf/bug sucks for trappers.

[rexalex]

Im totally depressed since the loot scale nerfing.
And the anti farm code what "not implemented" in hard mode makes me crazy.
Maybe a lazy programmer reused some old code what contained AFC, instead of remake it? donno AFC defenetly exists.
And ANET could solve the bot problem what made the loot scale thing to born.
Just disable the keystroke what picks up the loot... bots has no mouse

[mradraz]

Just disable the keystroke what picks up the loot... bots has no mouse

Wrong, many "pro" farmers are REAL people not bots who are paid to sit at a PC for 8-10hrs a day or even longer and farm over and over again.

[Saldonus Darkholme]

Wrong, many "pro" farmers are REAL people not bots who are paid to sit at a PC for 8-10hrs a day or even longer and farm over and over again.

While I am not discounting that there ARE pro-farmers, bots are a direct violation of the EULA, so removing the semi-colon shortcut WOULD be viable.

However, I'm thinking the majority ARE bots: if you go onto ebay, you can buy a bot which gives you a multitude of things you can do. It's rather sickening, really!

[rexalex]

While I am not discounting that there ARE pro-farmers, bots are a direct violation of the EULA, so removing the semi-colon shortcut WOULD be viable.

However, I'm thinking the majority ARE bots: if you go onto ebay, you can buy a bot which gives you a multitude of things you can do. It's rather sickening, really!

Is there a way to suggest ANET to disable the key?

[Saldonus Darkholme]

Is there a way to suggest ANET to disable the key?

It has been suggested in other threads.

[Freezyguy]

How come everytime A-Net makes farming more difficult they don't reduce the price or armour or skills? They have repeatedly reduced the effectiveness of farming from the scattering update, the loot scaling update, and the anti-farming code (either the old one which is supposed to be gone or the anti-nuke code) while keeping priced stagnent. The scarcity of gold should be reflected in price changes.

[Tijger]

How come everytime A-Net makes farming more difficult they don't reduce the price or armour or skills? They have repeatedly reduced the effectiveness of farming from the scattering update, the loot scaling update, and the anti-farming code (either the old one which is supposed to be gone or the anti-nuke code) while keeping priced stagnent. The scarcity of gold should be reflected in price changes.

Except that gold isnt that scarce and the price in gold of armor used to be higher btw.
Pre-insignia's the top end armors would cost 1500gp per piece for the standard and 15K per piece for elite armors and there was once also absolutely no guarantee you could get a rune out either.

So, basically, the price of armor is already a lot less then it used to be, now you see every joker running around with Obsidian armor, when I started playing having Obsidian was something special. So, please, try not to whine or complain so much?

[Dead On Stick]

Really one of the problems is that finding a party to farm a specific thing with can be lots of harder then it seems time you could spend farming. People are becoming most unhappy with these loot changes and to reward ppl for selling things to players instead to merchants is really kinda bad. What now is gonna come from this containment is that people gonna make money out of illegal ways: Marcoing or scamming. Couse normal solo farming in normal mode mostly is useless now, i once gone minotaur farming after the HM update well i menaged to clear all the mino's what did i get? 1 minotaur horn and a worthless white weapon. Further you can really see that theres less gold going on couse in the players economy ectos where once worth 8,5k now there down to 5k that is because of 2 updates the previous "nerf" witch came during release of nightfall. And now the hard mode nerf. The problem is as an elementalist main you have a limeted amout of time (Atleast when you use Mist Form) to kill the monsters. So i do a normal farming trip with the minotaurs but then in hard mode the problems are the following: Cause of increased AI they scatter very fast (not that much of a problem) What is the problem is that they then start using healing signet before they come back. So then you have another pack of minos with 100% health. And with earth magic builds you just lack damage. Further is that the price of events aint lowering. Take the Shing Jea Boardwalk for example those tickets cost 15 coins each but people dont have enough money to spend anymore. As i tryed to make clear in one of Gaile Grays visits is that maybe the price lowers in the players economy but they wont for things like armor. Sure you now lowerd the price for max armor from 1,5k a piece to 1k a piece but for that 0,5k a piece i cant get some radiant insignias. Further they gave all armor the couler gray making dye prices go up. And 15k armor has surtently become expensive. And you guys really forcing players to go green farming or somesort of rare axe. But greens have become worthless so the problem you first got with to much gold you now have with greens. And Perfect Upgrades dont cost as much as they used to be. So the only people benefiting are people who like farming.

[Absolute Eminence]

Farming used to feel rewarding. Now it seems wasteful.

[Dead On Stick]

Farming used to feel rewarding. Now it seems wasteful.

Agreed it now seems a waste of time. The only fun farming places are the places where you get items worth much so you are excited like: Omg will i get a ecto/shard/greenie? Just as Anet wanted to be so you sell more to others. But there extualy deciding what people sould farm. I think thats unfair. And gaile there arent any people exept for a very few who farm just for fun.

[rdpollard]

You need to research some better farming spots. HM has opened some pretty big doors if you know where to look. 25-30k per hour is not unreasonable. Go make some cash!:wink:

[rexalex]

please share the spot :)

[rdpollard]

please share the spot :)

Did you know that in HM Stone Elementals drop max golds, lockpicks, rubies, sapphires, and about 100g each (when they arent dropping lodestones or granite slabs)? An enterprising person might try soloing an area with Stone Eles...:wink:

[rexalex]

Did you know that in HM Stone Elementals drop max golds, lockpicks, rubies, sapphires, and about 100g each (when they arent dropping lodestones or granite slabs)? An enterprising person might try soloing an area with Stone Eles...:wink:
thx ill look around :)

[Dead On Stick]

Did you know that in HM Stone Elementals drop max golds, lockpicks, rubies, sapphires, and about 100g each (when they arent dropping lodestones or granite slabs)? An enterprising person might try soloing an area with Stone Eles...:wink:
Ive been soloing that type of monsters for a time now but 30k a hour? HEELLL no. The most things they drop are Sorched Lodestones Charcoal and Granite Slabs. I can farm the warr boss who drops a FOW or UW scroll once in a while but thats one of the few intressting drops.

[Whipcream]

I've come back to Guild Wars after a few months break and ran smack into this new patch. I was never much of a farmer (though I know how to do it) and this change seems a little... well....

Was this patch really supposed to reduce the amount of bots? I have never seen so many bots before!
When I created a new character in Nightfall and got to Chahbek Village I saw nothing but new bots turning level 2 in a giant conga line. I mean there were TONS of them! At first I though some special event or free Nightfall account deal was going on. They all have stupid names from banging random letters into the keyboard like "Aasdjnf Fohasw".

The places where bots used to be before have increased in number about 5x over. There's a certain irony in a group needing a Monk, having 20 of them around, and none of them real.

This can't possible be preventing bots from flooding the market with new gold. I mean, a living being can only farm on his/her own for so long. A bot can run 24 hours a day. How can one compete with that? How can this not drive players to purchase gold for cash from professional farmers? (even if that's illegal)

I somehow picture the Chinese gold farmers are going to be running 8 accounts at a time to bypass this

Anyway, that my 2 cents. I am so glad I was around to make all the money I could need years ago, before all the game balancing.

[Dead On Stick]

I've come back to Guild Wars after a few months break and ran smack into this new patch. I was never much of a farmer (though I know how to do it) and this change seems a little... well....

Was this patch really supposed to reduce the amount of bots? I have never seen so many bots before!
When I created a new character in Nightfall and got to Chahbek Village I saw nothing but new bots turning level 2 in a giant conga line. I mean there were TONS of them! At first I though some special event or free Nightfall account deal was going on. They all have stupid names from banging random letters into the keyboard like "Aasdjnf Fohasw".

The places where bots used to be before have increased in number about 5x over. There's a certain irony in a group needing a Monk, having 20 of them around, and none of them real.



This can't possible be preventing bots from flooding the market with new gold. I mean, a living being can only farm on his/her own for so long. A bot can run 24 hours a day. How can one compete with that? How can this not drive players to purchase gold for cash from professional farmers? (even if that's illegal)

I somehow picture the Chinese gold farmers are going to be running 8 accounts at a time to bypass this

Anyway, that my 2 cents. I am so glad I was around to make all the money I could need years ago, before all the game balancing.

I know i now lots of stuff about bots and people install bots cause its hard to get money and its a one time payment or affort (depends if they buy em or make em there selfs) to gain unlimeted amounts of gold. Buying gold you have to do over and over and over and over. But now with this solo farm nerf people cant really get much gold anymore making the game less fun also, so they think they have nothing to loose so there gonna resort to illegal gold taking methods useally botting if not buying if not scamming. I want 15k armor for all my charecter and now its so hard to get gold i can understand why people start botting (just to make clear i do NOT bot). I mean you try getting a set of 15k armor its kinda hard. With lots of effort before the second nerf ( the hard mode nerf) i menaged to get my first 15k armor set (Ascended Pyromancer Aka 15k pyromancer now renamed ELite Flameforged). And beleave my both nerfs (the Nightfall and HM nerf) crashed into the players economy like a bomb! One of the ways to see if its going good or bad with the players economy is ecto prices and they went down veerrrry quick! All people want armor, good armor but some people have trouble affording droks armor let alone finnaly getting that cool 15k armor.

[rexalex]

the only way to prevent people buy gold on ebay : make it reachable
the time to make some money for stuffs uncompareable more than playing and having fun. Lets try ANET to raise the amount of drop 5% in every week.
When ebay sellers cant sell anymore ... then ingame gold flow is good enough

[Dead On Stick]

the only way to prevent people buy gold on ebay : make it reachable
the time to make some money for stuffs uncompareable more than playing and having fun. Lets try ANET to raise the amount of drop 5% in every week.
When ebay sellers cant sell anymore ... then ingame gold flow is good enough
Agreed, i mean the problem aint that ectos become to hard to get or something that aint it cause prices in players economy evolve with the amount of gold. But armor prices dont 15k armor is harder and harder to get. Before the NF nerf almost everybody could affort there own black dyed set of 15k armor after that nerf only some people could. And now almost nobody can :(. I want to buy 15k armor again :cry: its unreacheble. And anet do you guys really think people start botting less and buying less? Nope they get mad they cant get gold anymore they want reveange etc etc and then the bots increase and increase and increase and increase untill finnaly you have 6,7 miljoen players from half are bot only accounts. Really anet you need to search really hard to find anybody who really likes that nerf. Even if you make farming so darn ineffective that you get 50 gold a run that dosnt matter bots can farm 24/7 and if a run takes i dunno 10 minutes then in the 8 hours the dude that has the bot is sleeping the bot has 2,4k that x 7 and you have a week of botting while you asleep only it has 16,8k and thats when farming is that nerfed lets make it more reasonable uhmm 500 gold for 10 minutes of farming thats 168k while you asleep only that x3 so they do 24/7 one time is 504K for a week of botting. So you can nerf farming all you want only more and more people buy bots. Or quit GW a very good friend of my in GW sold his account cause he couldnt get any money.

[Cyvil]

I don't believe that "everyone" is supposed to be able to get 15k armor. It is supposed to be more difficult to get than the Drok's armor, and that is why it is refferred to as "Elite." That being said, I am having difficulty playing along with the adjustments to the economy.

I was fine with the reduced whites, and adjusted by selling things on Guru. The trick is that the gold drops dry up as well. Only after going after cartography and skill hunter titles did dyes, golds and tomes start dropping again. At that, I can get one good run before having to run more missions or complete more quests.

I am VERY frugle with my money. IMO, the 15k armors are ugly. I keep starter armor, in Factions, until I reach KC. I do not buy runes or equipment to heroes, unless they come from drops. I am still losing money in the process, although the bleeding is fairly slow. We are supposed to pursue titles for GW2? Skill hunter costs a net of about 150,000ish. Aside from Cartography, the other titles are just as expensive, or moreso.

I am playing along, and trying not to complain too much, but at somepoint A-Net needs to unclench its cheeks, and allow the players to have some fun with this GAME. It is obvious that Anet's solution has not helped with the bots. New players are getting gold from somewhere, even without farming. I have had a few PUG instances of someone obviously inexperienced with the game showing off multiple greens and max armor.

Tell me how someone that has no idea of how to do a quest or a mission gets all of the green items? Ebay maybe? Bots? There are sites that sell greens for $1, cash. Want golds? $.33. 250 Lockpicks for $50? The ads run on banners in Guild Wars forums. I could get a bot off of Ebay for $10, but I keep hoping that Anet will step in and help out the average player, that does not want to violate the EULA.

[Dead On Stick]

Anet sould really see the problem here people want easy gold or moderate gold. But if you guys keep nerfing the drops to prevent botting. We might pay in greens someday cause gold is rarer then ectos. Really i dont see the point at this nerfing everything making every skill useless or less effective making monsters harder to farm cutting loot. And team farming??? You try and find a team to farm the elona reach minotaurs. In that time to find a team you could well be spended actually killing em.

[rexalex]

if the trophy drop rate would be 2X ( thats half the good old days droprate) it would be great.
To make enough trophy for a collector item takes more time than collect enough money to make a weapon at a crafter

[Dead On Stick]

if the trophy drop rate would be 2X ( thats half the good old days droprate) it would be great.
To make enough trophy for a collector item takes more time than collect enough money to make a weapon at a crafter
Collecters are sometimes hard to reach. Or just not have the weapon you want so you have to get it at another place. I think returning back the loot scales as it was before hard moode (Or preferbly before the nightfall update) then people be more happy and buy less gold cause they can get it thenselfs.

[rexalex]

Collecters are sometimes hard to reach. Or just not have the weapon you want so you have to get it at another place. I think returning back the loot scales as it was before hard moode (Or preferbly before the nightfall update) then people be more happy and buy less gold cause they can get it thenselfs.

I liked to help my litle guildies, to give good collector items ( compared to s*itdrops ) while they can afford some real good one. Its history now. :(
I have no exchange items.
And no little guildies anymore ...
No new member in thw last 2 weeks, and the 80% of the guildmembers are inactive. They cant get enough fun to play anymore.
And about the ebay gold...
i've never wanted to buy any, and i'll never vill. Its pathetic.
The game just lost that little shiny face what i met in the first days... what a shame...

[MoonUnit]

Then move to something else? :huh:

[Hiero]

Then move to something else? :huh:

sad but true...

just remember the game how it was before anet showed how totally incompetent they are.

[rexalex]

Then move to something else? :huh:

nope ... i still like this game
thats why i didnt play another game now.
and your comment is ... khm ... with 6447 post someone should be more constructive... nvm ...

[Saldonus Darkholme]

nope ... i still like this game
thats why i didnt play another game now.
and your comment is ... khm ... with 6447 post someone should be more constructive... nvm ...

Hey, when you spend most of your time trolling, you're gonna get that number up, eh? ;P:wink:

[lifesTooshort]

Ive spent just under 2 years playing Guild Wars and i see more bots than ever and less real players than ever :( . i used to play for about 2 hours or so a night until everything started to change ( loot nerf -Skills nerf etc ) . i havent finnished factions or nightfall yet and i don't think i probably will. The gold cash issue is not really a big thing for me i just earn the gold as i go along . What i would say is what drives me is when i get drops,dosnt matter what they are be it white blue purple gold etc its just the fact that something actually drops and i get something :) Call me strange or whatever you like but this to me is one of the main attractions for playing the game .

[Dead On Stick]

Ive spent just under 2 years playing Guild Wars and i see more bots than ever and less real players than ever :( . i used to play for about 2 hours or so a night until everything started to change ( loot nerf -Skills nerf etc ) . i havent finnished factions or nightfall yet and i don't think i probably will. The gold cash issue is not really a big thing for me i just earn the gold as i go along . What i would say is what drives me is when i get drops,dosnt matter what they are be it white blue purple gold etc its just the fact that something actually drops and i get something :) Call me strange or whatever you like but this to me is one of the main attractions for playing the game .
I dont know what anets is doing actually probally they arent even reading this cause they think they can handle better. I think gaile gray was hired to give the ppl of GW what they want so far i havent seen 1 single person who was happy with the less drops. Anet dosnt realise there making people unhappy with all these nerfs and stuff. The only time of year a city and town is a happy place is during events cause then you dont hear all those trade messages from people who try to get some money cause they cant get it of there own. Then theres the Shing Jea Boardwalk issue. 15 gold a ticket??? Come on people it suppose to be happy event you trying to make everybody poor here.

[jerseyjoe]

I gave up on casual solo farming. It's been nerfed. Period. Hardmode seems to be the way to make gold now, and I'll adapt and earn my gold whatever way I can.

[rexalex]

my dervish reached Kodash
i checked vabbian armor price and almost died ...
more than 200k with materials ... its like horror ...
its s*itwars now :( why they kill the game?

[Saldonus Darkholme]

my dervish reached Kodash
i checked vabbian armor price and almost died ...
more than 200k with materials ... its like horror ...
its s*itwars now :( why they kill the game?

You mean you didn't acquire enough to get everything you want and need just playing through? HUH!! Who'd have thought!!

[nkuvu]

You mean you didn't acquire enough to get everything you want and need just playing through? HUH!! Who'd have thought!!
Slight correction.

You don't acquire everything you want just by playing through.

"Need" varies from player to player. But Vabbian armor is by no means a "need," given that the only difference between that and armor you get at Consulate Docks is cosmetic.

[Saldonus Darkholme]

Slight correction.

You don't acquire everything you want just by playing through.

"Need" varies from player to player. But Vabbian armor is by no means a "need," given that the only difference between that and armor you get at Consulate Docks is cosmetic.

Being a moderator, I KNOW you've seen the posts that claim, "ZOMG! My character makes so much money playing the game through now!". (Actually, I was waiting for the old, "I didn't realize Vabbi was the end of the game," argument.)

I was being sarcastic: I do NOT want to get in that "hamspter wheel" argument again!!!

[nkuvu]

I was being sarcastic: I do NOT want to get in that "hamspter wheel" argument again!!!
Sorry, missed the sarcasm. Carry on. ^_^

[Dead On Stick]

I still think they sould change it back. Your right Vabbian Armor is not a NEED. But its nice to have it. These new loot scales are the worst idea EVER in the entire history of GW. I dont see the point in making it more of a challenge to get that 15k armor that makes no sense the point of updating is to keep the players happy. This is NOT the way to go.

[oceanicdemigod]

Little off tangent - but relevant ... somewhat...

I'm SUPER MAD at ANET with regards to Vabbian...and no...NOT at the price...but the price is part of my complaint.

Vabbian is super expensive...probably the second most expensive armor next to Obsidian. This is all fine and good...due to this exhorbitant price tag, one expects QUALITY MERCHANDISE.

Case in point - my Male Ritualist got his Vabbian armor. Looks fantastic...but then i noticed...ITS UNFINISHED!

The Tunic and the Headpiece BOTH LACK an intrerior TEXTURE! Outside of his Collar HAS a texture. The Inside = Invisible because it is textureless. The inside of the whole tunic...from the flaps that stick out by his rib cage and all around his back...INVISIBLE. For his Headpiece, the flap of cloth that hangs off teh right side of his face is visible from one side...but invisible from the other. Again...lacks a back texture. I would be perfectly happy with a flat black as the back texture...but NOT invisible.

Now if ANET wants to place an insane pricetag on armor...I EXPECT said armor to be of QUALITY worksmanship in 3d design and texturing.

Would people accept Obsidian armor to not be properly textured? no way. So we shouldnt stand for Vabbian to be INCOMPLETE as well.

So I feel ripped off for getting a substandard armor set that is supposed to be quite prestigious.

I hope they fix it before leaving GW1 to a maintenance team.

And yes...I am being very nitpicky about this armor BECAUSE it was expensive and BECAUSE elite armor is purchased FOR LOOKS not for stats. And Vabbian of all armor should adhere to a HIGH STANDARD of 3D Design.

I could grin and bare Loot Scaling if they fixed my vabbian's lack of textures >.<

[Emosh]

Loot scaling.
It really sucks how you are punished while using heroes/henchies.
Example: farming LB points in Remains.
I could go for 5 or 6 runs (8 man, me plus heroes and henchies) without getting a gold item to drop. Then I started doing 8 man runs but with real players. And what a surprise it was! It is rare to go for a full run without a gold item dorp. Also, it isn't rare to get 2 or 3 gold items drop per run!!! Psssttt, our heroes and henchies STEAL MORE DROPS than other human players.
Really, however has time can validate this claim. Make the LB run just with heroes and henchies for a good statistically number of runs (32+ I think it what most would recommend). Repeat the same number of runs but with 8 man groups and no heroes/henchies. Remember to not count golds from locked chests. I know that the runs with heroes/henchies are slower and less rewarding but if someone wants to prove that we get punished for using heroes this is one choice that we have.

I'm sorry if someone has already done it or suggested it, I didn't read the whole thread. If someone did, what were the results?

[Lady Jade]

Some thoughts...

Currently I'm up to the richest I have been in a long while. This is due to two reasons:

A) I've completed Canthan vanquisher and have been working on others.
B) We had two festivals. My net intake from selling alcohol off of those festivals alone gained me a massive amount of cash.

I have also rolled a new pre searing character as a survivor; after completing all quests in searing, he got run to LA and from there, he got taken to KC to get max armor and runes. He is currently at Aura Glade; he's done all tyrian quests thusfar, and so far he's got a net intake of 8k. He's sold everything along the way.

Here's something amusing though. I recently completed a vanquish of the Falls, and got absolutely no gold drops (forget about lockpicks anyway because the stupid things always break). Taking my survivor out with heroes/hench to complete a quest and Lord Timot happily dropped a gold for me. Was kind of funny.

There are still areas in NF and Tyria for that matter, I've noticed that drop more cash than anything else no matter if you have heroes or people in your party.

All in all, yes HM does net you a great deal of cash, but the replayability factor of this is kind of dead to me. I'm not intending on vanquishing with 11 characters over and over again to get money. Unless this is Anet's new type of farming.

[cowtrix]

Why not play the game for enjoyment? I mean really, my characters poor (125g in the whole world :P) and has cheap armour, max weapon though, but I just don't get people's obsession with gaining money. And virtual money. As for prestige armour, why is it that important? do you really think people see it and go "Gee, he's got Obsidian armour, I respect him now!".
When was the last time you just enjoyed and challenged yourself on Guild Wars, without thinking about drops or wondering if 500k is enough gold in your vault. If you can't remember, it's probably time to stop playing.

[woot im a warrior]

Why not play the game for enjoyment? I mean really, my characters poor (125g in the whole world :P) and has cheap armour, max weapon though, but I just don't get people's obsession with gaining money. And virtual money. As for prestige armour, why is it that important? do you really think people see it and go "Gee, he's got Obsidian armour, I respect him now!".
When was the last time you just enjoyed and challenged yourself on Guild Wars, without thinking about drops or wondering if 500k is enough gold in your vault. If you can't remember, it's probably time to stop playing.

I like to have my characters look nice for PvP, I get enjoyment from that. I am always broke, and always was even before LS.

All it did was increase the amount of time I needed to spend in PvE to get my characters looking the way I want.

[rexalex]

true
game must give fun and enjoyment or else its called real life
the first mode releases endorphin, the second adrenaline
maybe the game balancers should see this aspect too
give me more endorphin please!

[Colpo Dorato]

Well...
I've started to play in June of this year...
Mi first character was an Ipno for pve (bad choice...)
I've arrived to the last coop in profecies and I had only 7 K... (and of course 40 skill point). Now: with such money you can't do almost nothing... And this is not a good way to go...
At the moment I've finished all of the 3 campaign and I've got 50 K but I'm very disappointed with areanet about loot scaling.
I Can't purchase the best armor in the game...
Why put them if you can't buy it?

[Saldonus Darkholme]

Well...
I've started to play in June of this year...
Mi first character was an Ipno for pve (bad choice...)
I've arrived to the last coop in profecies and I had only 7 K... (and of course 40 skill point). Now: with such money you can't do almost nothing... And this is not a good way to go...
At the moment I've finished all of the 3 campaign and I've got 50 K but I'm very disappointed with areanet about loot scaling.
I Can't purchase the best armor in the game...
Why put them if you can't buy it?

"GREEEEEEN ACRES is the place to be!

FARRRRRRRRMMM LIVING................"

Well, you get the idea!

[Colpo Dorato]

"GREEEEEEN ACRES is the place to be!

FARRRRRRRRMMM LIVING................"

Well, you get the idea!

Sorry don't get it...

Can you explain in a different way?

Thanks

:smiley:

[Saldonus Darkholme]

Sorry don't get it...

Can you explain in a different way?

Thanks

:smiley:

Farming: to go out and kill things for the sole purpose of obtaining drops that can be sold in order to acquire the gold you want in order to buy the things you want. This used to be done by solo-farmers in certain areas so that they can generate gold, however, with the implementation of the loot-nerf, there have been several adjustments to said builds and where they apply.

ergo: ".....FAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRMMM LIVING......!"

[Dead On Stick]

Little off tangent - but relevant ... somewhat...

I'm SUPER MAD at ANET with regards to Vabbian...and no...NOT at the price...but the price is part of my complaint.

Vabbian is super expensive...probably the second most expensive armor next to Obsidian. This is all fine and good...due to this exhorbitant price tag, one expects QUALITY MERCHANDISE.

Case in point - my Male Ritualist got his Vabbian armor. Looks fantastic...but then i noticed...ITS UNFINISHED!

The Tunic and the Headpiece BOTH LACK an intrerior TEXTURE! Outside of his Collar HAS a texture. The Inside = Invisible because it is textureless. The inside of the whole tunic...from the flaps that stick out by his rib cage and all around his back...INVISIBLE. For his Headpiece, the flap of cloth that hangs off teh right side of his face is visible from one side...but invisible from the other. Again...lacks a back texture. I would be perfectly happy with a flat black as the back texture...but NOT invisible.

Now if ANET wants to place an insane pricetag on armor...I EXPECT said armor to be of QUALITY worksmanship in 3d design and texturing.

Would people accept Obsidian armor to not be properly textured? no way. So we shouldnt stand for Vabbian to be INCOMPLETE as well.

So I feel ripped off for getting a substandard armor set that is supposed to be quite prestigious.

I hope they fix it before leaving GW1 to a maintenance team.

And yes...I am being very nitpicky about this armor BECAUSE it was expensive and BECAUSE elite armor is purchased FOR LOOKS not for stats. And Vabbian of all armor should adhere to a HIGH STANDARD of 3D Design.

I could grin and bare Loot Scaling if they fixed my vabbian's lack of textures >.<
I agree some armors look like its drawn with a pencle and then the inkt started to leak. It looks very vague and no super high detail as you would exept from 15k armor take obsidian warrior for example the male one it looks like the pixels are HUGE. And the 15k Hydromancer could get a boost aswell. I mean some 1,5k armors look better then there 15k variants.

[Saldonus Darkholme]

I agree some armors look like its drawn with a pencle and then the inkt started to leak. It looks very vague and no super high detail as you would exept from 15k armor take obsidian warrior for example the male one it looks like the pixels are HUGE. And the 15k Hydromancer could get a boost aswell. I mean some 1,5k armors look better then there 15k variants.

You mean like the elementalist set in Nightfall that looks like rebar held together with fabric?

[XanatosDeCreon]

I know I'm going to get tore a part for this, but IMO they should have made solo farming less productive than group farming/ group anything.

This game was designed to have a 'guild'/social bases to many people are making it all about the single player and soloing and it's killing the community in other ways than simple market value.

Again, I know many wont agree, but that's how I feel. Solo farming really shouldn't be encouraged.

[Saldonus Darkholme]

I know I'm going to get tore a part for this, but IMO they should have made solo farming less productive than group farming/ group anything.

This game was designed to have a 'guild'/social bases to many people are making it all about the single player and soloing and it's killing the community in other ways than simple market value.

Again, I know many wont agree, but that's how I feel. Solo farming really shouldn't be encouraged.

I won't tear you apart: you have an opinion that happens to differ to mine. If a person wants to play solo, I don't see why they should be hit for it. And that's what the loot-nerf did: they spanked the solo-farmers, and they spanked them HARD!

The one appealing part of the game was the fact that you could play with a group or solo. (And I know you still CAN).

I just think the nerf was unnecessary: who cares about an "in-game" economy? What does it matter that I have 900K in storage or 9K. Was this all implemented to prevent players who've acquired large sums from selling their gold to companies, as I've seen on other websites? (Which, btw, I had no idea existed until I was torqued by this nerf and went to check prices on gold just to see wtf the deal was about).

[Dead On Stick]

I won't tear you apart: you have an opinion that happens to differ to mine. If a person wants to play solo, I don't see why they should be hit for it. And that's what the loot-nerf did: they spanked the solo-farmers, and they spanked them HARD!

The one appealing part of the game was the fact that you could play with a group or solo. (And I know you still CAN).

I just think the nerf was unnecessary: who cares about an "in-game" economy? What does it matter that I have 900K in storage or 9K. Was this all implemented to prevent players who've acquired large sums from selling their gold to companies, as I've seen on other websites? (Which, btw, I had no idea existed until I was torqued by this nerf and went to check prices on gold just to see wtf the deal was about).
I think you sould be allowed to be able to solo the game and even if you wish to farm in a team you useally cant cause finding a party is time consuming and in some places even impossible! I mean you try and go to elona reach and call out: LFP Mino farming! You wont really get a full team of it. I thought GW was a game for recreation to escape from the real world where everything gos more smoothly that you can relax after a hard day work. No that you need to spend hours and hours of farming to pay for armor cause else people wont let you in to missions. Or getting the right build so people wont call you a noob! And anet is basicly doing this on guesses: We think that if we decrease the ability to gain gold the people will have less gold to sell and the companys will go bankrupt. Wrong! they are probally swimming in money now cos it gos like this: They still had a big supply of gold from before the nerfs so they have enough to sell but the demand wasnt high cause people where able to get their own gold so they wont risk gettiing banned from buying. Then the nerfes came making farming harder so that people get more attracted to buying gold well the people that sell gold sold all of there reserves creating huge income so they can buy more accounts to compensate for the lesser gold income per account so there basicly at the same gold level but they have more demand.

[cloudbunny]

I think you sould be allowed to be able to solo the game and even if you wish to farm in a team you useally cant cause finding a party is time consuming and in some places even impossible! I mean you try and go to elona reach and call out: LFP Mino farming! You wont really get a full team of it.

Well the reason for that is very simple. You get less loot when farming in a party. There for very few are interested in team farming. In some areas team farming goes so much faster that people see an incentive to do it as a team. (B/P in tombs, duo farming in UW).

A solofarmer get 8 times the loot and do not need the time to set up a team and coordinate it. Not many are interested to put more work into something for less money.

You can argue that it is a big feat in it self to solo an area. However, the solo areas and builds are chosen carefully so that it many times is much easier and faster to solo than to go there as a team. At least that is my limited experience.

The big controversy about loot scaling is as I see it mainly due too the fact that solofarmers usually make 10-30 times more money than team players. Of course you are not willingly giving up such a great source of income!

What would have happened if Anet from the beginning had limited drops so that a soloplayer got the same drops as a party member in a full team?
My guess is that team farming would have been a very common feature like the Barrage teams in tombs. However, solofarmers would still be out there since it is easy to set up and is very effective in the right areas.

I have to say for me it is a let down to fight trough the UW-smites and hear a team member say: "With my solobuild this only take half the time". It really degrades my gaming experience, even though I know that our team build would do much better than a 55 hp monk at the Chaos Plains.

Regards,
Cloudbunny

[Dead On Stick]

Well the reason for that is very simple. You get less loot when farming in a party. There for very few are interested in team farming. In some areas team farming goes so much faster that people see an incentive to do it as a team. (B/P in tombs, duo farming in UW).

A solofarmer get 8 times the loot and do not need the time to set up a team and coordinate it. Not many are interested to put more work into something for less money.

You can argue that it is a big feat in it self to solo an area. However, the solo areas and builds are chosen carefully so that it many times is much easier and faster to solo than to go there as a team. At least that is my limited experience.

The big controversy about loot scaling is as I see it mainly due too the fact that solofarmers usually make 10-30 times more money than team players. Of course you are not willingly giving up such a great source of income!

What would have happened if Anet from the beginning had limited drops so that a soloplayer got the same drops as a party member in a full team?
My guess is that team farming would have been a very common feature like the Barrage teams in tombs. However, solofarmers would still be out there since it is easy to set up and is very effective in the right areas.

I have to say for me it is a let down to fight trough the UW-smites and hear a team member say: "With my solobuild this only take half the time". It really degrades my gaming experience, even though I know that our team build would do much better than a 55 hp monk at the Chaos Plains.

Regards,
Cloudbunny

No no anet did something to loot scaling to let people gain more loot the more people are in the party but in the end people soloing get more loot but in a party it gos faster. Anet also dosnt want to respond to this topic cause they think they know it better cause they designed the game.
What was this update intended to do: Decrease bots.
What did it do: Increase bots.
Secondary Effect: Making players unhappy.
Primary function of updates: Keeping players happy.
One of the uses of forum: Reaching anet to let em know what you want so they can furfill that wish.
I really think anet sould come up with atleast 1 very good reason that is true so dont say it reduces bots cause it actually increases it. I mean bots are irritating cause they give people an unfair advantage. But even if this update reduced bots witch it didnt i dont really care having multiple bots running around aslong as i can but stuff normally without having to do all of this bad stuff. I mean there arent many merchandises in this game i mean in games like runescape you have so many diffrent abilitys witch you need materials for and to get those you need a sertent level of a sertent ability so basicly the people that are good in one thing get the stuff for the people that are good in another thing those people then sell the stuff they made so they get money. At GW you can just mine a couple of iron ignots its hard to get em really you cant just deside: I am gonna get some ignots. You dont really have professions to make money with the only source of income has atleast something to do with killing monsters so you cant craft stuff that is expensive to sell it. So the primary income is killing monsters the end and if you nerf that
the money income is bad. The only changes of getting some good gold is in the hopes of getting somekind of rare drop. But if people get less money the rares become worth less! So you get a spiral down witch will eventually cause compleet destruction of the economy the thing you are trying to protect! And i also know much abouts bots and beleave my there are bots capeble of looking and acting like persons witch only a trained eye can see. Furthermore i would just like to say that i like it that anet would join this discussion instead of watching from a distance how this gos.

[ColdwaveKid]

I find it hilarious the very feature that was designed to reduce bots, increases the value of gold, therefore gets bots more money per transaction. Big fail from the company who knows the future of online games.

[Dead On Stick]

I find it hilarious the very feature that was designed to reduce bots, increases the value of gold, therefore gets bots more money per transaction. Big fail from the company who knows the future of online games.

Basicly what anets trys to do is reduce the income of bots so all off those bussnisses go bankrupt. Gr8 idea if it would work gold is indeed worth more but as i explaned before they still had huge amounts of gold from before the update that they couldnt sell cause people werent intressted in buying gold cause it was easy to get. Now they do want it so the companys get huge amounts of money so they can buy more accounts so they get more gold witch they can sell. I think the leader of those companys is currently diving into a swimming pool of 100 dollar papers.:angry: . And in the process of making the companys rich they make players unhappy cause so far i havent seen one player posting: Thank you anet! From this wonderfull update! Only some people that dont really care but really nobody has become more happy. And anet wont even post here with good and true reasons why the updates most stay, let alone change it back to normal loot scaling.

[vader]

Loot scaling is a joke. I just finished Frostmaw's Burrows with heroes and henchmen. I emptied my inventory before the run and made sure I picked up every item that dropped and all gold piles that dropped (I didn't touch any chests). After finishing the dungeon (I got a Diamond and Heart Of The Kinslayer from the chest) I checked my inventory and it wasn't even full. I had 13 empty slots in my inventory. I got zero golds, 2 purples, 3 blues and the rest were non-max whites and collectible drops. I sold it all off to the vendor and checked my gold. 3,700 and change. Subtract out the 2,000 gold from the quest reward and I got 1,700 gold for an hour and 45 minutes in 5 level a MASTERS dungeon. Pathetic.

[rexalex]

Thats not loot scaling, you were in full party, its just bad luck and low drop rate and H/H loot stealing

But yeah... its pathetic ...

[Drec Sutal]

Loot scaling is a joke. I just finished Frostmaw's Burrows with heroes and henchmen. I emptied my inventory before the run and made sure I picked up every item that dropped and all gold piles that dropped (I didn't touch any chests). After finishing the dungeon (I got a Diamond and Heart Of The Kinslayer from the chest) I checked my inventory and it wasn't even full. I had 13 empty slots in my inventory. I got zero golds, 2 purples, 3 blues and the rest were non-max whites and collectible drops. I sold it all off to the vendor and checked my gold. 3,700 and change. Subtract out the 2,000 gold from the quest reward and I got 1,700 gold for an hour and 45 minutes in 5 level a MASTERS dungeon. Pathetic.

I hope you realize that loot scaling refers to the total number of characters in your party... if you bring 7 h/h you get the same drops as a full party of real people. Loot scaling would be if you did frostmaw solo. If you did frostmaw's dungeon entirely alone, you'd get the same total of gold, collectors items, whites, blues, and purples... but 8 times the chance for gold items, green items, and rare crafting materials. Not including the final chest.

[Saldonus Darkholme]

I hope you realize that loot scaling refers to the total number of characters in your party... if you bring 7 h/h you get the same drops as a full party of real people. Loot scaling would be if you did frostmaw solo. If you did frostmaw's dungeon entirely alone, you'd get the same total of gold, collectors items, whites, blues, and purples... but 8 times the chance for gold items, green items, and rare crafting materials. Not including the final chest.

I don't think so. The computer treats you as though you are in a full party whether you are or not. Going solo does NOT increase you chances of getting gold drops, green drops, or rare crafting material. Your chances are the same regardless of how many people are in your group. Otherwise, ecto farmers would be getting several more ectos dropping other than the one per run average.

[Cyvil]

As of the April 19th, 2007 update, with the introduction of the hard mode, Money making from farming was decreased in parties with less th