There may not be another issue revolving around World of Warcraft than loot and its distribution. Once you get your character to max level, the only "leveling" beyond that is through loot. It’s no surprise, then, that so many people take it so seriously. I’ve always been somewhat vocal on this issue in my guild and elsewhere, and for a long time I’ve wanted to discuss it openly on the blog. Before we get started, realize that this post will be chock-full of opinion, and I both expect and hope for much disagreement in the comment section. Everyone has their own ideas on what is most "fair" and I’m sure I’ll rub at least one or two readers the wrong way.
The good thing, though, is this: I love a good fight. Let’s get to it.
In the simplest terms, loot systems are designed to make the random distribution of loot less random. Before you even get to the question of who should get a particular piece of loot, Blizzard’s calculators in the background must determine what will drop. Therefore, before the players can even get involved, loot is already incredibly random. With loot systems we normally try to remove as much of the randomness as possible.
The goal of the many loot systems is to make that non-random distribution method "fair."
What is "fair?"
This is the crux of any loot system, and therefore the number 1 stumbling block. Before you decide what loot system you should be using, or if you should use one at all, you have to determine what is "fair," at least in terms most of the people involved can agree on. You won’t find a loot system where everyone agrees, otherwise there wouldn’t be so many out there!
There are many different ideas on what is fair when it comes to loot distribution, here are just a few:
- People who put in more effort are more entitled than those who show up occasionally, if at all.
- Everyone who participates in a particular raid should have the same chance at any loot that drops.
- Loot should go to those raid members who will benefit themselves and the raid the most.
I believe a lot of what makes a particular philosophy fair depends on your guild and membership. If you aim to create and foster a hardcore, bleeding edge raiding guild, chances are you value who will benefit the raid most along with those who put in more effort. If your guild is more casually focused, you are more likely to focus on a more equal distribution of loot that skews things less to the top end raiders. Fair is too subjective a term to label any one system superior to the others in all situations.
The problem is that many guilds could not classify themselves as either extreme: all hardcore or all casual. There are many gray areas, and trying to find where your "fair" should rest is questionable. What if most of your guild is casual, but you have a hardcore contingent that wants more progress? What if your guild is mostly hardcore, but you can’t seem to find all hardcore members, and have to pad your roster with more casual players?
The Long View vs. the Short View
In the long view, the regular, random /roll is a fair system. Over 100 raids, the numbers will normalize. Sure, there will be spikes here and there, but a random system is fair by definition. The problem is that players don’t get the long view, and we rarely raid anything more than a dozen times or so. Also, in my experience, the more a particular instance is raided, or the longer it is "on farm," the more loot rules tend to loosen. Where in the beginning everyone is often interested in drops, as time goes on, and people begin to get focused, the pool of people interested in particular items naturally shrinks. Toward the end of our Karazhan raiding, loot could be just short of a free-for-all, with new 70s getting many drops on their first run.
In the short view, /roll can be horribly distorted. Because this system is truly random, each /roll is a separate entity, so individual players can (and often do) get high rolls an entire run, or for a few runs. Obviously this is potentially quite irritating for other players who feel, for one reason or another, that they have put in more effort and therefore deserve more. It’s sort of like clearing the spawns around a couple of resource nodes only to watch another player swoop and in and take the rewards.
In the short view, then, people understandably feel some kind of loot system is necessary — preferably one that rewards their level of effort. Really, with the way raiding works in WoW, there really only IS a short view. So how do loot systems try to address the problem?
The Question of Effort
Most loot systems try to translate your level of effort into gear. If you raid more often, you will have more DKP or whatever your system uses in order to have more leverage when it comes to gear drops. Conversely, if you raid less often or give less "effort," you are likely resigned, at least at first, to the drops that those with more points or what not don’t have an interest in or already have. It makes sense. If you raid more often, you should get more and better loot. It’s good for you, and it’s good for the raid when a reliable raider gets better gear.
The problem with this thinking, in my opinion, is that those who raid more often already get more and better gear naturally. Your effort is already rewarded by more chances at whatever piece of loot it is that you want. In a way, loot systems will punish those who put out less "effort" when the RNG that determines what gear should drop is unkind to regular raiders. I think the issue is with drops that are more rare than others. No, I’m not talking about Legendaries like the Warglaives of Azzinoth, but just pieces that drop with less frequency than others.
These excessively rare pieces are often sought by many. Does someone who raids more often really have any more right to it than anyone else? I’m not sure. I’m really not. But I do know that chances are the people who raid more are better geared than those that raid less. In fact that’s one of the only things of which I am fairly certain.
The Fix
So what can be done? How do you make everyone happy? Well, like I already said, you really can’t. Loot systems are designed, for the most part, to try to appease both groups of players in some way. The difference is in how the systems are managed and how much they are slanted either way. Straight, capitalist DKP systems favor the hard core more heavily. More liberal systems like weighted rolling systems and Suicide Kings tend to favor the more casual contingent, as they reward loot a little more evenly.
In all honesty, there are only two systems that I believe are both fair and honest. Loot council systems, and /roll. Loot council systems at least don’t try to hide behind the machinations of a fictitious bureaucracy – real people make real choices. There is blame to be had, yes, but at least those systems can be honest. If your goal is to gear up regular raiders first, my opinion is that you should quit hiding behind a mechanical "system" and come right out and assign loot as you see fit.
That’s just me, though.
The regular old /roll system has its drawbacks, honestly, but it does give everyone a fair shake. If you were in a group that helped kill a boss that dropped loot, you have as good a chance at anyone at getting said loot. You don’t have to hear "sorry, player A tried more, so you can’t have it." If you win the roll, you get the loot.
I’d also like to add that I believe in the context of 10-man raiding, you should be able to just work things out without a system. Honestly, if most of the loot that drops is only of interest to 2 or 3 people most of the time, can’t we all just get along? Especially if you are in a good guild? Don’t you know that Player A has been begging that the loot Gods let that particular epic to drop while he’s around? I know I would. I know I’d step aside and let him have it, no matter my level of interest. That’s just me, though.
I suppose part of me likes to rock the boat. Part of me enjoys the random, slot machine nature of /roll. I’ve been as burned as anyone else, but I’ve also come out on top.
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I’m in a mostly-casual guild that happens to raid a lot. We use loot council for distribution and it works well. Each night of raiding, each raid member gets one “first pick” item (with multiple people wanting the same thing settled by /roll). Once you win a contested item, you are expected to defer “first pick” to those that haven’t gotten something for the rest of the night. If no one wants to go “first pick” on an item (usually because it’s offspec or a downgrade/sidegrade for everyone that could use it), then folks that have already gotten an item are eligible to /roll.
Of course, in my guild being the guild that they are, we often have arguments that go like this (this actually happened last week in Naxx10):
Tree Druid 1: That trinket has a lot of spirit on it, but I’m more looking for spelldamage right now.
Tree Druid 2: I might use it for some fights, but your trinkets are greens. You should take it.
Tree Druid 1: Nah, I’d probably never use it. You take it.
Raid Leader: Guys, I need a decision!
Tree Druid 1: Fine, let the RNG decide.
Tree Druid 1 rolls a 7.
Tree Druid 2 rolls a 22.
Tree Druid 1: The RNG has spoken. You take it.
Tree Druid 2: Great is the RNG.
Non-guildies LOVE to raid with us. We gave an out-of-guild paladin 4 pieces of purple heally plate during one Naxx25 run a while ago.
While loot council systems present an opportunity for honest and fair loot distribution, it’s gained a very negative reputation, because human beings themselves are hardly anymore perfect than the mechanical systems the council system does away with. In other words, it’s very easy for council members to practice favoritism with respect to loot, either towards core raiders or relatives/friends of a certain member or two. The stigma of nepotism might deter potential applicants to the guild, even if loot is handled fairly.
I personally never believed the council system can work out well. Can you trust a new raider with these epics? If one harbours fears that their fringe raiders will simply run off after a few pieces of loot the system has failed. This trust is needed both ways, and it’s very difficult to establish between a guild’s core and a complete stranger who hasn’t been with the guild for a long time.
I’m in a more hardcore guild so I dislike /roll and loot council enormously. with /roll, I’ve seen one person pick up 3 huge upgrades from a single boss, while 5 other people stand by feeling ripped off. Sure, according to the rules of probability, they weren’t ripped off. But they *feel* ripped off and they *feel* bad about the time they just spent raiding. That is bad in my books.
With loot council, it puts an enormous strain on the council. Did they make the right decision? Did they weigh the right factors. Did they try so hard not to be biased in the obvious ways they went into negative biasing? I quit my last guild largely because our loot council favoured the weakest players. Where’s the fun in that for the strong players?
The truth in any 25 man is that the strongest players, who also tend to play the most, contribute the most to killing any boss. Our dkp system favours these people. If you’re more casual, you dont read up strats, you dont farm heroics, you’re a follower, not a leader etc etc… and you’re lucky enough to get in on a raid with people who are the opposite, then you should be back of the queue for loot. If you dont think that’s fair, then go off and setup your own 25 man with more casual people. After you’ve wiped 15 times on what I consider an easy boss, good luck with your /roll !
We’ve never had loot drama with our dkp system. I’ve seen endless drama with /roll and council.
Mostly I’m just teasing here. Of course I have no problem with more casual players at all
Its a wonderful game. Just giving you a perspective from a different side.
I’m the raid leader of my guild on Moon Guard, which is an RP-PVE server. The guild started after Burning Crusade with the goal of being both a role playing guild, and a raiding guild. Unlike some others, we did not believe those things to be mutually exclusive. We aren’t especially large, so we were focused on 10 person raid instances. By the end of BC, right before Wrath come out, we were farming Kara and had cleared ZA a few times. Pretty good for a casual role playing guild.
With Wrath and the advent of 10 person content through end game, this appeared to be our time to shine. Just last week we did our first 10 person Naxxramas raid and cleared 3 of 4 quarters, but got stuck on the last boss in the Abomination wing…okay, sorry, this post is about loot though, but you get an idea of where we’re at and what we’ve done.
In all of our raiding we have done just a simple /roll system. If you can use the item for your main spec, you get to roll for it. If no one rolls, it goes to off spec and then shard, etc. We also get people arguing that someone else should have it, like someone else mentioned. In a casual guild, people really seem to care about the others getting drops, and that’s pretty cool.
Before we started raiding in Wrath, the officers pondered changing to a loot system that might favor a quicker progression, such as attendance based DKP or Suicide Kings, or something. But in the end, everything just seemed too complicated for 10 person instances, and nothing was ever fair. Even though one person may get lucky and grab 3 or 4 items in a single run, everyone has the same chance on every roll as everyone else. And while they may complain that it’s not right or it feels wrong, they can’t argue that it isn’t fair. And usually when a person gets an item or two, they start to defer to others if something else drops that they can use.
Overall, our progression is going to be slower, but I think it’s in the best interest of keeping people excited about raiding that they have as good a chance as anyone else in the raid to acquire loot when they go.
gmazeroth’s last blog post..Moving
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This is an example where it depends a lot on the people in your guild. Hopefully, you have the most mature, even handed individuals leading the guild who would then make up the loot council. I think loot council gets a bad rap from the few idiots that have abused its power. I tend to think people in good guilds are more likely to hand out loot for the right reasons.
No problem, John. Like I said, I hope for dissenting opinions.
I should have said so in the post, but I would never advocate a pure /roll with no stipulations. At the VERY LEAST I would put a limit of one epic drop per run (unless there is something nobody else wants). In my raids I always use master looter, everyone passes, and then rolls manually. This prevents any funny business pretty handily, but still makes things fair for everyone.
As far as people “contributing more” and therefore “deserving more,” I have to disagree in some ways. While your characterization of casual players is sometimes true, it is not always the case. I farm heroics as much as possible, read strats before raids, watch videos, make sure I have the best consumables, etc. I just happen to be unable to raid 3 nights a week. So I don’t like any loot system that favors the hardcore TOO much. That’s why I’d never be in a hardcore guild, though! In the end, if everyone in your guild is happy with the hardcore getting the first shot at everything, so be it. You’d just never see me there.
The trouble with all /roll based systems, is that there is no *disincentive* to roll. I would /roll on every moderate upgrade, just to get more /rolls in for the evening, rather than wait for the one really great upgrade, because that is exactly what I would expect everyone else to do. What /roll does is turn loot distribution into a game theory problem. If EVERYONE only rolls on the ONE big upgrade that’s perfect for them, that’s fine, but if there’s even one shark that rolls on every potential upgrade (even just until he gets his one epic), then the system has been ‘hacked’. And then it sucks.
Resto druid rolling on a caster staff with +hit? Why not? The mages might be rolling on your MP5 one in half an hour. Better get your rolls in where you can.
It sucks. It sucks because of the way it makes people feel, when someone rolls on something that the ’shouldn’t have’. And the reason people do that is that they are compelled to, by game theory.
@Frock
I understand your issues. As I said before, I should have stated I don’t advocate a pure /roll system with no limitations. I would recommend a limit or some other method to stop the people that will just roll on everything.
Our guild had a great roll system for us:
The raid leader announces your number at the beginning of the raid according to what order you appear on their list in the raid list interface. That’s your number for shards. The spec you walk into the instance in is your main spec, and when something dropped, everyone who wants it for main spec gets to roll. If no main spec people want it, the offspec people can roll for it. If no one wants it, it gets sharded by our designated sharder, and the raid leader rolls and if it happens to be your number, gratz, you get a shard.
All this is announced before we even walk into the raid, so if anyone has any problems with it, they’re given a moment to say so, but in the end, we don’t change this. People are given the option to just not raid with us if they dont approve of the loot system we use.
This sort of system does set it up so if a bunch of already decked out people enter kara with say, me, who had all greens and blues… and because I’m the healer, obviously anything remotely healing is going to go to me. But say, when we all went into TK where everything was a possible upgrade for everyone… we all had a chance to get something. It was just bad luck for me that none of the darn things we killed dropped any healy stuff except an offhand (which I still have, wewt!).
I’ve never approved of “well player A worked harder than player B so player A gets said item”. How is there really a way to judge who works harder? Does the dps work harder than the tank? Does the healer work harder than the dps? If you die 5 seconds into the fight, did you work any harder than if you died at the very end with 1% left on the boss? You can say “oh well player A dpsed harder than player B” (assuming both player A and B are the same class and/or spec) but chances are, player A has better gear already. If that’s not the case, maybe player B hasnt found that special rotation yet or something. Does that mean that player B didnt work as hard as he/she could have? No, I dont think so.
Unless player B just stood there and picked their rumps, theres no real way to say they didn’t work as hard as everyone else did.
But that would be this humble cow’s opinion.
Fairness is a very interesting philosophical concept in itself. Here is an excellent and brief discussion of different fairness systems: http://www.ozpolitics.info/guide/phil/equity/ (it comes from a political perspective but the issues are the same).
Personally, I’ve been a bit burned by the RNG – in a month’s solid raiding naxx and more, I have not received any loot at all, losing rolls each time. But it’s just a game and I’m still having fun. The system we have works well when everyone (particularly the master looter) is sufficiently mature and knowledgable to know who deserves to roll on loot. I still think Blizzard needs to improve the system a little, since my druid shares tier 7 rolls with three other classes (which in our last raid comprised 7/10 of the raid).
Great is the RNG! (heh I love that)
Main specc /roll -> Offspec /roll.
Oh, and we have Master Looter on.
But we are a small guild, we can just about make 10man right now, 25s are way off. And we are mates and mates mates and so on.
I do think that Loot-systems do not have to be fair. They only have be agreed upon. This is a game, and yes ofcourse we play it to have fun. But for everyone’s enjoyment, there really are two things that are absolutes in The Real World (or at least should be if I can decide).
1: The Boss decideds (if he’s a good Boss (a.k.a. Raid leader) he’ll take into account the rest of the groups opinions, but in the end, somehow has to take the fiinal decision, and that is the Boss job)
2: What is agreed upon, is Agreed upon. (it’s like breaching contracts, you don’t.)
The problem PTD with taking a view of people who raid more often naturally get more gear is the same as saying well Person A works 70 hours in a week vs Person B who works 15 hours in a week, should they get the same salary? Most people would say no.
Along with that is that while if you take a raid from an individual perspective then what you see is a group of people who raid very often, while the casual individual does not. However if you take a large casual raiding guild the single individual casual raider might not attend that many raids, but you add in a lot of individual casual people all going on mixed nights and suddenly you have the hard core raiders continually fighting a casual raider, not often even the same one, for loot.
Lootguy, by the same token, should we not compensate both a full-timer and a part-timer for their time? Your example gives the impression that only 1 person deserves to get paid at all. A properly functional loot sys
If we want to look at loot as compensation for services rendered (I don’t) then that means that each person put in equal time on the boss at that moment (though perhaps not equal effort or effect). Each time you plug away at the boss, you have a chance at the loot. Problems- a) Loot you wanted may not drop, or b) someone else may want that loot, as well.
Everyone has equal right to any loot that drops by virtue of being there and expending the time to complete the encounter, until you fill the equation with qualitatives such as who did more damage or who needs an item more.
Yggdrasil – That method functions only as long as you view a raid as a single entity. Expanding your view to see raids as a set, not just a single boss encounter, you see that loot is a means towards progression. You need gear from one set of raids in order to expand into the next set up. Often Hardcore gamers aren’t looking purely for the loot, but the means to move to the next bigger and better thing. Casual players are at the end of the day a detriment to that. Each piece of loot that goes to a person who goes to a raid once a month slows the progression of that guild by a large amount. Simply put you won’t progress as any meaningful pace until you gear up each invidual casual person, which can take months by virtue of their play style. Thus casual raid guilds will end up going through what is effectively a loot grind, where in their hard core people are totally geared up and ready to move on, but either by virtue of numbers or a raiding policy they are unable to. It’s the previously mentioned duality problem with a casual raiding guilds. So weighting a loot system towards the hard core players gives them some kind of reward for what is effectively an entirely thankless position of loot grinding for other people. Casuals get loot and hard core people at least earn something for their time spent.
PTD,
You views are nothing more than what I would expect from someone that doesn’t raid by choice or because of the obvious constraints you have mentioned. I also read your blog in regards to jealousy. You views make perfect sense to me now. You are just like all the other feel-like-I’m-entitled-regardless-off-my-contribution, jealous, freeloaders that take up a large percentage of WoW these days.
I come from a rather large hardcore raiding guild on a PVP server. How would you feel if you spent 500 to 800 gold a week, 4 hours a day, 4 days a week for 2 months only to have someone show up for a raid for the first time in that same 2 month period that you busted your ass…..to take the only possible upgrade left for you in that entire instance due to /roll system. As jealous of a person as you claim to be…..you’d be one upset individual. See the bottom line, PTD…..is you only claim be in favor of the more random system because that is WHAT SUITS YOU. That’s about as greedy as it gets if you ask me. What favors YOU is what you are IN FAVOR of……how’s that any different than what DKP and other systems due for the hardcore raider. The only reason you see a modified version of /roll as being the “savior” for your kind of player is because that’s what best for YOU. You give every reason why it’s good for you but what about the guy next to you in your guild that is more hardcore minded. How is your system fair to him????? Pretty hypocritical if you ask me.
You people that believe you are “entitled” to everything in this game no matter how much you commit are the real problem….its not the loot system.
Look at this statement you made: —-”In my opinion, is that those who raid more often already get more and better gear naturally. Your effort is already rewarded by more chances at whatever piece of loot it is that you want.”
What about the time, effort, money, strategy learning that YOU don’t have to do. One more thing regarding that statement….why is it okay for you to determine that I’m “already rewarded” just because I put in more time than you therefore I get more chances Think about your statement with an clear mind and how that sounds….it’s got the smell of utter greediness and jealousy all over it. Admit it.
@Blogicutioner
Interesting!
“You are just like all the other feel-like-I?m-entitled-regardless-off-my-contribution, jealous, freeloaders that take up a large percentage of WoW these days.”
I’m not proposing loot welfare here. I’m proposing my idea of fairness. If you contributed to a boss kill, you should be entitled to the loot he drops in some way. If you aren’t going to let me have anything for my contribution, let me know so I don’t waste my time.
“I come from a rather large hardcore raiding guild on a PVP server. How would you feel if you spent 500 to 800 gold a week, 4 hours a day, 4 days a week for 2 months only to have someone show up for a raid for the first time in that same 2 month period that you busted your ass?..to take the only possible upgrade left for you in that entire instance due to /roll system.”
I’m not suggesting all hard-core raiding guilds should use /roll. I’m more interested in the middle of the road casual/raiding blends and more outright casual guilds. If you’re a true hardcore raiding guild, I think you should probably be on a loot council system, since it’s all about the overall raid’s progress, and not one individual’s loot rewards.
As a matter of fact, I see a lot of middle of the road guilds make the mistake of a “too hardcore” DKP based loot system. You know what this does to a middling guild? Causes the more casual types to not bother signing up. Which often leads to an inability to fill a raid in the long run.
As far as your single upgrade hypothetical, in essence you are blaming that casual player for the unpredictability of the RNG. He is penalized because the RNG hasn’t been “nice” to you in the past.
“You give every reason why it?s good for you but what about the guy next to you in your guild that is more hardcore minded. How is your system fair to him????? Pretty hypocritical if you ask me.”
Everyone in my guild that is more hardcore than me is far, far better geared than I am. That’s a fact. So if I get to go on one raid every other week, and the single drop that could benefit me also happens to be the last piece a more hardcore member needs to “finish” his gear, he is more entitled than I? If you go to the amusement park more often, does that mean you get to go to the head of every line? They reserve a spot for you?
“You people that believe you are ?entitled? to everything in this game no matter how much you commit are the real problem?.its not the loot system.”
You people. Interesting. I’ll tell you what, take all of “us people” out of the game, and see how long it lasts without us.
Besides that, I don’t feel I’m entitled to the same rewards, but I also don’t think I should have to hope for scraps just because I can’t raid as often. Why should I bother taking a spot, then? Out of the goodness of your heart I get to see the content, and I should be glad I got a few badges? Get bent.
“What about the time, effort, money, strategy learning that YOU don?t have to do.”
Believe it or not, I do study for raid content, and spend a lot of my time “getting ready” whether you think so or not. I’m not the only casual player that does so, either. Check out this post of mine:
http://parttimedruid.com/2008/08/21/5-keys-to-casual-raiding/
My solution: weighted rolls
Everybody rolls on everything, or rather a master looter rolls and each member is assigned to a range within that roll. Range is weighted by class/spec, current gear. Basically how much of an improvement the drop is to that person and the raid. This lets those who need improvements get them quicker without completely ignoring other players.
In a group who raids together a lot this system will quickly improve the raid as a whole. For groups with varying levels of raid attendance, rolls can be weighted to either favor those who participate more (DKP weighted in a way.)
Once more numbers are figured out, simulations ran, and awesome programs like rawr get improved, I think this system will work quite well.
“I?m not proposing loot welfare here. I?m proposing my idea of fairness. If you contributed to a boss kill, you should be entitled to the loot he drops in some way. If you aren?t going to let me have anything for my contribution, let me know so I don?t waste my time.”
Except, when looking at raids as a set, you contributed less than someone who has better attendance, or who plays their class better than you yours, or who is constantly pulling off big saves (offtanking, offhealing, offdpsing, some other metric), etc.
In a 25-man, and even in many 10-man runs, a handful or even up to half of the people in the raid are often contributing less than their fair share, and so it would stand to reason that they would not get fair access to loot.
“So if I get to go on one raid every other week, and the single drop that could benefit me also happens to be the last piece a more hardcore member needs to ?finish? his gear, he is more entitled than I? If you go to the amusement park more often, does that mean you get to go to the head of every line? They reserve a spot for you?”
This is a terrible analogy. An analogy that better fits the scenario would be that of two people in college. One attends every class and lecture, perhaps takes additional classes, participates in class discussions, and puts in hours upon hours of time doing homework and writing papers. Another attends less than every class and lecture, takes no additional classes, participates less, and puts in less time on their homework and papers. The first person graduates with high honors or highest honors, the second simply graduates. Both participants put in the daily time “X” on tests, but one put in far more “effort” across the set of X and was rewarded for it.
That’s a perfectly fair system that rarely, if ever, hear people complaining about in the real world, and it translates perfectly to loot system discussions, yet when it’s applied to loot distribution in MMOs, many casual players suddenly disagree with it or even wind up in an uproar over the very mention of such a system being fair to all participants.
“Besides that, I don?t feel I?m entitled to the same rewards, but I also don?t think I should have to hope for scraps just because I can?t raid as often. Why should I bother taking a spot, then? Out of the goodness of your heart I get to see the content, and I should be glad I got a few badges? Get bent.”
Like I said, more casual players get in an uproar. Those badges are just like the diploma that both students in the above scenario receive. The epics? Those are the honors, high honors, etc.
“You people. Interesting. I?ll tell you what, take all of ?us people? out of the game, and see how long it lasts without us.”
This doesn’t bring anything to the discussion at all, now does it?
Great Discussion. I’d like to add my own thoughts to it:
I’m a Raid/Co-Guild Leader whose guild has been running 25 Mans for the last couple of months. When we started out at the beginning we had enough people to fill out only about half the raid spots. We ran with a ‘Partner Guild’ to fill out most of the rest and ended up either bringing friends or PUGS to get to 25.
For the circumstances and ‘fairness’ we established a /roll system with stipulations. One Item per Boss, 2 Per Run, Main Spec first, Off-spec next. Off spec and Trash drops don’t count towards the Item limits. If you reached 2 items you could roll again once everyone else who would be rolling on that particular piece reached 2 items as well. Exceptions would be considered for class-specific items or if you were the only one who wanted/could use the item. Fortunately we are fairly knowledgeable about the loot and quickly made it clear we wouldn’t put up with anyone trying to abuse the system.
This system has worked about as well as you can hope it would… up to this point.
Our guild has been heavily recruiting over the last couple of weeks and the number of non-guildies we are bringing in to our Raids is slowly diminishing. We are just on the cusp of having a full 25 man Raid Core with sufficient fill-ins to cover people being out. We have a set schedule and expectations on attendance.
So… now this has started bringing up the situation of Loot ‘fairness’.
With our /roll system, even with stipulations, some people are beginning to feel cheated.
A lot of us are nicely geared and waiting on just those ‘one or two’ items to drop.
When we started out, with having to bring a lot of PUGS in, we knew that we had to be fair in the loot distribution and opportunities. If not, we knew word would get out quickly amongst our Server community that our guild was full of Dbags and don?t Raid with them, etc. Fast forward to the present situation where we are now bringing in maybe 3 non-guildies.
So now, some people are questioning the fact that as it stands, a non-guildie, friend or pug who comes in for a day has the same opportunity to roll over someone who has been there 3 weeks straight without seeing that item drop or has had the RNG hate on him.
I understand this. I understand the comment left by Blogicutioner. A lot of us have worked very hard to bring our Raid Team to where it is at. We are a very social guild with a Vent and Guild chat that is just about as fun as you could want. Something is always going on. Off nights are just as packed as Raid nights with people doing everything from old-world content for shits and giggles to achievement runs to helping people do whatever to farming to PVP to what have you.
In order to keep the overall guild atmosphere that has developed, we are very picky in our recruiting. Only keeping people who we feel fit our guild mentality and will mesh with our personalities. We don’t do drama, we don’t do emo, we don’t do Fail Players. (The people who can’t figure out left from right on Thad, no matter how many times you try to explain it to them). We are an 18+ guild. We expect maturity out of our members. We have /gkicked people who didn’t fit in due to various reasons, mostly because they exhibited asshat-like tendencies.
So, what this means is that it has been slow going filling up our Raid Team. We only bring in quality players. Meaning its not the gear you have right now or the amount of times you may have cleared naxx or your dps. But what type of person are you and do you actually know what you are doing vs. being carried and are you willing to listen to feedback for improvements on spec/gear/rotations etc…
We don’t consider ourselves ‘hardcore’. I guess like I said we see ourselves as a ‘Social Guild’ with a Core Raid Team involved in progression raiding. (as much as you can say it is now)
So yes, when we still have to bring in 2-3 players, whether from our old partner Guild or even friends who may only be there one day or hell, even one boss, we are getting the ‘Is it Fair?’ questions.
So we the Guild Leadership are in a bit of a quandary. We don’t want to do DKP, Loot Council or Suicide Kings. All parties involved have experienced bad times with one or more of these systems and pretty much have put the veto to all 3.
I like the idea of Weighted Rolls as mentioned by entropy. Perhaps based on attendance. If you are there for a boss you get an additional ‘x’ amount added to your Roll. Something like that. Obviously we have some discussions ahead of us amongst our Officers. The situation is not bad at all… yet. But… those soft, in the background grumblings ARE starting to be heard. We’d like to nip it in the bud, so to speak.
Once we fill our last couple of Spots it may all go away. Not really sure. Like most people agree with… there is always SOMEONE who thinks the current loot system is unfair or stupid. We know we can’t please everyone, but what we want to do is come up with something that is fair to the overall Raid Team without changing the atmosphere and camaraderie we have with each other..
But I have to admit, I am personally siding towards the opinion of Blogicutioner. I was a ‘casual’ Raider in days gone by and now I guess I consider myself a “Regular Raider’ who has put a lot of hard work and time to help us get to where we are now, as I am sure the rest of our core Raiders feel also. I am turning to the side of ‘effort and time’ should have its advantages over someone who just pops in for one day or a few bosses.
After all, it was us who put the blood, sweat and tears into making the Raid Team what it is now. This includes those expensive and long, long Learning Nights. Trying all the different Boss Strats to see which one works for us. You know, the actual EFFORT it took to get the raid instance on farm so now we can breeze through in a day or maybe a little more than a day. The farming of mats for Flasks and Food etc etc… If one of us core people is waiting on that ‘ONE’ upgrade, why shouldn?t we give them the priority or just give it to them vs. letting someone who hasn’t put in the time or hard work have the opportunity to outroll them then skip off into the sunset never to be seen again?
I think I am having more of a hard time with this than I thought. Effort and time put in do count in my book. Perhaps I should look at giving a ‘Loot Priority’ or something based on attendance and need.
We as Officers feel a very big obligation to our fellow Raid Members that we are as fair as possible to everyone who we bring to the Raid, regardless of affiliation. But we all know what its like to lose the roll on that ‘ONE’ item that has only dropped once in 3 weeks to a PUG.
Well, obviously I don’t have an answer to this yet but I thought I would throw my opinion out there. Thanks for listening.
/roll is only “fair” and normalized when the same set of people run each and every raid. People tend to get pissy when “that guy” that raids once in a bluemoon shows up and wins the new shiney purple off the boss you have been working on for 2 weeks. And the kill is his first ever pull on the boss.
A more fair system would be a boss dies. Everyone in the raid gets something for the effort. Just tokens to buy gear later, a token to get an item off the vendor later, or a random piece of gear for de, trade, sell, or use.
You probably won’t publish this anyway as I see you have quit the game and blog, but I thought this was a pretty interesting discussion. PTD, you certainly liked to play with fire in your time. You do mention your thought is more for average raiding/casual guilds, not hard core raiding guilds, so that would certainly play a part. I’ve seen casual raid guilds think DKP is the way to go, but casual raiders were basically discouraged even though that was the point of the guild. Good stuff, and good luck in life with your family.