FFA loot creates friendships and social interaction

Diablo II: Resurrected General Discussion
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I keep seeing so many comments that FFA loot is “toxic” and only gives an advantage to hackers/scripters/botters.

What nobody seems to mention about FFA is how it can create new friendships and social interaction.

When an item drops in a public game and someone picks it up there are a few likely scenarios:

  1. The player who picked it up needs the item for a build or for trade currency and keeps it. Assuming they were not cheating this is fair.

  2. The player who picked the item up does not need the item and either vendors/drops it after identifying. This gives everyone else in game another chance at getting it from the ground or the vendor.

  3. A player in game who did not pick up the item recognizes it was a set/unique/rare/rune that might be something they need for their build, which starts a dialogue between the two players…

Let’s refer to the players in scenario 3 as Player A who picked up the item, and Player B who thinks they might want or need that item.

Player B reaches out to Player A in the chat or a DM and says “Hi I see you picked up X item. Do you need that item?”

Player A could respond in one of several ways:

“Yes I need that item for my current build or alt character.”

“No I don’t need this item, do you have something would you like to trade for it?”

“No I don’t need this item you can have it”

“(No response, leaves game)”

If Player A does not need the item they will likely give it to or trade for something with Player B. Obviously there are trolls and people who get off on being mean, but I would argue that they are not the majority of players.

What new players will find is that wealthy players will be very generous and willing to help. I made many friends online through these types of interactions. Even if you have nothing to trade you will be surprised at how often people will be willing to help you out by giving you a drop.

I’ve seen a lot of people say “I don’t have friends to play with.” This is the beautiful part about the social interaction created by the FFA loot system in this game. It will put you in a situation where you want to reach out to other players and before you know it your friends list will begin to populate.

By taking away the FFA loot system Blizzard would be effectively eliminating the possibility for this social interaction to occur. Without this it’s likely to make a community that’s less interactive and more isolated.

My hope is that rather than spending time and resources revamping the loot system that they focus on cheat/hack prevention. I’m not so naive as to believe that hacking/scripting/botting won’t occur at all. But I think it’s better to let the devs focus on cheaters rather than taking this system away.

I understand that many people think they will be cheated out of loot. But I hope the devs don’t implement the ploot system and those players have the chance to be part of the community and understand why preserving this is so important to those of us who have fond memories of making new friends from these types of interactions.

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It probably can. But so can other loot systems.

Same works with personal loot/time allocated loot.

Same works with personal loot/time allocated loot.

It would not at all elimate these examples from happening. It would work exactly the same in both loot systems.

Also FFA should not be removed or replaced. Just have a toggle.

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No, it doesn’t because if it’s personal loot the other players would not have seen the item drop.

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Sure they would. All item drops should be visible for all players. Other games handle that perfectly fine.

Personal/allocated loot does not mean hidden loot.

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Yes, thank you. The personal loot crowd are people who demand to be able to play solo in multiplayer games, this is why ALL of their change demands are things that can be found in MMO’s, because that is how they always played on MMO’s - alone surrounded by people.

Shared loot makes the game you are in feel a thousand times more alive, connected, real.

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So we get to stare at a unique and not be able to click on it because it isn’t “allocated” to us?

Unless of course the person doesn’t want it, but then it goes to FFA after, however many seconds that is.

Is there an instance in personal/allocated loot, where you have to make a choice between 2 drops?

What about wanting the item, not having enough space, and not being able to hold it in your hand and leave the game?

So you go back to FFA anyways, and hope you get to pick it up?

Edit:

How do you determine which loot is predetermined first?

What about people that might accidently choose the wrong predetermined loot?

Do we then get people on the threads saying how they want Ploot revamped?

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For some, this is true. For many others, FFA loot discourages players from multiplayer games altogether and reduces player interaction. If two realms were possible, then each could have the loot system and social interaction that they prefer.

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FFA is here to stay and people need to get over it. But they will complain until they refund or uninstall.

Id prefer they stay and persevere. I feel they could learn to enjoy the game for what it is. Instead they will miss out on the best Hack and Slash ARPG of all time.

These posts just incite more arguments. I expect this thread to be removed soon too.

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you are dilusional to think diablo 2 with personal loot with every drop beeing visible to everyone in game would be a good experience that sounds horrible.

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Yep, and people claim PL would not be as brutal as FFA! :smiley:

Well, if you are fast you can maybe go to town, make some space, and return to grab the item. And if not, tough luck, someone else will likely take the item. No different from FFA in that regard.

So yeah, if you are low on inventory space, which is a very reasonable scenario of course, and you won multiple items, you might have to choose.

You need to explain what you mean here?

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You can play solo in mp game, it doesn’t matter one bit what loot allocation is there, people just open public games and don’t even care to interact with you when you join.

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Sounds quite similar to FFA. You would see the exact same items. How would it be horrible?
Also, it is an optional toggle, you would not have to use it.

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sounds similiar to FFA except i can actually only pick up 1/8th of the loot that drops and am left to watch others pick up the good stuff. what a horrible system and i never seen any game do it like that

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You won 2 items. How long do you get to decide for when you can pick it up, if you have 2 items, what is the time limit?

You can go to town and leave the item in the game world? Then go back and pick it up?
Ugh (deleted my obscene comment)

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The ultimate problem with Personal Loot comes down to the fact that if they don’t design the system to allocate specific loot to the appropriate class that can use it, people would be getting junk items while someone else gets the item that they want/need and not everyone is generous enough to stick around to trade that item, nor care to do so to begin with.

Personal Loot makes sure everyone gets a piece of the pie, but not everyone wants a crust on their portion.

and you can’t actually implement a loot system in this regard without also adding a ‘roll’ system because there could be any number of players in your game that need the same piece of gear.

Adding this system also introduces its own drawbacks. Some people get luckier than hell and win every roll if not most…

You can then argue that you could design it to allow others to win some loot, but how is that fair for someone putting in equal, if not more effort than the others just to be excluded because he won loot prior? (The biggest problem with MMO style loot)

There’s a whole mess of problems introducing Personal Loot which is why I feel it should be on its own separate realm.

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Here is a GREAT blue post from earlier:

“As of now, the D2R Classic (Base game) will still have the classic stash. I’ve passed off the feedback to the team regarding this but as noted, they are wanting to make sure the game still feels true to what it was in it’s previous life. Future QoL items may be considered but as of now the plan is to ship with the limited stash in the Classic (Base Game) version.”

“Still feels true to what it was in it’s previous life.” - RIP to the Changes crowd.

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This idea is the very reason why people are against ploot

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Every scenario described would happen just as much or more with a loot allocation system. A D3 style ploot system where drops are hidden would even allow for most interactions except the third.

If you’ve ever played path of exile in a group, that’s basically what allocation would look like. The exact same loot would drop, a lot of it would still be FFA, certain kinds of loot would be allocated either permanently or for a short duration, depending on the kind of system that was implemented. Allocated loot is visible to everyone, it’s just grayed out.

PoE loot allocation also means other players can call out allocated drops that someone else might have missed so they come back to get it. Unless it’s temporary allocation, then they might just stand there a few seconds and take it themselves.

You could also implement PoE style allocation but make allocated items hidden, which would mean all the same gear was dropping but the experience would be D3 style. I think a lot more items would be missed and go to waste in that scenario though.

You could also implement a roll system where most things are FFA but it lets people roll on uniques, sets and runes or whatever. That would be kind of a hybrid since a lot of valuable items would still be FFA, but people would at least get a chance to roll on certain items.

I’ll also point out that every loot system suggestion is typically a suggested option at game creation, not something forced on everyone. IE: you’d be able to pick traditional or loot allocation at game creation. Then the game filter could let you filter out games using loot styles you don’t like. That would allow purists to still only play with traditional loot and not even see the other games if they didn’t want to.

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Completely agree with OP.

I’ve said every time, removing FFA loot removes player agency. All of the possible outcomes of two players interacting with each other when an item drops that they both have the agency to act upon.

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PoE does it like that.

I dont have a hard limit on what the timer should be. Should probably depend on the item type/rarity. Like no timer on gems/potions (they drop FFA), very short timer on blue items, 1-2 seconds, rares maybe 5 seconds, uniques maybe 10-15 seconds. Whites with sockets; 10-15 seconds. Runes, depend on their rank, but between 5-20 seconds for example.

Also, if the winner of the item moves to another zone (except towns), or leave the game, any items they left instantly should turn FFA.

All those can be adjusted, the exact timers are not wildly important for the concept.

If you are fast, sure. Though that is definitely one of the things that could be changed, to speed things up, so going to town instantly turned the item FFA.

That should never ever happen. Outright anti-D2 imo.

This is no different from FFA, and as the OP was describing, is part of what might make people talk or trade.

That doesn’t matter. Their need is irrelevant.

Fairness is also pretty irrelevant tbh.

Yes, previous rolls should have zero influence on future rolls.

It definitely should be its own realm; No Changes running 1.14 with only FFA, and Changes Realm with a toggle for FFA or PL.
But honestly, there are no problems with the PL system outlined here, that are not shared with FFA. Basically everything you mentioned is the same in FFA.

Assigning items to a class has nothing to do with Personal loot, and is a horrible idea imo.

FFA should not be removed. Merely be a toggle on game creation.

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