No he is saying that each player would essentially have a loot distribution roll, using the metrics for drops that already exists.
The same amount of loot would drop per game, on average.
So…I would only get 1/4 of the loot that I would otherwise get solo?
That really sounds like a limitation, and my point still stands. your character growth would literally be 25% of the growth that solo players get, and the imbalance would be real. it would , IMO demotivate players from playing in groups. Not needed. I’d rather level a blizz sorc and farm solo.
In some ways, personal loot is demonstrably inferior, I agree.
In other ways, FFA loot is demonstrably inferior, as well.
There is no “superior” system, but server side cheats have absolutely influenced game developers for over a decade now, leaning toward Personal loot for a very good reason.
Would I prefer D2 with FFA loot and no cheats? yes. I want that. It’s unlikely to happen, cheating is too easy.
ploot is inferior in every way unless you are a weakling leech who wants to forcibly divide drops you did not earn and do not deserve. Maggots such as these must retire themselves to crawling on their hands and knees picking up scraps among the manure in spent cow levels.
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Ploot doesn’t change this. Hacks will happen just like they did in WoW. The game is not open source and even open source is horribly vulnerable because of app stack. All ploot does is remove variability and skill.
There are separate issues.
D2 currently calculates how much loot drops in solo and multiplayer games. These calculation would not change. Therefore, if there is a bias in the number of drops in a single player game versus a multiplayer game per each player, then that bias remains.
In multiplayer D2 games, each player decreases the no drop chance, resulting in more total drops but monster hp increases (normalized to “1 unit of hp” at baseline). The following shows single vs multiplayer games assuming that each player is contributing 1X damage and no one is being carried/can easily overwhelm the content.
So you will notice for coop parties, the sweet spot for loot acquisition rate is 2-3 person parties. Once a player can carry everyone in the party, then the math looks different.
Personal loot absolutely limits the ability of client side programs to take server generated items. It’s not even a question, personal loot absolutely cuts down the profitability of these programs.
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If blizzard cared they would have sued the companies into oblivion by now. Ploot only makes it so that it is server side. This can be done with FFA loot and would allow monitoring of pickup speeds and determine legitimacy and packet shaping. The problem is not FFA the problem is server side vs client side. Which is a major engine change.
Essentially are you asking for everyone to download spyware from Blizzard so they can more closely monitor us as we play? I don’t think a lot of people will be okay with that.
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LOL what do you think the Blizzard App is. Did you ever read the WoW terms of service.
Regardless nothing I mentioned in my post was about that. Server side means the item would have to be released to that person after performing a validation check. I would rather not sit here and spell out how to catch cheaters because the less they know the less chance that they can figure out ways around it.
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I’ve played all of maybe an hour of the free trial before I got bored, so no. Watched people play it at high level, still no. Really don’t like the game’s mechanics.
Anyways, pickit isn’t easy for them to monitor. It’s like you think they just haven’t tried. I trust that Blizzard will attempt to combat pickit, and I trust they will fail, miserably.
Dude, you go after the programmer, the program itself, the item selling companies, JSP if they felt so inclined and sue them all. They violated the terms of service, etc.
Yes they can stop pick it and with the character files being stored on blizzard’s servers for bnet it will will be extremely hard to get pick it working.
Well dont forget there wasnt bnet for d2.
ToS is only applicable to people using the application. If there is legal action for Blizzard to take Re: D2R, I am certain they will take it. As of right now I am not certain there are legal grounds to do anything about JSP.
They struggle to detect bots in WoW, pickit is a much simpler program that only has to be active for a fraction of a second. This type of program is extremely difficult to detect.
It is really not. If you have looked at how it functions it is extremely simple. The simplicity allows it to be detected. There are ways to make it virtually impossible but, as it stands right now it is easy. If Blizzard is having such a hard time and could use the help I would love too but, alas I doubt they will ask me. There are ways to make it extremely difficult without affecting end gameplay to be detrimental.
Interesting Info! Appreciate you posting that btw, I love seeing the numbers involved.
And it looks like it already has a bias…I suppose they’re anticipating the fact that extra players (assuming they all have equal input) will simply kill things faster, hence more drops in the same amount of time.
I suppose that they could tweak those numbers since they are already in the game. Plus, the loot is all tradeable, nothing preventing players from trading with each other after all the loot is collected. It would still feel unfair to those in PuG games vs. playing with friends, but all game with PuG have that same issue.
I don’t know. I think that if they made the loot visible to all, and bumped the #'s a bit more in the solo loot option, It would be feasible. I think visibility is important in that scenario, so you can know if X loot dropped so you could at least ask the other players if they wanted to trade.
Honestly at this point I’m on the fence. But if its an option, I don’t see it as a bad thing, since you could just avoid those games if you didn’t want to deal with it. I solo for the most part anyways, so doesn’t affect me much.
Couldn’t disagree any more.
Yo, Legolas was with the fellas in the Fellowship. If he was in a dark, grimy world overrun by evil, fighting with random, questionable, treasure hunting allies and he saw an epic ring on a lich lord’s finger, he very well could run up to try to guarantee he’d possess it. The point is the world of Diablo II is purposefully a much darker and more hopeless place than many worlds, including Middle Earth. This makes playing cooperatively when we’ve actually built some trust in game by communicating - bringing hope to a hopeless land - that much more gratifying.
There’s a fantastic interview of Max Schaefer in the early 2000s exactly about the dark nature of the world informing his attitude on pvp, especially. He loved the possibility of teammates pvping without much warning - it fits in to the hostile nature and aesthetic of D2’s Sanctuary. But that also relates directly to your point here about hostiling a teammate if they are doing something terrible like grabbing all the arrows away from your amazon -
Youre not a toxic player for pvping in that scenario. Even in any scenario, the game was designed so you can pvp at any time. It’s -deep breath in - OK. It’s a part of the Diablo 2 spirit. And this design is unequivocally defended by the original devs. Here are some quotes from that bad-derierre interview:
“But we’ve decided that PKing is part of the Diablo universe… we are not apologetic about it.”
“The entire game is set up to kill your player. Every monster, boss, and trap has as it’s only goal the death of your player. The addition of the occasional anti-social player only adds to the feeling of tension and fear that makes the rewards of success that much better. Remember this: the world of Diablo II is not a safe, warm place. It is a place of great evil, and even greater good."
"A story about heroes and conquests needs villians. Hordes of identical monsters do not fulfill this requirement in my opinion. Part of what makes the Diablo II community great is the great variety of personalities and styles [referring to players being able to choose whether to play “righteously” or more “villainously”]. The last thing we want is to force people into some idealized regimen of “proper” role-playing.”
—Max Schaefer, probably sometime in the early 2000s
You know something I firmly believe and not the referring to D2, just art/media/entertainment in general, is that sometimes things like this end up making something better or more fun… I know it sounds ridiculous.
Things aren’t always necessarily the best or the most fun when they are perfectly polished and fair. Flaws and imperfections have their place in games as well. Not that FFA is bad, but sure, it’s unfair at times.
I have no doubt personal-loot will be more popular in ARPGs going forward. Of course. It’s less controversial, it’s easier for a developer to justify it and for players to defend, it’s “better”.
You know a lot of times some of the best gems of games come from small companies that are simply works of passion and creativity. Then they become bigger, just like Blizzard, and focus switches entirely to what they players want and expect. Specifically the largest majority. In my opinion in many cases you get a lesser, watered-down product that is meant to appeal to casual players, which make of the majority of players in most games.
D2 is one of those gems of a game, and all the “flaws” that people mention like FFA loot, trading (because then sites sell items), hostile function, are exactly what make it so special. I think many would agree that D2’s “imperfections” are what makes the game what it is and make so many love it.
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Totally agreed Spekkio, well said.
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