Trial Loot System Feedback

[TeaLeaf]

Ok enough already.   Put the hand bags away.  If you want ot fight then arrange a duel outside IF where we do not have to listen to it - this applies ot EVERYONE.

Public notice:
ANY MORE FLAMING OR PERSONAL BULLSHIT WILL BE DELETED WITHOUT WARNING.
KEEP THIS THREAD ON TRACK. :angry:

TL.

[TeaLeaf]

Reply from the wow-loot.com author received.  He is clearly open to discussion and assistance, so list the item, state your case and recommended solution.  Just the facts please.

TL.

Thanks for the catch TL!

The belt was incorrectly rated and should have been 5 starts for both paladin classes.  Blackwing Lair page updated.


Kaliban

[Luthor]

DKP, communist ideology and DPS greed. posted by Badhead
Link to thread: http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=41794221&sid=1
 
This is a message to the guilds of WoW. We, the support classes, the healers, the tanks, will no longer stand for being treated as second class guild members.

Background

DKP is one of the greatest inventions of any raiding guild, it ensures that members receive rewards, in general, directly proportional to the time they put in, rather than randoming off and having johnny-come-latelys and "shows up to 10% of raids" guys be disproportionaltely and unjustly rewarded.

The system, in general works very well, until a healer or tank wants a DPS piece, and then all hell breaks loose.

When some priests and warlocks wants an item with +shadow damage on it, rather than bid high, warlocks tend to lowball the item. A priest wins the bidoff, a warlock gets upset because even though he only bid 30% of the DKP the priest did, he "really wanted it" and then the officers discuss what is going to happen.

Because the majority of officers and guild leaders themselves play DPS roles, or subscribe to the (quasi-communist) "for the good of the guild" ideology of the DPS class, typically the priest is told they cannot have the item, and it is instead passed on to the warlock. The priest may argue about it, and will likely be abused or otherwise shouted down by officers or the guild master, because they see a potential for drama and rebellion they wish to avoid. If the priest recognises this in advance and keeps a cool head, they may simply bitterly accept it, with plans to get what they feel they deserve later.

This same pattern emerges when a tank wants DPS plate or weapons, a shaman wants a big 2 hander or classically, when a druid wants feral gear.

The quasi-communist DPS ideology

The DPS classes one argument for why they "deserve" priority on such items is "for the good of the guild". The idea being that to progress, you need maximum raid efficiency, and therefore items should be allocated to those who will use them in raids. Some DPS players really do believe this, but for most it is simply a convenient excuse to justify them getting top priority on every single item they want.

Officers, like soviet bureaucrats, tend to be the kind of people who support this idea, they have a heavy psychological investment in the guild and tend to equate its progression with their own success, and imagine those who desire a more personal advancement to be traitorous or selfish.

They believe that efficient allocation can be determined from above, and that stopping the tank from getting an Ashkandi really will enhance rather than retard their progression.

This argument fails for two primary reasons, the first is psychological, the second is economic.

The true effects of DPS greed.

The first problem of DPS greed is economic, inevitably some items will be open to healer, hybrid and tank classes, and others not, and this tends to create bizarre inefficiencies.

For example, a Hunter may prefer weapon A, a Rogue prefer weapon B, and a fury warrior prefer weapon C. If bidding were open, this would most likely be the pattern of weapons they acquired. But if bidding is closed on item A to the hunter, and open on weapon C, the hunter may end up being forced into picking up weapon C, the fury warrior to weapon B, and the rogue to weapon A. Everyone loses, for no particular reason.

The second problem of DPS greed comes in the form of reduced competition for items. Without priests to compete with, DPS casters have little competition for desirous items, so they may decide to only show up to 50% of raids. Consequently, at any given time your raid is at suboptimal strength, some weeks its good, some weeks its bad, and your progression is retarded.

DPS classes, who easily acquire a tonne of phat lewts, then may decide to move on to bigger and better guilds.

The third problem is that healers, tanks and hybrids have a disincentive to come to early raids, for two reasons.
1) Bidding is closed on the items they really want, so they want to wait until they are open.
2) By the time bidding is open, the DKP price will be low, so they have no need to save.

So not only do your DPS stop showing up consistently, your healers and tanks do too.

The fourth problem is that your healers and tanks get ****ed off and leave your guild, or leave the game completely.

Overall, these problems result in guild progression slowing, guilds breaking up, inner drama and an overall sense of anger and frustration, all because DPS classes feel a sense of entitlement to more than they have earned, and officers support them in this

 
Now why did i post this.
 
First because i think its true.
 
Secondly because i think a Priority system that rewards anything but attendence is flawed in its nature, if players fail to see this, it is my belief it is them that are flawed not the system.
 
But i guess its easier to blame someone or something else. rather than looking upon ya self?

[Knabbel]

Nice one TL.....
 
I short, if you see things that are not correct you have the ability to say something about it now..... As this will help out a lot of people (considering not only SoG uses that site!!).
 
Chapeau

[Vargen]

I could point out one obvious flaw in this system.

Let's say I play a rogue. All the other rogues have all the weapons they want, but warriors and hunters don't.

I pick up [item]Dragonfang Blade[/item] from Vael. A hunter wanted it, but I get prio.
Then I pick up [item]Maladath, Runed Blade of the Black Flight[/item] from Broodlord. A fury warrior wanted it, but I got prio.
Firemaw falls and ofc I pick up [item]Claw of the black drake[/item] again on prio over hunters and warriors.
On Chromaggus I pick up [item]Chromatically Tempered Sword[/item] At this point I bet the warriors and hunters would either be pretty furious or allready have done /gquit

Just one example, but it clearly shows one of many flaws. A lot of rogue love in there, but none at all for slightly off specs or hunters.

[TeaLeaf]

....but you could do exactly the same with the highest DKP system due to your DKP!  I acknowledge yoru point Vargen, but it's a fault with both systems if someone has high DKP and insists on taking the item.

[Zabard]

Well, I don't know about the rest of the rogues, but I would not do that, as I only have my eyes on swords. Thus I would not take the dagger nor the fist weapon. Guess we are back to the "plan what you want from your character". The only reason for me using daggers now, is that I was told that daggers were the way to go for MC equipment. I later found that I don't enjoy using daggers as much as I did using swords (which I did from around level 20 to 60).

[Umbra]

The difference TL with a dkp system is that even though this is possible, as you use your dkp, it reduces, making it less likely you'll get the next item, with the prio system, it does not.

As Vargen pointed out, a rogue could get *all* dps swords before a warr would, with dkp this would be exceedingly unlikely unless the goue was old and the warr was new, in which case rogue has earned it.

However, since there are people who want items before they have raided as long as others, and in *some* cases this may benefit the raid, it can help, so like I said, After this trial, why not try using the 'rating' as a modifier as follows.

rogue has 3k dkp, tank has 4k dkp, maladath drops, great for rogue, good for tank (5* and 3*? cant remember)

5 x 3k = 15k, 3 x 4k = 12k, so rogue gets it, tank doesn't feel too bad since the rogue wasn't that far off dkp. (not like a new rogue taking a sword from a tank who has a year of raiding under his belt). AND since dkp goes down this reduces the likelihood of getting next item over someone who hasn't spent dkp.

What happens here is that you don't get:
classes taking all of an item type regardless of dkp before everyone else.
new raiders taking items from people who have saved for over a year.

you will get:
people still having to save conscientiously for items they want rather than taking anything they can.

All it means is that if something is better for your class, you are more likely to get it, but you won't just get it because of your class, time and effort and commitment should always be essential.

[TeaLeaf]

a rogue could get *all* dps swords before a warr would

I agree, we're all saying dimishing returns on the system.  But as Shylock said, "dicks will out" in any system.  People is people.

TL.

[Marduk]

Hmm i do like this system umbra said,
 
Your DKP pool times the numbers of stars and the one with the highest rating wins,
altho it would be hard in the beginning on the ML
having to alt-tab check two sites per item and then multiply by the number of people and then do a small calculation
 
take the CTB
a rogue whispers
a dps warrior whispers
a paladin whispers
a hunter whispers
of those classes there couple be mutiple people whispering
you would have to scroll down to the blade, write down the multiplyers per class and then add the dkp into the sum
if 2 people whisper, the system is great, if 20 people whisper, it will despawn b4 we figured out who what and where

[Umbra]

it might be difficult, but how much access do we have to the dkp server?

Someone (i could try) could grab the star ratings into a file/db, and write a simple app that would list the modified ratings on a single page having read (if possible) the dkp from the site. Or whoever did the funky dkp mods could add a filter option for 'rated listing' to list people by this modified method

yeah TL, I know that quote, but I thought I'd try and make a sensible contribution (gotta try once a year at least)

[Vargen]

Actually it wouldn't be so difficult. You would just use the compare function and quickly do the maths on the top few. Or even top of each class whispering. That would make it max 3 calculations per item, and since it is mostly weapons and rings/trinkets it shouldn't take too much time since allmost all armor is under the token system with no priority.

[Gallahan]

have been reading some more on the loot priority list, and a few more items has struck me as being prioritised odd, f.ex. Crown of Destruction has 2* for warriors and 1* for loladins, whereas i dont see what a warrior needs +int for, and even though its nice for those too i still would say it at least should be even odds for those 2 classes. And why are onslaught belt better for warriors than pallies? i dont see why it is, ofc warriors are often dps during raids, but then again thats an offspec aswell as loladin, so dont see any reason for this...
 
just a few thoughts

[Luminance]

I could point out one obvious flaw in this system.

Let's say I play a rogue. All the other rogues have all the weapons they want, but warriors and hunters don't.

I pick up [item]Dragonfang Blade[/item] from Vael. A hunter wanted it, but I get prio.
Then I pick up [item]Maladath, Runed Blade of the Black Flight[/item] from Broodlord. A fury warrior wanted it, but I got prio.
Firemaw falls and ofc I pick up [item]Claw of the black drake[/item] again on prio over hunters and warriors.
On Chromaggus I pick up [item]Chromatically Tempered Sword[/item] At this point I bet the warriors and hunters would either be pretty furious or allready have done /gquit

Just one example, but it clearly shows one of many flaws. A lot of rogue love in there, but none at all for slightly off specs or hunters.

u don't have that problem anymore, since Rogues say wich sort of wapon-rogue they are/will be, last time i checked all rogues accept noevra wanted Sword. So imo they see swords (like me) as 5 stars and the rest lower. That way other classes with 4-5 stars would get either prio or same chances (Dkp)

[Vargen]

have been reading some more on the loot priority list, and a few more items has struck me as being prioritised odd, f.ex. Crown of Destruction has 2* for warriors and 1* for loladins, whereas i dont see what a warrior needs +int for, and even though its nice for those too i still would say it at least should be even odds for those 2 classes. And why are onslaught belt better for warriors than pallies? i dont see why it is, ofc warriors are often dps during raids, but then again thats an offspec aswell as loladin, so dont see any reason for this...
 
just a few thoughts

When I see a paladin keep up with Dajo, I might consider this post serious.
But I will agree with you that a paladin benefits more from the stats [item]Crown of destruction[/item], a warrior will still do more damage with it.