Raid guild loot systems other than DKP?

[myriverse]

Originally Posted by Ravager [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

All things being equal is pretty much the textbook definition of unbiased.

Not true. All things being equal is a bias towards a false equality. It benefits those who don't contribute as much over those that contribute a lot.

[Vallanor]

No system is perfect, but DKP bidding seems the most popular because it boils it down to a simple currency game. The more you raid, the more DKP you have to spend. The more you want something, the more you'll be willing to spend, and the more likely you'll win the item. Active players win more things, as they should, but if they want something less than someone else, they won't win it.

It's tough for DKP to account for varying levels of contribution at a given raid event though, which is probably its biggest weakness. You pretty much earn DKP just by showing up.

The problem with /random, in my opinion, is there's no incentive for people to attend raids that aren't likely to drop something they can use. The guy who only shows up to Vindi raids because he wants the BP really badly is just as likely to win it as the guy who attends everything regardless of whether it truly benefits him personally.

So /random isn't exactly unbiased. It's actually biased toward selfish people who pick and choose which raids to attend based on the potential drops.

[Ravager]

Originally Posted by myriverse [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Not true. All things being equal is a bias towards a false equality. It benefits those who don't contribute as much over those that contribute a lot.

/random does this naturally. More rolls = more wins. Adding weight to the dice is what bias is, it artificially favors a particular outcome. Guy shows up to more raids, on average, he's going to win more rolls so he's going to be awarded more for the more work put in. It's easy, it's fair. Guy farms DKP the same way other people farm platinum and now you've go someone deciding which rolls count and it's going to skew more heavily in favor to the DKP farmer than it otherwise would have. That's bias.

What you are saying is that someone who puts in more time in raids deserves more loot, but when you put the thumb on the scale like that, you are disproportionately favoring one outcome over another. The 80% attendance people acquire more than 80% of the loot, the 20% attenders, (who tend to make up 80% of the raid) get less than 20% of the loot. /random everything and the numbers work themselves out over time. Yes there are streaks, but spread it out over a year and it's more even handed than any DKP or Loot Council you can devise and it has the added bonus of giving everyone incentive to show up for raids

Does a person who spends 8 hours a day for a week at the sarnak fort deserve Hidden Bracer more than the guy who just strolls in and gets one immediately by luck alone? I'm sure both will recall times when they got incredibly lucky on an immediate drop and incredibly unlucky on a camp that took days to do. It's the same for the dice. I won two RBG's in pickup groups in a weekend, but lost out on Heiro at least twice with a 99. But for the time I put in Seb, I got a reasonable amount of loot. It's the exact same with raids. Show up to the same raids every week for 52 weeks a year and you're going to get your share of picks with winning rolls.

Besides, there's nothing stopping someone from trading for rolls if they want an edge. They can outright buy a roll, promise to give someone a roll for a particular item if they give you a particular roll for a different item, etc. But in the end it still gives Joe Warmbody, who is every bit as important to making the raid work as 80% attendance DKP Jim a fair shake. It'd certainly do a lot to alleviate the turnover most raiding guilds face

[Cecily]

Random is how casuals on live discussing items they'll never see distributed items 15 years ago. It's not an acceptable loot distribution method for any entity that actually gets loot to distribute.

[Ravager]

Originally Posted by Vallanor [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

So /random isn't exactly unbiased. It's actually biased toward selfish people who pick and choose which raids to attend based on the potential drops.

But they still get less loot because they're not winning any from the other raids.

Besides, nothing is stopping a guild from /guildremove of people who do this.

[Ravager]

Originally Posted by Cecily [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Random is how casuals on live discussing items they'll never see distributed items 15 years ago. It's not an acceptable loot distribution method for any entity that actually gets loot to distribute.

Not acceptable to you maybe. But that's why you get to choose your guilds. /random is more fair. Period. Whether it's preferable is a different argument entirely.

[Vallanor]

Originally Posted by Ravager [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

But they still get less loot because they're not winning any from the other raids.

If items dropped for every class at every raid, /random would work out over the long run. I agree with that. It actually seems like a decent system for Kael arena raids and planar runs where there's usually a little something for everyone.

However, classic EQ does not work that way once you start killing major targets with limited loot tables. The guy who attends everything actually wins on average less per raid than the guy who only attends raids with the potential to drop an item he can use.

For example, the warrior who attends equal numbers of Velketor and Vindi raids wins half as much "per capita" as the warrior who only attends Vindi raids. Since Velketor only drops caster items, he has no opportunity to join in the /random for that raid.

[Ravager]

Originally Posted by Vallanor [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

If items dropped for every class at every raid, /random would work out over the long run. I agree with that. It actually seems like a decent system for Kael arena raids and planar runs where there's usually a little something for everyone.

However, classic EQ does not work that way once you start killing major targets with limited loot tables. The guy who attends everything actually wins on average less per raid than the guy who only attends raids with the potential to drop an item he can use.

For example, the warrior who attends equal numbers of Velketor and Vindi raids wins half as much "per capita" as the warrior who only attends Vindi raids. Since Velketor only drops caster items, he has no opportunity to join in the /random for that raid.

The caster has incentive to show up for melee drops because if he doesn't, the melee don't have incentive to show up for caster drops. Quid Pro Quo. If someone doesn't hold up their end of the bargain and blatantly skips raids, there's no reason to leave them guilded. DKP guilds have the same problem I'd guess, since even with the incentive of DKP many have minimum raid attendance requirements. A little leadership and sense of community goes a long way to eliminating this problem.

[Vallanor]

Originally Posted by Ravager [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

The caster has incentive to show up for melee drops because if he doesn't, the melee don't have incentive to show up for caster drops. Quid Pro Quo. If someone doesn't hold up their end of the bargain and blatantly skips raids, there's no reason to leave them guilded. DKP guilds have the same problem I'd guess, since even with the incentive of DKP many have minimum raid attendance requirements. A little leadership and sense of community goes a long way to eliminating this problem.

I don't disagree with anything you've written here. I'm just pointing out that a straight /random system doesn't ensure equal outcomes for everyone in the long run with classic EQ loot tables. People can game the system to produce better results for themselves, much like they can in other loot systems. It just incentivizes a different set of behaviors than a DKP or loot council set-up.

[Ravager]

Originally Posted by Vallanor [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I don't disagree with anything you've written here. I'm just pointing out that a straight /random system doesn't ensure equal outcomes for everyone in the long run with classic EQ loot tables. People can game the system to produce better results for themselves, much like they can in other loot systems. It just incentivizes a different set of behaviors than a DKP or loot council set-up.

But this example is a case of the people not being fair, not the system. As soon as anyone deviates from the /random principle, of course its going to bias the outcomes. That's the whole argument. Personally, I'd prefer to start out with a system that's inherently unbiased and then deal with the human interference when it crops in. When you start with a system that's biased from the start, you're just making it that much harder to make it fair.