The Lands of Arda

SerraAvatar · Site Admin Joined: 29 Jan 2007 Posts: 573

Mirwen is right, now I know why most of the dropp scripts seemed to me so un-Madwack likely (I know how he made them. The dropp rates really have been raised in the past.

Sir Nathan Ayloud · Vala Joined: 28 Jan 2007 Posts: 22

Yes but how important is it that only a handful of people have the end game items anyway? I have at least 3 characters decked out in the best of the best gear but i don't really feel like playing them.
When Arda came up all i wanted to do was roll a new toon, see what i could come up with. But then i remembered the months it took me to get each of those characters the gear they're wearing now and just dropped the idea altogether. Rare items should indeed be rare; in a high population server, where you can run into a pack of people you've never seen in your life and be the center of attention, get a little recognition for all the work you put into your toon. But this is a tiny tiny server where everybody knows everybody and have all done this before, i've been through 4 wipes on arda and i'm pretty sure most of the people here have been through at least 2, arda right now isn't our main goal in gaming, it's more like a nostalgia corner, a place you can go to and remember all the fun days you had, not a place to soak up every single minute of free time like it did in the old days.
I don't think we have to change our gaming mindset for arda like Serra Avatar said. We have less time, yes, but arda is easy to change, our lives aren't. As it is right now the forges are pretty much unattainable. I'm sure nobody is investing that much time in this game anymore and trading is pretty much impossible. So why shouldn't we adapt arda to our needs?

Nathan

Exavior · Joined: 28 Jan 2007 Posts: 309

There are plenty of chars that I have that are naked with no items...that's cause I don't play them and I didn't get along with playing the style of char I had created.

For example, I have a lvl 29 caster. It's pretty powerful and is fully tricked out with all the best forge gear and drops that I could get my hands on.

I hit level 29 a good 6 months or so before the server went down. Stopped playing it cause I didn't really enjoy playing a caster role.

I like playing monks, hence why I have 2 of them, one I play more than the other so that one has slightly better items.

I'm glad things are not going to get harder on the server, because it really doesn't need it. A little easier might be nice seeing as we're all here for memory lane playing perhaps more than anything else.

There are some very powerful toons on the the server, and while it may be easy for those chars, the rest of us still have a hard time of it.

At the end of the day I can't really change these things myself as I'm a programming n00b :p so it was just a suggestion.

SerraAvatar · Site Admin Joined: 29 Jan 2007 Posts: 573

We came back to Arda since we knew what to expect, and the dropp rates are a part of it. If you really have that many forge items on chars you dont want to play, move them to other chars, Nathan.
Some players are still playing regularily and would get bored if they reached their "aims" too fast.
And well, little peolpe onine? Today we had 11 at a time online, havent seen more on best times when I played on arda. Also a new player who got some starting stuff from Ithilsila and me.
Changing things because some people dont want to transfer gear from unused chars makes to me not too much sense Smile

Anyways, I doubt anyone would have the time to adjust ~1000 droppscripts *g*

CyanABX · Joined: 05 Feb 2007 Posts: 168

More EVENTS!

Ithilsilà · Joined: 15 Feb 2007 Posts: 323 Location: Catalonia

err... do we even have DMs?

SerraAvatar · Site Admin Joined: 29 Jan 2007 Posts: 573

Not as far as I know. And at the moment we dont have any people being adequate for that job either. I miss the as uncorruptable as wise Sal =)

Gupps · Joined: 07 Feb 2007 Posts: 485

Id love to complain about drops. I got nothing the 1st week back.

However ive hunted for a beast ring since they were introduced, including camping ren for days on end and nothing.

However 2 weeks ive been back and ive looted 2 beast rings, Ive looted 4 sets of cracks, numerous bowguards and a ring I though long extinct, which im not posting the stats of yet to stop everyone camping its location.

Only problem im having at the moment is actually knowing where stuff drops. Yer its frustrating if you know an item drops in a location but it just wont for you. Having said that im kinda having fun seeing the odd rare item pop up id forgotton about atm.

I havnt seen the ring I talk of for well before the 1st wipe /drool Very Happy

id guessed it had been removed for been overpowered or something.

mandix · Joined: 15 Feb 2007 Posts: 56

i have spoke to aule for some time ago, and i asked if i could get to be dm so i could make events, he said maybe and we neded to discus it in the forum but im not sure how often he check in here.

SerraAvatar · Site Admin Joined: 29 Jan 2007 Posts: 573

Well, it is hard to decide what rewards should be given when making DM events. Players always want items and/or xp.
Giving items at DM events or letting each player chose degrades those events to free item gains.
I know that it is the easiest way if an spontaneous event is made to spawn some bosses and let players roll at the end for dropps. But that is not what it should be like, we ll end up having an item inflation.
Searching items is big part of the game, it keeps us playing and gives us some little joy if we finally get what we wanted.

I once played on a server where you could earn "quest points".
For example for a specifiq amount of QP and some gold the players could earn a house with a unique key.

Quests might involve having 2 parties trying to reach one aim faster than the other. Rewarding the winner party with twice as much qp as the losers.

Nominating DMs is a really big thing. Before has to be clear where the powers end and what kind of rewards he may grant.

Mirwen · Joined: 15 Apr 2007 Posts: 15 Location: London

The events were fun but not very realistic, to be honest I would prefer to see drop rates increased a little bit to compensate for the lack of events. Say 5% increase. +1 on a d20 Smile

SerraAvatar · Site Admin Joined: 29 Jan 2007 Posts: 573

As I already told you, the dropp rates already have been increased, most items expect the ones intended to be really really rare have a droppchance of 16,66%. It wont change much if they were changed to 20%. And in another few months there will be again players asking for increases. We should stopp trying to fix Arda to death, even if the changes seem only little, as an increase by 5%.
It is hard to figure out where to stopp then.

oulu · Joined: 31 Jan 2007 Posts: 188 Location: Finland

What is the drop chance for rare items, say beast ring?

I really begin to think too that we shouldnt make any overall increases to drop rates. What i would like to see anyhow is to get places like zamka corrected. If i get 3 nameds all together in 18 tries it cant be right. I should have at least 40% chance everytime to get even one of the items.

We could gather a list of ridiculously hard drops and then check if its meant to be like as hard as it is now or is there a some sort of error in scripting.

Ill start:

-All drops from Queen of Zamka
-Beast ring
-etc

Not too good of a start Razz

Gupps · Joined: 07 Feb 2007 Posts: 485

This is the god honest truth...

Back before arda was taken down i camped moon fortress solidly and made a tally chart of how many goes it took me to get a beast ring...

Here it is :

207 kills 0 beast ring

Came back a couple of weeks ago to play arda, 2nd moon run I looted a beast ring. The next run after this, another beast ring. hehe go figure!

oulu · Joined: 31 Jan 2007 Posts: 188 Location: Finland

Well i think i've killed ren about 25-30 times now after server got up and no rings... nor did i get it before server was taken down either.