Looting -- The official thread for discussing the loot system. Updated 18th March, 2013.

Here's a quick thought for the guys at GGG regarding looting styles.

Have you thought about simply polling/surveying your beta testers to see what type of looting style they prefer?

I often hear a lot of hyperbole about players being happy with the way the current loot system works and question where you are getting this data from.

A thorough survey would put an end to this dilemma once and for all, especially if you surveyed 10,000+ beta testers and see >50% or 60% response rate of favoring the current free-for-all loot style.

Just a suggestion.

I'm a little shocked that this topic has gone this far.

It's obvious that a lot about "modern" games leave a lot to be desired, but instanced drops is an example of a consensus feature. Guild Wars 1 showed that it's a knife that cuts through the agonies of e-drama that grind the game to a halt and grabbing at stuff like hungry dogs that makes you not want to play with other people.

It's just like splash damage hurting your allies. That one lasted like one game in this genre and then disappeared.

Instanced, displayed only to you, should be the default. The only hypothetical situation in which it causes ANY problems is that some guy decided to be a goomba and leave a sweet unique you want on the ground. That you don't know about. So you feel no drama.

All the other options have drawbacks.

Free For All as an optional per-person or per-party toggle would be fine - hell if you could flash it on and then back off as a way of saying "I don't want any of this crap but you guys might", that alone is better than the timer that might be too long or too short, or having to pick up and drop things individually.

That's probably the best solution. That, or luxuriously generous timers so you can be a vulture or something..

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LimitedRooster wrote:

I'm a little shocked that this topic has gone this far.

It's obvious that a lot about "modern" games leave a lot to be desired, but instanced drops is an example of a consensus feature. Guild Wars 1 showed that it's a knife that cuts through the agonies of e-drama that grind the game to a halt and grabbing at stuff like hungry dogs that makes you not want to play with other people.

It's just like splash damage hurting your allies. That one lasted like one game in this genre and then disappeared.

Instanced, displayed only to you, should be the default. The only hypothetical situation in which it causes ANY problems is that some guy decided to be a goomba and leave a sweet unique you want on the ground. That you don't know about. So you feel no drama.

All the other options have drawbacks.

Free For All as an optional per-person or per-party toggle would be fine - hell if you could flash it on and then back off as a way of saying "I don't want any of this crap but you guys might", that alone is better than the timer that might be too long or too short, or having to pick up and drop things individually.

That's probably the best solution. That, or luxuriously generous timers so you can be a vulture or something..

Nah.

FFA FTW

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LimitedRooster wrote:

...
Guild Wars 1 showed that it's a knife that cuts through the agonies of e-drama that grind the game to a halt and grabbing at stuff like hungry dogs that makes you not want to play with other people.
...

FFA only causes e-drama if you let it. When I join parties, I leave my loot-hoarding mentality behind, and just focus on progressing through the areas and having fun. If I end up getting some good loot, that's fine, but I don't go in expecting to fill every square of my inventory with valuable stuff.

Although theoretically FFA can discourage cooperation, it's actually much less of a problem than people make it out to be. The other players in most of the random parties I join are generally quite courteous and will let you pick up your assigned loot even after the timer runs out. If I find that someone in the party is being a loot-ninja, then I'll just leave and play solo for a while, no harm done there.

FFA looting is the reason why i don't group.

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psyclum wrote:

FFA looting is the reason why i don't group.

Same here. FFA loot reduces the number of people that will party. It needs to be changed or the game will forever miss out on co-op

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wrathmar wrote:

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psyclum wrote:

FFA looting is the reason why i don't group.

Same here. FFA loot reduces the number of people that will party. It needs to be changed or the game will forever miss out on co-op

also same. i like the proposed changes though. but i dont agree about the 'adrenaline rush' of trying to read an item while fighting. i think the timer should be increased to something like 5 seconds. i still cant read an item and fight in that time so i would still be rushing with my mouse and eyes. 1 second is just useless, might as well be ffa loot.

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Float wrote:

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wrathmar wrote:

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psyclum wrote:

FFA looting is the reason why i don't group.

Same here. FFA loot reduces the number of people that will party. It needs to be changed or the game will forever miss out on co-op

also same. i like the proposed changes though. but i dont agree about the 'adrenaline rush' of trying to read an item while fighting. i think the timer should be increased to something like 5 seconds. i still cant read an item and fight in that time so i would still be rushing with my mouse and eyes. 1 second is just useless, might as well be ffa loot.

The timer actually varies

It seems to me that people are arguing from two different scenarios:

One side argues that loot should be FFA because it makes it easier to distribute cheap stuff like RGB links, high quality items, and generic blues.

The other side argues that loot shouldn't be FFA because they don't want to fight over rare stuff like exalted orbs or 6-links.

Isn't there a compromise?

Just posted this in the other Instance/FFA thread, and I feel it might add some perspective from the devs point.

Chris said this when they deployed the current system:

It's important to us that Path of Exile has a cut-throat feel where players are not only competing against monsters, but also their fellow players. We do not feel it is an option to arbitrarily hide items from players who have not been allocated them.

Over the past few months we've thought long and hard about this topic, and have come up with a system that we feel captures the cut-throat feel that we're trying to go for, but helps mitigate the valid complaints.

It's important that the time is low enough that the player can only get the item if they are paying attention and make an effort to immediately grab it.

(Me) In regards to the right click to make available to group, this is still instanced, in the sense that you are giving YOUR item to another player, which completely goes against what they are going for in this game. Longer timers MIGHT be more acceptable to them, but only a second or so would be added IMHO, if they were going to add anything at all.

I still feel that losing the name might help, as this may help ditch the entitlement that it's MY item, even after the timer is expired.