Our view on map drop rates

Hi guys,

This is posted in response to the Map Drop Rates thread.

Here are some observations on the current usage of the map system:

a) Players are not using enough chisels. I'm going to raise the drop rate of chisels in 0.9.12d. They are an important tool in helping get those maps that don't quite have complex enough mods to yield a whole new map on average.

b) Players are not playing hard enough maps (in terms of mods). If you don't have mods on it, its yield may not average a new map on average. For players who are making theirs rare with difficult mods, they get more maps than they spend, on average.

c) The nature of randomness means that conclusions drawn about playing low numbers of maps are dangerously misleading. Even when I was averaging 1.5 maps per map, I still had a run of six maps in a row where no new maps were found. I later had two maps in a row where I found three or more maps per run. That is randomness!

d) On average, players are finding more maps now.

e) On average, players are finding more items from maps now.

f) On average, players are reaching higher level maps more easily now.

g) Players appear to be running more maps than they were before the patch.

h) Most players are choosing maps that would have been good in 0.9.11, without switching to the mods that produce the best results in 0.9.12.

i) The modelling we were using does not account for some ways that maps are lost (disconnections, etc), so we are increasing the drop rate of maps in 0.9.12d to compensate.

Remember, if you get a bunch of people in a room to flip coins and count how many heads they get, a whole bunch of people are going to not get as many heads as they should on average and will feel that the system is unfair. For every person who has a bad experience with a string of eight maps, someone else is basking in riches. This same principle applies to everything else in this type of Action RPG that uses extreme randomness for its item system.

We'll continue to monitor feedback and statistics. Thanks again for the testing.

"

dsifu wrote:

I don't want to sound like a wuss, but right now the risk and rewards of running maps is completely imbalanced.

At lv75, the exp loss from dying to get 1% exp just makes running maps not worth it right now. I honestly think that the endgame is a bit broken at the moment.

Would you rather the content was easier? I'm very glad that people are scared of dying in maps, because our #1 concern is having the endgame too easy so that people are not challenged.

There's more parallel endgame coming in the form of PvP, Act three, more events, better trading, guild content, more maps, etc, etc.

We increased their drop rates (and the chance of getting higher maps) today in 0.9.12o.