Please explain Voidstones to me

Now that I finally have all four voidstones, and maps still drop below T16, I conclude that I entirely misunderstand exactly what VSs do.
According to the wiki:

- "Voidstones do not directly change the chance of a map of a given tier from dropping; instead, the dropped map selects an eligible map of the given tier based on your current Atlas, or adds to map equity. "

While I understand each of these words, I do not understand what this is trying to signify in practice.
I had mistakenly believed that -- after having procured all 4 VSs -- since the base level of all of my maps is now t16, when selecting which map will drop, the game will drop a map based on my atlas, and that map will accordingly be t16. But obviously not.

So if instead the game selects a TIER of map to drop, what does "selects an eligible map of the given tier based on your current atlas" mean? My current atlas is full of t16, I have no t11 for example. And yet a t11 will drop.

Since Voidstones no longer provide a vehicle for administering Sextant modifiers, what benefit does having all four VSs and thus an atlas full of T16 maps provide if the maps themselves continue to drop sub-16?

thanks in advance

There are sources of map drops in the game that ignore your atlas/voidstones.

Technically you should in fact only drop T16s unless a mechanic (like incubators) states otherwise.

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Scarletsword wrote:

There are sources of map drops in the game that ignore your atlas/voidstones.

Technically you should in fact only drop T16s unless a mechanic (like incubators) states otherwise.

I guess that the things that drop from other content (expedition, blight chests, heist lockers, etc.) would include those "other sources" -- right?
But I think I've had drops from just normal monsters be less than t16. Not sure.
If what you say is true, then the atlas nodes like shaping the sky (+ chance to drop 1 tier higher) are redundant with 4 voidstones? And the internal voidstone bonus (each voidstone yields + chance to drop one tier higher) is also redundant with itself once 4 are obtained?

It's not all other content. Most other content will only drop T16s. It's just some specific things that explicitly drop a certain tier that are exceptions.

Some examples are rare monsters that roll the map conversion modifier or the reward window from ritual.

Atlas nodes like shaping the sky still increase your overall map drops since it can go past 100% and will then increase the map tier to become up to 2 levels higher.

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Scarletsword wrote:

Atlas nodes like shaping the sky still increase your overall map drops since it can go past 100% and will then increase the map tier to become up to 2 levels higher.

But I don't understand this -- if everything should drop as t16, what is the point of having increased tier drop since it would be maximum anyway? (OK now there are t17 maps, but that is quite new)

Because that's not quite how it works. It's a bit more complicated (since it's PoE).

I'll try to simplify it as much as possible:

Your maps below T16 still get generated in "the background" but get converted to a hidden points system or "map equity". The more points you have, the more likely it is for your next map to be T16 until you drop a map that's on your atlas which "spends" those points.

Since this system exists, atlas nodes like Shaping the Sky directly increase the amount of T16 drops.


More detailed:
https://www.poewiki.net/wiki/Atlas_of_Worlds#Equity

Thanks. But I still do get more <t16 than I do get t16s. That cannot only be from those exceptions, can it?

It's probably something related to standard league then because I can't think of anything else.