Very low supply of HMP, Riftcinder and Riftdross

[ZoMBie343]

Hi SE,
The occurrence of riftcinder and riftdross is currently very low across all servers. Reforged Armor upgrade materials that come from VoidWatch is not enough to keep a marketable supply of Heavy metal plates, riftcinder or riftdross. Given that empyrean weapons are weaker, yet so expensive to make compared to relics or Delve Rank 15 weapons.

Can the dev team look into ways to increase the occurrence of these items? Is it possible to create a rift pouch that drops 1-10 of these items? Can this drop from an SKCNM20 perhaps or other 119 battlefields?

Thank you.

[Olor]

I'd like to see them add VW in Adoulin areas and have them drop pouches etc... Would be nice to be able to upgrade all VW armor sets too (been saying this forever) - especially if they upped the drop rate of "base" pieces in older VW. I mean stuff like Rubeus was never particularly useful but it was barely out before it was made into complete and utter trash.

Anyway just my two cents.

[Vasch]

As many empyrean weapons have become weaker now that the exclusive WS isn't so exclusive anymore, they sure cost a lot more to complete than their R/M counterparts. I'm all for them making it much easier to get plates and dross/cinders. If empyrean weapons became a lot easier to 99/119, they could become a much more favorable option for players that are looking to forge a unique weapon.

[Grekumah]

We currently do not have any plans to boost the amount of Heavy Metal Plates or other similar materials when dropped, but we do understand the demand for these items.

Though still in the planning stage, the development team is looking into increasing the opportunities to obtain these items. We’ll keep you posted on the progress!

[Zarchery]

That is kind of a confusing response. You're not planning to boost the amount of these things that drop, but you are increasing the opportunities to obtain?

Couple quick ideas:

1) Add these to the list of things you can trade Copper AMAN Vouchers for.
2) Add these to drops from high tier mission battles.
3) Add these as a reward to some Records of Eminence objectives. Could be tricky because if you add to a repeatable objective that could be way too much but if you add to a non-repeatable objective a lot of folks who did these objectives are locked out. Maybe add some Voidwatch related objectives and add them there.

[Vasch]

That is kind of a confusing response. You're not planning to boost the amount of these things that drop, but you are increasing the opportunities to obtain?

From what I understand, he means that we'll be seeing new ways to get them, as in new content rather than increasing the drop rate in old content.

I'm all for it. Voidwatch isn't exactly the most fun thing to do nowadays.

[ZoMBie343]

We currently do not have any plans to boost the amount of Heavy Metal Plates or other similar materials when dropped, but we do understand the demand for these items.

Though still in the planning stage, the development team is looking into increasing the opportunities to obtain these items. We’ll keep you posted on the progress!

Grekumah, I'm confused. Will we see new ways to obtain them....and existing methods will remain unchanged? Is that correct? Thank you!

[Afania]

We currently do not have any plans to boost the amount of Heavy Metal Plates or other similar materials when dropped, but we do understand the demand for these items.

Though still in the planning stage, the development team is looking into increasing the opportunities to obtain these items. We’ll keep you posted on the progress!

On a side note, is it possible to get an empy weapon boost next ilv cap? Such as higher stat, like +30 instead of +20. Currently they're very weak and overpriced compare with mythic. I don't mind empy being hard to obtain, as long as it's worth the price tag.

[Zarchery]

I actually in awe that anybody has completed any Empyrean above 90. I know it's happened--I know one guy with 119 Verethragna and another with 4-song harp. And another with 4-song harp and 99 Ochain. It still amazes me.

[Sapphires]

Could you increase the voidstone rate of replenishment? Like a ton? Or let us exchange 1k sparks for voiddust or something?

It is not uncommon for people to do VW 6x3 once a day at a minimum (i've done 18 pil, 18 kaggen and 18 akvan in an evening on occasion)

VW was popular but the new Walk of echoes pretty much killed it off because new WoE gives xp *and* capacity points, and gives voidwatch style spoils(good money items to buy dross/binder/hmp) for only a 1k gil per flux run that you can spam till your hearts content that has pretty much no time gating.

[Numquam]

Can't we just get them through a log-in camp-thingy?

[Shirai]

Can't we just get them through a log-in camp-thingy?

Uh, to be fair, the only possible thing I may see happen is that single HMPs will be added for the whopping amount of 2000 points each.
And that's not being sarcastic.

Forget about Dross/Cinders, that's not going to happen.


Could you increase the voidstone rate of replenishment? Like a ton? Or let us exchange 1k sparks for voiddust or something?

It is not uncommon for people to do VW 6x3 once a day at a minimum (i've done 18 pil, 18 kaggen and 18 akvan in an evening on occasion)

VW was popular but the new Walk of echoes pretty much killed it off because new WoE gives xp *and* capacity points, and gives voidwatch style spoils(good money items to buy dross/binder/hmp) for only a 1k gil per flux run that you can spam till your hearts content that has pretty much no time gating.

I'd rather see them drastically lower the CP/IS/AN requirements for Voiddust.
Apart from that, make the darn things stackable.
That will be a lot more helpful than adding them to the sparks/copper vendor.

[Afania]

I actually in awe that anybody has completed any Empyrean above 90. I know it's happened--I know one guy with 119 Verethragna and another with 4-song harp. And another with 4-song harp and 99 Ochain. It still amazes me.

What's so hard about it....you just need gil = =It's the same as mythic, just more expensive and no assault/ichor/token requirement.

[Sapphire]

What's so hard about it....you just need gil = =It's the same as mythic, just more expensive and no assault/ichor/token requirement.

No, you need more than just gil, you need a SUPPLY. Which was an issue with alex for a mythic before but isn't so much.

I managed to get my harp to 95 because 1. Friends and ls mates who would sell me plates for 100k and not the 120k+ people keep selling them for. 2. Having to get the crafting mats from some VWNMs that drop plates caused a slight uptake in plate supply on my server. 3. One friend spent a TON of gil on plates for me <3. 4. My brother and some others donated plates as well. 5. I spent my every last bit of gil I had had horded for two years.

Now I need 48 more cinders to 99 the thing. Even if I did managed to make back my gil (which I am working on!) I can't finish it. There are almost no cinders on Sylph! And even when there are people are selling them for up to 5 mil each. Yeah... no. But even if I somehow magically made 240 million gil to buy 48 cinders for 5 mil each (HAHAHAHA) There aren't 48 cinders on Sylph! They drop from what? Four mobs? That don't drop too much else anyone cares about, that can turn into right pains if you screw up oh AND the drop rate is "balanced" to 18 people allys (and even then is crap.)

I can't buy cinders that don't exist. I can do Morta/Bismark et al for days and not get a single cinder. And then let's not forget, I'm not the only one with a 95 harp who wants to buy.

[Afania]

No, you need more than just gil, you need a SUPPLY. Which was an issue with alex for a mythic before but isn't so much.

I managed to get my harp to 95 because 1. Friends and ls mates who would sell me plates for 100k and not the 120k+ people keep selling them for. 2. Having to get the crafting mats from some VWNMs that drop plates caused a slight uptake in plate supply on my server. 3. One friend spent a TON of gil on plates for me <3. 4. My brother and some others donated plates as well. 5. I spent my every last bit of gil I had had horded for two years.

Now I need 48 more cinders to 99 the thing. Even if I did managed to make back my gil (which I am working on!) I can't finish it. There are almost no cinders on Sylph! And even when there are people are selling them for up to 5 mil each. Yeah... no. But even if I somehow magically made 240 million gil to buy 48 cinders for 5 mil each (HAHAHAHA) There aren't 48 cinders on Sylph! They drop from what? Four mobs? That don't drop too much else anyone cares about, that can turn into right pains if you screw up oh AND the drop rate is "balanced" to 18 people allys (and even then is crap.)

I can't buy cinders that don't exist. I can do Morta/Bismark et al for days and not get a single cinder. And then let's not forget, I'm not the only one with a 95 harp who wants to buy.

I guess I'm lucky that I finished 99 empy long before SoA then....it only took me 5 months to 99 it from 90, it took me 3 years to build a mythic. But all of them were done before SoA, so maybe the difficulty was different back then.....

[Shirai]

What's so hard about it....you just need gil = =It's the same as mythic, just more expensive and no assault/ichor/token requirement.

Sure, you can solve everything by throwing gil at it, but you can have all the gil in the world and it won't matter if the product you are looking for is so scarse that it becomes a market for whoever wants to spend the most.
Apart from that, compared to the currency you need to make relic and mythic weapons, it is near impossible to solo.

Voidwatch relies heavily on teamwork, besides that you can spend double the time you take doing Salvage or Dynamis doing actual Voidwatch fights and still come out completely empty handed where with the other two you are at least guaranteed a decent amount of the needed currency.
Unless you suck.


I guess I'm lucky that I finished 99 empy long before SoA then....it only took me 5 months to 99 it from 90, it took me 3 years to build a mythic. But all of them were done before SoA, so maybe the difficulty was different back then.....

Hahahahahahahaha.
Sorry, but you're comparing days where everyone did every single Voidwatch every hour of the day with a point in time where you're lucky to see more than one Jeuno Voidwatch run per night.
And that's on a server with a somewhat decent population of players.

Supply was a lot higher and the prices of plates, dross and cinder were half to a third of what they are now, of course it was a lot easier to finish an Empyrian.

The other way around for your Mythic, couldn't truly solo Salvage back then, and before NNI and Salvage II you were lucky to see a Linen once per 5 or 6 runs.

[Olor]

yeah... unless they make something WORTHWHILE drop these things then the supply will be low. Even if you can sell these things (cinders, dross) for a lot of money (and dross isn't even really worth much either), they drop so infrequently and getting a group together is so annoying that few people want to do it. At least when the monsters also dropped relatively cool weapons that were (some of them at least) somewhat decent and gear that was somewhat decent you at least felt like there was more point to it.

And just increasing the drop rate wouldn't help because then the items become worth less, meaning that there is still no point really in doing the content unless you are collecting them for yourself. The only way it works is either if you can farm them reliably without getting an alliance together, or if the cinders/dross are made incidental to another thing people want. Ideally, both.

[Shirai]

The thing is, right now the only reason to do Morta or Bismarck is if you are making an Empyrian weapon.
Dross and Cinder are the only worthwhile drops coming from those, and as you say yourself, the droprate is so abysmal that it's simply not worth your time unless you or a friend is working on one.
And even in those situations I sell the Cinder to my mate (of course for a discounted price) because screw it! I'm working on a Mythic myself! I need the gil!
And the only reason there are plates on the market at all is because at least the Jeuno Voidwatch mobs also drop some other things that are of interest so people have another reason to at least do those.
But as I said on that subject before, if I see more than one (English) shout for those on a regular day by different people on the server I play on you can consider it a lot.

I don't mind if plates, dross and cinder drop in price again, it needs to become more easily available because as it stands right now, people are paying 300M+ gil for a weapon which is in many cases only comparable to their much cheaper Relic and even inferior to their Mythic counterparts.

[Olor]

I am all for increasing supply - I am just saying simply increasing the drop rate would not necessarily put more on the market, because if the items are worth less, people will still not want to do the event.

Like yay dross is worth 300K or w/e but no, that is not enough to interest me in doing a mob... a chance to get 300K is just not that interesting compared to getting a chance at a cool/useful gear item. At their current drop rate I don't even really feel that motivated by cinders and they are worth a lot more.

I am way more interested in doing Akvan than whatever that demon in the dunes is called - why? Because I still don't have akvan's shirt and I still want it. Even with Akavan's shirt not being very useful at all anymore, it still has more of a motivating effect on me than a tiny percent chance at an item that will be inventory -1 and require me to leave my computer on all night to bazaar to get anything off of it. And akvan's crafting item can be directly useful to me or put on the AH for gil.

What made people do voidwatch in the first place was wanting the shiny gear (some of it is still some of the best looking gear in the game) with the plates etc as a nice bonus you got while you were doing a billion pops trying to get a shiny dagger or a decent pair of boots or a march harp or whatever.

Best way to get voidwatch going again is to put actually good gear into it and/or allow us to upgrade VW gear sets. Would also be nice to be able to play a job I like in content that can actually advance my character again.

[Tidis]

Make the VWNMs that drop the upgrade items also drop heavy metal pouches, riftcinder and riftdross sorted.

[Stompa]

15k sparks for 1hmp sounds about right. 50k sparks for the cinders.

Or make the items drop in events that can be solo'd, or duo'd with a friend. Same as Relic, Mythic, Ergon.

[Zarchery]

What's so hard about it....you just need gil = =It's the same as mythic, just more expensive and no assault/ichor/token requirement.

Sapphire beat me to it, but with a relic you could finish it in a month if you had enough gil. For mythic you could shave off a lot of time by buying tons of alexandrite although there's probably not 30,000 available at any point on any server, and there's still all that other stuff. But empyreans.... even if you had a billion gil there's just nothing near 1500 heavy metal plates in existence.

[Shirai]

15k sparks for 1hmp sounds about right. 50k sparks for the cinders.

Or make the items drop in events that can be solo'd, or duo'd with a friend. Same as Relic, Mythic, Ergon.

As much as you wish for it, this isn't going to happen.
They would have to do the same for Alexandrite and Dynamis currency and there'll never be a good ballance.

The best suggestions I have seen so far are to either add pouches, Dross and Cinder to the loot pools of the Voidwatch NMs that people still want to do (The ones dropping AF upgrades) or make it so that people want to do Morta and Bismarck again by adding interesting stuff to their loot pools.

Will the first suggestion break the market? Heck yes it will! But I don't see it as a bad thing because right now in my humble opinion an Empy simply isn't worth the gil and effort.

[Kincard]

I'm thinking that if they were going to do anything about the HMP and Riftitem situation it would likely be tied to Voidwatch somehow, because they decided to tie Reforged Armor to Voidwatch drops as well. Wouldn't be surprised for them to add these to the pool of things like Voidwrought.

The only other way would be to spread out both of these category of items into other events, but I honestly wouldn't mind that method because it can be pretty hard to come by the reforged armor ingredients too since they drop off a grand total of one specific NM.

[Olor]

I would be very surprised if empy reforging didn't have a voidwatch component. Maybe each piece will require a pulse cell.

*trollface*

[Sapphire]

I seriously think I've gotten more reforged items spamming the Campaign BCNMs during the Festa events than I have from the VWNMs themselves!

[Olor]

I seriously think I've gotten more reforged items spamming the Campaign BCNMs during the Festa events than I have from the VWNMs themselves!

what... they drop those too? shiii.... need to get on that.

UGH... I missed it...

SADFACE.

[pim-ptarutaru]

I'm currently building Gandiva atm 50/1500 such a long way to go... I wouldn't object if they add other ways of obtaining HMP.

[Feary]

if s.e would allow us 200 capacity points per kill on Tier 6 jeuno and t3 zilart/tav, i would call it day.

stop being lazy and start making runs to farm. the mats and emp upgrades is very nice gil + merits + curor(for cells).

each alliance gets at least 20 hmps per run/ ive seen 200+ in 6 kills. hell, ive brought/farmed and sold over 300 this week, they go like hot cakes averaging only hour-ish a day.


1500 hmps is not much of anything, 30k alex is much harder, tbh.

only reason its difficult because no one is motivated to do the content. when a server has 1-2 shout per day, and 6-9 ppl want to buy hmps at any current price, its going to low in demand.

[Shirai]

Uh, what?
200 plates in 6 kills? I'm not sure which universe you live in because even in the unlikely situation where every member of the alliance gets a plate each kill I still come to only 108.

[pim-ptarutaru]

um i've done about 15x2 this week and got only 50 its all about that dumb thing they got luck...
Im not lazy to do the content as im going to keep going at it to get this bow done. just getting 1500 is a pain in the ass.

[Feary]

if you are doing pil and kaggan for hmp farming(which is highly idiotic), yeah 50 per ally per run is dumb luck. on those 6 runs can net an alliance 5-15 average.

however, um yes 50-200 per alliance on for example uptala or qilin or even morta on a lucky day per alliance is very feasible.

hell ive gotten 5 riftcinder in one mortax6 run. yes that is stupid crazy luck and i dont expect that to happen to anyone again, however we wont have any chance of anything if ppl dont do the content appropriately.

yes it would be nice if they would update the tiers or reforge the gear because its nice to have new content. however, updating this content so that we have incentive to kill these nms for hmps is ridiculous. we should already be grinding out. the server, has to grind vwnms just like we grind the zones of dynamis or salvage. Doing 12 kills per server per day is nothing. wanting to complete you're emps are enough of a motivator to shout of get group together. 8-12 119 players are more than enough to do a run on any of these nms.

at this stage of a ffxi it is structured so that everyone should be striving for at least 1 relic, 1 emp and 1 mythic.

one thing to also look at is do you have the periapts and upgraded atmacite? are you useing rubicund and colbalt cells.

hell i make good gil on synth mats i get from vwnm. stuff that you probably just leave in the chest/ toss or npc when they sell on the ah for a few thousand. it adds up, and then 1 run gets me enough gil to buy one more hmp.

[Kincard]

I have no idea where you're getting your numbers from. Selecting that one time a ton of plates dropped doesn't really prove anything.

One thing you are right about is that the higher tiers are definitely better for farming HMP specifically, but people do those a lot less nowadays because they lose out on the chance for reforging mats which are also chances for gil anyway (and for someone actively working on a weapon, like you pointed out, gil = more plates).

HMPs off Pil and his partners is about 33%.
Pouches off Qilin and his partners is about 6%.
Morta and the like drop HMPs at about 15% if you're generous, and about 4% cinder and 2% dross (those two are inverted depending on the NM)

Pouches give 3~15 plates so even if you were in an alliance of 18 and every single pouch you got gave 15, you'd get like 97 plates on average given that 6% drop rate. Morta's a different story altogether since you nobody goes there for plates anyway.

I really think they should do something with all that voidwatch gear we slaved away to get, but I think recently they did say they'd like to move away from reforging stuff.

[raps1355]

They really do need to fix this as ppl arent blitzing VW how it was when it was the only relevant content. We need a global point system or event that can be traded in / spammed to work toward a specific goal items at a reasonable pace. No content should become harder/longer because ppl have moved on. The time spent should remain static at all times.

As a side note farming jeuno T3's is more efficient as you will get at least 2 out 6 plates per run and its not uncommon to get 4-6 plates in a run whereas a pouch drops on average 1 in 5-6 runs. So you have 6 runs @ 2-6 plates vs 6 runs for a pouch and when you open this pouch you will land 7-8 plates on average so 12 plates worst case > 7-8. Its just not worth gambling for that extra 3 plates.

And yes we have all had those runs where we get 4 pouches but lets be realistic we have all done 10+ runs and not had a pouch. Long term you are better off on J3's Any other mats you get are just bonus and is not the real reason you are there.

Time wise kaggen is the best one provided you have a dispeller as akvan tends to barricade procs with magic shield and ppl still seem to fail at removing pil's shield and turning him b4 doom.

Remember 350% red only and 3 rubicunds only. Have fun :)

[Feary]

i dont know how you think my entire post is based of the one time i was lucky.

my numbers are coming from doing the content on multiple accounts(up to 4 of my own plus feedback) for multiple years and from mulitple players/linkshells who would farm vw.

although imo and experience drops are better than this.

if 1 person per kill got 1 pouch and that pouch was only 3 hmps. x6 kills that would be 18 hmps.

which is where i get 15.

although ffxidb drop information is not correct since everyone in the party is not posting results to the collective. however, i will go with your numbers of 33 percent and 6 because it will be received as the best information we have.

even looking at with your info, as 18 individual chests x 6 kills = 108 chances of a pouch drops. at 33% for pil. you are looking at 35 plates. i said 5-14 which i think is more reasonable.

6 pouches = 18-90 plates. which i said up to 200 as i can see why you dont agree.


either way hmps arent going to become more available unless ppl do the content and not complain that is there is no incentives when there clearly are. gil/exp/cruor (and possible capacity points :) ) and updating your own weapons should be enough. if there is update it should be to gear and not the rate of hmps drops

im tired going to bed.

[Protey]

i don't remember who said it in this thread, but whoever said it doesn't matter how much gil you have because there is no supply: create the market. if you are willing to pay enough people will go in droves to farm HMP/Cinders. You'll probably complain that you don't want to spend that much gil. Tough, that's supply/demand. You have to make things worthwhile to people, or have friends/LS willing to help.

[detlef]

Using ffxidb.com drop rates and assuming an expected value of 9 hmp per pouch, farming the sky T3 NMs is indeed a better way to get plates. You can expect 3.2-3.4 hmp per 6 fights on average (roughly 6% chance of pouch, although you'd get nothing most of the time) whereas Kaggen/Pil/Akvan would yield a little over 2 plates per 6 fights on average (roughly 35% chance of hmp). Of course, you'd also have a 5% chance of the ilvl 119 relic upgrade material on top of that so the Jeuno T3 NMs are probably the best way to go. Morta and Rex might be an even better option considering how rare and pricey cinders are now.

[Afania]

i don't remember who said it in this thread, but whoever said it doesn't matter how much gil you have because there is no supply: create the market. if you are willing to pay enough people will go in droves to farm HMP/Cinders. You'll probably complain that you don't want to spend that much gil. Tough, that's supply/demand. You have to make things worthwhile to people, or have friends/LS willing to help.

But then almost all empy weapons except harp would be so expensive that it's completely not worth the effort when you can get mythic for a much lower price.

[Kincard]

I'm going to ignore most of everything else since I'm indifferent to the whole "you should just put forth the effort" argument and respond to this:


ffxidb drop information is not correct since everyone in the party is not posting results to the collective

I'm not going to argue that FFXIDB data is 100% accurate, but to say that it's less accurate than limited sampling of your multiboxes plus friends you ask is highly unlikely. It doesn't matter if it doesn't collect data from everyone, it still averages drop data from across thousands of attempts and is probably more accurate than what any one person or even linkshell can accomplish. The only sampling bias FFXIDB has is that it only samples people on Guildwork, which really shouldn't affect how accurate it is at all, because it's not like the game is going to be especially nice/mean to people on Guildwork for no reason.

[Protey]

But then almost all empy weapons except harp would be so expensive that it's completely not worth the effort when you can get mythic for a much lower price.

pretty much the only empy worth doing to 99 is harp. and to say it isn't worth the effort i'd have to disagree. that 4th (5th under clarion call) song can make a world of difference. nothing else can replace that harp. even though Terpander grants one additional song, it's still not two. all the other empyreans are outclassed, save ochain. and there is no real point in taking ochain past 90 save bragging rights.

edit: didn't mean to imply that you said harp isn't worth doing.

[Demonjustin]

although ffxidb drop information is not correct since everyone in the party is not posting results to the collective.I'm curious, why do you think this leads to inaccuracies in FFXIDB's drop information?

[bungiefanNA]

I'm curious, why do you think this leads to inaccuracies in FFXIDB's drop information?

For one, everyone must be running Windower or Ashita with a plugin loaded that monitors the drops and submits them to the database. That means console users are automatically excluded from the statistics.

[detlef]

For one, everyone must be running Windower or Ashita with a plugin loaded that monitors the drops and submits them to the database. That means console users are automatically excluded from the statistics.Are you suggesting that the game has different drop rates depending on your system? Or are you saying that console and pc users cap lights/use cells in a different way?

[Shirai]

I'm not sure about the rest of you, but I'd still take the word of an automated system collecting data from thousands of different instances over that of a mental list from an individual who'se statistics are based on them playing a few characters.

Unfortunately, the latter seems to have the biggest group of followers here...

[Byrth]

FFXIDB is inaccurate in two cases that I know of:
1) In a "layer zone" aka instance like Salvage or Delve. -- Packets are sent by the server multiple times because SE's server infrastructure is bottlenecked and they make it playable by being incredibly redundant in cases where they think the packet might have been dropped. This means that item packets can be sent twice, which results in higher than realistic drop rates. For instance, if you look up Khrysokhimaira Elder (http://www.ffxidb.com/zones/74/khrysokhimaira-elder) you will notice it has a 125% drop rate on Linen Coin Pouches. That's because the drop rate in that zone is overestimated by about 25% due to high traffic/lag. Orthrus Seether (http://www.ffxidb.com/zones/75/orthrus-seether), on the other hand, is only listed as having a 105% drop rate because Bhaflau is less laggy/popular.

2) When determining the precise level of TH. -- FFXIDB fails to notice non-traditional forms of TH, like Bounty Shot, TH Trait on BLU, pets with TH, and Fellows with TH. This results in higher than realistic TH0 drop rates, but has no affect on higher tiers of TH. Also, it assumes that you automatically have the highest level TH in the party regardless whether they acted on the mob, so in that sense it biases drop rates downwards. Overall, FFXIDB underestimates the effect of TH.


As far as I know, Voidwatch drop rates should be near 100% accurate. XIDB has also collected data on alignment, but no one has bothered to parse it.

[bungiefanNA]

Are you suggesting that the game has different drop rates depending on your system? Or are you saying that console and pc users cap lights/use cells in a different way?

I meant that events with individual loot pools, with console users in the party, won't have their items reported. So the stats on a full party getting drops may be incorrect. Drop rates are calculated on the server, not your system, so of course consoles won't have different drop rates. However, FFXIDB doesn't talk directly to the server, it relies on us having a program to record the activity from the server, which can't be easily done on a console.

[Kensagaku]

The thing is that drop rates are not calculated by party; they're calculated by number of drops over X runs. Whether it's 18 people over ten runs or ten people over 18 runs, you've still got 180 different data points. It may take more runs if not everyone is calculating, but overall a trend will become visible. It doesn't matter if not everyone is recorded; it will not change the overall trend.

Example, say you have all 18 people in an alliance parsing over 18 fights. That's 324 points of data. Now let's say you have ten people doing it instead of 18; it'd take 32-33 fights to get the same amount of data, but you're still getting the same general trend of data over time. The more fights you do, and the more data you get, the more the pattern and exact drop rate becomes obvious. It doesn't matter how many people there are doing it, except to determine how long it takes to get enough of a sample size to prove a relative rate. And with how long VW has been out, likely the rate is pretty accurate by now.

So yeah, it doesn't matter if there are console users or users that aren't giving item drop information; the rate will eventually be determined simply due to having a large enough sample size, since droprates are the same across all players.

[Demonjustin]

Well it seems I'm late to the party. Regardless, I'll give my own explanation.

Roll a die 1,000,000 times and record the results of every roll. You should see each side come up roughly 16~17% of the time.
Roll a die 1,000,000 more times, this time record only the results of every third roll. You should still see each side come up around 16~17% of the time.

The reason for this is that probability isn't being affected by your lack of gathering results from those other two rolls. You're ignoring two thirds of the rolls but you're not excluding specific numbers or anything, they're entirely random, it's as though these rolls never took place. If you excluded specific numbers you'd be tampering with the data, but since it's entirely random data you're missing and each roll had an equal chance to produce the results you're going to get an accurate number all the same.

FFXIDB is missing information from some players, yes, but this doesn't prevent it from getting the overall picture. The only way it would is if the chance for the dice to land on a specific number was different for each character/console or if it specifically ignored certain information and thus, tampered with it's own data.

[Olor]

So this weekend I see a shout for morta (I think, anyway it was a cinder dropping NM), I join. It's me and the shouter. After about 15 mins of NOT ANOTHER SINGLE PERSON EXPRESSING INTEREST the shouter decided to change it to akvan. It filled up okay after that... but yeah cannot express enough how uninterested most people are in doing this content. This was on a Saturday afternoon (Pacific time) so should be a great time to scare up people for a shout.

People don't feel like gambling their time when cinder rates are so low and dross is worth so little. I don't blame them. I just joined cause I like VW.

[InpendingDeath]

Heavy Metal is trivial now that it requires T3 mats for reforged armor, only thing it takes is a couple weeks granted you have the gil to buy from people. Maybe requires you to make your own VW shouts when there are no shouts going on which everyone is capable of doing with little to no common sense.

Riftcinders/Dross are the real problem. I'd rather do 1500 plates twice than plates+cinders because no one sees value in doing these anymore.

SIMPLE FIX! Make Empy Armor reforge require Sealord Skin (Bismarck drop) or Belladona Sap (Morta drop).

[Shirai]

SIMPLE FIX! Make Empy Armor reforge require Sealord Skin (Bismarck drop) or Belladona Sap (Morta drop).

This will work making those a bit more attractive indeed, the main problem however is still the plates, moreso, the supply and demand forcing the price to a point where in my opinion it's not worth the pricetag.
As I've said before, as it stands right now gilwise an i119 Empyrian weapon costs considerably more than even a Mythic weapon (going by Bahamut prices for plates and Dross/Cinder), which is ridiculous because most Empyrian weapons are only equal to Relic weapons in the department of damage output (And only IF you ride AM3 constantly) but don't even come close to the extra utilities the Mythic weapons and some of the Relic weapons have to offer.

[InpendingDeath]

This will work making those a bit more attractive indeed, the main problem however is still the plates, moreso, the supply and demand forcing the price to a point where in my opinion it's not worth the pricetag.
As I've said before, as it stands right now gilwise an i119 Empyrian weapon costs considerably more than a Mythic weapon, which is ridiculous because most Empyrian weapons are only equal to Relic weapons in the department of damage output (And only IF you ride AM3 constantly) but don't even come close to the extra utilities the Mythic weapons and some of the Relic weapons offer.

I don't believe there "Only Equal" you get an item not many people have which is worth a lot now days imo. I'd rather have something rare and cool looking. Everyone has the standard bandwagon R/Ms, takes dedication to said job to make the Empy99. I can usually talk people into selling plates for 100,000g. Most the time I shout for VW I have several LS mates in the run to help me and they get pennons for their efforts. Now days a lot of people are doing the grind of mythic so a lot of people will take fast cash for plates if ask. I wouldn't buy one for over 120,000g and I did 1500 in a few weeks spamming T3 and Sky NMs. I don't see any problem with plates, I would rather do 1500 twice than the Cinders still.

My suggestion is make your own VW runs, invite LS mates, make friends with people who do regularly with you and talk them into selling at 100-110,000 each. I can't speak for bahamut but a lot of people on Cerb have no problems handing them over for the quick gil, there are people who get VW mat and can't wait to go to AH and undercut asking price by 150,000g+.

If you build a R/E/M for the "Parse to win"/Bandwagon job mentality I am very sorry. Should build a weapon because you like the job. Any R/E/M will do good damage if you aren't a moron with gear sets and won't make or break any content in the game having one over the other. I once cared about doing the most damage also, but then I hit puberty.

[Shirai]

Don't get me wrong, I get the whole job dedication thing and the like and have major respect for the people that are still willing to make them under the current circumstances.
But in my opinion when you want to make a top weapon Empyrian is not worth its pricetag when you compare the actual weapon to its alternatives.
An Empyrian is a pure DD weapon which offers nothing else in the form of utility but at this moment comes at a pricetag that exceeds even that of what for many jobs is considered the best weapon in game by most people.

[InpendingDeath]

Don't get me wrong, I get the whole job dedication thing and the like and have major respect for the people that are still willing to make them under the current circumstances.
But in my opinion when you want to make a top weapon Empyrian is not worth its pricetag when you compare the actual weapon to its alternatives.
An Empyrian is a pure DD weapon which offers nothing else in the form of utility but at this moment comes at a pricetag that exceeds even that of what for many jobs is considered the best weapon in game by most people.

I understand but it still comes down to what the person playing the game wants to make, money isn't the issue, spam some T3's and you get lucky and get mats/cells and sometimes buy all the plates that drop to people from run and still walk away with profit, might not be good profit but any counts. I like VW and don't mind spamming it for something to do so I guess empy was the path for me. In most cases of making empy you will be the one shouting for Sky/T3 VWs so it's not like you won't get any pouches/plates/cinders for yourself further cutting the cost. Some people hate VW and prefer doing dynamis or salvage everyday and that's cool to each his own they'd prob be better off doing R/M. There all top tier weapons I don't see a couple %'s of damage being a deciding factor since it won't make or break any content in the game.

There is a HUGE drought on Riftdross/Cinder because there is no benefit to anyone else besides the gil, which they can argue they can get off T3s this needs to be fixed as I suggested making Bismarck/Morta materials part of empy reforge would help out incredibly people would actually join these shouts then and then you can drag LS mates to these and make them sell to you for slightly less than market price :) not to mention the influx would drive prices down a bit and there will be a good market for those mats so they still get something out of it and it comes down to same think as T3s you can talk other people out of their cinders/dross for lower than market price so they can get the quick gil to do their R/Ms.

Dev response does sound like that they would add these mats from morta/bis to be used in empy reforge, They can't have the only mobs in game for this upgrade to continue to be dead it's not an option.

[Zarchery]

I'm not good with crunching the numbers and comparing stuff. How does a 119 Empyrean weapon compare to, say, an Oboro weapon of the same type that you can get for a measly couple of million with about a grand total of 2 hours work?

[Shirai]

I'm not good with crunching the numbers and comparing stuff. How does a 119 Empyrean weapon compare to, say, an Oboro weapon of the same type that you can get for a measly couple of million with about a grand total of 2 hours work?

Well, to be very blunt, there is no comparison.
You're better off getting yourself a few Delve wins and getting an augmentable weapon from there, Skirmish being a decent alternative if you're looking to try your luck or burn a lot of gil with the augment roulette.

As I said before, the margin between an Empyrian weapon and a Relic is very small, under the certain circumstances a Delve weapon can come close.
Except for a few exceptions because of their utility, Oboro is the poor man's choice.

[Olor]

I'm not good with crunching the numbers and comparing stuff. How does a 119 Empyrean weapon compare to, say, an Oboro weapon of the same type that you can get for a measly couple of million with about a grand total of 2 hours work?

Well a 119 empy would cost more than a hundred times more and definitely isn't a hundred times better. But as other poster said, Oboro weapon is more of a stopgap so you have enough accuracy to hit stuff in current content, not something you want to rely on entirely in the long run.

I have several and I love them but other than the Oboro harp (no thanks dharp grind) I'm looking to replace all of them with something better when I get the chance.

[Kincard]

As others have said, many RMEs are still at least comparable to other best options if not better, and the weapon skill update even made some of the garbage ones more viable (Rhongomiant for exmaple, isn't as bad as it used to be because of how they updated Torment). Thankfully though, there's not really any jobs that "need" an RME to function well anymore, unlike the Abyssea/Voidwatch era.

The only ones I'd really consider "overpowered" anymore are Aegis, Daurdabla and arguably the Ergon Weapons.

[Gwydion]

I would like to see HMP/Riftdross/Riftcinder and other empy items, drop from Unity.

(Assuming the content is even viable, fun, etc).

[Protey]

SIMPLE FIX! Make Empy Armor reforge require Sealord Skin (Bismarck drop) or Belladona Sap (Morta drop). would be very nice. so hard to get sealord skins to make Sweordfaetels +1 for my x-hit. 0/20 on that synth ; ;

[Gwydion]

The supply of riftdross/riftcinder is so terrible. :(