Mount/Minion Loot System Flaw

Hello FFXIV Team!
I have been directed here by a Supervising GM to post my experience with a massive flaw in the way vanity items such as Primal Mounts and Minions are distributed via the current looting system within the game. I'm sure you may already be aware of this, but unfortunately I have fallen prey to it out of a mistake purely of my own accord.

I understand that this may not be a 'bug' to be filed here, nor does it follow the specific template rule, but this is the error message I receive when trying to submit a post in the 'Not A Bug Report' section of the forum: http://i.imgur.com/xtca8ng.png

Experience:
Last week, I had joined a party via Party Finder with a FC companion to 'farm' the Ramuh fight instance. Since she had been with me for a while now helping me obtain my Markab mount, I thought I would continue to join her to see if we could finally get her one. The party we had joined, was determined to fill out the entire party with Markab mounts, and I declared to them that I was already in the possession of one. With three adventurers left to obtain theirs, another Whistle dropped, and out of pure tiredness or what have you, I mistakenly rolled Need on a Whistle, and won, a mount that I already own. Now, I have a Markab mount in my 'Mount Guide', and a Markab Whistle in my inventory that is essentially rendered useless to me, and should have been claimed by another player who earned it.

I admitted my mistake to the party, and they were very understanding about it. They directed me to the GM services, and we continued to complete the instance over and over to claim more whistles. The only person that left that night without a whistle, was my FC companion, because the party was under the impression that GM services could remedy the issue. A complete video recording of the entire scenario can be found at this link, where at roughly 30 minutes in is where I made my mistake on rolling. To be absolutely clear, both me and my FC companion were in this party for its entirety;

http://www.twitch.tv/cloudstrife_xx/c/6622026

Below is my conversation with SE's in-game automated support system. Following this, I requested to speak to a Supervising GM.

http://i.imgur.com/u9t95kD.jpg

Below is the conversation I had with a Supervising GM, which was very pleasant, and has some suggestions on how this particular situation can be remedied:

http://i.imgur.com/qfBEHjX.jpg

Design Flaw:
As a looting system for items that are very rare and have nothing to do with player progression, this system is entirely flawed and is subject to player harassment. If I had perhaps declared to the party that I had already used a Whistle, and out of harassment or spite, rolled a second one only to destroy it in front of them, I'm sure this would have been handled a LOT differently.

Primal mounts, and Crystal Tower minions run on an item system that is lotted, and once lotted, you 'use' the item to obtain the mount/minion which is transferred to a different player inventory, thus freeing up the pre-requisite item from your main inventory. The game then decides that you are no longer in possession of that item, and allows the player to roll on it again when they continue to run the instance. Players should not be allowed to roll these items once they have been claimed, and transferred to the mount/minion 'guide' inventory. This is an entirely different matter from gear and upgrade materials.

I know there has been some issues in the past regarding players 'accidentally' looting items that they wish to be sent to another player, and regarding raid drops and gear progression items, this can be a very delicate subject in order to not be used as a player exploit. This is why I understand that the GM has told me that an item transfer cannot be performed. However, in this circumstance (refer to my conversation with the Supervising GM) I find it harmless to have this item transferred to the other player, as it is purely vanity and they had been present with me in the party during its lot. I can picture a situation where a GM would supervise the destruction of my second whistle, and have one sent to the other player via Mog Mail as many of the Veteran Rewards are sent. This however is a quick solution to an extremely flawed vanity loot system. I understand it was my own mistake that generated this unique situation, but it is still a design flaw and should be looked into more closely for now and for future vanity items.

Thank you for taking the time to look over my report, and enjoy the weekend!

Didn't they talk about a system that allows you to trade an item once that dropped in an instance after obtaining it in one of the live letters? I could be wrong and in the end that will do nothing if someone decides to be a brick.

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Primal mounts, and Crystal Tower minions run on an item system that is lotted, and once lotted, you 'use' the item to obtain the mount/minion which is transferred to a different player inventory, thus freeing up the pre-requisite item from your main inventory. The game then decides that you are no longer in possession of that item, and allows the player to roll on it again when they continue to run the instance. Players should not be allowed to roll these items once they have been claimed, and transferred to the mount/minion 'guide' inventory.

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And that's the only fix to it to distribute stuff fair x.x

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Originally Posted by Magistrella

Didn't they talk about a system that allows you to trade an item once that dropped in an instance after obtaining it in one of the live letters? I could be wrong and in the end that will do nothing if someone decides to be a brick.

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As it currently stands, this system does not exist. The GM I spoke to also said that it is not possible at this time to do an item transfer, as their policies are very strict. They can only 'restore' an item to a player's inventory if it was at one point in there. Essentially, if my FC companion had rolled the item, won it, and then accidentally discarded it, then it could be restored. However in this scenario, I don't see why SE cannot remedy the situation, as intentional 'ninja' looting is taken extremely seriously in this game as verbal contract.

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Originally Posted by Magistrella

And that's the only fix to it to distribute stuff fair x.x

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How is this the only 'fair' way to distribute loot of this nature? Systematically, a player should not be able to roll these pre-requisite items once they have them because they are unique and on-time use. Let me be clear. They can keep the same loot distribution system, just do not allow players who have CLAIMED the pre-requisite item in the character's lifetime, to roll it again.

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Originally Posted by white_mage

How is this the only 'fair' way to distribute loot of this nature? Systematically, a player should not be able to roll these pre-requisite items once they have them because they are unique and on-time use.

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I was referring to the last part of what i quoted - as you said: the only way to fix it is to prevent people from rolling on an item at all after they obtained the pet/mount aquired with it ^^


And yes i know that system doesnt exist (yet), and i figured if it was anything like in XI you'd have no chance to get it transferred to someone else :/

On a sidenote: If you ever need to use the item restoration, make sure you make it count. The first item you'll get back without much trouble, if you should ever need a second make sure you document precisely.

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Originally Posted by Magistrella

I was referring to the last part of what i quoted - as you said: the only way to fix it is to prevent people from rolling on an item at all after they obtained the pet/mount aquired with it ^^

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Ah apologies, I thought you were referring to the current system.

Yeah, my heart almost stopped today when I queued up for Garuda ex. I just need nightmare and one dropped. I rolled a 93, thought I had it, someone else rolls a 97 of course, then leaves. We pf again, same player comes back and says oh I needed xanthos and I'm like omg so you didn't need nightmare? :( But, they said they did, but also needed the Garuda pony. That run, rolls on xanthos, wins that and leaves. Wish I had that luck >.< please make these unrollable/needable for people who already have them. While the drop rates may have increased, the parties capable of farming them and the chances of rolling highest among 7 others (cuz these are the only people who are willing to run this content when people already have their pony) has not. It's too much of a waste leaving this open for harassment or needing by mistake by accident.

I also agree that it should no longer be possible to roll on a pony or minion if it is already in your possession. There is no purpose to it, other than making harassment and potential mistakes possible.

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Originally Posted by Its_Elodie

Yeah, my heart almost stopped today when I queued up for Garuda ex. I just need nightmare and one dropped. I rolled a 93, thought I had it, someone else rolls a 97 of course, then leaves. We pf again, same player comes back and says oh I needed xanthos and I'm like omg so you didn't need nightmare? :( But, they said they did, but also needed the Garuda pony. That run, rolls on xanthos, wins that and leaves. Wish I had that luck >.< please make these unrollable/needable. While the drop rates may have increased, the parties capable of farming them and the chances of rolling highest among 7 others (cuz these are the only people who are willing to run this content when people already have their pony) has not. It's too much of a waste leaving this open for harassment or needing by mistake by accident.

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No one essentially 'needs' any of these drops. In this case, these are two different mounts. Unless the player had already obtained them beforehand, they were completely within their rights to roll on both of them. This is how it is designed and I believe its working completely as intended, its just the nature of grinding for a rare item in a game where everybody wants one.

I didn't intend for this post to become a thread for people discussing how 'lucky' or 'unlucky' people are on the matter. While I am sorry for your seeming 'unluckiness', I wanted to bring it to the attention of the team that the ability to roll a unique vanity item twice exists in the game.

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Originally Posted by white_mage

No one essentially 'needs' any of these drops. In this case, these are two different mounts. Unless the player had already obtained them beforehand, they were completely within their rights to roll on both of them. This is how it is designed and I believe its working completely as intended, its just the nature of grinding for a rare item in a game where everybody wants one.

I didn't intend for this post to become a thread for people discussing how 'lucky' or 'unlucky' people are on the matter. While I am sorry for your seeming 'unluckiness', I wanted to bring it to the attention of the team that the ability to roll a unique vanity item twice exists in the game.

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I Just wanted to take a moment to thank you for your courteousness in proof reading my previous rushed post on my iphone that I didn't have time to proof read because my church service started. I edited it :) I'm going to ignore the callous attitude and say again that I agree with your post. SE, please implement a system where if you already have one of the specific primal mounts that you can't roll need/greed again so people who don't that specific mount already have a chance at obtaining the mount. People who already have the mount can use this as a form of harassment towards other players who don't by needing on it purposely, or accidentally as well.

You have a nice day now, OP.

I just love our community in game and on this forum, so much love.

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Originally Posted by Its_Elodie

I Just wanted to take a moment to thank you for your courteousness in proof reading my previous rushed post on my iphone that I didn't have time to proof read because my church service started. I edited it :) I'm going to ignore the callous attitude and say again that I agree with your post. SE, please implement a system where if you already have one of the specific primal mounts that you can't roll need/greed again so people who don't that specific mount already have a chance at obtaining the mount. People who already have the mount can use this as a form of harassment towards other players who don't by needing on it purposely, or accidentally as well.

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Apologies, I didn't mean to come off this way. There are a plethora of threads on the Official Forums and other social forum networks that are filled with players complaining about how unlucky they are, and share their horror stories about how the RNG calculations have it out for them. I've been there, trust me. I just didn't want this semi-official report to turn into that, because it isn't the place for it. My particular example is unique in the sense that it draws reference to a small flaw in the way this vanity loot is distributed, and doesn't have anything to do with the way the RNG is operating. Thanks again for the response and gl on the rest of your runs!

Greetings,

We're planning to make it so players who already own minions and mounts cannot need or greed on them by mistake.