Normal mode raids: please don’t settle on this loot system...

[Galgarion]

Actually, everything you just said is why we have Tomestone gear. Which happens to be 10 levels higher, has no RNG, and can be largely obtained at your leisure without slamming your face into a single brick wall.

Cool, cool, but can Joe Everyman get that tomstone gear hotness at a rate of three new pieces in seven days (hat, gloves, boots) like he can with normal raids, because if he caaaan't then that leaves normal modes as a perfectly acceptable filler, like intended

[Darrcyphfeid]

Cool, cool, but can Joe Everyman get that tomstone gear hotness at a rate of three new pieces every seven days (hat. gloves. boots)like he can with normal raids, because if he caaaan't then that leaves normal modes as a perfectly acceptable filler, like intended.

I don't even know what you're trying to argue against, honestly.

What you responded to was what people should start asking themselves once they've started to grow tired of the gear treadmill, which is always the same with a different coat of paint. If "Joe Everyman" isn't tired of the grind, then he doesn't have to and won't want to change anything. That's fine. But if he is growing tired of it, then my post applies even if they ultimately reach a different conclusion.

[Galgarion]

I don't even know what you're trying to argue against, honestly.

I'm not arguing against anything. I'm advocating for normal modes, which you wrote that people have no reason to do. Which is absolutely true, if you have a regular raiding static, millions of gil, and a full mendacity set (not currently possible). I get your point, it's just that it's so one percenter that it doesn't really touch on the average player experience at all.

[RiyahArp]

Actually, everything you just said is why we have Tomestone gear. Which happens to be 10 levels higher, has no RNG, and can be largely obtained at your leisure without slamming your face into a single brick wall. I don't really know why we have gear from the NM raid

You can only gear one class per two months with tome gear; if you want to have an optional class to play in other content, its really only normal mode gear or expensive crafted stuff, or staying at the base ilvl until they release the new 24 man. Like I want to use my tank in casual stuff, you start seeing the power loss over time otherwise.

[Darrcyphfeid]

I get your point, it's just that it's so one percenter that it doesn't really touch on the average player experience at all.

I dunno if you do, 'cause this is very much a 99%er sort of thing. Like, genuinely.

If you're doing Savage content, you're better served with i350 crafted gear (or just rolling with the i340 Creation gear and an i355 Byakko weapon for the first 2~3 fights) and by using your time inside of Savage doing progression instead.
If you're trying to clear Byakko, some i350 normal mode gear might help a tiny bit while learning by slightly increasing HP. But then, once again, any time you spend in NM raid could've just been spent learning Byakko's mechanics better.
If you're not doing Savage and you're not doing Byakko then yay, you've spent X number of hours getting a 10 ilvl bump that you're not going to use on **** all and which will get quickly replaced by the actual welfare gear, i360 Mendacity, in fairly short order anyway.

Wanting multiple jobs at i350 (for whatever reason) aside, this is the sort of stopgap thing that the more you think about it the less appealing it becomes. "Filler" is also fine, but filler implies you're just rolling on everything and taking what you get. Which means you do it once a week, most likely, and generally walk away with items you may or may not need - a thing that would be lessened by the change proposed earlier in the thread.

You can only gear one class per two months with tome gear; if you want to have an optional class to play in other content, its really only normal mode gear or expensive crafted stuff, or staying at the base ilvl until they release the new 24 man. Like I want to use my tank in casual stuff, you start seeing the power loss over time otherwise.

I used to dual main DRG and WAR, so I'm aware.

But I'm also aware of how overpowered for everything non-Savage/EX Primal I was just using the upgraded uncapped Tomestone gear.

[Colt47]

To be frank there isn't really a lot of point to savage or EX fights besides happy cudos points. It's basically a giant time sink designed to widdle time away until the next content push and it's also frustrating content because it usually entails dying repeatedly to a boss for no real gain until the event is complete. The only real reason I can see that makes it worthwhile is maybe glamour, and even then it still would be better served just gaining that glamour in any other way.

Also, this isn't a bash against people who run the content, just that for most people it's way more about how fancy can my character look over how high the iLvL is. Even back in the olden days the real joy of having the raid gear was having the looks. The bonus was basically being a living, walking trophy.

[Mizunoko]

I ran 9 sigmas after this reset and not one of my rolls was above a 40. Now you all can say you don't believe me or whatever, but RNG IS that trashy sometimes, and that's what i think fails most about this game. Others have to work waaaay harder to get something another can get lucky on. I have had consistent bad RNG more than any good RNG, and being one of those people i feel that implementing it into a gearing system is just a moronic idea. If they want us to keep running the content to keep it alive and not complain about shortages of content there are better ways to go about it, perhaps guarantee a token for everyone and set the token trade for the gear at a higher quantity. At least then people will know the gear is guaranteed for them instead of running 10 runs and then when they finally get a high roll someone rolls even higher. To me it just seems like commons sense......but i never knew SE to have any of that anyway so i won't keep my hopes up. They are bad with communication with anyone other than japan too i feel.

[Shurrikhan]

I have played with personal loot and it is the same level of garbage as random gear drops. It's still a gamble to get an item at all and then also to get it for the right slot. In some forms of personal loot whichever drops you don't want to use can't even be passed on to someone else so that they have a better time looting. If you can't get loot for a job you aren't currently playing then personal loot forces you to play lower geared jobs in order to get gear for them. This is not the case with tokens and tomes.

The system we have for normal 8 man raids isn't poor at all. You can get one or more pieces you can use every week, for any job and any slot regardless of what job you run the raid with. You have a 50% chance to get any token per kill and the average amount of runs it takes to get all tokens per week is two per boss, 8 total. This amount of RNG is totally bearable. You can do with even fewer runs if you collect your tokens in a different order than other people. It is a very small amount of work and takes only 4 weeks to complete (per job) when combined with tome gear.

I honestly don't see what issue people could have aside from not getting to select a piece from the loot list after only one weekly kill for all four bosses. I doubt any game has such a generous loot system for their main PvE content.

I'd argue the token system isn't poor, except in that it takes up item slots, but the loot competition following removal of weekly lockouts certainly brings particular disadvantages to the fore. A system that works if and when a player must decide which single token to take will not necessarily (or remotely likely) work well when any player able to take all.

In the same way, normalized or supplemented RNG in personal loot systems allows for very similar rates of acquisition to token- or currency-based gear progression, but still allows for a sense of boss caches. Without any normalization, however, the same issue occurs. It ends up less a matter of the "right" system, as a system done "right". (Personally, I like a mix, slightly favoring currency for a sense of deliberate or player-chosen progression, adapting for certain random drops.) But I do think it's safe to say that the current system is not ideal, and ends up problematic after cap removal.

[AxlStream]

...you'd think a static could organise to run this stuff together each week, so every member can get the pieces from NM they need/want...
You'd also a think that a serious static would rather see crafted&melded gear - unless some Sigma-pieces have godly substats for some classes. Making friends with a crafter or becoming one yourself can really go a long way! And if Sigma is so tedious and horrible to you... why not invest the same time in leveling up a crafter?

Okay, not all groups have alot of hours. I know you're aware of this. We raid 2 hours x 3 days a week. We like those actually being prog stuff not snooze an hour+ on normal trying to get everyone their drops. Also, not every group has this huge network of gatherers/crafters at our beck and call like we're Elysium. There's 8 of us. We play other games. Some of us invested into crafting to get level 70 1 star. Keeping up to date with all the overmelds REQUIRED, is a pain in the buttcheeks. So guess what we did? We went in, in our Deltascape BiS 340 gear after we made sure our time before raid on release was spent on unlocking savage so we could start on time.

If you're "broke af" and you ain't got no crafters, this would seem to imply that you don't use food or stat pots either? You'd think a static would support its members though. /shrug

Eh, I use El Cheapo last tier stuff and no pots. Gets me through and the price drops from this patch are quite appreciated.

[NolLacnala]

...so you'd rather have a loot-system like in normal dungeons? Aka: the chest drops two random pieces of gear, might not even be for your class - might not even be for ANY class in the group! - and repeat that until you dont only see the drop that you want (could take a while...) but also win it?
...

No. I want to not make seven enemies the moment the boss dies because we enter pvp for tokens mode. And while you say "lazy just wants one run win"

THAT IS EXACTLY WHAT THE CURRENT SYSTEM DOES

5% of players "win" on their first run. 90% run1-3 times. Then you have the bottom 5% who are forced to run one fight 15+ times a week for ONE token.

And you think this is okay.