1% drop rates... a thought expriment.

[Welsper59]

Thank you for the much better laid out argument. It really is appreciated.

It's a matter of time. Most statics are smart enough to know that they'll get to tier 8 faster if they spam the hell out of trying to kill t6 & t7 than spamming the hell out of levi X to upgrade their weapons from i95 to i100. So why make a major detour to spam the hell out of LeviX to acquire a weapon you're just going to ditch before you get to the point where weapon really matters? (tier 9)

In the scenario that Levi mirror weapons are consistent and predictable to obtain, why would an FC want to ignore that fact, and go into harder content without acquiring a noticeable upgrade beforehand that's from a far easier thing? t6 and 7 were not easy when they first came out (and still not easy for many). Unless your idea of the predictability behind mirror weapons is along the lines of killing him 500-1000 times for an item to get it, there's really no reason that FCs looking to do Coil would ignore an easy upgrade from Levi. It's the way your peers work. Any upgrade, if seen as simple to acquire, becomes "mandatory". Likewise, it's apparently mandatory for people that don't do Coil to acquire mirror weapons despite having no purposeful use for it (compared to something like Zenith relic or the regular Levi weapon).

You remember when RPGs used to give you random amounts of stats when you leveled up? That was stupid, most RPGs have removed that random element because there was nothing particularly fun about saving before you leveled up and reloading until you got a "good" stat level up.

You ever hear Yoshi talk about why the bosses tend to do more scripted moves than random ones? It's because he wanted the players to win or lose fights based primarily on their skill. If the fights were too random, you'd end up with easier or harder versions of the fights depending on which skills got used and in which order. So a player might win a fight once because it did the moves in an "easy" sequence and then lose a fight because they got a "hard" sequence. Players do not want to lose fights "just because", they want them to feel fair and that they lost them because they made a mistake. So, while there are some random elements to the fights, most of it is pretty scripted so you get a reasonably consistent experience from one attempt to the next.

Advancement and gear is also important to RPGs. People may kill stuff a few times just because it's fun, but you'll need to have that carrot on this stick (loot) to get them to keep killing it. This way content doesn't get outdated too quickly. By the same token I think having massive RNG is a lazy way to set up the carrot and the stick. When you base advancement (loot) on RNG, and then make that RNG very low, then by the same token, a player's ability to progress is going to vary wildly depending on how RNG treats them. Some RNG is good so that people don't necessarily know exactly what to expect each time. However, too much and you're going to end up with too many players that chase that carrot, never get the stick, and are going to be put off by the process. Which is why I feel it's bad, and really lazy.

See the argument is pertaining to gear acquisition though, not mechanics or stat distribution. Not wanting to lose a fight because of some random ability that you just can't avoid is really worthy of complaint. It really is. Loot is a different matter though. They serve a purpose. It's a tool of progression that is, often, required to succeed (if you're actually aiming to progress in the intended content it's to be used in). You're right about the carrot on a stick bit, but there are other options. If a player willingly chooses to not take part in those other options, they're the cause of their problem, not the devs choice to use RNG on the one option the player wants to use. Ignoring the consequences of your own choices is very... bad. Not just from a game advancement perspective, but from a purely personality one. You're right again that this player will just get fed up chasing the carrot, but that's... expected. This player is willingly choosing not to participate in other content. What's to say they won't quit after they acquire it? They won't do anything meaningful with it that they couldn't do with a lower weapon lol. Mind you, I'm not saying they shouldn't get the item. I'm saying that they don't have much valid complaint because of their intentional neglect of the rest of the game.

When a player understands their own choices, and what it means to make that choice, they'll know what they are in for (generally). If I willingly choose to ignore Coil, I'm making the intentional choice to not be able to acquire the best gear available. I'm aware of the consequence that in order to get gear, I'll have to make do with what's available to me in order to get what I consider endgame for myself. For the more advanced thinkers, you'd also be aware that these alternatives must coincide with balance requirements and the additional time/RNG that is to come with it. I'm choosing the leisure alternative, which depending on how equivalent of gear it is to what's in the hardest content, may be something I never see. If that single piece of gear is the reason I'm playing this game, I never really belonged here to begin with. I wouldn't be the target audience because of how fickle I am as a loyal consumer. Thankfully, despite my lack of interest to do Coil, I'm not quite so fickle as to place all my attention to some piece of gear that wouldn't do much for me but make me kill that generic lv48 mob in the open world a second faster.