Friday, May 22, 2015

Bonus Coin Roll Changes I'd Like to See

I want it and I want it all.  I am starting this post with that clear statement because I know I am asking for a hell of a lot here.  But this is my blog and I am delving into my imagination, so I might as well have some fun with it.  I've seen the reward of gold way to often, more often than I would like and way more often than to believe their is any truth to the statement that there is such a thing as roll protection.

With my unhappiness with rolls I have been thinking what would I like to see to make the bonus coin roll system better.  The actual loot system can be whatever you choose to use, a loot council, a point system, a need before greed, personal, what have you, but the coins, the bonus rolls, that is what I am talking about here.  That is where I would like to see some changes made.

Gold:

First things first, gold is nice, I like gold, who doesn't like it, but at this stage in the game it does not seem like such an amazing reward.  At least not when you win gold off every boss you kill anyway, so gold does not feel like something special from a coin roll.  Not when you can page through your characters and complete a few missions every day and make hundreds of gold even without trying to recruit all treasure hunters.

They need to boost the gold enough so that when you see you won gold it might suck you did not win the item you were looking for but this is a nice chuck of change.  Having a bonus roll give you an amount of gold that most of the time does not even come close to covering the cost of a repair feels lame.

If anything, I would say if you do not win anything it should give you nothing at all.  Giving that tiny bit of gold is more like adding insult to injury.  Hey, you did not win anything, but here, have some gold so you can repair three pieces of your gear, but only three. 

Being blizzard does want to make even loosing rolls feel as a complete loss they give you a consolation prize and they use gold as a measure of that consolation prize. If they choose to keep using this system of reward I believe they need to boost the gold you get from a losing roll to actually feel like something more than pocket change.

My suggestion would be that it reward somewhere between 200 and 500 gold.  It is not exactly a game changing amount of gold but at least it will cover the cost of a few repairs, maybe a stack of food, or some return on your time invested into the raid.  Being blizzard wants to give a consolation prize, this seems like more of a fair consolation prize than giving 27 gold is.

Goodies:

We, or at least I, do not know what the rate is for winning on a roll.  I am just going to throw a number out there even if it not true for an example.  Lets say the chance to win loot is 10%.  Lets also add another layer to what you can win.  A 50% chance.  So 50% of the time you will win a goodie bag.

Although no one would ever be hoping for a bag when they need loot from the boss, it will still at least make it feel like you won something once in a blue moon even if the bag is filled with junk.

I'd suggest that the bag be something like the tank or healer baggie from dungeons, except smarter.  My healer friend keeps getting stamina flasks in his healer bag.  I guess I did not know about the new stacking stamina for better heals build and neither did he so I am not alone, but blizzard seems to love the build as it always gives him a stamina flask.

But I digress, I am thinking about smart bags that will give you an augment rune or two, a flask or two, or some other thing that might be useful to your current spec, or set spec specialization when you open it.  No chance at mounts, no chance at pets, nothing like that, just some raid support items to help you defeat the next boss in hopes you can win something off that one.

Selectable Loot:

Totally disregard the previous two things I said, yes I like them, yes I would like to see them, but they are not the reason I made this post, this suggestion was why this post was written.  I just couldn't have one suggestion so I needed to make some others.  Not saying I don't think the others would be a good change, but this is the one I really want.  This is the one that makes me feel like I am acting all greedy, as I mentioned in the first line.  I want it and I want it all.

I would love to see a change made to bonus rolls so that when you win a piece of loot and it flashes the word loot it stops there.  It does not flicker from that word loot so show you a pair of boots you don't need or the 4th ring you have received tonight, but a selection of all loot you are capable of receiving off that boss in any spec you are capable of playing.

For example, lets say I just killed Operator Thogar and nothing dropped for me so I use a coin and see the loot screen.  It would follow with a selection screen showing me the shoulder tier token, the mail waist and the mail feet, as those are the only three things a hunter can use from that boss.

They will all appear as normal items.  No warforging, no gem slot, no extra stats.  Just basic.  I could then choose what I would like, the shoulder tier piece of course.  When the loot is awarded to you it would then randomly see if it will any any bonus on it, just like the tier token does not tell me if it has any bonus on it until I convert it.  So even if I decided to take the boots, they could still end up with one, two or even all three of the bonuses on it.

This would make the bonus roll really feel like a bonus roll.  I would not mind either of my first two suggestions and would be glad to see them implemented in the game but if this one were to make it into the game I have this feeling I would need to write a love letter to the person who added it to the game because it would be that great.

The excitement of seeing you finally won something after rolling for 6 weeks is great but disappears quickly when you won the one thing you didn't need from that boss.  A bonus roll would really feel like a bonus if you could choose what you won and I would like to see that added.

I would even be willing to sacrifice everything else from the bonus roll system.  If I lose give me nothing at all, keep your 27 gold.  They could even flash up a sign saying, you lose sucker, in big red letters in the center of my screen, because it already feels like that to begin with.  They could do anything they like, just so long as when I do win on a bonus roll it actually feels like I won something.  Is that too much to ask for?

10 comments:

  1. Give a choice of a good amount of gold or valor points so you can save up to buy the piece from a valor vendor NPC.

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    1. Don't you start me on valor. lol

      They just need to add valor and valor gear back into the game.

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  2. Gwyndel - Thunderhorn EU

    First and foremost thank you for sharing your thoughts, I might be silent but I read and appreciate your ramblings.

    Personally I think the whole coin mechanic has lost his purpose. It only seems to induce frustration by being do random, and it has very litle merit as a catch up mechanism. I mean, we are essentially combatting RNG with more RNG right? It doesn't make sense.

    I would really much rather see bosses dropping some more loot as a baseline. And since we are wishlisting; could we have the loot be more aligned with classes/specs that are present?

    From one elf to another: I wish you all the luck in finally beating the RNG and making good guild raidprogression. I, for one share your pain.

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    1. I know exactly what you mean about loot that your raid can't use. It still burns that when they first introduced warforged things as thunderforged in ToT, the first, second and third thunderforged things our raid had ever seen were all for a holy paladin. We had no holy paladins. Do you know how much that sucked? A lot.

      Thanks for reading and thanks for wishing me luck, it seems I need it. We will get there sooner or later, I think this will be the first time since I started playing that I can remember where I will not have killed an end boss before the next tier comes out unless something changes. But I think we can get there. I am thinking we have at least 4 lockouts left. If we extend and work we can do.

      Good luck to you as well.

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  3. I like the idea, but I don't see Blizzard going for the loot window. They are way too into loot being like a lotto ticket these days.
    The goodie bag thing is a great idea that might actually be implemented. Even if they didn't make the bags smarter, someone in your raid can use that stam flask. I'd take that over 27 gold any day. We get more than 27 from missions now.

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    1. Random is killing the game, in my personal opinion. Random is needed in this type of game but sometimes you can just go to far and for me I believe they have reached that point.

      I think the last time my pet relieved itself the pet pooped out more than 27 gold. Darn hyena eats everything I kill, including the coins. ;)

      I agree, we will see the baggie before we see the loot choice.

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  4. Interesting idea.

    I like the idea of bad streak protection, but yeah they must've fumbled the implementation.

    As a consolation prize, they could increase the gold each time you don't get a loot drop off a bonus roll. Exponentially would be idea.

    So after a while you start cheering no loot, but when you finally do get loot it's still a positive (even if it's not an upgrade).
    --
    Regards,

    regardsanon

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    1. I don't think their roll protection is working as it should, if they ever even added it and didn't just say they did to appease us people with horrible luck, which I am starting to believe.

      Actually getting loot that is not an upgrade after not getting anything for so long feels worse than getting gold now. Because you feel you just used up your roll protection on junk. If there is roll protection to begin with that is.

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  5. I agree that the loot system is "broke" and feel it needs a lot of attention. I'd like to see Bliz take the loot offerings a little further...What if they gave us up to eight different choices of loot options, for example the pieces of gear or the 200 gold, or maybe 100 gold and 50 valor, or 100 gold 100 Apexis and 10 flasks, or the goodie bag with a crap load of usable junk. Just so you feel you get something more than 20 gold. Maidens and Blast Furnace are tough fights and that warrants something better than a few gold coins.

    I like what you described too and think anything other than just gold or just the same piece 5 times in a row is way better. But it seems to me Bliz took the easy road this xpac and are going to let RNG remain in place for everything that determines compensation.

    On another note...my guildies were reminiscing about the WoW of yesteryear and wished that Bliz had not homogenized the game like they have. I think what we are seeing in this and last xpacs are going to be the norm going forward. I just don't see them bringing back talent trees. (I like how things worked in Wrath)

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    1. They took the easy RNG road with a lot of things this expansion and consider it to be compelling content. The problem with RNG is that is can sometimes (most times) be frustrating and that is bad for the game over all.

      I think most liked how things were in wrath. Was was not perfect, but it seems to be as close as they ever came to perfect.

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