What is the attraction to EM event items that makes them worth so much more than items obtained through Felucca spawns? Once a week there is an event that hands out more items, worth more, than most people could match through Fel spawning in said week. Unless of course there is great luck involved (not in the 'mods on my suit' sense) On top of that, you cannot bring multiple character slots off the same account to come collect your "freebie" from a spawn, whereas you can do this for a majority of event items.
There is a 30% TOTAL chance of a special item drop (10%shared, 15%decorative, 5%unique) with the chances of getting an actual desired item much, much smaller seeing as these drop rates are split among a set of mostly useless items (cleanup points, which rewards have already lost their value seeing as the system has been in place for so long with no end in sight). This number is even more diluted, for personal income ($), when more than one person is working the spawn, but for this thread's sake we will assume we are soloing. Of all the items offered by these spawns, only 5-7 are actually sought after because of the income they can bring. These are mainly the stealth cloak, detective boots (3 diff versions might I add), Glad collar (unique 5% drop), LT sash, and maybe a few other deco pieces or whatever you'd see as suitable as plugging into the 1-3 open slots of my previous 5-7 item claim.
This leads to the problem of prioritizing spawns you would work for money, as a Semidar or Rikki spawn has more valuable items on their loot tables compared to say, a Memphitis, but take longer (40mins-1hr solo, depending on the player) than other spawns to work. Essentially, this means you cannot chain these spawns over and over in hopes of getting an item drop for income because they are constantly watched (unless in the wee hours of the morn) and highly sought after. I point this out because this means you cannot dedicate 100% of your allocated play time to participating in spawn farming.
With that being said...
Scrolls (6 without a protector, 12 with) have lost a lot of their value seeing as the markets are flooded with them, with the exception of magery/mysticism/resist and the VERY few others that carry a nice 7-8mil+ value. The chances of one of these dropping @120 value are very minute, and binding scrolls up to 120 is a long grind seeing as it takes 10 of a specific skill to up a single scroll to the next tier (not necessarily 120, just the next tier). There are 35 skills (someone double check my counting, I attended public school) these drops will be split among that can exceed the 100 cap, most carrying little value. If you were to increase the drop rate, it would only further depreciate the value of these scrolls. If you were to decrease the drop rate, you would only be making the grind that much longer, removing the appeal, as it would only be a temp fix until vendors emptied their inventories...
We will go ahead and take the 5% glad collar drop as an example (it is higher end monetary value and the 5% is a nice round number, and a nicer drop rate than say, an LT sash, which shares the 10% drop with 2-4 other items on all tables offered) I will spend 20 champion runs, statistically, to get a Glad collar worth 14-20mil. This is 13.3 - 20 hours of playtime for a replica drop (40min-1hr solo spawns), 120 scrolls (without protector) or 240 scrolls (with a protector). A vast majority of these scrolls, as previously stated, have little or no value as the market already has plenty to offer. This is NOT taking into account that you have the chance (and a good one when soloing in non middle of the night hours) to lose all of your work seeing as these areas are in Fel ruleset. This is purely uninterrupted spawning.
How can this compare to a CONSISTENT once-a-week handout where you can take 6 different character slots to an event, click on a statue for a reward, and sell 6 of your bottom tier items for 1-2mil? Thats 6-12 mil, per account, for 15 minutes of clicky time compared to 13+ hour grinds for a near equivalent value. This doesn't even take into consideration that you have the chance to get a 100mil item, these are just bottom of the barrel handout items. I should also point out a majority of these events can be done ALONE, whereas Fel spawns can require teamwork. As a matter of fact, the only items off bosses that drop worth near this value are offered almost exclusively to trammel ruleset (Abyss Bosses) Did I mention you can get these handouts, a vast majority of the time, completely uncontested from the safety of a trammel ruleset?
What I am proposing: Alternate the ruleset in which events take place weekly/biweekly so all player role choices can participate.
Why: To bring a deserved value to these items.
It seems to be a common argument that Fel is empty and Trammel is uber popular. So we can all agree that the number of people participating will greatly outnumber those trying to oppose. The weekly handouts/events should benefit ALL playstyles, instead of just catering to one. Does this not seem fair?
Please do not reply to this thread if you can only say "Fel killed this game". There is a difference between "Fel killed this game" and "Fel killed this game for ME". You must distinguish the difference between the two. Such statements are not supported by any evidence, as populations were healthier when Fel:Tram ratios were more even. The only relation of rulesets and populations shows with the implementation of more trammel rulesets came a decline in population.
There is a 30% TOTAL chance of a special item drop (10%shared, 15%decorative, 5%unique) with the chances of getting an actual desired item much, much smaller seeing as these drop rates are split among a set of mostly useless items (cleanup points, which rewards have already lost their value seeing as the system has been in place for so long with no end in sight). This number is even more diluted, for personal income ($), when more than one person is working the spawn, but for this thread's sake we will assume we are soloing. Of all the items offered by these spawns, only 5-7 are actually sought after because of the income they can bring. These are mainly the stealth cloak, detective boots (3 diff versions might I add), Glad collar (unique 5% drop), LT sash, and maybe a few other deco pieces or whatever you'd see as suitable as plugging into the 1-3 open slots of my previous 5-7 item claim.
This leads to the problem of prioritizing spawns you would work for money, as a Semidar or Rikki spawn has more valuable items on their loot tables compared to say, a Memphitis, but take longer (40mins-1hr solo, depending on the player) than other spawns to work. Essentially, this means you cannot chain these spawns over and over in hopes of getting an item drop for income because they are constantly watched (unless in the wee hours of the morn) and highly sought after. I point this out because this means you cannot dedicate 100% of your allocated play time to participating in spawn farming.
With that being said...
Scrolls (6 without a protector, 12 with) have lost a lot of their value seeing as the markets are flooded with them, with the exception of magery/mysticism/resist and the VERY few others that carry a nice 7-8mil+ value. The chances of one of these dropping @120 value are very minute, and binding scrolls up to 120 is a long grind seeing as it takes 10 of a specific skill to up a single scroll to the next tier (not necessarily 120, just the next tier). There are 35 skills (someone double check my counting, I attended public school) these drops will be split among that can exceed the 100 cap, most carrying little value. If you were to increase the drop rate, it would only further depreciate the value of these scrolls. If you were to decrease the drop rate, you would only be making the grind that much longer, removing the appeal, as it would only be a temp fix until vendors emptied their inventories...
We will go ahead and take the 5% glad collar drop as an example (it is higher end monetary value and the 5% is a nice round number, and a nicer drop rate than say, an LT sash, which shares the 10% drop with 2-4 other items on all tables offered) I will spend 20 champion runs, statistically, to get a Glad collar worth 14-20mil. This is 13.3 - 20 hours of playtime for a replica drop (40min-1hr solo spawns), 120 scrolls (without protector) or 240 scrolls (with a protector). A vast majority of these scrolls, as previously stated, have little or no value as the market already has plenty to offer. This is NOT taking into account that you have the chance (and a good one when soloing in non middle of the night hours) to lose all of your work seeing as these areas are in Fel ruleset. This is purely uninterrupted spawning.
How can this compare to a CONSISTENT once-a-week handout where you can take 6 different character slots to an event, click on a statue for a reward, and sell 6 of your bottom tier items for 1-2mil? Thats 6-12 mil, per account, for 15 minutes of clicky time compared to 13+ hour grinds for a near equivalent value. This doesn't even take into consideration that you have the chance to get a 100mil item, these are just bottom of the barrel handout items. I should also point out a majority of these events can be done ALONE, whereas Fel spawns can require teamwork. As a matter of fact, the only items off bosses that drop worth near this value are offered almost exclusively to trammel ruleset (Abyss Bosses) Did I mention you can get these handouts, a vast majority of the time, completely uncontested from the safety of a trammel ruleset?
What I am proposing: Alternate the ruleset in which events take place weekly/biweekly so all player role choices can participate.
Why: To bring a deserved value to these items.
It seems to be a common argument that Fel is empty and Trammel is uber popular. So we can all agree that the number of people participating will greatly outnumber those trying to oppose. The weekly handouts/events should benefit ALL playstyles, instead of just catering to one. Does this not seem fair?
Please do not reply to this thread if you can only say "Fel killed this game". There is a difference between "Fel killed this game" and "Fel killed this game for ME". You must distinguish the difference between the two. Such statements are not supported by any evidence, as populations were healthier when Fel:Tram ratios were more even. The only relation of rulesets and populations shows with the implementation of more trammel rulesets came a decline in population.