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Analyze looting rework and see if it can be reverted

Discussion in 'Suggestions' started by akashsky, Nov 16, 2021.

  1. akashsky
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    akashsky Horntail

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    Throughout ML's history, there have been a few gameplay changes that have negatively impacted the player experience. The changes happened because players were playing in a way that staff wanted to discourage. Here, I want to go through the looting changes from anniversary 2021 to give a brief history on their cause / impact and give an argument for a revert.

    My only request from this suggestion is that staff reassess the situation and decide if it is still worthwhile to keep the below looting changes in maplelegends.

    Looting Rework - Anniversary 2021

    • Meso bags (1000+ mesos) are now only lootable by the killer (items can still be looted by other players, however).
    • Players in [​IMG] Dark Sight or [​IMG] Oak Barrel are no longer able to loot using pets

    Why it happened

    Players were widely using a type of mule called a sweeper mule in order to loot the items farmed by their mages. It was an innovation that was first brought to the meta by moomins in his skele leech guide. Essentially, this mule allowed a mage player to continuously kill monsters and loot simultaneously, which means they farmed a significant amount more than their counterpart mage who would need to stop killing monsters in order to loot the drops.

    At the time of this change, there was a general concern among staff that players were generating too many mesos. Stopping the use of sweeper mules was one of the ways that they hoped to curve the rapid inflation brought out by advanced farming metas.

    What happened as a result

    In response to the new looting restrictions, players who were dead set on using sweepers had to adapt and stop using mesos up when farming (because sweeper mules cannot loot meso bags). Furthermore, they swapped from using lv 20 thiefs to using 4th job warriors with stance or high level thieves with shadow shifter. The warriors with stance / high hp and the thieves with high avoid didn't care about taking touch damage from the monsters being farmed, so they could continue sweeping as normal. For this type of player, they suffered a loss of perhaps 1-2m per hour due to not using mesos up.

    Other players adapted by optimizing their loot cycles when farming on their mage. By buying mounts (or getting to 140% speed), extra pets, and completing the kentas advice questline (a quest that makes your pets move as fast as you) these players drastically reduced the amount of time required to loot drops. In the end, sure, they took a hit from not being able to use sweepers, but the hit was probably something around 5% less mesos per hour.

    A few players adapted by using the above strategy in combination with multiple mages. Using the "mage sweeper" strategy, a multimage player is able to loot all the items their mages farm without missing a single spawn wave. For the multimage players, the looting changes actually had no impact on their income, whereas it lowered the incomes of the single mage / sweeper mule players.

    Why the nerf should be reverted

    The looting changes have clearly not fixed our inflation problem as white scrolls and chaos scrolls prices have continued to soar regardless. Furthermore, the nerf is regressive where it hurts casual players far more than the hardcore multimage players. Essentially, this is a custom change that feels more like a bug than a feature and doesn't seem to have had any positive impact on the economy.

    Of course, I do not have access to maplelegends economic server data, so the above conclusion could be wrong. It is merely my conclusion based on my observation as a participant in the maplelegends economy. Please consider whether or not maplelegends would be better off if the loot changes were reverted.
     
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  2. Nise
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    Nise Supervisor Staff Member Supervisor Game Moderator

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    Going to play devil's advocate here, but couldn't it be argued that while not the overall profitability was not affected by much, the aforementioned meta shifts promoted healthier gameplay by necessitating the use of meso sinks?

    While if we compare just the per hourly profit it might be true that the difference might be only ~5%, but from a more wholistic perspective, the meta shifts mentioned seem to utilize more meso sinks than previously.

    Previously:
    1) meso up created more raw mesos
    2) using thieves with dark sight meant barely any mesos spent on pots
    3) only mesos being "burned" / "sunk" from the economy were mage MP pots

    Meta shift:
    1) no more reliance on meso up means less raw mesos generated
    2) using warriors that can tank instead means they get hit and at least some mesos "burned" by purchase of pots (opposed to previously where there was 0 spending)
    3 a) buying a hog for 120% speed is a 20 mil meso sink
    3 b) buying a silver mane for 140% speed is a 20 + 50 mil = 70 mil meso sink
    4) [ not mentioned by akashskyakashsky ] shift from purely raw meso generating maps being farmed to maps that also include commodities that are traded between players, such as Temple of Time with Pieces of Time, Helm Dex scrolls, and more gachapon tickets. This means less raw mesos being generated and more player-to-player trade, which also is subject to the 2.5% taxation.
    5) mage MP pot costs remain the same

    If we were to re-introduce sweeping, wouldn't players continue using the optimized strategies that they've developed? Making it perhaps even higher than the perceived ~5% that's been observed? Similarly, wouldn't players continue using multimages and thereby the income disparity of single mage vs. multi mage remain the same or get worse?

    Looting changes was meant to bring our server's inflation rate to a manageable amount, and ensure that all goods and exchanges didn't suffer from inflationary prices. Looking specifically at just white scroll & chaos scrolls might result in an inaccurate portrayal of server health. Additionally, there are other factors that need to account for the trends in ws/cs prices that need to be remembered:
    1) due to the Halloween event being skipped this year, seasonal supply of white scroll/chaos scrolls have been disrupted, which in turn would partially explain recent change in prices
    2) due to the Prestigious Coin system feedback thread, it seems some players have jumped to conclusions about how the system will be upon launch & when it'll be launched, leading to the return of purchases based on speculation.

    Just food for thought from another perspective~
     
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  3. OP
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    akashsky
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    akashsky Horntail

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    I do agree to your points that the looting changes did infact limit the mesos coming into the server overall. However, from my perspective as a player I don't think that it was significant enough at all to affect the economy. Of course, I could be wrong, but I can't know this, only you as a staff member can, because you have access to the server data regarding meso generation, etc.

    If after analyzing the data, you believe that the looting changes have had a positive economic impact on the server, then so be it - leave things as they are. However, from my perspective as a player, the looting changes are something that have negatively impacted the player experience and have not had any significant impact on the economy. I just want you to reassess and make sure that the net benefit of the looting changes exceeds the inconvenience caused to players.
     
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  4. -ovv
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    -ovv Horntail

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    I'll chime in and say that my warrior sweeper spends maybe 2 or 3 honsters an hour if I'm playing sloppy. This is largely due to the fact I use a bishop and have heal as part of my rebuff rotation.

    Personally, the only way the sweeper nerf impacted my total meso production (besides not being able to use Meso Up now) is that it lowered my desire to play altogether, so my time in this game has just been reduced. I used to play Maple because I enjoyed grinding mindlessly and efficiently. It was therapeutic. Lately, it hasn't felt like such.
     
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  5. TORONTOTOKYO
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    TORONTOTOKYO Windraider

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    My turn to chime in, the only way the sweeper nerf impacted my total meso production is that it lowered my desire to play altogether, so my time in this game has just been reduced. However, the reduction in game time is largely due to inflation than the sweeper nerf. LOL
     
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  6. Alyosha
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    Alyosha Skelegon Retired Staff

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    You got Akash to buy a bunch of mounts which means the crisis is averted and we can go back to old sweepers
     
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  7. fael
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    fael Nightshadow

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    It's just a different way to farm, but still the most efficient one, if that's what you're looking for.
    I don't have an opinion about it, but I agree with reconsidering this patch, based on economic impact.
     
  8. -ovv
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    -ovv Horntail

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    I'm not complaining about the new strategies employed to farm efficiently. I'm actually quite fond of people adapting to changes, but I find it quite ironic that the changes just pushed people to develop even more degenerate strategies of generating mesos without really tackling the problem head-on. Meso inflation continues, and the White Scroll production has become even more closed-off to multi-mage farmers (higher rate of meso and gacha generation).

    All this change really did was nerf certain meta maps like Skeles and Petris from their clean rotations by forcing the mages to loot. And as Akash mentioned, the impact it had to overall meso production hasn't been very apparent.

    I'd be pretty confident in saying most players* would probably have preferred a more direct nerf to meso production rather than the nerf to sweeping. Alas, staff/balance team continues to cater to casual/single-client players.

    *I think the problem with a lot of balance considerations is that each player is not the same, but certain types of players carry more weight than others. Balancing around people who tend to quit before getting to end-game is kind of pointless, don't you think?
     
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  9. fael
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    fael Nightshadow

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    I don't know if I understood well, but if that's what you asked I don't think the server should be balanced around few end game players. A reason for white scrolls being that price is because there aren't enough players farming. Where are gs2 grinders? Event grinders? Even leech sellers?
    In my point of view, I'd prefer to see a server full of players everywhere instead of perfecting my new weapon, so I actually prefer updates and balance changes that benefit most of our players.
    I'm not saying it's not important. I just probably care less than you.
    Early sorry if that wasn't what you meant LOL.
     
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  10. -ovv
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    -ovv Horntail

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    Nah I'm saying that the server is constantly being changed in attempt to phase out a few sweaty/end-game players but these indirect changes are inadvertently affecting the entire server. I've always said this - what new players? The majority of the people that continue to play this game are the ones that have aligned themselves with meta playstyles like selling leech, mage farming, etc., so constantly breaking the meta to serve for 'fair and balanced' single-client gameplay only serves to drive older, established players away.

    On the point of serving players everywhere - the biggest travesty of this server is that the entirety of 1st, 2nd, and 3rd job classes do not exist due to the meta of washing, and all of the gameplay is concentrated at the top between the mage farmers, mage leechers, and bossers. There needs to be some rework to leech's cost/time-effectiveness and int-mule grindability, or - there needs to be a complete reworking of how HP washing works. I think the former is a much easier change to implement and a much more fun one overall.
    If people actually played their 1st, 2nd, and 3rd job classes, a market of weapons that are non-end game would emerge.
     
  11. fael
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    fael Nightshadow

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    I believe more people join during events, for example. They don't need to play forever like end game players. They just need to be around. It helps the white scroll market, for example.
    When covid players joined, cs was 65m (right when I started). I remember I didn't know it was more expensive months ago until someone told me. It means more players decrease ws/cs prices. They quitted months after, but they "helped" this market. Now, seems all covid players that continued playing and all older players are looking to buy ws/cs at the same time, but there's not enough people gacha-ing them. So I feel like if next patches focus more on bringing new players or even quitted people back and also bring us prestigious coins, everyone would be happy. But seems we aren't on topic anymore lol.
     
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  12. -ovv
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    -ovv Horntail

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    My personal thoughts as to why the sweeper nerf was bad - I just think it was implemented poorly and there could have been other ways to go about it.

    If the goal is to reduce meso production over all, couldn't the drop rates for mesos on mage ultimates be considered? That would be a nerf that doesn't impact game play itself but the direct production of mesos instead.

    If sweeping was too afk/easy in dark sight/barrel with pet, why couldn't looting be impacted by forcing non-killers to manually loot instead? Why go through the trouble of coding specific lootability between bags/non-bags?

    Why should income disparity between single mage vs. multimage be regulated?

    Which goods have been suffering from inflationary prices? The problem is that in the current state of this server, there is only ever demand for end-game items. A non-existent 1st-3rd job class makes 95% of this server's goods worthless.
     
  13. shck
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    shck Timer Retired Staff

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    What they fail to realize about most players that are here to stay:
    [​IMG]
     
  14. TORONTOTOKYO
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    TORONTOTOKYO Windraider

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    Add to the fact that not all jobs are equal, decreasing the worth of >50% of this server's goods. good luck selling those timeless eq for shitty classes.
     
  15. Jaewonnie
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    Jaewonnie Capt. Latanica

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    ...make ws farmable from pq o.o
     
  16. zeroxlr
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    zeroxlr Windraider

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    I want to make a note that regardless of meso earned by people with less than 2billion mesos...

    Inflation of items such as scrolls has nothing to do with the general population. Especially since the aggregate wealth is owned by a small percentage of players whom often choose to Owl Mule and buy out all the items in a particular category for the purpose of resales at higher prices to drive up inflation.

    To those resellers, they have to power to control the economy of ML, since it's a free market without controlled on heavily contested items.

    Instead of hurting the general population by preventing everyone from making mesos, by setting Standardized NPC prices to buy HOT ITEMS, then there's less of an incentive for Hoarders/Resellers to drive up those prices artificially.

    For example:
    XBow 30%s for WA was only 400k average (2020-early 2021).... now that Hoarder/Resellers recently have bought out the whole free market and set the price to 2m per scroll (a few weeks ago 2021)

    Polearm 30%s for WA was also 400k avg (2020-Aug 2021)... now its 1.2-2m per scroll.

    I wholeheartedly think that certain goods should be Sold by NPC, such as WS/CS since it actively allows Staff to control the contested items (instead of Prestigious Coins... since coins will be hoarded too).

    Since technically with 1.3k-2k number of WS owned by a few people in the whole server as of right now, there's been a reverse of Power-Creep:
    - a Power-Drain

    So.... whatever means to control endgame content access due to the Power-Creep issue as of right now, is having the opposite effect, a power-drain.

    There should be more perfect items in the market by now, but there isn't.

    TLDR:
    Hot Items using RNG (WS/CS/Pcoins) = power-drain/hoarding/resold higher = bad

    NPCs Selling Hot Items = controlled market = good
    - can also make it like the Magic Seed Trade-In method to lower npc prices with Boss Etc.
    .
    .
     
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  17. TORONTOTOKYO
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    TORONTOTOKYO Windraider

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    Power creep by draining you. KEK.
     
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  18. Cak33
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    Cak33 Headless Horseman

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    I have to disagree with this. Main reason why CS and WS are locked behind gacha and exclusively only player-based trades is to regulate the amount of supplies, making total number of perfect weapons limited in game.

    by having an NPC selling them, u introduce an unlimited supply of these scrolls. Any multi-mage farmers can easily create perfect weapons and I believed its against the staff's interest.
     
  19. zeroxlr
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    zeroxlr Windraider

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    I understand that you'd disagree.... but obviously the outcome is not the ideal that we both know should've happened.

    There's a "limited supply" of those scrolls but not due to gacha, since hoarders are actively buying out the market and controlling it.

    With the current 1,200 to 2,000 amount of WS/CS owned by a few people in the server currently, its being hoarded. The extreme of what Staff wanted.

    Staff wants limit supply WS/CS = stop power-creep = balanced power

    BUT Hoarders/Resellers either hold onto WS/CS or inflate FM = power-drain

    Meaning that CS/WS are unregulated, since FM prices are inflating, and there is less than the liquidated supply necessary to keep the market balanced.

    If it were regulated, it'd be direct staff control, rather than having a quick fix like a coin that can be hoarded once again.

    Multi-mage farming OR people playing for +3-4 years and have funds and can buy out the market currently already, but they actually play the game.

    Hoarders/Resellers dont care about perfecting weapons, they just want to make more mesos to play the FM Economy rather than play the game.

    The micro-economy needs more direct control to stop Hoarders/Resellers through meso sink options, rather than hurting people that just play the game (farming/grinding)
    .
    .
     
  20. Cak33
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    Cak33 Headless Horseman

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    It's true that hoarders making limited supplies of WS/CS. However in my opinion its more important to tackle the root cause of these rather than trying to do bandaid fixes.

    I admitted that I have suggested bandaid fixes, which eliminates trading of CS/WS (converting existing CS/WS to untradable, non-expiring coupons, and making all redeemed coupons into tradable, but 1-year expiry scrolls)

    hoarding the CS/WS to inflate the economy is only one of the many reasons. There are legitimate reasons for hoarding these stuffs.

    1) You can't buy perfect weapons with mesos due to the ~2b meso limit per character.
    2) You cannot earn more mesos if you do not liquidate your mesos to WS.

    and ofc, the other 'loophole' reasons such as inflation, tax evasion, etc which imo has to be solved.
     
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