Personally Master your loot
Myrmidon
Baron von PuttenhamCalifornia Icrontian
I've been digging through the loot system and trying to decide whether to go with personal or master loot. I thought I'd pose the question to you fine folks.
My current stance is to go with Master Loot.
Arguments in favor of ML
-Guaranteed loot drops - predictable loot means predictable progress.
-Better loot distribution - Ryanfodder won't receive the same healing ring three times in a row when Susurro needs it.
-Better offspec efficiency - If an OS piece drops and nobody needs it for MS, the piece will still be used. Contrast with PL which will only drop lootspec pieces, need 'em or not.
-Better 'extra roll' efficiency - if a piece for two raiders drops, both raiders can spend an 'extra roll' if they're so inclined. If the extra roll awards one raider the piece in question, the dropped piece can then be given to the other raider. Since PL is done before extra rolls, this situation can only get less efficient under PL.
-Better 'useless loot' efficiency - loot that nobody needs can be DE'd for the guild or DE'd for greed to fill your pockets with delicious monies.
-Loot funneling - if a ring is a small upgrade for raider A and a huge upgrade for raider B, the option exists to give it to raider B (note: rolls will still rule, so this situation will occur only if raider B rolls higher OR raider A is generous. Still better than JUST if raider B rolls higher, as in PL)
-No lootspec swapping - multi-spec raiders that forget to set their lootspec before each fight aren't SOL.
Arguments in favor of PL
-Ease - fire and forget.
-No competition with others for gear
-No loot drama
-Chance to receive more than the allotted amount of loot per boss.
-Raiders can put more emphasis on offspecs than main specs if their MS's are fully geared (if an OS piece drops for you in ML, it goes to other raiders via MS before you get a shot at it. If an OS piece drops in PL, you just get it).
I'm sure there are more arguments in favor of PL, please help me think of them.
Meanwhile, my stance is that the arguments in favor of PL are not very strong:
1. Ease: master looting is not hard, this benefit is negligible to me.
2. No competition: In the long run, we'll all get loot. Loot that goes to someone else boosts the chances of loot going to you in the future, because that someone else isn't going to take off and never be seen again.
3. No loot drama: since MoP, I can only think of one instance of loot drama involving a ring, and I wasn't even there for the event. I don't feel like loot drama is a problem in our little group.
4. Chance to receive more than allotted amount of loot: I believe this will be offset by the corresponding chance to receive NO loot on a boss. I imagine the statistics work out so that after 100 raids, PL numbers are roughly equal to ML numbers - though this is just speculation.
5. More emphasis on offspecs: This is definitely a benefit, however, I don't feel it's as good a benefit as it's ML counterpart, 'better loot distribution.' Is also only a benefit for those who have finished gearing their MS.
Now, it may be wise to switch to PL if we have a shit-ton of pugs. I won't lie, I'm legitimately being greedy for our guild in that case. Pugs are less likely to be generous, more likely to have loot drama, more likely to never be seen again with gear we give them. Otherwise, though, I think ML is the way to go.
What do you guys think?
Comments
Based on all our previous raid experience and the arguments made above, I vote for master looting.
Based on Mik getting my loot, I vote on NickLooter
You think (or know?) that there could be NO loot for a given boss across 10-xx people with PL?
I think, I can truthfully say that I have no opinion. I will defer to the more well read individuals such as yourself.
My stance would be early on when everyone needs gear, PL is more efficient (more drops), when we have X% (admittedly unknown) of the raid geared already, matter loot is better.
I guess it depends on unknown variables; so without further info it's hard to decide.
I'm leaning towards agreeing with CannonFodder: for now, PL is probably better; when we're raiding Mythic and maybe even Heroic top-tier content, ML is probably better
PL is thought to give statistically as much loot as ML.
Then ML is better because of intelligent decisions.
I'd love to see the data though.
I've been trawling for data myself, but there doesn't seem to be any. The best I can find is a random gentleman saying "didn't I see that it was 20% once?" with no source (which would fall in line with ML - one piece of gear per five raiders), and the original dev watercooler where they implemented personal loot specifically saying that PL wasn't to change the AMOUNT of loot you get or make it EASIER, just to remove the human drama component from it: http://us.battle.net/wow/en/blog/4736886
PL in not raids is fantastic!
Raid wise; PL is great for normal a little while or while you are doing heroic. PL is okay the first 3ish times you do heroic. There is no PL for mythic.
Ryan doesn't need those boots again does he? Mostly when Bri/yans need it. Sad seeing people get the loot you need and they already have the bis.
i dont have a problem with master loot, but if it is true that loot drops increase on pl, then maybe we should PL while we are all still gearing up...but im cool with whatever.
I I imagine it will be hotfixed back in soon. The response to it being removed has been huge.
Yeah the reactions are pretty stronk
I'm good with whichever is better for the group -- Maejah is good with whichever gets her the phat drops.