is personal loot the least of all evils?

[IxilaFA]

You don't run into voidstep to wipe, you jump off. Better in every way. I agree that when a wipe has been called people may stop moving and let mechanics kill them, but that doesn't account for 200+ hits

Are we really going to argue the best way to wipe? I don't usually jump off the edge because I don't want to risk not getting mass rezzed, myself. But considering the difficult time my guild has getting people to die once a wipe is called, I'm willing to be half the people stop altogether which, with the way void fiends bounce around, could cause 10 hits in a single wipe.

You know that still counts as getting hit, right? Melee can avoid stepping in purple as easily as a hunter can, it is, after all, what you called

Oh I'm aware that melee can avoid getting hit by not tunneling. And considering if a void fiend jumps into melee and hits all of them at once, that's like 6 hits right there. So if you want to count one errant jump as 6 accidental hits you're within your rights, but that's all caused by only one person making a terrible mistake (whoever kited the fiend too close to melee)

I don't know many guilds progressing that just call a pull because 3 people are dead, but IDK how your guild does stuff. But even using your arbitrary cutoff of not counting anything that happens after 3 deaths, your guild still got hit by voidstep 57 times. Which is enough to illustrate my point, which was that

Yes we usually call wipes pretty early, so long as we have mechanics and timing down.

Theres also something incredibly wonky with the way warcraftlogs.com tracks voidstep which you would have noticed had you taken more than five seconds to look beyond just pulling up the data and running triumphantly to the forums to try and prove me wrong. As I mention in my edit above, it says I got hit 3 times in one attempt, yet all 3 times happened at the same moment. I also find it hard to believe that our fel tank got hit 15 times in a single night when that would have led to 15 wipes right off the bat. We definitely would have noticed if something like that was happening.

All that goes to say that you can't make a determination like that by looking at logs out of context. You don't know our strat, you don't know when we wipe (I can't even look at those wipes and tell definitively when a wipe was called), you don't see anything beyond just a number on a screen. And if you want to make determinations about people in my raid group based on numbers on a screen I can't stop you, but I think it's a little silly.

was laughable hyperbole.

Anyway sorry if it felt I was taking shots, I just prefer facts to hyperbole.

Of course it was hyperbole! It was a statement made purely to show that if someone really got hit by a voidstep 13 times in a single night, they should have been sat long before that point. Do you disagree with this point of view?

[Jeathebelle]

Looking at it further, all 3 hits were at the exact same time. I'm not sure about the wonky way WCL tracks voidstep, but getting hit by it once in 50+ attempts isn't anywhere close to awful.

The fact you can't read logs is ironic, considering you said my looking at voidstep hits was the wrong way to look at logs, but I'll break these down for you if you want.
Not counting anything that happened after 3 deaths, on Jan 7, you got hit once on wipe 26, 1:17 into the fight. And then you got hit 2 separate times on wipe 29, at 1:08 and 1:10.

And I wouldn't have brought it up except that again, it's amusing that you said I was using logs wrong, when you have demonstrated not being able to use them at all. WCL wasn't being wonky or counting them wrong, you were.

[Jeathebelle]

Theres also something incredibly wonky with the way warcraftlogs.com tracks voidstep which you would have noticed had you taken more than five seconds to look beyond just pulling up the data and running triumphantly to the forums to try and prove me wrong. As I mention in my edit above, it says I got hit 3 times in one attempt, yet all 3 times happened at the same moment. I also find it hard to believe that our fel tank got hit 15 times in a single night when that would have led to 15 wipes right off the bat. We definitely would have noticed if something like that was happening.

Nope, as I just explained, you just aren't reading the logs right.

- - - Updated - - -

Actually we could have easily sat valimare since I had two healers on the bench for most of progression.

I can't prove it to you, but I can definitively state that he did not cause 5 voidstep to trigger in 14 attempts because we would have noticed. Why does Warcraftlogs.com show that? Not sure, but it also shows people getting hit 3 times in one second. So I take the logs with a grain of salt.

Again, you're misreading the logs.

[IxilaFA]

Nope, as I just explained, you just aren't reading the logs right.

- - - Updated - - -



Again, you're misreading the logs.

Hey everyone, look, Ix can't read logs right!!

Good enough for you?

Hey question for you. Do you honestly think logs give you the full picture of what happened during the fight?

[Ahovv]

Actually we could have easily sat valimare since I had two healers on the bench for most of progression.

I can't prove it to you, but I can definitively state that he did not cause 5 voidstep to trigger in 14 attempts because we would have noticed. Why does Warcraftlogs.com show that? Not sure, but it also shows people getting hit 3 times in one second. So I take the logs with a grain of salt.

Interesting that you deleted this part.

"I can't prove it to you!" but you can say whatever you want and just ignore the logs when they don't work in your favor, apparently.

Yeah. Earlier you claimed you were done talking to me; that turned out as lie. I'm done talking with you since you're going to blatantly ignore your own evidence. It's impossible to win an argument against a delusional individual.

Goodbye, and good luck with that guild.

[Jeathebelle]

Hey everyone, look, Ix can't read logs right!!

Good enough for you?

Well since I proved it, and you are forced to admit it, yes, that is good enough

Hey question for you. Do you honestly think logs give you the full picture of what happened during the fight?

Absolutely. That's precisely what the logs do.

In fact, you just gave really strong evidence for why logs are a much better picture of what happened than anyone's recollection or impressions. "I cant prove it but X definitely didn't happen" when logs in fact show it did, kinda demonstrates why we rely on logs.

[IxilaFA]

Interesting that you deleted this part.

"I can't prove it to you!" but you can say whatever you want and just ignore the logs when they don't work in your favor, apparently.

Yeah. Earlier you claimed you were done talking to me; that turned out as lie. I'm done talking with you since you're going to blatantly ignore your own evidence. It's impossible to win an argument against a delusional individual.

Goodbye, and good luck with that guild.

I deleted it because I was wrong about the 3 times part.

Flat out: my guild isn't a hardcore progression guild. We do give more leeway for people making mistakes. I'm not going to sit here and argue with you why players are in my guild and allowed to continue progression attempts.

Good diversion though, you were successful in getting people to stop focusing on your hypocritical approach to rewarding loot. You got me!

- - - Updated - - -

Well since I proved it, and you are forced to admit it, yes, that is good enough



Absolutely. That's precisely what the logs do.

In fact, you just gave really strong evidence for why logs are a much better picture of what happened than anyone's recollection or impressions. "I cant prove it but X definitely didn't happen" when logs in fact show it did, kinda demonstrates why we rely on logs.

I disagree, but I guess that's why you continue to keep responding. I think logs are a critical tool when you're in the group and you wipe and go "how can we avoid that next time." I think logs are a good comparison tool. I think logs are good for looking at someone and seeing what spells they are doing, why they are doing lower DPS or HPS.

So I can't prove that a person in my guild didn't get hit 5 times during progression. I can't explain it. Maybe he did and it escaped my notice. Maybe we had wipes called early. These are unknown factors to me. All I know is that if one person in my group was consistently causing problems, I would have noticed it and would have taken the proper actions. That's all I can say for myself. I can't pretend to know everything about my group and I can't pretend to remember every attempt and why we wiped and who caused it.

So there's my point of view on it.

[Jeathebelle]

So I can't prove that a person in my guild didn't get hit 5 times during progression. I can't explain it. Maybe he did and it escaped my notice. Maybe we had wipes called early. These are unknown factors to me. All I know is that if one person in my group was consistently causing problems, I would have noticed it and would have taken the proper actions. That's all I can say for myself. I can't pretend to know everything about my group and I can't pretend to remember every attempt and why we wiped and who caused it.

So there's my point of view on it.

What's interesting is that literally a week ago you were talking about confirmation bias. The cognitive bias you are displaying is a close relative. Everyone tells himself a story about himself, and typically, he is the hero of his own story. E.g. "All I know is that if one person in my group was consistently causing problems, I would have noticed it." That belief about oneself leads to self-delusion.

As you said a week ago:

You can't make a claim like "confirmation bias doesn't work on me" because confirmation bias is a fundamental flaw in human processing...

The only way you can disprove confirmation bias in this situation and prove there is something wonky going on is to actually keep meticulous records ...

Couldn't have said it better myself. That is exactly why we have logs--"meticulous records"--and use them in evaluating performance.

Anyway, it's been fun but we're way off topic. Cheers.

[keqe]

MMO-champion, please never change.

OT: I highly dislike DKP/EPGP systems. It might be just my experience, but they seem very exploited. People don't "roll" on upgrades to save points for "what they want", making a good upgrade go to someone who barely gets anything out of it. The system basically punishes for upgrades and rewards hoarders who pass upgrades to gain something they personally want.

Well used loot council is the greatest loot choice in my opinion. Saying this as one who has never been an officer. Personal loot should be left for pugs to avoid drama with strangers.

[Socialhealer]

why is this a thread?

OPTIONS PEOPLE.

you can decide personal loot or group loot, if you as a group cannot decide maybe that's not the group for you? as a mythic raider i should never have personal loot forced upon me because of pug groups who cannot handle the responsibility of deciding that group loot is too risky so will only join a personal loot group.

[Kraineth]

Loot Council will always be the best option for Progression oriented guilds. I have been on both ends of the Loot Council system as well. I've had obviously corrupt ones, and ones that were mismanaged and wound up wasting loot on people who were not brought to the harder bosses of an instance.

My current guild though has a very transparent system that is laid out before the loot ever drops. Key items like trinkets, tier sets and weapons are assigned before we ever step foot in the instance. So we know who should be getting what items, who is getting 2-set first, or 4-set first. All based on what is mathematically the best way to distribute loot in addition to which classes/specs we expect to see the most use of on the last half of the instance.

Obviously this system isn't great for guilds who care less about progression rankings, or guilds with a wide spectrum of player skill. In those cases personal loot is the best option for at least the first few weeks before getting duplicates becomes an issue.

But I would never say that personal loot is the best, the potential of getting 0 useable drops after the first few weeks is too high. If trading personal loot becomes a real thing in live I think that would be pretty cool overall, even though I doubt we would ever use it.

[Zantos]

Personal loot is the savior of random dungeons, and I hope and pray they extend it to the lower levels. Nothing sucks more then getting that all important drop, just to have in taken by some idiot. Like a spirit trinket taken by a mage.

Personal loot is amazing. Great for pugs, and guilds. My guild used it thanks to it given more loot then other settings when we were gearing at first. After that, when we had only a few needing gear, we went back to master looter. In a personal setting, it really is the absolute best. No one can get ninjad that way. Especially since the MS>OS has been stated to be to vague of a loot rule. An example being MS>OS could mean My Stuff > Others Stuff.

[IxilaFA]

What's interesting is that literally a week ago you were talking about confirmation bias. The cognitive bias you are displaying is a close relative. Everyone tells himself a story about himself, and typically, he is the hero of his own story. E.g. "All I know is that if one person in my group was consistently causing problems, I would have noticed it." That belief about oneself leads to self-delusion.

As you said a week ago:



Couldn't have said it better myself. That is exactly why we have logs--"meticulous records"--and use them in evaluating performance.

Anyway, it's been fun but we're way off topic. Cheers.

Fair enough, I deleted my last post continuing this argument, fair warning, and would just like to state why this argument broke out in the first place.

My original stance is still unchanged. I don't think you should withhold loot from people who helped you kill the boss just because they messed up a few mechanics. The fact remains that if you plan to replace them then do so, and until that point they are still contributing to the guild. Since nobody really argues this point I'd say that it is acceptable.

We can get bogged down in off topic arguments about my hyperbole, my over exaggerations, and my poor memory but I don't think it's helpful when it comes to the original topic at hand. If you use loot council and are determining who gets gear based on who gets hit the least by mechanics on a fight or who gets higher ranks, I think that's the wrong way to go.

[clevin]

Except I don't see how that is possible.

If you are randomly distributing loot via PL, that will *always* make the raid less powerful than if you allocate the items intelligently based on need and talent.

Also, I don't understand why attendance keeps being brought up. Who here has advocated that flakes deserve loot in a loot council? No one.

Attendance is important because the gear does no one any good on a character who's not there. There aren't just perfect attendees and flakes, either. There's the 75% attendee vs 100% or the people who are there for farm, but not progression. Yes, high end raids don't typically have those issues as much, but the OP started off talking about mid-range raids who, in my experience, can have them.

If you are randomly distributing loot via PL, that will *always* make the raid less powerful than if you allocate the items intelligently based on need and talent.

1) Got actual stats on that? Right. You don't, no one does outside of Blizzard. My understanding of the system is that it's designed to be roughly the same over a high number of boss kills which is why I noted you need several resets to even begin to judge this.

2) Your claim assumes something that's not necessarily true - that the boss drops on non-PL loot will always be used. But we've all seen instances where a drop isn't good for anyone (int mail with no shaman caster or healer, etc) or where tokens drop for the classes that have them. In those cases the loot is wasted.

3) Early on in a tier when most of the raid can use most of the drops PL could be better if it results in more people getting drops than in the average boss drop case.

I'm assuming the simplistic case here of course - that if 4 people get loot upgrades it's better than if 2 or 3 people get upgrades. And finally, loot is the wrong way to punish people who aren't performing. IF you have someone drastically underperforming the way to deal with that isn't loot, it's talking to them and making it clear that they need to up their game or they can't come. Or, of course, if the raid is more casual, not caring unless they're actively wiping the raid.

PS: Rather obviously if you're an experienced raid and want to gear, say, DPS before tanks or whatever then, yes, PL will be the wrong choice for you. But it DOES avoid drama and unless your loot scheme is demonstrably better (not just you think it is, but it really is), then you would want to go with PL - same or better results, no drama = win.

[zephid]

i have yet to see a loot drama free guild 11 years of playing wow. i am referring to fun guilds that by todays standards clear a few mythic bosses only. do such drama free guilds exist or should we suck it up and use personal loot as the least of all evils?

Is loot drama common in "casual" guilds? The reason I ask is because I've been a hardcore raider since Vanilla and I've yet to be in a guild in which loot drama has occurred.

[Kreeshak]

Is loot drama common in "casual" guilds? The reason I ask is because I've been a hardcore raider since Vanilla and I've yet to be in a guild in which loot drama has occurred.

To my dictionary drama doesn't have to be a loud voice. Even when there is *thoughts* that there is a problem with distribution, and that person keeps the thoughts for himself, essentially it is similar to what people consider drama by regular definitions.

[Youn]

Is loot drama common in "casual" guilds? The reason I ask is because I've been a hardcore raider since Vanilla and I've yet to be in a guild in which loot drama has occurred.

I think the answer is it's more common in Semi-hard core groups vs casual or very hardcore groups.

In a semi-hardcore group the players are competitive but have no control over the other players in their group. This means they are gearing up to try and complete the encounter alot of the time through brute force. This means these groups do the following:

Using HFC as an example:

Week 1 to 5: They will kill first 6 bosses in Heroic.
Week 6+: They will add 1 new boss per week in heroic while full clearing first 6 bosses each time until they kill archimonde.
Week 13-15ish: Now that they have killed archimonde on heroic, they will Full clear heroic for first 2 nights of their week and work on assault and reaver over on third night.
Week 15+: At this point, they will drop down to just killing Manno and Archi on heroic before working way through Mythic for rest of week.


Now, what happens when you don't push the envelope with a group like this is anytime they run into a stone wall. Someone will ask why loot is being distributed to player X or player Y as it would better go to player Z because he is top dps. It's not really a matter of what betters the entire raid group to cause people to advance faster.

The issue with that above group is the truly skilled players can find better raiding groups to advance faster and the underskilled players cannot complete the instance without the skilled players. And neither group wants to skip gear bosses to get the kill. This comes down to must overgear the content before you move on.

[Ahovv]

Attendance is important because the gear does no one any good on a character who's not there. There aren't just perfect attendees and flakes, either. There's the 75% attendee vs 100% or the people who are there for farm, but not progression. Yes, high end raids don't typically have those issues as much, but the OP started off talking about mid-range raids who, in my experience, can have them.


1) Got actual stats on that? Right. You don't, no one does outside of Blizzard. My understanding of the system is that it's designed to be roughly the same over a high number of boss kills which is why I noted you need several resets to even begin to judge this.

2) Your claim assumes something that's not necessarily true - that the boss drops on non-PL loot will always be used. But we've all seen instances where a drop isn't good for anyone (int mail with no shaman caster or healer, etc) or where tokens drop for the classes that have them. In those cases the loot is wasted.

3) Early on in a tier when most of the raid can use most of the drops PL could be better if it results in more people getting drops than in the average boss drop case.

I'm assuming the simplistic case here of course - that if 4 people get loot upgrades it's better than if 2 or 3 people get upgrades. And finally, loot is the wrong way to punish people who aren't performing. IF you have someone drastically underperforming the way to deal with that isn't loot, it's talking to them and making it clear that they need to up their game or they can't come. Or, of course, if the raid is more casual, not caring unless they're actively wiping the raid.

PS: Rather obviously if you're an experienced raid and want to gear, say, DPS before tanks or whatever then, yes, PL will be the wrong choice for you. But it DOES avoid drama and unless your loot scheme is demonstrably better (not just you think it is, but it really is), then you would want to go with PL - same or better results, no drama = win.

You've completely misrepresented my arguments when I was being quite clear.

1) I did not claim personal loot would drop less items, so please do not pretend otherwise.

2) My claim doesn't assume anything of the sort. Again, please stop creating strawmen. In fact, if you're going to attack the idea of loot council on the basis that the drops won't always be useful, the same could easily be said for personal loot. With personal loot, you could just as easily get items you already have, or items which aren't upgrades for yourself but instead for other players.

The only comparison which matters here is that one system is random in distribution while the other can be more efficient by granting items based on criteria. For example, if four items drop regardless of system employed, the raid will see a larger benefit if you make decisions on where those items go. I don't really know how to make this more clear for you, and I would appreciate if you stop misrepresenting my arguments.

3) This argument is only valid if personal loot inherently offers more average drops, which is not the case according to all information I could find on the matter.

4) Once again you seem to be implying that attendance is something loot council cannot correctly account for.

Here is an overview from the loot council guidelines we established.

VENDETTA LOOT SYSTEM - RIFT

Like always, this system is subject to tweaks and changes as the officers see fit.

In a nutshell, Vendetta's RIFT team uses a Loot Council system with priorities on raid effectiveness and fairness.


THE LOOT COUNCIL PROCESS

If an item is best suited to one class and the Class Officer is present, then the Class Officer consults members of his class and/or other officers before deciding on one of the following:
- Award the item to a player
- Select multiple players of their class to /roll for the item
- Decline the item
The Raid Leader has the right to veto the Class Officer's decision but in practice this is highly unlikely to ever happen unless the Class Officer or Raid Leader are on bath salts.

If an item is declined by the Class Officer, or the Class Officer is not present, or the item applies to multiple classes (example: upgrade tokens, hybrid weapons, etc.), then the decision is discussed jointly by all Officers present, with the Raid Leader deciding on one of the following:
- Award the item to a player
- Select multiple players and/or classes to /roll for the item
- Runebreak the item to fund the guild bank


FACTORS IN LOOT COUNCIL DECISIONS

In general, the Loot Council will try to achieve fair loot distribution without compromising raid effectiveness. The following factors are taken into account:

Performance: The players with the best performance will get priority on items that offer the biggest increase in raid effectiveness (usually top-tier weapons).
Attendance: Players with regular attendance of both raids and class meetings will get priority over those with spotty attendance and/or lateness, especially over people with unannounced absences.
Upgrade Weight: Larger upgrades in a given item slot are usually preferable to smaller upgrades, since they usually offer a bigger increase in raid effectiveness.
Loot History: The quantity, quality and recentness of past loot awarded to players is taken into account. This means that we will make an effort to have relatively even loot distribution among all core raiders.
/roll as Tie-breaker: If a decision is too close to call between multiple players, a good old-fashioned /roll will serve as a tie-breaker.

We will make efforts to track these factors as accurately as possible.
- Performance is largely subjective and is tracked by Class Officers
- Attendance and Loot History will be recorded on our old DKP pages (ignore the DKP numbers):
http://guild-vendetta.enjin.com/dkp
- Upgrade Weight can easily be determined by inspecting the player's gear ingame


NOTES

If there are any questions/issues/discrepancies, it is up to the decision of the Raid Leader / Guild Leader to resolve any disputes not contained within these rules.

Please feel free to post any questions below and we will attempt to answer them!

The only aspect to be changed would involve class officers since it's implausible to have an officer representing each class in World of Warcraft.

[Kreeshak]

I think the answer is it's more common in Semi-hard core groups vs casual or very hardcore groups.

In a semi-hardcore group the players are competitive but have no control over the other players in their group. This means they are gearing up to try and complete the encounter alot of the time through brute force. This means these groups do the following:

Using HFC as an example:

Week 1 to 5: They will kill first 6 bosses in Heroic.
Week 6+: They will add 1 new boss per week in heroic while full clearing first 6 bosses each time until they kill archimonde.
Week 13-15ish: Now that they have killed archimonde on heroic, they will Full clear heroic for first 2 nights of their week and work on assault and reaver over on third night.
Week 15+: At this point, they will drop down to just killing Manno and Archi on heroic before working way through Mythic for rest of week.


Now, what happens when you don't push the envelope with a group like this is anytime they run into a stone wall. Someone will ask why loot is being distributed to player X or player Y as it would better go to player Z because he is top dps. It's not really a matter of what betters the entire raid group to cause people to advance faster.

The issue with that above group is the truly skilled players can find better raiding groups to advance faster and the underskilled players cannot complete the instance without the skilled players. And neither group wants to skip gear bosses to get the kill. This comes down to must overgear the content before you move on.

This sounds extremely familiar.

[rayvio]

personal loot is one of the very best features ever added to the game. it's not suitable for all raids, but it is the single best solution to any kind of pick up group
trust the people responsible for the loot (entire raid in event of need/greed, master looter, dkp officer, etc) then you're probably better off using something else, but otherwise personal loot isn't just the best option it's the only sensible one