Zin'rokh, Destroyer of Lives

[Deleted]

I have written a post on the official EU WoW forums (can't link yet as a new forum member) addressing the game mechanics of archaeology. The reason for bringing it up here is that I would also like to hear what the take is on the mechanics of archaeology by the MMO-champion community.

The point I am trying to make in this post is that the established ways to get PvE loot in WoW has a finite level of input from the player.

If you participate in a raid with part of the goal being to obtain a certain item from a certain boss and the particular item in question did not drop, you can ask yourself: Have I done all that I could to obtain this item? Yes, you did. The game mechanics prevent you from further pursuing the item for that week.

If you commit yourself to (Heroic) dungeons in order to obtain justice points to buy gear from the JP vendor, you have game mechanics there to balance the amount of effort put in to the obtainable rewards (i.e. JP cap, limited amount of obtainable gear).

When asking yourself the same question when it comes to archaeology: Have i done all that I can to obtain this item? Until you actually obtain the item you pursue, your answer will always be, no. Archaeology puts the ball firmly in the players court. You can always keep grinding away until you finally obtain your epic PvE item. This is something I find very disturbing. There is no mechanic in play to protect the player form his or her pursuit of the object of their desire. This simply promotes an unhealthy dedication to the game. You only have to read the comments on this forum and Wowhead to see the insane amount of time players put into obtaining these rare archaeology PvE items.

Changing one of the three mechanics of archaeology would make sure some form of checks and balances are introduced to archaeology:
1) Do not put current level epic items in the archaeology loot/artifact table;
2) Put a cap on the number of sites that can be excavated;
3) Make the assignment of rare artifacts to be solved less random.

So my question to you all, what is your take on this?

[Deleted]

Archeology can be frustrating when it comes to farming the PvE Epics - for me as mage its Tol'Vir .... hey wow 17% of all Digsites will be Tol'Vir so i just gave up on it.

Farmed it to 525 just for the Achievement and to have something when spending time waiting for raids =)

[Yuanrang]

So your problem is that you can't restrain yourself properly to not spend so much time on Archaeology? Or is it just that you dislike that RNG isn't giving you the only item you need?

See, neither of those are Blizzard's fault, nor the design. It's your expectations that's to blame, just as with everyone else spending time on it, because they have the time for it and they really want the various BoA's. The thing what people like you always fail to realize is that, even if you remove the "unhealthy dedication" to a certain aspect in the game, they're just going to find another thing to spend an insane amount of time doing.

Multiple raids a week? Can't do it anymore? Let's make a new alt so I can raid on him!
Point caps? Time to do "the Insane" while I wait for the reset!
Insert any arguement related to a limited grind and then a distraction here.

Capping archaeology just won't solve anything. If you really cared about people and them wasting time on a MMO grind, you're just naive. It's an MMO, people will grind if they're dedicated/obsessed and nothing can stop that. Even if WoW had tons of caps to prevent any form of grind, the sheer amount of content would siphon their time by reaching all the caps per week, or they'd just switch games.

[lunchbox2042]

I saved up 500 troll fragments for 450. Did not get Zhin'rok. I'm very sad now.

[Rauno]

Around 2900 troll fragments, no zin'rokh. Oh well, cant give up now.

[Deleted]

Put the work in, get rewarded.

[Deleted]

A very good point Yuanrang. My intention is not to start a blame game. And Blizzard sure enough is not to blame when it comes to people having no self restraint. My point is neither to argue that game mechanics that prevent grinding are not circumventable. The point that I am trying to make is that having no restriction in place at all promotes unhealthy game dedication. I read it on the forums and I see it in my own guild. People that spend a few hours every couple of days online are now grinding into the early hours of the morning in pursuit of the object of their desires. Putting some form of restrictions in will help those that can’t or aren't willing to help themselves.

Sure enough there will still be players that will relog and start grinding away on an alt, but the point is that some restrictions will be better than none at all.

---------- Post added 2010-12-24 at 04:01 PM ----------

Put the work in, get rewarded.

Well that is just one of the issues i have with archaeology. Complete randomness of the artifact assignment. Put X amount of wok in, get the result you are after. Point is that X amount can be your first solve, it could be your 200th. X amount of work put into it does not equal a set amount of reward, it is completely random.

[frozenkex]

Imagine if you wanted to catch a specific fish, but you were only able to fish from 4 pools at a time on the continent and the pools of fish were random ones, that doesnt make sense, and so doesnt archeology.

[Deleted]

Mama always said Archaeology is like a box of chocolates, sometimes you get the good ones and sometimes you get the bad ones.

[Arganaut]

Mama always said Archaeology is like a box of chocolates, sometimes you get the good ones and sometimes you get the bad ones.

I lol'd. But "you never know what you're gonna get"

[Deleted]

Mama always said Archaeology is like a box of chocolates, sometimes you get the good ones and sometimes you get the bad ones.

Lol Epic one :P

Anyway been farming this for 5 days-Still no luck ;(

[Mayden]

Overall Im really happy about Archeology. Its something I can do alone, the mechanics are nice. And currently the rewards are very substantial, althouhg very hard to obtain.

But since everything is hard to obtain currently, its in balance so to speak. I agree with Blizz putting low drop chances on everything. This prevents that everyone is running around with a Zin'rok, or rides around on the AQ mount. If you manage to obtain one of those items you got something special. And thats nice.

Only small thing that I would like to see changed, is that there was some hidden system in place so that people who put tremendous effort in it get eventually the thing they are after. If its stay random till the end you might never get the item your after. And thats a bit sad.
With all the statistics the system is recording this should be really easy to implement. Just an increased chance of getting a rare say after 100 solves of one race. Blizz shouldnt never explain how everything works exactly, but just put it in secretly. Then even those who get it after 200 solves will eventually encourage others to go for their goal. And thats the spirit you want in the game for Archeology. People encouraging each other to pursue their goals

[Deleted]

Lol Epic one :P

Anyway been farming this for 5 days-Still no luck ;(

Same here and nope ; <

[Deleted]

The only one of your suggestions that I'd consider worth posting is the third one. It sucks when you get bad RNG, but RNG is fair and that's the best you can hope for.
There really is no problem here for you other than your apparent lack of self control, or your opinion that others have none. Admittedly, some people do go a bit overboard when farming their Zin'rohk, but that's not even close to a majority, and that's fine. Some people go overboard with a lot of things, but the ones of us without issues with self control shouldn't be punished for it. I personally have spent several hours trying to obtain it, currently to no avail, but I'm not sitting here thinking to myself that I'm scum and a failure for not doing all I can to get it.
I think that the enforced caps that Blizzard have put on things like guild rep, and daily factions like Tol Barad are pointless and a little insulting. I understand that they want us to keep playing the game for longer, but I feel they should offset that with more content. Personally I don't like being forced to log on every single day just to keep up. Archaeology is one of my favourite things currently, because there's no pressure as to when I do it, and I can enjoy it on my own schedule.
Putting a cap or limit on Archaeology would not only not fix it, but completely ruin it for a good number of players.

[SoulPoetry]

i lol'd at the threat title, very apt.

RNG is here to stay, it's kind to you sometimes and tells you to kiss it's ass sometimes too. thing is as well, Arch isn't necessary in the slightest. you can already get the biggest mount/pet achievements without it and you can get a 359 weapon from Magmaw, arguably the easiest raid boss. so like blues keep saying: it's the players choice and no one is forcing you to take the profession.

[warboss]

I cannot even begin to count the amount of people that farmed ZG bi-weekly for 6+ months and never saw a tiger, the amount of guilds that farmed heroic icc25 to never get a single heroic DFO, The countless raids that farm Kael weekly trying to get a'lar. Lesson learned? Dont count on RNG.

And as for the last little segment you wrote Blizzard isnt forcing you into putting hours into farming, YOU ARE. There is a mechanic for that, its called self-restraint. Blizzard isnt your mom or dad, they dont need to patrol your every possible action in the game.

[Deleted]

As other people have mentioned in roundabout ways, you're expecting too much to come out of something that was designed to take time to complete. Unfortunately, RNG is a complete fool sometimes, although, when it wants to be nice to you, it can be very rewarding. So, my advice is to just stick at it, take your time, and just take it easy. If people want to dedicate all their time to spending hours and hours and hours farming for these epic items, that's their issue. They're paying for it after all.

And besides, that's why these epic items are soooo rare... Blizzard didn't want players to just spam farm Archy to get free epics. That would defeat the object and it will just be WotLK all over again. It's nice to see some items that actually have a rarity about them, again.
And, just for consolation, I've been farming Troll artifacts for ages trying to get Zin'Rokh. Still no luck

[microtonal]

The x-pac has been out for 3 weeks. If you're complaining, whether it's for yourself or by proxy for others, that you have yet to find all the archaeology rare items you want, you might be unhealthily impatient. That's taking the desire for instant gratification to the point of psychosis.

I mean, I consider myself an impatient person, but that's completely ridiculous.

[itself]

It's intended to be a casual profession. If you want to go all out to get an epic level 85 item or whatever in the first few weeks, go right ahead.

[Furioer]

3000 troll fragments. 83+ solutions.

11 rares from various groups. 4 epics. 96 unique commons. No sword.