One mediocre player effectively had all the gear, so we either needed to get into interpersonal drama by creating rules specifically to combat his rolling, or move to a system that ensure that loot was being spread out better, while making people take it upon themselves to choose more wisely whether they need it.

And for us, I looked for a system that was more self-sufficient. I never cared much for having to keep track of who got what items that day, there’s too much room for error (and I get forgetful). We also started using it before 3.1, and were searching for methods to incorporate dual-specs into looting, since we feel that flexibility is an asset to our raiding style.

1 epic per night
1 tier piece per night (these two do not count against one another)
anyone who can use it /roll

the only real exceptions are if you have won something that night, but no one can use another drop later, then you are rewarded it as well (and any subsequent drops that match this)

there is some discretion as to what is an “upgrade” for your class, but i guess there has never really been anything that has come up as a real conflict, i.e. hunter vs rogue weapon, etc…

i know it can reward people with low attendance, but it seems, on our low horde population server, pugs reign and there has to be incentive.

Eleazor’s last blog post..Ok, I Lied…

If you don’t include common sense in your setup, even as a backup, something is wrong.

One of the most interesting things about loot system discussions is that people usually cite moving to some system because it is “more fair”. Really, the most truly 100% fair thing you can do is roll on everything. RNG discussions aside, “random” favors everyone equally. All these systems serve to trade away some of that fairness, to gain direction. We actually want our systems to be deliberately NOT FAIR. We want to be able to influence looting, whether that means that people don’t get the Focussing Iris, that once you loot you don’t get more until others loot, or that the fact that you attend more gives you an increased chance to get loot.

It doesn’t work out too bad, the only problem I find is that it is hard to track who has been getting what loot, and who has been passed on loot a few times.

Loot is distributed usually based on a person’s attendance, previous loot received, and how large of an upgrade it really is.

To be completely honest, the main problem I’ve been having with this system has been giving myself loot. I like to avoid petty loot squabbles, but the fact of the matter is, when the loot master wants to give himself loot, people will attribute it to “he just got that loot because he’s an officer”, rather than, “he got that item because he makes 100% of raids and rapes DPS”.

A system like DKP or something with set points would help me out personally, but other than that, our loot council works fine.

Macbook

Macbook’s last blog post..Macbook Needs Guest Posters!

I think key to the decay rate, mathematically, is not to avoid point hording, but to avoid what I would call an “issue of scale”. If you had some raiders that had raided every week for a year, and your points didn’t decay, you would start to see them all have the exact same priority, and it would be difficult to change, because of scale. A new person with 50 EP and 10 GP, will make a significant change in PR if 10 points are moved from EP to GP (i.e. 5 -> 2). A person with 5000 EP and 1000 GP makes almost no change in PR if you move 10 points (i.e. 5 -> 4.94). So without decay, all your “core” raiders would have practically the same priority, which would fall into an order that was very difficult to change, and it would become an almost static list.

Say you have five people:

A
B
C <– Not in the raid.
You
E

If A takes a piece of loot, it rearranges the order:

B
You
C <– Not in the Raid
E
A

So C retains his spot as third from the top and is rewarded for making it that high in the order when he comes back to raid, but you are rewarded for raiding the week that C isn’t there by jumping over him when loot is distributed.

It is a lot like SK, except that you have two numbers in the list, a higher number, and a lower number. When you bid, you can choose which of them you want to use. If you used your lower number, and get outbid, you can choose to then outbid with your higher number (if it is high enough). This method still has everybody below the number bid move up, moving “around” the spots of those who are not present.

This, I think, works better than the standard SK, as it allows you more flexibility in prioritizing items, rather than a simple yes/no. The way I tend to use my numbers is to bid for most things with my lower number (this leads to a lot of churn at the bottom of the list), while holding on to my higher number for when something really big comes along (Torch of Holy Fire, that last Tier piece I need for my set, or whatever). And, if I do burn my higher number getting what I really wanted, it becomes my lower number, and what was my lower has already worked its way back up the list a bit.

We have an addon written by one of our raiding alliance members which makes keeping track of this very easy. New folks are added in with a “/roll 500 1000″, and get their two numbers equally spaced above and below the middle of the list. When loot comes up, the list goes out, for all to see, with all the spots for those present shown, and each individual gets whispered what their two numbers are. An item goes up for bid, and it is done publicly. If you want it, then “/raid “. Highest bid takes the item, and that number goes to the back of the line. The public bidding means that considerate raiders can check to see how big an upgrade an item is before they outbid somebody else, as well as being able to see who could potentially outbid them in a situation.

All in all, I like it better than the DKP, Loot Council, or “just /roll, dude” methods I have seen used and abused in some other raids I have attended. Attendance is rewarded, it is completely unbiased, it allows an individual to make a weighted decision (“Yeah, I want it, but not that badly. All yours.”), and works to fairly quickly distribute loot.