Curse

jotes · Sep 25, 2009, 11:11 AM // 11:11

Hello,
I just wondering if anyone has done any research to prove that leechers affects on number of drops at raptor (or any) farm.
I know (i saw some table with calculation) that killing group of mobs at once (eg using AoE) cause less golds than killing them slowly (one by one).
Does anyone have done any research about affect of leecher for drops?
Can you share numbers, procentage, chances, etc, for any popular build (eg W/N, E/M or else) with and without leechers.

Is it official that leechers rise the chance for golds? Is it also affect for white items? For festive items?

And finnally - does NM/HM affects on number of festive items? Or maybe both modes has the same chance to get it.

XxSanctusxX · Sep 25, 2009, 11:17 AM // 11:17

Aint alot of official stuff around about droprate, there is someone though who studied it a bit, made graphs etc. It's on the forums somewhere.

jotes · Sep 25, 2009, 11:24 AM // 11:24

I coudn't find those graphs and sheets.

wilderness · Sep 25, 2009, 11:30 AM // 11:30

I've made hundreds of raptor runs in the past week.

I spent an hour farming with 6-8 Leechers, and an hour famring with none, and I saw no noticeable difference in drop rates.

If larger parties = more drops, then I must have been extremely unlucky.

jotes · Sep 25, 2009, 11:55 AM // 11:55

So the leechers stuff its just an urban legend?

MasterIceSlayer · Sep 25, 2009, 11:56 AM // 11:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by wilderness

I spent an hour farming with 6-8 Leechers, and an hour famring with none, and I saw no noticeable difference in drop rates.

I have had the same experience over the shortened Grog weekend. I was using the old A/E sliver build, and saw no noticeable difference using no leechers, 1 leecher, or up to 4 leechers.

I did get a decent amount of gold and Grog drops. I didn't chart the numbers, but I think that the faster the mob died the less the boss dropped. If I split the mobs, I got Elite Tomes and the Green regularily. If I pulled the whole cave and the boss went down in a group I got nothing or a white. But it did make a difference between a less than three minute run versus an over four minute run.

lilDeath · Sep 25, 2009, 12:07 PM // 12:07

I suggest you get cracking with your research. A period of a year would be sufficient.

Further, this research won't really prove anything as a certainty. You might see a trend of sorts, but nothing that is a mathematical certainty.

Don't forget to count the amount of people in a zone at any given time also doing the farm, since this may also play a role in the droprate.

kthx

Riot Narita · Sep 25, 2009, 01:14 PM // 13:14

If it does make a difference... it must be so small that a) I can't detect it, and b) it's cancelled out by the time wasted gathering leechers. That's time you could have spent doing extra solo runs.

I suppose IF you believe in leeches, AND your runs take 3+ minutes, then it might be worth it - but good luck with that cos the leeches won't be happy. My current E/Me takes 85-90 seconds to zone out, kill 31-32 nestlings and the boss, return to town and zone out again... and even that's sloooow by today's standards.

So, in my opinion - don't bother with leeches.

Reformed · Sep 25, 2009, 01:45 PM // 13:45

The only things you can expect to change with leechers should be gold coins (autosplit so who cares) and lower end drops. Everything else including gold items, dye and holiday items are all exempt from loot scaling.

The folks who perpetuate this myth either a) didn't bother to read how loot scaling works or b) are too lazy to work on their Asuran title any other way.

vamp08 · Sep 25, 2009, 02:15 PM // 14:15

The better drops with leechers myth more than likely sprouted out of people who wanted max asura rank fast but could not find an alternative. So they tricked the classes who could raptor farm into thinking if they came along with them to syphon(aka "Leech") asura rep. that the farmer would get better drops.

And wha' 'da ya' know, it worked.

Metatail · Sep 25, 2009, 02:20 PM // 14:20

For leechers to affect the drop rate they should be in the radar range with the farmer. If they are not there is no difference.

i farm baddies · Sep 25, 2009, 02:29 PM // 14:29

your chances of drops only increase in a bigger party if those people are in compass range of the monsters dying, that is proven i believe?

edit: wow i fail, the person above me got it perfectly lol

Quaker · Sep 25, 2009, 04:37 PM // 16:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by jotes

- does NM/HM affects on number of festive items? Or maybe both modes has the same chance to get it.

This is something I have been curious about lately - not so much because of festive items, but more so because of the items that the Traveler wants. I have always found it easier to get the travelers items - which are just common drops - in NM. This could, as usual, just be one of those random things that evens out if you have a large enough sample, but here's something to consider:
There are things that drop in HM (such as Tomes) that don't drop in NM. Also, HM seems to have more good drops than in NM. And, are festive items just common drops or are they considered uncommon/rare. So the question is - does the increased chance of getting a good drop decrease the chance of getting a common drop, or does the ratio of common to good remain the same, but there is just more variety and less crap in the good drops?

More research would be needed, but I'm playing D&D Online these days, so someone else will have to do the research.

QueenofDeath · Sep 25, 2009, 05:17 PM // 17:17

I can only give what I have found while farming feathers. If I take a full group of four I only get maybe 10-12 feathers, if I take a group of 3 I will get 15-18 feathers. If I take a group of 2 I will get 24-39 feathers. If I solo I get about the same amount of feathers as the group of 2 or a few more.

I also did this same test on those Stone Summit Badges Dwarves just outside of Yaks bend. This test I just did solo. The first run I got 39, the second run I got 34, the third run I got 28 and the 4th run I got 25. I noticed a considerable lower drop rate each successive time I did the SAME area. I also tried this for those insect legs around Kamadan and played solo and each successive time I got less and less drops in the same area.

All these played in NM and the groups were made up of heroes. I'm pretty sure without a doubt that there is a random code minus a value when farming. Solo I still get more, but, not always that much more than farming with another player or another hero. Thus now I can take a hero necro and let it do all the work and all I have to do is pickup the profits.

) There is no specific this amount will drop everytime value though. It looks to me like there are at least 4 code values everytime I play the same area. Plus if I see certain npcs when I zone into an area also makes a difference on the amount of drops I get.

Riot Narita · Sep 25, 2009, 06:12 PM // 18:12

Quote:

Originally Posted by QueenofDeath

I also did this same test on those Stone Summit Badges Dwarves just outside of Yaks bend. This test I just did solo. The first run I got 39, the second run I got 34, the third run I got 28 and the 4th run I got 25. I noticed a considerable lower drop rate each successive time I did the SAME area. I also tried this for those insect legs around Kamadan and played solo and each successive time I got less and less drops in the same area.

Instead of 4 runs, try 4000. Or 40,000. Then you might have some meaningful statistics.

Chthon · Sep 25, 2009, 06:29 PM // 18:29

Leechers do not help with drops one tiny bit. Depending upon how long it takes to find them vs how much time they save zoning you, they may have a positive or negative impact on how quickly you can repeat your farm.

This post provides the best known explanation of how loot scaling works in GW.

Jecht Scye · Sep 25, 2009, 08:22 PM // 20:22

I wouldn't know unfortunately. I always did a cost/benefit analysis in my head of the actual drop rates if that rumor is true versus the definite stupidity I would ultimately have to deal with and I decided that - It's just plain easier to go alone.

QueenofDeath · Sep 25, 2009, 08:36 PM // 20:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hissy

Instead of 4 runs, try 4000. Or 40,000. Then you might have some meaningful statistics.

I would say in the over 4 years that I've played I've done 4000 runs of each except for Kamadan area. My stats are valid for me and that's all that matters. When you get the same statistics over and over and over again from numerous tries as I have it's pretty easy to draw a conclusion of how the drop rate and code work together. I'd never say it's 100% effective, but, it's close enough for me.

) Now go on back to your trolling elsewhere.

)

Martin Alvito · Sep 25, 2009, 10:03 PM // 22:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by Reverend Dr

This result can be easily achieved in an hour or so of observering. If we want stronger results then p value of less than .01 can be reaching in a day or so observing.

Calculations and clearly specified assumptions, please. Also, what hypothesized mechanism are you testing? Leechers, repeat farming -> fewer drops, what? What drops? Ecto, gold items, event items?

Without the math, I don't see generating a .05 level hypothesis test in an hour anywhere. A day, sure. An hour? No way.

jray14 · Sep 25, 2009, 10:09 PM // 22:09

The required number of runs depends heavily on the underlying (unknown) baseline drop rates. (BTW software development for sample size analysis happens to be one of my day jobs, lol).

I'd be happy to analyze any data that anyone submits to me. You'd just need to define your criterion in advance (e.g., drop rates of a specific item or class of items under two different conditions, such as n1 teammates vs. n2 teammates) and try to make sure that no other factors vary. Alternate or randomize the two situations to account for possible time effects. Please PM me with any data.

For example, let's say you're measuring the drop rate difference of festival items when soloing vs. with 7 leechers. Then depending on the approximate drop rate when soloing (Ref Proportion) and the underlying difference (Proportion Diff)), you'll need approximately this many total runs (if split evenly between both situations) to have a 95% chance of establishing a statistically significant result at the .05 level:

Code:

         Ref  ----------------- Proportion Diff ------------------
  Proportion    0.005    0.010    0.050    0.100    0.250    0.500
  ----------  -------  -------  -------  -------  -------  -------
        0.01    21370     6392      580      240       76       28
        0.05    86130    22494     1196      386       96       32
        0.10   159288    40676     1890      548      116       34
        0.15   223788    56692     2496      688      134       36
        0.20   279630    70546     3014      808      148       38
        0.25   326814    82234     3448      904      158       38

If any of you happen to have SAS installed where you work or go to school, here's a program that you can modify and run for different situations:

proc power;
ods output output=p;
twosamplefreq test=pchi sides=1
proportiondiff = .005 .01 .05 .1 .25 .5
refproportion = .01 .05 .1 .15 .2 .25
alpha = .05
power = .95
ntotal = .;
run;
%powtable(data=p, entries=n, rows=refproportion, cols=proportiondiff);