WTS!: In-Game Loot Distribution

We're all familiar with the typical loot options in the game. I think the two that get used the most are Group Loot and Master Looter. I don't know anyone who uses Round Robin or Need Before Greed, and Free-For-All is pretty much a gimmick option for running lowbies through things, or similar off situations. I would like to see implementation of a loot system by Blizzard for raids, so there is a "standard" method - even if Blizzard makes it optional.

In my mind, a player should have an "edge" when rolling on items for his spec and professions, as well as when he hasn't received any loot from a boss (or raid) over multiple kills. Of course, this can't "carry over" between guilds, so each raid would have to be tagged for a guild or as "PuG" when entering, and each player would have a running tab of what amounts to DKP with each guild he runs with, while PuGs remain how they are now.

As an example of the mechanics, let's say that the bias for a player who can use an item is +5 to a roll, and the bias for not having won something yet is another +5 per boss. So in your Sunwell raid, the engineering goggle upgrade for your character's class and spec drops, and you haven't won any loot for 5 kills. So you have a total of 30 points to add to your roll. What I'm suggesting isn't a straight addition, but simply an increase of top roll - so (/roll 1-130) instead of the normal (/roll 1-100). These additional points would be "spent" on a winning roll, but retained on a losing roll. This puts a soft cap on the amount that you can effectively use, and so encourages people to roll often without making any points over a certain number useless.

This also leaves a large part of the loot to chance. The roll isn't being sold to the highest bidder, it's being biased toward the unlucky. There is still the chance for someone to show up, roll 100 on everything and leave, or for a dedicated raid member to lose every roll, even though he has a bonus of 500, but these are very unlikely situations.

Of course, a huge dilemma with this is that there is no "standard" system now, so how can Blizzard choose one to impose? That's why I suggest that it only be mandatory in a PuG setting, and can be turned off in a raid to allow a guild to use whatever system they're already using. I don't really expect to see this anytime soon, but here's hoping!

The Problem with Random Drops. . .

is that they're random. But sometimes it doesn't seem that way.

For instance, my guild is comprised of my two brothers, my girlfriend's two sisters, and a couple of friends. This leaves us with at least one spot on our Kara runs that we need to fill every Sunday. Well, I say "need" but we really can 9-man it. It's just a good way to keep the pace and get it done in a reasonable amount of time. We have all the tanks and healers, so we just need one little dps to come along. Three of the last 4 weeks, however, when we pug we end up with someone so horrible that the healers out dps them on some fights. 

This in and of itself isn't as bad as the fact that the loot table seems to sense this and want to improve them somehow. Every boss drops something this 10th can use. We even had a hunter rolling on resto shammy gear because "I can wear it, too."

Even this last week, when we had to pug 3 and actually got people who know what they're doing, we ended up giving everything to an elemental shaman.

I guess I wouldn't care as much if we weren't trying to gear up a couple of alts. All of the mains in the guild are in full badge and/or PvP gear, so we don't need anything that Kara can drop (except those damn enchanting formulas!). But to go in every week and have gear drop that nobody can use except the 150 dps hunter is just frustrating.

ZOMG NEW SHINEYS!

So. . . .the new tabard and pet available to anyone (who participates in PvP) that Blizzard released today. On the one hand, I think that it's a good idea to make exclusive content for different aspects of the game. Like the achievements that are being instituted in WotLK. But on the other hand, I HATE RANDOMNESS.

Just in case that wasn't clear, the pet is only obtained on a *chance* every time you win a battleground. So far, it seems that it doesn't take any other factors into account; just if you won the battleground. I've heard of a lot of people who got it on their first win, and others who are going on 20+ wins in the struggle for the [Gold Medallion].

This is something that has bothered me about the game from my first days playing. I'd run an instance hoping for a particular drop and by the time I get it, I've picked up something better from a quest reward or a vendor. It never fails that on all of my 70s, I've gotten no more than 2 pieces of my Dungeon Set 3 before I start getting random bits of armor that are twice as good from rep grinds or whatnot.

I think there are two viable solutions to this problem.

1. Make the drops better.

If the dungeon drops (or random chance items like the dragon pet from PvP) are good enough, then it will be worth winning enough battlegrounds or completing enough instance runs to get it.

2. Increase the drop rate.

This can be done by making tokens similar to the tier piece tokens that drop 100% of the time for multiple classes, or simply by increasing the drop rate of the items themselves. This way, the items are of some use when they drop other than being turned into shards for the auction house.

How does this pertain to the PvP Chinese dragon pet? Well, it's hard to get. And by hard, I really just mean unpredictable. This means that someone with no PvP skill at all (myself included in that very large group) can simply walk into a winning battleground, beat on some things, heal some people, and walk away with a bright new pet. Admittedly, this is how I came away with my [Reins of the Raven Lord], but I like to think that I had to have at least some skill to survive the heroic, even if the skill wasn't that much.

I guess this is all just a frustrated outburst about how I can't get my pet, even though I've won a total of 12 AB matches since the release of the tabard and pet. I haven't done any PvP before this, and don't intend to after, but I'm doing it now for the pet. Similarly, I did Slave Pens for the [Deathfrost] enchant and [Frostscythe of Lord Ahune], but don't really plan on going back until another special occasion. 

So if you want to think about the Olympic pet as a rare drop in an instance then, compared to similar seasonal bosses, I've more than paid my dues.