The word has been around for a while now, and I don’t really know why I haven’t covered it before considering my previous interest on the topic. I got a poll up to the right, which indicates that people want gear to go to the people who contribute instead of the ones who can roll high, or at least that roll is not enough. I also have been saying that we have no real idea how contribution is calculated, since it seems so random.
Now we know how contribution is calculated. It’s so shockingly simple, so obvious we wonder why we didn’t figure it out a long time ago. It isn’t.
See, instead of actually measuring all the data players do during Public Quests to find out who contributes the most every player is making a roll when they enter a zone, and that roll is your contribution that appear. It doesn’t weight all your healing, all your damage, all your buffing, or everything that make you more worthy of a reward than a player standing AFK in a corner. It’s just random. The roll remains until you zone so you will get the same contribution in both Keeps unless you relog or someone with higher roll enters the PQ area.
It has been discussed in threads on Warhammer Alliance and VN Boards, with screenshots to show how someone getting #1 contribution in one Keep will get #1 in the second Keep in the same zone, despite not doing anything. Enough people have tested and confirmed it to make it more than plausible.
A practical joke from Mythic’s side or did they just not care? I guess they tried to create a tool that would actually measure contribution, but they didn’t manage to finish it in time. No small wonder, you don’t need to be a programming expert to figure out that it won’t be easy. Exactly how should you value things? Healing more than damaging? Ressing? Buffing? Guarding a door instead of breaking down the gate? Then is the matter of actually programming it.
Despite what their intentions were I am horribly disappointed in Mythic. Not that they failed to create this tool, but that they still used a roll system and named it contribution; made us believe that what we did actually mattered. Lied to. Deceived. I can think of no complimentary words for what they did. It’s another big feature that caused me to buy this game which isn’t implemented. They might have kept half the system if they would finish it at some later time, but I still can’t figure out why they would name it contribution. It makes no sense! The only word we have got about the system is the usual “working as intended”.
Anyone who has played World of Warcraft knows how annoying it is to run an instance 20 times and still lose the item you want to someone who does it the first time. Contribution seemed to be a step in the right direction, without having to involve complex DKP systems out of the game. But what we have is still a random system; it is in fact worse than the one in WoW considering you don’t have the possibility to need/greed/pass on items. Here it’s like you press need every time, which can be quite frustrating when you don’t want the loot and others can benefit so much more from it.
At least we can stop worrying and sweating what it takes to finally grab the gold bag, it’s random so it will come when it comes. Disappointed is not enough to explain how I feel. Betrayed is maybe a more suitable.
Dune Messiah
Elminster in Myth Drannor
Wow. Is this only for keeps or for PQs as well? I could swear that at low levels I could pretty much guarantee a #1 contribution bonus on my AM just by running around dotting everything and then healing myself. Of course the doesn’t work much past very low levels but it definitely seemed like contribution was being calculated somehow and not simply random.
I agree, it’s a betrayal. It’s made me feel very crappy when I bust a gut to heal everyone and then come bottom contrib regardless for 2 keeps consecutively.
It does explain an awful lot of weird results I’ve had, both good and bad. I’ve had #1 and #2 contribution spots when I *knew* that I didn’t rate them — not that I hadn’t done anything, but just totting up what I did in some keep sieges compared to what I saw others do, and it was obvious I shouldn’t have had the gold bag. Not once, but twice in a row. The only other reason I could think of for it at the time was that I was the lowest level there, and that maybe it beefs up contributions from lower-ranked chars to sort of even the playing field a little — I’d have preferred that as an explanation.
I’m still hoping this will be debunked. Sadly, it’s pretty damned plausible and almost everyone I’ve spoken to has said something like “Aahhh, that does explain a lot.” :|
Honestly, they should scrap the whole thing and just give tokens for everyone there when the Keep Lord drops. These tokens can be exhanged for pieces of armor. Each piece would require a handful of them, so that you’d have to take on the Keeps more than 5 times to get your gear.
Also, when are they going to add rewards for defending? Right now, it makes no sense to defend other than pride and to get some fighting on. If as a player, I’m wanting to get my set of armor, I’m going to take the unguarded keep, not defend one that the enemy’s attacking.
Yes it’s working this way both for normal PQs and Keep Lord PQs. If you got a really bad contribution at the first keep the best thing to do is relog or zone in and out so you get a new roll and a chance to score high, more effort won’t increase your chances.
Tokens is a good and easy way to handle loot distribution, with the only negative thing being that it rewards time instead of skill (if you could see people RvRing too much a bad thing). It baffles me why they didn’t do such a simple thing instead of using a broken system and deceiving the player base.
For a very long time people beleived that the random loot allocation tables in WoW raid dungeons were somehow linked to the leader of the raid and they could show how “item x always dropped” as proof. Of course this turned out to be false.
I wouldn’t be suprised that this is all true but I wont hold it as gospel. I don’t really care either way. In fact if it is truly random that should help with people doing what they should instead of maxing contribution. Guarding the postern door of a keep is an essential task but nets you no contribution if nobody turns up(or you scare them off). Should that party of players be penalised? You need a tank for a keep take but 90% of the time he can do prettymuch nothing, should he be penalised?
The typical stupid blogger using there blog to blow something out of proportion just because they got screwed over in a roll.
After reading that thread, I’m pretty much convinced that it’s true. Sounds like Mythic flat out lied to us.
Interesting thoughts. Feel free to post some evidence sometime as well. Keep working on the grammar.
We need the option to pass on these rolls. This gear is essential for tanks to allow the entire guild to progress and we would all pass to gear up a could of tanks but instead the bags go to completely random individuals….
I can tell you one night at a guild PQ run i was placing first in contribution every time. I started to fell bad because i didnt need the rewards anymore, so I went afk and did zero participation. Guess who was highest in contribution again? Yup, I was and I was afk. Alot of us have confirmed this in many ways. The Contribution system has never worked. Now after reading this, it makes more sense while i placed first everytime in contribuation during that PQ run if it was based on some roll when i entered.
Voted “perfect as is” even though it’s far from perfect - I quite like the contribution/random weightings but they need to change how contribution is worked out from its current oddly broken system.
Hmm random thought - could it be the contribution is purely based on the amount of time you’ve spent in the keep area or the RvR area?
(that’s the only way to account for people scouting etc. though it would reward people doing bugger all as much as those actively helping)
Guys … dont want to piss u off but sooner you’ll realize that this game is a piece of crap…and i’m totally agree with u all … all the fustration it can get by paying this f***ing game and playing without any interesting rewards … thanks
Catastrophe Guild rank 17: Leader is Relrye on sylvania
Chars :Ginette Sorc rank 35
MuRDeRs chosen 21
Jeanpaul shammy 8
La Cabale Guild : Leader Blackstaff and MuRDeRs
White Lion rank 17
See ya all!!
I was investing a lot of time in this game but no rewards so i just quit!!
why do the people that make these claims keep refusing to post screenshots? or if they claim to have tested it “dozens” of times post only 2 screenshots?
the burden of proof is on the person making the claim.
I’ve never seen myself get the same contribution, or the same roll, twice in a row. but some of these people say it should happen each time if I don’t leave the zone. They should post screenshots if they expect me to believe it.
i want to see some screenshot if possible.
is this claim valid or just rumors spread by bloggers who hate WAR (and WOW fan boy ?)
I agree that this is terribly disappointing (and lazy! I’m sure they could have come up with a simple replacement, even if it wasn’t completely fair), but I want to play devil’s advocate and imagine the scenario where they announce a roll only system. I can only imagine the number of leeches and moochers who would come make one hit to get on “the list” and then go /afk to wait for the roll. It would be mayhem, not to mention demotivational in the worst degree. No, a secret random award system disguised as a contribution-based system is bad PR (when it is uncovered), but at least the general playing population was engaged in the correct behavior (acting as if their contribution mattered). I can only hope that Mythic realizes that their hand has been forced, and that they must publish a contribution-based system immediately.