Disillusioned with loot. Research on accurate drop rates.

[Shiromar 0]

After hosting a few MC pugs, and logging all the loot we have got, I am under the impression that drop chances in Molten Core, on this server, are inaccurate.

It's quite frustrating to host MC pugs, and see consistently trash loot dropping every week. I want puggers to get geared - get the items they want. There is items I want for myself, for selfish reasons, so yea I am starting to become slightly disillusioned, especially when I see other runs, on different days of the week getting way better drops.

I decided to do some research on actual Blizzlike drop rates in Molten Core based on data taken from WoW Allahkazam from no later than Dec 2006, pre patch 2.0 (just to keep it as accurate as possible).

The data can be found here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1IpLe-ockfQ5d0wYWRZJaQ_lHcXpi9Jm34lO9dzYr5Gg/edit?usp=sharing

The big table shows you the drop chance of each item, the far right columns show you the chance each item will drop in a MC run, the average amount of runs required for that item to drop & then the drop chance in our Wednesday MC run. If you scroll down I go into a bit more detail on what the loot tables should probably look like, based on common sense really, but it's still a work in progress. For example Magmadar should always drop 2x tier item then have a 60% chance to drop 1 of it's 4 unique boss loot items, and a 40% chance to drop 1 of the 8 shared loot table items,

 

.....

 

Now in my MC run we've had the following loot over the past 7 weeks:
- 3x Essence of the Pure Flame (trash item, takes the place of good items on Ragnaros, RIP)
- 3x Crown of Destruction (trash item compared to other items it can drop)
- 4x Core Forged Greaves (trash item compared to other items it can drop)
- 4x Fire Runed Grimoire (trash item)
- 3x Manastorm Leggings (trash item) 
- 4x Sabatons of the Flamewalker (trash item)
- 3x Seal of the Archmagus (trash item)
- 4x Netherwind Pants (sure it's not bad, but why do we get 4 Mage pants & 5 Druid pants?)
- 5x Stormrage Legguards (is there even 5 Druids on the server?)
- 3x Mana Igniting Cord (this is a good drop, not complaining, but it is still weird it drops 3 times)
- 3x Onslaught Girdle (again, nice item, no complaints, but it's the same bunch of items dropping!)

Using my database on Blizzlike drop rates I can tell that: 

[Sabatons of the Flamewalker] has a 4.98% chance to drop in Molten Core, or once every 20.08 runs, yet in the Wednesday MC pug we've had them drop 4 times in 7 weeks (or a 57.1% occurrence). How is it remotely possible for an item that should drop once every 20 runs to drop 4 out of 7 runs? This server is meant to be Blizzlike, correct? 

[Fire Runed Grimoire] has a 13.65% chance to drop each Molten Core ID, or once every 7.33 runs on average, however we've seen it drop 4 times in 7 runs (or a 57.1% occurrence). Once again, grossly inaccurate drop rate.

[Manastorm Leggings] has a 9.01% chance to drop in each Molten Core ID, or once every 11.1 runs on average, however we've seen it drop 3 times in 7 runs (or a 42.9% occurrence). Grossly inaccurate.

[Essence of the Pure Flame] has a 16.81% chance to drop in each Molten Core ID, or once every 5.95 runs, however we've seen it drop 3 times in 7 runs (or a 42.9% occurrence).

[Stormrage Legguards] have a 14.92% chance to drop in each Molten Core ID, or once every 6.7 runs, however we've seen it drop 5 times in 7 runs (or a 71.4% occurance). Infact we had the same [Stormrage Legguards] & [Netherwind Pants] combination drop 3 weeks in a row, which seem absurd, the chance of that are almost non-existent.

Infact, this trend of the same items dropping seems pretty obvious. Sure, if it was [Quick Strike Ring] or [Robe of Volatile Power] dropping off every boss like [Sabatons of the Flamewalker] is, then I wouldn't be getting disillusioned, but it's not. It's the same trash items dropping. There should be a greater disparity of different items, not the same items always dropping. Sure, I only have 7 Molten Core runs to pick from, but there is definitely a trend here, I'm not imagining things, the same bunch of items dropping consistently.

To do 7 MC runs in a row & not see any of the following items drop seems completely wrong since they all have a high 15%~ drop chance each:
- Band of Accuria
- Cauterizing Band
- Heavy Dark Iron Ring
- Medallion of Steadfast Might
- Perdition's Blade
- Quick Strike Ring
- Robe of Volatile Power
- Striker's Mark
- Wild Growth Spaulders
Yet we see [Sabatons of the Flamewalker], one of the worst items you can get in MC, which has a blizzlike 5% drop chance, drop 57% of the time.

Now I do alot of raids on this server, and for the most part Blackwing Lair loot tables look accurate, AQ40 looks accurate (all be-it Ring of the Godslayer has a 12% drop chance Blizzlike vs 50% on this server), and Naxx feels pretty accurate, so fair enough, good job there. But MC feels pretty off. I'm gonna keep logging the loot & I have a sneaky feeling this trend of trash items like [Sabatons of the Flamewalker], or [Stormrage Legguards] off Ragnaros is gonna continue, or getting the same trash item 3 weeks in a row.

You can see the loot from our raids here, I log everything that drops & then rank it based on how good or bad it is: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1kQdeNYELlV4zgVJaZ9SzxJIjP6Ug0TpVsaVFDMKf9as/edit#gid=859140161 Last week was okay loot, but I'll prove that drop tables are wrong in MC on this server by saying that [Plans: Lionheart Helm] shouldn't even drop from that boss (Link to official Rag loot table) but for whatever reason it dropped off Ragnaros in our pug run.

[Zancon 117]

The drop percentages are a function of chance on each kill. It is not in any way a guarantee that you would see it once every how ever many kills. The percentages on any tracking website would be the average drop percentage found across all reported boss kills. It all comes down to the random number generator and the chance to get a specific piece of loot.

With the above said, I am going to forward your information to the development team for a look.

[Nalfein 22]

Perhaps if you were to average it out over 50 runs or so, you would see a drop rate that is closer to the drop chance %. However, it is simple RNG, (as Zancon said) and you could get "lucky" and get the same item 10/10 times, or you could run the instance 40 times and never have it drop once, regardless of what the drop chance is. Every run you have x% chance for an item to drop from a specific boss or mob, if you get the drop one run, it doesn't mean you won't get it the next. You still have the same chance every instance reset. Also, it should be noted that some item's drop chances increase or decrease, depending on the mob or boss you kill. [Plans: Lionheart Helm] does have a chance to drop on a successful Ragnaros kill @ 4%, which is Blizzlike. It is possible your data isn't completely accurate.

From what I have seen, the drop rates are what they should be, but I can always take a deeper look.

For future reference, it is helpful to report any game feature you think is not functioning correctly or "bugged" to our Github page. This way our Dev and QA teams can look into the issues further, and try to reproduce them. Here is the link to our Github:https://github.com/elysium-project/classic-bug-tracker