Drop Rates in Pre-Sear

I hope I'm posting in the right spot. Feel free to move this to a different forum if necessary.

With the changes in Normal Mode loot (aka party-scaled loot), I decided to see if I fully understand how they have changed the drop rates. I don't have the luxury of having 4 computers and 4 accounts to run a few "full party" runs and compare them with solo runs ... but I am able to hire one friend to get a 2-player "full party" test in Pre-Sear Ascalon.

So the test I devised is relatively simple. Repeat the "Elementalist Experiment" quest several times and record the drops. Do it both for solo runs and for 2-player "full party" runs ... and compare the total number of drops for the entire party. (Not just what one person gets, but what the full party gets).

What I expected to see: more item drops for a 2-player run which should be double of what a solo player sees.

If any of you can remember what you typically see while hunting in pre-sear, please respond. I thought that the pre-update "drop rate" allowed every monster to drop an item (except for the "pet" types). I really looks like we're now getting 50% drops ... at least in Pre-Sear.


(Data at the bottom, after the results)

The results:

Solo Player (168 monsters killed)
No Drop: 54.2%
Coin Pile: 0.6%
Lodestone: 0.0%
White Item: 35.1%
Blue Item: 10.1%

Full Group (2 people) (144 monsters killed)
No Drop: 43.1%
Coin Pile: 0.0%
Lodestone: 2.8%
White Item: 43.8%
Blue Item: 10.4%

Those results kinda baffle me. For one thing, the drop rates are pretty much the same. It is possible that loot scaling doesn't affect Pre-Sear at all; but there's also the possibility that the game is applying a "full party size" of 4 players instead of the maximum of 2 in Pre-Sear.

(Sidenote: since I did the test during the event weekend, I might have experienced some unexpected buggy behavior. I'm planning on repeating this test this week.)


--- data ---

In the "good old days", you can do the Elementalist Experiment quest solo and get 12 drops every time (1 from each elemental). You also have to beat 2 (or 3) level 3 ice elementals on the way, and you'll get something from them as well.

Solo Runs:

9:47pm EST 4/28
... did the quest 3 times. 42 enemies killed. zero coin piles, zero icy lodestones. 13 white items, 6 blue items (and 1 cupcake). total sell value: 35 gold

11:43pm EST 4/28
... did that quest 3 times. So, once again, 14x3 = 42 enemies killed. result: 17 drops (and no cupcakes). Again, zero coin piles, zero icy lodestones. only 4 blue items and 13 white items. total sell value: 37 gold.

11:28pm EST 4/29
... did the quest 3 more times. Once again, 42 enemies killed. result: 21 drops, no cupcakes. zero coin piles. zero icy lodestones. 3 blue items, 18 white items. total sell value: 46 gold.

5:20pm EST 4/30
... 3 more runs. 42 enemies killed. result: 19 item drops, no cupcakes, plus 1 coin pile. zero icy lodestones. 4 blue items, 15 white items. total sell value: 43 gold (plus 8gold coin pile)


Group (2-player) Runs

10:20pm EST 4/30
... 5 runs. 72 enemies killed, 0 coin piles, 2 icy lodestones, 33 white, 7 blue. Total value: 87 gold (combined total for both of us)

11:52pm EST 4/30
... 5 runs. 72 enemies killed, Results: coin drops: 0 ; icy lodestones: 2 ; white: 30 ; blue: 8 plus 2 birthday cupcakes total value: 79 gold

I would imagine since pre sear is a training area and not part of the main game, it would be exempt. There is no hard mode/normal mode, just pre sear regular mode. So your drops would be no different before and now and as I have noticed, I'm getting just as many good drops as before.

I gotten a silver dye last night and few other dyes and drops. Nothing great yet.

My question would be: Are you noticing that about 50% of the enemies you kill don't drop anything? That's what occurred in my test runs.

I'm going to attempt doing full-zone "vanquish" runs. That might be a better indicator if anything has changed in pre-sear. Maybe I can "vanquish" The Northlands ... several times

I've been finishing up my charr boss runs this week while HM came into use and the loot scale hit. Now, playing necro, I like to summon some help while running about so i tend to kill everything up to and around the bosses just to have some fun.

What I see happen is probably an average of one less purple item every 3 runs, 3 grawl failing to drop anything, 2 charr skip a drop. No change to the bosses. I've seen a lot more hides and carvings lately but that is more likely just the drop cycle I'm in.

pre-searing doesn't appear to have any loot scaling (I mean impact from). Then again, I don't think any of the /reasons/ for loot scaling apply to presearing.

A) There is nothing worth much anyway except dyes, etc. Which are exempt from loot scaling anyway.
B) Party max is 2. The "equation" for loot scaling may not make an impact, depending on how it works.

I went into pre and did some testing, and yes, it appears to be exempt. I'm not sure if it makes a difference though

My results show that I'm getting about 50% no drops whether or not I am solo or in a duo. Prior memory of pre-sear conflicts since I remember seeing 100% drops (or pretty close to it).

And that's why I brought forward the theory that pre-sear might have loot-scaling on a 4-person-party level (instead of 2 person).

Mind sharing your numbers and how you concluded it is exempt? One of the reservations I had about my tests is that I did it during a special-drop weekend ... and those might have affected the normal drop rate. I'm going to run some tests tonight, and if we can combine data, that would be great.


There's a real reason why I'm conducting this test in pre-sear: it's for the benefit of new players, and the possibility of straightening out any bugs or unintended side effects in loot scaling. You're right that there's "nothing worth much" in pre-sear when compared to post-sear ... but, there should be enough in pre-sear to adequately equip a character going into post-sear. A new player has no access to the benefits of hard mode loot.

1/2 Droprate compaired to 1/8 droprate in other areas of the game for solo. Try this somewhere else where it would actually make a difference.