Feedback for Musco, You Asked For It (In Regards to Drop Rates)

[JediJasonL]

So, I'm just going to do some math here and give you my feedback regarding that math.

 

So, we have a chance at two items, which can either be a Silver/Gold item from the new pack or a Grand Chance Cube:

• Chances per pack = 2
  

 

There are 30 packs per Hypercrate, 5 packs per Supercrate, and then the stand alone packs:

• 30 packs per Hypercrate * 2 chances per pack = 60 chances per Hypercrate
  
• 5 packs per Supercrate * 2 chances per pack = 10 chances per Supercrate
  Standalone pack = 2 chances
  

 

Now, onto what I have gotten so far:

• 4 Hypercrates * 60 chanes per Hypercrate = 240 chances
  
• 2 Supercrates * 10 chances per Supercrate = 20 chances
  
• 2 standalone packs * 2 chances per pack = 4 chances
  

 

Total chances = 244 chances

Number of Unstable Arbiter Lightsabers = 0

Number of Unstable Arbiter Dualsabers = 0

 

Now, let's assume I got one of either saber:

1 / 244 = 0.41% drop rate

 

This means my current drop rate is less than one half of one percent on the Unstable Sabers.

 

Amount spent ~= $160

 

Now, with all of this math, I'd like to voice my opinion on said math. First, I should not have to spend that amount of money to try and get something that I want. Yes, I understand it's a gamble. However, at the same time, I'm a loyal subscriber, regardless of the numerous faults this game has. I'm also not in Vegas playing slots. It's a video game that I subscribe to. There is absolutely no reason something on a market like the Cartel Market should be that rare, especially for subscribers that are willing to fork out the cash to play the game every month anyway. This leads directly into my second point: Why is the drop rate so low anyway? On top of all that, from some of the accounts I've read, my drop rate isn't even that bad. Some folks are experiencing drop rates on the order of <= 0.25%!

 

So, Musco, this all leads very finely into my whole point:

 

ABSOLUTELY NOTHING we are willing to spend extra money on in this game should have a drop rate that abysmally low!

[gadenp]

/Agree

[Karellan]

I didn't bother to do the math like you, but I purchased a total of 14 hypercrates -- I had accidentally transferred two into my cargo hold whilst sorting -- and I got a whopping ZERO sabers. Got everything else though. I don't know what the drop rates are on the sabers, but apparently they're even lower than what you posted sir/ma'am. Sad day.

[JediJasonL]

I didn't bother to do the math like you, but I purchased a total of 14 hypercrates -- I had accidentally transferred two into my cargo hold whilst sorting -- and I got a whopping ZERO sabers. Got everything else though. I don't know what the drop rates are on the sabers, but apparently they're even lower than what you posted sir/ma'am. Sad day.

 

Yup! That puts you at the <= 0.1% drop rate.

[Osodvus]

0.0925%

[crashcru]

I purchased 14 hypercrates as well, and actually came to the forums to see if it was a bug of some sort. I have multiples of all the items but did not get either arbiter saber. It seems to me that this should be almost impossible if all the gold items have the same drop rate, so apparently they do not. To add insult to injury, all the remaining items that I did get are essentially worthless due the flooding of them on the GTN. This is just poor form, and makes people like me who consistently buy 6-7 hypercrates each time a new one arrives not want to purchase cartel market items any longer.

[Gothreg]

368 packs opened zero saber drops....

 

By 307 I was missing only two items from this release (sabers not included)

By 368 At least one of every item dropped. (sabers not included)

 

For me the issue comes down to expectations, they need to tell their customers that an item will not be dropping at the same rate as the other. They did away with bronze but added another drop that did not follow the same % as their other 'gold' items, and never bothered to tell anyone that they had made a new 'platinum' level item while still classifying it as 'gold'.

No matter how you cut it, that is by definition 'Bait And Switch'

 

As for the constructive portion:

I think it comes down to the average players perception of value and spending habits. IMO, this should be the target.

 

You want the players to work for items and perhaps spend a little more than they would have liked but at the end of the day you want them stepping away with the feeling that the trade cash-for-collectables was an equitable and even exchange.

 

Where is the point of equality? I do not know but I assure you BW/EA does (or should). The issue (to me) is that they have lost sight of that and they are indeed taking advantage of their customers more than they need to, more than is healthy for the customer the game and the game economy.

 

There are TONS of things they could do in the coding to make this work, not just base % drop but adjusted % drop based on the average return they would like to see from each pack. They could give a slight increase that scales as the customer opens more packs and then drops once they have already received that item....You could seriously nail down the cost to customer vs. return to customer within a few % points and then everyone can walk away content.

 

Unfortunately they have chosen a path that is unhealthy for the customer and the game long term.

Edited February 12, 2016 by Gothreg

[Gothreg]

I purchased 14 hypercrates as well, and actually came to the forums to see if it was a bug of some sort. I have multiples of all the items but did not get either arbiter saber. It seems to me that this should be almost impossible if all the gold items have the same drop rate, so apparently they do not. To add insult to injury, all the remaining items that I did get are essentially worthless due the flooding of them on the GTN. This is just poor form, and makes people like me who consistently buy 6-7 hypercrates each time a new one arrives not want to purchase cartel market items any longer.

 

Quoted for truth....

[knowmyname]

Good. People like you guys buying multiple hypercrates are driving this short bus to hell. BW listened when your wallets spoke and now we have seen this transition in the game.

 

Look at the sub rewards. CC coming next month for subs. To spend on cartel, getting players hooked on the gamble of the next hot ticket item.

 

I'd rather have content and bugs squashed than garbage Barbie items

[Gothreg]

Good. People like you guys buying multiple hypercrates are driving this short bus to hell. BW listened when your wallets spoke and now we have seen this transition in the game.

 

Look at the sub rewards. CC coming next month for subs. To spend on cartel, getting players hooked on the gamble of the next hot ticket item.

 

I'd rather have content and bugs squashed than garbage Barbie items

 

You do realize "People Like Us" help pay the bills for those chasing bugs and developing content. Guess they will be letting a developer or bug tester go next month when I stop buying packs....

 

Sorry about that

Edited February 12, 2016 by Gothreg

[Staavis_SC]

Good. People like you guys buying multiple hypercrates are driving this short bus to hell. BW listened when your wallets spoke and now we have seen this transition in the game.

 

Look at the sub rewards. CC coming next month for subs. To spend on cartel, getting players hooked on the gamble of the next hot ticket item.

 

I'd rather have content and bugs squashed than garbage Barbie items

 

Ummm...perhaps someone needs to tell Bioware they are DOING IT WRONG.

 

You don't get people hooked if those people don't get the "payoff" for their comp coins.

 

It's like a liquor company trying to get you hooked on booze that only gets you drunk 0.09% of the time.

 

These guys at Bioware really don't get it. Perhaps hiring some folks from Jack Daniels or Smirnoff might show them how to get people hooked on something.

 

(Yes, I am well aware of how politically incorrect that statement was.)

Edited February 12, 2016 by Staavis_SC

[KaleTogras]

I'm fine with BW making a lot of cha-ching on the Cartel Market. People like their shinies, nothing will ever change that, and nothing on the CM can affect the core gameplay of the game.

 

But spending 200$ on the most blatant cash-grab in recent SWTOR history sends EAWare the wrong signal. What do you think is preventing them from selling Hypercrates at 20000 CC? Or charging F2P scrubs 10$ to level past lvl 20? Fear that we will walk away in disgust or refuse to fork over the cash. Take away that fear and presto! You get fewer items for your money, Grand Chance Cubes and 0.04% chances for new pack drops.

[ebbehhm]

Im fine with them trying to make money, but when they use that money on just making more money on the CM, thats a no no.

 

At least invest in decent content, not just trash mob spam and new rip off CM packs.

[jimmymcjimmy]

Agreed. I usually buy around 5 hyper crates if there is something I want. Some people will call me out on being foolish, but I’m happy to support the game in this way, as long as I got what I wanted and if I didn’t; I’d have enough other rare items to sell on the GTN to obtain said items. Unfortunately with this new pack that is not the case. 6 + packs later and no sabers. I honestly feel cheated and if BioWare won’t remedy this. I will cease to support the game via the CM.

[Corsin]

Dont know why you guys are still buying crates...

 

Ive spent over 3000 dollars over the last few years on previous packs.

 

But I closed my wallet as soon as this cube thing came out. and in protest it will stay closed until they change it.

 

You guys buying 14+ hypercrates are just playing into the fraudulent design. Stop it! lol

Edited February 12, 2016 by Corsin

[SteveTheCynic]

I didn't bother to do the math like you, but I purchased a total of 14 hypercrates -- I had accidentally transferred two into my cargo hold whilst sorting -- and I got a whopping ZERO sabers. Got everything else though. I don't know what the drop rates are on the sabers, but apparently they're even lower than what you posted sir/ma'am. Sad day.

That's OK, he didn't do the math either. He just counted stuff. Let's go back to basic statistics and probabilities. 244 samples is *nothing* when assessing distributions like this. The individual items, especially "what's the probability of item X dropping" when X is a cube-only item among thousands, have a lower probability per sample-point than 1/244.

 

So, obviously, by an inversion of the pigeon-hole principle, it is clear that there will some items (thousands, even) which are not received in a 244-chance sample. There aren't enough chances to get them all. Duplicates, on the other hand, are startlingly common. Someone mentioned 2000 different items in total -> the math behind the "birthday paradox" says that the probability of a duplicate (i.e. that at least one item appears more than once) exceeds 50% when the number of chances is around 1.2 times the square root of the number of items. (This "paradox" is illusory, and named for the fact that if you have groups of people, you'll find that a group of just 23 people has a > 50% chance of at least one shared birthday.) 244 is way far more than 1.2 times the square root of 2000, so the chance of duplicates is correspondingly higher than 50%.

 

Then we move on to sample sizes and "margin of error", and we conclude that 244 is too small a number of samples to say much of anything for sure. Consider all those political polls that asked 1500 people and have a margin of error quoted at 3-4 percent. That margin of error is a function of the total population (i.e. all the samples taken by everyone), the sample size (the 244 figure), the probabilities of each possible outcome, and a measure of how confident we want to be that the true probabilities will be inside the calculated margin of error.

 

It's rare for political pollers to publish their confidence levels, but it's usually 95% or 99% - the higher it is, the wider the margin of error will be. They do publish their sample sizes, and they are normally much higher than just 244. The higher the sample size, the narrower the margin of error will be. 244 samples is fairly low, and will produce a correspondingly wide margin of error.

 

There are enough different possible items that we would need to make tens or even hundreds of thousands of samples to get a decent idea of what the probabilities, and yet the birthday paradox speaks of getting duplicates at 50+% probability with a number of samples in the mid fifties (assuming 2000 different items).

[BenduKundalini]

Now that's what I call a comic CON

[Jessabeans]

Here is my feedback,

 

There should not be 2 chance cubes in a single pack, if you buy one pack you should have at least one item from the pack. I liked the theory of the chance cubes but in practice they have much to large of a list of items to draw from and that list seems to be heavily weighted towards toys, dyes and companion customization. (IE the stuff no one wanted from the previous packs anyway.)

Edited February 12, 2016 by Jessabeans

[brazilboy]

Isn't the right way to look at the math like this -- and forgive me as it's been a while since my statistics class.

 

Chance of something happening = (1-chance of not happening)

Drop rate of Arbiter saber(s) per pack = let's assume 0.05%

Non-drop rate of arbiter saber = 1-.05% = 0.9995 <-- chance of Arbiter saber NOT dropping per pack

 

Chance of arbiter saber not dropping in 240 packs (8 hypercrates) = 0.9995^240

(note the chance per pack may not be the 0.05% because of the # of rolls you get per pack, but that's up to someone else to calculate)

 

If that's right, that says the chance of the saber NOT dropping after opening 8 hypercrates (240 packs) is 88.7% ... or, conversely, if you open 240 packs you have roughly a 11.3% chance of getting the Arbiter saber.

 

Base math:

chance of something happening [x] times in a row is just to multiply probabilities

if something has a 25% chance of happening, it has a 75% chance of not happening.

the chance of not-happening (75%) every time over [x] tries is just to multiply the probabilities

that is: chance of not happening 3x in a row = 75%x75%x75% = 42%

in this case, the chance of the Arbiter saber not dropping is just 1-(chanceofdropping)

 

So ..

Chance of receiving Arbiter saber after

opening 30 packs (1 hypercrate) = 1.49% [1-(0.9995^30)]

2 hypercrates (60 packs) = 2.96% chance [1-(0.9995^60]

etc.

 

That's all assuming (a) my math is right and (b) the 0.05% drop rate is right

Edited February 12, 2016 by brazilboy

[crashcru]

Dont know why you guys are still buying crates...

 

Ive spent over 3000 dollars over the last few years on previous packs.

 

But I closed my wallet as soon as this cube thing came out. and in protest it will stay closed until they change it.

 

You guys buying 14+ hypercrates are just playing into the fraudulent design. Stop it! lol

 

I didn't realize there would be such a dramatic change in drop rates with the new pack. I have loved the cartel market packs since they were released, and I took them at their word that the only change was that bronze items would be replaced with chance cubes. It is now my impression that what was once going to be bronze items are now silver, and a couple of those silver items became gold. Had they advertised the fact that the arbiter sabers that they premiered on the pack would drop at a rate below 1% up front, I wouldn't have bought as many hypercrates as I did, but it wasn't until I had burned through them that I thought something was wrong.

 

I can definitely say that I will not be buying hypercrates for some time due to my feeling that this was blatant and disingenuous. What I initially attributed to RNG now appears to just be the new plan.

[JediJasonL]

To both of those individuals that attempted to insert statistical math here, good try. What you have attempted to convey would be in regards to determining margin of error in comparison to sample size in a random community poll used to represent a community as a whole.

 

What I am discussing here are the drop rates on items determined by the number of chances versus the number of items received for each individual, which can be calculated by simple percentage. While my drop rate is the only one I can be truly certain of (since my experience is the only one I witnessed first hand), the drop rates of others can be reasonably approximated by the number of packs they say they opened.

 

Now, I'll be the first to admit that, while my drop rate is extremely low, it cannot readily represent the drop rate of the community as a whole. To do that, BW would need to randomly poll a number of players (2,401 players to be exact to receive a community drop rate with a 2% margin of error; see Gallup Poll) to find out how many packs they opened versus how many sabers they got. However, I think, with the number of folks I've seen post similar stories to mine, both on these forums and others, compared with the number of people I have seen in game with the sabers and the number of sabers listed on the GTN, it is fairly safe to say that the drop rate on the sabers is still much lower than what Bioware told us the drop rate on Gold items would be.

[DustyDemonNinja]

So, I'm just going to do some math here and give you my feedback regarding that math.

 

So, we have a chance at two items, which can either be a Silver/Gold item from the new pack or a Grand Chance Cube:

• Chances per pack = 2
  

 

There are 30 packs per Hypercrate, 5 packs per Supercrate, and then the stand alone packs:

• 30 packs per Hypercrate * 2 chances per pack = 60 chances per Hypercrate
  
• 5 packs per Supercrate * 2 chances per pack = 10 chances per Supercrate
  Standalone pack = 2 chances
  

 

Now, onto what I have gotten so far:

• 4 Hypercrates * 60 chanes per Hypercrate = 240 chances
  
• 2 Supercrates * 10 chances per Supercrate = 20 chances
  
• 2 standalone packs * 2 chances per pack = 4 chances
  

 

Total chances = 244 chances

Number of Unstable Arbiter Lightsabers = 0

Number of Unstable Arbiter Dualsabers = 0

 

Now, let's assume I got one of either saber:

1 / 244 = 0.41% drop rate

 

This means my current drop rate is less than one half of one percent on the Unstable Sabers.

 

Amount spent ~= $160

 

Now, with all of this math, I'd like to voice my opinion on said math. First, I should not have to spend that amount of money to try and get something that I want. Yes, I understand it's a gamble. However, at the same time, I'm a loyal subscriber, regardless of the numerous faults this game has. I'm also not in Vegas playing slots. It's a video game that I subscribe to. There is absolutely no reason something on a market like the Cartel Market should be that rare, especially for subscribers that are willing to fork out the cash to play the game every month anyway. This leads directly into my second point: Why is the drop rate so low anyway? On top of all that, from some of the accounts I've read, my drop rate isn't even that bad. Some folks are experiencing drop rates on the order of <= 0.25%!

 

So, Musco, this all leads very finely into my whole point:

 

ABSOLUTELY NOTHING we are willing to spend extra money on in this game should have a drop rate that abysmally low!

 

I love you so much for doing the math. Yo Eric, wake up, go yell at that darn micro transaction team. This is disgusting.

[Ratajack]

To both of those individuals that attempted to insert statistical math here, good try. What you have attempted to convey would be in regards to determining margin of error in comparison to sample size in a random community poll used to represent a community as a whole.

 

What I am discussing here are the drop rates on items determined by the number of chances versus the number of items received for each individual, which can be calculated by simple percentage. While my drop rate is the only one I can be truly certain of (since my experience is the only one I witnessed first hand), the drop rates of others can be reasonably approximated by the number of packs they say they opened.

 

Now, I'll be the first to admit that, while my drop rate is extremely low, it cannot readily represent the drop rate of the community as a whole. To do that, BW would need to randomly poll a number of players (2,401 players to be exact to receive a community drop rate with a 2% margin of error; see Gallup Poll) to find out how many packs they opened versus how many sabers they got. However, I think, with the number of folks I've seen post similar stories to mine, both on these forums and others, compared with the number of people I have seen in game with the sabers and the number of sabers listed on the GTN, it is fairly safe to say that the drop rate on the sabers is still much lower than what Bioware told us the drop rate on Gold items would be.

 

No matter how bad your luck and your results are/were, you CANNOT calculate the drop rate based on your results, or even the results of others with equally bad luck. The sample size is too small, and also does not take into account those who had exceptional luck.

 

What the poster to whom you refer was trying o point out is that there is a difference between statistics and probability.

 

Let's hypothetically say that the drop chance is 1%, or 1 in a 100. That does NOT mean that you will get that lightsaber if you open 100 packs. Each pack you open has the EXACT SAME chance to contain that lightsaber, whether it is the first pack or the 350th pack.

 

Now, I'm not saying that the drop chance is 1%. I have no idea what the drop chance actually is, although I suspect is lower than 1%. Even at 1%, though, it could take hundreds of packs to get that saber.

 

Here is a link to site which explains it far better than I ever could.

 

http://www.engadget.com/2010/01/13/drop-chance-probability/

[brazilboy]

No

Now, I'm not saying that the drop chance is 1%. I have no idea what the drop chance actually is, although I suspect is lower than 1%. Even at 1%, though, it could take hundreds of packs to get that saber.

http://www.engadget.com/2010/01/13/drop-chance-probability/

 

At 1% drop rate per pack, your chance of getting at least 1 saber per (n) packs opened is the inverse of your chance of NOT getting a saber per (n) packs opened.

 

The chance of NOT getting a saber -- which we'll call NOTCHANCE -- per (n) packs opened is NOTCHANCE x NOTCHANCE x NOTCHANCE etc. or NOTCHANCE^n where (n) are the packs opened.

 

In this case, 1% chance of getting saber means 99% chance of NOTCHANCE ... so let's say you open 240 packs (8 hypercrates), then your NOTCHANCE = 99%^240 = ~9% ... so your chance of getting at least 1 saber would be 1-9% or 91% (!). That's because a 1% drop rate is actually pretty high - if you open 3 hypercrates you'd still have a 60% chance of getting at least 1. Reported drops seem much lower. If we move the % chance of getting the saber to 0.5%, your chance of getting at least 1 in 3 hypercrates of opened crates falls to ~36%. If we move the chance to 0.05%, your chance of 1 per 3 hypercrates of opened crates falls to ~4.4%.

 

If I'm doing the math right.

Edited February 13, 2016 by brazilboy

[Ratajack]

At 1% drop rate per pack, your chance of getting at least 1 saber per (n) packs opened is the inverse of your chance of NOT getting a saber per (n) packs opened.

 

The chance of NOT getting a saber -- which we'll call NOTCHANCE -- per (n) packs opened is NOTCHANCE x NOTCHANCE x NOTCHANCE etc. or NOTCHANCE^n where (n) are the packs opened.

 

In this case, 1% chance of getting saber means 99% chance of NOTCHANCE ... so let's say you open 240 packs (8 hypercrates), then your NOTCHANCE = 99%^240 = ~9% ... so your chance of getting at least 1 saber would be 1-9% or 91% (!). That's because a 1% drop rate is actually pretty high - if you open 3 packs you'd still have a 60% chance of getting at least 1. Reported drops seem much lower. If we move the % chance of getting the saber to 0.5%, your chance of getting at least 1 in 3 packs of opened crates falls to ~36%. If we move the chance to 0.05%, your chance of 1 per 3 packs of opened crates falls to ~4.4%.

 

If I'm doing the math right.

 

You're math is incorrect.

 

Even if you account for 2 chances at a saber per pack, 3 packs would be 6 chances. If the saber drop rate were 1%, that would only be 5.85199% chance of seeing a saber in those three packs. Even a 30 pack hypercrate (60 "chances") only equates to a 45.28434% chance of seeing a saber if the drop rate is 1%.

 

In WoW, I ran ZG over 650 times, across several characters, before the panther mount dropped. With 650 runs, there was a 99.85450% chance to see that mount drop. You would think I should have seen it drop sooner, but it didn't. In those 650+ runs, I saw the raptor mount (also a 1% drop rate) drop 5 times. On the flip side, the Ashes of A'lar mount from Tempest Keep (another 1% drop rate mount) dropped on my fourth run.

 

I do agree that the saber drop rate seems to be less than 1%, but based on the limited sample size, we cannot determine the actual drop rate.

 

I think the actual drop rate is lower than 1% because with a 1% hypothetical drop rate on the saber and two "chances" per pack, or 480 "chances" in 240 packs, there is a 99.19667% chance of seeing at least one saber. Notice, though, that even with 240 packs (480 "chances"), there is still no guarantee of seeing a saber.

 

Is the drop rate too low? Should it be adjusted up? Those are decisions BW will have to make. I expect that they will make those decisions based on the sales of the new pack. If people continue to purchase the new packs (either to open them hoping for a lightsaber, or to sell them on the GTN), then BW will be less likely to adjust any of the drop rates.

 

For the players, however, the choice is whether or not to spend CC's (either "free" CC's from subscriber stipends or referral rewards or CC's purchased with RL money) or in game credits (via the GTN) on those packs.

 

I, personally, will not be spending any CC's on packs, nor will I be purchasing any packs (or any of the new items from this pack), given the apparent drop rate of the grand chance cubes.