106 replies to this topic

[sty0pa]

(Opening new thread on mod suggestion to keep relevant and timely)

As people may know, unidentified dyes' drop rates spiked in (IIRC) the 11/2 patch, to the point people were getting a dozen dyes in an hour.  I remember thinking my new guardian alt must have been somehow "blessed by god" and proof that devs love paladins...

This was IMMEDIATELY fixed by a subsequent patch within 24 hours.

Now, UD drops seem to have fallen through the floor.

We of course have no access to actual drop data, but this is supported by more than anecdotal evidence.  UD's sold pre-spike around 2s each.  During the spike, great wailing and gnashing of teeth was heard from sellers as the price dropped allegedly below 1s (I never saw it get that low, only dropping to around 1s...what's the vendor price?).  Now the price is well over 10s, suggesting that in the simplest terms, overall drop rates are 1/5 what they were.  Let's be conservative and suspect that some of that is hype, so say drop rates are 1/4 original.
(GW2DB implicitly confirms this, the current price the last two days has been 10s; the 30 day average is just over 5s.)

Personally, I think this is way too low.
I still think it sucks that colors are toon-bound, FWIW.  I think that was a crass money-grab on Anet's part.  

But particularly while colors are character-specific, the current drop rate is simply too low.  
Is this again a money-grab by Anet, as I don't see any 'rush to patch' this time?

[MandraxUK]

I'm a born skeptic and wouldn't be surprised if they have done this on purpose in an attempt to boost sales of dye in the cash shop...

[AetherMcLoud]

Dyes should be accountwide that is their biggest problem IMHO.

[TGIFrisbie]

Did you really think the spike in dye drops were just some random bug involving dyes?  No...I contend they were setting the dye drop rates lower and unintentionally increased them.  Then in order to patch that they announced they needed to "fix" them, and thus lowered them below where they had been set since release.

At first I thought the "fix", decrease, was draconically obvious.  After a while I decided it wasn't so bad, but still I agree it is MUCH lower than from release.  So now, was the spike unintentional or intentional, covering a brief period, so they could announce a "fix" that would actually reduce the rates to lower than original?

After the "no gear tread mill" "we got gear tread mill" bait and switch, I have no faith in this company's honesty about anything.

Edited by TGIFrisbie, 27 November 2012 - 03:53 PM.

[kalendraf]

I've noticed that my newer alt characters seem to find a lot more dyes when exploring the various starter maps.  I've even observed this behavior to a smaller degree when I take one of my higher level characters back into lower level map areas.  It seems to affect both drops from monster kills as well as from vegatable harvesting.

I'm wondering if ANet has changed the dye drop rate to be lower on certain maps, level of foes or something similar that leads to lower drop rates for players on the highest level maps.

[RedStar]

Dye drops have always been weird. Using an irrelevant sample of 3 players (me and 2 guildies), we created our characters and hit level 80 at approximately the same time. The results were different :
-5 rare, 10 uncommon, 20 common
-2 rare, 3 uncommon, 15 common
-1 uncommon, 7 common

The chance to get dyes is weird. My necro is lucky when harvesting in 1-15 areas (personal best being 5 dyes in a row) but I've yet to find one by doing that with my thief or guardian. It comes and goes.

[matsif]

While I level alts I generally sit them in wayfarer foothills as I have a nice little path I can follow to do the daily bonus in ~30 minutes depending on DEs on the path.  I average 10 dyes a week during this path over a week and its been about the same since about release.  per day however its very random, some days I'll get none and other days I'll get 5 or 6.  Its been about the same in amount over all of my characters in that zone (all profs but thief).  

I've found that I get dyes more often in events than on random mobs, and I get them more often in large spawns of enemies like the wurm events or the arctodus cave in wayfarers.  But I just as often don't get any from them as I get 2 or 3 from them.

Edited by matsif, 27 November 2012 - 04:42 PM.

[Uhhsam]

Isn't it possible the rise in dye prices can be attributed to the recent bot bannings that were also responsible for raising the price of high level crafting materials?

[tristania]

Since that patch to fix the unintended increase in dye drops, my characters didn't get dyes at all, except for one situation: I needed to grind materials to craft lower level rares for my alt, and there 5 dyes dropped (2/hour). But other then that: nope, nothing.
before the patch however, my friend reported to me he got like 2 dyes/day, where my necro got a dye every other day. Also certain harvesting nodes in certain maps, seemed to have an increased chance to get a dye out of them. But yeah, want them to increase drop rates a little again, so we don't have to 'farm' for dyes. Accountbound dyes will stay a dream, I'm afraid.

[UNTYPABLExNAME]

sty0pa, on 27 November 2012 - 01:53 PM, said:

Personally, I think this is way too low.
I still think it sucks that colors are toon-bound, FWIW.  I think that was a crass money-grab on Anet's part.  

The drop rate is too low for you personally, so you can't get as much UD as you want.  Which you want to sell to make some in game gold.

This is more honorable than someone wanting to grab RL money?

Question for OP: how much in game gold do you have?

Spoiler

I have 1g 87s 44c in game
and 2400 gems

[DuskWolf]

MandraxUK, on 27 November 2012 - 01:57 PM, said:

I'm a born skeptic and wouldn't be surprised if they have done this on purpose in an attempt to boost sales of dye in the cash shop...

Based upon everything else they've done, I wouldn't call you a sceptic, I'd call you a realist.

[MazingerZ]

Let's put it this way, since rolling my Mesmer last Wednesday, I've gotten a total of three dyes by level 33.  An uncommon and two commons.

My thief, before she hit 60 and yes, during the high drop rate, had 4-5 rares, three rows of common and two rows of uncommon.  She even had Abyss drop for her.

Either they fail at statistics and probability or something is off here.

[GrandmaFunk]

TGIFrisbie, on 27 November 2012 - 01:58 PM, said:

Did you really think the spike in dye drops were just some random bug involving dyes?  No...I contend they were setting the dye drop rates lower and unintentionally increased them.  Then in order to patch that they announced they needed to "fix" them, and thus lowered them below where they had been set since release.

Tinfoil silliness.

Once they removed the halloween items from the drop tables, the now unassigned portions of those tables defaulted to dye drops, that's what the bug was.

Edited by GrandmaFunk, 27 November 2012 - 05:53 PM.

[Racthoh]

MandraxUK, on 27 November 2012 - 01:57 PM, said:

I'm a born skeptic and wouldn't be surprised if they have done this on purpose in an attempt to boost sales of dye in the cash shop...

At time of writing:

Abyss - 13+ gold
Celestial - 9+ gold
Black - 7+ gold
Midnight Ice - 6+ gold
White - 5+ gold
Midnight Fire - 5~ gold
Gold - 1 gold 55 silver
Unidentified Gray - 1 gold 45 silver

It costs 1 gold 26 silver to get 75 gems, the cost of buying one unidentified Yellow or Brown dye from the cash shop. Considering none of those dyes fall into Yellow or Brown (correct me if I'm wrong) then I think we're safe to say it's not a conspiracy. We can, however, say that Anet are pretty dumb with their gem pricing on the dye packs. They're a complete waste of money still.

[TGIFrisbie]

GrandmaFunk, on 27 November 2012 - 05:50 PM, said:

Tinfoil silliness.

Once they removed the halloween items from the drop tables, the now unassigned portions of those tables defaulted to dye drops, that's what the bug was.

Oh?  Then why is the drop rate LOWER than before the "bug" that was fixed?  Right....some peeps just like posting crap like "tinfoil silliness".  The drop rate is lower than post release, get over it.

[RedStar]

TGIFrisbie, on 27 November 2012 - 06:01 PM, said:

Oh?  Then why is the drop rate LOWER than before the "bug" that was fixed?  Right....some peeps just like posting crap like "tinfoil silliness".  The drop rate is lower than post release, get over it.

Did you take a sample of the playerbase before and after the update to see if that was true ? Because as far as everyone is concerned dye drops have been irregular since the start. Sometime you are the luckiest player in the world, and other you can go on weeks without finding one.

[MandraxUK]

Personally, in over 280 hours of playing, I've never received a rare dye of any kind.  I'm probably just unlucky.

[sty0pa]

UNTYPABLExNAME, on 27 November 2012 - 05:09 PM, said:

The drop rate is too low for you personally, so you can't get as much UD as you want.  Which you want to sell to make some in game gold.

This is more honorable than someone wanting to grab RL money?

Question for OP: how much in game gold do you have?

Spoiler

I have 1g 87s 44c in game
and 2400 gems

Curious why you approach this from this point of view?

I'd point out (and if anyone from Anet could confirm, I'd be delighted)
- I have never, not once, sold a dye.  Every single dye I've gotten, I've used on one of my toons.
- across all 5 toons, I probably have about 11g.  No toon has more than 3.
-  I have 200 gems, because that's what's left over from my 1 time minimum-gem buy, and spending on an extra bank slot.

Aside from that, your postulate might make sense if I was asking for UD to drop FOR ME ALONE.  Which I'm not, neither implicitly or explicitly.  Otherwise, see, raising UD drop rates should directly impact the AH prices proportionally, so  increasing the drop rate would mean prices would FALL...how would I personally "get rich" in that scenario?  You might want to check your basic economics.

And yes, to your observation , I would absolutely characterize my point as "this is too low in my personal view", but I'm curious from an existentialist point of view how you (apparently) believe it's possible for anyone to post something that's NOT their own point of view?

RedStar, on 27 November 2012 - 06:49 PM, said:

Did you take a sample of the playerbase before and after the update to see if that was true ? Because as far as everyone is concerned dye drops have been irregular since the start. Sometime you are the luckiest player in the world, and other you can go on weeks without finding one.

Well, the chance in price in the Auction house wasn't gradual as the bots were extinguished.
It was pretty radical from day before the UD spike, the day of the spike, and the day after.

If it was entirely due to the bot removals, there'd be a smooth line of pricing with a spike (down) during the patch, returning to the previous trendline after it was fixed.  Doesn't seem to be the case.

Edited by Leyana, 28 November 2012 - 12:00 AM.
No

[GrandmaFunk]

sty0pa, on 27 November 2012 - 08:33 PM, said:

If it was entirely due to the bot removals, there'd be a smooth line of pricing with a spike (down) during the patch, returning to the previous trendline after it was fixed.  Doesn't seem to be the case.

I'm not sure I follow that logic.. since bot removal was done in a few large waves, wouldn't their impact on the prices be in steps rather than a 'smooth line'?

Edited by GrandmaFunk, 27 November 2012 - 08:41 PM.

[sty0pa]

GrandmaFunk, on 27 November 2012 - 08:40 PM, said:

I'm not sure I follow that logic.. since bot removal was done in a few large waves, wouldn't their impact on the prices be in steps rather than a 'smooth line'?

Granted, you're right.
But it wouldn't be in one big step before/after the spike, in any case, unless that patch and it's repair themselves had a MASSIVE impact on bots - which isn't impossible but seems pretty coincidental.

[RedStar]

Maybe players found another recipe that used unidentified dyes.

[Khlaw]

If and when dyes go account bound there will be simultaneous rejoicing and gnashing of teeth.  It will be quite the cacophony.

I have yet to get an abyss, but I've gotten multiples of a couple that go for 1g or more.  I ended up keeping them for alts, but would have sold them (of course) if they were account bound.

[LavaSquid]

Anet should have realized that making dyes account wide will further encourage players to buy the dye packs from gem store.

[Nonlinear]

The price of unidentified dye has only more than doubled since the beginning of September so everything must be fine.

http://www.gw2spidy.com/item/20323

Maybe a bunch of fools got precursors from the Lost Shores event and are foolishly stockpiling dyes on some silly mega-grind to get a legendary?

[Lucas Ashrock]

Yes, too, for Bifrost.

[Nabuko Darayon]

Dyes drop as they did before. I still liked after-Halloween situation but I get the frustration.

[Chillius]

Don't think dye drop rate is to low...
For example:
2 days ago I had 6 dyes in about  3 hours of play time on my guardian (lvl 25-30) in the Gandaren Fields.
Yesterday on my mesmer (lvl 50-55) I just found 1 dye more then 4 hours of play time in lvl 50 area

It seems to me more dyes drop @ lower lvl area's.
My therory is that : due to less people playing those area's there is a higher chance of getting better drops and because there are no rares or exotics @ those lvl area's dyes drop more often.
Not sure though, and not about to set up a test to prove it.
But it seems logical to me
Anyways I'm always finding more dyes in the lvl 0 - 35 area's compared to higher lvl area's.

[Traveller]

I wish they would just make them account bound already, like it was originally imagined. The whole logic of making characters "unique" was pretty moot to begin with since people just buy the same dyes for alts mostly anyway. It's pretty much another goldsink they wanted to add in the game, I guess, or an attempt to make people buy dye packs from the gemstore. While I understand the need for goldsinks, I feel that in this case they are looking the dye system the wrong way.

I would actually buy more dyes if they made it account-wide, since I know every future character benefits from it also.

Edited by Traveller, 29 November 2012 - 03:37 PM.

[typographie]

MandraxUK, on 27 November 2012 - 01:57 PM, said:

I'm a born skeptic and wouldn't be surprised if they have done this on purpose in an attempt to boost sales of dye in the cash shop...

A "skeptic," by definition, is one who demands real evidence to back up assertions, rather than simplistic, causal fallacies. You're entitled to your opinion, but you're the opposite of a skeptic.

[Zhahz]

sty0pa, on 27 November 2012 - 01:53 PM, said:

As people may know, unidentified dyes' drop rates spiked in (IIRC) the 11/2 patch, to the point people were getting a dozen dyes in an hour.  I remember thinking my new guardian alt must have been somehow "blessed by god" and proof that devs love paladins...

This was IMMEDIATELY fixed by a subsequent patch within 24 hours.

IMO, ANet intended all along to drop the rate significantly since people like dyes and this steers them to the gem store.  The dye kits have always been a horrible "value" with the price of UD so low.  As the price of UD gets to be higher and higher, they will start to be more of an option, or would be if it weren't for the fact that the gold exchange is equally out of control.  I guess if you're buying gems for cash it might be an option but converting gold to gems to get dye kits is just as bad an idea now as ever.

The game is F2P and so of course ANet is going to have to do what it can to steer people to the cash shop.  This is the pitfall of F2P (that I'm steadily getting sick of, that and the seemingly lower quality of F2P players, not so much in GW2, but in other F2P I've been trying).

Seems to me that all MMORPGs economies get out of control in some way.  Usually the massive inflation in a typical MMORPG ends up not being a big deal since it's usually easy to find something to sell to get involved.  For ex, even a noob entering such an economy can gather low level mats and sell them at crazy prices and gain the wealth needed to buy expensive low level items.

Player economy has always kind of sucked in this game and seems to be getting worse.  It's not quite the same situation as you find in typical MMORPGs but it still seems like it's a mess even with ANet attempting tight control.