Eliza Hullbreaker
Sea Legs
Note that the update today may have changed all this.
Before I begin, I just want to say that luck is one of the biggest factors for good loot drops. There is nothing that will ever change this, but nonetheless I think that there are problems in how loot is generated that is beyond luck.
This is my personal theory on how loot is generated, and why loot, or at least land loot is so bad currently.
If you don't believe me about the land loot, take a look at these skulls I got several days ago. These are not the only ones I got, and I did find a few that did give good loot, but these are by far the worst.
I believe, first off, that quality of loot is based on location. The fact that you can only find cursed blades on Raven's Cove and Isla Tormenta proves that the code allows for location to factor in to what may drop, and it is entirely possible that quality of loot is dictated by location, for example, I don't think anyone has ever gotten a legendary weapon on Perdida, Cutthroat, or Cangrejos, despite them being home to enemies that are fairly high level, while the vast majority have come from Tormenta and Raven's Cove. More evidence of this is that enemies on Isla Tormenta drop significantly more gold then enemies on Raven's Cove. The picture that was taken by the south idol actually depicted a fairly average gold drop there, while enemies in the treasure room in Tormenta I've seen give over 200 gold in a single skull, not including treasure items. Now, this could be more of a case of time spent then actual code, after all, who grinds for legendaries on Perdida, Cutthroat, or Cangrejos? But I do think location has an influence, even if it's small.
Secondly, I think that the level of the enemy has at least some influence. When was the last time you saw a legendary drop from one of the Undead Gravediggers in the Port Royal graveyard, even if they are yellow tag at the time? However, I think level of the enemy has very little influence once you get beyond the level 20 to 25 range, while the chance for legendary and famed weapons begins to appear I believe around this point, the garbage weapons such as rusty cutlasses and clay dolls do not begin to disappear, which I believe is one of the biggest factors to why there is so much bad loot. I do not believe that they should disappear entirely, if only for balance reasons, but you should not find as many cracked blunderbusses from a level 50 Thrall Captain as you do from a level 1 Undead Gravedigger.
Thirdly, it is a popular belief that you completing the Black Pearl Quest and/or maxing your pirate and all of your skills drastically increases your chance of finding a legendary. I personally do not share this belief, but I have not maxed a pirate yet so this may or may not be the case. I personally believe that this is just a myth and that it is still possible to find famed and legendary even as a level 1, so long as the enemy you attack is of a high enough level. In fact, if it is the case that gaining a higher level on your pirate increases your chance of gaining famed or legendary, I think this should be removed and all level pirates have the same chance per enemy defeated, depending on the enemy's level, to pick up famed or legendary. What greater drive to get your pirate from level 1 sword to level 30 then to use the Lost Sword of El Patron you just picked up?
And finally the actual mechanics. This is just my theory and my speculations and may or may not be true, but here it is.
I believe firstly each loot container type has a range of values with which to generate loot. These are just ballpark estimates for the ranges and may or may not be correct.
Loot Skull Chest: 50 - 110
Loot Chest: 30 - 90
Loot Pouch: 10 - 75
The first thing I believe happens is that a random number is selected from these ranges. The game then randomly picks loot based on a percentage chance to fill the container with, and stops when the selected number is reached. These are ballpark estimates for what the items may be worth:
Legendary Item: 90 Points
Famed Item: 75 Points
Rare Item: 50 Points
Common Item: 25 Points
Crude Item: 10 Points
Cheat Card: 10 Points
Common Treasure Item: 5 Points
Uncommon Treasure Item: 10 Points
Rare Treasure Item: 25 Points
Gold x 10: 1 Point
Ammo x 5: 1 Point
So theoretically, using the above chart, A Loot Skull Chest could randomly be given the value 102 by the random number generator. The game then decides to fill the chest with 1 Lost Sword of El Patron (90 points), 50 Gold (5 Points), 10 Steel Shot (2 Points), and 1 Letter Opener (5 Points), thus reaching the assigned value.
Needless to say, the items which require more points will be more rare, and not every Loot Skull Chest can generate a legendary weapon, or even a famed.
However, I think that the reason loot is so horrible is because some items have more value assigned to them then they are actually worth. The best example of this are "rare" pieces of clothing such as Chill Boots and Thanksgiving Blouses. Despite them being of little value, even to sell, they are given a value of 50 because of their "rare" quality, and because of this, it locks out the generation of legendary or famed weapons in the Skull Chest, because the (theoretical) max value a skull chest can have is 110, minus 50 makes 60, not enough remaining value for a legendary or famed. To make matters worse, I believe that clothing has a higher percent chance to drop then weapons do, so you have a higher chance to get a "rare" clothing piece then a rare weapon, much less a famed or legendary. I have lost count of the number of skulls I've seen with only a common weapon and a "rare" corset.
There are other items that also I believe have more quality assigned to them then they are actually worth, and some of this is leftover from the original game's Basic/Unlimited Access system. These are some of the more glaring examples:
Zombie Doll: Common, only gives poison resistance, worth 1 gold
Dagger: Common, basic dagger
Rusty Throwing Knives: Common, worth no gold, lowest attack among throwing knives
Cutlery Set: Common, infinite asp, worth 1 gold
(Can't remember the name) Staff: Common, Blast Boost 1, Attack 2, worth no gold
Rusty Bayonet: Common
Worn Broadsword: Common
Now despite how anyone looting in Tormenta or Raven's Cove would call these items trash, they are given a "Common" quality by the game, simply because in the original game they were locked behind Unlimited Access, meaning that they are worth 15 more points then similar trash such as a rusty cutlass or a wheellock pistol, thus taking up more value that could go to more useful things, even if you don't get a famed/legendary.
Now the reason why land loot is so much worse then sea loot is tougher, but I believe that the reason for this is either
A. a purposeful nerf of land loot to encourage more sailing (possibly because of the great sailing nerf that ended the 10000 gold voyages where you got 100 royal chests),
B. Gold is not counted towards the total loot value for a skull because it goes straight to "Gold Already Looted", thus freeing up more value for weapons
C. It's just our imagination, and the sea loot is just as bad as land loot
D. Loot Skull Chests have a far higher chance to drop at sea, thus increasing the amount of loot you get, both good and bad
I personally believe that D. is the case. In your average mat run, at least 50% of the time you will have at least 1 Loot Skull Chest, that would mean roughly about 1/20 to 1/50 ships you sink will carry a Loot Skull Chest on your average mat run. Now compare this to land loot, where currently the drop rates of loot pouches seems extremely high (about 85% maybe), and Loot Chests seem to have an unusually high chance of dropping compared to skulls. I estimate for every skull I have seen there have been at least 10 Loot Chests, maybe even 20. That would put the percent chance to less then 1 percent per enemy that you would get a skull. Now of course you don't spend nearly as much time fighting a single enemy as you do sinking a single ship, but right now the chance per enemy that a skull will drop is so low that you could probably complete at least 1 mat run before you even see a single skull from land loot.
In conclusion, I believe that, while famed and legendary should indeed be rare, I think that loot skull chests should either be more common on land for what they currently drop (mostly commons and occasional rares), or the quality of some loot needs to be changed so that less trash spawns.
Do you have your own theory or speculations? If you do post it below.
Before I begin, I just want to say that luck is one of the biggest factors for good loot drops. There is nothing that will ever change this, but nonetheless I think that there are problems in how loot is generated that is beyond luck.
This is my personal theory on how loot is generated, and why loot, or at least land loot is so bad currently.
If you don't believe me about the land loot, take a look at these skulls I got several days ago. These are not the only ones I got, and I did find a few that did give good loot, but these are by far the worst.
I believe, first off, that quality of loot is based on location. The fact that you can only find cursed blades on Raven's Cove and Isla Tormenta proves that the code allows for location to factor in to what may drop, and it is entirely possible that quality of loot is dictated by location, for example, I don't think anyone has ever gotten a legendary weapon on Perdida, Cutthroat, or Cangrejos, despite them being home to enemies that are fairly high level, while the vast majority have come from Tormenta and Raven's Cove. More evidence of this is that enemies on Isla Tormenta drop significantly more gold then enemies on Raven's Cove. The picture that was taken by the south idol actually depicted a fairly average gold drop there, while enemies in the treasure room in Tormenta I've seen give over 200 gold in a single skull, not including treasure items. Now, this could be more of a case of time spent then actual code, after all, who grinds for legendaries on Perdida, Cutthroat, or Cangrejos? But I do think location has an influence, even if it's small.
Secondly, I think that the level of the enemy has at least some influence. When was the last time you saw a legendary drop from one of the Undead Gravediggers in the Port Royal graveyard, even if they are yellow tag at the time? However, I think level of the enemy has very little influence once you get beyond the level 20 to 25 range, while the chance for legendary and famed weapons begins to appear I believe around this point, the garbage weapons such as rusty cutlasses and clay dolls do not begin to disappear, which I believe is one of the biggest factors to why there is so much bad loot. I do not believe that they should disappear entirely, if only for balance reasons, but you should not find as many cracked blunderbusses from a level 50 Thrall Captain as you do from a level 1 Undead Gravedigger.
Thirdly, it is a popular belief that you completing the Black Pearl Quest and/or maxing your pirate and all of your skills drastically increases your chance of finding a legendary. I personally do not share this belief, but I have not maxed a pirate yet so this may or may not be the case. I personally believe that this is just a myth and that it is still possible to find famed and legendary even as a level 1, so long as the enemy you attack is of a high enough level. In fact, if it is the case that gaining a higher level on your pirate increases your chance of gaining famed or legendary, I think this should be removed and all level pirates have the same chance per enemy defeated, depending on the enemy's level, to pick up famed or legendary. What greater drive to get your pirate from level 1 sword to level 30 then to use the Lost Sword of El Patron you just picked up?
And finally the actual mechanics. This is just my theory and my speculations and may or may not be true, but here it is.
I believe firstly each loot container type has a range of values with which to generate loot. These are just ballpark estimates for the ranges and may or may not be correct.
Loot Skull Chest: 50 - 110
Loot Chest: 30 - 90
Loot Pouch: 10 - 75
The first thing I believe happens is that a random number is selected from these ranges. The game then randomly picks loot based on a percentage chance to fill the container with, and stops when the selected number is reached. These are ballpark estimates for what the items may be worth:
Legendary Item: 90 Points
Famed Item: 75 Points
Rare Item: 50 Points
Common Item: 25 Points
Crude Item: 10 Points
Cheat Card: 10 Points
Common Treasure Item: 5 Points
Uncommon Treasure Item: 10 Points
Rare Treasure Item: 25 Points
Gold x 10: 1 Point
Ammo x 5: 1 Point
So theoretically, using the above chart, A Loot Skull Chest could randomly be given the value 102 by the random number generator. The game then decides to fill the chest with 1 Lost Sword of El Patron (90 points), 50 Gold (5 Points), 10 Steel Shot (2 Points), and 1 Letter Opener (5 Points), thus reaching the assigned value.
Needless to say, the items which require more points will be more rare, and not every Loot Skull Chest can generate a legendary weapon, or even a famed.
However, I think that the reason loot is so horrible is because some items have more value assigned to them then they are actually worth. The best example of this are "rare" pieces of clothing such as Chill Boots and Thanksgiving Blouses. Despite them being of little value, even to sell, they are given a value of 50 because of their "rare" quality, and because of this, it locks out the generation of legendary or famed weapons in the Skull Chest, because the (theoretical) max value a skull chest can have is 110, minus 50 makes 60, not enough remaining value for a legendary or famed. To make matters worse, I believe that clothing has a higher percent chance to drop then weapons do, so you have a higher chance to get a "rare" clothing piece then a rare weapon, much less a famed or legendary. I have lost count of the number of skulls I've seen with only a common weapon and a "rare" corset.
There are other items that also I believe have more quality assigned to them then they are actually worth, and some of this is leftover from the original game's Basic/Unlimited Access system. These are some of the more glaring examples:
Zombie Doll: Common, only gives poison resistance, worth 1 gold
Dagger: Common, basic dagger
Rusty Throwing Knives: Common, worth no gold, lowest attack among throwing knives
Cutlery Set: Common, infinite asp, worth 1 gold
(Can't remember the name) Staff: Common, Blast Boost 1, Attack 2, worth no gold
Rusty Bayonet: Common
Worn Broadsword: Common
Now despite how anyone looting in Tormenta or Raven's Cove would call these items trash, they are given a "Common" quality by the game, simply because in the original game they were locked behind Unlimited Access, meaning that they are worth 15 more points then similar trash such as a rusty cutlass or a wheellock pistol, thus taking up more value that could go to more useful things, even if you don't get a famed/legendary.
Now the reason why land loot is so much worse then sea loot is tougher, but I believe that the reason for this is either
A. a purposeful nerf of land loot to encourage more sailing (possibly because of the great sailing nerf that ended the 10000 gold voyages where you got 100 royal chests),
B. Gold is not counted towards the total loot value for a skull because it goes straight to "Gold Already Looted", thus freeing up more value for weapons
C. It's just our imagination, and the sea loot is just as bad as land loot
D. Loot Skull Chests have a far higher chance to drop at sea, thus increasing the amount of loot you get, both good and bad
I personally believe that D. is the case. In your average mat run, at least 50% of the time you will have at least 1 Loot Skull Chest, that would mean roughly about 1/20 to 1/50 ships you sink will carry a Loot Skull Chest on your average mat run. Now compare this to land loot, where currently the drop rates of loot pouches seems extremely high (about 85% maybe), and Loot Chests seem to have an unusually high chance of dropping compared to skulls. I estimate for every skull I have seen there have been at least 10 Loot Chests, maybe even 20. That would put the percent chance to less then 1 percent per enemy that you would get a skull. Now of course you don't spend nearly as much time fighting a single enemy as you do sinking a single ship, but right now the chance per enemy that a skull will drop is so low that you could probably complete at least 1 mat run before you even see a single skull from land loot.
In conclusion, I believe that, while famed and legendary should indeed be rare, I think that loot skull chests should either be more common on land for what they currently drop (mostly commons and occasional rares), or the quality of some loot needs to be changed so that less trash spawns.
Do you have your own theory or speculations? If you do post it below.
also i find your theory very interesting