It's getting close to a year since the controversial drop rate changes were implemented. Since then we've seen price hikes on valueable items that required drop rate gear for a reasonable drop rate. These changes were met with huge player dissatisfaction and many people quitting.
In 2017 the Maplestory team issued this statement before the patch was due.
Greetings Maplers,
We made a promise to keep the community informed ahead of time should balance changes to the drop rate be applied in the Global version of MapleStory.
We have confirmed that these balance changes will be a part of our v188 update. We’re aware of the initial feedback that the community had towards this change and we’d like to share the reasoning behind this decision. Progression for each Mapler is different and this progression was heavily divided by how fast and efficient an individual could farm for items.
From the release of new content, a visible line could be seen between those with a great deal of drop rate gear to those who could not acquire such gear. It is the intention of this change to address this widening gap and the balance of content completion across all Maplers.
With the changes to the balance of drop rate, the formula for drop rate gear will be changed. This means that stacking a great deal of items dedicated towards increasing drop rate will not have the same effectiveness as it does currently.
Again, we know that this will affect our hardcore Maplers who have invested time and resource into acquiring the best drop rate gear. Due to this, there will also be an increase to the base drop rate of highly sought after farmable items such as Nodestones with this update. Additionally, we will do our best to introduce more events with desired items obtained through previous means of farming as rewards.
Thank you,
- Maple Team
I'll get into the issue with the statement in just a moment but first I would like to mention that since this update went live over time we have seen more events that allowed players to get nodestones and symbols. Something which was fairly absent prior to these changes. However it is simply not enough.
Based on this statement, it is made clear that the Maple team doesn't fully understand how the gap between funded and unfunded came about. It has a lot to do with the reliance on the cash shop in this game and while there are ways to get certain items from the cash shop that help with progression, as a free player you will never get enough to compete with someone who can swipe the credit card. This is the underlying problem. Nexon has made efforts to close this gap in other ways such as the introduction of the reward point shop and scrolls from elite bosses but it is simply not enough. Cubes probably make the biggest difference and while obtainable in game are not common enough as you need hundreds to create endgame gear. This is especially the case regarding drop rate gear.
If Nexon really wanted to help close the gap they would work on making items such as cubes far easier to get in game allowing the less funded players a chance at getting drop rate gear easily. They could have also changed things so you could get the drop rate % potential lines on unique pot also. Rather than making the necessary changes that would probably hurt their profit margins a little they opted to screw over the players who invested a lot of time and money into drop gear to benefit long term.
Here's a quote by the user Rolls who I think sums things up nicely.
Again with this "evening out the playing field", "decreasing the gap between the rich and poor"
Making it harder for people above you doesn't make it easier for you. Changing the way you see it's not going to change the fact that it will be harder to get nodestones in general. The first general increase will benefit everyone, the nerf will be a huge detriment to those already situated with drop rate. And then prices will start to rise, due to a decrease in supply of nodestones. And then botters will abuse that to profit even more.
That's not even accounting for that even if it was a benefit to less funded players for nodestones, this will lower drop rate to symbols, droplet stones, event items, basically everything important. The drop rate nerf isn't just about nodes. The current system is fine. It doesn't need a nerf.
And Nodestones aren't something that's supposed to be very rare and very valuable. They're something you need thousands of to max out on, at least a few hundred to get to just a decent place with in terms of progression.
He/she is exactly right. Fastforward to 2018 and what was said here is pretty much what has happened in game. Nodestone market controlled mainly by botters, prices on Nodestones have gone up since the nerf. Nodestones more or less harder to get than before, symbol drop rate almost non existent even during 2x drop rate events (which we almost never see anymore), droplet drop rate non existent, event items and quest items drop far less often and much more. I could go on all day.
This nerf didn't "close the gap". It only widened it. All you have now are the rich buying their Nodestones because why not? Funded will always be at the top regardless in this game and shelling out billions to botters selling on the market to get ahead is no issue. There's no point trying to limit that. Less funded now have to deal with higher prices on Nodestones and an even slower progression time. Players are now limited to events, event shops and dailys.
Lets face it. The only reason this nerf was ever implemented is because the developers saw how quickly players were progressing through content and decided to slow us all down. It's a disgusting move but it's the reality. If they were all about closing that "gap" they would have made cash shop items such as scrolls and cubes way more accessible but they didn't. At this point I'd suggest removing the drop rate potential line completely and buffing drop rates across the board as it is and always has been a huge inconvenience to switch gear during fights. There's also the fact that drop rate doesn't affect major bosses such as Lucid for equip drops. The symbol drop rate and the droplet drop rate still needs to be addressed. Nodestones could also use a massive drop rate increase.
Many have posted video evidence after the patch went live to demonstrate how much worse things are as far as symbols and nodestones go. The video below demonstrates how bad the nerf is. Of course this is just 1 piece of evidence out of many.
credits go to MasteringGaming.
I hope Nexon realises their mistake and makes the necessary changes to bring drop rate values back to what they were before for everyone. Not just the funded. This means they should also remove drop rate potential lines completely. How's that for "closing the gap"?
Comments
That was just 1 example. I mean I have full drop rate gear myself but I would much rather the game without it provided they increased the drop rates globally for all items to make up for the loss of the stat.
Next thing I would target is Wolf Underling Familiar. That is because it is something that, again, with few exceptions, only the rich can afford. But more importantly because its drop buff is a fixed amount. If we remove all these familiars, we can double the base drop rate again, still leaving the rich at the same drop rate they had before, while the unfunded get better rates than before. (Well, more accurately we'd have to raise the base drop rate 1.4x, the difference between Big Spider and Wolf Underling.)
This is a harder change to make because people will be mad about losing a familiar they paid billions of meso or unknown sums of NX to acquire.
Only after that would I remove drop gear. This is because its effect was already nerfed, plus different people have varying amounts of it. Do we increase the base drop rate to compensate for the absolute top possible drop rate on gear? Or would that mean everyone swimming in drops?
Perhaps a better idea would be to add drop rate to Unique potential, as you suggested, so people could more gradually build up to higher and higher rates (including for free).
Regardless of what is done to "narrow the gap", though, it's clear to me that the base drop rate of certain items (primarily symbols, droplets, and nodestones) is much too low. It should be raised ASAP.
I forgot to mention familiars and completely forgot about the coupons. I wouldn't mind if they got removed provided the drop rate was increased to make up for those things being gone. Of course there's compensation to consider which would be tricky considering the prices for the wolf has varied over time.
In regards to dealing with removing the drop rate stat, in my opinion they should increase the drop rate based on the average % for drop rate gear. Most endgame players have around 180%. Increasing it by around 150-200% would be fine to make up for the loss.
Apart from all that there are certain items in the game that need a huge drop rate increase that were barely dropping even before the drop rate nerf. I think the developers really need to look at this and make the necessary changes. Some items you never see on the market because they almost never drop.
I've spent an hour farming for node stones during a 2x event, using a 2x drop coupon + Decent HS. The result? Nothing. 0 Nodes, 0 Symbols, 0 Droplets. At first I thought, maybe I was just unlucky. So I tried it again during the next 2x period, same conditions. The result? NOTHING!
At the same time, I see streamers loaded in dropgear getting so many node stones that they don't even bother to pick them up.
That was the moment I said to myself, "I'm done with this game".
If this is how you're supposed to progress in the game then count me out.
I don't have really any droprate other than spider yet, but from some of my friends have had similar things happen. One was using a 3x drop coupon during a 2x event and had DHS+ some drop gear and got worse rates than on a regular day without coupons. Another was was complaining that it seemed like their drop inner ability didn't seem to make a noticeable difference. There was also the people who were saying that DHS was bugged and making drop rate worse, but I don't know what came of that.
TL;DR
RNG is whack.
You probably saw streamers from a different version and if they were from this version it would have been a long while ago. The drop rate is absolute trash even with drop gear and a wolf. 2x drop coupons still run off the old multiplier so they help but the drop rates still suck.
The drop rates have always been terrible in this game even before the nerf which is why people invested into drop gear to begin with. With drop gear cubes actually dropped from bosses almost always (as they should). You also got far more nodestones per hour. Something that should drop far more often since you need hundreds to thousands.
Right now, even if you have drop gear that makes up for 180-200% it wont feel any different than not having any drop gear on at all. Prior to this change you needed at least 60% and a spider to see a difference in drop rate. So it kinda raises the question, why even have the drop rate % stat? This was a horrible change and now not only are unfunded players that didn't have drop rate gear seeing almost nothing while grinding but now people who invested billions and hundreds of dollars into creating drop rate gear or buying it see almost nothing too. Such a stupid change which is why I'd prefer them to standardise drop rate.
In Every Region Besides GMS, players can freely trade: Pets / Red, Black, Bonus Cubes / Crafted Flames and Crafted Cubes / PSOK / Cash Scrolls / Style Boxes etc,
in the Auction house or to other players.
That's the real big change nexon should make, i'm sick of having Account Tradeable only Nodestones because of excuses like: "It's Because of Botters and hackers"
*I know that you can get fully tradeable Nodestones from nodecrafting, but that's just not enough. ( also with the lower drop rate we get even less nodestones then before, so less node shards in turn making even less crafted nodes.
This really kills the market, you know how awesome would it be to buy a perm pet or a bonus potential cube from the auction house ?
or let's say you done cubing and you got 5 cubes left, in current gms you get 3 options:
1. Cube something else and hope for the best
2. Sell it as a service to someone else
3. Let it rot in your inventory until it expires
In the other regions ( yes every region besides GMS, i'm talking about KMS, TMS, CMS Etc..., even MSEA which is ran by Asia Soft which Many Sea players keep saying they are an even worse company )
Players have 5 Options:
1. Cube something else and hope for the best
2. Sell it as a service to someone else
3. Sell it in the auction house for mesos
4. trade it to another player for meso or service
5. Let it rot in your inventory until it expires
*Note: That in order for a Cash or NX item to be fully tradeable to either; another player, or to sell in the auction house, the item Must be bought with NX-Only Cash items bought with Maple Points, or Reward Points ( if we get the option to use 100% Reward Points on certain Cash Items like in other regions )
are Not Tradeable at all.
So someone still has to pay NX for the item ( but that someone has the choice to either, use it, or sell it )
And obviously the item must not be used ( can't trade perm nx after you wear it ), or a cash coupon after you used it.
*I don't know how would GMS' NX-Prepaid and NX-Credit Unique System would work with that however, ( GMS is the only region with NX credit and Prepaid, other regions only have 4 options; Cash ( NX ), Maple Points, 30% Reward Points Discount, Pay with 100% Reward Points ( for certain items like pets and cash clothes )
PS. Forgot to mention that in other regions, elite mobs and bosses can drop reward point tokens
( that give somewhere between 50 - 80, and can be used up to 5 times per day )
TL;DR: GMS Should make all Cash Equipment Tradeable with other players and in the Auction House ( Like all the other regions can )
that is why KMS Regular Server are more popular then reboot ( You can buy Red, Black, Bpot cubes or even pets with Meso from the Auction House )
Make All Cash items Freely Tradeable, Improve Reward-Point