Loot system

A Loot System is any method to distribute items amongst a group of players. Whenever more than one player share some reward, they're participating in a loot system, even if it's only the default roll system from Blizzard. Frequently, the terms DKP and "loot system" are used interchangably, because DKP based systems are the most widely used form of loot systems used in raids.

Loot System Categories

There are two basic methods to earn DKP (standard and zero-sum), and similarly two basic methods to determine who gets the item. Each income method can in theory be combined with each loot order determination method, although a combination of zero-sum with bidding would be highly unusual.

Earning DKP

Standard DKP

The most popular method to earn DKP is to simply hand them out for every appropriate reason. This is what's usually meant if DKP is used as a generic term. A short list of popular reasons to hand out DKP:

On-time: at the starting time of the event, all members present receive a reward for punctuality

Replacement: If a raid member drops out, a readily available replacement receives a bonus

Duration: At the end of the raid, a reward is given for staying for the duration

Time spent: For each hour spent in the raid, a certain amount of DKP is handed out

Boss kill: Each boss killed yields a certain number of points, depending on boss difficulty

First kill: If a boss is killed for the very first time, an extra bonus is awarded to all participants

Points for tasks: Some systems expand "raid-related tasks" to include all activity that benefits the guild, like farming runs to acquire potions, runs for learning new encounters or donations to the guild item vault.

Zero-sum

The above standard methods main drawback is that the income needs continuous awareness and tweaking (particularly scaling boss rewards needs attention). Zero-sum DKP makes the income side extremly simple - all points expended are immediately distributed back to the players present. For further details, see the Zero-sum DKP article.

Spending DKP

Bidding systems

Bidding systems simply hold an auction for each drop.

Non-Bidding systems

When no bidding is used, the loot hierarchy is usually determined by the current point scores. In most cases, the raid member with the highest current DKP score who wants the item gets it. Some systems use the DKP scores as die roll modifiers, and interested members decide by rolling who gets it.

Relational DKP determine the hierachy by looking at the quotient between DKP earned and spent.

In all these systems, the item price is either a Fixed price or a Variable price, the latter being usually all or some fraction of the points of the winner.

Non-DKP systems

There are many Other loot distribution systems not using DKP, ranging from Blizzards standard roll system to merit systems, and the extreme ends of the scale - "Quickest fingers win" and "Loot council".

Loot System Discussion

Loot systems are frequently subject of heated debate, sometimes these discussions bear religious traits. The loot system may even be a reason for players to switch guild. Athough discussions are not normally material which should be persented in an encyclopedia, this discussion is so wide-spread and returns consistently in forums, that it deserves a deeper look. The following section is based on the massive thread "I will tear apart your Guild loot system" by Angelie (lvl 60 human priest from US Ner'zhul) in the official forums. This thread has vanished, but has returned as a sticky ^[1]. Unfortunately that new version lacks a few of the finer points. The quintessence remains the same: "No loot system is perfect".

Historical Overview

The core problem is that endgame bosses drop only few but very valuable items, while a large number of players must work together to bring them down. The simple Roll Systems normally used for loot distribution in 5 man content don't appear to be fair any more. The first DKP system was introduced by Thott of the guild Afterlife in Everquest. After a boss kill, each raid member got one point. Loot was still distributed by rolling, each player had as many lots in the pool as he had points, plus one. Winning an item would cost a predefined amount of DKP.

Characteristics

The core idea of loot systems is always to give some compensation for raid members who don't get loot, to provide a kind of "memory" for past acheivements. The grand goal is "fair" loot distribution over a long timespan. The following is a list of fundamental desirable characteristics which all loot systems strive to achieve:

Avoid drama
Sustain raid progress
Items go to those who benefit most
Upgrades (even minor ones) for any raid member are not be disenchanted
The system is elegant, easy to understand and consistent
A fair balance exists between effort spent and reward gained for everyone (newbies and veterans)

Standard

The most widely spread loot system uses standard DKP on the income side, and a bidding system when it comes to loot distribution. This offers the maximum flexibility for both sides - raid leaders may reward whatever they feel appropriate, and raid members pay exactly what they think the item is worth. In an ideal world, such a system would fulfill all of the above requirement perfectly.

Unfortunately, in the real world such a system has two serious problems, the DKP gap and collusion. Beyond these two inherent problems there's also the fact that some people have a good grasp of the market, while others don't. The auctions themselves are a kind of meta-game, and raid members understanding this well earn better rewards than those who don't want to think about item market dynamics. Finding the "right" price for an item requires experience and knowledge by all raid member who could use it.

The DKP Gap

This effect is also known as "Inflation", which is not quite appropriate. Inflation in a real economy means rising prices and devaluation of income, while in a DKP system, the effect means that new members simply have too low DKP scores to buy anything meaningful. A whole genre of DKP systems was invented to counter this effect, the Zero-sum DKP. They guarantee that inflation in the real world meaning cannot occur. Unfortunately, as Anglie pointed out in her article^[1], the actual problem in loot systems has nothing to do with real-world inflation, but deserves a different name - the DKP Gap exists in Zero-sum systems too.

Assume that in a zero-sum, fixed-price system some veteran has (after maybe 30 MC runs) luckily won his full Tier 1 set, and now a current score of -100. The 8 pieces had a value of 460 points. A newbie (equipped in Dungeon Set 1) enters the system at 0 points. Although the visible difference in DKP between the two is -100, and the newbie seems to have a point lead over the veteran, the real gap is actually 360 points. The newbie will have to equip himself, paying the fixed prices for his gear, while the veteran will accumulate points, and only rarely take an item. When the newbie finally acquired his 8 pieces of Tier 1, the veteran will meanwhile either have some Tier 2 items, or a very obvious point lead. This game of hare and hedgehog will continue indefinitely - on top-of-the-line drops, the veteran will always have priority over the former newbie, even after both players contributed the same for several months.

In effect, the zero-sum, fixtd price system fails to acheive its set goal, it is by no means "fairer" to the new raid member as a traditional system, where the veteran has an obvious lead by maybe 700 points. It can even be argued that in a traditional system after a few runs the newbie acutally has a chance to win an item by bidding, or can even close the gap by getting items cheaper than the veterans.

The DKP Gap is probably the single biggest problem which loot distribution systems use to have. Many people have objections against all formalized loot systems because they fear to find themselves in this very situation - being behind in the priority list, with no possibility to do anything about it. A possible development is that the newbie will run with his initial group until his chance to get meaningful drops becomes very low, and then simply look for another guild where he can enter the system at zero, and his chances for good loot are better.

This behavior is inherent in many loot systems. This is not an accidental problem, it's rather a case of a job done too well. Loot systems are meant to provide a kind of memory. A fixed and unattainable DKP gap just means that the memory is too good, and needs some toning down (by introducing taxes for example). Some people actually feel that such a situation is just, and doesn't really need a solution - the veterans did contribute more to the guilds progress after all.

Collusion

In real world economics, collusion means price fixing. This very effect can easily happen in a bidding system. There's quite a large number of drops which is interesting only for a certain combination of class and build (e.g. plate items with int are useful only to holy paladins), while there are other items which are wanted by a large number of raid members (e.g. a necklace with +heal and mana regen is wanted by any healer). Now assume the raid has only two holy paladins. It would be natural for the paladins to agree on the plate items to simply take turns - whenever they're both in the same raid, one bids the minimum amount, and the other passes. This saves them a lot of points, which they can use to bid on the cross-class items, therefore gaining an advantage over the other healers which may have more competition for class specific items. Another example for collusion is if some high-profile raid member (e.g. an officer) bids, and all others interested in the item pass out of courtesy.

These two cases are explicit collusion, people willingly agree to a lower-than-appropriate price. There's also implicit collusion, for example if by chance some item drops many times, or if one class is all alone (e.g. tree or moonkin druid). Items are too cheap in these cases by accident, the players paying these too-low prices gain an advantage over other members of the system nontheless.

Non-bidding systems make collusion systematically impossible, usually at the price of disenchants. By setting a pre-defined price for each item, it's simply impossible to manipulate. Unfortunately, this leads to situations where an item which is only a minor upgrade, sidegrade or situationally useful is disenchanted, because the fixed price is considered to be too high. Disenchanting is always bad, because even a fractional increase in efficiency sums up over time, and some players happiness is greatly increased if they have a nice collection of off-spec epics sitting in the bank. Some raids offer such items at a discount, but this immediately brings back the collusion problem (and/or lengthy discussions whether some item really is an upgrade or not). A second big problem of fixed price systems is to find and maintain an appropriate price for hundreds of items.

Frequently, the disenchanting problem is tried to remedy by introducing some discount (or a free roll) for unwanted items. This reintroduces collusion through the back door - whenever it's possible to get an item cheaper than what others paid for it, it's possible to find some silent or explicit agreement to save DKP.

Integrating Newbies

A big challenge to all loot systems is that they should be fair to both, newbies and veterans. This is a very delicate issue, because on one hand, the new member should not be discouraged and should also be able to win drops. On the other hand, the veterans like to claim first pick on certain rare or high-value drops. Obviously, veterans deserve some advantage over newbies. But after a certain time, every newbie wants to have the chance to become a "full member", to gain the right to be at least in theory able to compete even for top-of-the-line drops. One of the most difficult aspects when selecting and fine-tuning a DKP is getting this balance right. From which point on should a newbie have similar loot opportunities as an old member (assuming that both spend the same effort and time on ensuring the raid's success)?

Taxes

As detailed in "the DKP gap" above, many loot systems do their job too well by providing a basically unlimited memory, which makes newbie integration difficult. A natural solution is to make the memory less than perfect, by introducing a DKP decay over time. For example this could mean that each member loses 2% of his points per week. In Relational DKP systems taxes are an integral part of the concept. In all loot systems, taxes make raid members more willing to spend their points, and reduce the effects of the DKP gap and collusion.

On the negative side, DKP rich longterm mebers may feel treated unfairly when they wait for a certain item which by bad luck simply doesn't drop, and they feel punished by seeing their hard earned points just melt away from taxes.

DKP for alts

Many veteran players have alts. Eventually, those alts may reach high levels, and that player may wish to play that alt in raids, and earn DKP. There are multiple ways to handle DKP for alts:

Pooled DKP: DKP is linked to that player, rather than to the character. All DKP earned and spent are shared among all of that players characters.

DKP per char: DKP is linked to each character. Each toon has its own DKP account. No DKP may be transferred.

One-time transfer: In a DKP per char system, it's sometimes allowed to transfer some or all DKP from one account to another.

Hybrid systems: Some guilds allow mains' and alts' DKP to be linked, without the full flexibility of the Pooled DKP approach. For example, a player could spend points earned by the main on his alt and vice versa, but when raiding with the alt only earns points at a reduced rate.

References

^ ^a ^b Angelies sticky

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