Reduced drop rate of Bounder's Bags

[Vilan]

Interesting. The first couple days of the bounders event, turn-ins were maybe 10k each day. At that rate, nobody would've finished by the time HD comes out. Then Sapience (I believe, some blue name anyway) says that the drop rate was set wrong and they go in and fix it. Tokens start falling from every other mob. Within days a dedicated German army hits their server goal and the rest of us are at 500k or so. Farmers Faire comes on and the rate gets set back to the original rate. Not good, but I gave Turbine a pass since they're trying to get people to attend the festival. Now all festivals are done, but the drop rate has not gone back to the officially correct rate. One can only conclude that the "correct" rate was actually an attempt to do damage control by upping the drop rate initially.

I'm not really worried. I don't want the steed or any big ticket items. I'm sure the Harvestmath fest will offer more token chances. Perhaps they'll even give us the "correct" drop rate in the last week or so before HD to encourage logins, since daily logins seem to be the be-all-end-all for Turbine. But I admit I'm disappointed that they told us one thing and now are apparently doing another.

[Fearless.one]

Interesting. The first couple days of the bounders event, turn-ins were maybe 10k each day. At that rate, nobody would've finished by the time HD comes out. Then Sapience (I believe, some blue name anyway) says that the drop rate was set wrong and they go in and fix it. Tokens start falling from every other mob. Within days a dedicated German army hits their server goal and the rest of us are at 500k or so. Farmers Faire comes on and the rate gets set back to the original rate. Not good, but I gave Turbine a pass since they're trying to get people to attend the festival. Now all festivals are done, but the drop rate has not gone back to the officially correct rate. One can only conclude that the "correct" rate was actually an attempt to do damage control by upping the drop rate initially.

I'm not really worried. I don't want the steed or any big ticket items. I'm sure the Harvestmath fest will offer more token chances. Perhaps they'll even give us the "correct" drop rate in the last week or so before HD to encourage logins, since daily logins seem to be the be-all-end-all for Turbine. But I admit I'm disappointed that they told us one thing and now are apparently doing another.

I would not get your hopes up this event has been a messed up since it stated. I think it was nothing more then a advertising stunt for HD that failed in some way. Well I know it failed for me. I was going to buy HG even if I don't need it but since this drop rate problem came up and they don't fix it or even just respond in anyway. That was what really made me mad was the lack of any response. I figure if they can't even respond with some sort of a answer or even a good lie that they must not need my money and I know I don't need the expansion.
Best idea I ever had! Went and bought me a new game with the money I had set aside. My version of a boycott. I figure there is no reason to take this from these guys really there are lots of other game company's that are more then happy to take my money.

After this I have no intention of taking this game serious if I was a subscriber I would just cancel but since I am premium and bought all the content it will just be something I fool around with from time to time. I have over 100 charters I play so going to just play my main a bit now since they put the XP dis-abler on sale now I can finish My world renown on my main and call it good,

This used to be a great game but it getting run into the ground now days I have had more then my share of disappointment and I think it's foolish for me to keep giving them my money so they can give me the high hard one!!

The easiest way to not be disappointed in this game is to not be here

[Eartholloth]

I would not get your hopes up this event has been a messed up since it stated. I think it was nothing more then a advertising stunt for HD that failed in some way. Well I know it failed for me. I was going to buy HG even if I don't need it but since this drop rate problem came up and they don't fix it or even just respond in anyway. That was what really made me mad was the lack of any response. I figure if they can't even respond with some sort of a answer or even a good lie that they must not need my money and I know I don't need the expansion.
Best idea I ever had! Went and bought me a new game with the money I had set aside. My version of a boycott. I figure there is no reason to take this from these guys really there are lots of other game company's that are more then happy to take my money.

After this I have no intention of taking this game serious if I was a subscriber I would just cancel but since I am premium and bought all the content it will just be something I fool around with from time to time. I have over 100 charters I play so going to just play my main a bit now since they put the XP dis-abler on sale now I can finish My world renown on my main and call it good,

This used to be a great game but it getting run into the ground now days I have had more then my share of disappointment and I think it's foolish for me to keep giving them my money so they can give me the high hard one!!

The easiest way to not be disappointed in this game is to not be here

bye bye...........

[ucot]

You just cant change the distance of the race (i say race because that is what it basically is), after the first 3 runners have crossed the finish line, congratulate the winners, give them their prices and then say to the rest "25 more laps guys, good luck!" and walk away.
After that I personally stopped running after half a lap doing events but then i couldnt care less if i ever reached the finishline.

[Fearless.one]

bye bye...........

I am not going anywhere I have to much invested I just not putting anymore into the game. I still have 2 expansion I never seen I could play another 2 year and not spend a dime.

But anyway I was doing deeds on Brandywine and either I had really good luck or the drop rates are better on this server, but anyway I got about 250 tokens tonight has anyone else seen a improvement on Brandywine?

[manstan]

Now this is more like it. Playing with my 26th level cappy I realized I hadn't joined a guild yet so joined the cooks guild; why not? I had went to start the bounders bag event with her and found out I hadn't done much of anything in the shire. It was a surprise when I killed the first wolf while hunting for strawberries, and picked up the wolf slayer deed. Well I needed bounders bags, wolf slayer 1 is easy enough to finish, so while hunting for the strawberries I killed every wolf in sight. By the time I finished wolf slayer 1 I had 3 bags and enough bounders tokens to get the universal tool kit. Which was all I wanted with this character from that. Note, I killed boars too so I don't have a real accurate kill count.

Now that sounds about right for drops. If I could get a similar drop rate with the rest of my characters I wouldn't be here griping. I think that worked out to about 1 bag an hour. At that rate my 50th level hunter could get his war horse in a week or 2. Which I really don't think is too bad. Better then the snowballs chance in hell I have been having so far lol

[Teslana]

I've just finished playing for approximately three hours and in that time earned, I think, 15 tokens. I think this probably means I don't stand a chance of ever affording that horse (like others, I tried to hand everything I got in so the server would get the prize). I know I'm a casual player, but it's still disappointing and people who do three times or more play than me a day must be absolutely infuriated that they may not be able to afford the steed (or maybe they stockpiled more than enough before the nerf?). Still, genuine congratulations to anyone who has managed to acquire the horse - it's a lovely creature and I shall covet it wherever I see it, you lucky heroes

[Cybelline]

I've just finished playing for approximately three hours and in that time earned, I think, 15 tokens. I think this probably means I don't stand a chance of ever affording that horse (like others, I tried to hand everything I got in so the server would get the prize). I know I'm a casual player, but it's still disappointing and people who do three times or more play than me a day must be absolutely infuriated that they may not be able to afford the steed (or maybe they stockpiled more than enough before the nerf?). Still, genuine congratulations to anyone who has managed to acquire the horse - it's a lovely creature and I shall covet it wherever I see it, you lucky heroes

One word: Festivals.

Harvestmath will happen prior to Helm's Deep, and if it is anything like Farmer's Faire, it will be a bonanza of tokens. Farmer's Faire alone got me the horse, all the housing items and enough tokens to turn in for the deeds.

[redwoodtreesprite]

One word: Festivals.

Harvestmath will happen prior to Helm's Deep, and if it is anything like Farmer's Faire, it will be a bonanza of tokens. Farmer's Faire alone got me the horse, all the housing items and enough tokens to turn in for the deeds.

Sadly, most of that will likely be the Haunted Burrow. Which will be a nightmare with so many players waiting for quest NPCs to spawn in there. I intensely dislike the quest with the barrels of rotted flesh that make your character puke too.

I am really hoping that those chests that you can open every hour or so will have a chance of a bounder bag...

[Thorwyn99]

I've just finished playing for approximately three hours and in that time earned, I think, 15 tokens. I think this probably means I don't stand a chance of ever affording that horse (like others, I tried to hand everything I got in so the server would get the prize). I know I'm a casual player, but it's still disappointing and people who do three times or more play than me a day must be absolutely infuriated that they may not be able to afford the steed (or maybe they stockpiled more than enough before the nerf?). Still, genuine congratulations to anyone who has managed to acquire the horse - it's a lovely creature and I shall covet it wherever I see it, you lucky heroes

Heh i admire your good will, but the fact is it isn't fair. I got my stuff mostly before farmers faire (with my landroval chars getting their horses with the faire, no titles though) but it is simply unfair to the people coming in late. If it is all about people not paying universal toolkits and outrider tokens than at least be honest about it and say though, if not for Odin's sake at least give a reason for the totaly out of whack drop rates. That is the least turbine could do.

[Zikaris99]

One word: Festivals.

Harvestmath will happen prior to Helm's Deep, and if it is anything like Farmer's Faire, it will be a bonanza of tokens. Farmer's Faire alone got me the horse, all the housing items and enough tokens to turn in for the deeds.

I donated a bunch while the drop rate was up (on Landroval), skipped most of the Farmer's Faire... but doing the Birthday event on six characters let me get enough tokens to get one horse plus some extra tokens. I'm hoping that Harvestmath will let me get a couple more for some of my other 85s. I enjoy it so I'll be participating in that one.

On another note, I was deeding tonight and it seems as if the drop rate on the bags has been slightly increased from what it was a week ago. Or maybe the RNG likes the character I was on!

[LethalLethality]

Heh i admire your good will, but the fact is it isn't fair. I got my stuff mostly before farmers faire (with my landroval chars getting their horses with the faire, no titles though) but it is simply unfair to the people coming in late. If it is all about people not paying universal toolkits and outrider tokens than at least be honest about it and say though, if not for Odin's sake at least give a reason for the totaly out of whack drop rates. That is the least turbine could do.

It's actually not too terribly bad if you consider that everything that has a use of some sort is 135 tokens or less, so even those who aren't getting many bags can get them after some time.

The only things that are vastly out of reach is a steed, which in all likelihood, will be made available in the shop for those who absolutely must have it for a bunch of TP and the Symbol of Celibrimbor, which will be outdated as soon as HD is released since they're just have something else to make a 95 Second Ager.

[Thorwyn99]

It's actually not too terribly bad if you consider that everything that has a use of some sort is 135 tokens or less, so even those who aren't getting many bags can get them after some time.

The only things that are vastly out of reach is a steed, which in all likelihood, will be made available in the shop for those who absolutely must have it for a bunch of TP and the Symbol of Celibrimbor, which will be outdated as soon as HD is released since they're just have something else to make a 95 Second Ager.

True, but my peeve is with the inequality of it. You could play 2 weeks before the faire and get the steeds/other stuff just doing your slayer deeds. Now you would have to grind just to get one steed. I'd be fine with that if turbine could offer a reason for it(any reason at this point).
What i do find the worst though is the bounders recognition plaque, i mean i never had a chance at being mentioned there drop rate change or not lol, but at this point i think it is just tottaly pointless cause the competition is absolutely not fair and i don't believe the people putting their time and effort into it would be happy in winning the spot in such a way.
In the end it will not make a difference power wise but i find it poorly handled.

[LethalLethality]

True, but my peeve is with the inequality of it. You could play 2 weeks before the faire and get the steeds/other stuff just doing your slayer deeds. Now you would have to grind just to get one steed. I'd be fine with that if turbine could offer a reason for it(any reason at this point).
What i do find the worst though is the bounders recognition plaque, i mean i never had a chance at being mentioned there, but at this point i think it is just tottaly pointless cause the competition is absolutely not fair and i don't believe the people putting their time and effort into it would be happy in winning the spot in such a way.
In the end it will not make a difference power wise but i find it poorly handled.

I definitely agree with the plaque. It's really just a slap in the face to anyone who started late, and it's a bigger slap in the face to the smaller servers to list the first servers to reach goal.


At the very least, Turbine could do something to make questing a viable alternative for getting bags. A chance to get some from ore/wood/scholar nodes, add them as a temporary deed reward such as completing 10/20/30 deeds in an area or slayer deeds, etc. It would also encourage lowbies/newbies to reach Rohan before HD is released.

[trancejeremy]

I definitely agree with the plaque. It's really just a slap in the face to anyone who started late, and it's a bigger slap in the face to the smaller servers to list the first servers to reach goal.


At the very least, Turbine could do something to make questing a viable alternative for getting bags. A chance to get some from ore/wood/scholar nodes, add them as a temporary deed reward such as completing 10/20/30 deeds in an area or slayer deeds, etc. It would also encourage lowbies/newbies to reach Rohan before HD is released.

Slap in the face? Competition?

I don't understand what people are so upset about it. Just play the game like you normally would, and you get free stuff.

It's a bonus, not a requirement. Just play the game and get free stuff.

I managed to get pretty much every crafting alt I have (which is well over 50 of them across 7 different servers) a universal toolkit. That's like what, 150tpx50?

And on top of that, Turbine is basically giving away TP, thanks to the deeds involved. 5 for donating 250 tokens.

[BackAgainAndThere]

Slap in the face? Competition?

I don't understand what people are so upset about it. Just play the game like you normally would, and you get free stuff.

It's a bonus, not a requirement. Just play the game and get free stuff.

I managed to get pretty much every crafting alt I have (which is well over 50 of them across 7 different servers) a universal toolkit. That's like what, 150tpx50?

And on top of that, Turbine is basically giving away TP, thanks to the deeds involved. 5 for donating 250 tokens.

I think the problem is that Turbine had a much higher drop rate a few weeks ago, and then changed it. It's one thing to go from low rate to high rate, but going from high rate to low rate makes the players unhappy...

[Zikaris99]

I think the problem is that Turbine had a much higher drop rate a few weeks ago, and then changed it. It's one thing to go from low rate to high rate, but going from high rate to low rate makes the players unhappy...

Not to beat a dead horse (pun intended) but I agree. I play a LOT, and do a lot of mindless deeding, and I doubt that I'll be able to get the steed for all of my characters at the current drop rate. I'd also like to get some of the other items - yard trolls etc. - but I don't think that I'll be able to. Color me disappointed :/

[Fearless.one]

So from what i see here the other night when I had like 250 tokens in a night was a fluke, I kinda thought it was because my wife was with me and she got lest the half that I did and the only thing that saved the nite was she got one 70 bag.

I was hoping this was a sign that the drop rate got better.

I am guessing since they have never responded to this thread that they have no intention to change anything.

Man I fear to see what the Havestmath Fest will be like this year if they leave this as it is now and force everyone to run that fest. Now that will be a nightmare,

They could use the Lotto system have some token give away's that would not be the first time they used it for that. They used to do that for every festival.

[Winnower]

The bounder's recognition was made into a very sad, poor joke by the changing of the drop rate up and then down again without warning. There is no way for anyone who wasn't farming the short time the rate was up to catch up at this point. I had such high hopes when this event was released and yet the implementation of it has really utterly shattered my morale with regards to logging in.

The inequity of it all is shocking. I feel sorry for the people who think they were getting lots of tokens at the farmer's faire - you weren't getting a fraction of what people before you were farming. Some people who had the time and who immediately jumped on the bandwagon got paid off; those who tried to "play the game" got shafted by comparison.

And the refusal by anyone Turbine *for weeks* to say anything about this matter is a mocking condescending insult. Some middle manager somewhere probably forbade them to say anything more about it; not realizing that they were doing more harm and angering more customers by *not* saying anything than by being responsive to customer concerns. Whoever made the decision should be fired, though.

[Hoopy_Frood2]

After finishing the 3 tier deeds I decided I would donate about half of what I got back to the bounders.

However..the drop rate is almost 0 for me on riddermark now....In the last week I have gotten maybe 150 tokens. I'm not complaining. But by dropping the drop rate they have forced me to be more conservative with my donations. How Can I not..this isnt an open ended event and the steed is 1500 tokens.

As an example(an yes I know some will say its the way the RNG works) I have done the 3 hytbold crafting instances regularly...last few days I'm lucky if I get 1 bag....yesterday I got my bag on the last kill of the last instance for the night. Something seems fishy to me there. Odds are odds but it just happened to be the last drop of the last instance...strange.

PS- early on sambrog and maze dropped tons of bags for me..now maybe 1 running both if I'm lucky.

Hoopy

[Jimwise77]

Has anyone taken any notice of whether or not the bags drop more frequently on level appropriate kills? I get one every now and then (around 75ish kills), but I'm out questing and deeding on mostly green-to-me mobs.

My drop rate has been the same regardless of the mob levels. I have also experienced that the rate is a per kill rather than per time: approximately 1 bag per 45-50 kills. For example, 1 hour on level 28 mobs: 612 kills and 15 bags; 1 hour on level 50 mobs: 408 kills and 9 bags; 1 hour on level 74 mobs: 298 kills and 6 bags. These were all mostly "normal" mobs and not signature or elites. I have gone from as many as 231 kills between bags, to as little as 3 bags in three straight kills, but over time, the rate has held.

Total bag-farming time since the end of the Faire: 14 hours. I have tried most zones up to the Great River, but I have not yet tried Mirkwood, Lothlorien, or Angmar. I have not done any skirmishes. I know it's still a small sample, but the consistency for me has been noticeable.

Level 76 Hunter on Gladden

[Crell_1]

Here's something that surprised me: while rolling disposable alts, I've gotten bounder's bags in the introduction instance!

[manstan]

I'm working on getting forochel done with my my main, a human hunter. I'm also gathering hides and prospecting; not much wood there lol And I seem to be getting a consistent 1 bag per hour drop rate. But even massacring everything in site I can get a skin from, forochel isn't very populated so it's a low kill rate. I actually got my first; and only, 70 token bag

But still at that rate I figure it will takes weeks to get the 1500 for the war horse; not like I can do anything with a war horse yet lol

I'm in no hurry

[Cybelline]

I feel sorry for the people who think they were getting lots of tokens at the farmer's faire - you weren't getting a fraction of what people before you were farming. Some people who had the time and who immediately jumped on the bandwagon got paid off; those who tried to "play the game" got shafted by comparison.

I don't THINK I got a lot of tokens during the Faire. I KNOW I did, so don't feel sorry for me; I don't. I don't give a brass bean what the situation was for the weeks prior to coming back to the game. It's utterly irrelevant to me.

I hopped back into the game after a very long absence on the 6th of September. Started playing my highest level character, a level 30 hunter, noticed the Faire and started doing it, because I like holidays and I like completing things. I only did it on one character with the exception that as week 2 started to wind down I ran the Egg hunt on the other 5 characters I had above level ten, because I was missing a solitary stripped egg and refused to spend gold at the AH to purchase it (and essentially being a newbie, I also didn't have the 15g the Blue and White Striped Egg was selling for).

So that's it. One lowly little level 30 hunter on an essentially newbie account played the Faire everyday but one, and 5 level 11ish alts ran the Egg Hunt for 4 days. I did it for the Faire and not to grind tokens. They were just a bonus. Result - around 3400 Faire tokens and around 5000 ish Bounder tokens.

I'm not posting all this to be a braggart. I'm posting this to demonstrate the effects of playing the game the way it was presented and getting a happy result.

Now, if I was intentionally farming tokens outside of the Faire, well that's a different story. Since the Faire closed I rolled a new hunter and have done every single quest in Ered Luin, the Shire and I am almost done with Bree-lands ( I have only Northern Breelands and the Barrowdowns to finish). I am not intentionally working on the slayer deeds, just doing the quests. I think I might have collected 250 Bounders Tokens in all this time.

Without the Farmer's Faire I wouldn't stand a snowballs chance in hell of having achieved what I have, mind you, there IS still just under two months to go on this (50 calendar days from today), AND there is still another Festival. I will run that Festival on a couple of toons as I would like another mount or two, and a half a dozen toolkits.

But, this thing was SUPPOSED to be time consuming. It was SUPPOSED to be make-work. It was supposed to be filler and be something to dither time away on before the expansion launch. It WASN'T meant to be completed in a week or two. It wasn't designed so that every single player, regardless of how much or little time they spent playing would be able to purchase every single item. If that was the case either Bounder's Tokens would drop like mana from heaven or the mount would cost ONE token not 1500. But ..... everyone can get what they want if they do it right.

With 50 game days left, if you start from absolute scratch and want the Deeds (2500 tokens) and the mount (1500 tokens) you will need to collect 80 tokens each and every day).

The Fall Festival will offer 12 repeatable quests over 14 days (10 quests at the Burrow and 2 Racing quests), so 168 Bounders Bags per toon. I can run 8 toons through the Fall Fest so there are 1344 Bounders Bags for the taking soon. Even if RNG gives me the middle finger and I only get 5 tokens on every single bag, I can net 6720 tokens over a 2 week period. If I had to landscape grind that, I simply wouldn't; I loathe make-work projects with every ounce of my soul and I work smarter, not harder.

So, from this LotRO newbie, MMO Vet, certified Get-Off-My-Lawn Old Fart, take this lesson: either find the paths of least resistance (Festivals) or go grind your heart out on mobs. Those are your choices if you want the rewards. Take it or leave it, whining will get you nowhere. It doesn't matter in the slightest what the situation was a month ago. It really doesn't. This is the situation today. This is the situation you have to work with. Do what you can to realize the rewards you want realizing that all this is OPTIONAL.

You don't NEED any of the rewards. You WANT them. In life and in games, you will find that you occasionally have to expend some effort to satisfy your WANTS, even if other people seemingly get them thrown at them like confetti. Not everyone gets a BMW for their 16th Birthday; not everyone got all the Bounders rewards in record time. Sorry if that offends anyone, but it's true nonetheless.

[Zikaris99]

But still at that rate I figure it will takes weeks to get the 1500 for the war horse; not like I can do anything with a war horse yet lol

I'm in no hurry

It's not a war-steed though: it's a regular mount AND a set of war-steed cosmetics. You only ever get one war-steed and that's through a quest line. Everything else is cosmetics to customize it.