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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsBreakfast Topic: The ninja problem
by Mike Schramm 
Oct 31st 2009 at 8:00AM
Obviously, over on Guildwatch, we've been covering people shouting out names and guilds on the forums for a while, but as we've also reported a few times over there, that barely helps -- even if people do remember a ninja on their server, one name change later and they're gone. A few guildleaders over on Jubei'thos have tried putting a site together to track known ninjas on the server, but even that has issues; it's tough to avoid false positives, even if you do require screenshots.
But surely there must be a solution, so let's put our heads together: a debuff? Something like the group vote-kicking system that's coming in patch 3.3? If Blizzard wanted to really go for fair, they could just take the Need-before-Greed system and turn it into straight Need: if an item matches your class and spec, you get a roll (with items everyone can use giving everyone a roll), and the best roll always wins. You can turn it off (for a Master Looter-style raid), but for PuGs, why even bother with a Need/Greed difference? What do you think?
Filed under: Items, Breakfast Topics, Instances, Raiding, Bosses, Making money
Reader Comments (Page 4 of 5)
Biscuit Oct 31st 2009 10:52AM
Meh, any system can be abused. The best solution is to know who you are grouping with. There is a guy on my server who to this day, any time he tries to put a PUG raid together, trade lights up with "IS THE DST ON RESERVE?" Just be smart about who you run with and don't freak out when rare mounts are ninja'd. Because they almost always are.
As someone who runs PUG raids on occasion, I'm not to into the idea of a down rating system. I've been accused of ninja'ing (though never to myself) physical dps pvp loot to tanks, items like the satchel of spoils from Sarth (I always use a 1-25 roll because it's easier than sorting through 25 different ones), and for giving loot best suited to a certain spec over what the roll was (no, hunters, you cannot have the strength weapon, so sorry). Most people who come to my pugs leave happy, so it would be annoying to have a handful of not so bright people ruining my fun.
Aeternal Oct 31st 2009 10:58AM
People run raids without master looter enabled?
Gerik Oct 31st 2009 11:21AM
My previous guild raided the entirety of Burning Crusade through Ulduar with the loot set to FFA without a single incident. It was much less of a hassle and free of the problems associated with Master Looter.
luna Oct 31st 2009 11:08AM
This article doesn't match the screenshot. If you're on a roll system, everyone needs a mount if they want it. Gear is different. If you wanted some of your "loot council" to have priority to get rare mounts, go master looter and take DKP. Simple as that.
luna Oct 31st 2009 11:24AM
Even if you didn't want to track DKP for PUGs, just make people link their existing slot item. Sure, there may a person once in a while that links a trash BoE green, but that's why you check their armory if it seems suspicious.
Otherwise if you don't want to spend a lot of time managing it, Need before Greed and possibly let people moan and groan because they didn't get "their" drop. At least you know it's coming when they say "I hope my X drops". Sorry, maybe next time buddy! I don't control RNG
With dual-specs, and possibly switched specifically for what your raid needed, it's perfectly OK for them to roll on gear. That's why gear-homogenization is such a good thing for loot, more people rolling on gear, but a lot more gear usable by more specs.
The only thing I think isn't cool to need on is something that someone has put a lot of time into and is almost done, e.g. where they are only missing one BoP quest item ( legendary mace piece, darkmoon card, etc) that only drops from an dungeon/raid instance.
neminem Oct 31st 2009 11:27AM
We often use "need" as "I want this a lot", and "greed" as "this would be a sidegrade/I might use it later/it's for my offspec/etc.". It does make sense to restrict rolls to things it would be theoretically possible for you to use, but I would still want two tiers of showing interest in an item.
Ozzard Oct 31st 2009 11:34AM
There's an easy, two-part technical, one-part social solution to this.
Technical 1) Assign each character a unique ID that persists across server, faction and name changes. Make that ID visible on an Armory dump. Suddenly a ninja cannot hide *from the Armory* by changing some part of their identity.
Technical 2) Anyone can now set up a "Rate My Ninja" site. I'd love to set one up, based on trust networks. These are networks where you tell the system whose opinions you trust and whose you distrust. You can then see opinions of ninjas based on people you trust, which means it's much harder for an isolated group to manipulate the system.
Social 3) The people who are concerned about ninjas can then flock to one or more of these site - ultimately, one or two will win and become the de-facto rating information for characters in WoW.
Note that this specifically does *not* deal with someone who ninjas with several characters on the same account - each one would have to be found and downranked separately. I think this is important; any other approach requires Blizzard to expose which characters are associated with which account, and I think they're right to allow people to keep that private.
Sleutel Oct 31st 2009 11:39AM
Unfortunately, maintaining unique IDs can punish people who have a legitimate reason to want to escape their old identity--e.g., to avoid harassment. I had a friend in an old guild who was contemplating that a while back to get away from one or more people who had been viciously harassing her on level 1 alts after a portion of our guild splintered off.
Ozzard Oct 31st 2009 11:52AM
@Sleutel - I agree, and ultimately there's a privacy/accountability trade-off here. At the moment I think it's rather too easy to drop one's existing identity - we have at least three probable "serial ninjas" on our server who appear to change names as often as they can, then come back into groups and raids with new, untraceable identities.
OK, here's a modified proposal: when a player changes name/race/server/faction, they can choose whether to keep their existing reputation (keep their ID) or drop it (be assigned a new ID). This means it's no longer possible to track ninjas over time, as they'll always drop IDs; instead, as part of the social side, players will learn to be wary of seeing character histories of "Notaninja (level 80 Tauren death knight). First seen: 3 days ago. 0 ratings." Meanwhile, characters who have built up a "good trading history" can elect to carry it with them when they transfer.
Would such a system ease some of your concerns?
(Why the ID when there are names, by the way? Two reasons: firstly, so that characters can carry their history between servers. Secondly, so that a character created on the same server as a former ninja, with that ninja's name, doesn't pick up that ninja's history by accident)
Tbah Oct 31st 2009 12:10PM
http://www.wowprogress.com/detective
It's working again. And now as we have dates on achievements, it's almost 100% reliable. And it knows to track for ppl of the opposite faction as well.
Nathanyel Oct 31st 2009 9:28PM
You could also be careful in general when joining a raid where the leader is someone you've never seen before, from a guild with a weird/poser name.
Calithos Nov 4th 2009 7:40PM
The big problem with master looter is that not everyone who puts it on can be a completely trustworthy person. I have heard stories before of people really taking the time to go Master Looter, then when something -they- want shows up, but other people want as well, can simply loot it at their discretion, with no one else able to do squat about it.
The only way to really combat this, and what I've found is the best solution -so far-(THough I won't hesitate to try a new method if one shows up), is to have as best a trust system as you can with people, and point out the looting rules as quick and to the point as possible. Group looting, set to uncommon, and if something big shows up, -everyone- rolls Need. Screw "I might like this, but I'll roll greed and hope no one else does", because that won't get you anywhere. Like it or not, a PuG is never pretty when dealing with rolls.
Ormal Oct 31st 2009 12:05PM
Instead of a "ninja button", ask players to rate everyone else and leave comments after the run. Then allow other players to see rankings through the armory and set up filters to only group with players with a high enough rating.
cmichaelcooper Oct 31st 2009 1:19PM
I didn't read everybody's comment, so I apologize if this has already been said.
You will STILL get a greed roll, but need rolls will still trump those greed rolls, with the additional class/spec requirements in the notes. So if nobody specifically needs a piece of gear, greed rolls will be the next consideration, with disenchant rolls following last.
So even if you have "ninjas", they will only be able to need roll on gear they are allowed to roll on, and if they win the roll over somebody else, is it really that big of a deal? The way epics are being given out these days, most rare or epic dungeon loot is vendor trash anyway. Also, I think other than cloth wearers, there should be little competition for gear when it comes right down to it.
Jagoex Oct 31st 2009 1:31PM
Your article and the image you posted echos an experience that I just had last night...
In VoA25, I rolled a 97 on the Grand War Mammoth, but it was passed to a player who rolled a 69. After the rolls were submitted, the raid leader announced "loot rules" where "69 was an automatic win." And, of course, the winner was his guildmate.
It would be difficult to fix the current loot system without disrupting the design within the game that keeps us coming back for more. The anticipation we feel for obtaining random loot is greater than working towards an observed goal--it's a principle in psychology that can be explained away via our current knowledge of how the neurotransmitter dopamine impacts our affinity for "risk-taking" behaviors. That is why the dice system in loot distribution is so powerful, and Blizzard knows this.
Just think about the rush you get when you 1) down a boss and see that your loot dropped and 2) you roll on the item. The two variables compound on one another, and even though it seems like it should make us uncomfortable, the rush we feel is somehow reinforcing.
If you think this is crap, just ask someone who has gone sky-diving. I mean, how in the world can jumping out of a plane be reinforcing?
Anyway, I'm totally digressing. The main question should be this: "How do we limit the roll of Ninjas in the distribution of loot while maintaining Blizzard's system of reinforcement build into the game?"
That's a tough one...
Jagoex Oct 31st 2009 1:35PM
That last "build" should be a "built." Copy-editing fail right there. :)
Leviathon Oct 31st 2009 1:45PM
You've been able to report ninjas for the past couple months now (you see the ninjas whining all the time on the CS forum)
VSUReaper Oct 31st 2009 2:06PM
What Blizz needs to do, and in all honesty I'm surprised it hasnt been done yet, is to make some items, such as mounts, automatic roll. And when I say automatic roll, the game goes "hey, look, this item is special" and it bypasses master-looter and the need/greed box or any other type of loot setting and gives a "roll" box. It has 2 buttons, a pass and a roll (I hope I dont need to explain what the buttons mean...) Whoever wins the roll will automatically have it sent to their toon.
When I say special items, I mean stuff like mounts, tabards (if they ever dropped in instances), pets, etc - basically any vanity item that tends to cause loot drama. I honestly cant see any downside to a system like this. Its fair, if you win and decided to sell it or give it away, then that's your purgative, and its not a ninja.
In all honesty the only items like this that Blizz would need to fix with the forced roll command is the mounts that drop (this includes world drops such as the TLPD and instance drops).
nonentity Oct 31st 2009 2:11PM
There are only 2 issues that cause me to be very, very pissed at Blizzard: Garrosh, and the way the treat ninjas. The can develop the story any way they like, do whatever they want, I'm fine with it.
Except Garrosh. He is imo the single biggest piece of sh*t-storyline they ever did.
And ninjas.
Ninjas are a major problem, yes, the occurences are few and far between, you can go months without encountering one ninja. But one time is enough to change your enjoyment of the game, for the worse.
I've encountered 2 ninjas last month and it has severely impacted my enjoyment of the game. Even more so because I feel utterly abandonded by Blizzard on the issue.
We report them, they don't do sh*t even though they can clearly see from the chat/loot-log what went wrong there. We can't officially tell each other about them. We can't do anything about it.
The only response we ghet on the issue is not to use the Loot Master system because when we use it we're f*cked if things go wrong, it was our fault......... yeah........
9 out of 10 random raid raid leaders/loot masters are totally ok and the loot master system works for those cases. Why should we have to pre-condemn those nine people because of those very few assholes?
BigMary Oct 31st 2009 2:20PM
Hi I was directed to this article from a guildie today. I am one of the GL's who developed WarcraftNinjas.com and after reading a fe wof the comments posted here do wanted to addres a few issues.
1) Blizzard does NOT beleive ninja looting or "looting out of turn" exists. They cleaerly state that when Master Looter is applied the Master Looter is given the right to distribute loot as that person sees fit so those of you who think Master Looter in PuGs is the way to go are 100% wrong. Having said that Blizzard does state that if you make the ML state the loot rules prior to the raid and they violate them it becomes a scam and THAT can be reported. Reporting ninjas is useless unless the loot rules are stated first.
2) From some of the comments it seems that alot of you seem to not have run into ninjas who loot everything to themselves just to vendor it. Yes, it does happen.
3) We use blacklist for the most part on Jubei it si a great add on everyone should use :).
My suggestion on the Suggestion Forums was for Blizzard to change the LFG/LFM system where Raid Leaders have to check off what the loot rules will be while recruiting PuGs. This way if something is ninja looting it falls into the scam area and that person can be reported.
So far as the skydiver comparison....well if chute doesn't deploy, well that is the craptastic (dead I know :)) feeling people who won after taking FULL part in the raid feel when their loot is taken or looted to a friend.