This week’s Massively Overthinking comes to us via a phrase MOP’s Eliot dropped back in April that leaped out at me. He was discussing Final Fantasy XIV’s Cosmic Exploration, and he mentioned that he is “generally a Random Reward Disliker,” which is why he wasn’t thrilled with the random draws. He called it a “[him] problem” and shrugged it off, but… is it? Because I’ve never been a random reward fan whatsoever. I don’t know anyone who is. Or do I?
Let’s Overthink it. Are you a Random Reward Disliker – or a Random Reward Enjoyer? What are the variables that can push you between those two sets of preferences? And perhaps most importantly, which MMOs are currently delivering rewards in a particularly annoying way?
Brianna Royce (@nbrianna.bsky.social, blog): I’m definitely a Random Reward Disliker, and I have been as long as I can remember. I want to know whatever I’m doing will result in something specific that I want. I am not here to gamble with my time and/or money. I feel this way about everything from lockboxes (I have never, ever bought one) to dungeon drops. I’m just very over it.
That doesn’t mean I won’t ever engage with a random reward system to get something I really want. But I will probably complain about it the whole time, and it will probably hurt my trust in the game eventually. I was going to grant an exception for crafting, but I don’t even particularly like random experimentation rolls even in Star Wars Galaxies crafting, the pinnacle in crafting for the genre. It could still be better. Random experimentation rolls are just a time- and material-waster, and we all know it.
So give me currencies and badges any day of the week – or better yet, let us craft exactly what we want. Oh, I’ll complain about those too, but at least I get to pick out what I want.
Carlo Lacsina (@UltraMudkipEX, YouTube, Twitch): There’s a deeper conversation about rewards here. I’ve been spending the last few weeks casually deconstructing the “why” behind the reward structures in MMOs while on the toilet. Personally, I’m beyond whether or not I like random/non-random rewards. I’m more concerned about whether or not we’ve gone too far towards using external rewards to do the content. Shouldn’t the reward be playing the content?
Of course, I understand MMOs need a lot of players and providing rewards is the most straightforward way to give them… does that say something more about or society and our values? It’s all very exhausting to think about.
Anyway, there’s a lot more of thinking to do. You know where to find me.
Chris Neal (@wolfyseyes.bsky.social, blog): I’m not sure I super-duper hate random rewards because getting a nice bit of shiny out of nowhere is always nice. But then again, if there aren’t any avenues for me to get what I specifically want, then I’m pretty certain that I’ll bow out.
A lot of this kind of keeps me out of most of the bigger looter shooters such as Destiny 2. I mean, sure, the gunplay is fun enough, but not being able to reliably get the kind of weapon I want really sucks the oxygen out of the room, especially since I’ve never been a fan of the “god roll” reward structure. In fact, they had that kind of mechanic with Monster Hunter Wilds’ Artian weapons, and you know what weapons I use in that game most? The ones I’ve put together myself from monster parts.
As I said, though, I would not mind a best of both worlds structure. Except not balanced in favor of RNG. Maybe more like an 80/20 lean to targeted goodies. That’s a good balance in both MMO rewards – and incidentally, ground beef and fat content for juicy burgers.
Eliot Lefebvre (@Eliot_Lefebvre, blog): I think it’s a good idea here to clarify what I mean by not being a Random Rewards Enjoyer. And because it just patched and has examples of the versions I like, the versions I dislike, and how to turn the latter into the former, I’m going to use V Rising. Whee!
In V Rising, there are three “research” stations, each of which allow you to randomly unlock accessory, weapon, and armor upgrades along with new consumables and decorations. These recipes are randomly dropped by enemies but can also be unlocked by spending a number of paper/scrolls/schematics to randomly unlock one of the various rewards. Perhaps most importantly, that random unlock feature is drawing only from the stuff you don’t already have unlocked, so if you randomly unlock Merciless Iron Claws from a drop, another roll of weapon research will not unlock Merciless Iron Claws again. (The recipe can drop again, but you can salvage it for scrolls for random research.) This is, to me, a fine example of how to keep the random reward thing going. You might get the recipe you want first time, or you might not get it until you have researched everything else in the category, but if you keep at it, you are going to unlock it eventually. Randomness affects the speed of the unlock, not the unlock ever happening.
Now, the game also features Ancestral Weapons that you need to reforge, and these artifact weapons have randomly rolled stats… and this is an example of a bad feature because you cannot actually be sure of what those stats will be. The odds of getting a stat you want on the weapon are basically 1/6th, which is not zero, but the laws of randomness means that it is possible to theoretically never get the stat you want, no matter how many of these weapon shards you farm. It’s unlikely, but possible.
The reason this system is bad is this: Not only is the reward you get random, but there’s no way to manage the randomness. You are, at the end of the day, at the mercy of random draws that stretch on forever. It is possible (if not likely or practical) to never get the Artifact Weapon you may want for a given weapon category, too. However, the most recent patch also adds a new system wherein you can basically manually meld weapons you don’t necessarily want, meaning that you do have control over the randomness again; you can fuse two shards or two finished weapons and choose the stats to keep, meaning that even if you don’t ever get the stats you want on a role, you can get the weapon you want even if it might take some more play or elbow grease.
This is, ultimately, what I mean about not being a Random Rewards Enjoyer. It doesn’t bother me if you have low odds of getting something if you can, through consistent play, expect to eventually get what you’re aiming for. Randomness affects the amount of time you have to spend on something, possibly even by a significant amount (this time in V Rising I got the full set of my preferred armor as my first set of random research, for example), but it doesn’t dictate whether or not you’ll ever get it. That doesn’t mean I’ll never engage in a system that doesn’t make that a guarantee; World of Warcraft has been ruining its loot systems ever since Wrath of the Lich King and generally done everything short of going back to that sensible system for ages now. But it does mean that I’m less of a fan of that particular design.
Sam Kash (@samkash@mastodon.social): I’m probably somewhere in the middle of a fan and a hater of random rewards for many games. I do like to get random drops and occasionally see them with increased power. At least while I’m leveling. It’s fun to get a rare piece for my current level.
Where you’d lose me is at endgame content. I never played WoW or its raids, but the idea that you need to keep repeating the same content so many times to randomly get the piece of gear you were waiting for sounds a bit miserable.
Tyler Edwards (blog): As you’d expect from someone with my level of neurodivergence, I tend to prefer consistency and predictability, so I’m generally more against random rewards than for them. That said, I’m not sure I’d go so far as to want them gone entirely. Randomness can be fun when it feels like a bonus rather than something you have to rely on.
For example, I was a fan of WoW’s warforged/titanforged system, in which gear had a small chance to drop with a slightly higher item level, and I’m still lowkey mad Blizzard got rid of it. That min/maxers starting viewing titanforged pieces as “required” and getting the system removed is one of the clearer examples I can think of of players optimizing the fun out of games.
I think if I were designing my ideal MMO, I’d make all dropped gear available from currency vendors, but if you got it as a drop, it would have a small chance to roll with better stats. Makes it so you can gear up to the minimum reliably, while maintaining some excitement around maybe getting an especially good drop.
Every week, join the Massively OP staff for Massively Overthinking column, a multi-writer roundtable in which we discuss the MMO industry topics du jour – and then invite you to join the fray in the comments. Overthinking it is literally the whole point. Your turn!
