Mod Math - Why there should be 100% mod drop rates and Cantina Energy increases
August 4, 2016 1:40PM
edited August 2016
So we all have adjusted to the reality of Mods, for better or worse, but what does it take to get that mod you really want. Here is a simplified look at some probabilities on EA/CG's wheel of mod roulette:
Let's say you just want a 2 rarity (2 dot) Receiver (Arrow) with Speed as a primary because you really want Rey to rock. Unfortunately, your first time through the mod battle, you got a 1 dot protection primary receiver (argh). How many more times do you need to fight to get what you want?
Since this is a "battle" the assumption is that you are playing the mod set type you want and are playing the node that drops Receivers. Let's also assume that you don't care about secondary stats or initial quality. Let's also assume a 40% drop rate. EA_Jesse has said the rates are better than shard drop rates and shards, from most accounts, drop about 33% of the time. So a 7% increase seems EA like. We will also assume that mod rarities (1 or 2 dot) drop and mod primary stats drop at equal rates. There are 7 primary stats for a Receiver.
The probability looks something like this:
Chance of getting a mod x chance of getting a 2 dot x chance of getting the primary you want: 0.4 x 0.5 x 0.14 = 0.028 or about a 3% chance.
(If you need a frame of reference, betting #21 on roulette wheel has a 2.6% chance of hitting, rolling snake eyes on a set of dice has about a 2.8% chance).
So you need to fight about 30 battles (300 Cantina energy) to, on average, get that mod.
Don't worry, it gets way more depressing. Now let's say you want the same mod, but want at least a 4 or 5 rarity and you are lucky enough to have a First Order Team that beat Tier 3 of the Offensive Mod Challenge. So what does it take to get a 4 or 5 rarity Receiver with speed primary - because who wouldn't want Rey with speed and an offense set bonus?
We will use the same assumptions as above, but add in each mod shape drops equally (there are 6 Shapes) and each challenge may drop 3 rarities equally (Tier 3 can drop 3, 4 or 5).
The probability looks something like this:
Chance of getting a mod x chance of the mod being a receiver x chance of the mod being 4 or 5 dot x chance of speed primary: 0.4 x 0.167 x 0.667 x 0.142 = .0063 or 0.63% chance of getting the mod you want at the conclusion of any battle.
So, on average, you need to play about 160 battles to get that mod. That's 2560 Cantina Energy or about 11 days of playing just that battle with one refresh (so natural energy and 1100 crystals).
The good news, is that you should, by that point, on average, have all the mods in the set you want, with the primaries you want... but that is a lot of resources to dedicate and a lot of lost opportunity cost in the Cantina (probably about 77 character shards from battles and about 5500 currency (70 Shards).
The simple 'fix' to this two fold: Adjust drop rates. Even at a 100% drop drop, you still only have a 1.5% chance of getting that 4 or 5 mod you want. Provide more Cantina energy be either increasing the natural refresh rate or lowering the refresh cost. That should help a little bit, but will still be a grind.
While we are on the Mods subject, one feature I would like to see is the ability to transfer the entire mod card. I can unequip and re-assign on a per mod basis, but it would be nice to be able to transfer cards between toons as they are used in different game functions. The credit cost would be the same as if they are down individual, but would just speed up the process.
Thanks for reading! Hope this made sense.
Let's say you just want a 2 rarity (2 dot) Receiver (Arrow) with Speed as a primary because you really want Rey to rock. Unfortunately, your first time through the mod battle, you got a 1 dot protection primary receiver (argh). How many more times do you need to fight to get what you want?
Since this is a "battle" the assumption is that you are playing the mod set type you want and are playing the node that drops Receivers. Let's also assume that you don't care about secondary stats or initial quality. Let's also assume a 40% drop rate. EA_Jesse has said the rates are better than shard drop rates and shards, from most accounts, drop about 33% of the time. So a 7% increase seems EA like. We will also assume that mod rarities (1 or 2 dot) drop and mod primary stats drop at equal rates. There are 7 primary stats for a Receiver.
The probability looks something like this:
Chance of getting a mod x chance of getting a 2 dot x chance of getting the primary you want: 0.4 x 0.5 x 0.14 = 0.028 or about a 3% chance.
(If you need a frame of reference, betting #21 on roulette wheel has a 2.6% chance of hitting, rolling snake eyes on a set of dice has about a 2.8% chance).
So you need to fight about 30 battles (300 Cantina energy) to, on average, get that mod.
Don't worry, it gets way more depressing. Now let's say you want the same mod, but want at least a 4 or 5 rarity and you are lucky enough to have a First Order Team that beat Tier 3 of the Offensive Mod Challenge. So what does it take to get a 4 or 5 rarity Receiver with speed primary - because who wouldn't want Rey with speed and an offense set bonus?
We will use the same assumptions as above, but add in each mod shape drops equally (there are 6 Shapes) and each challenge may drop 3 rarities equally (Tier 3 can drop 3, 4 or 5).
The probability looks something like this:
Chance of getting a mod x chance of the mod being a receiver x chance of the mod being 4 or 5 dot x chance of speed primary: 0.4 x 0.167 x 0.667 x 0.142 = .0063 or 0.63% chance of getting the mod you want at the conclusion of any battle.
So, on average, you need to play about 160 battles to get that mod. That's 2560 Cantina Energy or about 11 days of playing just that battle with one refresh (so natural energy and 1100 crystals).
The good news, is that you should, by that point, on average, have all the mods in the set you want, with the primaries you want... but that is a lot of resources to dedicate and a lot of lost opportunity cost in the Cantina (probably about 77 character shards from battles and about 5500 currency (70 Shards).
The simple 'fix' to this two fold: Adjust drop rates. Even at a 100% drop drop, you still only have a 1.5% chance of getting that 4 or 5 mod you want. Provide more Cantina energy be either increasing the natural refresh rate or lowering the refresh cost. That should help a little bit, but will still be a grind.
While we are on the Mods subject, one feature I would like to see is the ability to transfer the entire mod card. I can unequip and re-assign on a per mod basis, but it would be nice to be able to transfer cards between toons as they are used in different game functions. The credit cost would be the same as if they are down individual, but would just speed up the process.
Thanks for reading! Hope this made sense.
Do or Do not.
DarthBarron (Kevin, aka KevWalker)
DarthBarron (Kevin, aka KevWalker)
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Replies
DarthBarron (Kevin, aka KevWalker)
This is a big assumption. I have a feeling they are not dropped at equal rates.
DarthBarron (Kevin, aka KevWalker)
It's a little different that Pre-crafting in the sense that everyone could take advantage, if they chose to use resources to do so.
If they would just change the drop rate to 100%, like it was, and make the cost of cantina refreshes like normal energy so it goes 100-100-200-200-etc., that would help solve some issues.
DarthBarron (Kevin, aka KevWalker)
I have been doing the math on my live streams for a while, and I agree with your points. regarding the precrafting though, it is pretty much the same thing actually. There was a 1-2 day period where they announced the change was coming til the time the change was implemented. A lot of people, similar to mods, spent a lot of extra crystals for energy refreshes to farm the gear and pre-craft the items before the change. So there is definitely a parallel with that.
Personally, I would be happy with EITHER a 100% drop rate OR double cantina energy regen so it is on par with energy; but the fact that neither is happening has caused many to quit or stop spending.
We definitely need 100% drop rate for mods!!
DarthBarron (Kevin, aka KevWalker)
Besides, now that I'm pretty much done moding all the guys I'm actively using, I can finally get back to cantina farming for the characters I want.
It's literally the worst system I've ever seen in a game. Customizing our teams based on RNG? At least with sorry gear drop rates we know what we're getting once they finally do drop. And who besides the hugest of whales levels up all their mods to see if they have the secondaries they're looking for? It would cost me at least 5 million credits just to level up all those ****ing square ones they keep dropping.
Maybe one has +10 speed and 4.5% potency secondaries. I'm not spending every credit I get in this cheap game to find out.
Yup. You need to drop about 250k to reveal all the slots. And when you're just trying to min/max for those secondaries, that's a huge waste of credits. Except that because of the imbalance of how good speed is, you're almost forced to chase that +X speed on the secondaries to stay competitive at the top of the arena. It's the one stat where literally a single speed point can make all the difference. No other stat comes even close to potentially having this much of an effect.
(For someone who doesn't understand how that's possibly, if you have two characters with exactly the same speed of say 200 on opposing sides, the character with 201 will go first and that means it's your Rey who'll be critting for 25k and gaining foresight first. No other stat can even come close to making this much of a difference in battle).
Eventually you will reach the point where you either have every Cantina hero or all the heroes you are willing to spend time on. Then what will you do with your Cantina energy? There will be no use for it. The mod system gives you something else to spend it on.
The krakens have almost assuredly reached this point. Farming mods gives them incentive to continue spending by buying Cantina energy.
Tweak 1 - T3 Challenges should only drop MK5 mods.
Tweak 2 - The drop rate for Mk5 mods should be the same rate as shard drops (which was what was stated by the Devs.) This is definitely not the case.
Tweak 3 - Once you 3* a given mod challenge it should, from that time forward, allow you to select the slot of the mod you want to drop (if it drops). Then if you need Arrows, you can farm Arrow. If you need Pluses, you can farm Pluses. Stats would still be random, but at least people could fill out a character without waiting a century.
The complete randomness of everything is what really kills it. Being able to select the slot would be a huge help and would likely result in a lot more people actually trying.
Exactly. I'd suggest they use the battle table format for the t1/2/3 challenges, but I doubt EA wants to design 6 more battles for each challenge and tier...... That'd be 8 types * 6 slots * 3 tiers= 144 battles.
I do want to remind anyone trying to drum up the recent 'pre-craft 2' jargon that this is nothing like that issue. Everyone was able to benefit from the 100% drop rate and cheaper leveling costs. Whether they took advantage of it and saved up or spent on resources to level a bunch or not, it wasn't en exploit. Also, the "divide" some have mentioned actually gets smaller over time. Just some notes for thought.
You miss things when you don't log in and play every day, just how it goes for this genre.
EDIT: apparently it's hom0nym morning.
This
It's the randomness factor combined with the cantina energy usage. If I am farming Boba Fett, I can reasonable predict the grind. Same goes for gear. I can choose resources appropriately and decide a course of action. You can't do that with mods.
Mods is a roulette wheel, more than a grind. Some players may get lucky, others may not, but since it is a single piece that makes a difference, RNG has a much bigger influence on character development.
DarthBarron (Kevin, aka KevWalker)
@Bulldog1205
It's more than several weeks for the 5* mods. With regular shards you have a 100% chance of getting what you need one it does drop.
With raids it's random but the new donation system and the gear sometimes showing up in the regular shop plus the guild shop makes it easier to collect over all.
But with the 5* mods it's an insanely long grind well beyond anything else.
Here are the steps to get a 5* with Speed as the main stat (we're not even going to mention secondary RNG)
1) You have about 40% chance of anything dropping at all (the devs said Challenge drops are slightly above the 33% shards are).
2) Once you do get one to drop, you only have a 33% chance of it being 5* instead of 4 or 3.
3) Once that 5* does drop, you only have 17% chance of it being a slot you're looking for.
4) Once you do get that slot (slot 2 in this case), you only have 9% chance of it being the speed stat (or whatever else you may be looking for).
That's a ton of RNG at each step to actually get what you need and all of it is at 16 energy per try. So on average you're looking at 15 attempts per day. It's going to take you way more than a couple of weeks to get just 1 correct piece, let alone 6 for a single toon, and then 30 for a full squad.
Thanks @Jophue ! Wanted to put a little perspective behind what it takes to get mods, especially for everyone who keeps getting the same type. It's all RNG. And the odds aren't good.
DarthBarron (Kevin, aka KevWalker)
At least with shards and gear, while the drop rate is low, there is at least the knowledge that what you are looking for will drop within reasonable energy expenditure.
DarthBarron (Kevin, aka KevWalker)
I'll be updating as I go along. Hang with me.
Lube was on 2-for-1 special!
Optimizing mods on my toons with pen and paper, it looked like I was playing a full page of sedoku puzzles.
Making drop rate 100% just means your 4 dot speed primary is worthless. because everyone else has a 5 dot speed primary on their rey. And you need one too.
No matter the drop rate, you can spend a huge amount of credits on mods. The first few you roll, they are all useful. As you get more an more, the chance any are better than your current mods decreases. It is the same no matter what the drop rate. It just changes where you stop and are satisfied due to cost/benefit ratio. If mods are super cheap... well why not just give everyone the best mods for free. Everyone have the same exact thing. Why? Because that's not fun. And it doesn't give the f2p player that chance of getting a lucky mod.
Mods way faster/cheaper than gear. So there is no problem that isn't worse with gear. I don't care if you're in a t7 guid. You still need purple gear, and it's still slower than mods.
It is not supposed to be bam, bam, done, next! This is a major new content. It's supposed to take time to fully experience it. The drop rate only changes one thing... It means everyone will have cookie cutter teams sooner rather than later. It means if you don't have a max dot perfect secondary, you aren't done, yet. Mods are supposed to increase variety. Making them faster/easier hurries up the end where they are just another box to tick.