This is not a particularly specific guide to any one MMO, just a suggestion to all the guild master and officer teams out there about what to think about as you plan and re-plan your loot systems. I will go through a few more popular systems for dishing out loot and discuss some of the pros and cons with these loot systems.

The loot system I plan to discuss is Zero-Sum DKP(with a focus on NDKP), bid dkp, flat rate purchase/most dkp wins, and loot council. The key thing to remember is that no one system is proven perfect. No one system will provide your guild with the perfect way of dividing out loot that makes everyone happy.

Zero-Sum/NDKP

Zero-Sum DKP is a system which attempts to maintain a total zero value for DKP between those with positive and those with negative DKP. This is accomplished by the following system of rules:

1. When an item drops and is given to a player, everyone in the raid(including that player)receive the value of the item divided evenly amongst the players. For instance, if an item is valued at 25 DKP, and you have 25 players in your raid, each player gets 1 dkp, the buyer being at -24 and everyone else with 1.
2. Item values can be variable depending on the quality of the item and the stats it holds. Alternatively item values can be flat priced(i.e. 50 DKP for tier pieces, 20 for everything else).
3. NO BONUS DKP. Any addition of outside DKP is flat inflation that CAN NOT be removed. Thus, it is not appropriate to add this DKP into the system.
4. Attendance can be tracked to create a sort of “sub-priority” which, if a person doesn’t have a certain percentage of attendance, they will be denied loot.

NDKP was the best system to implement zero-sum in my opinion. NDKP is a Nurfed tool which was used in vanilla WoW to create an extremely flexible zero-sum system. It had variable values from item to item, a “boss-by-boss” attendance system, nice charts and graphs, reduced values for downgrades or off-spec items, and useful in-game mods.

Pros:

• Attempts to minimize inflation
• Flexible in terms of item values and how they are handled (allows players to take off-spec items or downgrades)
• Allows new players to have a more fair shake at loot because they start at the middle of the pack, rather then the bottom

Cons:

• Often difficult to implement into websites if you use a custom application
• Long term inflation is possible if you have a small group of long-term players but have to keep reverting to old instances to gear new players(the old players absorb points for the same items many more times than they should without spending any)
• Does not reward players in a meaningful way for showing up on progression only nights when loot does not drop (hence, attendance tracking is often important)

Loot Council

Loot Council is a system of loot distribution that relies on a small group of raiders to select the proper loot distribution for the entire raid. Essentially, when loot drops, this group (usually in secret) decides who receives the item but, typically, provides no justification to the raid for that choice. The power of loot council is that a players attitude, attendance, skills, and general ability can be considered.

Loot Council is often plagued in controversy because it has the potential to be ultra-fair and simple, but is often riddled with negative emotions. Players often feel slighted when they felt it was their turn for loot and, for one reason or another, the item is not given to them. This leads to accusations of collusion amongst the council and an unfair loot distribution system. This player is further disgruntled when some players feel the same way and make their opinions known, causing small divisions within the raid.

Alternatively, council members often feel a number of different pressures. They can feel pressure to support their friends for loot. Or, they can legitimately feel tempted to take items for themselves because they are in a position to do so (this is real collusion but is ultimately possible). Or, perhaps still, council members can not come to an agreement forcing a single player (typically the GM) to make a decision which alienates some officers and not others.

The best hope for a Loot Council system is, from day one, to try and convince your raiders that loot is not the aspect of the game you are focused on. Your raid group will be focused on completion of the game’s content in a timely and fun fashion. Make it clear the loot council will be used as a means of unbiased and custom tailored way of giving out loot. Its important to pick people for your council that do not have strong ties to particular players and, whose main concern is whats best for the raid group.

Its equally important to make sure that each and every player understands that every choice for loot is done to make the raid better and not for the individual interests of players. Allow players to voice their opinion for future loot items, but make it clear that your choice is your own and that yourself and the officers make every piece of loot’s decision carefully.

Pros:

• No source of inflation or artificial skewing
• Loot choices can be based off any number of real or artificial factors
• No updating of DKP or web-based systems

Cons:

• Possible collusion amongst council members
• Players easily feel hurt or betrayed when loot is not given out the way they want
• Small divides within the raid is possible because classes or friends tend to try to support each other

Bid DKP

Bid DKP is a system in which DKP is given out in an arbitrary manner deemed acceptable by the master or officers and is spent in a traditional bid system. DKP is awarded in any number of ways for any number of reasons, including when bosses die, when the raid kills new bosses, when new bosses are attempted, and for showing up on time.

DKP is spent when items are dropped and can either be handled by blind bidding or by auction style bidding. Blind bidding is good because it allows players to determine what they feel the item is worth without seeing what others have put in. This prevents the “1-up” problem that auction bidding can lead to. A disadvantage is that items can sometimes go for substantially less to later players receiving the item which means that players can stack DKP and potentially miss real upgrades.

The “1-up” problem of auction bidding is where a player bids X amount for an item and another player waits to see his bid and then bids X+1. This will continue back and forth until one player gives up or until one player runs out of DKP. In either event this can cause the loot to take a considerable amount of time to dish out. This can usually be avoided by putting in rules on minimum up-bidding, such as you can only bid in 50 dkp increments, or whatever is applicable for your system.

Pros:

• Reduced inflation because players will usually bid a substantial percentage of their DKP on an item
• Rewards can be given out for desired behaviour (i.e. showing up on progression nights)

Cons:

• “1-up” problem
• DKP amounts can still rise quickly and a great disparity between the top players and new players will exist
• Item values are not fixed so players never know how much they will end up spending

Flat DKP 

Flat DKP is, arguably, the worst possible loot system. Interestingly, its also the most widely used. This is likely because its easy to implement and easy to track.

Flat DKP is where flat amounts of DKP are given arbitrarily much like in a bid DKP system, but unlike a bid system, items have a flat value. This value is often decided based on the items overall value to players. The problem with this is that this value is often tough to pinpoint because to much DKP cost can cause players to avoid it, and too little leads to large inflation in the system.

The major problems with this system is that great disparity exists between players with top DKP and players with bottom. It often becomes so bad that the players at the bottom take anything that comes to them because they will never get out of the hole anyway. Players at the top, on the other hand, get all of the best items right away because they hoarded DKP for them.

This means that loot is not distributed evenly through the raid and people often miss upgrades.

Pros:

• Easy to track and maintain
• Rewards can be given out for desired behaviour

Cons:

• Inflation is rampant
• Tough to create a good pricing system
• Large disparity between players

Conclusion

There are a large number of other alternative loot systems that I did not cover. There are systems such as “Suicide Kings“, “RDKP“, and “Ni Karma“. My personal preference lays with Zero-Sum DKP, especially the NDKP implementation of it.

Choose one that best suites your raid and the players are happy with. Remember that new players will come and old players will go. Your system should be adaptable to these situations.