Do you prefer loot heavy RPGs?

[Safav Hamon]

Because I don't. Games feel like chores when half your time is spent excessively looting bodies, managing inventory, and travelling back to town to offload vendor trash.

I know some people love that crap, but it can ruin an otherwise good RPG for me.

 

[Strange Fellow]

You'll have to elaborate. Do you mean the Diablo kind of loot heavy, or the Wizardry 8 kind?

 

[Theldaran]

Because I don't. Games feel like chores when half your time is spent excessively looting bodies, managing inventory, and travelling back to town to offload vendor trash.

I know some people love that crap, but it can ruin an otherwise good RPG for me.

Games with good itemisation make a distinction between the piss-poor equipment found on low-level mobs, and meaningful equipment.

So it's not like you have to loot every goblin expecting to do shit. In BG, I hardly pick up the 5-gp gems and whatnot. It's like trying to become rich throwing 5-cent coins into a piggy bank.

 

[Cael]

Depends on whether the loot is worth it or not. I don't mind tons of loot if some of it is interesting and fun, and they run a LARGE range of power.

DnD, unfortunately, is rather hamstrung in this, as +5 is as high as they go pre-Epic. There is not a lot of room to move between +1 and +5.

FO2, on the other hand, has great potential in going loot heavy, and if the guns were more distinctive and varied, it would be fun to have a loot heavy FO2 game. Unfortunately, it suffered the problem of most guns coming into availability too late to be of use as a better gun would already have been acquired. For example, the basic Hunting Rifle and the .44 Magnum that you can get at The Den is objectively superior to most weapons you can acquire until either NCR or SAD.

 

[Theldaran]

I believe DnD was designed first at low- and medium-level, and then at high- and epic-level, so that explains why the traditional range of weapons is so "limited".

But a +5 weapon is pretty fearsome and potentially game-breaking should you give it away happily to your players at lower levels. I know because I played some campaigns with unfair characters played by people associating with each other, and man was it crap.

 

[Bester]

I'm trying to think of RPGs that didn't have a lot of loot and am almost drawing a blank. Septerra Core may have been without loot. What else?

 

[Cyberarmy]

NO!
I tend to pick up everything and hoard so games became torture after a point if they are loot heavy.

 

[Cael]

I believe DnD was designed first at low- and medium-level, and then at high- and epic-level, so that explains why the traditional range of weapons is so "limited".

But a +5 weapon is pretty fearsome and potentially game-breaking should you give it away happily to your players at lower levels. I know because I played some campaigns with unfair characters played by people associating with each other, and man was it crap.

Which is my point. DnD doesn't have the range to have really loot heavy campaigns. You simply cannot have weapons above +1 before a certain level or you are basically creating walks in the park for the players. That is why Monty Haul campaigns tend to end up being hilariously broken most times.

And that is before 3.x introduced the wealth-by-level mechanic, which really restricted what you can or cannot do without upseting the whole CR/XP system.

 

[Jokzore]

Every loot system seems to have its drawbacks.

- When i played WoW it always bothered me that the boss I just killed didn't drop that sexy looking sword i was hoping for, even though its clearly right there in his cold dead hands.

- In Fallout 2 enemies dropped a ton of loot (usually the stuff they were using to shoot you) but it always bothered me how none of it was special and the reason i was picking it up was purely for the purposes of selling ... I'm also a bit OCD about loot and cant leave anything on the ground.

- Dark Souls I felt distributed its loot perfectly, not too much, not too little. Also I loved that all the gear is unique and has a story behind it. The downside was most of it was purely fashion with no real impact on gameplay.

I suppose BG, IWD and PST were the best in regards to loot. Special mobs drop special equipment, there was plenty of shit to buy if you werent happy with what you looted, great variety of gear (not just armor and weapons but potions, scrolls, trinkets). There was also a lot of junk but at least i could leave it lying on the ground knowing its not worth much even to the vendors ... Also those bags of holding really help with my hoarding tendencies.

 

[*-*/\--/\~]

No, especially when combined with unlimited inventory so the game effectively forces you to vacuum every piece of trash because you might need that burnt potato peel 10 hours later for a potion.

 

[kris]

In my opinion everyone should have appropriate loot going by what they wear/use and should be equipped with.

I simply want realistic loot.

 

[Kabas]

The dwarf run features perhaps one of the best loot systems from what i can remember. Every moment where you find a new equipable item is a moment of joy.

Like, you can find an axe that deals a good damage, but gives you penalty to accuracy - a great item if you focused dex on your fighter. Or you can get a higly accurate, but low damage hammer. Or a shitty iron stick that can deal an itching debuff(reduces the action points of the enemy). You can acquire a rifle that can potentially deal a very high damage or very low or staff that gives you bonus spark spells per battle.
You can also get something build defining like the helm of speed(enough action points for one bonus attack per round) or a shield that gives a 50% chance to deflect projectiles, but reduces your accuracy a bit.
Even a simple thing like a +1 dex ring feels meaningful thanks to the way the stat system works.

 

[JarlFrank]

Depends on what loot-heavy means.

Lots of generic trash loot to sell off? Meh.

A huge variety of different loot types, and some unique items that are potentially game-changing? Gimme!

It's all about quality of loot, not quantity of loot.

 

[Riddler]

I believe DnD was designed first at low- and medium-level, and then at high- and epic-level, so that explains why the traditional range of weapons is so "limited".

But a +5 weapon is pretty fearsome and potentially game-breaking should you give it away happily to your players at lower levels. I know because I played some campaigns with unfair characters played by people associating with each other, and man was it crap.

Which is my point. DnD doesn't have the range to have really loot heavy campaigns. You simply cannot have weapons above +1 before a certain level or you are basically creating walks in the park for the players. That is why Monty Haul campaigns tend to end up being hilariously broken most times.

And that is before 3.x introduced the wealth-by-level mechanic, which really restricted what you can or cannot do without upseting the whole CR/XP system.

What are you talking about? It is really easy to create interesting and varied items in DnD.

Create items with bonuses against certain creature types, odds to cast spells on specific die rolls, material specific resistances etc.

Only a piss poor DM could fail to create varied loot in 3.x e.

 

[octavius]

I liked the system used in MM2, with +'s going up to 32 or 64, which meant most encounters could yield interesting loot.
Same with Nahlakh and Natuk to a lesser degree.
So these three are among my favourite loot whoring games.

Of loot heavy games, the TES games have one of the most boring systems, with lots and lots of boring fluff, and only unique items being of real interest.

Wiz 7 too was boring loot wise, with monsters never dropping anything interesting, and if you started with imported items chances were you never found better weapons.

But on balance, "yes" to the question.

 

[Wysardry]

I prefer that there is a wide range of loot available in a game, but that can quickly become a chore if you have a limited inventory system.

I like the way it was handled in Daggerfall, as you could buy a cart to leave at the dungeon entrance and transport more items. It also separated armour into more pieces, which made more sense as it's unlikely you would be able to take a complete undamaged set of armour from the corpse of someone you just killed.

Dungeon Siege had mules that could carry loot, which was also handy.

 

[Cael]

I believe DnD was designed first at low- and medium-level, and then at high- and epic-level, so that explains why the traditional range of weapons is so "limited".

But a +5 weapon is pretty fearsome and potentially game-breaking should you give it away happily to your players at lower levels. I know because I played some campaigns with unfair characters played by people associating with each other, and man was it crap.

Which is my point. DnD doesn't have the range to have really loot heavy campaigns. You simply cannot have weapons above +1 before a certain level or you are basically creating walks in the park for the players. That is why Monty Haul campaigns tend to end up being hilariously broken most times.

And that is before 3.x introduced the wealth-by-level mechanic, which really restricted what you can or cannot do without upseting the whole CR/XP system.

What are you talking about? It is really easy to create interesting and varied items in DnD.

Create items with bonuses against certain creature types, odds to cast spells on specific die rolls, material specific resistances etc.

Only a piss poor DM could fail to create varied loot in 3.x e.

The wealth-by-level restricts your choices in 3.x. Technically, you are not even supposed to get a +1 weapon until level 4 or 5. You want to tell me how you make a varied weapon based on that?

 

[Nano]

I'm trying to think of RPGs that didn't have a lot of loot and am almost drawing a blank. Septerra Core may have been without loot. What else?

Mass Effect 2.

 

[Theldaran]

Cael level 5 is nothing...

Beggars can't be choosers!

 

[Lilura]

Deus Ex itemization and inventory management is impeccable.

 

[unfairlight]

Picking up anything in the world is a cool concept but if you just think for about 5 seconds you realize that filling the world with forks, shovels and a million other pointless items that you can pick up only for the sake of it is a total waste of time of both the players and the developers. I think something like Divinity Original Sin 2 is the worst that concept has ever gotten since there is no reason why there should exist so much pointless garbage.

 

[vonAchdorf]

When I was younger, I was annoyed when games didn't let you loot all of the enemy's equipment because "muh realism" ("where is the sword he clearly wielded"). But now I'm more than happy, if only meaningful stuff drops. The Witcher 3 has some of the worst itemization / loot system. Lots of named weapons which are trash loot, but you still have to inspect and can't outright discard by the name. Lots of loot in every crate, of which you barely need anything, because you only have to brew every potion once.

 

[Egosphere]

Not really. I don't mind huge quantities of worthless junk if your inventory space is huge and you have crafting that can hoover it all up, otherwise I'd rather the devs cut it all out

 

[Daemongar]

As long as the loot system fits the game, I'm happy. I generally like the PoR/Arcanum loot systems: you find everything the enemies had. Armor, clothes, weapons. You probably can't carry it all, so you have to make decisions on most gold for the least encumbrance. Items probably won't be there when you return later.

Might and Magic 6/7/8 probably had one of the best loot systems, though. (other than looting 6,000,000 dragonfly bodies for a grand total of 180 gold early in the game.) The treasure chests with random stuff based on the difficulty of the area and the difficulty of the trap made looting a fun event - if you avoided save scumming.

Also like the FO3/FONV loot system: you use most stuff to either sell or repair existing equipment, but you are generally given what the enemy is carrying.

Not a big fan of the "loot porn" type games (Diablos/Borderlands) or at least i don't play them for the loot. Not wild about hand placed loot being the only loot. Not crazy about being able to carry everything and everything having minuscule redundant items that I feel compelled to loot (Gothic).

Now that I think about it, I'm a fan of the D&D ideal of loot - you get what creatures are carrying - guaranteed - with random loot tables like in MM6. Damn, I'm old...

 

[Damned Registrations]

It's funny that Diablo clones are the go to example for games vomiting irrelevant loot on you, since the original Diablo was quite the opposite- enemies didn't respawn in a proper single player playthrough, and magic items were rare enough that even simple stat bonuses were interesting and potentially changed the way you could play by giving you access to new spells or equipment options.

Ultimately that is that matters- if the loot doesn't change the way you're playing, it's garbage, just like gaining levels and only gaining hp and basic stats. You need those moments where you go "AHA! Now I can charge at those archers instead of luring them through doorways!" "Now I can fight enemies in a big group with an AoE attack instead of picking them off!"