Aion Armory. Fact? Or Fiction?

**Epylon** · 09-17-2009, 03:36 PM

So i've heard a lot of you refer to Aion Armory now as a good reference site for the game, crafting, drops etc. However i have some mixed feelings about the websites validity that maybe some of you who know something i don't know could help address. While it's true that the armory seems to be a good source for recipes and drop descriptions, i do have one major problem, and that would be where the drops come from.

For instance. Me and Neo wanted our Stunning Strike skill before the end of CB5 i think it was. Stunning Strike seems to have been renamed Inescapable Judgement now? ( not sure as i didn't play open beta ) but according to the armory it dropped from the blaze spirits in Theo. I want to say a good 5 hours in total was wasted out there killing hundreds of blaze spirits by multiple members of the legion without a single drop. Meanwhile Hatnclox ran off to a different part of the zone a shortime later and killed a regular level 24 Harpe and got a blue chain body peice. Possibly one of the best drops gotten by anyone in our legion the whole series of CB's. Having looked at the armory for all possible drops for the different Harpes across the zone, that piece was nowhere to be found. Later on that day while outside of Elthen fortress a couple of us found a ranger and a sorcerer stigma stone off of the sparky's just outside that forts walls while doing a smaller quest. Once again these were not listed as possible drops for that mob type on the armory.

Now. I'm not trying to say that the armory was wrong about the Stigma Stone. It does seem to be a very rare drop.What i AM trying to convey is the thought that the website itself is somewhat young, and has not had the proper amount of time to compile a genuine list of drops or the mobs that they come from. It will perhaps be a very large amount of time before the website will have the info it needs to be an end all be all trusted source of information.

There is also another variable about the game mechanics that we may never truly have an answer on and could be up for endless speculation. Consider please 2 possible scenario's.

Scenario #1
All of the possible items that can be dropped in one zone at any given time have a certain percentage and can be dropped from any mob at any time.

This scenario would explain why one person will get completely different items from the same mobs with repeated kills, and how one person can kill the same mob once, and get a very rare drop.

Scenario #2 ( the more unlikely of the 2 )
Every person has a certain chance of getting rare items from every kill.

This Scenario ties in directly with the hidden "Luck" stat myth that is in so many MMo's out there. I'm not sure how a system like this would be implemented into game mechanics but would also help explain how some people can get very rare items over and over from kills or harvesting, while other people doing the same thing doesn't get jack.

If either of these scenario's have any possibility of being true, then they would completely derail Aion Armory's section on drops as it would all be left up to chance, meaning the same item could be aquired from any mob in the zone. How do you make a drop list out of something like that?

My last beef with the website is something i just noticed today and i'm sure has an explanation, i just don't know what it is. When you go to any mob on Aion Armory, it shows you what zone they come from, spawn points, as well as possible drops. However i noticed that the in game icon that appears next to the mobs name on the top of the screen, ( you know with the circle and the colored dots, the one we use to judge the mobs strength compared to our own. Rei i think it was made an excellent post about these awhile back.) is also shown next to the mob name. What are they judging that on? I know that if you are too far below a mobs level all you will see is ???. The only reasonable explanation i could come up with is that they use the mobs main level 21,14 etc and compare it to you if you were the same level? I just want to know where they are getting this info from.

I'm kind of in a daze today so i hope that's clear enough to be understood. Once again it's only my two cents on the matter. Any shed light would be appreciated.

3....2......1....DISCUSS!!

**Ferris Bueller** · 09-17-2009, 03:49 PM

During CB, I see it as entirely possible that they were wrong, because as you said, it hadnt had enough time to form up the right information. However, after having talked to one of the head honchos of AionArmory on IRC during one of the many downtimes in open beta, I found out a couple things:
-The aion development team completely supports aionarmory. As such, they are actually GIVING them game information as changes are made.
-The information given relates to item names, drop locations and mobs, but not percentage chances.
-The information that players gather will continue to be added in to fill in gaps in what the developers were giving out.

So sure, like any info site of its kind, its going to have some gaps, but during open beta, we found it to be spot on. The mobs that were supposed to drop certain items for us were definitely dropping them. I had many of the same doubts as you do Epy, but after finding out the support they're receiving and doing some checking of my own (i.e. when we would get stigma drops and then comparing them with what aionarmory said should be dropping them) I trust it. Sure, it's be nice if maybe there were percentages on there, but we can only ask for so much pre-release.

**LordMeatwad** · 09-17-2009, 05:43 PM

I only want to know who drops inescapable judgement and how one guy got 2 of them! Luckly he was selling for 125,000 so me and ferris bought them for a quick 75,000 profit

Also I want to make it know that i checked the broker EVERY sec I got for that stigma. FINALLY saw it for 50,000 and didn't have the loot. Halligan graciously bought it for me right away. Thanks again Halligan!

**Halligan** · 09-17-2009, 05:59 PM

Anytime, my friend

As far as the stigma's go, I read that they are a random world drop and can drop off of any level appropriate mob.

**Unload** · 09-18-2009, 10:53 AM

I would treat it as if it were wikipedia. Most of it is going to be correct, and I haven't found a problem with their information yet, but you could never cite it in an official document, or scholarly work

The game has also been released in Korea for some time, and I know there have been Americans who have played the Asian version of the game.

There's always a chance that the information is incorrect, but I haven't seen any red flags.

**Reiketsu** · 09-19-2009, 11:55 AM

One item of note: The Gatherables section now has a perchantage for the drop of the specials. For example, those petals we were getting from the Wiki plants are listed at 2% chance.

Rei