Hotfix 6/28 -- Item drop rate changes

[Kevin]

People keep saying that this fix doubles the drop rate and I don't see it. Is there something in the patch notes that makes high level helms twice as likely to give me str, vit, all resist, and a socket? Getting the right collection of mods is what matters!

The way I see it is that the effect of the change is that it's still very rare to see the mods I want, but now when they item does drop it's likely to be a higher level so more likely to be an upgrade. I don't see how you go from this to claiming the drop rate is doubled.

This fix doubles the drop rate. It went from 13 to 26 (or whatever).

You are not concerned about the drop rate. You are concerned about the useful item drop rate. You are correct that this has not doubled. It has increased but as Yricyn explained, it hasn't doubled.

So people can say the drop rate doubled because it did. It is correct use of language. The problem is that isn't the measure that people care about. Blizzard applied a fix that has a tertiary affect on what the problem for people is. There are other ways to fix the useful item drop rate, some more drastic than others. Upping the drop rate does still have an effect on the useful item drop rate though, and it's an easy thing to change and can be hotfixed, so it was likely the quickest way to apply a tweak to core problem.

Also from Blizzards point of view since the Auction House is part of the equation, a tweak like this increases availability of usable items more in general as more of these items will show up on the AH now. This of course does not help all types of players and there will be players who get an good item for another class that they don't put on the AH because they either don't realize, don't want to use the AH, or just really want crafting mats, or something else. So that growth rate is another multiplicative factor where growth slows.

Since I've never known Blizzard to do good theorycrafting in any of their games I don't expect them too have with these changes either. They are simply making a change that has a positive indicator in the direction of change they want and seeing what happens. It's the approach they have taken pretty much every game they have made.