So tired of the garbage drop rates for master writs

jssriot · March 2018

My toons have so many achievements unlocked, know so many motifs, have so many traits researched, have so many skill points put into the crafting skill....

The drop rates for master writs for me has never been great, but I bared with it. but since Dragon Bones and housing storage, it's been abysmal and I'm struggling with justifying the amount of time and effort I put into making my toons comply with what everything from the patch notes to iffy player-to-player hearsay has said I needed to do to get master writs, and I AM GETTING SIGNIFICANTLY FEWER, by far the worse drop rate since they introduced master writs..

Yes, I did the stupid new outfit achievements too. In fact, the more achievements and skill points in to crafting on each toon, the fewer writs I'm getting.

I get they wanted to make housing storage expensive, to make them something people had to work for. They could have done that by making them cost more the 100-200 vouchers. They didn't need to *** up the already garbage drop rate for master writs, if that's why I am getting next to nothing for putting so much work into my crafter toons.

Someone at ZOS needs to revisit the basics of game design, in particular how players get frustrated and quit if they don't feel the time they spend in-game is being appropriately rewarded.

Skwor · March 2018

I average 1 master writ a day on my crafter, seems right to me.

Anotherone773 · March 2018

I get them in lots. I may not get any for a week or two and then ill get 2-4 in one day. and then ill go few days with none and then another one and then back to a week up to a few weeks before i get more. I heard that motifs dont significantly increase drop rates from some people and from others it does, same with research... and pretty much everything else. I honestly just think its completely random and not based on anything myself.

Anotherone773 · March 2018

Anotherone773 wrote: »

I get them in lots. I may not get any for a week or two and then ill get 2-4 in one day. and then ill go few days with none and then another one and then back to a week up to a few weeks before i get more. I heard that motifs dont significantly increase drop rates from some people and from others it does, same with research... and pretty much everything else. I honestly just think its completely random and not based on anything myself.

PS: you can buy sealed writs on guild traders and do them.

Taleof2Cities · March 2018

Anotherone773 wrote: »

Anotherone773 wrote: »

I get them in lots. I may not get any for a week or two and then ill get 2-4 in one day. and then ill go few days with none and then another one and then back to a week up to a few weeks before i get more. I heard that motifs dont significantly increase drop rates from some people and from others it does, same with research... and pretty much everything else. I honestly just think its completely random and not based on anything myself.

PS: you can buy sealed writs on guild traders and do them.

^This.^

redspecter23 · March 2018

The best way to get more sealed master writs isn't actually trait knowledge and motif knowledge. Yes, that helps, but only a very small amount. I've found that having multiple toons doing writs daily increases your chances much more. By all means continue to learn traits and motifs on main toons, but an alt with zero traits and zero motifs will provide a much greater overall increase.

CaffeinatedMayhem · March 2018

My higher level crafters (all/most motifs known) average about 25-40 vouchers per week, each. On a lucky week one of them will get a good writ worth 75-100+ but that's not every week. My lower level crafters average 10-25 per week. 4 crafters, gives 75-130 vouchers a week. That's not great, but it's enough for a few furnisher's document containers.

If you want hundreds of vouchers per week, you'll have to buy the writs, or have 12 toons doing writs, and most of them will need to know the recipes and motifs.

I play the game a lot, and love crafting, but 4 crafters are all I can keep up with.

Juju_beans · March 2018

My provisioner character only has provisioning and alchemy maxed out and gets writs all the time..low ones though.

agegarton · March 2018

I currently do the crafting writs across multiple characters over four accounts. The drop rate has dropped below the point where it’s worth the time and effort, so I am stopping. Equally, pricing for blueprints in guild stores has dropped, so there are are few items that are worth the investment in materials versus just buying what I want.

disintegr8 · March 2018

I currently only do the three crafting writs (Wood, Smith, Cloth) every day on 8 characters, getting anything from 1 to 8 master writs per day. In fact I got 3 out of 3 on one character a couple of days ago. While it is very rare that I do not get any, my blood can still 'simmer' when it happens.

Voucher count can also vary wildly, there might be 8 mw's totaling 50 vouchers one day, 2 mw's totaling 90 the next, followed by 1 worth maybe 5 vouchers the next. Not doing the provisioning writs, I think 5 is the smallest voucher writ I get.

I have never done daily writs purely in search of master writs and writ vouchers, I do them for the gold improvement materials and anything else I can sell. To pay for the materials I need, the lower level writs are sold through my guild traders. I will not do a 'legendary' writ worth less than 60-70 vouchers and will not do an 'epic' writ worth less than 40 vouchers.

For me the effort put in is worth it: I own all the chests, a transmutation station, target skeleton, about 7 sets of attuned crafting tables and an outfit (dye) station.

Wreuntzylla · March 2018

agegarton wrote: »

I currently do the crafting writs across multiple characters over four accounts. The drop rate has dropped below the point where it’s worth the time and effort, so I am stopping. Equally, pricing for blueprints in guild stores has dropped, so there are are few items that are worth the investment in materials versus just buying what I want.

If the last two weeks are not an isolated RNG thing, I think that the drop rate actually has decreased. I typically run 25+ Cp720 toons through writs per day and typically spend 3-4 hours running the master writs on the weekend. The last two weeks it's taken me less than an hour...

For perspective, ~20 are full 9/9's. I can't imagine what it's like for people only having a few crafters.

thatlaurachick wrote: »

...

I play the game a lot, and love crafting, but 4 crafters are all I can keep up with.

I assume you mean upgrading them with motif knowledge, etc. Getting the skill points alone is a pain. I have done that over however many years this game has been running and spread that pain out.

You likely know this, but for others, actually running the writs is fairly quick if you keep crafter inventories at least 50 slots empty and premake stacks of each provisioning and alchemy product used by the writs. I keep most of my toons in Mournhold and I think logging in and out takes more time than the actual writ part.

disintegr8 · March 2018

Wreuntzylla wrote: »

..... I think logging in and out takes more time than the actual writ part.

This^^. If managed properly, doing daily writs in multiple characters can be fairly quick and painless - if not for load screens.

I have a 2 day cycle for 8 characters:

I pick up the writs when I log in to get my hireling mails on day one, but do not do them. This takes at least 30 minutes, most of which is load screens. I am logging in for mails anyway, so no additional time taken really.

On day two I log in after the new days writs come out and complete the previous days writs, followed by the new days writs. I speed this up because I know the crafting cycles and make all 6 items on the first visit to each station. After I hand the first items in, it's just a trip to the board and straight back to the drop off point. This can take me up to an hour if I am not interrupted, once again 20-30 minutes is due to load screens.

I could make several days worth of gear on every character but not all of them have the available slots. This would also require time allocated to renew each characters stock every few days.

I_B_Squishy · March 2018

Skwor wrote: »

I average 1 master writ a day on my crafter, seems right to me.

Doesn't seem right to me...........one crafter?

I have 9 crafters and I run writs every day on all of them, maybe I get *a* writ every other day between all 9 characters, if that...............and legendary writs? I can count on one hand how many I've gotten in the last year.

Slick_007 · March 2018

i had 3 drop on 1 toon yesterday. amazingly i could complete all 3 as well. other toons picked up 1 or 2 also
today iv done 2 toons - 11 eligible writs - got 1 so far

helediron · March 2018

DB update did not nerf drop rates

The numbers represent a good crafter doing writs over two years.

The Avg/month shows how much one crafter can expect to get in one month.
The Avg/charday shows shows chance for dropping each master writ and average daily voucher earnings (still unreliable).
The graphs can be interpreted as monthly stats for one crafter.

Further details in my little blog .

Esmaralda · March 2018

I totally agree! I have all but enchanting maxed and I have not had any MR drops! What gives Zoz?

laurajf · March 2018

I stopped doing writs because of the poor drop rate for master writs. I honestly don't have the patience to just do the small ones I do get (6 vouchers). By the time I save up enough to get the stuff I want, they change up the writ vendor guy's inventory.

Actually, I stopped doing a lot of things because of the drop rates and/or RNG. I'm starting to lose interest in everything because everything I'm interested in obtaining is becoming too much of a grind/hassle to be worth it. That makes me sad.

Feric51 · March 2018

laurajf wrote: »

I stopped doing writs because of the poor drop rate for master writs. I honestly don't have the patience to just do the small ones I do get (6 vouchers). By the time I save up enough to get the stuff I want, they change up the writ vendor guy's inventory.

Actually, I stopped doing a lot of things because of the drop rates and/or RNG. I'm starting to lose interest in everything because everything I'm interested in obtaining is becoming too much of a grind/hassle to be worth it. That makes me sad.

With the latest DLC, there is a new master writ merchant that sells all the old plans carried by Rolis. Even better... The old plans are now reduced in price (100 writ vouchers vs 125 originally)!

Jayne_Doe · March 2018

I, too, had felt that the drop rate was lowered, but I've come to realize over the past few weeks, that I've just had some rotten luck. Also, since I've been trying to get more vouchers for the MW furnishing documents, and spending them as soon as I get enough for a few of the purples, I'm not seeing that steady increase I was when I was just letting them pile up after purchasing everything I wanted.

This update has introduced not only new plans, but storage containers, the more expensive furnishing documents, and a return of previous plans, plus the glass motif (for those who don't already have it). So, there's suddenly a lot more that I want to buy and I'm now keeping a closer eye on the writs that I do get.

That said, I just haven't been lucky. Since the update, I've gotten maybe one or two gear MWs on my main crafter (who knows ALL motifs and traits, has all achievements) that were worth 5 or 6. She has mostly gotten a handful of alchemy and enchanting writs worth 2 or 5 and one provisioning writ worth 2. I still tend to get more gear writs overall on my alts, whose knowledge is much lower. I got one gear writ worth about 80 on an alt, plus, just this weekend my main did get a gear writ worth 135. But, outside of those two anomalies, I'm getting really low voucher writs when I do manage to get them, across 6 toons doing all top-tier writs.

However, my spouse, who's only recently begun working on crafting on console (he plays largely on PC, but he popped the BA motif from a free crate and decided to start working on crafting on XB). A few weeks ago, he pulled a writ worth 280! My highest ever, that I received a LONG time ago, was 257 (and the only one I've received that was worth more than 100 and change). Then, just about a week or so later, he pulls - ON THE SAME DAY ON THE SAME TOON - a writ worth 315 AND one worth 92!

That is what is so discouraging about this system. No matter how much time and gold you've spent/wasted, how many mats you've thrown down the drain, it all comes down to chance. Not only in getting a writ (which supposedly all our knowledge helps to improve) but in the value of the writ. A new player who just gets a toon up to level 50 to do top tier writs can pull a MW worth hundreds, without any trait/motif knowledge or all the achievements. This system that was designed to reward master crafters often fails to do so.