ZOS sets the drop rate intentionally. They also happen to sell the motif in the store for those that aren't interested in the grind. They create a problem and sell you the solution. It is absolutely 100% intentional.

I haven't been farming this particular one yet, but consider that there may be an invisible cooldown on your motif drop chance. They could have a 24 hour timer tick once you get your drop and before another is possible. I'm not saying for sure this is the case, but if it is, then the drop chance could be much better than 1 in 58, but you are on lockout without knowing it.

If you say cooldowns for motifs - is that "per account" or "per character"?

And which, if any, other motifs is such a thing known or believed to apply to?

jle30303 wrote: »

If you say cooldowns for motifs - is that "per account" or "per character"?

And which, if any, other motifs is such a thing known or believed to apply to?

Don't know if it's fact or fiction, but: Some player in one of my guilds says that Northern and Southern Elswyr only drops 1 motif per day. Is that true? Gosh, if there is a 1 per day limit, sure wish ZOS would publish that, all official-like.

I'm more upset that I have to finish almost the entire main story on every alt just to open this up to them. This is an unusually long and annoying hurdle to access a repeatable quest giver.

Found forum discussion on similar situation:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/516986/shield-of-senchal-motif-is-there-a-cooldown-on-drops/p1

So . . . I guess there is a 1-motif-per-day-per-account limit . . . and one cannot get another motif until 20 hours after the last motif dropped? So, when performing "Wayward Guardian" daily quests, stop opening reward boxes after one gets the first motif, then start opening reward boxes again after 20 hours has elapsed? Guess that's what I'll start doing.

Thanks everyone for helping me to understand how Wayward Guardian motif-dropping works (or might work) (or probably works). The original post was based on completing 58 Wayward Guardian quests, and only getting 1 motif. Apparently, after that first motif drops, another motif will not drop (account-wide) until at least 20 hours have elapsed.

So today, here are the results of three independent sets of Wayward Guardian dailies. Lots of quest-sharing going on, with many qualified characters, to get a fair number of reward boxes. This time, reward boxes were not opened until all dailies were completed. For all of us, we stopped opening reward boxes after the first motif dropped, assuming that motif-dropping starts the 20-hour cooldown timer that blocks another motif from dropping.

Set 1: 1 motif in 5 dailies
Set 2: 1 motif in 13 dailies
Set 3: 1 motif in 1 daily (jackpot!)

We will all start opening our reward boxes (from today) starting tomorrow after 20 hours has elapsed. Gee, maybe we should wait 24 hours just to be sure?

Anyway, thanks again everybody for setting me straight on this motif mechanic. Much appreciated.

MasterSpatula wrote: »

Murkmire motifs you can definitely get more than one of per day. Summerset, I'm pretty sure you can.

Northern and Southern Elsweyr you absolutely cannot.

I've just worked on the assumption that this is the case for everything since, so I stopped opening boxes when I got a page in Western Skyrim and The Reach daily boxes.

And no, this is frankly not okay. It strikes me as just plain mean to do it at all and outright cruel to do it and not tell anyone. But at least once you figure it out, you won't replicate the error of opening too many boxes.

I agree. The rewards in the game should be equal to the amount of effort you put into something. Arbitrary cooldowns are not fair. The drop rates are so ridiculously low you have to do these on more than one character, but can only get one reward per day. You should be able to get as many motif pages as the ridiculously low drop rate gives you for as many boxes as you earn.

HumbleThaumaturge wrote: »

So today, here are the results of three independent sets of Wayward Guardian dailies. Lots of quest-sharing going on, with many qualified characters, to get a fair number of reward boxes. This time, reward boxes were not opened until all dailies were completed. For all of us, we stopped opening reward boxes after the first motif dropped, assuming that motif-dropping starts the 20-hour cooldown timer that blocks another motif from dropping.

Set 1: 1 motif in 5 dailies
Set 2: 1 motif in 13 dailies
Set 3: 1 motif in 1 daily (jackpot!)

We will all start opening our reward boxes (from today) starting tomorrow after 20 hours has elapsed. Gee, maybe we should wait 24 hours just to be sure?

Our research team continued testing again today. Here are the results from three sets of Wayward Guardian dailies.

Set 1: 1 motif in 2 dailies
Set 2: 1 motif in 7 dailies
Set 3: 1 motif in 1 daily (jackpot, again!)

Per our plan, we waited at least 20 hours (22 hours actually) until after the last motif dropped yesterday. Once a motif dropped, no more boxes were opened. I now firmly believe that when a motif drops, a "cooldown" timer starts, preventing another motif from dropping on that account (from any character) for at least 20 hours.

My Original question was: "Is extremely low drop-rate of "Wayward Guardian" motif chapters a "bug"? or is it intentional?"

Answer: The motif drop-mechanics are, indeed intentional. It's not a "bug." Yet I now see that the "drop-rate" (in terms solely of the number of daily reward boxes required to get a motif) is actually reasonable. The drop-rate only becomes unreasonable if an ignorant player (such as I) keeps opening reward boxes after a motif has dropped for the day. That's what happened to me on my first day of motif farming. Thanks everyone for your help! Completing this motif is going to be easy now: I already have 10 out of the 14 chapters.

Last Update:

Continuing experiment performing Wayward Guardian dailies and opening reward boxes hoping for a motif chapter. Now waiting greater than 20 hours from time a motif dropped last time. Stop opening reward boxes after a motif drops, which starts account-wide 20 hour timer again, blocking any more motifs from dropping for all characters on the account. Quest-sharing was used to run up to 7 dailies per character.

Day 1
Set 1: 1 motif after 5 dailies
Set 2: 1 motif after 13 dailies
Set 3: 1 motif after 1 daily

Day 2
Set 1: 1 motif after 2 dailies
Set 2: 1 motif after 7 dailies
Set 3: 1 motif after 1 daily

Day 3
Set 1: 1 motif after 7 dailies
Set 2: 1 motif after 2 dailies
Set 3: 1 motif after 1 daily

Again, I suppose the "drop rate" is reasonable, as long as you know to stop opening reward boxes after a motif drops. You can save reward boxes . . . so you open them on future days, at a time when the 20-hour cooldown timer is reset. I am now taking notes . . . marking the time when a motif drops, as well as the 20 hour reset time.

The "cooldown" theory is both true, and false at the same time... I'll explain.

Let's say you have saved 2 days worth of boxes (14 boxes). If you open them all, I'd suggest you'll only get a single motif page (you may be incredibly unlucky and get zero... but I've yet to see such bad luck). So the motif page is NOT a guarantee even if you wait the suggested daily cooldown.

You might get a motif immediately (like within the first 1-3 boxes you open. You should probably STOP opening boxes at this point... waiting until the day resets/20hr cooldown and you'll likely get another from the remaining 11-13 boxes... in fact, you could end up being really lucky and getting 1 motif per box over a 14 day period. This is where the cooldown can absolutely be confirmed as in play.

However, just because you get a motif out of the 14 boxes, you could still get VERY lucky and get another if you open more... heck, you could get one every box opening all in one go - it's VERY unlikely though. But this is where the cooldown appears "false" when you get a 2nd motif in the same day.

It's my belief that the drop rate is high until you get the first of the day... then some sort of code kicks in once you have one that lowers the drop rate dramatically. This is where the cooldown exists and operates.

My wife and I stacked boxes upon boxes prior to the release of the page - because we knew from previous experiences (Senchel motif style operates the same way) that boxes earned BEFORE the release could still contain the pages if opened AFTER the release. We had a LOT of boxes saved... so many... that my wife already has the entire book learned, and I'm about 3 or 4 pages away from completion

HumbleThaumaturge wrote: »

(...)
- 58 daily quests completed
- Only 1 motif chapter dropped!(...)

There's a cooldown system implemented on motif drops from daily quests (20-24h cool-down).

HumbleThaumaturge wrote: »

(...)Some player in one of my guilds says that Northern and Southern Elswyr only drops 1 motif per day. Is that true?(...)

Yes. A cooldown was implemented a shortwhile after SE release but, upon release you could get several drops per day from NE n SE motifs (you couldn't get all motifs because motifs were released on different dates, ie, Shields of Senchal had already a cooldown when it was released but Dragonguard hadn't cooldown when it was released)

jle30303 wrote: »

If you say cooldowns for motifs - is that "per account" or "per character"? (...)

Cooldown is applied to account.

virtus753 wrote: »

There's also a cooldown on Morrowind house motifs you can get by stealing from NPCs in Vvardenfell.

It's a soft cooldown, as mentioned above, so there is a very slim chance you can get one again in the 20-hour cooldown period, but you must be very lucky.

It's a much better use of time to get your first motif of the day and wait the 20 hours out doing something else.

This cooldown is character based though. I got these motifs by rotating through 4 sneaky thief toons I made designed specifically for farming them lol. It's about an hour I found.... I got all these motifs within a week using this method

The wayward guardian one I'm nearly complete myself on, and my wife is complete. Alts really are very useful.

Rittings wrote: »

virtus753 wrote: »

There's also a cooldown on Morrowind house motifs you can get by stealing from NPCs in Vvardenfell.

It's a soft cooldown, as mentioned above, so there is a very slim chance you can get one again in the 20-hour cooldown period, but you must be very lucky.

It's a much better use of time to get your first motif of the day and wait the 20 hours out doing something else.

This cooldown is character based though. I got these motifs by rotating through 4 sneaky thief toons I made designed specifically for farming them lol. It's about an hour I found.... I got all these motifs within a week using this method

The wayward guardian one I'm nearly complete myself on, and my wife is complete. Alts really are very useful.

I was trying to test the Morrowind one on my alts, but none has very high rank in TG or Legerdemain right now, as they’ve mainly been crafters. It’s good if they’re per character, though, I think. Makes it feel worthwhile to have alts.

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

This cooldown was done to help average players. Most players are going to do 2 or 3 dailies each day. In the past, their chance to get a motif was very low. While the people who did like 40 dailies per day were getting 3 and 4 motif pages. Now, the average player has a much higher chance of getting a motif page. This makes them feel good and want to play again tomorrow.

1). Prevent the average player from feeling like they never get motif pages and stop trying due to discouragement.
2). Don't make drops so common that market gets flooded with motif pages and they become worthless.

These cooldowns (whether hard or soft) accomplish both of the above and seem to be a good compromise between "make it easier for average player to get a motif page" and "motif pages are stupidly easy to get".

This was "raise the floor, lower the ceiling" for motif pages and it seems to have worked effectively in a way that they continue to struggle with for combat!

How is the average player getting a higher chance to get a motif page with a 20 hour cooldown?

The only way would be if the actual drop rate went up, which I have not heard anywhere is the case.

Having more pages from players that got them on alts did not make the motif pages worthless, it just lowered the price in traders after a few months when supply caught up with demand.

I don’t see it helping anyone, it just keeps a lot of players from farming all the plans themselves, then they get tired of the absurdly low drop rate and buy them from traders. Since there are fewer pages in the system though, the price will be higher.