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Devupdates/Archive/05
Drop tables
Hello all! Another quick update (with no pictures yet, sadly). I just finished working with the drop table system on the game. I feel like the system now is quite good and flexible, and adding items + new drop tables is very easy.
Next, things will get a little more technical as I will try to explain how the system works. I appreciate feedback if you have better ideas (or math) for the drop tables or how to improve them. I hope it's not too boring although it's mostly math!
Each activity in the game can have multiple drop tables attached to them. A drop table consists a list of items with different probabilities (like 1/1, 1/15, 1/128 etc.). There are three different kind of drop tables: drop tables that will always be rolled, weighted drop tables where only one of the weighted ones gets rolled based on their weight and special drop tables which have a probability to be rolled in addition to all other drop tables. Each of these are used for certain types of activities, but mostly the type that is always rolled will be used.
Then, all probabilities on the table will be rolled from the most common to the rarest probability. The item that was rolled successfully and had the smallest probability will be chosen to be dropped. So only one item can drop from a table. If multiple items on the drop table have the same probability (for example there could be multiple items with 1/1 chance) their probability will be rolled against, and then one of the items with the probability will be chosen. So lets say we have a drop table looking like this:
1/1 Iron Helmet
1/1 Iron Pickaxe
1/1 Iron boots
1/5 Steel Gloves
1/5 Steel Platebody
1/100 Gold bar
It will first choose one of the items with 1/1 success chance as the drop (so in reality, each of them have a ~1/3 chance to drop). Then, it will roll against 1/5 and if its successful it will choose either steel gloves or steel platebody as the drop (so in reality, each of them has ~1/10 chance to drop). Finally, it will roll against 1/100 and if that is successful, it will choose to drop the gold bar. So each probability will be rolled against, and it will always drop just one item from the table (the rarest item that was rolled successfully). Because one activity can have more than just one drop table attached to them, it is easily possible to have activities that can drop multiple items.
I'm not very good at explaining math stuff, but I hope this cleared things up a little. Why I chose this system is because it is very easy to create drop tables (I only need to give an item a probability, like 1/128 and then it just works). The problem is that the drop chances aren't really what I've given to the items (when there are multiple items with the same probability, it makes the drop chance lower + other items with smaller probabilities affect as they could be chosen instead if rolled successfully).
For the player the actual probabilities can be easily shown exactly as they are. But for me this system is a bit more difficult, as I can't really make items in a table that contains multiple items to have the exact drop chance that I want without having to do lots of math. But it will be approximately what I've given, so there's that at least.
If you have feedback or suggestions please tell! Sorry for the boring update, but its important to have early feedback from systems like these. I hope next one will have some pictures... ;)
