I've heard mixed answers on this so I'm not sure which is the case. Is loot pressure in the Confluence universal? Or are Confluences in each realm separate from each other?

~ Methais

Replying on Halloween day to post 666:

You may be feeling the results of the elimination in Sept. or Oct. of multiple gem drops by elementals in the Confluence. Prior to the change, 25% of elementals that dropped gems or plinites would drop more than one gem. After the change, all elementals that drop gems will drop only one gem. You can verify the change in your logs by searching for the phrases "appear in its place" (when more than one gem was dropped) and "appears in its place" (when a plinite or only one gem was dropped).

> my testing would indicate they are separate, but an official word would be nice.

Strange, as my (limited) testing seems to indicate the opposite. Last week I was hunting the Confluence on Teras and everything with the loot seemed pretty normal. Then it suddenly took a massive nosedive with barely anything dropping at all. I very rarely see anyone else in the Confluence, but figured with as much as I grind there maybe I managed to somehow wreck the place myself. So I checked the Confluence in Landing, Icemule, Solhaven, Zul'Logoth, Ta'Illisim, and Ta'Vaalor, and River's Rest and they were all equally poor.

There's no way that every Confluence is being hunted into oblivion. I've been grinding mostly the Teras one for a long time with no dip in the loot, and I kill a lot of elementals. Like a really huge amount. It doesn't add up, because I know Confluences in every town aren't being hit that hard. I rarely see anyone in any Confluence in general. It really feels like they're all linked together just because the loot in all realms seems to go up and down at the same time. When they're good, they're all good. When they're bad, they're all bad. I've tested this twice so far, checking every town when the loot turns to garbage and the results have been the same.

>You may be feeling the results of the elimination in Sept. or Oct. of multiple gem drops by elementals in the Confluence. Prior to the change, 25% of elementals that dropped gems or plinites would drop more than one gem. After the change, all elementals that drop gems will drop only one gem. You can verify the change in your logs by searching for the phrases "appear in its place" (when more than one gem was dropped) and "appears in its place" (when a plinite or only one gem was dropped).

I'm not sure how accurate this is, as I've definitely seen some 2 gem drops even earlier this month, though it's been a pretty rare sighting for a while now to where it's not really worth mentioning.

~ Methais

>Could it not be both (regional, and at a certain threshold, global)?

It's possible, but that would require someone to confirm it. Last time I spoke to a NIR they told me that Confluences loot doesn't really work any different than how loot works in "normal" areas, but seemed to imply that there's still a little bit more to it. But by the end of that conversation, which didn't really offer much of any details, it was suggested that if one town's Confluence is poor then I might have better luck in a different town's Confluence. Which I tried and there was no change in any Confluence. If they were consistently being hunted a lot it would make sense, but I play at all sorts of different hours and have been grinding the Confluence since before the wizard nerfs and at best I might see someone else running around a couple times a week for like 5-10 minutes and then they disappear.

Any chance we can get a more official word on how exactly Confluence loot works? I'm kind of with Doug in that it might be a mixture of both.

~ Methais