Spawning Rares: How to make them rare

you could stick random rares in random containers in the world (nujelm island huts just east of the craft center for example) and see how long it takes someone to find it). I usually double click container looking things when I am out in random places and have yet to find a single item inside

Same here, I can't help it. I used to find all kinds of things in random containers in Ultima VII, so the habit never died.

izcenine is reading me loud and clear and I like his idea of some reward system for helping others along in the community. However, being the weirdo that I am, I will say the only reward I ever need is knowing that someone else is enjoying Ultima as well.

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Back on live UO i would check almost every barrel as a noob searching for stuff, too bad it was only junk hehe. Doughnuts have a large spawn, gotta check all the guard posts i think to find them, and that is pretty sweet.

Once again a brilliant idea from the Blaise! Would give those useless chests a use, and it's very Ultima to search containers in town and not.

Love it.

QFT
Ultima 8, very first thing I did was loot the barrel at the docks. I could cite dozens of other instances of 'whoa, wtf lewt' from barrels in Ultima and various titles. It's just a thought to mix it up and put some discovery and wonder back in the game where so much has been removed with timers and automation.

Ban razor i say

I like the current system because those dedicated to "camp" a location and learn the timer, put in the time and effort therefore deserve the reward but it does pose a problem of someone having that rare locked down.

It's interesting to learn that 50% of the rares spawn in a large area, rather the same spot. Good job! (and good to know)

I like Blaise's idea of random spawning rares here and there but maybe it could be a one time deal like when there's a patch. Probably would be pretty easy to do rather than coding a random spawn. Im not sure if I like the monster drop idea though.

I have found sharing locations only allows it to be shared further thus you may not ever get the rare again. For example, I shared a nice spot with a friend and a fre months later, one of his friend's rubbed it in my face that he has gotted the last 4 spawns... that he ghosted it to learn the timer. I guess the lesson I learned is dont share the spot unless you gain one's trust. I thought I had in this instance however obviously was wrong.
Another example is trading spot for spot... well that was also done and now various people seem to now know about the location rather than that one person. I havent found the rare since. I planned to trade that item for other items I wanted.
So... rather than share spots I find it better to trade the rare one gets with another you may want. I have one spot Ive shared with no one and probably never will given what has happened previously.

I understand the "exclusiveness" arguement however it simply takes time to find them. Given the area spawn and variable timer, I like the system however again, the random here and there spawn is a good idea as well.

The rare spawners on UOR are the best I've ever seen. Go staff!

That said there's a big difference between the environment we have here and what we had during the era. Right now rare spawns are more of a good 'ol boys club. During the era you had folks like Marquee Dragon publishing the location and timing of every spawning rare, and most of the server-births as well.

Spawning rares were extremely competitive in-era, but for different reasons. Back then when everyone had access to this information there were still (relatively) few players trying for them, but because every rare hunter knew every location there was a lot of traffic.

Daily rares (those that spawned at server start, which I think were server-side statics that were not locked down) were freaking ridiculously hard to get, even on the less populous servers. I tried for a solid month for the fruit basic in Yew, having one character logged out there 24/7. As soon as the server went down that morning I'd start hammering on the login, finally get in and run my UO Assist macro to grab the basket. Half the time all I'd see was a puff of smoke as someone else recalled away. I did end up with two baskets out of 28 attempts, but it ate up all my morning UO time.

After that I decided I'd have more fun doing something else in the morning. Anything else really.

Anyhow, I think the rare spawners as-is are great, even though I wouldn't bother with them. However I do agree that some interesting, exceedingly rare loot could be added to dungeon and town chests. That'd be pretty cool Also the platinum system already addresses this concern to a degree. Any player will be able to get platinum by just about any game-play style and get items that have a high intrinsic worth and a decorative use. Those can be sold for gold or traded for rares if you want.