Raid loot mechanic

Please help improve this page.

You can help by editing this page. For suggestions, please see the talk page, or embedded  while editing this page.
Reason: Missing some 20th list info, fill in the corresponding table cell, U29 Rune details

The raid loot mechanic for DDO has changed through the history of DDO:

Current end reward mechanic[edit]

The chance for a raid item to drop for you at end chest varies from raid to raid. Most raids also have an additional mechanics, so that even if you're unlucky with the end chest, you slowly work towards your desired raid item.

As of Update 41, the end chests of end game raids include raid runes (BtA). You can turn in runes for raid loot.
Most older raids use a different mechanics: every 20th completion (or 5th / 10th for Master Artificer and Lord of Blades respectively) the quest giver offers a special reward list - generally a list of only raid loot. Each raid differs in exactly what and how many items you can select from.

Raid	Type	20th reward list
Tempest's Spine	N/A	Does not implement this system.
Plane of Night		Select from 12 items every 20th. (From a pool of 20 items plus 6 +2 tomes - 46% of the list - Epic items are excluded)
The Titan Awakes		Select from ~10 items every 20th. (From a pool of 17 items plus 6 +2 tomes - 43% of the list)
Zawabi's Revenge		Select from 10 items every 20th. (From a pool of 16 items plus 6 +2 tomes - 45% of the list - Epic items are excluded). If you run your 20th raid on epic tier, the list of 10 will be a random selection of Shards for Epic Crafting, for items which drop in the raid only.
The Reaver's Fate		Select from 8 items every 20th. (From a pool of 12 items plus 6 +3 tomes - 44% of the list)
Ascension Chamber		Select from 7 items every 20th. (From a pool of 13 items plus 6 +3 tomes - 37% of the list.)
The Shroud	Special:	Select from 7 items every 20th: A stat tome of your choice (1 for each stat will always appear in the list, can be +2 or +3) or an Essence of Cleansing which can remove Taint of Shavarath from your Green Steel Accessories. Around 15% chance that a tome will appears as +3 instead of +2.
Hound of Xoriat		Select from ~10 items every 20th. (From a pool of 11 items plus 6 +3 tomes - 59% of the list)
A Vision of Destruction		Select from ~10 items every 20th. (From a pool of 10 items plus 6 +3 tomes - 63% of the list)
The Chronoscope	Special:	Select from 9 items on every end reward. About 6 of the 9 (67% of the list) items will be raid loot; the other few will be replaced by similar min lvl randomly generated loot of the same type as the item it replaces. The 20th completion will be different: all nine choices will be raidloot (no randomly generated items), and unlike the non-20th list, they can include every named item from the raid, even those which are otherwise strictly chest loot. (From a pool of 15 items - 60% of the list)
Tower of Despair		Select from ~10 items every 20th. (From a pool of 32 items plus 6 +4 tomes - 26% of the list)
The Lord of Blades	Special:	Select from 10 items every 10th. Your choice of Cell (Martial, Mystical, Greater), 2 compounds, 4 spirits, and 1 random refined spirit. Around 25% chance of getting the refined spirit you want.
The Master Artificer	Special:	Select from ~43 Alchemical weapons every 5th. Every single list will be the same for everyone, select your choice of any type of weapon, all ~43 will always appear.
Caught in the Web		Select from 7 items every 20th. (From a pool of 13 items plus 6 +4 tomes - 37% of the list. Commendations do not appear.)
The Fall of Truth		Select one from the list every 20th. The list includes all named items.
Temple of the Deathwyrm	Raid runes	Trade runes for raid loot (including Shadow Dragon Phlogistons)
Fire on Thunder Peak	Raid runes	Trade runes for raid loot (including Fire Dragon Phlogistons)
The Mark of Death	Raid runes	Trade runes for raid loot
Defiler of the Just	Raid runes	Trade runes for raid loot
Legendary Tempest's Spine	Raid runes	Trade runes for raid loot
Legendary Hound of Xoriat	Raid runes	Trade runes for raid loot
The Codex and the Shroud	N/A	Does not implement this system.
Riding the Storm Out	Raid runes	Trade runes for raid loot
Old Baba's Hut	Raid runes	Trade runes for raid loot
The Curse of Strahd	Raid runes	Trade runes for raid loot

Notes:

Tomes are generally weighted to be far rarer in the end reward lists then the other raid loot. The other raidloot itself doesn't vary much from item to item in terms of rareness.
Tomes from any source also have a 1 in 4 chance of instead being a BtA upgrade tome of the same type that would otherwise appear. (For example: A BtC +3 Strength tome could instead appear as a +3 to +4 Strength tome upgrade which would be BtA instead of BtC).
Guild renown will usually be offered in addition to the above items.
All raid reward items bind and a "Are you sure?" message will be displayed. (Exceptions: The Lord of Blades and The Master Artificer rewards vary in binding.)

Default raid end chest loot mechanic[edit]

Pre-Epic era raids[edit]

The chance for an older raid item to drop for you is as follows:

On normal, 1 in 6 chance
On hard, around 1 in 5 chance - varies depending on raid difficulty
On elite, around 1 in 4 chance - varies depending on raid difficulty

However, The chances will vary depending on how hard the developers think the raid scales up from normal to hard/elite. For example, there is little to no NHE difference in the Titan Awakes.

More recent raids such as The Master Artificer and The Lord of Blades do not use this loot mechanic and instead have unique mechanics; check the quest pages themselves for details.

Eberron Epic raids[edit]

On original epic difficulty (before EN, EH, EE difficulty was implemented), around 1 in 4 chance, and often a second chance at an alternate item

In the original Plane of Night on epic, you have a chance at raid loot, similar to as if you ran it on elite, but could also get a flawless red dragon scale in the same chest.

Later with MotU uodate, EN, EH, EE difficulty was added to these original Eberron Epic raids, however, on many occasion drop rates were busted beyond comprehension. On some raids EN and EH had better chance and EE didn't seem to drop any etc. It was hard to determine if there was any formula or rules for raid drop rates with these raids.

Post Menace of the Underdark raids[edit]

Caught in the Web and The Fall of Truth both contain Commendation of Heroism. It is far easier to obtain this in FoT however.

Post Shadowfell raids[edit]

Temple of the Deathwyrm, Fire on Thunder Peak and The Mark of Death all have far less chance than before for named items to drop in the end chest. The Developers made this change to the drop rate to encourage players to run harder difficulties. However, most players simply gave up hope of pulling anything other than token style ingredients from the end chest and instead aimed to gain rewards by completing sets of 20 runs on Epic Normal instead, often with the use of Raid Timer Bypass Hourglass. At the time, there were many Bypasses floating on Auction House from Anniversary Card Collection duping. In Defiler of the Just drop rates returned to a higher frequency.

Raid Runes/Post-Legendary contents[edit]

With Legendary Raids the Developers again changed the Raid loot system. These raids still offer a chance for named raid items to drop, but the end chest also contains runes specific to that raid (Tempest Rune, Xorian Rune etc). The number of runes that appear in the end chest varies, with higher amounts appearing on harder difficulties. They cannot be transferred in the chest, but are Bound to Account on Acquire so can be transferred between characters on the same account. The quest givers for each quest also give the option of opening a barter window in which 1,250 runes can be traded for any of the named raid items. The barter window items are non-mythic, non-reaper versions.

The Codex and the Shroud (the Legendary version of The Shroud) drops both Legendary Shroud crafting materials (see Legendary Green Steel) as well as varying amounts of Codex Rune. Higher difficulties drop greater amounts of runes and crafting materials. The runes can be traded at the Altar of Fecundity for Legendary Green Steel base items.

In addition, the legendary raids now require the use of a Legendary Raid Timer Bypass Hourglass to skip the three day raid timer, instead of the old Bypasses.

For the original Developer's post on the new system, see DDO Forums

Name	Introduced	Drop location	Amount	Note
Tempest Rune	Update 29	Legendary Tempest's Spine	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite	Can also be traded for Tier 1 and 2 LGS materials in quantity of 1,000.
Xorian Rune	Update 29	Legendary Hound of Xoriat	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite	Can also be traded for Tier 1 and 2 LGS materials in quantity of 1,000.
Codex Rune	Update 29	The Codex and the Shroud	♦50-150Normal ♥100-300Hard ♠300-400Elite total across all chests	Not used for named item purchase. Used only as a part of the LGS crafting system.
Kor Kaza Rune	Update 35	Riding the Storm Out	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite
Hut Rune	Update 37	Old Baba's Hut	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite
Strahd Rune	Update 37	The Curse of Strahd	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite
Time Rune	Update 40	Killing Time	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite	Runes can also be traded for Schism Shards in quantity of 500
Death Rune	Update 41	The Mark of Death	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite
Deathwyrm Rune	Update 41	Temple of the Deathwyrm	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite	Runes can also be traded for Thunder-Forged crafting materials in quantity of 500
Thunderpeaks Rune	Update 41	Fire on Thunder Peak	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite	Runes can also be traded for Thunder-Forged crafting materials in quantity of 500
Defiler Rune	Update 41	Defiler of the Just	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite
Nemesis Rune	Update 42	Project Nemesis	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite
Forge Rune	Update 42	Too Hot to Handle	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite
Artificer Rune	Update 47	Legendary Master Artificer	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite	Second rune filled chest for doing optional objective
Blades Rune	Update 47	Legendary Lord of Blades	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite	Second rune filled chest for doing optional objective
Vision Rune	Update 47	Legendary Vision of Destruction	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite
Demigod Rune	Update 48.4	The Dryad and the Demigod	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite	Second rune filled chest for doing optional objective; items that would drop from a Greater Feytwisted chest cost 2500 runes
Vault Rune	Update 50	Plane of Night	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite
Chronoscope Rune	Update 50	The Chronoscope / The Chronoscope (Legendary)	♦21Normal ♥28Hard ♠45Elite	Two rune filled chests for doing certain optionals in the Marketplace (one drops 22 runes on Normal)
Sands Rune	Update 50	Zawabi's Revenge	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite
Hunter Rune	Update 53	Hunt or Be Hunted	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite	Second rune filled chest for doing optional objectives
Dread Rune	Update 55.2	Skeletons in the Closet	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite	Optional secret ending chests do not include extra runes; items that drop from these chests cost 2500 runes
Ceremony Rune	Update 61.1	Fire Over Morgrave	♦64Normal ♥84Hard ♠125Elite

History: Pre module 5 Mechanic[edit]

Prior to the release of module 5 at the end of a successful raid, the warded raid loot chest would always contain two pieces of warded raid loot not assigned to any specific player. The loot could not be removed from the chest without a Glyph of Warding. Two Glyphs of Warding (small stone objects) would spawn near the chest. These glyphs could only be taken in two ways:

By default, only the party leader could take them, and then trade them to the player(s) who could then use them to loot an item.
The party leader could change the raid to a "random party loot mode", where two random individuals would be able to pick up a Glyph. This needed to be done before the raid was completed, and could not be switched back to the default after it had been set.

Once a player had a Glyph in their possession, they would then be able to remove a raid reward item from the warded chest.

This system was discontinued since there always were 2 raid loot guaranteed per instance, and short-manning raids for better loot per person, was becoming very popular, especially for then latest raid, The Reaver's Fate. Some guilds went far more extreme, since they as a 12-man group could take down the raid boss to 2% and 10 of them could leave the instance to enter another, then remaining 2 members could get guaranteed piece of raid loot etc.

Raid loot mechanic

Contents