I don't know if I'm the only one experiencing this or notices that whenever the server has been up for a long time without any problems drops become really abnormal. For example, two days ago I was questing in the Wild Kargo Den for Kargo Spirits. I spent 5 hours grinding there and I found probably hundreds of equips from the Cold Eyes but almost nothing at all from the Kargos. I literally found everything possible from the Cold Eyes except Icicle Throwing Stars and I was beginning to get pissed off I was there for 5 hours and not even a single set dropped. So server starts herp-a-derping the last two days and I didn't get on at all until today when it finally came back on. I went straight for Cold Eyes and Kargos again because even after 5 hours I couldn't find all 33 Spirits even after I probably killed 500 of them. I start killing and killing and killing and my inventory finally gets full about an hour later and I had found like 5 Helmet Def scrolls and 8 sets of Icicles and I found about 12 spirits (which was EQUAL to the amount I had to grind 5 hours for 2 days before). And now I've been killing Tauromacis and Taurospears for almost 2 hours now, killed at least 100 each cause they are bit tough for my level right now and I'm getting an equip or so but I've only found 3 Tauromacis Spirits and no Taurospear Spirits. As for the Cold Eyes, they keep dropping Pink Moon and Cats Eyes but Icicles haven't dropped for 2 hours again and probably won't drop anymore all day if the same thing ends up happening. I know a lot of this can be attributed to just bad luck or whatever but I honestly believe that as time goes on better drops become more and more scarce but as soon as the server gets a reboot or goes through a server check I seem to be able to find items I couldn't before and it applies to any enemy. I've tested it with Platoon Chronos where I grinded for a week straight where the server didn't have a single hiccup and I did not find a single Esther Shield or GFA 60%. The server went down for a short time that week and I jumped back into the grind and after an hour or two I was getting Maple Shields, Esther Shields every 50 kills or so, I literally had an entire inventory of just those two items and nothing else dropped for a long while. A few hours more went by and both those items stopped dropping entirely and nothing but Zards, Serpents Tongues, Jangoon Pants etc.. dropped non stop. It seems like to me like certain equips have a heavier influence with the drop rate compared to others. If I grind at Platoons or any mob for that matter but especially Platoons, even on 1x drop I should be finding 3-4 GFA 60% every couple of days if I grind for 5-6 hours a day for a week straight but I don't.
You're just unlucky I farm at platoon chronos pretty often I always get GFA 60%s. As for esther shields they're pretty useless no need for them. It's the maple shields that you want from them. Regarding the other maps I have no idea, but whats the point of farming for icicles. Steely's drop nice at GS5 and ilbis are extremely cheap.
Whether the Esther Shields or Icicles are useless or not is completely irrelevant. This type of situation happens on every type of mob I kill for extended periods of time. I was giving Platoons as an example. I can kill thousands and thousands of them for an entire week straight and level up a dozen times and still not find a single GFA scroll or Esther shield and when the server goes through a reboot or a server check is when these items I wasn't finding before seem to begin dropping within a very limited window. This has been happening to me ever since I joined the server and I've noticed it more and more as I try to specifically grind for certain items.
I think you just have bad luck, but I'll check the drop rate for quest items with the spirit rocks- I need to do that quest anyway. I got a gfa 60% from Plateons earlier in Omega after just killing about 200 or so, as did my friend. Some quest drops don't drop at all- such as Notes from Chief grays. I received 2 sets of icys from Cold eyes while doing the cold breath quest, i don't remember what my drop rate of EQs were from Kargos because at the time I could barely kill them. I'll check back in here once I go through those quests. You have to keep in mind drop rate is only 2x, not 4x. Some people will spend forever hunting for an item and not get it at all. Some mobs, like Coolies, don't drop certain items - such as scrolls. If you notice a quest doesnt' drop the quest items at all after hunting over 100 or more, then report that quest in the Feedback "Quest report" thread Edit: Also I remember in GMS the drop rate for that quest was naturally extremely low. I never completed it because I was a cleric/priest and killing those was difficult for me. But the drop rate was very low. Same for the cold eye quest- I killed over 600 cold eyes to get the 30 or so quest items.
Actually I noticed this with craven drops at black Kents. Usually I would get at least a tenth of my weapon drops be Cravens after a reboot but some days I can farm for hours without a single craven. Just figured it was bad luck though since fm seems to be flooded with them recently
