Ok, I posted earlier, but didn't have time to explain. The short of this is not rolling 1-30 out of 1000, but rolling the right combination to get what you want. The original post would work for mission rewards, but it would be a single value that you need for a particular item. All said, 1000 may be too high, but when you go through the combinations, it may be too low. Let me explain... Does everyone understand that there are at least 3 random number generation 'pulls'? RNG 1 is when you kill an enemy. This pull determines what loot, if any you get. This is from null, primary, secondary and heavy ammo, sometimes a combination of the three, a green drop, a green+blue drop, or a purple drop. The key here is that the green, blue or purple is NOT identified until you run it over (generic icon, easy to code). RNG 2 is when you pick up the green, blue or purple. On the Xbone, this is almost instantaneous, and I would assume so on the PS4. On the 360 (don't know about PS3), there is a delay. Why, because it needs to determine the class of the item: primary, secondary, heavy, helmet, gloves, chest, boots, class item. If it is a green after 20, at least I think it identifies them around 18 or so, then it must determine, under this category, what exactly it is. I have NEVER gotten anything better than a green from an auto-identified item. Anyway, assume that the item is a blue or purple, all this RNG pull determines is the class of the item. Why do I make this claim? Well, I started with a titan, then a hunter. I held off my warlock for the DLC because the leaked images showed that the level requirements were 7-14, so I thought I would go through the new content with the warlock. This is the same with the HoW images, which is why it is believed they were originally part of the game, as well as the files being on the disc, but I am not going to go there. I store blue armor engrams in the vault because that way I have some if a toon is close to leveling. For my warlock, this gave him armor to use on the way to 20. Here's the thing, if my lvl 28 picked up that engram, shouldn't it have been for the lvl 28 titan and not the level 5 warlock? The only way this would work, is RNG 3. RNG 3 is the tower. The tower is where the final pull and whether or not you get something worthwhile is determined. My hunch is that the loot tables were set with a specific number of possibles. A blue primary, for example, could be any blue primary (AR, SR, PR), potentially any level range (I have gotten level 16 from a level 26 strike), any purple or exotic primary, strange coin or mote of light. Think the same with helmets, gloves, etc. The easiest way to program this is to have a RNG sub routine that you would call. The drop that we see dictates which table is pulled. Here's the thing, in order to do that, you would have to make the loot table large enough to work across everything. What if there isn't enough equipment to populate that, well, that is where the coins, motes of lights, shards and energies come in. Sprinkled throughout the loot table are the drops that nobody wants. Think about nightfall rewards. It is set to pull from legendary and above, per my understanding. Well, that table also has at least coins, shards and energies as fillers. My guess is that there are many spots on the table where these fill in, leading to disappointment. Say for the nightfall there are 30 legendary + exotic things that could drop. If the loot table is 100 spaces, you have a greater chance of coins, energies, shards than anything else. Raid, specifically bosses have a special table they pull from. Maybe it is smaller, maybe not. In either case, mats and coins are space fillers. Their 'smart' loot table probably looks at what you have, what you rolled, and if it comes out the same, +/-1 should get you something different. However, from the sounds of it, that doesn't work, or the equipment is listed multiple times. But, I am willing to bet mats make up the majority of the table. This is why I am adamant about the only things earned in this game are exotic bounties, and things bought with coins and merits. Everything else is pulling 777 on the slot machine that is Destiny.