Holiday Ops 2023 / 2024 Loot Box Value Guide
13Disciple | 10-Dec-2023
As a WGNA CC, I was provided with 250 Holiday boxes (62/63 of each type) for the purpose of making content on Twitch and for this article. I've supplemented this data with users that sent me their videos and screenshots.
This type of written article takes hours and hours of data entry, on top of putting together the tables and graphics. If you would like to support my work, please pop on over to my Twitch, or my YouTube page and check out my content.
This type of written article takes hours and hours of data entry, on top of putting together the tables and graphics. If you would like to support my work, please pop on over to my Twitch, or my YouTube page and check out my content.
These boxes are yet again excellent value. If you want to put gold or premium time (purchased for gold) in your account, I would recommend purchasing large (gift) boxes. This year sees the continuation of a guaranteed vehicle mechanic. You are guaranteed to get a tier 8 or 9 vehicle drop after 50 large gift boxes.
Since the vehicles that drop are guaranteed to be vehicles you don't already own, and that every 50 boxes you are guaranteed one of the tier 8's/9 you don't yet own, you can now fully know exactly how much it will cost you to guarantee that you get one (or all) of the new Holiday Ops Tanks.
While I would still like to have the tanks sold outside boxes, this is a big improvement to consumers. It effectively caps how much you will need to spend to get the exact vehicle you may be fishing for.
Since the vehicles that drop are guaranteed to be vehicles you don't already own, and that every 50 boxes you are guaranteed one of the tier 8's/9 you don't yet own, you can now fully know exactly how much it will cost you to guarantee that you get one (or all) of the new Holiday Ops Tanks.
While I would still like to have the tanks sold outside boxes, this is a big improvement to consumers. It effectively caps how much you will need to spend to get the exact vehicle you may be fishing for.
Gold per USD Value
A note on data: I want to thank everybody that has submitted data to me. This year I was able to log 6,228 total boxes entered for this data.
NEW For 2023/24
This year saw changes to the Holiday Ops boxes compensation. In the past when you pulled a duplicate tank you would get the tanks value in gold as well as a garage slot. This year there is no more garage slot compensation. Your first drop of each tank comes with 1 garage slot, and you get no duplicates after that.
Because there are no garage slot duplicates, and you can now buy garage slots for credits, I've decided to remove garage slots completely from the calculations.
NEW For 2023/24
This year saw changes to the Holiday Ops boxes compensation. In the past when you pulled a duplicate tank you would get the tanks value in gold as well as a garage slot. This year there is no more garage slot compensation. Your first drop of each tank comes with 1 garage slot, and you get no duplicates after that.
Because there are no garage slot duplicates, and you can now buy garage slots for credits, I've decided to remove garage slots completely from the calculations.
For this calculation I used ONLY Gold and Tank Value, ignoring credits, premium time, and garage slots.
Approximate gold per dollar value is likely considerably lower for the smaller packages, as you are far less likely to draw a high tier premium where much of the value of the boxes resides. NEW For 2023/24 This year a 2 new package were added - 160 and 240 boxes. This means we have a new tier for value! The 160 box offer doesn't improve greatly in value over the 75 box package, however the 240 box package offers the most gold per dollar estimate, at a whopping 617 gold per USD! |
Total Gold Value: 6,186,750 / 6,228 boxes = 993.4 gold per box average
If we only use the raw gold and gold value of duplicate tanks (assume all duplicates) - and ignore all other items in the boxes then we get ~ 751 gold per box. Total Gold Value: 5,010,350 / 6,228 boxes = 804.48 gold per box average In Terms of Total Gold Value per Box, I calculated the confidence intervals.
Based on the overall 993 gold per box average. Upper 95th percentile confidence interval is 1041, and lower 95th percentile confidence interval is 946. |
Despite the gold per dollar being lower than last year... The average raw gold per box dropped by 10 gold per box lower than last years averages. However, this is easily explained by no longer counting garage slots. When we ignore all items except gold and tanks, then the value has gone up slightly compared to last years data.
* The first year I did this analysis I only used 225 boxes. I placed the sample size in this chart so that it's clear to you that the lower sample size could point to inaccuracy of the actual value for that year of data.
** This year does not include any garage slots, all other years included garage slots valued at 150 gold.
** This year does not include any garage slots, all other years included garage slots valued at 150 gold.
This year's value are noticeably higher than the last 2 years. If we consider the frequent War Chest bundle of 25,000 gold for $100 USD which yields 250 gold per $1 USD. Using this benchmark, it's quite clear that the 75 box bundle is still a good value. However the new 260 box bundle now offers the best value available for World of Tanks content annually.
If we consider the worst case scenario of buying two sets of 25 boxes for a total 80 USD, and assume only 1 high tier premium was the result and it was the lowest value tier 8 premium, we'd still get about 260.3 gold per dollar. Which means even in the unlikely event of a worst case scenario, holiday ops boxes are still the best value year round when compared to the War Chest bundle.
If we consider the worst case scenario of buying two sets of 25 boxes for a total 80 USD, and assume only 1 high tier premium was the result and it was the lowest value tier 8 premium, we'd still get about 260.3 gold per dollar. Which means even in the unlikely event of a worst case scenario, holiday ops boxes are still the best value year round when compared to the War Chest bundle.
Drop Rates (Your Drop Rates Will Vary)
Wargaming once more decided to publish the drop rates for all regions. Even more interesting is the fact that the drop rates from last two years haven't actually changed. Below is an image from this year's 2023 large boxes, where the drop rates for low tier common items, low tier tanks, and high tier tanks are identical.
Observed Drop Rates For Standard Items
Drop Rates For Low Tier Vehicles
Drop Rates For Tier 8 Vehicles
PLEASE NOTE: Because the tank drops at tier 8 are guaranteed to drop un-owned tanks first, this will skew the percent drops toward the vehicles that haven't yet been on sale in the premium shop.
Why are the drop rates for tier 8 higher in the data than in the article?
It may not seem intuitive but it should statistically be higher than 2.4%. The new 'bad luck' mechanic that says after 49 boxes of no tier 8 premiums, it guarantees the 50th box to contain one, it sets a floor for the drop rate. This means it's impossible to go below a 2% drop rate (when data sets are divisible by 50). Normally a standard distribution for this drop would be around 2.4% evenly spread between 0% and 4.8%. With this mechanic you technically get a spike at 2% because all probabilities between 0 and 2% are summed up here. This floor to the drop rates means the average in the data is displaced to be higher than 2.4%. This higher drop chance also accounts for the lower percentage chance observed in standard items. If higher than average drops are tier 8 tanks, then this would inevitably reduce the other two. The image is Courtesy of Overlord_Prime. You should absolutely check out his Twitch Channel! |
This higher drop chance at tier 8 also accounts for the lower percentage chance observed in 'standard' drops.
Bonus Resource Drop Rates
This year Wargaming kept the same resource system from last year. Each box was guaranteed to drop 50 resources of type from which ever box you purchased, and an additional 150 resources of a random type. I inquired bout the drop rates, and I was told they should all be equally likely, therefore the expectation was 25% for each resource. The data mostly matches this with the differences explained by sample variance.
|
3D Skins for Tier 10 Tanks
This holiday season brings with it new 3D skins for tier 10s - and continues Holiday Ops 3D style for tier 9. New this year is the Cobra, EBR 105, AE Phase 1, E75, and G.W.E. 100. Along with these new skins, it was also possible to draw the skins from last year: Super Conq. STRV 103b, Minotauro, and BC 155 58. Adding in the 3D styles from last year's holiday Muddies the draw rate a bit. If you were missing both sets, then you'll get random pulls from both. Because of this, I decided to list the average number of boxes to pull five 3D skins, so that if you are going into this Holiday missing only the new ones, you know roughly the average number of boxes to draw them all. Once you pull all five new 3D Styles, you are unable to pull duplicates.
"Luckiest" Boxes
For a bit of humor I've added in the luckiest boxes again. This time around we see a big dip on the New Year boxes, and I think i can explain why this is. Most people will open their boxes from top to bottom, meaning the first set of boxes is always going to be the New year set. Since a vast majority of 4 box bundles do not have 50 boxes, there is no trigger of the pity mechanic on the first set of boxes. This means we'd expect a spike on the next set of boxes, which we've observed here. If people opened their boxes in random order, then these would likely normalize.
Criticism for Holiday Ops 2023 - 2024
The Good
Wargaming is giving away a lot of freebies this year for Holiday ops. Between the advent calendar, drops, and daily missions from Chaffee (though you need to buy those) right now . Similar to last year, this year it's now possible for free to play players to obtain the 50% holiday ops bonus with in a couple weeks of activity - and for those buying boxes it's even simpler. I'm glad to see this maintained from last year. way to go Wargaming!
This year Chaffee the dog is actually useful. Investing him with gold will give you a daily set of missions that provides you various rewards. If you invest in him early on, he's probably worth the gold.
The advent calendar this year also includes coins for the slot machine where you can get experimental equipment, and components to upgrade it. Additionally instead of hiding a tank in the slot machine, this year we have a higher drop chance, and something that's useful.
Additionally we've finally rid ourselves of the goofy mobile game mechanic of the credit sink that automatically collects resources for you.
We are still missing the sales in the advent calendar this year, but they have also been replaced with weekly sales of tanks for gold. Another way to help spend all those resources you've amassed during Holiday Ops.
Lastly, I want to point out a criticism from last year - which is the BZ-176. An absolutely broken vehicle. This year's vehicles feel fun, unique, and not at all broken. I think this has been one of the best Holiday Ops on record.
Thank goodness. Honestly lots of things has been resolved this year, and Wargaming should be praised for it.
Wargaming is giving away a lot of freebies this year for Holiday ops. Between the advent calendar, drops, and daily missions from Chaffee (though you need to buy those) right now . Similar to last year, this year it's now possible for free to play players to obtain the 50% holiday ops bonus with in a couple weeks of activity - and for those buying boxes it's even simpler. I'm glad to see this maintained from last year. way to go Wargaming!
This year Chaffee the dog is actually useful. Investing him with gold will give you a daily set of missions that provides you various rewards. If you invest in him early on, he's probably worth the gold.
The advent calendar this year also includes coins for the slot machine where you can get experimental equipment, and components to upgrade it. Additionally instead of hiding a tank in the slot machine, this year we have a higher drop chance, and something that's useful.
Additionally we've finally rid ourselves of the goofy mobile game mechanic of the credit sink that automatically collects resources for you.
We are still missing the sales in the advent calendar this year, but they have also been replaced with weekly sales of tanks for gold. Another way to help spend all those resources you've amassed during Holiday Ops.
Lastly, I want to point out a criticism from last year - which is the BZ-176. An absolutely broken vehicle. This year's vehicles feel fun, unique, and not at all broken. I think this has been one of the best Holiday Ops on record.
Thank goodness. Honestly lots of things has been resolved this year, and Wargaming should be praised for it.
The Bad
The only criticism I can come up with is that Wargaming no longer includes garage slots with the vehicle compensation. Something that is useful for newer players. However you can get garage slots out of Chaffee missions as well as purchasing them for credits now. Overall I don't see this as a huge problem, but something I didn't know before opening boxes.
The only criticism I can come up with is that Wargaming no longer includes garage slots with the vehicle compensation. Something that is useful for newer players. However you can get garage slots out of Chaffee missions as well as purchasing them for credits now. Overall I don't see this as a huge problem, but something I didn't know before opening boxes.
I do want to give a shout out to all the people that spent time filling out those spreadsheets, again, none of this would be possible with out you. Feel free to stop by and say hi on my Discord or join me on Twitch. Let me know how Holiday Ops went for you this year.
Special Thanks To:
Everybody in the Discord Channel that provided your data!
I had hundreds of messages between WoT Forums, and Discord. Thank you for supporting the data that allows me to post this type of content.
Everybody in the Discord Channel that provided your data!
I had hundreds of messages between WoT Forums, and Discord. Thank you for supporting the data that allows me to post this type of content.