Can you explain "Map Drop Equity"?
Some initial Information:
This is intentionally done to match the 3:1 upgrade recipe.
How does map drop equity work for maps that didn't drop when they are higher tier than the maps you were running?
Example: What does a T13 map that didn't drop due to it not being able to actually do if I'm only running T11-T12 maps? Will it only affect future T13 and higher tier map drops, or will this also increase the amount of lower tier map drops?
If you're running Tier 11 and Tier 12 maps, and you have no Tier 13 or higher maps available to drop on your Atlas due to Watchstones (if this situation is even possible), then when it attempts to drop a Tier 13 Map it will not drop the map, and will accumulate Equity.
At this point, it then checks your current equity and determines if it's high enough to drop maps by first checking if it's high enough to drop a Tier 16, then Tier 15, then Tier 14, so on and so forth, but in this example it's presumed you cannot drop any maps above Tier 13 (due to watchstone state) and thus it doesn't drop a Map and adds Equity. It never tries to drop maps below the original Tier it tried to drop, so for example it won't try to drop a Tier 12, Tier 11 etc. map.
Can I accumulate high equity by running low tier maps (say T5-T12) while my Atlas is fully watchstoned to be T14+?
Example: I have been running T14 maps, and am about to run out due to a bad streak of luck. Can I increase the chances of obtaining T14+ maps by going back and running a bunch of low-mid tier maps to "bank" the equity before going back to T14+, as no maps can generally drop while I run these?
Yes, but it will accumulate low(ish) values of equity, so it will require a large amount of Map Drops (which could just be upgraded using the 3:1 recipe).
A Tier 5 Map grants 81 Equity.
A Tier 16 Map requires 14,348,907 Equity.
But yes, it will technically accumulate and help.
Is there a cap to this equity?
Yes, there is a cap. 143,489,070 Equity is the cap (10x Tier 16 maps).
Does Map Drop Equity affect map drops from 'additional connected map' from map bosses, as it has its own set of mechanics that differ slightly from normal drops?
No it doesn't. Any method of dropping maps that has the fallback to drop Maps with their native Tiers does not use the Equity system.
Does Rupturing's "Bleeding on [ruptured enemies] expires 25% more quickly" affect bleeding in the same way as "Bleeding you inflict deals damage x% faster" mods? Does it stack multiplicatively?
Not quite, but the total effect of rupture is similar despite these applying to different things at different times. Modifiers that cause ailments to deal damage faster modify the damage per second multiplicatively (just like a "more damage" modifier), and apply the inverse modification to the duration, so that the total expected damage of the ailment stays the same. Multiple 'deal damage faster' modifiers stack additively with each other.
Modifiers that affect how quickly things expire do not affect the magnitude of the effect at all, and technically do not modify the duration, they make time be tracked differently for that effect. The most common example is Temporal Chains, which you can see in-game does not affect the numerical duration of buffs/debuffs on you, but makes their timers tick down more slowly.
If you inflict Bleeding that would deal 100 damage per second for the default 5 seconds, but have "Bleeding you inflict deals damage 25% faster", that applies 25% more damage per second, and the inverse of this modifier to the duration, resulting in inflicting a bleeding that deals 125 damage per second for a 4 second duration; the total expected damage is still 500. These are the values applied to the enemy in the debuff.
If that enemy is Ruptured, they have 25% more damage taken from bleeding, and the bleeding expires 25% more quickly. So assuming no other modifiers, they would be taking 156 damage per second, and the Bleeding debuff's "4 second" timer would tick down faster, resulting in it expiring after only 3.2 real seconds have passed, and thus dealing a total of 499 damage - 1 having been lost to rounding.
Note that the modifiers from Rupture are dynamic - a bleeding enemy starts taking more damage when they become Ruptured and ceases to do so when Rupture expires, and similarly, a bleeding enemy that becomes ruptured will have the timer on their bleeding debuff speed up, and return to normal speed if rupture is removed.