03-13-2003, 03:02 PM
>Awesome Full Plate Mail of the Stars - I came across
>these two plates over b.net not too long ago with the
>exact same stats, so I logged them:
><copied directly from log file>
>
>Pack03 01:1C24BE91D3:46 Awesome Plate of
>the stars 75_80(90) +150%ac +8a R90s
>...
>Pack19 01:1D24BE91D3:46 Awesome Plate of
>the stars 75_80(90) +150%ac +8a R90s
>
>APoS - 75 base AC, +150% AC, +8 to all attributes (90
>duribility).
I am not familiar with what the numbers Moe write to the screen, but if I recall correctly it is indeed the ilvl you identified followed by the 32 bit seed (the value before the ":" should be source, 1 would be monsters in dungeon I think, possible also chests and such.
So it is indeed several different values shown together. Now I understand what you meant by "code" though.
>Explanation: Obviously, these two items were dupes.
Well, dupes are suposed to be identical items, these items are NOT identical. They did not result from copying one item into another one.
>It is virtually impossible that two identical plates of
>this caliber have been found.
Actually it is not and it can be done by the game itself and IS done quite often even. More often than one would think. Most of the times it happens for gold and non interesting items or even more for "no item" drops.
This is the huge flaw in the game as far as Blizzard decided to handle seeds and initialization of the game.
The thing is that almost as often the ilvl will also be the same.
Now, that does not mean these two items were such ones. It is indeed a very high chance they were created items.
However, dupes are identical items simply copied. As soon as you start creating items by changing values, it is no longer duped items, but created (many would use the word "hacked" items. There is really no difference just because you started of from another item or started from scratch and since the game does not consider such items dupes, I would not call them so either. If for no reason to avoid confusion.
> I checked the value you
>see above (01:1D24BE91D3:46). This is what I was
>refering to as the "code" Jarulf, perhaps its better to
>call it an ID?
No, it is better to call it three different values Moe have decided to lump together only differenting one of them from the others. Oh well. :)
> Notice how these two ID's differ by a
>single value.
The *ilvl* differ by one value :)
> Through some experimentation, I
>learned the the bold sections of the ID (one byte)
>refer to the ilvl of the plate.
Yup, and that is true for all items.
> On the first plate, the ilvl
>= 29. The second has an identical ID, except for the
>fact that it its ilvl = 28. I then took the first
>plate alone, and edited its code in an editor -
>changing byte 04 (ilvl) from 1C to 1D. I loaded it in a
>game, then created a new one to see what
>happened. The edited plate did not morph into a new
>item; it was stable. Both were able to exist in the
>same game without destroying each other.
Yes, since the game compare not only the seed, but also item type and ilvl to decide if items are dupes. This to minimize the risk of making false identifications.
> Ofcourse,
>this is no suprise condisering their ID's are different.
>So what we have here is essentially a duplicate item
>that the game doesn't treat as one.
No, we have two created items (well one of them at least), that was created very similar to each other. Again, "dupe" should be kept as complete identical items or one is in dangerous water I would say.
You could for example instead of changing the ilvl, change the seed and get the same item as well (harder, but possible). You can change both the ilvl and the seed (and even the source) and end up with the same final item, are they dupes to? What if you started out with one to get the other? You would end up calling any item with identical stat for dupes then, especially since there is really no way to clearly draw the line and you can just as easilly (if you know what you do), change for example the seed instead of the ilvl. Such items are in all cases created items and not duped, although they may end up almost (or even exact) identical.
>I have tried other values for the ilvl on this item, such
>as ilvl = 30 (1E), but in a new game the item morphed
>into something else: I think it turned into a sapphire
>FPM IIRC. Also, raising this value to 60 or above can
>yeild the Holy/Godly full plates, etc.
See my other post. What the ilvl in effect do is decide what pool of affixes are possible. Since the affixes are pickable if their qlvl is equal or below to the ilvl but above or equal to half the ilvl changing it will remove some possible affixes but add others. However, with small changes, you may not nessecarilly add any nor remove, especially since the ilvl/2 is truncated and two values will have the same lower limit and for higher values, there are really few affixes. For example, how many affixes for armor has the qlvl of 30 or 31?
If you go higher, above 50, the lower limit is always fixed to 25 but there is VERY few affixes added for various high values. So you can change it even more without changing the affix pool.
>By perfect, I mean that the specific value of the
>prefix/suffix is the highest for that given range. For
>instance, the prefix on this plate is "perfect" because
>it raises the AC by 150%, which is the highest
>possible value for the "awesome" range.
OK, that should not matter though since the actual value doesn't affect the pool of possible affixes. However, my guess might be that you and perhaps others tend to look at high ilvl values with perfect stats. Often with the highest possible affixes, like godly and such that requires a high ilvl. This means changing the ilvl will not change the affix. If the affix stays the same, the actual stat value will NOT change.
Then one take a random non perfect item and try it and it have a higher tendancy to change the affix pool and thus one is believed that the perfectness matter. just a guess.
> It seemed
>to me from the above example that you could change
>ANY item (save uniques) by a single ilvl to effectively
>copy it.
With the knowledge of how the affix pool is picked, the ilvl in question and item type, it is VERY easy to see what changes to the ilvl would not add or remove affixes from the pool of possible ones. The higher the ilvl, the more likely since there is not affixes for each ilvl value.
> I tried this on a few other items, to see what
>would happen. For any item that is not already ilvl =
>30, it usually works. I found out, however, that when
>an item had perfect stats, the item would be
>regenerated no matter what you changed the ilvl to.
This I simply can't believ, sorry :)
Changing the ilvl for the plate above (or even a perfect such one) changing the ilvl to 1, would not allo it to have those affixes. If you can show me such an item (perfect stats or not) were you can lower the ilvl to 1 (or an arbritary higher value) and not morph it, please do so :)
>For example, if the plate above were 75 AC +150% +
>11 to all attributes (11 being the highest value
>for "of stars"), then changing the ilvl on the original
>plate to any value would cause the item to morph in a
>new game.
I don't follow you here. Now you say that changing it WOULD morph it.
>It is interesting to change the ilvl to different values to
>see what you can get. It is like the prize in a cracker-
>jacks box. You can't pick and choose what you want
>this way though, like you can :)
Well, yah, since it controll the affix pool that is the result and with that knowledge it is even possible for you to completely determine possible changes (you can't tell what exact affix will be picked unless you do some random number generations with the seed as well, but you can always tell what affixes are possible. It is really no magic involved.
>Anyways, I hope that cleared up some of my
>confusions. Also, I guess you don't have to believe
>that there were actually two plates - after all it would
>be easy enough to type a C instead of a D - but you'll
>just have to trust me :)
I don't doubt your two plates. The only thing I doubt is that an item with perfect stat would not morph if you change the ilvl.
>these two plates over b.net not too long ago with the
>exact same stats, so I logged them:
><copied directly from log file>
>
>Pack03 01:1C24BE91D3:46 Awesome Plate of
>the stars 75_80(90) +150%ac +8a R90s
>...
>Pack19 01:1D24BE91D3:46 Awesome Plate of
>the stars 75_80(90) +150%ac +8a R90s
>
>APoS - 75 base AC, +150% AC, +8 to all attributes (90
>duribility).
I am not familiar with what the numbers Moe write to the screen, but if I recall correctly it is indeed the ilvl you identified followed by the 32 bit seed (the value before the ":" should be source, 1 would be monsters in dungeon I think, possible also chests and such.
So it is indeed several different values shown together. Now I understand what you meant by "code" though.
>Explanation: Obviously, these two items were dupes.
Well, dupes are suposed to be identical items, these items are NOT identical. They did not result from copying one item into another one.
>It is virtually impossible that two identical plates of
>this caliber have been found.
Actually it is not and it can be done by the game itself and IS done quite often even. More often than one would think. Most of the times it happens for gold and non interesting items or even more for "no item" drops.
This is the huge flaw in the game as far as Blizzard decided to handle seeds and initialization of the game.
The thing is that almost as often the ilvl will also be the same.
Now, that does not mean these two items were such ones. It is indeed a very high chance they were created items.
However, dupes are identical items simply copied. As soon as you start creating items by changing values, it is no longer duped items, but created (many would use the word "hacked" items. There is really no difference just because you started of from another item or started from scratch and since the game does not consider such items dupes, I would not call them so either. If for no reason to avoid confusion.
> I checked the value you
>see above (01:1D24BE91D3:46). This is what I was
>refering to as the "code" Jarulf, perhaps its better to
>call it an ID?
No, it is better to call it three different values Moe have decided to lump together only differenting one of them from the others. Oh well. :)
> Notice how these two ID's differ by a
>single value.
The *ilvl* differ by one value :)
> Through some experimentation, I
>learned the the bold sections of the ID (one byte)
>refer to the ilvl of the plate.
Yup, and that is true for all items.
> On the first plate, the ilvl
>= 29. The second has an identical ID, except for the
>fact that it its ilvl = 28. I then took the first
>plate alone, and edited its code in an editor -
>changing byte 04 (ilvl) from 1C to 1D. I loaded it in a
>game, then created a new one to see what
>happened. The edited plate did not morph into a new
>item; it was stable. Both were able to exist in the
>same game without destroying each other.
Yes, since the game compare not only the seed, but also item type and ilvl to decide if items are dupes. This to minimize the risk of making false identifications.
> Ofcourse,
>this is no suprise condisering their ID's are different.
>So what we have here is essentially a duplicate item
>that the game doesn't treat as one.
No, we have two created items (well one of them at least), that was created very similar to each other. Again, "dupe" should be kept as complete identical items or one is in dangerous water I would say.
You could for example instead of changing the ilvl, change the seed and get the same item as well (harder, but possible). You can change both the ilvl and the seed (and even the source) and end up with the same final item, are they dupes to? What if you started out with one to get the other? You would end up calling any item with identical stat for dupes then, especially since there is really no way to clearly draw the line and you can just as easilly (if you know what you do), change for example the seed instead of the ilvl. Such items are in all cases created items and not duped, although they may end up almost (or even exact) identical.
>I have tried other values for the ilvl on this item, such
>as ilvl = 30 (1E), but in a new game the item morphed
>into something else: I think it turned into a sapphire
>FPM IIRC. Also, raising this value to 60 or above can
>yeild the Holy/Godly full plates, etc.
See my other post. What the ilvl in effect do is decide what pool of affixes are possible. Since the affixes are pickable if their qlvl is equal or below to the ilvl but above or equal to half the ilvl changing it will remove some possible affixes but add others. However, with small changes, you may not nessecarilly add any nor remove, especially since the ilvl/2 is truncated and two values will have the same lower limit and for higher values, there are really few affixes. For example, how many affixes for armor has the qlvl of 30 or 31?
If you go higher, above 50, the lower limit is always fixed to 25 but there is VERY few affixes added for various high values. So you can change it even more without changing the affix pool.
>By perfect, I mean that the specific value of the
>prefix/suffix is the highest for that given range. For
>instance, the prefix on this plate is "perfect" because
>it raises the AC by 150%, which is the highest
>possible value for the "awesome" range.
OK, that should not matter though since the actual value doesn't affect the pool of possible affixes. However, my guess might be that you and perhaps others tend to look at high ilvl values with perfect stats. Often with the highest possible affixes, like godly and such that requires a high ilvl. This means changing the ilvl will not change the affix. If the affix stays the same, the actual stat value will NOT change.
Then one take a random non perfect item and try it and it have a higher tendancy to change the affix pool and thus one is believed that the perfectness matter. just a guess.
> It seemed
>to me from the above example that you could change
>ANY item (save uniques) by a single ilvl to effectively
>copy it.
With the knowledge of how the affix pool is picked, the ilvl in question and item type, it is VERY easy to see what changes to the ilvl would not add or remove affixes from the pool of possible ones. The higher the ilvl, the more likely since there is not affixes for each ilvl value.
> I tried this on a few other items, to see what
>would happen. For any item that is not already ilvl =
>30, it usually works. I found out, however, that when
>an item had perfect stats, the item would be
>regenerated no matter what you changed the ilvl to.
This I simply can't believ, sorry :)
Changing the ilvl for the plate above (or even a perfect such one) changing the ilvl to 1, would not allo it to have those affixes. If you can show me such an item (perfect stats or not) were you can lower the ilvl to 1 (or an arbritary higher value) and not morph it, please do so :)
>For example, if the plate above were 75 AC +150% +
>11 to all attributes (11 being the highest value
>for "of stars"), then changing the ilvl on the original
>plate to any value would cause the item to morph in a
>new game.
I don't follow you here. Now you say that changing it WOULD morph it.
>It is interesting to change the ilvl to different values to
>see what you can get. It is like the prize in a cracker-
>jacks box. You can't pick and choose what you want
>this way though, like you can :)
Well, yah, since it controll the affix pool that is the result and with that knowledge it is even possible for you to completely determine possible changes (you can't tell what exact affix will be picked unless you do some random number generations with the seed as well, but you can always tell what affixes are possible. It is really no magic involved.
>Anyways, I hope that cleared up some of my
>confusions. Also, I guess you don't have to believe
>that there were actually two plates - after all it would
>be easy enough to type a C instead of a D - but you'll
>just have to trust me :)
I don't doubt your two plates. The only thing I doubt is that an item with perfect stat would not morph if you change the ilvl.
There are three types of people in the world. Those who can count and those who can't.