04-04-2003, 06:41 AM
Hi there-- hey Pete, I thought I could count on you to bang my drum forever. I've only really contributed one, maybe two, things to the Diablo community and now no one remembers *sob*.
When Ironbeard (i think) mentioned that he and someone else (sadly and hypocritically I've forgotten who) had discovered that drops were based solely on the start-time of the game, I had a wonderful idea.... and then... it was I who then took that idea and ran to the shrines with it. I discovered that, seemingly, shrines were based on this time too. I could get the same shrine over and over again, and no matter what I wore, what I threw down, the last spell I cast, the last thing I equipped, or anything I did in-game, the results were always the same. (Until Jarulf that is)
This gave the DSF enough info that when ppl came on and said, "HEY WHEN U JUST WEAR WHITE ITEMS IT RAISES YER CAP EVRY TIME" we could say, no sorry WRONG.
As one reg said, I had killed a whole lotta superstition.
(If you can bear with my self-promotion a bit longer, this may get more interesting...)
As it turned out, I wasn't totally correct (aint it always da truth?). Jarulf eventually told us that things you did in-game DID affect the shrine.... and this ties in with the "shield" thing...
We knew it better as the "Chain Lightning bug", which many insisted was pure superstition... I felt that Blizzard MEANT to make the Hidden and ... uh ... Enchanted shrines random, but that their random failed to be random, I had more shields and CL hits than you would expect. People were divided into "it's random for me" and "hits the same thing most every time" camps. Jarulf showed us: it was a playing style issue... if you only play one or two levels a game, you will have a different view of the shrines' randomness than someone who clears six or seven. When I did my tests, I would always take the most direct route to the level involved, since I was testing game-start versus shrine-touch determination. Level-creation was not one of variables I tested. *sigh*
I think we must also give a lot of credit to Crystalion here, too. In terms of reading code, he was Jarulf's master, IIRC.
Oh, how I miss the joy of finding those two shrines .... tho finding a gem shrine almost makes up for it (but not quite).
-Van
PS. Pete, say hi to yer roomie fer me
PS. Salt -- you get the same number of shrines in church and cats (I counted them when I researched the above). If yer shrine-hunting, I found church was quicker because cats levels were often spread out so far, whereas in church, you just look for the small rooms and they're never far. (I seemed to get less shrines on level 4, but that was probably just bad luck... hehe)
When Ironbeard (i think) mentioned that he and someone else (sadly and hypocritically I've forgotten who) had discovered that drops were based solely on the start-time of the game, I had a wonderful idea.... and then... it was I who then took that idea and ran to the shrines with it. I discovered that, seemingly, shrines were based on this time too. I could get the same shrine over and over again, and no matter what I wore, what I threw down, the last spell I cast, the last thing I equipped, or anything I did in-game, the results were always the same. (Until Jarulf that is)
This gave the DSF enough info that when ppl came on and said, "HEY WHEN U JUST WEAR WHITE ITEMS IT RAISES YER CAP EVRY TIME" we could say, no sorry WRONG.
As one reg said, I had killed a whole lotta superstition.
(If you can bear with my self-promotion a bit longer, this may get more interesting...)
As it turned out, I wasn't totally correct (aint it always da truth?). Jarulf eventually told us that things you did in-game DID affect the shrine.... and this ties in with the "shield" thing...
We knew it better as the "Chain Lightning bug", which many insisted was pure superstition... I felt that Blizzard MEANT to make the Hidden and ... uh ... Enchanted shrines random, but that their random failed to be random, I had more shields and CL hits than you would expect. People were divided into "it's random for me" and "hits the same thing most every time" camps. Jarulf showed us: it was a playing style issue... if you only play one or two levels a game, you will have a different view of the shrines' randomness than someone who clears six or seven. When I did my tests, I would always take the most direct route to the level involved, since I was testing game-start versus shrine-touch determination. Level-creation was not one of variables I tested. *sigh*
I think we must also give a lot of credit to Crystalion here, too. In terms of reading code, he was Jarulf's master, IIRC.
Oh, how I miss the joy of finding those two shrines .... tho finding a gem shrine almost makes up for it (but not quite).
-Van
PS. Pete, say hi to yer roomie fer me
PS. Salt -- you get the same number of shrines in church and cats (I counted them when I researched the above). If yer shrine-hunting, I found church was quicker because cats levels were often spread out so far, whereas in church, you just look for the small rooms and they're never far. (I seemed to get less shrines on level 4, but that was probably just bad luck... hehe)