Delurking: MF and Gamble questions

[Kasreyn]

Hi,

Been a long time since I've posted here, but maybe one or two will remember me.

Playing LoD 1.10 *Open* single player, usually using /players8, so keep those in mind while answering...

Am building (or attempting to build) the stereotypical MF Sorcie, mostly because I want to see for myself if high MF really does have a visible effect. To this end, I have many many (many many!) questions!

1. What is a good skill setup? 1.10 is new to me, as are the multifarious ways in which it ruined all my 1.09 characters over level 25. For instance, my last serious playing of Sorcies was in 1.03, when everyone maxed Warmth. These days, I'm told by several sources that more than 5 points in Warmth is a waste. Also, due to immunes in Hell diff, it's obvious that single-tree is a thing of the past. I intend to major cold; what minor is recommended for *speed clearing*?

2. Just how DOES MF work? I mean, not just a general description of "it applies this added percentage to each monster's item drop chance". What is the NORMAL item drop chance for magical, rare, set, unique? Maybe 5% for magical? It seems to be something around there. So would +100% MF mean magical drop chance increases to 10%? I'm guessing it's more complex than this.

3. Current equipment (all twinked from other characters, but not traded) includes perfect topaz socketed Tarnhelm, Gull, Goldwrap, and some crap boots of fortune or whatever it is that gives +22%MF. The tarnhelm is only 39%, so I am at 215% added MF currently, according to my calculations. So far, no visible improvement. Is this just a really low amount? Also, what item slots are worth keeping in order to have affixes so I can survive? Is it better to ignore MF for now and wear items to be tougher, so I can level faster and put on the MF later, or should I MF all the way? Non-MF gear includes Stealth (to be worn until I can find the runes for Wealth), an Eye of Etlich and an SoJ, as well as Frostburns (all twinked) until she finds Chance Guards.

4. Have been gambling like mad in an attempt to get aforementioned Chance Guards, but I am only L26 as of yet... am I too low to get it? I saw a post by Brista on AB saying unique gambling chance was now "realistic" in 1.10, and I laughed myself sick. 0.02% chance at (currently) 6k per pop = 15 million gold and 2500 gambles for an even (50%) chance of finding it. Of course, I remember the glory days of 1.03, which is when most of my uniques were gambled... personally I think Blizzard overcorrected a wee. :P Or is there something I need to be doing differently? How DOES unique gambling work? I know MF doesn't affect it, but how do the combined chances of exceptional upgrade and unique upgrade work (ie, can a gambled Splint Mail become Skullder's Ire?). People have mentioned an item nicknamed "Gheed's" something or other that reduces vendor cost. What base item type is it and how can it be found?

5. Other MF questions. I saw another post at AB mentioning using MF in Meph runs. This confuses me - I thought the only effect of MF was to ensure that a greater number of drops were magical or better, rather than normal? Well, Meph always drops several magical items, so how could MF help? Does MF improve the chances of the magical items being upgraded to rares, sets, and uniques? If so, how?

6. In general, is it worthwhile for me to bother attempting to gamble stuff like Chance Guards, Skullder's Ire, or Griswold's Valor, given that extremely low 0.02% chance? Someone mentioned that if you just gambled at a low enough level and twinked the gold, you could gamble cheaply, but surely those items require a high enough level to spawn that the gambling costs would be prohibitive. Is it more time-efficient to skip standing by Anya for hours and just go kill things? :P

Thanks in advance for any assistance. I wouldn't have posted this if I had been able to find the info anywhere, but my apologies if I've overlooked an obvious thread or link.

-Kasreyn

[vor_lord]

Hi,

Been a long time since I've posted here, but maybe one or two will remember me. 

Playing LoD 1.10 *Open* single player, usually using /players8, so keep those in mind while answering...

Am building (or attempting to build) the stereotypical MF Sorcie, mostly because I want to see for myself if high MF really does have a visible effect.  To this end, I have many many (many many!) questions!

3.   Is this just a really low amount?

4.   People have mentioned an item nicknamed "Gheed's" something or other that reduces vendor cost.  What base item type is it and how can it be found? 

5.  Other MF questions.  I saw another post at AB mentioning using MF in Meph runs.  This confuses me - I thought the only effect of MF was to ensure that a greater number of drops were magical or better, rather than normal?  Well, Meph always drops several magical items, so how could MF help?  Does MF improve the chances of the magical items being upgraded to rares, sets, and uniques?  If so, how?

6.  In general, is it worthwhile for me to bother attempting to gamble stuff like Chance Guards, Skullder's Ire, or Griswold's Valor, given that extremely low 0.02% chance?  Someone mentioned that if you just gambled at a low enough level and twinked the gold, you could gamble cheaply, but surely those items require a high enough level to spawn that the gambling costs would be prohibitive.  Is it more time-efficient to skip standing by Anya for hours and just go kill things?  :P

I'll just take very quick stabs at the obvious ones here ;) I'm posting mainly to get you to stop wasting money gambling :(

3. You should see a pretty large improvement with 215% MF, particularly on act bosses. I usually wear as much MF as I can obtain easily while still keeping myself alive and relatively quick at killing (except for boss running, then I load it all on).

4. Gheed's is a unique charm. The best way to find it is to kill things (and wear MF)

5. Your impressions of MF are incorrect. Ignoring the diminishing returns aspect, wearing MF will increase the chances that an item will spawn as a rare, set or unique as well. It's always worked this way, and there are a number of charts which will show percentages (sorry no links, but I'm at work and it shouldn't be hard to find them).

6. No. It is not worthwhile. If you really want those chance guards, wear your 215% MF, and kill things. Gambling is still useful for certain rares (gloves, boots, and jewelry in particular) but getting sets and uniques this way is a thing that went away with the introduction of the expansion pack.


The best way to get MF gear is to wear MF gear. Certainly running bosses like Meph is a very effective way to get many of the not-quite-top-tier uniques. If you run Meph, I guarantee soon you'll have more versions of chance guards than you will keep, for example.

[edit: fixed messed up comment on when good unique gambling went away]

[Thrugg]

1) The popular sorc for questing these days is Blizzard I believe, however for MF I am currently playing (and can strongly recommend) one which is usually referred to as Meteorb. It uses FO primarily and Meteor for CIs. The guts of the build is max FO and CM, max Meteor and then work on Fire Mastery and Fire Ball (FB is a synergy for Meteor, the new 1.10 buzzword, you pump it purely to make your meteors stronger). You can probably find better guides if you look around the various forums.
Warmth is worth a point, but not much more. The wide availability of +skills and regen mana on uniques in 1.10 makes Warmth less important.

2) In a sense MF "is as simple as that". It takes the base chance of an item dropping with a certain quality, and multiplies it up. However, there is diminishing returns and all sorts of other complicated stuff. I will go into more detail at the bottom :)

3) There is much much much better MF gear available now than there was in Classic. 215% is a fine amount to start with, but you are costing yourself useful power increasing mods by using those old items. I recommed MFing NM Meph to get off and running. I'd also suggest, as you say, levelling with power gear on for a while before getting down to the MF.

4) You can gamble Chancies at clvl 26 but gambling is much harder than it was in Classic (much better than 1.09 though). I recommend just killing normal Meph a few hundred times for those.

5) When an item drops, the game first checks to see if it unique, then if not, if it is set, then if not, if it is rare, then if not, if it is magic. Your MF is used for each of these checks in turn. So more MF certainly does improve your chance at getting uniques. More below.

6) Heh. Gambling for Griswold's Valour :) It is actually a 0.05% chance of a unique (whee) and 0.1% chance of a set item. Do not see gambling as a way to get sets and uniques. It is primarily a source of rares (which are pretty good in 1.10) and if you score a unique one day, good for you. The only real way to get the name-brand gear is to kill things.


OK, MF. As I stated, the game checks for unique/set/rare/magic in turn, and your MF is used each time. Base chance of each depends on the item type (class-specific items are more likely to be higher quality) but for regular stuff it is 1/400 unique, 1/160 set, 1/100 rare and 1/34 magic. This is modified slighlty by the difference between the monster's level and the item's level (ie Hell Baal dropping a Sash is more likely to be high quality).

Your MF is applied to the chance next. However, it is put through a diminishing formula, slightly different for each test. For the unique test your effective MF is MF * 250 / (MF+250). This is capped above at 250 no matter how high your MF gets. Your 215% becomes 115% after diminshing, which means an item is 2.15 times as likely to drop unique, or about 1/186 of the time. For sets, the formula uses 500 instead of 250. For rares, 600. For magic, it is not diminished at all, so you do have 3.15 times the chance of an item dropping magic, or about 1/11.

Next you apply boss bonuses. Random uniques, fixed uniques and particularly act bosses get a further improvement to their quality chance here. For example, Mephisto is 1024/41 times as likely to drop a unique, set or rare as a regular monster, and always drops at least magical. That brings your chance of getting a unique from Meph up to a healthy 1/7 or so - just about one every time you kill him. It doesn't take too long to fill up your stash running Meph.

There are some details I have omitted for simplicity, but that is probably enough to get you going.

Good luck, and welcome to 1.10.

[Kasreyn]

I guess my optimism in gambling was due to the fact that within 30 minutes of first playing 1.10, I gambled a unique (Steelgoad for my new polearm barb), so I guess I was laboring under the assumption that the odds were livable.

Here's a question... if (as I'm given to understand) the game generates all the items on a gambling screen when you click gamble - and NOT when you buy them, but before - then does this mean it's wise, if you're gambling for a set or unique, to make sure you don't miss a single one of its base item? It can often take me 10 to 12 reloads to get Gheed to offer a chain gloves, and I get into this glazed-eyes routine of clicking and cancelling, sometimes I cancel a screen that had a chain gloves hiding on it. I wish gambling items were displayed on a "mannequin", with one weapon, one shield, one armor, one hat, one glove, one boot, and jewels in the appropriate spots. Then you'd know where to look. :P */gripe*

But speaking of this, does anyone know why Jamella's gamble screen takes longer to load than Gheed's? The items appear to be the same. In my game (LoD 1.10 Open with a nocd loader), Gheed's screen opens nearly instantly; Jamella's has about a quarter second lag. Could this be due to the rendering of Jamella's graphical little "air-signature" move, or is it just my comp? Can anyone else test their D2's to see if they get "Jamella Lag" also? I haven't noticed it with any other gambling merchant.

At least I have gotten loads of good rares. Yesterday I burned through something like 500,000 gold on gambles (I'm a gambling addict!!), and got some nice things, mostly rare chain gloves (hmm, wonder why ^_^). But since I have a gold max and nothing else worth spending it on (repairs and merc revives are cheap for now), I guess I'll keep gambling and hoping. :)

Btw, found a 2-socket plate mail and am planning to make Stealth for my MF Sorcie (since I'm a couple runes shy of Wealth), but I was wondering if it was worth waiting to try to find a Light Plate since it's a lighter armor type and won't drain stamina so bad? But of course, Stealth adds 25% run/walk anyway... will that stack with Treads of Chthon or War Traveller (which is my next target item after chancies)?

Whew... fulla questions, ain't I? ^_^

Finally, as to MF, last night I ditched my Chilling Staff of the Magus (with a fond farewell) and switched to Gull + Whitstan's, and also moved into A4. However, monsters here seem to be dropping really poor stuff. Are late A3 monsters actually higher mlvl than early A4?! Because I was getting much better drops from Blood Lords and Heirophants *without* Gull, than I am from Venom Lords and Stranglers *with* Gull. o.O

Reached L32, working on FO and CM. Equip question: Smoke or Stealth? I can make either. Shield question: 3 diamond tower or Ancient's Pledge? I'm a Shael shy of Rhyme.

Off to do a few Meph runs!

-Kasreyn

[Thrugg]

You are correct about the danger that the unique version of an item might go by in the gamble screen, then you will never be able to get it that session. Have to be careful, I'm afraid.

Jamella's gamble screen is like that for everyone. I don't know why. It even happens in Single Player. it is very annoying for the "power gambler" :P

I usually try to make runewords in the preferable armour type, but if you only have one char and you really need it right away, it isn't crucial. The main reason people use Light Plate is for the lower Str requirement rather than stamina drain (and a speed penalty too) with heavier armour. Sorc don't usually have many points to spend on Str.
Faster Run/Walk does stack but it has diminishing returns. Movement speed is explained at length here.

Late A3 monsters are about the same level as early A4 monsters, certainly not less. They should be dropping about the same level in terms of base item - such things are fairly random of course. A reason you might be seeing lower quality items is because there usually aren't as many boss packs in the early part of an Act as the final stages. Bosses (even random ones) and champion monsters get a drop quality bonus that makes quite a difference. Also, the wraith-type monsters (such as Stranglers, also Gloams & Ghosts) don't drop the same as their more solid friends. They tend to drop more jewelry, charms, gems and runes, and less equipment items. Which can make a perceptive difference to your overall drops.

I have to admit I have never made Smoke in an armour, though I have heard good things about it. My developing caster chars usually get the (very good) Stealth/Rhyme combo. I would go for a 3 diamond tower over Ancient's Pledge (if you can lift one), but keep a look out for a Shael.

Good luck :)

[Mephista]

Go for an exceptional or elite equivalent of a quilted armor (I'm forgetting the name now). Higher def, less strength needed. Sorcie shouldn't be wearing heavy armor for run/walk issues. (Although they do look hot in plate mail.)

Back in the day, my MF addict friends would do 100+ meph runs per sitting. That gets boring for me... I just play. =P

[Brista]

I saw a post by Brista on AB saying unique gambling chance was now "realistic" in 1.10, and I laughed myself sick.

Heh, don't believe everything Brista writes ;)

I think I said that it was realistic to gamble a Gaze, an item which I myself had never found MFing

Remember to that the gold is trivial, maxxed gold finders get over 100k per council boss in Travincal

So it's basically time. If you spent a week gambling bone helms you would probably get a Gaze and if you spent a week MFing Meph you probably wouldn't

Of course you'd get a sackload of other stuff from MFing

Also at the time I wrote that we didnt know about the MF/Act Boss quest reward bug which skews things considerably towards MF