Gambling

[gta-maloy]]

Gambling

how clvl is involved

Character level determins two things while gambling, the first is what items may be purchased and the second is what item lvl the purchased item will attain.

(I had the list here...too long)

ilvls are determined by an equation:
ilvl = clvl + rnd[10] - 5
or more simply clvl-5/+4

odds via uniques, sets, rares

The odds to receive a specific quality are much higher than I had originally expected. The following are the odds for a purchased item to become unique/set/rare.

unique: 1/2000
set: 1/1000
rare: 1/10
magical: 1/~1.1

or percentages:

magic: 89.93%
rare: 10%
set: 0.05%
unique: 0.02%

Odds at attainning exceptional/elite versions of the item

here are the equations used to determine whether or not the item will become eceptional or elite:

exceptional = 1 + (ilvl - excep qlvl) * GambleUber / 100

elite = 1 + (ilvl - elite qlvl) * GambleUltra / 100

gambleuber = 90
gambleultra = 33

One last thing I would like to add about gambling is simply this. MagicFind in no way affects gambling.

sources:
http://www.battle.net/forums/thread.aspx?f...&p=1#post102770
http://www.theamazonbasin.com/d2/forums/in...opic=28671&st=0
http://www.lurkerlounge.com/forums/index.p...t=ST&f=8&t=3827
http://www.diabloii.net/items/quick-gambling
Thanks to Rob7410 for pointing this out

[Thrugg]

They revised the odds for set and unique between the beta and the final version of 1.10.
You have listed the correct fractional odds for final 1.10, but the percentages are for the beta. It is now
magic: 89.85%
rare: 10%
set: 0.1%
unique: 0.05%

[Crystalion]

,Aug 5 2004, 10:30 AM] ilvls are determined by an equation:
ilvl = clvl + rnd[10] - 5
or more simply clvl-5/+4

...
magical: 1/~1.1 ...

IMO clvl-5/+4 is notationally confusing. More traditional would be [clvl-5..clvl+4] (where "[" is an inclusive range delimiter and "{" non-inclusive) and this is commonly abbrv. to clvl-5..clvl+4.

FYI the odds of uniques are a bit lower in practice, because every item generated for the gamble screen and every item dropped in the game, if it is unique, flags the game state to not generate that "unique" again (this mechanism is perhaps not bullet-proof, as occassional claims of exceptions are made).

"Failed" uniques get rerolled as hidurares (high durability rares).

As a bit of trivia: in Classic gambles of throwing weapons always seem to come out as normal or superior.

Also I believe Ruvanal pointed out, in someone's prior summary post like this, that you can only gamble exceptionals in nm/hell and elites in hell.

And your post is short enough that I assume your omission of how ilvl/qlvl/alvl interact is beyond the scope of your presentation? (If you don't know this stuff, then a comment such as I recently made, that lower level characters should consider gambling the "worst" base item for caps/gloves/boots, makes little sense).

Happy Gambling. :)

[adeyke]

Also I believe Ruvanal pointed out, in someone's prior summary post like this, that you can only gamble exceptionals in nm/hell and elites in hell.

This is not the case. You can gamble even elites in normal with a sufficient clvl. AFAIK, all gambling vendors in all difficulties are completely equivalent except for the resale prices.

[Ruvanal]

Also I believe Ruvanal pointed out, in someone's prior summary post like this, that you can only gamble exceptionals in nm/hell and elites in hell.

This is not something that fits with what I know of the gamble function in the code nor have I pointed such a thing out (since it is false). There is for shopping at the vendor restrictions only having exceptionals appear in nightmare and hell difficulties along with a similar restriction that the elites will only appear in the shops in hell difficulty.

[Crystalion]

Also I believe Ruvanal pointed out, in someone's prior summary post like this, that you can only gamble exceptionals in nm/hell and elites in hell.

This is not something that fits with what I know of the gamble function in the code nor have I pointed such a thing out (since it is false).

Gotcha.

Funny, I thought the LL was relatively deserted lately, but apparently all I have to do to summon the experts is to make an off-hand misrecollection. I'll be sure to try that next time I want an answer to some issue ;)

Presumably one can not gamble (or shop or horcube) elites in Classic? This would suggest that gamble prices in Classic and and LoD diverge at some clvl, eh?

AFAIK then, when one notices a price bump in a base item (e.g. a lower base item costing more than a higher base item) that is due to the possibility of the item being exceptional or elite (gambled in any difficulty)? Presumably the qlvl/clvl -5..+4 interaction order is nonetheless such that the optimal time to gamble for an exc/elite is some levels beyond when they are first available? (Unlike, I assume, circlets/coronets which must be at least a certain ilvl, i.e. clvl+4, when you first (can) see them?)

[gta-maloy]]

Yes, I have caught on to the error in percentages. Thanks you for all the feedback on this topic.

To Crystalion:

only ilvl and clvl are a factor while gambling, vendor/act/difficulty do not matter. AFAIK prices do not alter because of exceptional/elite versions.

Also, you mentioned qlvl above, qlvl or item quality level is used to help determine if a drop is possible when a unique is selected to drop. I don't understand why this was mentioned for gambling :S

[Ruvanal]

Presumably one can not gamble (or shop or horcube) elites in Classic? This would suggest that gamble prices in Classic and and LoD diverge at some clvl, eh?

Correct and I would imagine that there is a price divergence. But I have not paid much attention to the portions of the game that have had differences set up for the classic version to be sure that they made a price allowance for classic not getting elites in gambling. You might still be getting the increased price at that point even though there is no chance of the elite.

AFAIK then, when one notices a price bump in a base item (e.g. a lower base item costing more than a higher base item) that is due to the possibility of the item being exceptional or elite (gambled in any difficulty)?

Yes for that item. Not all gambled items on the screen have the same ilvl, so it might serve as a small giveaway that a particular item has a chance to be an upgraded version.

Presumably the qlvl/clvl -5..+4 interaction order is nonetheless such that the optimal time to gamble for an exc/elite is some levels beyond when they are first available?

Correct. Particularly for those that are not aware of being able to spot teh price bump (which would include me in casual play).

(Unlike, I assume, circlets/coronets which must be at least a certain ilvl, i.e. clvl+4, when you first (can) see them?)

Sorry I do not follow what you are trying to state here?

For gambling the base item is chosen from those with a qlvl<=ilvl (iirc or is it qlvl<ilvl). Then if the ilvl is high enough to allow the upgrade codes item qlvl there will be the bump in price and a chance of the upgrade.

The screwy part with the circlets, coronets, tiaras and diadems is the way the upgrade codes were set for each of the four items.
circlet::circlet->tiara->diadem
coronet::coronet->tiara->diadem
tiara::coronet->tiara->diadem
diadem::coronet->tiara->diadem

While both the circlet and coronet show the same upgrades, the resulting item will use the graphic of the first item after the "::" to display the item on the gambling screen. So even if the game started by picking a circlet and then upgraded it to a tiara or diadem, the display would then show circlets as circlets and the other three types as a coronet.

[Crystalion]

,Aug 6 2004, 01:47 AM] AFAIK prices do not alter because of exceptional/elite versions.

They do and they don't, depending on the sense in which you mean "prices alter". If you look up some old thread on gambling pricing (that isn't out of date due to changes) you'll probably find what I'm referring to: when the ilvl/qlvl increases enough to allow the exc/elite versions to be possible, the gamble price (cost) gets a bump up. (They don't alter in the sense of tipping you off to whether an item *is* exc/elite).

This sometimes results in a "lower" base item gamble price in excess of the next base item(s?), which themselves are not yet possible to bump up (to exc/elite).

Also, you mentioned qlvl above, qlvl or item quality level is used to help determine if a drop is possible when a unique is selected to drop. I don't understand why this was mentioned for gambling :S

When one summarizes gambling info I make the presumption the info is for consumption by gamblers... a common desire of gamblers is to increase their odds of particular affixes and to achieve this it might be worth mentioning the way in which qlvl detracts from ilvl in arriving at alvl (except for magic_level > 0 bases). In lay terms, you'll sometimes find it "better" (in some sense) to limit your gambling to the lower base items.

Was I any clearer this time, or was that not what I mentioned that was confusing? Perhaps the issue of killing uniques? You can find threads documenting the "loss" of uniques to game drops and to gambling caused by gambling. The non-technical quickie advice would be to only gamble in a fresh game (and then don't play in that game) and to *always* buy every base item of the type(s) you are seeking to get a unique during your gambling session. It is probably true that the effect is small in practice, but eliminating the unfavorable clipping "costs nothing", so why not avoid a tragedy (i.e. getting a hidurare)?

[Crystalion]

The screwy part with the circlets, coronets, tiaras and diadems is the way the upgrade codes were set for each of the four items.&nbsp;
circlet::circlet->tiara->diadem
coronet::coronet->tiara->diadem
tiara::coronet->tiara->diadem
diadem::coronet->tiara->diadem

While both the circlet and coronet show the same upgrades, the resulting item will use the graphic of the first item after the "::" to display the item on the gambling screen.&nbsp; So even if the game started by picking a circlet and then upgraded it to a tiara or diadem, the display would then show circlets as circlets and the other three types as a coronet.

(the answer to the "Sorry I do not follow what you are trying to state here?" part is that I was merely pointing out that when you've not seen a base item before, gambling, and level up, the first ones you see are clvl+4. A trivial point but important for non-coronets/circlets because at that point the alvl is the worst possible, and so the gamble for them isn't great, *unless* you're planning to craft or reroll and knowing the ilvl is clvl+4 is a benefit, e.g. for a base item you can't otherwise easily obtain/shop).

Yes, I know about the oddity with the Coronet display (no doubt from reading you detailing it long ago?) and in fact came up with a Bayesean argument to only buy Coronet gambles when pairs (or more) of them are showing. The probably slight edge involved here is no doubt dwarfed by the time loss in doing so many gamble screen refreshes, but as such gambles are quite costly (relative to the total amount of gold you're likely to have to gamble with) I thought it couldn't hurt.

Ignoring the details here it probably still is relevant to have him add to his summary that one should not gamble circlets expecting to get diadems/tiaras (ever).

[gta-maloy]]

Was I any clearer this time, or was that not what I mentioned that was confusing? Perhaps the issue of killing uniques? You can find threads documenting the "loss" of uniques to game drops and to gambling caused by gambling. The non-technical quickie advice would be to only gamble in a fresh game (and then don't play in that game) and to *always* buy every base item of the type(s) you are seeking to get a unique during your gambling session. It is probably true that the effect is small in practice, but eliminating the unfavorable clipping "costs nothing", so why not avoid a tragedy (i.e. getting a hidurare)?

no, I understood the unique items part, I simply think we both are speaking of a seperate "qlvl"

What I mean is simply this:

gull dagger
TC-doesn't matter here, melee3 I think
qlvl - 6

the qlvl is there to stop a monster from dropping the dagger unless monster level (or area level) is equal to or greater than 6....I do not know what you speak of when you say "qlvl"

[Thrugg]

The same is true of gambling. For each item in the gamble window, the game generates an ilvl randomly in the [clvl-5, clvl+4] range.
It then does the roll for quality. If it successfully rolls unique, it then checks the level of the unique against the ilvl and if the ilvl is too low, the item will be rare (triple durability? Not actually sure here, I only ever gamble amulets and rings :) but I would assume so)
So a level 1 char cannot gamble a Gull ever.

[Crystalion]

,Aug 6 2004, 12:24 PM] no, I understood the unique items part, I simply think we both are speaking of a seperate "qlvl"

qlvl is short for quality level and in common D2geek usage is used to refer to both the qlvl that all base items have as well as the additional qlvl for set and uniques.

Its design function is indeed to scale the "quality" of an item by a limit of ilvl. I can understand that it is confusing, for sets and uniques, to casually use the term for both numbers (each of which are used... in many cases for normal sets the qlvl of the set is essentially irrelevant as the qlvl for the base item is higher, but, as Thrugg points out, the qlvl for a Gull dagger is very relevant, as it is higher than the base item qlvl by quite a bit).

I vaguely recall Jarulf once expressing a preference to use two different terms here, for clarity.

In any event, the "qlvl" that a non-set/non-unique item has, from its base type, will affect what affixes the item can get (when magical etc.) by clipping alvl. This is potentially unimportant for sufficiently high ilvl items as the alvl can end up being so high anyway as to surpass the highest affix alvl req. (particularly relevant for Classic, which has a weenier set of affixes available). (Again, this effect is bypassed for items, like circ/coronet, that have a magic_level... this greatly affects what clvl you'd try to gamble +skill headgear depending on what base item you're gambling!).

[Crystalion]

and if the ilvl is too low, the item will be rare (triple durability?&nbsp; Not actually sure here, I only ever gamble amulets and rings :) but I would assume so)
So a level 1 char cannot gamble a Gull ever.

Normal Andy (in classic) recently dropped four rares and a magic item, so, vaguely recalling a recent Ruvanal post ("vaguely recalling" is going to be my new watch phrase here, LOL) I looked at the magic item and, sure enough, it was a hidurare, a double durability Trident iirc (aka a failed set).

Checking through the rares I noticed a 3x hidurare Falchion (failed unique, because norm Andy didn't meet the qlvl for Gleamscythe).

As to clvl 1 Gamblers (gone are the golden days when you could gamble ammys at that clvl, sigh)... it would be nice to have a master calculator, that would quickly tell us the figure for the (low) millions of gold a clvl 11 (probably optimal?) gambler would need to go through, on average, to get a Gull (etc.). Afaik this is one of the "easier" unique gambles (and should be easier in Classic, timewise, as slightly fewer low level base items show up to crowd out daggers).

I am not really aware of what hack programs are out there, but it wouldn't surprise me if there were shop and gamble bots.

Certainly Gold Find builds seem like an interesting bot tactic (since I have heard that auto-pickup of drops is an available cheat).

The "mule" in Dungeon Siege was kinda cool, but what I'd really like to see in EQ/D2 genre games is programmable sidekicks (i.e. extending the rpg "party" under control of one player concept by letting you develop characters and having the game then "automagically" run them somewhat as you've shown/indicated--not that far beyond the Shadow Warrior/Master copycat AI, really).

In such a game, of course, you'd be free to make buying/selling "character" bots. People would no doubt "hire out" character they'd raised/trained as mercs (and, of course, you'd potentially have trained chars guarding your estate... only, perhaps, to return online to find it looted and razed?)

A pity that market dynamics (i.e. high costs, limited "slice of consumer pie" available) has sharply limited innovation.

[Any1]

I usually spend all my cash by gambling on rings, amulets, circlets. I have a few characters at clvl 80-90 and beyond, so I do a lot of gambling. It's also a fun way to keep my motivation up for leveling a character.

It seems that at least for rings, my chances of getting a unique are much better than 1 in 2000. I just gmabled a Raven Frost yesterday, as well as a Dwarf Star the day before. I remember gambling a Dwarf Star and a Nagel, in the same session, a few weeks back. I usually get at least one set or unique every three sessions.

At clvl 85+ I usually have about three million in cash. A ring costing 50K to gamble, I gamble about 60 rings per session. That's a unique/set every 180 rings. I should seriously start keeping closer stats on this.

Anyone else have this experience?

[gta-maloy]]

Yes but I think that with rings t seems as though you are getting more only because of the following:

1) there is no magical version of rings/amus.
2) the price is right and you can gamble many at a time.

[dta]

Sorry for resurrecting an old thread... was searching for something else and this thread came up and noticed this line just now.

AFAIK then, when one notices a price bump in a base item (e.g. a lower base item costing more than a higher base item) that is due to the possibility of the item being exceptional or elite (gambled in any difficulty)?


Yes for that item. Not all gambled items on the screen have the same ilvl, so it might serve as a small giveaway that a particular item has a chance to be an upgraded version.

Hmm. so that's why a few times, I noted the gambling price for sash became costing more than plated belt... didn't thought of anything about it though at that time...

Where can I find the character levels that such a price bump start to occur for the various items? Has someone made a list of when (clvl) you start to be able to gamble for exceptional sash? elite sash?

[adeyke]

Sorry for resurrecting an old thread... was searching for something else and this thread came up and noticed this line just now.
Hmm. so that's why a few times, I noted the gambling price for sash became costing more than plated belt... didn't thought of anything about it though at that time...

Where can I find the character levels that such a price bump start to occur for the various items? Has someone made a list of when (clvl) you start to be able to gamble for exceptional sash? elite sash?
[right][snapback]71852[/snapback][/right]

In order to gamble an exceptional item, the ilvl (determined by clvl - 5 to clvl + 4) must be at least equal to the exceptional item's qlvl. The same goes for elite items.

[gta-maloy]]

In order to gamble an exceptional item, the ilvl (determined by clvl - 5 to clvl + 4) must be at least equal to the exceptional item's qlvl.&nbsp; The same goes for elite items.
[right][snapback]71873[/snapback][/right]

these qlvls are listed @ http://www.d2data.net