Misc. minor musings & testing v1.10s oddities

[Crystalion]

In the course of my thinking about tests and problems I often wonder about how particular things work that affect my "plans". Usually I'll find an answer on AS or AB or LL and be satisfied. Often, however, I'll run a quick test to verify an answer.

Most of these results I bury in my mind so I won't "wonder" next time the issue comes up. But I figured if I started dumping some of these into a thread there is a decent chance that a reply to an oddity might reveal (to me) something interesting (like Librarian telling me about v1.09 Golem inheritance of caster replenish life).

So here are a few from the last half hour, for starters...

V1.10s, SP, normal Pindle area, with a Necro (no hireling, no minions) with -25 damage reduction circlet *and* amulet (two perf Life Everlastings) with Bone Armor up... Prowling Dead took down the bone armor and then weren't able to ever do any damage to me. Even so, their no damage hits steadily eroded my durability on my various pieces of armor.

The AS basic experience info is wrong, at least for v1.10s, in several respects.

For example, for 2 players I tested the permutations of:
not/partied
not/nearby
not/nearby w/ in/out of zone (i.e. AS assertion about being in named zone mattering)

The more recent info about xp splits needing to be within ~2 screens *plus* needing to be in zone is true but not the odd assumption one might make from AS statements that a not-nearby partied member who is nonetheless in zone gives +35% xp bonus.

Also the statement that xp is at least 1 isn't precise, as 5% of 18 xp for a Sorc of level 36 killing a blood moor fallen turns out to be 0 xp (killing the quill rats and zombies, at 21 & 33 respectively, give 1 xp).

Finally, a level 1 character killing a level 31 act 5 Enslaved (with do, for a level 36 Sorc, give the 1179 xp d2data indicates) gave only 23 xp, which is way below the supposed 5% minimum suggested on AS. As 23 is such an odd number I'm inclined to guess that whatever formula is used for dilution for kills above you either is capped at 2% or isn't capped. I didn't find it convenient to do additional tests to try to answer that (though they wouldn't be terribly hard).

Here's a fun one I've not tested: If a below clvl 11 character is using a socketed shield, and you stick an Eld rune into it while it is still equiped, I'm sure it remains on their arm but turns "red"... will the character block still? At the increased rate from the Eld? Similar questions can be constructed for, e.g., completing a runeword on an equiped item (with some runewords you could even have the case where only the final rune inserted takes the item over clvl req, such as Honor).

Unlike that test, I have lots of tests I haven't gotten around to doing that I consider significant, in case you were wondering "why doesn't he just do it?". An example would be that I don't understand why my clvl 6 Necro isn't successful damaging monsters near the Frigid Highlands waypoint with CE.

Lots of oddities I have no way of knowing if they are significant. An example of that would be seeing Bloody Foothills lightning catapult hits "shock" my clvl 1 character (no resists) but do no damage. I can think of *several* plausible explanations, but narrowing it down would take too much time away from my other testing (and occasional play).

Feel free to post your oddities here (this isn't a "Crystalion research report" thread). :)