Gradual Reduction in MF Effectiveness

[JustAGuy]

Wow, somebody's gettin' all riled up. Ok, now some words regarding the "stupid" issue at hand.

The realms version vs. the single player version: definitely not identical, probably mostly minor differences, i.e. bug fixes. We know for a fact that they are different, because Blizzard has stated that they made some realms-only patches for a couple of things. To what extent, we don't know, but according to you that's immaterial.

The effectiveness of MF does not reduce after multiple runs of the same monster.

What was Blizzard's aim with Diablo 2 v1.10? To make things harder. Things got a lot harder, if only temporarily. It's actually hardest when you have crappy items. Blizzard has made bosses drop well the first time, and poorly afterward (but still good, in most cases). Blizzard has made Pindleskin (arguably the easiest to boss to reach) drop good things less frequently. Blizzard made the Durance level 2 massive in order to slow Mephisto runners (I assume, there isn't any other reason for it). Blizzard made the tower bigger, presumably to slow Countess runners.

Now, what breaks this nice little model Blizzard has created? The items make the game fun, the items make the game unbalanced, the items make the game easier; having easy access to the all the great items with very little effort and almost no risk shatters it. Do a few runs, and you are guaranteed to get some really great, if not the best, items in the game. What about all those other schmoes that bust their humps with only a sharp short sword of the leech and a sturdy leather armour to take Hell on with?

Is it so unbelieveable that Blizzard would add one more thing to the already long list of changes to make the game that much harder? Less good items = more difficulty. Items are there for incentive, and eventually you will find them. In the mean time, you have to suffer? No -- people run for it. But running isn't what Blizzard intended, otherwise they would not have decreased the drop after 1st kill, otherwise they would not have made the durance and some other levels bigger, otherwise they would not have MADE THE GAME GIVE YOU CRAP IF YOU KEEP RUNNING. Your MF doesn't give you crap, the game does by way of a mechanism we don't know about.

So yes, some of what we as runners are experiencing is psychological. I concede that one. But that's not to say that it isn't happening. Technically, there is no degredation of MF, but I highly doubt that these results are simply statistical. When drops have the perceived curve that we are experiencing, you know it isn't just the law of averages working itself out. There is very possibly a hidden mechanism causing this behaviour.

You mention that people hardly notice this problem. That's probably because the people who do notice it are the ones doing it the old fashioned way, and not using a "bot". People who use "bots" to run wouldn't notice anything, nor would they care, since they just let the bot go over night and, by average (even with diminished possibility of a good drop), they would have the loot they sought.

While doing a bunch of runs won't prove anything, I'm still going to do them. Why? Well, it gives me something to do, and I just might find those sweet items. I'm going to write down the results for sanity's sake, and if a clear pattern emerges, you'll be the first to know. ;)

You know, the Blizzard developers are quite talented. Diablo II is a very complicated game. They could have come up with something very ingenious to achieve this "midly annoying" feature. It's not necessarily someplace you've looked before. After all, you haven't really taken a long hard look at the game code this time around, so it's quite possible you could have missed it.

I see what you mean though; why spend time trying to prove or disprove something that, at this moment, is in your opinion, non-existant. My answer is, why not?