Rarest drop in the game?

In my last post, I talked about having four

Sol runes and no chipped Saphire for two weeks. It's now three weeks and I have ten

Sol runes and no

Chipped Sapphire. What, do you think, are the odds of that happening?
Let's frame this with some context. I've been playing Nightmare Anderial runs P3 and P5.

In the same time frame, I've seen many set drops (if I see another Sigon set piece drop I think my eyes will bleed), many unique armors, weapons, wands, staves and many great rares. I also had three 10 million gold gambling vacations at

Gheed's Gambling Emporium where I got numerous +2 to skills coronets. Let's talk about things that helped my character: 47% MF

Tarnhelm to replace my 33% one, 39% Chance Guard to replace my 33% one, 30% Naglering to replace my 24% one, Lidless Eye with 344 def to replace my 286 def one, Occulace and SOJ.

NO CHIPPED SAPHIRE.

I just don't understand.

Don't kill bosses for gems...kill everything else.

Nightmare for chipped gems? You get tons of them in normal.

If you want chipped gems the best ways I have found to get them is from cows and normal catacombs. Chests and Caskets are a good way to get gems and with normal catacombs, there is an abundance of those and flawed can't drop at the level so it is forcing just chipped

yeah i'd recommend start a new build for fun with some MF bonus and you'll get a drop for sure on normal

You want unlimited chippies,

El runes and elds? Play on a Brand new character in A1 haha

Everybody is missing the point. I've been getting chipped gems of ALL other types the whole time...NO CHIPPED Sapphires at all in over three weeks.

Obviously that's unfortunate and highly unlikely but that's just how probability works... If you want them, go to A1 normal.

I have one I will give you for free. I don't think anyone is missing the point. Found several (6 or 7 of pretty much every chipped gem) today and yesterday leveling a new character. Cubed most but would gladly give you one, if you want. Normal is the way to go for chippies.

I appreciate the gem offer. And everybody IS missing the point. The point is that in three weeks a gem didn't drop. All the other gems of that level had dropped multiple times. I find that amazing. I guess no one else does.

It's not amazing. It may sound like a cop-out answer, but that's RNG. I went two weeks without a

Chipped Topaz early last season when I needed one. The only reason you're noticing this right now is because you need exactly what you aren't getting.

For a series of X chipped gem drops, you have the same chance for any one sequence of X chipped gems as any other individual sequence. You're picking up the sequence with no chipped sapphires, but the odds of that are no different than another individual sequence.

The problem with our perception of probabilities is that we look at it as what we want vs. the field. That makes sense in certain analytical scenarios, but you're never "due" for a specific drop. When you break down each individual outcome (assuming that the possible outcomes aren't weighted), it's the same as any other. Someone's going to hit that sequence of no chipped sapphires eventually, just like someone else would have hit chipped sapphire-amethyst-topaz-topaz-skull in order for a hypothetical sequence of 5.

I started carrying one of each type and quality of gem in my shared stash and also extra assorted non-perfect gems in my gem mule's inventory to withstand future dry spells. I haven't worried about any gem droughts since.

I'd gladly trade some of my saphires for your

Topaz or amethysts

As others pointed out, to specifically look for chipped gems in nightmare is not a good option.
I allways create a "lowgems" mule so i allways have some when needed to cube - and i've allways more spahires than any other gem, because i craft rings with

Sol runes.

Budda_Belly wrote: 2 years ago

In my last post, I talked about having four

Sol runes and no chipped Saphire for two weeks. It's now three weeks and I have ten

Sol runes and no

Chipped Sapphire. What, do you think, are the odds of that happening?
Let's frame this with some context. I've been playing Nightmare Anderial runs P3 and P5.

In the same time frame, I've seen many set drops (if I see another Sigon set piece drop I think my eyes will bleed), many unique armors, weapons, wands, staves and many great rares. I also had three 10 million gold gambling vacations at

Gheed's Gambling Emporium where I got numerous +2 to skills coronets. Let's talk about things that helped my character: 47% MF

Tarnhelm to replace my 33% one, 39% Chance Guard to replace my 33% one, 30% Naglering to replace my 24% one, Lidless Eye with 344 def to replace my 286 def one, Occulace and SOJ.

NO CHIPPED SAPHIRE.

I just don't understand.

Simply farm your way through

The Forgotten Tower in Normal Difficulty a couple times and you will all have so many chipped gems they will be coming out of your ears.

Budda_Belly wrote: 2 years ago

I find that amazing. I guess no one else does.

yeah it is as puzzling as rune drops VS

Key drops on countess.

it works on the same Principle, where you need actually lower chances/<=players5 to get runes and higher chances to get

Key/P8.

it is puzzling. but it also makes sense you'd get shitty crappy stuff on P1 rather than on P8.

its not that obvious, I agree on that!

Budda_Belly wrote: 2 years ago

I appreciate the gem offer. And everybody IS missing the point. The point is that in three weeks a gem didn't drop. All the other gems of that level had dropped multiple times. I find that amazing. I guess no one else does.

Honestly, no one is missing that point, it's hardly a complicated point.

You're right, it is amazing, but that's just RNG! Plenty of things like this will happen. I found almost every unique ring in the game before I found a Manald, including two Bul-Kathos rings, for example.

Budda_Belly wrote: 2 years ago

In my last post, I talked about having four

Sol runes and no chipped Saphire for two weeks. It's now three weeks and I have ten

Sol runes and no

Chipped Sapphire. What, do you think, are the odds of that happening?
Let's frame this with some context. I've been playing Nightmare Anderial runs P3 and P5.

In the same time frame, I've seen many set drops (if I see another Sigon set piece drop I think my eyes will bleed), many unique armors, weapons, wands, staves and many great rares. I also had three 10 million gold gambling vacations at

Gheed's Gambling Emporium where I got numerous +2 to skills coronets. Let's talk about things that helped my character: 47% MF

Tarnhelm to replace my 33% one, 39% Chance Guard to replace my 33% one, 30% Naglering to replace my 24% one, Lidless Eye with 344 def to replace my 286 def one, Occulace and SOJ.

NO CHIPPED SAPHIRE.

I just don't understand.

cow runs in normal. tons of chipped gems.
kill trash in general.

rikus wrote: 2 years ago

Budda_Belly wrote: 2 years ago

I find that amazing. I guess no one else does.

yeah it is as puzzling as rune drops VS

Key drops on countess.

it works on the same Principle, where you need actually lower chances/<=players5 to get runes and higher chances to get

Key/P8.

it is puzzling. but it also makes sense you'd get shitty crappy stuff on P1 rather than on P8.

its not that obvious, I agree on that!

Player count generally has zero impact on the quality of drops, only the quantity.

Countess is a very special Edge case for runes up to

Ist because of her extra rune drop table which can be picked from multiple times but suffers from items from the normal picks having priority while a hard

Cap on drop amount is enforced that is actually lower than the theoretical max number of items from normal picks + rune picks. As a result, increasing player count, which lowers the no drop odds, results in on average more items from the normal picks, reducing the number of open items possible from the rune table, in turn actually lowering the odds for runes up to

Ist from countess on higher player counts. The odds of runes beyond that, up to

Lo, still go up because those can only drop from the normal picks and not the rune table.

Random normal gem-dropping mobs don't work like that and follow a very different Principle which is the general Principle of "every higher odd number of players = lower no drop = more loot on average".

Schnorki wrote: 2 years ago

Player count generally has zero impact on the quality of drops, only the quantity.

my bad. I am still learning the game even after 20 years.

so the MF is what influences the quality of the item that drops? not the chance for the drop itself? where can i read on this..

regard countess drops, I'm guessing you read this:
https://www.reddit.com/r/diablo2/commen ... unes_keys/

i only scrolled down..so I'm asking you, you sound like an expert, if players count(P1-p8) affect rune drops quality(or does it?), what would be a good balance to get higher runes drop? p5? p7? p3?

I remember doing a few runs on hell countess p1, getting really low, and when i raised it, it upped a bit. but it could be just RNG luck..not much of a runner in any scale.

rikus wrote: 2 years ago

Schnorki wrote: 2 years ago

Player count generally has zero impact on the quality of drops, only the quantity.

my bad. I am still learning the game even after 20 years.

so the MF is what influences the quality of the item that drops? not the chance for the drop itself? where can i read on this..

Depends on how you define quality.

In a rather simplified rundown, every mob has a selection of items they can drop. Be that gold, runes, gems, armors, weapons, whatever.
As you kill said mob, they get x amount of picks from that selection and can drop up to x items.

Depending on the mob, each such pick may also result in a "no drop", meaning no item is selected for that pick, reducing the overall number of items they drop. That no drop chance is what gets reduced with player count, resulting in more items being picked and hence dropped overall. This is purely a matter of quantity, not quality.

Now, when the mob does pick an item they may pick say a

Long War Bow, a

Gothic Bow or a

Hydra Bow (so normal/excep/elite). The odds of each of these happening (excluding the no drop factor above) are set per mob/treasure class. They may change with level (read:

Terror zones shifting mobs into different treasure classes/loot selections) but will not change based on anything you do. Player count or your MF have no impact on this.

When the mob does decide to drop a

Hydra Bow though, that bow can then be White, magic, rare, unique, ... that roll is where your MF comes into play, giving you higher odds of receiving a

Windforce overall because while your odds of getting a

Hydra Bow won't change, your odds of getting a

Windforce out of it when you do get one move up with MF.

Runes similarly have their odds dictated by the mob and its treasure class and are unaffected by player count (except for the no drop factor) or your MF.

Again, the above is fairly simplified. For significantly more detail, see for example https://diablo2.diablowiki.net/Item_Generation_Tutorial




TL;DR:
- Player count going up increases the total number of items but has no impact on their quality or rarity.
- MF going up gives items that can be magic/rare/set/unique to begin with a higher chance of being magic/rare/set/unique when they drop but does not impact how often those specific items drop to begin with.
- Everything else (elite vs. excep vs. normal, high rune vs. low rune, ...) is dictated only by the mob you kill and its inherent item selection.

rikus wrote: 2 years ago

Budda_Belly wrote: 2 years ago

I find that amazing. I guess no one else does.

yeah it is as puzzling as rune drops VS

Key drops on countess.

it works on the same Principle, where you need actually lower chances/<=players5 to get runes and higher chances to get

Key/P8.

it is puzzling. but it also makes sense you'd get shitty crappy stuff on P1 rather than on P8.

its not that obvious, I agree on that!

That's roughly 100 hours of play time with ALL other types dropping multiple times and no Sapphires.

I wasn't looking for advice on how to get chipped gems (I took my Druid outside the

Rogue Encampment and had two of them in about ten minutes), I was simply making an observation that I hadn't noticed before and found to be odd (to me at least).