The Pit Farming Advice?

I'm currently running a Lv.78

Poison Nova Necromancer (with 3 pieces of Tran-Oul's and

Blackbog's Sharp) at the moment, and I was absolutely destroying content, until I hit Act 2 Hell. There was quite a bit of Poison Immune enemies, which my

Lower Resist didn't seem to have any affect on anymore. This led me to looking for ways to compensate, which in turn led me to realize that I would have to get myself a

Death's Web, which isn't something I've ever be able to afford (my best drop so far, is a

Lem).

So, I stumbled upon the The Pit being the perfect place for my Poisonmancer to farm, and so far, it's gone pretty well. In fact, I managed to quickly go from Lv69 -> Lv78+, with experience still being good enough to keep me interested in continuing at this location. However, I don't have anything remotely close to Enigma, so I have to walk to the cave every time, making dungeon runs take about 5 minutes each. Last night when I got ahold of a

Harlequin Crest and

Skullder's Ire (which I slotted with a

Topaz), and a basic

Gheed's Fortune thanks to a generous player I traded with, which pushed my Magic Find up to 315, but I'm still not finding anything great. I read the Magic Find thread here, but none of that really helps, unless I drop the Trang-Oul's 3 Piece Set (

Belt, Gloves, Trophy), which gives me a bunch of Poison buffs.

Some things I've considered doing, is dropping the Trang-Oul's Gloves and Trophy, and replacing them with some MF Gloves and maybe a

Monarch's slotted with 2

Ist I've managed to save up (or slot one into a

Milabrega's Orb, for a cheaper +45%); that would give me another +75% MF or so, but I'm a little nervous about how dropping that 3 Piece Set Bonus would affect enemy Poison Resist, etc.

What are some things I can do to improve my dungeon runs? What Magic Find should I aim for farming in The Pit, or is mine mostly fine and I just have to rely on RNG? And what are some good final gears I should aim for, outside of Magic Finding for my Poisonmancer?

Doing these Pit runs are interesting, but pretty slow (maybe 10 to 15 per hour), so I'm willing to try anything at this point. It seem no matter how much effort I put into this game, I never seem to find any noteworthy drops.

So, the standard answer is RNG is RNG. Not satisfying, but such is life.

From the drops you are getting, you are doing pretty good, so don't get discouraged.

I would say take a look at the MF charts and figure out where you want to be. There are definitely diminishing returns at some point, so ditching your killing power for pure MF is not the best trade.

One thing to keep in mind is that right now 40 Pgems are going for an

Ist, so getting a gem factory to turn the flawless into Pgems isn't a bad deal. I do it as a geared out lvl 94 Zon. Ists are Ists.

Also, just because the Pit can drop everything doesn't mean it is the only game in town. Countess has a 1/64 chance to NOT drop a rune. I've gotten Ists from her, which one source said was the highest. Other sources say she can drop up to a

Lo, and a while back someone was crowing that one of her minions dropped a

Cham.

Basically, if you are feeling burnt out, don't scoff other areas. They might not be AS lucrative, but still good.

For gear, I will let the Necro Pros weigh in, but I am sure there are options between what you have and the BiS

Death's Web.

Leaker416 wrote: 2 years ago

I would say take a look at the MF charts and figure out where you want to be. There are definitely diminishing returns at some point, so ditching your killing power for pure MF is not the best trade.

I've seen the chart, from the "Cheap MF Gear" thread, and I think I want to be around 400+ MF, because that seems to be a good point for Unique droprate, before the curve starts to flatten out considerably. However, I've used DropCalc and the Probability of getting a

Death's Web is so low, that having another +100 MF doesn't seem to matter much. Then again, if I don't try farming it at all, my Probability of getting one is 0%.

Leaker416 wrote: 2 years ago

One thing to keep in mind is that right now 40 Pgems are going for an

Ist, so getting a gem factory to turn the flawless into Pgems isn't a bad deal. I do it as a geared out lvl 94 Zon. Ists are Ists.

Yeah, that's how I got the 2

Ist I have right now, through making a public room advertising for it. Pretty much the only way I can seem to get one, although I'm almost out of

Perfect Gems now, and they don't seem to drop very often in The Pit. Before I started farming here, I was getting like 20-ish a day.

Leaker416 wrote: 2 years ago

Also, just because the Pit can drop everything doesn't mean it is the only game in town. Countess has a 1/64 chance to NOT drop a rune. I've gotten Ists from her, which one source said was the highest. Other sources say she can drop up to a

Lo, and a while back someone was crowing that one of her minions dropped a

Cham.

Basically, if you are feeling burnt out, don't scoff other areas. They might not be AS lucrative, but still good.

For gear, I will let the Necro Pros weigh in, but I am sure there are options between what you have and the BiS

Death's Web.

I've tried farming

The Countess on Hell. I have a

Frozen Orb Sorceress, but each run takes about 3 minutes, due to her and her minions being Cold Immune. So, I have to kill them with Firewall, and let my Mercenary kill her, which is decently fast, but it all adds up. Frankly, she needs a redesign; I was thinking of making her

Frozen Orb and Lightning of some kind, because I don't like the way

Meteor can be avoided, but I don't know which Lightning spell to dump my points into. I was thinking

Chain Lightning, but it seems like a lot of people just spam the normal Lightning?

Anyway, farming Countess does give me runes, and just one time got a

Lem off her. I suppose I could go back to that, after experience stops being significant in The Pit.

I leveled a little while ago, so I decided to experiment some. I took off my Trang-Oul's set and pushed my Magic Find to 360%. However, my damage dropped by around -1,500 and I had to use

Lower Resist considerably more times than I wanted to. On my next run, I put my Trang-Oul's gloves back on and gained another +1,000 damage (with 336% MF), and things went a bit smoother, but it was still rough, as that -500 damage I was missing was just enough to allow enemies to occasionally survive more than one

Poison Nova. That, and the unwanted Block Chance from my MF shield put me in some dangerous situations that I barely escaped. The slight increase in MF was definitely noticeable though; I noted that gems seemed to drop more often, and got a couple Flawless on both runs, but I'm not sure the slowed progress and risk are worth the swap.

So, it looks like I need to stick with the Trang-Oul's set while farming, for now. On the plus side, before I did the experiment, I managed to get a

Heaven's Light, which was a pretty great drop. It looks like I can still get great drops with 315% MF, although I wish it was higher so I can get better rates and gems, etc.

If your necro is a matriarch/patriarch, I'd suggest switching it up and doing cows as well. Besides the runes, their sheer numbers mean that they'll regularly drop charms, gems and bases, which can particularly fetch quite a price.

Otherwise, if you're undergeared, the Pit is your go-to for high-end drops, unfortunately. And not just because it's a lvl 85 area, but because there aren't any good lvl 82+ areas for your poison necro to farm until act 5. Lvl 85 is overrated anyway. So yeah, it's the Pit, the cows and the Hole in the

Black Marsh.

Also, Magic Find doesn't affect gem drops. Or any drops. Its only effect is whether the game upgrades an item that it's already chosen to drop to be unique, set, rare or magic instead of plain White.
My endgame lvl 95 hammerdin has 287% MF. I'll sometimes switch back to my CTA for the extra 30% MF before finishing off a boss, but otherwise, 287-300% is more than enough.

iamergo wrote: 2 years ago

If your necro is a matriarch/patriarch, I'd suggest switching it up and doing cows as well. Besides the runes, their sheer numbers mean that they'll regularly drop charms, gems and bases, which can particularly fetch quite a price.

What do you mean by Matriarch/Patriarch; you mean my main? I'm certainly enjoying it more than my Sorceress, so I'm probably sticking to it, for now anyway. Throwing out a single

Poison Nova and watching everything around me die never gets old. Especially since I can just throw out

Lower Resist if something is Poison Immune. Whereas, with my Sorceress, it's all fun an games until something is Cold Immune, and then it's a whole process that ends up like being a logic puzzle that I have to resolve quickly or die (and I hate having to rely 100% on my Mercenary in those scenarios).

iamergo wrote: 2 years ago

Otherwise, if you're undergeared, the Pit is your go-to for high-end drops, unfortunately. And not just because it's a lvl 85 area, but because there aren't any good lvl 82+ areas for your poison necro to farm until act 5. Lvl 85 is overrated anyway. So yeah, it's the Pit, the cows and the Hole in the

Black Marsh.

Yeah, I think I might switch up and do Cows every now and then. Although, I have yet to get past Hell Act 2 on this character. So, I would have to join someone else's game or make it for myself through my Sorceress, which is kind of a pain. As far as I know though, I think Cows have low Poison Resist (I made a

Rabies Druid recently, and they were strongly recommended for farming). Right now though, I'm still getting about ~+10% of a level per run on my Necromancer, so I'm going to stick with it. I know experience slows down in the Lv.80's, so things will get boring soon.

iamergo wrote: 2 years ago

Also, Magic Find doesn't affect gem drops. Or any drops. Its only effect is whether the game upgrades an item that it's already chosen to drop to be unique, set, rare or magic instead of plain White.
My endgame lvl 95 hammerdin has 287% MF. I'll sometimes switch back to my CTA for the extra 30% MF before finishing off a boss, but otherwise, 287-300% is more than enough.

I didn't know that about gems; I'll keep that in mind. A lot of times I take my lower level characters to Cows to farm, and it's good to know I won't need to bring along a ton of MF gear when I do. I'm glad that my MF% is fine for the moment. I figured it was pretty decent, but I've seen posts where people talk about having 600% to 800% and doing Pindle runs. So, I thought maybe I was doing things wrong.

Matriarch/Patriarch is the title awarded to a character after they kill hell

Baal for the first time. You've cleared up the rest for me.

Hell cows have a 33% Poison Res, lower than the 50% for Cold, Fire and Lightning. So yeah, it's a great spot.

My

Berserk barb has ~750% MF. The reason I and people who farm Pindle go for high MF is because you want to increase the odds that a really rare item, like an

Unearthed Wand or a

Dimensional Shard, that a boss or a champion monster drops rolls as a unique. These high MF characters, usually barbarians, target-kill bosses and champions and ignore the White monsters. If you're killing lots of White monsters, giving up killing power for Magic Find makes no sense because the base odds for White monsters to drop something above normal rarity are very low. You'd be multiplying a 0.00000001% chance by 800, big whoop. That's why Javazons that specialize on cow farming typically have 0% MF. They're not after those uniques and sets. They want the items that MF doesn't affect: runes, charms and bases for runewords.

iamergo wrote: 2 years ago

Matriarch/Patriarch is the title awarded to a character after they kill hell

Baal for the first time. You've cleared up the rest for me.

Hell cows have a 33% Poison Res, lower than the 50% for Cold, Fire and Lightning. So yeah, it's a great spot.

My

Berserk barb has ~750% MF. The reason I and people who farm Pindle go for high MF is because you want to increase the odds that a really rare item, like an

Unearthed Wand or a

Dimensional Shard, that a boss or a champion monster drops rolls as a unique. These high MF characters, usually barbarians, target-kill bosses and champions and ignore the White monsters. If you're killing lots of White monsters, giving up killing power for Magic Find makes no sense because the base odds for White monsters to drop something above normal rarity are very low. You'd be multiplying a 0.00000001% chance by 800, big whoop. That's why Javazons that specialize on cow farming typically have 0% MF. They're not after those uniques and sets. They want the items that MF doesn't affect: runes, charms and bases for runewords.

I see. Cows definitely do drop a ton of that stuff, and I've noticed Javazons there dramatically out-performing my Sorceress, to the point that I was going to make a Javazon. I'll have to drop into a Hell Cows game and see how well my Poison does.

Where do you recommend farming for levels later, in general? The Pit is still giving me +10% experience a run, despite just hitting Lv.80, but my Lv.87 Sorceress struggles to level, so I got bored with her. The only spot I really know of that still gives decent experience at that level is Hell

Baal. I'm not sure where people go to hit Lv.99

I personally would recommend against making a dedicated Cowazon. I made one and, well, it's boring. I'd rather have a hammerdin that can clear cows at 80% her efficiency, but also roflstomps every other area in the game. I'm respecing this java into a spearzon once 2.4 hits. Just need to find or buy a +3 to skills/4 open socket

Matriarchal Spear for the Infinity.

Talking about leveling is getting a bit off-topic, but here's a simplified version of it:
1. Up until character level 70, you get 100% of the XP a monster grants if you're within 5 levels of their level. So in a lvl 65 area, White monsters will give you full XP from lvl 60 to lvl 70. With six levels off and more, the XP gain drops off rapidly.
2. Past character level 70, the above rule applies, but there's also a constantly increasing penalty that reduces XP gained.
3. Given that the highest area level in the game is 85 (well, there

Arreat Summit with alvl=87, but there aren't any monsters there), it's the easiest to level to 90. Past that point, you're relying on super unique monsters that have their own set mlvl independent of the area (like

Baal's waves, i.e. Colenzo has mlvl=88 and Lister has mlvl=92) and act bosses (Diablo has mlvl=94 and

Baal has mlvl=99).

A few points here I guess.

Firstly, at 315 MF, you're not "too low". More is obviously more and better in the pure "chance for unique" sense of it. However, as you already noticed, getting more means dropping other things.

From what you describe, your main problem is in kill speed. Not in MF. Getting another 50-100 MF at the cost of slowing your clear speed even further isn't worth it, even more so due to the diminishing returns of it.

No amount of MF will ever get you a screen full of only uniques every time. Even at 600+, you'll still get plenty of worthless stuff and depressing White diadems and the like. So you seeing that stuff now isn't something you'll solve with more MF, it is just something you'll slightly reduce with it. In the end, it all boils down to repetition and RNG luck.

Do be careful on the assumptions you make though. It sounds as if you're looking at

Death's Web to solve the immunity problem you've mentioned. That doesn't work.
Immunities against poison can only be broken with lower res. Your item -res doesn't help with that, no matter how much you have. As such, if an immune stays immune after lower res, having a

Death's Web for -res won't change that. The only thing that could help with that is more +skill to up your lower res but due to the crap scaling of it at higher levels and the 1/5 effectiveness against immunes, even that will not help anymore in most cases. There is and will always be a fair number of mobs whose immunities you sadly just can't break. What

Death's Web does do though is massively boost your damage against those mobs whose immunity you did successfully break with LR as they typically still end up at around 95-99% resistant. -Res does amazing things on that as that then kicks in at full effectiveness (taking them from 99 to 49 with a solid

Death's Web alone).

For your sorc, if you're specifically looking at countess and such,

Nova makes for a solid second element spell actually. Even more so with the 2.4 synergy addition. Though there's plenty of options all in all. Matter of preference.
The same goes for a dedicated cow farmer. Javazons are stupidly fast, yes, and to a lot of people quite entertaining, too. But there are some (admittedly very few) other builds that can compete on about the same level once properly geared.

As iamergo already pointed out though, not everything is affected by MF. So adding to the point already made above, if you're solely after "value" and don't care how you get it, you really don't have to focus on MF, especially for a cow runner. Sure, you'll eventually run into a rare

Diadem and kick yourself, going "oh, if only I had more MF!". But at the same time, you will have gotten there with typically significantly faster kill speed, in turn resulting in many more drops overall and as such more runes, more charms, more bases (which would be negatively affected by MF actually) and more gems to sell.

As for the XP slowdown, it really isn't bad in the 80s. Getting to 90 via

Baal runs is fairly quick. Even after that it isn't too bad yet. But yeah, the further beyond 90 you go, the more you really do notice the slowdown.