Claw Shopping Guide by BMAY

CLAW SHOPPING 201

I wrote this guide originally for my friends at SlashDiablo, which is a private server without bots, and features a configurable loot filter which let me change the color on the names of items with specific mods. While Diablo 2 Resurrected likely won't have this feature, everything else contained below is still applicable & relevant!

WHAT'S THE GOAL?

TL:DR - To shop a godly claw, duh!
The goal is to get a sweet claw with +5 or +6 to

Lightning Sentry, or Venom. Easier said that done. I can do about 20 runs per minute, and often get in the habit of doing so every night while watching Netflix before bed... Now, RNG is RNG, and you could find something amazing in your first hour, or spend weeks upon weeks. This guide will show you how to optimize your time in this endeavor.

HOW DO I CHECK 4000+ CLAWS PER HOUR?

TL:DR -

• Be an Assassin, level 94+ with 55-78 dexterity.
• Keep Nihlathaks portal open and run between it and
  Anya to refresh her inventory quickly.
• Equip Harmony bow, cast
  Burst of Speed, and wear FRW gear.
• Bonus: Utilize a lootfilter if possible (Not currently available on battle.net) to flag any valuable claws as PURPLE or another easy to see color.

I counted how many total claws

Anya had in her inventory over 500 runs and it came out to 1,756; which averages to just over 70 claws every 20 runs. Or 3.5 claws per run on average. I also timed my average speed and can check her inventory about 20 times per minute. That gives us ~4200 claws per hour.

Here is a video of me claw shopping doing 20 runs per minute - https://youtu.be/wx-b_iPFbdQ

These tricks make it so that you don't need to mouse over every single claw that

Anya has. Since these mods cannot spawn on Normal quality items, you only mouse over the red, unable to equip claws, like seen here.



Since the highest requirement 'normal' quality claw is a

Scissors Katar with 55dex/str requirements, I chose to have 55 dexterity exactly. This way you eliminate the possibility of missing your godly claw if you're (un)lucky enough to also roll a "-requirements" suffix.

Greater Talons, which have a requirement of 79, go down to 56 with the Simplicity suffix, for example.

Bonus option: With the help of a loot-filter configurated, you can shave off milliseconds needed to fully read the mods of the claws you do mouse over. With a quick glimpse you can tell whether the name is in the normal blue color, or highlighted Purple/Orange/etc. A special color will catch your eye quick!
(Seen in the image in the next section)

WHAT MAKES A CLAW VALUABLE?

TL:DR - Having +5 or 6

Lightning Sentry or Venom, and then ALSO rolling 2 open sockets. LS is much more sought after, however.

Like I said, +5 or more to a desired skill like

Lightning Sentry or Venom is a good start. A +6 of either is basically guaranteed to make you some $$$. However, after you've shopped your godly claw then comes the next hurdle; Socketing it via

Larzuk.

If you plan on selling then it's your decision to take this gamble or not. You can roll the dice and risk rolling 1 socket, or sell it unsocketed and leave it to the buyer to take that gamble. A 1 os claw is worth LESS than an unsocketed claw (which still has the potential to roll 2 os) which is of course worth less than one which already rolled 2 sockets!

Here is an example of a +5 LS claw I bought, which rolled 2os. It spurred quite the bidding war on the server I played on and I walked away a significantly richer man. The value of such items on D2R's Battle.net is still to be seen, and strongly depends on the prevalence of bots, among other factors.

WHAT'S THE BEST LEVEL TO SHOP FOR CLAWS?

TL:DR - Level 94+

There are two thoughts on this. One is to be the minimum level to roll the desired mod, which is 75 for the +3 skill tree affix. This is because the ilvl necessary to spawn +3 skill tree is 80, and a shop item's ilvl is always your character's level +5. However, it's also important to consider that only exceptional and elite quality claws can roll staffmods at all. And the chance of a shop having an upgraded quality item increases with your character level. To maximize this, you want to be lvl 94+, so that the ilvl of the claws are all ilvl99.

The shop's probability formula to have an upgraded exceptional or elite item looks like this:

• Exceptional upgrade in Hell: ((ilvl * 128) + 5000) / 100,000
• Elite upgrade in Hell: ((ilvl * 16) + 1000) / 100,000

Therefore, the chances of an exceptional claw in hell at clvl 75 (ilvl80) is 15.24% and the chance for a lvl 94+ char (ilvl99) is 17.67%.
While the chances of an elite claw is 2.28% at ilvl80 & 2.58% at ilvl99.
The total combined chance of either upgrade happening is 16.82% at ilvl80 & 19.34% at ilvl99

WHAT ARE THE ODDS?

TL:DR - (at level 94+)
1:41118 for 5-6

Lightning Sentry (0.0024%)
1:328947 for 6

Lightning Sentry (0.0003%)
1:102833 for 5-6 Venom (0.00097%)
1:826446 for 6 Venom (0.00012%)

Venom is more rare than LS to roll because it is a level 30 skill, while LS is a level 24 skill.

The odds of these mods rolling on any capable claw are as follows:

• The odds of spawning 6 LS at ilvl80 are 1:62200
• The odds of spawning 6 LS at ilvl99 are 1:63600
• The odds of spawning 6 Venom at ilvl80 are 1:155500
• The odds of spawning 6 Venom at ilvl99 are 1:159000

The chances of +2 assassin +3 are much better.

• The odds of spawning 2/3 LS at ilvl80 are 1:31100
• The odds of spawning 2/3 LS at ilvl99 are 1:31800
• The odds of spawning 2/3 Venom at ilvl80 are 1:77750
• The odds of spawning 2/3 Venom at ilvl99 are 1:79500

And remember, there are other ways to roll +5 as well. For these other possible versions, we have:

• 2tree/ 3 LS = 1:62200 (ilvl80) & 1:63600 (ilvl99)
• 3tree/ 2 LS = 1:15550 (ilvl80) & 1:15900 (ilvl99)
• 2tree /3 Venom = 1:155500 (ilvl80) & 1:159000 (ilvl99)
• 3tree/ 2 Venom = 1:38875 (ilvl80) & 1:39750 (ilvl99)

So what's the likelihood of AT LEAST one of the various +5 LS happening? Summing all of the previous chances, I've listed the odds of getting at least one of the 3x rolls for LS and Venom at both ilvl80 and ilvl99 below. (rounded)

• 1:8886 for ANY +5 LS at ilvl80
• 1:9086 for ANY +5 LS at ilvl99
• 1:22214 for ANY +5 Venom at ilvl80
• 1:22714 for ANY +5 Venom at ilvl99

Not too bad right? Until you consider that's only possible on the 16.82-19.34% of claws that will roll past normal quality in the first place. So what's the probability of BOTH of these things happening?

• 1:52854 for a +5 LS claw at lvl 75 (1/8886 is 0.00011253657 x .1682 = 0.00001892...) for a .00189% chance
• 1:46992 for a +5 LS claw at lvl 94+ (1/9086 is 0.00011005943 x .1934 = 0.00002128...) for a .00213% chance
• 1:132069 for a +5 Venom claw at lvl 75 (1/22214 is 0.00004501665 x .1682 = 0.00000757...) for a .00075% chance
• 1:117447 for a +5 Venom claw at lvl 94+ (1/22714 is 0.00004402515 x .1934 = 0.00000851...) for a .00085% chance
• 1:370370 for a +6 LS claw at lvl 75 (1/62200 is 0.00001607717 x .1682 = 0.00000270...) for a .00027% chance
• 1:328947 for a +6 LS claw at lvl 94+ (1/63600 is 0.00001572327 x .1934 = 0.00000304...) for a .0003% chance
• 1:925926 for a +6 Venom claw at lvl 75 (1/155500 is 0.00000643086 x .1682 = 0.00000108...) for a .00011% chance
• 1:826446 for a +6 Venom claw at lvl 94+ (1/159000 is 0.0000062893 x .1934 = 0.00000121...) for a .00012% chance

Whew...Now to find the total chances of either, we sum the odds of any +5, with the odds of the +6, and the final odds are..

• 1:46253 for +5 or 6 LS @ lvl 75 (0.00002162004... for a .0022% chance to roll)
• 1:41118 for +5 or 6 LS @ lvl 94+ (0.00002432022... for a .0024% chance to roll)
• 1:115582 for +5 or 6 Venom @ lvl 75 (0.00000865179... for a .00087% chance to roll)
• 1:102833 for +5 or 6 Venom @ lvl 94+ (0.00000972447... for a .00097% chance to roll)

Source numbers come from the tools.harrogath.com affix calculator - https://tools.harrogath.com/affixcalc.html

THE REALITY OF IT ALL

TL:DR - Unlikely, but possible!
With the odds and speed listed above, I could expect a 5 LS claw every ~10 hours (41118/4200), and a 6 LS claw after ~78 Hours! (328947/4200). A 5 Venom claw should pop up every ~28 hours (115582/4200), and a 6 Venom claw after 197 hours! (826446/4200)

These are average times until you could reasonably expect to see one. NOT until you can be guaranteed to find one with confidence. EX: You could expect to roll a 6-sided die and get a "1" about 1/6, or 17% of the time, but this isn't guaranteed. Luck is a big factor.

It's an unfathomably small chance to get a +6 claw to roll . Over on the old "BotNet" people set up

Anya bots specifically to look for these. I've heard of these bots running 24/7 for a MONTH or more before seeing a +6 claw. That's 730 hours! Of course +5 is still very good, and MUCH more common.

But is isn't impossible! Within a few weeks I shopped 3 admittedly less useful +6 claws, however all with the same odds as a +6 Venom or LS claw, as pictured below:


Isn't RNG just great?
So, If you aren't necessarily looking for these claws yourself or are just trying to get rich, you are better off doing virtually anything else. In the 60 seconds it takes me to do ~20

Anya runs, I could have done a complete Pits MF run, or a Chaos seal glitch, or any number of other loot-finding methods that are proven effective. I guarantee you that simply running cows/chaos/or any other lvl85 area will be much more worth your while if your goal is getting high runes.

However if your immediate goal is getting a +5 or +6 claw, my girl

Anya is still your best bet!

This is really, really fantastic work mate. So well formatted and presented.

@Udyret could we add this to the sticky if its not already there?

it's in there already. i replaced it with the old one.