Weekend Blueposts
Posted 15 April 2012 by RushsterWhile Jay Wilson is enjoying his vacation and Michael Chu rocking at Cochella the GMs have their hands full in the forum answering questions.
Kaivax on Rare Loot drops
It seems like the loot system is, for lack of a better word, predictable. Just for clarification, I’m not talking about the party loot system, or any of that stuff. I’m talking about the extreme lack of drops(by drops I mean blue-lettered items and up) that come from just regular mobs, breakables and those glowing white chests.
Yes, I know, not a lot of drops would come from the breakables anyway but at least there was a slight chance of something in D2(and yes, before anyway says anything: I know this isn’t Diablo 2). Although this is far, far from being game-breaking(or anything of that sort), it just takes away from the randomness of loot drops.
In our internal testing recently, I’ve gotten yellows from barrels. I started seeing them once in a great while starting at ~level 28. I’m talking about one in a hundred barrels or more. Blues from barrels definitely drop more often than yellows. I’d say it’s working as intended.
The SK only drops yellow on your first kill of him per character.
That is incorrect.
The possibility of a boss (or anything, really) dropping magic gear or rare gear when you kill him remains intact on kills subsequent to your first. The probability may change, but it does not change to a probibility of zero.
To be clear: On your first kill of a boss in normal difficulty, you are guaranteed a random rare and a class rare, as well as some blues and other stuff. All other kills on all difficulties result in standard drop probabilities. You have a decent chance of getting a rare or two every time you kill a boss.
Kaltonis on Framerate issues and beta client
I was very happy to receive an invite to the Beta of D3. When I downloaded it, I received a message saying that my graphics card wasn’t compatible. After checking for updated drivers, while the game will play, it’s in slow motion. Very disappointing! When I saw the list of unsupported cards, and seeing that my card isn’t even on the list, I couldn’t help but wonder why Blizzard would create a game that is only compatible with such a small number of graphics cards. Why Blizzard, why????
Hey all.
I’m curious as to what video cards some of you are running, since Diablo III supports video cards made as far back as 2004, and should run fairly well (at release, not beta) on cards made back in 2006. 6+ years is an extremely large window of support for a new, big budget title.
Keep in mind that many pre-built systems don’t have real video cards in them. It’s entirely possible to have bought a new computer just a couple years ago that can’t run Diablo III because it doesn’t have a real video card in it. The good news is that you can add a video card to systems like that rather inexpensively, and then you’ll be good to go. Assuming of course that it’s a desktop.
Video cards are routinely the most expensive components of computers these days, so manufacturers will often drop the video card and leave only the onboard video (cruddy for games) in order to make a system appear to be a better value. Thankfully, the rest of the components in those systems are usually quite nice, you just need to add a real video card.
Oh, also…if your video card truly is a newer card and you’re still getting the error, it’s probably just a bug. Try closing out the message and continuing. Otherwise, these should all be cleared up by launch.
It let’s me in the game all right, but it’s in slow motion and not at all fun to have such low frame rates even with all of the settings turned down.
Bear in mind that the beta has its own FPS issues simply because it’s a beta; Diablo III won’t be optimized until release. My custom-built gaming system can’t play the beta smoothly either, but it will be fine on release. Blizzard betas are genuine betas, unlike the glorified demos that some companies refer to as a “beta”.
Still, it is no consolation for those with newer laptops with the intel 4 series chipset, which isn’t supported. Why?
Speaking honestly, the Intel 4 series is equivalent in power to the Geforce 5200FX which came out in 2003. My sympathies for having one. It’s performance was so poor that the backlash from it spurred Intel to finally get serious about designing a somewhat decent onboard video option, and that led us to the Intel HD series. The HD series still isn’t as good as a real video card, but at least you can usually count on most games to be playable.
1st
“On your first kill of a boss in normal difficulty, you are guaranteed a random rare and a class rare, as well as some blues and other stuff.”
Funny stuff, Kaivax. Assuming the Skeleton King is a “boss”, this means he should always drop 2 rare items on the first kill. I’ve often seen him drop only 1 rare, or even 0 rare, on the first kill.
Sometimes, I wonder if devs even play their own games…
Last time I checked, you have never killed a boss yet
You killed sk hes NOT a boss, his a hes a quest boss / sub boss/ mini boss/ w/e, aka blood raven. hes not a ‘Boss’
Bosses are referring to act bosses, the real bosses of the game.
hmmm, its a good point but if his statment only refers to the “big cheese’s” top bosses.
But we still need to know the benefits of the valour system if bosses can be farmed for quick top items.
It was confirmed via blue post that it was their intention not to encourage Act Bosses farming to get loot. According to them, the really good stuff should drop from packs of mobs + valour buff.
Then again, they are talking about the end-game. The Inferno. So who cares if an Act Boss has a guaranteed loot drop in Normal? As long as it doesn’t happen in Inferno, it is not that a big of a deal really. Chances are, that guaranteed drop from Normal will become obsolete and replaced midway the next Act anyway.
Perhaps they’re only considering act bosses in that formula. They might have 12 different internal names for different things we’d call “bosses” and are SHOCKED we don’t know them.
Edit: Bleh I was late.
today i played a fresh run, got 2 rare from the sk and 1 at level 5 from a normal zombie.
i love the idea of 2 guarenteed rares but no mention or unique makes me wonder a bit. i am guessing its just an over sight on the blue post and its not actually guaranteed “rare”
You want guaranteed legendaries? That is a bit greedy isn’t it?
It should be rare+ no just rares well I hope that the case.
lol no not guaranteed legendaries, Its like rockman said, should be rare or above. I pretty much figure that’s what they mean but it seems they are not very clear about anything anymore lol
Diagree – I think it should be only a “guaranteed” rare, and no chance of a legendary. Keep the legendary items special!
I have gotten ( bad English 101) 2 rares from Skeleton king in the past. I have seen rare drops from barrels and normal monsters. Even more extraordinary, one time in more then 300 hours of game play a vendor sell a rare.
first kill is when you get achivement “<smth> skeleton king (Barbarian)”. If you roll new character and get him again it wont count as first kill anymore – you got only one first kill per boss per class not character.
Thats at least what i noticed …
I am actually at the point (having beta maxed and overachiever) that the fastest way for me to get rares is to create a new toon and beat the beta again. With very few exceptions, I have received at least one rare for each new toon that kills the SK.
Wrong, with a new toon that has not got a SK kill before you will always get a rare.
The 2 rares from first kill is actually not working. I’ve done a first kill in patch 16 and gotten zero rares once. Other times, one piece of armor or one class rare. So at MOST one rare, and that’s not even guaranteed!
This is true, 100′s of SK kills no rares and only one rare the first time I killed him.
i did have 2 runs where he dropped 2 rares…… and yes always one of them is class specific (but not the right class for the char i used to kill it)….. i think i done ~30-40 first kills.
As mentioned above SK isn’t an Act Boss he’s just a Super Unique Mob, using Diablo 2 terminology. His equivalant would be something like Griswald from Tristram. Blizzard just put more effort into Super Uniques in this game it seems to give them that big boss feel.
Actually, that is not quite accurate. Diablo 2′s hierarchy of power was:
Normal
Champion
Super/Unique
Act Boss
Unique, and Superunique being the same thing, with SU’s having fixed spawn location. One example of Superunique is Blood Raven, also the council in Travincal, and the Smith.
However, in D3, it goes like this:
Normal
Champion
Unique/Superunique
Mini-Boss
Act Boss
So, there is new category of monsters that are stronger and more important to the story then Superuniques, but less powerfull and less important then the Act Bosses, who are still top monsters in D3. King Leoric is a Mini-Boss, not a Superunique. Example of Superuniqe monster from the beta would be Manglemaw, Captain Dalton (was that his name?) and Wretched Queen.
Gamekk, let’s cry together
I can confirm that.
1.) That You were first.
2.) That yellows drop from other sources. I got a yellow off an urn in the Skeleton King room once. The Kings probability to drop me one was long long in the cellar by then (100% sure SK has diminishing returns) so it was a nice surprise to kick that urn and: voila !
Edit: My first SK run on patch 16 dropped 2 yellows as intended.
“All other kills on all difficulties result in standard drop probabilities. You have a decent chance of getting a rare or two every time you kill a boss”
So hes saying on all other difficulties “not normal” you have a good chance of a rare from a boss on everykill ??
So then how does the nepth valour system fit into this, that was supposed to make a boss still worth killing as he would drop rares or better with the buff just like the first time you killed him.
From how Kaivax describes it, it sounds like boss farming in nightmare and above will be viable for quick rare/legendry runs as the bosses will always drop good stuff, and the huge diminished returns on boss in normal is just in normal difficulty.
Thoughts ??
Edit:
“The SK only drops yellow on your first kill of him per character.
That is incorrect.”
Cough cough bulls*it, I’ve done hundreads of runs in max beta mf gear and never another yellow from SK.
I would have to say thats exactly what i was thinking my moneys on they will change it or their system is rather pointless other than normal wont be good for farming which it still wont be worth to farm anyways so honestly whats the point of the system??
omg, wtf is going on.
The game was explained as:
“At lvl 60 you get the valour buff from champs and rares so farming bosses for good loot would be viable as long as you got the max buff”
And now we are told this
You are making assumptions that are just wrong. What we really want to know is what is a “decent chance” for a rare. 50%? 5%? Or maybe even 1%. If the SK doesn’t drop rare items after 100 kills it doesn’t mean he doesn’t drop rare items ever. The chance is probably very low.
Also the nephalem valour unlocks at level 60 so that will only be late hell or inferno.
Durr, I said at lvl 60.
As another poster pointed out, the SK is not a boss only a quest boss/mini boss.
Blizzard needs to make the game systems nice and clear in regard to what needs to be done to keep good looting dropping from bosses.
The valour system is great, I hope they stick with it. It keeps boss farming limited to hell or inferno and only with the buff from champs and rares to prevent quick boss runs.
We shall see on release
Well, they may be wrong about the whole rare thing, but at least they’re finally being honest that the Beta performance is terrible, and stopped telling people the heating and retarded stutters and fps drops are the players fault.
Stutter stutter stutter stutter stutter stutter stutter stutter stutter stutter stutter no stutter 60 fps stutter 30 fps stutter stutter stutter stutter 60 fps and no stutter more stutters and 30 fps stutter stutter stutter stutter stutter. Win
Gotta love those people with 8 year old onboard graphics card that complain about the system requirements.
i can skyrim on high with 0 lag ever, cannnot max though. i should be able to play d3 almost max with no lag i hope
Lag has nothing to do with graphic settings. That infuences FPS.
lag as a general term, low framrates = lag. not latency lag, lag in general. pretty sure its a word if not people i know use it BEFORE so idc. what would you call low framerates if it isn’t lag?
edit: maybe i should specify FPS lag.. even though im talking about graphics it should be obvious. lol
People who are upset because they’re not being rewarded with rarer drops simply because they killed a mob probably haven’t played much Diablo. This early in the game you should consider yourself lucky when you see a drop that’s not equivalent to cracked quilted armor.
It’s going to take time to really be rewarded, and even at the highest level it will take patience and repetition.
^This exactly. I remember my first time taking down Blood Raven, and being excited to get a blue with a bonus that I wanted for my Sorc. And it was effectively worthless taking the game as a whole. But the loot changes drastically the farther you progress.
Thanks for the reinforcement Hellpyre.
Part of playing through is going to be getting a feel for where the good drops come from, but that also depends on your luck. A good drop might just mean there’s a higher chance for rarer items with more mods, or legendary and set items. This does not mean that the item will be good at all, You might get mods that don’t mesh or just less desirable mods. The higher difficulties in Diablo 2 spawn higher level mods on higher level base items and a higher number of maximum possible modifiers on a rare item.
Say you get into Nightmare and you get a nice roll of mods but it’s on a low end piece of armor. It’s very possible to get lucky and unlucky at the same time, and that’s why it is so special and rare to have all of the right mods spawn on the right base item. Drops were dependent on the monster level in Diablo 2, and monster level was dependent on the area where they resided and whether they were normal monsters or a rare/champion pack. If things are similar, once the higher difficulties are in play it will be very possible to find great items from even just a normal monster. This is where Diablo is different from other games that only drop good items from the final bosses of an area. You never know when you will get lucky.
In Diablo 2, one of the best swords for a long time was a cruel collosus blade of quickness, which was a 2 modded blue text sword with 40% increased attack speed and over 300% enhanced damage. 2 mods, and nobody complained.
That everything depends on probability is a wonderful part of Diablo, and makes great drops special. Finding an item with just the right mods all together and in high values for those mods is what a lot of loot runners play for.