If I drop stuff on the ground, will it stay there?

[krunchyfrogg]

Or will stuff eventually disappear?

I'm becoming overloaded on chipped gems, and IIRC, I can upgrade them when I find the cube (and since I'm entering ACT II it shouldn't be too long).

I'm playing a solo game, and since my stash is full, I'm wondering if dropping a bunch of them around my stash is a tactic that will work.

TIA

[Mursilis]

Depending on what the item is they will eventually disappear. I can't recall the actual time frames for each type of item (magical, unique, gold, gems) but if you do drop them make sure to pick them back up periodically. Say every 5 minutes or so, to "refresh" their dropped time.

Quest items will never disappear though, so you can leave things like the staff in Act II and the organ pieces from Act III on the ground as long as you like, iirc.

[SmittySixTen]

My suggestion would be to use some gems in socketable items. If you're still in Act 1/2 of norm, chances are socketed items will be stronger than anything blue the vendors sell.

[jeremyrx]

If by "solo" game you mean single player I would download ATMA which is an item mule program that will let you store all those chipped gems and anything else you find across as many mule characters as you'd like.

Just google "ATMA" and you should be on your way.

[Death Merchant]

ATMA is a single player's best friend.

[krunchyfrogg]

Thanks. I'll check out ATMA.

I assume I can safely install this and it won't hurt my saved games, right?

[lionheartthebrave]

Thanks. I'll check out ATMA.

I assume I can safely install this and it won't hurt my saved games, right?

Yep, it's widely used in the SPF (though GoMule is becoming more popular)

It will not damage save files (and even makes back-ups just in case)

[krunchyfrogg]

I tried downloading this program, but I'm not quite sure how to work it.

Can anybody give me a "dummies" guide to it?

Thanks! :D

[lAmebAdger]

Basic muling use:

having ATMA on, you go under file and click load directory.

now you browse and find the folder where all your d2 characters are saved (.../Diablo II/save). you click that folder and load it...

it should appear in the bar on the left along with a list of all d2 characters in that folder.

Now you can double click on one of those characters and it will load with its stats/name/inventory/... in a window.

you can have multiple character windows open and drag items from one character's inventory to another's (click-hold-drag-release) (if you drag a belt, you will lose all the potions in that belt, if you drag a cube, the items in that cube will be dragged also)

after dragging, a * will appear next to the character's name (the one you dragged from and the one you dragged to) in that window, which means it's marked as "dirty". That means that the current status of this character is not "accepted" as save by the game and the game will only load the status of the character as it was before the dragging. To make the game "accept" this char's status, you need to (while having this char's window selected) click on save (the dark-coloured one-disk icon in the top left corner of ATMA). That makes the * disappear. Make all the * disappear before you close the character windows, otherwise, the changes won't be saved...
To make that easier, just click save-all (dark-coloured three-disk icon) after each dragging and all * will disappear

(if you, for example, only save the char that you have just dragged the splint mail to and close the other char who has lost his splint mail without saving, then that splint mail would now be on both chars. This is called "duping an item" and is considered cheating... so take care of all *)


PS: There is so much more to ATMA, and many nice extras..., but this is basic muling and should be all you ever wanted for now...

PS2: you can create a stash file under 'utility' which you can also drag to and from. This will be a D2I file and will be under the D2I tab, (you're d2 char files are under the D2S tab)
again...you can have multiple character windows open along with the stash windows...

EDIT: stashes are D2X files and will be under the D2X tab... thanks to lhtb for reminding ...

[lionheartthebrave]

This will be a D2I file and will be under the D2I tab,

Use d2x files for stashes, d2i is a weird format that ATMA works with

[lAmebAdger]

oops, I thought 'D2X, D2X...' like half a minute before writing D2I T_T

fixed post...