On average, lower Kurast drops Ber in 2500 runs, or; the most effective way to get Ber is in 2500 minutes.
That’s 8 hours per day for 5 days, or a whole work week, not including lunch breaks.
And then, you need several enigmas for your different characters – and let’s face it, you need Infinity, Faith, Chains of Honor…
You could multiply the drop rate by 8 for the higher runes and still not fully gear an amazon:
You need a 15-2 Faith to be done rolling them, and that is 1 in 10.
…
Even playing 8 hours per day every day isn’t going to make you fully gear one single bowazon with a 15/2 faith.
And this is all the evidence the devs need for why they should never take the ‘drop rates are fine!’ side of the community seriously.
I’ve played the game for literally 20 years and have yet to find Jah or Ber.
I only get enigma because of inflation due to botters and because people that start playing the game quits, mostly because they never get to see the content in the game.
Most people don’t read guides: They have no idea what content lurks inside.
If they play the game as originally intended, from act 1 Normal to act 5 Hell, once with each character class, they’re lucky if they see a single Ist rune drop anywhere else than the hellforge.
They’re likely to not know Tal Rasha’s set exists.
They definitely won’t know about Death’s Web, Death’s Fathom, Gore Rider, Griphon’s Eye or any of the elite uniques ment by the original developers to be used during the campaign, on the hero’s quest to defeat Baal.
…
At a distance, it’s obvious that the current drop rates are a fluke.
I simply cannot imagine the devs making the elite sets and going:
“Nice. We’ve made a set of elite items in this mainly singleplayer rogulike rolplaying game where people stop playing after killing Baal.
Sets that most players will never see one single piece of drop before they quit the game out of boredom, never knowing the depth and integration of lore we the developers invested in the game because we never showed the players these items ingame, even if they play through the game with each character.”
Like. It does not make sense.
The drop rates had to consider the game as a mainly singleplayer game – the game including the sets and uniques are originally ment for players that quit after killing Baal, and that do not trade, and cannot mule items from one character to another.
Giving items to other characters you own is unique to D2R, and implemented solely because players not only quit because they get bored, but feel offended and are less likely to buy games from Blizzard because of negative experiences.
I’ve played MMOs, Dungeons and Dragons Online, which has some pretty rare items – but rare items which drop in campaigns with actual content when you slay bosses in these acts or campaigns, with a specific chance.
None of them are 1 in 34 000 like Death’s Fathom from Baal.
Comparing Diablo 2 to MMOs is not fair for starters, because Diablo 2 is a story-driven singleplayer roguelike action roleplaying game, not a sandbox-amusement park style MMO like both DDO and WoW.
But I’d rather have missions with a 1 in 20 odds of finding Death’s Fathom at the end of it than the current 1 in 34 000.
I’d gladly play the entire campaign 20 times over farming Baal 34 000 times or clear entire level 85 areas 10 000 times.
Drop rates only make sense if they made these items with the intent of making them drop more often in the cancelled second expansion, which would make a lot of sense:
Having items available before the place they’re ment to be used – but excessively rare is great design – in that you spin the myth of their existence and increase desire for these items before the expansion, which grants you these more readily.
And the same goes for runewords.
I have played through the game something like 100 times in singleplayer over the years – and the best runeword I’ve ever made during the campaign is Oath, once.
Still never seen Ber or Jah drop.
And once again, I simply cannot imagine the devs making all the runewords knowing very well most players won’t ever get to make one with a high rune before leaving the game – playing the game as a reasonable responsible adult or even youth.
I again hope they intended for these runewords to be used in the cancelled expansion, and that runes Pul+ were intended to drop far more often in that second expansion, so that players actually get to build runewords when it actually matters.
…
I seriously doubt that any of the developers, new or old, played the game in any meaningful capacity, due to these facts:
Nothing any of the developers ever have said implies that they actually are aware of the state of drops in regards to the game as an action roleplaying roguelike game.
Bored after finding Jah and Ber on one character?
Gosh golly gee whizz, you’ve got 20 character slots – I’m literally certain you don’t have a 15/2 Faith bow on your bowazon and on that one character with a bowazon mercenary for style, enigma for all your 15+ non-sorceresse characters.
When you get Enigma, there’s still Grief – and when you’ve got Grief, you’ve not got a 40/400 Grief. You’ve got to roll hundreds of Griefs to get a perfect one.
You’ve got to roll Exile. Death. Chains of Honor for your mercenary. Infinity. Faith.
Phoenix.
Many of them requires you to roll several times for a good roll:
If you have an excess of Jah and Ber runes – I do not believe you for one single second.
I’d need 200 Jah runes to consider starting to have an excess.
I need an average of 8 for my pefect Faith.
I need an average of 8 for my perfect Faith for my mercenary.
And then, the sky’s the limit for my Ice bow for my frostmaiden:
It’s 140-210 enhanced damage and 25-30% bonus cold damage.
That’s an easy sink for 34 Jah runes right there to roll a 200+ with 30% bonus cold damage.
Then there’s Phoenix runeword.
It’s 40 Jah runes for a level 15 redempion aura with 390%+ enhanced damage.
Finally, for Jah runes, it’s Last Wish.
It’ll sink any number of 100 Jah runes to get a 10% off perfect.
And finding Death’s Fathom is not the end of the journey for a cold sorceress.
There’s random rolls on it, and you need 20+ to get a 10% from perfect roll.
I’d only consider my search for Death’s Fathom finished with a roll equal to or better than +27%+ cold damage +35%+ lightning resistance and +35%+ fire resistance roll.
That’s 20 Death’s Fathoms right there.
I’ve found one single one in 20 years, which so happened to be above those stats.
…
And then there’s Death’s Web with a similar ratio:
It’d have to be -48%+ enemy poison resistance, +2 necromancer skills, which is 1 in 18.
Like.
You lot who claim you’ve found too many runes, do you lack an imagination, do you only play one single character with no interest in actually playing the majority of the content of the game – the other classes and their skills and getting good rolls – or are you lying because you have an agenda?
Which one is it?