Greetings everyone!
I recently completed 3,100 Cow Runs with the goal of farming until a Zod Rune dropped. Obviously, this doesn’t prove anything definitive, but for those who enjoy statistics, I’ve shared my results below.
I tracked every rune from Um and above, though I eventually removed the Um and Mal runes from the list since they were dropping so often it got messy.
In the end, the Zod never dropped, and I decided to call it there.
This was all done in Single Player on Players 7.
I’m curious, what do you think of the results? Was RNG on my side, or not really?
For anyone interested, I’ve made a video with the drops.
https://youtu.be/iL5tQIPC4FY?si=TMszT1IlhLsK9hVC
The Runes I found in those 3100 Cow Runs:
Um - 18
Mal - 27
Ist - 6
Gul - 12
Vex - 9
Ohm - 7
Lo - 6
Sur - 7
Ber - 1
Jah - 7
Cham - 1
———————————————
And these are they runs they dropped.
Run 47 - Lo
Run 114 - Ist
Run 161 - Vex
Run 240 - Vex
Run 356 - Ohm
Run 506 - Lo
Run 512 - Lo
Run 513 - Lo
Run 521 - Vex
Run 522 - Sur
Run 532 - Vex
Run 673 - Ohm
Run 702 - Sur
Run 716 - Lo
Run 718 - Ist
Run 807 - Gul
Run 817 - Jah
Run 868 - Cham
Run 928 - Ist
Run 936 - Vex
Run 978 - Gul
Run 985 - Gul
Run 1023 - Jah
Run 1074 - Ohm
Run 1075 - Gul
Run 1112 - Ber
Run 1275 - Ohm
Run 1389 - Sur
Run 1472 - Gul
1671 - Vex
1715 - Jah
1737 - Sur
1780 - Jah
1804 - Ohm, Um
1819 - Sur
1820 - Gul
1839 - Gul
1893 - Mal
1906 - Ist
1984 - Gul
2064 - Ohm
2103 - Ohm
2218 - Vex
2219 - Gul
2361 - Jah
2366 - Vex
2399 - Gul
2402 - Sur
2409 - Ist
2451 - Gul
2463 - Jah
2498 - Jah
2527 - Vex
2625 - Sur
2737 - Ist
2818 - Gul
3083 - Lo
4 Likes
3100 cow runs? 192 hours? Holy sh.. You need a dose of grass after that haul..
Oh ok, over the course of 10 months. But still. 
2 Likes
my problem with this is that your stats are wrong. i see you’re not running a loot filter so you absolutely left a lot of runes behind. Some of them possibly a Zod.
Also, i bet you’d quintuple those results in 2000 Plains of Despair runs.
1 Like
at least for jah, um, mal, I agree, it is unlikely that they are consistent with the chances from the drop calcs… that’s what statistics give…
nice work though ! lucky you !
1 Like
Odds and results are two different things. The higher the run count, the more the results line up with the odds.
Loot filter is probably my #1 most desired quality-of-life feature, but even though I play on Single Player, I prefer not to mess with anything outside the official game. I can’t deny that I might’ve missed a few high runes here and there, but definitely not to the extreme you’re describing. I usually try to avoid huge herds of cows because of the loot clutter, and when it does get messy, I reposition or quickly clear the ground, mostly gold and potions to keep things manageable! 
Plains of Despair? How come? 
burning souls in PoD have very high probabilities for dropping runes
eg for jah it is 1:120000 compared to 1:186000 in the cow level
: )
https:/ /dropcalc.silospen.com/
Ah, then I guess Arcane Sanctuary would be better and safer. Plus, it always has wraiths while in Plains of Despair Burning Souls don’t spawn always.
same chance as in the plains, also lower level area, but lower monster density…. at the cows you are probably killing much faster… also, not all enemies at the AS are wraiths so you are not getting the best chance every time
it is avg kill speed vs avg drop chance…
the ratio of probabilities is 2:3 (it is bigger actually - not all monsters are wraiths in AS)… if the ratio of the kill speeds is greater than the inverse of this ratio then the cow level is better, if not, AS is better… that holds given that both levels have about the same amount of monsters, which is estimated to be around 400 for both according to AI… if however there is a substantial difference in the number of monsters between AS and CL you need to estimate the kill speed per monster in order to decide which is better and how much…
btw, idk specifics about kill speeds… I can’t play the cows efficiently with my beloved 10-14K MF bowazon… but I don’t like this level very much anyway : P
: )
1 Like
Game punished you with a 400+ runs dry streak for deciding to use the broken build
Haha true! 
But it also blessed me with some great drops in the beginning!
why players 7 and not players 8
drop chances sort of cap in p7 if I remember correctly… at p7 the no drop is minimum…
The no-drop chance decreases depending on both player number and players in your vicinity (up to 2 screeens away). If there are no other players around then the no-drop chance for p7 and p8 is the same.
Can’t find the table at the moment … sorry … 
are you refering maybe at the arreat summit / parties page ?
Now that you mention it, they actually do have that info there, yes. I needed to check.
h ttps://classic.battle.net/diablo2exp/basics/parties.shtml
Improved Drops for Parties
Every party member in the area of the kill increases the chance that stuff will drop (whether via monster death, chests, etc). Every two additional other players in the game (whether it’s a non-party member or a party member in another area) count as one additional party member toward the extra chance for a drop.
For example (for a sample baseline 25% drop):
Party Chance Of Getting Something
1 1-(0.75^1) = 0.250
2 1-(0.75^2) = 0.438
3 1-(0.75^3) = 0.578
4 1-(0.75^4) = 0.684
5 1-(0.75^5) = 0.763
6 1-(0.75^6) = 0.822
7 1-(0.75^7) = 0.867
8 1-(0.75^8) = 0.900
So when playing alone in a p7 or p8 game gets you to 4: 1-(0.75^4) = 0.684 that level.
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This is a bit more complicated than I though. If I get this right, this means that:
A party member of 8 players in the same area have more chances of extra drop
from a Single player where the other 7 players are in a different location?
1 Like
Each party member in the area decreases your no-drop chance.
For party members further away and other players not in your party, it only happens for each second player.
So your understanding is correct.
1 Like
Great thanks! So basically Bnet still holds the advantage over SP if they manage to get some party rolling!
1 Like