Runes are still too rare

General Discussion
1

This is precisely the kind of change that should come in 1.15, after the game launches and developers have time to make some -minor- balance changes before any big patch:

Runes are still too rare

Compared to top end elite uniques, sets, charms, jewels, etc- runes are vastly more difficult to find, by orders of magnitude, and yet have vastly higher demand at the same time. A top end unique item that might only be useable by 1 out of every 10 characters might be 100x as common as a high rune that 9 out of 10 characters want to have multiples of in their build.

Only a bowazon, or maybe their mercenary, would ever use a windforce. Not all amazons are bowazons. So when a windforce drops to any player, the demand for it is relatively low, but its such a rare and hard to obtain item that its tradeable. And people who find items find items they can’t use themselves, so they trade them. That’s how a healthy game economy works. But the 1.10 runewords make it so every character wants to have at a minimum an enigma and call to arms, and usually an infinity and maybe another runeword and maybe even runes in their sockets. Even a mundane light sorceress with best-in-slot gear usually wants 1 jah, 3 bers, 1 ohm, 1 vex, 2 mals, 2 ists. And every character wants jahs, bers, ohms, etc.

And yet, if you kill hell baal in P8P8 with 200% MF, the odds of a windforce dropping are 1:14348, while a ber rune is 1:49465, and a zod rune is 1:173393. And that’s one of the rarest unique items in the game at TC87. A single rune is many times rarer than the rarest uniques.

When it comes to actually trying to farm runes, it shows how unobtainable they can be. The best source for them, even more efficient online than running lower kurast / sewer chests, is killing cows. But in P1P1, hell bovine have a 1:487033 chance to drop sur, 1:730549 to drop ber, 1:654171 to drop jah. To get a jah or ber (2 surs, 1 jah or 1 ber) that’s a combined 1:142776 droprate. There are about ~450 cows per cow level on average, so it takes about 317 cow runs per high rune dropped. That’s a huge number. That’s doing a cow run every 20 minutes a night for 6 hours for two and a half weeks to find a single rune. Want to make infinity and enigma? That will be 1200+ runs, a few months of grinding like its a full time job. You could find multiple copies of every elite unique and set and every other piece of non-rune best in slot gear of every stripe by doing 1200+ boss runs.

Runes should really be at least 5-10x more common, so at least they aren’t that much rarer than other top-end uniques, even if they’re still 5-10x more in demand.

2

Of course, first comment is an insult.
What woo woo.

3

Dude you have to infinity and beyond to farm runewords on non ladder now. This is absolutely unnecessary.

4

Nope. I can share some numbers for you if you’d like.

As one example, let’s look at a top end unique, such as Death’s Fathom. Much, much more rare than HRs, and if you want a well rolled one? hah! good luck finding a 28-30% Death’s Fathom before finding 10 HRs…

The search for these is the replay value. We do not “need” any of these items. If you give them away like candy, the game is stale. The game got stale with duping and botting.

These numbers seem like they’re chosen with a purpose. It is common knowledge running bosses for HRs is suboptimal, and that you should be speedfarming trash white mobs if you want the most HR/hour. HRs are way easier to farm than Windforce, certainly.

This shows you don’t really have a good grasp on the game. Chaos sanctuary is a far better place to farm HRs than cows, and it isn’t even close.

Lol, first you say players 1, who runs cows on players 1? And 317 cow runs isn’t a lot. It’s also not nearly the most efficient, see my previous comment about runefinding.

This is so far off base it’s not even funny. Did you even look at the droprates for these things? oh wait you did.

This quote doesn’t match up with the previous one. How are you going to find multiple windforces and every other elite unique in just 1200 boss runs?

I’d find multiple HRs every week if I played casually. This would be awful.

5

No, they aren’t. You can actually get up to a couple HRs a day, even with zero help. You simply re-create a Sorc with your twink leveling gear and rush yourself to hell forge, repeat. This can be done 2-3 times in a single day depending on how quick you are and how long you play. If you play with even a single friend to help rush you online, you can do this a dozen times in a single day.

You’ve never tried to find Tyreals might or mang songs have you? :face_with_raised_eyebrow:

High level runewords are extremely over powered. they SHOULD be extremely hard to find.

1 Like
6

The numbers are wrong. Please read my entire post if you’d like to actually contribute.

7

I agree fully, I was posting about this in another thread. I’m not saying that high runes should rain from the sky, but even if they were 10x more common they would still be insanely rare. In something like 10+ years of playing D2 off and on with probably 5,000+ hours played I’ve only ever found a handful of high runes. That’s simply unacceptable, it’s like the game was MADE for botters, or they devs intended on Enigma/Infinity/Etc being for absolute nolifers only.

The biggest issue is that with the rune droprates as they are, it’s hard to come up with reasons not to just buy items for real money. I mean, what’s the better option for a working adult? Play the game like a job for a month(6+ hours daily) grinding, or to pay $40 for an enigma that was farmed by some guy running a bunch of bots? The items can’t be so rare that people just say ‘screw it’ and support botters and RMT sites.

8

No. It is good as it is. You don’t like? You don’t have time?
Well… Your Problem.

9

You think a Pul rune or better should drop every 5 runes?

You think a Vex or higher should drop every 14.8 runes?

This is what you’re asking for with 10x droprate. It’s insane.

Can you imagine every < 15th rune being a Vex or higher? that would ruin this game, completely.

Here are the droprates for runes when R17 is rolled

Zod 5171 5171
Cham 1981 1432
Jah 1321 687
Ber 1475 469
Sur 983 317
Lo 1091 246
Ohm 727 184
Vex 764 148
Gul 509 115
Ist 538 95
Mal 358 75
Um 367 62
Pul 245 50

The first number is the standard drop rate, the second is the or higher rate.

a 10 fold increase in rune drop rate means you would get a Ber rune or higher every
<47 runes.

I’ve had 47+ runes drop in 1 day before, that is just insane.

10

That sounds about right or from how I remember it. The rarity of the highrunes are the reasons why people get so excited when they find one. You also have to account for all the uniques and rares you find in those runs which sometimes could be worth several highrunes.

I’m against the changes. Don’t change the drop rate :slight_smile:

11

Ok, maybe 10x is a bit much, but rune droprates could easily be buffed 2-3x with no overly negative effect on the game. And yes, I think in Hell difficulty you should find a VEX at least out of every 50+ rune drops.

12

Everyone would be geared within a week and it would feel exactly like how D3 is now. Hollow.

13

Well you just made hoto way too easy…Every char has a hoto within a week, yay!

Yuck.

14

Who even farms for just runes? You MF for mostly uniques/rares/gcs and get lucky every couple weeks or so when a random HR drops in hell. Otherwise… its always Hell forges or trading.

15

I remember someone saying this is what they would cry for next after Ploot. Looks like they are starting on it early.

16

Here’s the thing, you’re not stopping people from getting geared. You’re just forcing people to spend $$ and support the botters(who do kill the game) if they want to get geared and have any kind of a life. I’d rather have runes be more obtainable for average people and not have people support the cheaters.

17

Naw man its a slow burn gameplay on non ladder now. You dont need to buy them with money and you dont need to grind hours everyday on ladder to get them before its ends.

18

i hate this argument. people who spend real money on in-game crap is a very small minority of people. it doesnt create these people, they already exist. and no matter how easy a game is, they will always pay and do zero work.

19

Disagree. There will only be so many whales to buy runes @ 500$ a pop. The D2 1.14 drop rate will absolutely keep people under geared for a long time, and create replay value.

20

I think this would be a bad change. I don’t remotely mind farming for weeks on end; makes the reward worth it. Take that away, and the reward becomes just … a prerequisite. There are enough games like that.