Hi,
I was wondering how loot randomness works in D3.
Has my loot line been defined in the game the day I created my account? And I will drop what the game has decided, no matter which mob I kill next, or which chest I open or do not open next?
Or does my loot vary depending on what mob I kill/what chest I open next?
Or some other formula I haven’t thought about…
You really think the server makes a list on char creation with every single drop in sequence you will ever get?
Sounds like you’re having troubles or issues with the game?
It’s random. Next question.
Half-joking aside, not entirely I believe. I think game decides if you really need or deserve a piece of loot sometimes, depending on some parameters. It is pseudo-random at the end of the day.
The pseudo Random Number Generator pushes out a number in nanoseconds. Why would it look at the position of stars the moment you create your account like an astrologist? You hit a monster, a monster hits you or any time an item looted; pRNG rolls a number for damage in the expected values, the damage you incur or the quality of the rolled item in less than a fraction of a second.
Most random number generators use what’s called a ‘seed’ when generating some numbers. Some generate a random hash depending on their own algorithm, some take the international digital clock that is counting seconds since 1970-01-01 at the startup. You can read about it online.
The pRNG script of D3 is client sided, and you should not mettle with it, as it runs the risk of getting banned when system checks files. Thus, no one can really tell you how things work unless they risk their account. So you have to get what you can read online, or here.
Game may use the seed for creating terrain, spawns of entities then pull it apart for other uses to generate numbers, else generate the equipment on the fly by rolling completely irrelevant random numbers. My theory is that seed number “may” change and get rolled again depending on your actions in-game. Nobody could know but developers themselves.
That’s how I see it, at least because if it was completely random then the number generator wouldn’t be called a pseudo-Random, would it? It simulates randomness but still can reward player often to keep you going; if it was completely random everyone would be complaining about this game being relentless or stingy at their item drops and quit years ago. You’re free to dismiss me and come up with your own scientific beliefs.
The game has a “smart loot” system. Most instances that can spawn loot (an “instance” being loosely defined as killing a monster, opening a chest, breaking a breakable object, searching a dead body, etc) will use the smart loot system which, to be very brief, basically says most of the loot you find will be for the class you’re playing when you cause the instance.
One sentence of Nak’s post that’s 100% accurate is this one:
Nobody except the developers really knows EXACTLY how it all works so you’ll never get concrete fully accurate information unless said information is shared by a dev directly. But the basic idea is the Smart Loot causes things for your current class to drop more often than not from most activities causing instances of Loot generation. Said generation is thought to be weighted random - we know for example that certain items (such as Rift Keys) can only drop from certain sources (such as Rift Guardians or a handful of seasonal mechanics) - but as per that Nak sentence, nobody here knows the full picture.
EDIT: Not to imply Nak’s definitely incorrect on the rest of it. He might be right on the pseudo gen + seed stuff! But he also might not be, is my point. But he is 100% correct in that only a developer for this game has the full working knowledge of it all.
Highly doubtful. RNG generators need a seed number to start the random number chain. If that was tied to your account, every time you start a new session, the seed would be loaded and you would get the same set of random numbers. Basically, if the first time you played you get a legendary after the second monster killed, you would every time.
More than likely, the seed is chosen when you start a session or enter a game. How the seed is chosen? No one outside of Blizz is privy to that information, so we don’t know. This is a good thing, because if people knew how the seed was chosen, they could figure a way to abuse it.
Yup. The game decides what you get from random drops.
What you get isn’t always affected by what you kill, what you open, what you break (there are exceptions like weapon/armor racks). How much you get does. Bosses on T16 drop a few items every time. Single monsters generally don’t drop 1 or no items. Chests and breakables have a different drop rate than single monsters.
Basically, there is no way to abuse the drops other than maximizing your drops/hour. If you are only concerned about drops and not paragon, farm T16 Visions as fast and as often as you can.
It does. Create a new seasonal character and a loot table is generated; certain items will refuse to propagate until certain other criteria are met. Pretty sure this was proven many years ago.
People have been discussing and arguing about this for many years now.
We can only guess because there was never any Official information, only unprovable Player Theories.
Some Players are more knowledgeable about game design, but we will never know for sure unless a Blizz Dev spills the beans.
We do know for sure, it was proven many years ago. There’s an amount of predetermination that goes on. Certain breakpoints and thresholds that must be met before certain things will appear
Nothing has been proven. As yessquire said, it remains a theory, nothing more.
While it went down for me that way because I’m really quick at changing pace or my targeted slots at gambling, that is just a theory. All affixes in the item pool are weighted, some will appear more frequent than others on the loot you got and most often than not, you’ll end up getting desired pieces from the common affix rolls first then work your way to rarer desired affixes.
It may appear that game would “refuse” to give you a perfect trifecta gloves or that desired reroll of 99-100%+ ChD on your amulet, because you are lacking efficiency from other armor slots. But, it’s how weighted randomness appears from the perspective of dedicated progress.
In case you feel stuck on not getting proper loot, most likely you are trying to score a piece that require stars to align to be the right piece. You can read this as one of the reasons why gambling jewelry has a higher price per piece from Kadala; to not let player get frustrated early on.
It was literally proven, they showed the table/code and everything. But I know you of course will always disagree with what I say so it’s whatever. I don’t really care what you believe or if you want to stay ignorant about it, that’s your choice to make
It was a theory but then it was proven; pretty sure at that point it’s called a fact
Providing a source or at least hinting towards it would help your claim. I’m not saying it’s impossible or it’s any nonsense but giving a clue would go that extra mile.
Show me a proof (A real proof, not a theory)
Nope, no troubles nor issues with the game. Not being very video games literate (D3 is the only game I play), I was just being curious about how D3 works.
Many thanks to all those who took time to explain what we know and what we don’t!
I don’t specifically know D3 but based on general knowledge and WoW-specific…
Which items can drop is level and class dependent. Especially at lower levels. I’ve never seen any tables or code released by Blizzard but that at least is observable.
I have to agree with this 100%. I have always thought this and the game knows what you want. I said that on here one time and people thought I was nuts.
Pro-tip: I play with a tinfoil hat. Since I adopted it, Blibli can no longer know what I’m looking for 
Editor’s note: the loot is not better…
There was (perhaps it still exists, but I don’t have the link) a website that gave the accessible legendaries, by level, and by class.
It was quite interesting
If anyone still has the link…