Loot table community

[Darrell R Crain]

Ok.. on loot tables.. from a CODING perspective it is Impossible to have every item possible as a drop in EVERY game. Simply caus it cant have that many variables in one string.. THERE FORE the drop you are CAPABLE of getting ARE INDEED decided at GAME GENERATION. And since 2.0 loot was enabled its even MORE apparent now then it was. EVERY DIABLO OR OTHER CRAWLER GAME USES THE SAME METHOD. when it has Legendary type drops. If All items were random THEN it would not be nesseary for them to do this.. but like i said.. this is a have to cause of the limitations of the programming langue.

Now if u say but drops are determened off the mobs that are generated.. and thats when ill ask you WHEN those mobs are generated... chicken or the egg? Any how just cause some one tells u the sky is purple dont mean u should belive them. Y not acctually do 30 secs of research...

[thegrimace]

Ok.. on loot tables.. from a CODING perspective it is Impossible to have every item possible as a drop in EVERY game. Simply caus it cant have that many variables in one string.. THERE FORE the drop you are CAPABLE of getting ARE INDEED decided at GAME GENERATION. And since 2.0 loot was enabled its even MORE apparent now then it was. EVERY DIABLO OR OTHER CRAWLER GAME USES THE SAME METHOD. when it has Legendary type drops. If All items were random THEN it would not be nesseary for them to do this.. but like i said.. this is a have to cause of the limitations of the programming langue.

Now if u say but drops are determened off the mobs that are generated.. and thats when ill ask you WHEN those mobs are generated... chicken or the egg? Any how just cause some one tells u the sky is purple dont mean u should belive them. Y not acctually do 30 secs of research...

Lol

10char

[nhjelle]

Ok.. on loot tables.. from a CODING perspective it is Impossible to have every item possible as a drop in EVERY game. Simply caus it cant have that many variables in one string.. THERE FORE the drop you are CAPABLE of getting ARE INDEED decided at GAME GENERATION. And since 2.0 loot was enabled its even MORE apparent now then it was. EVERY DIABLO OR OTHER CRAWLER GAME USES THE SAME METHOD. when it has Legendary type drops. If All items were random THEN it would not be nesseary for them to do this.. but like i said.. this is a have to cause of the limitations of the programming langue.

Now if u say but drops are determened off the mobs that are generated.. and thats when ill ask you WHEN those mobs are generated... chicken or the egg? Any how just cause some one tells u the sky is purple dont mean u should belive them. Y not acctually do 30 secs of research...

I'm really glad to see that preschool is offering programming classes these days. It's a good idea to start the next generation off with a valuable curriculum.
However, please do not try to explain client-server session exchanges simply on the basis of variable assignment/population. It would be an absolutely horrid practice to send a "string", as you called it, of every drop available to the client. It would be even worse to determine item drops when spawning monsters. Talk about wasted bandwidth... If they did this, it would be a strenuous data transfer operation for monsters that might not even be killed.
Instead, think about this. Client sends request to server when the player enters new game world. Server runs algorithm to create an array of monsters. The types are determined by a look-up table for that specific world ID. Server sends an array to client containing monster ID, levelarea ID, and point object (X, Y, Z coordinates).
The client creates a monster at the location for each index of the array.
When a monster is killed, the client sends a request to the server mentioning a unique identifier. Server responds with an array of items that drop.
There is a multitude of possibilities for how the server determines item drops. From what we've seen with leaked drop tables, chances are it's probably fairly simple.
The server first determines item quality based on the odds for each quality. There are 6 options when it comes to armor: weak (gray), normal, superior, magic, rare, and legendary.
Next, the server determines what type of item it is based on the available types for the quality (there are no weak follower tokens for example). There aren't that many options here either.
For most items it'll simply be a generic item and this step can be skipped. If it's a legendary, there's a small table of legendaries for the item slot. We've already seen the rates for this part...
Finally, the server determines stats of the item. This process is similar to the above.
The server sends the client an item object. For example, it could contain [4,34,18,520,53,544].
This could mean it is a magic item which is a scoundrel token. It has 520 dexterity and 544 vitality. The item name might be determined by the client based on stats, or another value might be attached such as 8D,3C. This could be a prefix ID and a suffix ID in hex.
The client uses this item object to generate an in-game item.

In addition to all of what I've explained, it's possible that drops are pre-determined on the server to add some slack. These would be SPECIFIC to each character. If you're playing on your Barbarian, the server might have already determined what the next magic, rare, and legendary item will be. Next time you kill something, the client sends a request to the server. The server rolls to determine item quality based on that monster's drops (unique elites drop 1 rare). If it is a unique, the server simply sends the cached rare drop to the client. It's still completely randomized, it was simply determined before you killed the monster, but this is entirely server-side... When you log off, the cached items are likely garbage collected.

Can you exploit a system like this? Sure, but you'll have to find your way into one of Blizzard's server farms and somehow gain access to a machine.
Will it help to log off and reset item cache? No. The server doesn't determine if a legendary will drop until the monster dies, but it might determine what that legendary will be IF one does drop, and there's no way to know which legendary this will be.

[maggibesti]

Blizzard already said this whole loot tables thing is false...

Yeah, if loot tables are false. Then how can someone explain when I play like 4-5 hours in a row and I've found at least 2x of each item sometimes up to 4-5 times? Where are all the other items? I've also noticed when I played with a friend he was also getting lots of the same items, 2-3x same amulet or ring in those 4-5 hours. We almost never got the same items but we got many of the items we found.

If loot tables wouldn't exist, what's the possibility of me finding the same items not once, not twice but up to 3-5 times in just 5 hours? Out of all the possibilities of finding all those items that exist in the game, I only get those select few? And this isn't just happening once, but every time I play. I haven't noticed this until we got the community buff. So either Me, including my friend and many other people probably that play high torments and for a few hours here and there, are really lucky(unlucky) to find bunch of the same items over and over? Like sometimes I drop 4 echoing furies and 2x some other crappy maces in 5 hours, including some shitty stone gauntlets 5 times too. While the next days I drop tons of shitty Chaingmail chests and Devil toungs including one or two of Wildwood and Severs.

But yeah basically, if I play for some hours, I drop an item I'll definitely get that item at least 2-4 more times in 5 hours including the same item type (mace, sword, gloves, boost etc). So do explain. Oh and PS, sometimes when gambling I notice my self getting 5-6 legs every 500 shards, and then poof all the sudden I get 1 every 500. How come? Maybe RNG, but come on, RNG starts to become more and more unrealistic and loot table more and more realistic. Though in the end it's still based on RNG, but with loot tables.

I doubt a blue post can explain that, can they? And also like someone said, not finding an item in along time then all the sudden you find 2-3 of them in 2 hours? Some items I haven't seen since first 2 weeks of RoS all the sudden drop 2-3 times in 2 hours, including more items of the same type.

It might all be just RNG, we can't disprove that so quickly, but it sure doesn't look like 100% RNG to me. :-)

[Darrell R Crain]

I'm really glad to see that preschool is offering programming classes these days. It's a good idea to start the next generation off with a valuable curriculum.
However, please do not try to explain client-server session exchanges simply on the basis of variable assignment/population. It would be an absolutely horrid practice to send a "string", as you called it, of every drop available to the client. It would be even worse to determine item drops when spawning monsters. Talk about wasted bandwidth... If they did this, it would be a strenuous data transfer operation for monsters that might not even be killed.
Instead, think about this. Client sends request to server when the player enters new game world. Server runs algorithm to create an array of monsters. The types are determined by a look-up table for that specific world ID. Server sends an array to client containing monster ID, levelarea ID, and point object (X, Y, Z coordinates).
The client creates a monster at the location for each index of the array.
When a monster is killed, the client sends a request to the server mentioning a unique identifier. Server responds with an array of items that drop.
There is a multitude of possibilities for how the server determines item drops. From what we've seen with leaked drop tables, chances are it's probably fairly simple.
The server first determines item quality based on the odds for each quality. There are 6 options when it comes to armor: weak (gray), normal, superior, magic, rare, and legendary.
Next, the server determines what type of item it is based on the available types for the quality (there are no weak follower tokens for example). There aren't that many options here either.
For most items it'll simply be a generic item and this step can be skipped. If it's a legendary, there's a small table of legendaries for the item slot. We've already seen the rates for this part...
Finally, the server determines stats of the item. This process is similar to the above.
The server sends the client an item object. For example, it could contain [4,34,18,520,53,544].
This could mean it is a magic item which is a scoundrel token. It has 520 dexterity and 544 vitality. The item name might be determined by the client based on stats, or another value might be attached such as 8D,3C. This could be a prefix ID and a suffix ID in hex.
The client uses this item object to generate an in-game item.

In addition to all of what I've explained, it's possible that drops are pre-determined on the server to add some slack. These would be SPECIFIC to each character. If you're playing on your Barbarian, the server might have already determined what the next magic, rare, and legendary item will be. Next time you kill something, the client sends a request to the server. The server rolls to determine item quality based on that monster's drops (unique elites drop 1 rare). If it is a unique, the server simply sends the cached rare drop to the client. It's still completely randomized, it was simply determined before you killed the monster, but this is entirely server-side... When you log off, the cached items are likely garbage collected.

Can you exploit a system like this? Sure, but you'll have to find your way into one of Blizzard's server farms and somehow gain access to a machine.
Will it help to log off and reset item cache? No. The server doesn't determine if a legendary will drop until the monster dies, but it might determine what that legendary will be IF one does drop, and there's no way to know which legendary this will be.

the drops are generated locally and encrypted.. so no bandwidth usage... U send the item to the server.
And ya im half arsed with my termonology.
Far as you thinking the items are determined till you log off.. just LOL.
Man u can join a game play in it for 5 hrs rifting.. then leave that game go back in and ull notice your drops changed completely.
For instance last night i was in a game that droped a set piece Every rift. Thats no were NEAR random did it drop the same set pieces no. but all the same quality.. Green
this theory is confirmed every time i look at clan loot logs or talk to friends. Go look at the raw drop data that guy compiled.. and tell me if its randomly possible to see straights of Mauraders in even a remotly random world..

[ccrackheads]

Ok.. on loot tables.. from a CODING perspective it is Impossible to have every item possible as a drop in EVERY game. Simply caus it cant have that many variables in one string..

the drops are generated locally and encrypted.. so no bandwidth usage... U send the item to the server.
Far as you thinking the items are determined till you log off.. just LOL.
Man u can join a game play in it for 5 hrs rifting.. then leave that game go back in and ull notice your drops changed completely.

From what we've seen through gameplay, Items are pre-determined until you log off/switch toons/change games... If you sit in one game on one character, you're gonna keep getting the same legendary items. Leave the game, and the item table changes if you come back.

And I highly doubt that the CLIENT sends the drop data to the SERVER. If it were client-side, that's just begging to be manipulated where you're dropping tons of legendaries. Seeing as how they had a RMAH at one point and an end-game entirely based around item grinding, it'd be really dumb from a programming standpoint. Not to mention you'd have 4 different players sending data at the server, bogging it down. A lot faster to have one server sending data to 4 characters... A lot less for the server to interpret, try to mash together so everyone is in sync, then send back to everyone. Nhjelle's method is sound from a programming standpoint, not to mention that it reduces the amount of data being sent between clients and the server, which is of pretty big importance when you're planning on running a few million game instances across a network of servers.

Just... wow. Seriously, what background do you have in programming that you would think this way? Are we talking a 2-year "degree" from ITT Tech or Westwood? Because what you're saying is half-ass backwards from the 2 years I spent in college on a programming degree before changing my major.

[awp2004]

the drops are generated locally and encrypted.. so no bandwidth usage... U send the item to the server.
And ya im half arsed with my termonology.
Far as you thinking the items are determined till you log off.. just LOL.
Man u can join a game play in it for 5 hrs rifting.. then leave that game go back in and ull notice your drops changed completely.
For instance last night i was in a game that droped a set piece Every rift. Thats no were NEAR random did it drop the same set pieces no. but all the same quality.. Green
this theory is confirmed every time i look at clan loot logs or talk to friends. Go look at the raw drop data that guy compiled.. and tell me if its randomly possible to see straights of Mauraders in even a remotly random world..

That first sentence, and Im sorry to bust your bubble, is very wrong

[awp2004]

btw, do u know what guy WHO posted raw data also posted photoshopped pictures

[nhjelle]

Drops would NEVER be determined by client. That's the worst possible practice for an MMO.
Pre-determined loot doesn't infer similar items. What I explained was a vague representation loot generation scheme used for an MMO that I worked on at my previous job. At a scale as large as Diablo 3, I would assume that they don't bind pre-determined loot to a player or game party since there are simply too many players logging in and out. It's more feasible to use a "loot pool" system where the server maintains a certain amount of item objects. When the client requests loot for a specific monster, the server determines the item quality. Next it would decide if the item will be use the smart loot system or if it is randomly chosen. Then it will either pull the next item that's suited for the player's class or it will just take the next one from a general scope. The loot pool would always have an equal amount of drops for each class, and a new item will be created to replace those that are removed.
As for items being similar, it's just luck (good or bad) if an item pops up multiple times. They're still randomly selected from lookup tables.

[n00bmasta]

Play the game and you'll see that you don't roll the same legendaries in the same game on different toons. But since that probably won't be enough for you...

"-The loot table is determined by toon, per game. If it were possible to play in one game indefinitely, there would be certain legendaries you would have mountains of, and certain ones that will never drop. You could open 50 A1 Cache and not get a single RRoG because RRoG is not in your table for that game. "
TealDawn: RNG: Debunked and explained

1. Tealdawn is in my clan. He's taken back a lot of what he has posted.
2. In a particular instance of A5 afk farm (+puzzle ring), I got about 10 different rings. This blows the 5/slot out of the water.
3. Might as well do lootservers right

So, people believe in this stupid loot table fallacy without even data to assess its existence.
On the other hand, they completely reject blizzard posts and common sense because they can't prove that loot tables don't exist.

Wow, I have never seen such backward thinking.

+1

[nhjelle]

For those who are hardcore skeptics, here's some conditional references IDs used in client-server communication on D3. The 37 at the end is the ID type.
The whitespace was cut out for some reason, the client understands each of these as text and sends two numeric values to the server: ID type and ID.

NOTTorment36844837
KillElitePackFive23140837
KillElitePackFour23140737
KillElitePackOne23097937
KillElitePackThree23098237
KillElitePackTwo23098137
PlayerIsBarbarian5092637
PlayerIsCrusader31692437
PlayerIsDemonHunter10201437
PlayerIsMonk5092737
PlayerIsWitchDoctor5092937
PlayerIsWizard5093037

And here's some item-related reference IDs. Blizzard calls these "GameBalance" IDs, probably a quip regarding how terrible client determined loot would be... The 2237 at the end is ID type.

ItemTypes197552237
SetItemBonuses1230482237
RareNames197652237
SocketedEffects197662237
AffixList197372237
ItemEnchantments2749312237
ItemRequiredLevels2561582237
ItemSalvageLevels3614302237
Items_Armor197502237
Items_Legendary1706272237
Items_Legendary_Other11892237
Items_Legendary_Weapons197522237
Items_Other197532237
Items_PagesOfFate2451932237
Items_Quests1308672237
Items_Quests_Beta1978802237
Items_RandomPlaceholder3612402237
Items_Weapons197542237
ParagonBonuses2867482237
RecipesBlacksmith1900732237
RecipesJeweler1900742237
RecipesMystic1900752237
PowerFormulaTables1537622237

Edit: x1_EnchantItemAffixUseCountCostScalars3466982237 - I missed this one.

One more thing, this might be related to future content: x1_DevilsHandRedeemableSets3244162237
Devil's hand was datamined in RoS beta, but I'm pretty sure this one is new

[Darrell R Crain]

For those who are hardcore skeptics, here's some conditional references IDs used in client-server communication on D3. The 37 at the end is the ID type.
The whitespace was cut out for some reason, the client understands each of these as text and sends two numeric values to the server: ID type and ID.

NOTTorment36844837
KillElitePackFive23140837
KillElitePackFour23140737
KillElitePackOne23097937
KillElitePackThree23098237
KillElitePackTwo23098137
PlayerIsBarbarian5092637
PlayerIsCrusader31692437
PlayerIsDemonHunter10201437
PlayerIsMonk5092737
PlayerIsWitchDoctor5092937
PlayerIsWizard5093037

And here's some item-related reference IDs. Blizzard calls these "GameBalance" IDs, probably a quip regarding how terrible client determined loot would be... The 2237 at the end is ID type.

ItemTypes197552237
SetItemBonuses1230482237
RareNames197652237
SocketedEffects197662237
AffixList197372237
ItemEnchantments2749312237
ItemRequiredLevels2561582237
ItemSalvageLevels3614302237
Items_Armor197502237
Items_Legendary1706272237
Items_Legendary_Other11892237
Items_Legendary_Weapons197522237
Items_Other197532237
Items_PagesOfFate2451932237
Items_Quests1308672237
Items_Quests_Beta1978802237
Items_RandomPlaceholder3612402237
Items_Weapons197542237
ParagonBonuses2867482237
RecipesBlacksmith1900732237
RecipesJeweler1900742237
RecipesMystic1900752237
PowerFormulaTables1537622237

Edit: x1_EnchantItemAffixUseCountCostScalars3466982237 - I missed this one.

One more thing, this might be related to future content: x1_DevilsHandRedeemableSets3244162237
Devil's hand was datamined in RoS beta, but I'm pretty sure this one is new

this proves me right... were the entirity of the item is on the server the Roll is local the client Sent ID's to the server.. Sending data rather then having te server process the roll is more efficient.. not less

[nhjelle]

this proves me right... were the entirity of the item is on the server the Roll is local the client Sent ID's to the server.. Sending data rather then having te server process the roll is more efficient.. not less

I really don't understand how you come to that conclusion at all. Here's an example of how the data-flow might be processed for Diablo.
Edit: ownedcore destroys image quality..

Once this process is finished, the client ends up with a representation of the item in numeric form. The client uses the data to create a tooltip based on a string look-up table and item image stored in client files.
This is merely an example of rolling an item directly when loot is supposed to drop. With pre-determined loot stored in a "pool". The client is removed from the data flow in this diagram.
The server will create item objects through the same process and maintain a certain amount for each quality and each slot for each quality.
When the client requests loot, the server will pick one from the pool. This concept should be easier to grasp... but here's a picture of it too..
In the picture below, the communication between client and server are the curved lines.

[sezz]

2. In a particular instance of A5 afk farm (+puzzle ring), I got about 10 different rings. This blows the 5/slot out of the water.

I also got 15 different rings in one game (stayed ~8 hours in that game doing rifts because a SOJ dropped, but I didn't get another one, only a crapload of other legendary/set rings).

[ccrackheads]

I really don't understand how you come to that conclusion at all. Here's an example of how the data-flow might be processed for Diablo.

Because he (Darrell R Crain) doesn't know what he's talking about.