1.07 Guide
Thanks to Rapusz from the DiabloII.net Single Player forum.
The following guide/FAQ is the much updated, corrected and improved version of the previous v1.07 guides. This time many players of the SPF community have helped me, and we've managed to do a wonderful job You should be able to find more information here about 1.07 than you may ever need, but if you still have questions, feel free to post them on the diabloii.net Single Player Forums, our frequently visited lair (aka here ^^). Here we go again guys and gals, attach your belts for we're taking off...
Note: I don't have much more constructive to add to this fat guide, so from now on you won't see major improvements in it in the future. Minor polishing (typos, lil' corrections etc.) may be in order, but I won't repost the guide ever again.
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The contents of the v1.07 guide
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I,) General informations about v1.07
Q: What is v1.07?
Q: What is so hot about it? Why there are so many people who play it?
A) Certain unique/set items that are different from their v1.09 equivalents
B) Crafted items
Q: Is it true that v1.07 crafted items are bugged?
Q: According to different sources you cannot craft a cruel weapon before reaching Lvl 78. Is this true?
Q: Will crafted items keep the attributes of the base item?
Q: Can one really imbue crafted items?
C) +Max/Min damage charms/resist all charms
Q: So, how can I install v1.07? Do I need to download something?
II,) v1.07 differences from v1.09, gameplay features, bugs etc.
Q: How can I mule in v1.07?
III,) Treasure Hunting in v1.07: from Alpha to Omega
A) Unique/set items
Q: Is this true that MF is nerfed?
Q: So how to get the uber set/unique items then?
Q: Where and how to do rack runs?
The area levels of some of the most popular "racked" areas
Armor/Weapon types - qlvl
Rack running tips
B) +Minimum/maximum damage/ resist all charms
C) Crafting ingredients
D) Other important monster drops
IV.) Monsters
A) "Teleportation" bosses
B) Lord de Seis
C) Baal
D) The Ancients
V.) Mercenaries
VI.) Class-specific character build tips
1. Barbarian
2. Sorceress
VII.) v1.07 Ethics
VIII.) Credits
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I,) General informations about v1.07
Q: What is v1.07?
A: The patch version v1.07 is the release version of the Diablo II : Lord of Destruction expansion pack. It was the code name of the game during the final beta tests on battle.net and it has never been available there, but I still wouldn't call it "the beta" since it is an official version of the game. If you want to know what changes have been made to the game after v1.07 then you should dig up the patch.txt file in your Diablo II folder.
Q: What is so hot about it? Why there are so many people who play it?
A: As you know, v1.07 is a bit beta-smelling. I have never understood why Blizzard released the final game with this version when they had a nearly (or maybe completely?) finished v1.08 patch in their fridge... Anyway, v1.07 is full of unbalances, both in a positive and negative way. Beating v1.07 on hell is a big challange. I mean BIG. Certain monsters are very powerful, and you've got to go untwinked unless you upgrade a classic char to the expansion. However, what makes v1.07 so popular are all the overpowered items that you cannot get in v1.09. And which are these?
A) Certain unique/set items that are different from their v1.09 equivalents
Mainly the notorious "vita" items and several other great stuff. Most unique items are weaker than in v1.09 but the minority makes up for the crap majority... For v1.07 item stats check the http://www.d2realms.com database, or directly the mpq files if you need perfectly correct stats. If you know how to read these files then you can find them (the extracted txt files) here:
http://wreckernl.homestead.com/file...s/107_files.zip
The most popular v1.07 uniques are the following:
Arkaine's Valor (Balrog Skin) - +2 all skills, 1554 def, +2.5 vitality/per level, +2 life per level, 50% fire resist...
The Grandfather (Colossus Blade) - 150% ED, but +175 life and 25% life and mana bonus
Harlequin Crest (Shako) - +2 all skill, 100% ED, +40% life, no PDR or life/mana per clvl, 50% MF
Baranar's Star (Devil Star) - 1.5 vitality per level, no elemental damage
Stormshield (Aegis) - The special item type makes it interesting, but the mods on it are the same like in v1.09, and the Aegis has more str req and less blocking..
Lightsabre (Elegant Blade) - 200% ED, 30% lightning absorb, interesting item type
Wizardspike (Bone Knife) - 95% res all!
Hellslayer (Decapitator) - +2 vitality per level, 150% ED, Indestructible, but the Enhanced max damage is less than in v1.09
Arreat's Face (Slayer Guard) - +2 barb skills, +0.5 max damage per clvl, 15% target's defense (especially useful in PvP)
Vampire Gaze (Grim Helm) - 8% life and mana leech, 25% PDR, rest is same
Valkyrie Wing (Winged Helm) - 30% IAS, faster cast, faster run/walk
Gerke's Sanctuary (Pavise) - +1 vitality per level etc.
Visceratuant (Defender) - +2 necro skills, +80 life
Saracen's Chance ammy - Prismatic Atma's Scarab...
String of Ears (Demonhide Sash) - fixed 8% LL, 15% PDR etc.
Herald of Zakarum (Gilded Shield) - Cannot be frozen, +damage!
Hellmouth (War Gauntlets) - Cannot be frozen, 20% IAS
Skullder's Ire (Russet Armor) - +30 vitality and perfect ED% along with all the bonuses of the v1.09 one
From the set items, the most interesting ones are the Laying of Hands (Bramble Mitts) for it's 50% fire absorb, the Mavina's Tenet (Sharskin Belt) for it's 10-15% mana leech and 40% faster run/walk and the Griswold's Honor (Vortex Shield) for it's random class-specific auto mod ( Ed% +AR or resist all ). There is a section below in the guide that explains how to get these uber items. IMPORTANT: The v1.07 Veil of Steel (Spired Helm) does NOT have the +1.5 vitality per level ingame( stupid Bliz...sigh...), so do not waste your time on such a rack!
B) Crafted items
If you check the patch.txt file, you can read the following sentence in the v1.08 changes paragraph:
"-Crafted items cannot generate with affixes meant for magic items only."
It means that in v1.07 they CAN get magic-only affixes, like Cruel, Godly etc. And since crafted items work as rares, they can get up to 6 additional affixes along with the pregenerated mods. And these crafted items could also get up to 3 sockets from a single socketing quest at Larzuk... Just imagine a crafted CB with 500% ED, 40% IAS, +2 barb skills and 3 sockets... Naturally, the odds of getting something decent are very low, and the ingredients are damned hard to get, since both the rune and jewel drop rates are low. This is the list of the working crafting recipes:
Lesser Crafting Recipes
Any Weapon + Jewel + Ort Rune + Perfect Sapphire -> Lesser Hitpower Weapon
Light Plated Boots + Jewel + Eld Rune + Perfect Ruby -> Lesser Blood Boots
Heavy Gloves + Jewel + Tir Rune + Perfect Ruby -> Lesser Blood Gloves
Belt + Jewel + Nef + Perfect Ruby -> Lesser Blood Belt
Any Weapon + Jewel + Ort Rune + Perfect Ruby -> Lesser Blood Weapon
Light Plated Boots + Jewel + Eld Rune + Perfect Amethyst -> Lesser Caster Boots
Heavy Gloves + Jewel + Tir Rune + Perfect Amethyst -> Lesser Caster Gloves
Plate Mail + Jewel + Ith Rune + Perfect Amethyst -> Lesser Caster Body
Breast Plate + Jewel + Ith + Perfect Emerald -> Lesser Safety Body
Any Weapon + Jewel + Ort Rune + Perfect Emerald -> Lesser Safety Weapon
Greater Crafting Recipes
Vampirefang Belt + Jewel + Dol Rune + Perfect Sapphire -> Greater Hitpower Belt
Any Weapon + Jewel + Fal + Perfect Sapphire -> Greater Hitpower Weapon
Mirrored Boots + Jewel + Sol + Perfect Ruby -> Greater Blood Boots
Vampirebone Gloves + Jewel + Shae Rune + Perfect Ruby -> Greater Blood Gloves
Mithril Coil + Jewel + Dol Rune + Perfect Ruby -> Greater Blood Belt
Aegis + Jewel + Hel Rune + Perfect Ruby -> Greater Blood Shield
Kraken Shell + Jewel + Io Rune + Perfect Ruby -> Greater Blood Body
Any amulet + Jewel + Lum Rune + Perfect Ruby -> Greater Blood Amulet
Any Ring + Jewel + Ko Rune + Perfect Ruby -> Greater Blood Ring
Any Weapon + Jewel + Lum Rune + Perfect Ruby -> Greater Blood Weapon
Wyrmhide Boots + Jewel + Sol Rune + Perfect Amethyst -> Greater Caster Boots
Vambraces + Jewel + Shae Rune + Perfect Amethyst -> Greater Caster Gloves
Troll Belt + Jewel + Dol Rune + Perfect Amethyst -> Greater Caster Belt
Luna + Jewel + Io Rune + Perfect Amethyst -> Greater Caster Shield
Hellforge Plate + Jewel + Io Rune + Perfect Amethyst -> Greater Caster Body
Amy Amulet + Jewel + Lum Rune + Perfect Amethyst -> Greater Caster Amulet
Any Ring + Jewel + Ko Rune + Perfect Amethyst -> Greater Caster Ring
Any Weapon + Jewel + Fal Rune + Perfect Amethyst -> Greater Caster Weapon
Greater Hauberk + Jewel + Io Rune + Perfect Emerald -> Greater Safety Body
Any Weapon + Jewel + Fal Rune + Perfect Emerald -> Greater Safety Weapon
Note: all these recipes work in SP,you don't need a perfect gem to execute any of these, any quality will do the job, and they don't have to be magical, white ones will do the job. Greater craftings have better preset mods, but since the rest of the affixes get picked randomly, nothing guarantees that the outcome of a greater crafting will be any better than a normal crafted item of that sort.
Q: Is it true that v1.07 crafted items are bugged?
A: In a special way, yes. Sometimes, instead of getting all the different preset mods of the recipe, only one of the mods spawns on the item but it stacks multiply times. This frequently happens with the blood recipe items, and the result is a 10%+ life leech or sometimes mana leech item. This may occure with other recipes as well, though.
Q: According to different sources you cannot craft a cruel weapon before reaching Lvl 78. Is this true?
A: No, it is definately a rumor. I got my first cruel at Lvl. 58. I haven't heard 100% exact informations about how the game selects the affixes that the crafted item may get, but one thing is sure: the crafted item's ilvl has nothing to do with the possible affixes. I crafted with a Level 6 char and Level 74 item an Ilvl 3 Beserker Axe and it had +2 masteries as one of its mods. In test crafting 2 I used a ilvl 9 bow and a clvl 79 char and the result was an ilvl 51 item, with mid-high affixes. Jarulf mentioned once that the max alvl on .07 crafted items is either clvl*0.66 or ilvl*0.66, and the higher one is used in the alvl determining, but he wasn't sure back then. It seems to be true, though.
Q: Will crafted items keep the attributes of the base item?
A: No, it is a rumor that I've started spreading after reading it somewhere. I've tested it many different ways, and the result never kept the base item's sockets, runeword, or the stats of the jewels/gems/runes that I previously socketed in it. It did seem to keep, however, the superior mods. Whenever I crafted a superior +15% ED, +1 AR, 3 socketed Mythical Sword, I always got relatively high ED% and some AR bonus. It might have been only my luck, though.
Q: Can one really imbue crafted items?
Yes, no matter how impossible it sounds. You can imbue crafted rings, ammys or even sorceress orbs. You *might* have some [i]small[i/] chance of imbuing a +4 skill orb or ammy this way, but doing so would require some insane luck.
C) +Max/Min damage / Resist all charms
A v1.08 change: "- Decreased values on +maximum damage and +minimum damage charms.
(This will not affect existing items.)"
In v1.07 you can get up to +40 max damage from a single grand charm, on the Serrated g.ch. of Maiming. They have also very low clvl reqs, so they will be the best friends of your untwinked "fighter" chars who lack of a hurty weapon. Remember, these charms add their +damage to that of the weapon, and their bonuses are multiplied by your skills, stats, etc.
Resist all charms are equally great, too: the Shimmering prefix adds up to 3-6% res all on a small charm, 7-13% res all on a large charm and 14-20% res all on a grand charm...
Q: So, how can I install v1.07? Do I need to download something?
First of all, no, you need nothing but your expansion disk and some free space on your HDD to install v1.07.
This is how to do it:
1, Copy your current Diablo II folder to a separate directory, and re-name it to something like Diablo II v1.07 or whatever you like.
2, Delete the patch.mpq file in this folder.
3, Replace the current Game.exe, D2game.dll, D2Client.dll and D2Common.dll file with the v1.07 files. You can find the zip file that contains these files here:
Now you can run v1.09 in the orginal folder and switch to v1.07 anytime with the other folder. You should know, however, that both versions will save your chars in the save subdirectory of the original folder. If you start v1.09, you will see your v1.07 char(s) on the character selection screen. But DON'T panic! As long as you don't actually start a game with a .07 char in .09, s/he doesn't get upgraded! This means that you don't have to backup your .07 chars everytime you play .09!
II,) v1.07 differences from v1.09, gameplay features, bugs etc.
- There is no "players x" command, so you cannot increase the XP you get from monsters. The only way to get more XP requires either a home LAN or a good PC. The trick is easy enough: you host a game with your char, then join with another one to this game and team up with him/her. To do this on one PC, you need the modified d2gfx.dll self-muling file: it works with all the versions of the D2X.
- You cannot find elemental damage charms. They were added in .08.
- You cannot find/create socketed Troll Nests, Bone Visages, or assassin claws with more than 2 sockets. Also, polearms and crossbows seem to be the only item types with potentially 6 sockets. Circlets, Tiaras, Coronets, Diadems and sorc-only orbs are always at least magical, no white ones exist, so you cannot imbue any of these.
- No minions can be summoned in town, Iron Golems are not saved with their necros..
- You cannot sell items for more than 25k gold.
- Full Rejuvenation bug: With the following trick you will never run out of full rejuves. You should get the Horadric Cube as soon as possible and then cube 2 Full Rejuves. Now empty your belt, sell one of them, and put the other in one of the slots of the lowest row of your belt. Then hold down Shift and right click on the rejuve in the vendor's shop. This will fill that column in your belt where you put your 2nd big purple with other big purples. Now repeat this until your belt is filled with them.
- Increased attack speed, faster cast rate and enhanced maximum damage mods do not display the exact %, only fast, faster, fastest ( legacy of CD2 ) and it can be very confusing, since let's say fastest run/walk on a grand charm and the same mod on M'avina's belt mean totally different values, 14% vs 40% f r/w.
- Horadric Cube recipes: The 2 popular recipes of v1.09, the 3 chipped gems + 1 sword and the 3 perfect gems + 1 magical item, seem to be broken. The chippie recipe generates long swords only ( a hard-earned soldier's long sword of alacricity, anyone? : / ), and the other recipe seems to generate magical items with low level affixes only like +1 max damage grand charms and the like way too frequently... Certain researches have shown, however, that with some patience you can cube such items this way like Godly Sacred Armor...
We have also the classic recipes. The 6 perfect gems ( one of each type but the skull ) + any quality ammy creates a random quality ammy with "hidden" prismatic mod. I am not usre if you can get a unique amulet this way. However, you can surely get anot her prismatic mod on these for some amazing resists! The same is true for the single resist ring recipes.
- Runewords do exist, but not those that in v1.09. The working v1.07 runewords are listed here:
http://www.chainsmokingdryad.com/d2/1.07_runewords.txt
Note: these runewords are lost once you upgrade them to v1.09, with the exception of those that work in v1.09, like Ancient's Pledge for example.
- A change from v1.07 -> v1.08: "Adjusted damages for all Elite weapons."
Heh, this is nice...In 1.07, it is amazing how underpowered the elite items, especially the weapons are. A typical example:
The damage of the Colossus Blades is 17-107, less than that of the Executioner Swords ( 47-80 ), but the CBs have a base clvl req of 73!!!
The probably only elite item type with the same damage as in 1.09 is the Hydra Bow. So, I must say that in v1.07, elite items are useless junk with outrageous clvl reqs. Luckily, once you upgrade a char to v1.09, the stats of the elite items are adjusted in accordance to the v1.09 stats.
- Rare jewels: long ago, when we started playing v1.07 one of the most exciting things were the rare jewels, with their 6 potetial mods. Since then we've learnt that:
1, It is close to impossible to find a rare jewel
2, Those very few rare jewels that I know about in v1.07 all have only 3 mods.
3, The most popular v1.09 jewel affixes ( Ruby, Thunder, Scintillating ) are all worse in v1.07 than in v1.09: the best example is probably my Jewel of Thunder with 1-30 lightning damage...
- Ethereal weapons and the special, mysterious "Enhanced Maximum Damage" mod: This is an attribute that existed only pre-1.09, and occasionally spawned on ethereal items. It adds 50% ED to the max damage of the weapon that is then enhanced by the etherealness. So the damage of these items - instead of the (min damage+1)*1.5 - (max damage+1)*1.5 formula of the v1.09 ethereals - is (min damage+1)*1.5 - (max damage+1)*2.25 (1.5*1.5). If an item has ED% and +max damage on it, then the max damage will be (base item max damage+1)*(1+ED%/100+0.5)*1.5 + max damage.The ED% is the sum of any possible ED affix, superior mod, plus the ED jewels and/or OHM runes socketed in the item. So a 10% ED superior ethereal Enhanced Maximum Damage 250% ED Cruel Thunder Maul of Eviscreation ( let's say +50 max damage ) socketed with OHM and a 40% ED +10 max damage jewel has a max damage of: (180+1)*[1+(250+40+50+10)/100+0.5]*1.5 + 60 + 10 = 181*5*1.5+60= 1410 damage! *faints*...
- Larzuk's socketing quest: this topic was a subject of many arguements and discussions. It would be cool to be able to socket multiply times the uber set/unique items, but over time it was proven to be a rumor only, started by Blizzard himself, grrr:
Quote:
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- Version 1.07
Attention
- Items with one or two sockets may gain an additional socket.
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Every time I use the quest reward on a unique item, it gets only 1 socket, and the game doesn't allow me on other difficulties to use the socketing on that item again.
What we've learnt about his quest is:
1, White items get sockets depending on their ilvl, but if dropped in NM or Hell they always get maximum number of sockets
2, Uniques/sets get 1 socket
3, Crafted items can get up to 3 sockets, but if the an item type cannot have 3 sockets, then it gets the maximum number of possible sockets - e.g. 2 for all claws. Some items are unsocketable(?) - Troll Nest, Blade Barrier, Bone Visage - as I have mentioned it before.
4, Magical items get randomly 1-4 sockets from a single socketing quest, or less if they cannot have as much as 4 sockets.
Note: no items can be socketed by Larzuk twice.
Q: How can I mule in v1.07?
The best way right now is the d2gfx.dll. It works with every versions of the D2X. 1.07 Shadowmaster or Jamella has more bugs than a rain forest, so it is not recommended to touch them, only at your own risk.. Luckily, we no longer need these dangerous applications when we have or precious ATMA! ^^ For more on this, read the following thread:
http://forums.rpgforums.net/showthr...threadid=188075
III,) Treasure Hunting in v1.07: from Alpha to Omega
This is probably the most awaited section of the guide ^^
A) Unique/set items
You may have already heard about that in v1.07 no items from over TC 66 can drop. Unfortunatelly, this is true: Bliz simply haven't finished the TC system for v1.07 and stopped somewhere near qlvl 66-67 items. They probably spent that evening in a local bar drinking beer instead of working - what wouldn't be a problem: after all beer is good - but you will see later that the 1.07 players really suffer from this "little" neglection... So, you can hope for only the lower level unique/set items from monsters including Shakos, Devil Stars and all the interesting exceptional uniques and M'avina's belt. Unfortunatelly, Bramble Mitts are qlvl 69 - who knows why... - just like Balrog Skins and so on. And even TC 66 seems to be available mainly on the Hell cow level. You will see later how to "beat the system" and still be able to get nearly all the items...
Finally, chests drop very high ilvl items - equal to the are level, just like racks - but they use the TC system of the nearby monsters. They are good at dropping misc items and runes, but nothing else.
Q: Is this true that MF is nerfed?
No, despite of what we thought before it works well. As King's Specter explains in his guide:
When a drop occurs, the game checks for the quality of the item by rolling for unique, rare (yes, rare first in 1.07), set, magic, in that order. The base “Chance” value for each quality is listed below:
Unique: 1000
Rare: 200
Set: 125
Magic: 30
Class specific items have roughly half these values. The odds for any given quality are 1/Chance, or 1/1000 in the case of uniques. This is for a normal monster or rack, and is unmodified by MF. There is also a modifier for item qlvl vs. mlvl, but it has very little effect and I have dropped it for now.
The final equation adjusted for boss/champion and mf bonuses looks like this:
Final Modified Chance = (128*Chance - (128*Cx*Chance/1024 ) - X*MF)/128
Cx is a bonus factor that bosses and champions get, it’s 983 for Act Bosses and 800 for uniques and champs. The X factor is a MF bonus, 4 for NM and 9 for Hell.
And what role do all these calculations play here? With high enough MF%, you can make bosses drop nothing but uniques all the time!!! Gargamella created a nice calculator for v1.07 that is located here:
http://digilander.libero.it/heroes3dl/dropcalc.zip
So what does this mean? Let's say you have 374% MF and kill the Hell Council: you have 93.75% chance of getting a set item from them!
And with more than 556% MF, any act bosses in hell will drop unique items only...
It sounds unbelievable, isn't it? Well, it is nearly useless because of two facts:
1, The previously mentioned "no items from over TC 66" problem
2, Act bosses seem to be nerfed. It is unknown whether it is a bug or a feauture, but one thing is sure: they never drop from over TC 40. Too bad...
But then how to benefit from this? First of all, the popular v1.07 Visceratuant (Defender) could be found easily this way, from Hell Andariel. You could also get unique amuletts this trick, so the key to the v1.07 Saracen's Chance could be this. Finally, if you would like a M'avina's True Sight (Diadem). Diadems have a qlvl of 60, so the Hell Council uniques can drop them, and with ~374-400% MF you would score a set one from 90% of the drops.
Q: So how to get the uber set/unique items then?
You would have never expected the answer: from weapon and armor racks! Prepare yourselves: this will be long...
The base idea is that v1.07 racks (and v1.08 ones as well... but that's another story) can drop any qlvl item types that are available for them. The only acceptable reason for this is probably that they do not use the TC system for determining which item(s) they drop, they roll randomly from all the item types. The next important info about them is that while in v1.09 they are capped at TC 75, as I mentioned before, there is no such like TCs for racks in v1.07. So, they can drop even those items that are in TC 87 or 90 in v1.09: Caduceii, Sacred Armors, Vortex Shields... And finally: the ilvl of the items dropped by racks is equal to the area level where the racks are, so the last racks in Nihlathak's temple generate ilvl 99 items - high enough to get a Cranium Basher off them ^^
However, all this would mean nothing without the most important custom of the racks: they like to stick with one item type that they drop on a constant basis, so with some patience, sooner or later they reward you.
Important note: Racks of any versions cannot drop wands, staves, bows or xbows! This leads to the fact that in v1.07 it is IMPOSSIBLE by ANY means to get a Hydra Bow, Grand Matorn Bow or Archon Staff drop! Bye bye v1.07 Wf & Stormspire...
Q: Where and how to do rack runs?
Racks have 1:125 odds for set items and 1:1000 for uniques - for class-specific items these odds are halved. MF doesn't help decreasing these numbers, so don't even bother to equip MF gear for rack runs. You should wear as many faster run/walk equipment as possible instead in order to greatly decrease the time it takes to reach the rack. The ideal gear is the following:
- 40% faster run/walk boots
- M'avina's Tenet (Sharskin belt)- 40% FRW
- Trang Oul's Scales (Chaos Armor) - 40% FRW
- Peasant Crown (War Hat) - 20% FRW or Circlet of Haste - 40% FRW
- Cat's Eye (Amulet) - 30% FRW
- Inertia charms: small charms add 3%, large charms add 5% and grand charms add 7% FRW
The first step is finding a rack that drops an item type that you like. It sounds simple, but this is one of the most complicated and hardest to predict things in v1.07. In order to be effective at rack running, it is important to understand how the game seed, map seed, player seed, area seeds etc work and how they modify rack drops in v1.07.
( For the following section I used, sometimes even copy/pasted, parts of the posts from the pros like Jarulf and Hammerman - big, BIG thx to them
So, what is this so called map seed? It is a random value. Unfortunately it is slightly misnamed as *map* seed. It would probably be much better to call it game seed. A "seed" is a random value used by a game's (or other program on a computer) random number generator. Basically computers work for creating random values by using a formula that take some value (usually called seed) and then spit out a new value (a new seed). Those values are more or less "random". That is, for somoene just lookiing at the resulting random value, there is no real way to predicty the next one. Also, all results for the random value is equal probable and the distribution is good (that is, it is not 1, 2, 3 , 4 and so on). Obviously one need a starting value for this (that is the first seed). It should be one that is as random as possible and vary each time you start a new game (for example). The first seed, the starting value for the random number generator, is called "map seed" and it is just the intial seed generated from the computers clock and the time it has been turned on. That is, the starting value for the random number generator and it is saved with your character. Since the random number generator works by applying a specific formula to a seed value and then generate the next value from the previous one and so on, as long as you don't change the difficulty setting in single player, you will get an exact same order of random values. If you use those values to generate a map for example, you will get an identical map if the starting seed was identical. Now, as you play, something will not happen in the exact same order, like monster killed and so on which makes the seed to be used for a particular item, to NOT be the same each time you kill for example the "same" monster. The item type is determined by the monsters current seed for example, since EVERY action the monster do basically needs a random number or more, it will hardly ever be the same (just making an attack for example requires several random rolls, as do simple movement or starting an action). Even if the seed for the rest of the item creation is the same, a change in item type will give a completely different result. Now, for chests, racks and such, there is not much they do in the game, they just sit there and then pop out item(s). They should have their own seed set to them (since they are units as is basically everything in the game). Their seed values seem to be effected by the room seed: as you move on alternate routes in an area, the game generates the various sub sections of the map in a slightly different order and only near your character, that's how it is possible that taking different routes to a rack with a fixed location results in different item drops. If you move in different directions at a certain location, the room seed may have to generate different monsters, so the random number generator spits out different room seed values. Eventually, the seed value of the racks in the room will be derieved from the room seed, and this difference in the room seed caused by moving on alternate routes and forcing the game to generate different monsters will lead to different rack drops. However, pre-1.09, the monster seeds do not(?) effect the room seed - it was changed in a later patch so that all the units with seeds in the room are initialized - so killing them does not effect your rack drops as long as you do not move too much while killing so that you do not force the game to spawn more monsters. The only other factor other than the alternate routes that effects the room seed (thus the rack drops) are other racks. If more than one rack exist in a room and you click on one of them, the others will drop totally different item types as if you hadn't clicked on it, since acting so made the random number generator spit out a new value, and the seed value of the next rack was then calculated of this latest seed value using a formula etc.
Here you can read more on how racks pick the item they drop and where to hunt for racks if you want a specific item type to drop.
First of all,
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Racks don't use TC's. A list of possible items to drop is created, and a random item from that is picked. The chance for an item to get on the list is 1 / (rarity - act number). Act number is act - 1 (so act 1 has 0, act 2 has 1, etc). If rarity - act number is 0 or lower, the item automatically gets on the list. In addition, qlvl must be equal or lower than area level - 1 (which is the ilvl), else the item is skipped. Weapon racks also check if the item is metal.
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The area levels of some of the most popular "racked" areas: (Normal / NM / Hell)
Countess' tower : 7 - 40 - 73
The Stony Tomb : 12 - 45 - 78
Tal Rasha's false tombs : 17 - 50 - 83
Lower Kurast : 22 - 55 - 88
Durance of Hate Lvl 2-3 : 25 - 58 - 91
The frozen caves : 29 - 62 - 95
Nihlathak's temple Level 1 : 33 - 66 - 99
Nihlathak's temple Level 2 : 34 - 67 - 100
Nihlathak's temple Level 3 : 36 - 69 - 102
Now the list of the rarity and qlvl of the "more interesting" item types :
Armory (qlvl [qlvl of the unique] / rarity)
(sets have very low qlvl compared to their item type, that's why your can't see their stats here)
Defender: 34 [36] / 1
Demonhide Sash: 36 [37] / 1
Gilded Shield: 40 [50] / 4
Slayer Guard: 43 [50] / 5
Russet Armor: 49 [50] / 1
Pavise : 50 [52] / 2
Winged Helm: 51 [52] / 2
War Gauntlets: 54 [55] / 3
Grim Helm: 50 [49] / 4
Diadem: 60 / 4
Shako: 65 [69] / 1
Bramble Mitts: 67 / 1
Vortex Shield: 67 / 5
Balrog Skin: 77 [85] / 1
Aegis: 78 [77] / 2
Corona: 81 / 2
Lacquered Plate: 84 / 3
Sacred Armor: 88 / 4
Weaponry
Bone Knife: 58 [69] / 1
Elegant Blade: 61 [66] / 1
Devil Star: 64 [70] / 1
Decapitator: 67 [71] / 1
Caduceus: 69 / 4
Mythical Sword: 72 / 1
Thunder Maul: 75 [91] / 1
Colossus Blade: 76 [85] / 4
Do not forget that the area level - 1 has to be higher than the qlvl of the item type or the unique item (depends on which is higher) if you want to get an item. So e.g. you cannot get The Cranium Basher before hell act 5, since even in Durance 3 the racks drop ilvl 90 items. You may get a Thunder Maul rack, but that won't gift you with a CB, with a triple durbility rare at best... And if the quote from Hammerman is valid for v1.07, then I would also advise you to search for a specific item type that has equal or higher rarity than the act's number ( that is 1 for act 1, 2 for act 2 etc.).
And why have I dragged you through all this? Knowing and understanding this is necessary. The basics of rack running is that you want the rack to get the same seed value every time you run it, so it will drop the same item type all the time. If you know how you have manipulated the room seed when you got a "good" item type, then all you need to do is mimicing your actions and the route you have followed in that particular run.
First of all, you select an area where you want to do your rack runs. The shorter it takes to get to the racks, the better is the map. There are 3 popular areas:
1, Durance of Hate Lvl. 3 - Mephisto's Lair: There is one armor and one weapon rack on the two sides of the level, behind the 2 super-unique council members. The racks have fixed locations, but the Lvl 2 waypoint is randomly placed so it is not easy to get a map where the wp is close to the entrance and the racks on Lvl 3 drop good item types. Generally, you can get two different item combinations from them, depending on which order you touch the racks at, armor->weapon or weapon->armor
2, Lower Kurst - A wide-spreadly popular rack running area, because it can have multiply racks on the same map. Testing all the different routes takes alot of time, but it is usually worth it. The combinations can be endless, just a typical one: if I want to get a Balrog Skin 100% of the times, I need to run around the WP, then run past a house - not too far from it - and then follow a slightly curved path that leads to a lonely rack in the middle of the jungle. Voilá, I have a Balrog Skin drop!
3, Halls of Pain - Nihlatak's temple, Lvl 2: You should activate the waypoint for this one. You can have 5 different map variations here, two of which are great rack running maps with the proper item types. Don't forget to try each different routes twice, changing the order at which you click on the two racks next to each other.
If you know how to manipulate the room seed, then you can try dozens of different routes in these areas, and it won't take you long to get a desired item type(s).
Some of us has experienced - mainly in Nihlatak lair - that sometimes, if you have multiply copies of the same rack type in the same area, then their drops are connected to each other. They frequently drop similar qlvl items - Balrog Skin & Hellforge Plate, Caduceus & Mythical Sword etc.
I have also noticed that sometimes the very same item combos may appear in different areas and different games with the same map seed, but I am not sure how that can happen - maybe not only the game seed, but also the room seed of the area where you last quitted the game is saved with your character?
Finally, here is the wonderful collection of advices on rack running from Hurtlocker, that should help a lot anybody who is new to v1.07:
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There is no real “best” place to farm racks but due to the difficulty of playing 1.07, I suggest you use a place where your not trapped in a small place. I have had very good luck farming Lower Kurast on Hell level for a number of reasons.
a) There are plenty of weapon and armor racks in one pretty small area, no dungeons or stairs to lower levels to go to.
b) There is a waypoint near to most areas of the map.
c) The monsters are generally not too powerful, so your chances of getting killed are pretty small.
d) Its pretty early in the game so your character can be a pretty low level to start farming. (about level 55-65)
There are plenty of other places to use, and it really doesn’t matter much as your odds of finding great stuff is the same.
The weapons are generally underpowered in 1.07 so you can be overwhelmed easily even with a “tweaked” character. I wouldn’t say one character class is better to rack farm than others, just use one that you feel comfortable playing. Since its best to farm on Hell, leveling your character up to that point will take a long time. 1.07 is tough to play no matter how you look at it and the bugs in this version of the game can be a real pain.
The key to successfully finding uber gear from a rack is finding the best map, which is not as easy as it sounds and will take a lot of searching . I use the following method:
a). Using Lower Kurast as an example I will first reset the map.
b). Travel through the waypoint and “uncover” the whole map by just running or fighting your way till it is all exposed.
c). Identify the racks on the map and remember where they are.
d). Save out the game and start again in town.
e). Now the tricky part, when you come out the waypoint in Lower Kurast go the most direct route to the rack you want to check. Note what drops. Then go to the next rack and see what drops there, keeping track of the route you took.
f). Save the game and repeat the exact process about 3-4 more times, using the exact route you took the first time, saving between each time you check.
g). You will notice a pattern of drops about 80-90% of the time, if these racks drop lets say a Balrog Skin and a Champion sword then just keep running the same route over and over. The great part is you should expect a Set item about every 125 runs and a unique about every 1,000 runs. The other 10-20% of the racks will drop different stuff even if you use the same route so you can see that the investment in number of runs doesn’t seem worth it. I will say that I have hit a set item in the first 10 runs (Kraken Shell) and a unique item in less than 100 runs (Legendary Mallet). I have also hit a Balrog skin rack well over 700-800 times and gotten 8-9 Green ones but no gold ones. (I lost this map accidentally, Boo Hoo!!)
h). If the racks you check are giving lousy drops, check the other racks on the same map using the same method. I have found that the farther you run, the harder it is to duplicate the same drop every time. The lower Kurast area is also great to use as ther are usually about 3-4 weapon and 3-4 armor racks in the same map.
i). As you can guess, its takes patience and a “feel” for the map that you can develop whichever area in the game you use. I would suggest that you try to use a map with the waypoint close to the racks you are farming. I have had maps where I could do runs in less than 30 seconds!! That’s about as easy as running Pindle over and over, although you don’t really have to kill anything.
j). It doesn’t seem to make much difference in the drops if you kill the monsters or not, just don’t deviate from the route if you can. I tend to kill some just to get some experience ).
The pros to rack farming are:
a). If you find a Vortex shield dropping rack, you can expect one to drop about every 62-3 runs.
b). Most of the items that drop from racks are white or have sockets. Even if you don’t get the green or gold items, you will definitely get a Elite item with the max sockets available at some point.
c). If you find a Elite with green and gold versions, you can expect to get both if you do enough runs. (a good example is Balrog Skins)
d). The drops are not contingent on the level of the game or the character level.
e). Potentially the odds of farming uber items is better, in my opinion, than just Mfing meph,. Hitting the racks and you are farming a specific item vice the luck of the drop.
Cons of rack farming:
a). Finding that great map is tough. I find about one great map in about 25 tries.
b) The 1.07 game is much harder than 1.09 so your investment in the character is much higher.
c) The stuff you find may be inferior to the 1.09 version.
d) The number of runs to get a unique version of ant item is very high, about 1,000 to 1. Do 1,000 Pindle runs and I bet you get more than one great item.
e) You don’t get any experience points from hitting racks.
f) And last but not least, BORING!!!
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B) +Minimum/maximum damage charms
Once again, MF doesn't help. The best affixes have low alvl, so they can be dropped from late normal difficulty. The best chances of getting one are in NM.
1, NM Council - They are easy to kill with high level chars and have decent odds of dropping charms, jewels etc. A barb with the Find Item skill can be very effective here.
2, Lower Kurast chests - This is true for all the "special" chests - shiny chests, Arcaine Sanctuary - but in Lower Kurast there are at lest half a dozen great chests on each map, and there is always a hut with 2 uber chests. They seem to drop a lot of jewels and runes as well.
3, The secret cow level - This is a great XP area, but they don't drop as much charms as the other two. It is rather an honorable mention.
C) Crafting ingredients
1, Jewels - Probably the hardest to get items in the game. Chests and NM or Hell council runs are the fastest way to get them.
2, Runes - They, too, are dropped very seldomly. However, it seems that the map seed plays a very important role in jewel and rune drops. If you get a good rune or jewel dropping chest, you should run it a lot. I once had a map where on my way to a weapon rack two hung corpses were randomly generated, and one of them dropped Shae
runes frequnently while the other dropped blue jewels.
3, Crafted items - It seems that the higher the ilvl of the item used in the crafting the better, so you should try to get the main ingredient from racks/chests in Nihlatak's temple.
D) Other important monster drops
- Super-uniques and champions: They drop only one item, but with the proper MF value they have great odds for droping sets
- Countess: Her cool rune drop odds were added in a later patch, so forget about her
IV.) Monsters
Overall conclusion: monsters in v1.07 are strong. Stronger than in v1.08 or v1.09, for several reasons:
- They have global physical resistance in NM and Hell mode as well, 50%.
- Magic Resistant bosses have 75% resist to all elements, not 40% as in v1.09.
- Bosses can spawn with multiply immunitites, with up to 4(!) different ones.
It is good to know that Amplify damage and Lower resist could break the immunities of the different monsters. You can shop for wands with these charges, and they will be your only hope in certain situations.
Crushing Blow is a very mighty properity in v1.07: it is not affected by immunities, and doesn't suffer from penalties with bows!
A) "Teleportation" bosses
Your doom. In v1.07 it still works as it used to work in classic, but these bosses can get even various immunities that make them super powerful. Why? A Teleportating boss heals a random value every time it teleports, but they can fully rejuvenate themselves in less than 3-4 seconds! In Hell mode it is fatal if a "must-kill" quest monster ( such as
Diablo's captains, Council members etc. ) spawns with teleportation and multiply immunities: you had better keep your AD and LR wands on weapon switch and pray that ythe curse doesn't expire before you can finish the guy off...
B) Lord de Seis
He has his own paragraph in this guide, and that fact probably makes you imagine how strong he is... Well, he is Tri-elemental immune on Hellin many cases and sometimes even on NM difficulty! Without Lower Resist charges a sorceress cannot harm him with any of her spells!
C) Baal
If you read the patch.txt, you can find a v1.08 change that says: "- Adjusted the difficulty of Baal on higher difficulties." Heck, at least in v1.07 he is not a little puppy that is considered as "refreshing" fun after the Hell Ancients... He has one helluva strong attack that is close to impossible to survive: that short range mana burning fire based tentacle thingy. The only way to protect yourself from it is by equipping a Laying of Hands that provides 50% fire absorb -> fire immunity...
D) The Ancients
It is important to know that in v1.07 you could complete their quest by defeating them at ANY clvl unlike in v1.09 where you "cannot get quest completion credit for the ancients' quest unless the character level is 20 or greater in normal difficulty mode, 40 or greater in nightmare, and 60 or greater in hell difficulty mode."
V.) Mercenaries
- +Skill items don't work on mercenaries. This means that you cannot increase the strenght of their auras, or you cannot exploit the lightning hose rogue bug.
- Life leech doesn't work with mercenaries
- Act2 mercenaries switch between 2 auras that fit to their mentality - offensive, defensive, combat - and which are available on normal and NM in v1.09. So an offensive merc switches between Might and Blessed Aim etc. The Holy Freeze aura doesn't work.
- Act 5 mercenaries seem to have a strange feature, - bug? - at least at higher levels: no matter how much damage they take, they fully regenerate in 2-3 seconds! They can serve as excellent tanks.
- You can hire higher level merc than you, mainly in hell.
- If a merc is lower level than you, they level up VERY quickly: in the proper area they can gain level twice a minute...
- Corpse Spitter bug: In act 4, if your merc dies nearby a corpse spitter, due to a bug the monster may eat his/her corpse what destroys the poor fellow permanenly! If you try to ressurect the merc, you get the "Cannot complete that request" message. All of its gera is permanently lost as well!
- Act bosses have hugh damage multipliers versus mercs, and not only their phyisical attacks, but their spells as well, This leads to instant death for a merc with 900 HP by Mephisto's "mighty" Charged Bolt spell... Btw, this spell is _indeed_ a hurty one, it seems that Mephisto was weakened, too, in later patches.
VI.) Class-specific character build tips
Since most of the v1.07 players have started playing v1.07 for MF'ing purposes, I will give advices on how to build the 2 most popular MF'er classes, the barbarian and the sorceress.
1.] Barbarians
- Find Item -The skill that makes them the most popular MF'er class in v1.09 - is much less useful in v1.07, since it's not monsters who drop the best uniques/sets. Find Item is a very useful skill to use on the Hell Council and you can get many crafting ingredients - jewels, gems, runes - this way. It can be a good way for charm hunting as well.
- Masteries and Battle Cries - The lack of good twinked gear can lead to serious problems - low resists, low life etc. - but the brabarian has many nice built-in skills for solving these problems. Battle Orders, Natural Resistance etc.
- Whirlwind - After the good, ol' classic days this skill good nerfed badly in v1.07. It is now weapon speed dependant, much like in v1.09, with the same breakpoints. It is important to mention that %chance to cast items work with WW - unlike in v1.09 - but due to a bug, upon triggering some kind of effect with WW, the barbarian stops his WW'ing. NOTE: according to the patch.txt file in v1.07 WW doesn't alternate between 2 weapons when using two-weapon style!
- Berserk - Monsters have global physical resistance from NM act 1, so the magic damage of this skill can be pretty useful. However, according to a recent discovery it is best keept at Lvl 1, because it is bugged in that way that makes it greatly increase your barbarian's defense instead of dropping it to 50% of the original DR that way thought to be the real bug with Berserk...
- Barbarians can be great rack runners, as they have their passive speed-enhancing skill, Increased Speed. At higher slvls, however, it is diminishing, so you'd better keep it at Level 5-8 and invest your hard-earned skill points elsewhere.
2.] Sorceress
She is probably the most popular rack runner char out there. She is not equipment dependant (ideal untwinked char) and Teleport is easily the most useful skill for rack runners.
It is good to know that:
- Cold Mastery pierces the Cold IMMUNITY of the monsters! So with maxed Cold Mastery you can cruise through the entire game with only Frozen Orb!
- Static Field has no caps. You can take any monsters in the game on every difficulty to sliver with it...
- Unique items with Piercing Attack increase the piercing % of your Cold Mastery. That's why the The Demon Machine (Chu-ko-no) is probably the best sorceress weapon in v1.07: the 66% pierce and 50% mana bonus is awesome.
- Lower Resistance can break any kind of elemental immunities, and it can be very helpful vs certain monsters (like Lord de Seis). You can shop for wands with LR charges.
VII.) v1.07 Ethics
First of all, everybody is allowed to cheat or hack on his/her PC, it is their own problem and I have nothing against it. I mind my own business. However, the SPF (and the rest of the rpgforums.net forums as a whole) has a rule set up: Do NOT post cheats or hacks. I would like to ask everybody who finds a way to exploit some kind of fishy thing related to v1.07 not to post here or on any of the other forums how you did it, and this includes 'I have crafted/cubed the uber l33t itam, pat my back' if you got the mentioned item by cheating. You will never earn respect through cheating here, and sooner or later we will find it out anyway, and THEN you get exposed to Warkof's and his band's mercy, then consumed by the Squid and eventually banned. Is it worth it? It is really easy to dupe crafting/cubing ingredients, but the SPF community is strictly against it. Moving items from v1.09 to v1.07 by any means is also forbidden here. Do not expect to find any legit forumite here who will trade for your crafted/cubed items if you used duped ingredients.
The SPF v1.07 community has also an agreement that everybody should accept here, because that's what keeps the economy balanced: you are allowed to trade only ONE rack dropped elite set item per item type. If we started overspoiling the SPF with Griswold's and IK items then we would ruin the trades of those who worked very hard to get those impossible to find items in v1.09, and they would be right to get angry on us v1.07 players.
Finally, please, ALWAYS warn your trade partner if you intend to trade a v1.07 item to him/her!
VIII.) Credits
- Blizzard Entertainment: For creating this wonderful game, releasing it with a buggy version and then being late with the latest patch... You rock, guys
- The Diabloii.net staff: For maintaining this wonderful site
- The Single Player Forum: For keeping up my interest in this game and for being uber l33t ^^ You are the coolest, guys!
- King's Specter: For his Treasure Hunting Guide, for being helpful and da man!
- Hakai_no_Tenshi: For letting me use the v1.07 ATMA beta, it helped a lot with testing various v1.07 rumors
- Jarulf: "For his excellent technical information", and for answering many of my noob questions =) And for his many informative posts.
- RTB: For being pro, and for helping with many, many problems. All around warm-blooded calculator
- Hammerman: "For his rack running informations" and his posts on the Statistics forum
- gargamella: For pioneering the rack running and not hiding this secret ^^
- Hurtlocker: For his tireless rack running researches that helped a lot in writing the treasure hunting section, and for the practical advices on rack running.
- Bloodrose: For cracking off the v1.07 runewords (others may have done that, too, but AFAIK he was the 1st who revealed them to us on the SPF)
And last but not least at all:
- The SPF v1.07 community: For helping me correct the mistakes in the previous v1.07 guides and feeding me with newer and newer experiences, ideas, informations, etc. Just to name a few of them: MattIsTheBastard, PalaDjinn_user, azymeth, goldcow, ashrael2, Munch, Reigns, Kull and so on. Sorry if I've forgatten somebody, but my memory is one of my (many) weak points... ^^
--Repusz--
