Fun and profit with iLvl 63 stats and probabilities

It is no secret, that the current loot system is having some problems, which in turn affects the game play and the retention rate of players, once they hit max level and the end game. I talked a bit about what Blizzard could do about the sucky loot in Diablo 3 and I am confident that Blizzard will eventually get around to fixing and balancing loot. This is also why I think that magic find gear will start being what you want to go for your farming purposes, since farming with magic find gear preserves your wealth better.

However, today I will explore the probabilities of getting good, great and godly iLvl 63 weapons. You may think it is bad, but I believe you will be shocked by what you are about to read.

The chance of organically upgrading your weapon is…..not good

I think pretty much everyone that farms gear knows, that the drops are thrash 99% if the time. First off you need to get an iLvl 63 drop, then you need to 6 affixes and then have them roll high. All in all, you need a perfect storm of rolls.

Getting a 1500+ DPS weapon in Diablo 3 requires a perfect storm of damage stats, so start saving.

What we have here is a table of simulated weapon drops for every class of weapons. The first thing that sticks out, is that the only weapons theoretically capable of breaking 1500 DPS are two handed axes, maces, polearms and mighty weapons. That isn’t really that much of an issue, since you are usually much better off going for dual-wielding, because you can get much higher money stats and combined DPS this way, and thus the overall DPS is higher for dual-wielding. However, don’t discount 2 handers, since they do have their place, if you use a lot of weapon-damage based abilities in your build or you have mana/arcane problems.

Digging in to the iLvl 63 table

The percentage at the top of the table is the chance of getting a weapon below this DPS. So if we look at the top weapon, the 1 handed mighty, it has a 99% chance (1 in 100) of being below 880 DPS and a 99.999% chance (1 in 100,000) of being below 1180 DPS. The column to the right is the highest DPS weapon found in a 10 million drop simulation. So if we continue with the top weapon, the highest DPS found in 10 million iLvl 63 drops is 1320 DPS.

This is also why your weapon drops suck most of the time. Getting a 1000+ DPS weapon is a 1 in 1000 or even 1 in 10,000 drop, so sucky loot is no surprise. So if you think you can farm your own upgrades, then think again. Of course, this plays nicely in to Blizzard’s hands and their auction house. You are more or less forced to use the AH to upgrade, which is also why the end-game is hurting.

How the table was created – the iLvl 63 algorithm

First of all, this table was created by Blammar on Reddit, who derived the algorithm by datamining the AH and piecing together a function, which would give more or less the stats of a dropped weapon. Quite the achievement! This is the algorithmically derived amount of weapons at different DPS vs. the amount of weapons on the AH sorted by DPS:

The algorithm stacks up nicely against actual iLvl 63 weapons in Diablo 3

Naturally we see fewer and fewer weapons as we progress in DPS. There is a pretty nice correlation between the distribution of derived and actual DPS amounts, so the table gives a pretty accurate picture of the actual state of the loot system.

The DPS of a simulated weapon is based on the following stats being rolled randomly:

• Damage bonus: 5% chance of none, 20% chance of physical, 75% chance of elemental
• Attack speed: 15% chance of 5-11% attackspeed, 85% chance of none
• Additional damage: 25% of 10-50% additional damage, 75% of none

All stats consume one affix, and a iLvl 63 weapon rolls 4-6 affixes. The damage bonuses can roll up in 6 different ranges of extra damage:

• Range 1: 32-84
• Range 2: 47-124
• Range 3: 68-175
• Range 4: 87-237
• Range 5: 112-256
• Range 6: 143-381

So first off, you need to roll a damage bonus, then you need to roll a high damage range and then you need that range to roll high as well. After that you need to roll additional damage as well, and have the additional damage roll high as well!

There are other stats on weapons as well, but they have no direct effect on the weapon DPS, so aren’t in the algorithm. However, if you, as a player or investor, are out looking for high-DPS weapons be aware of what stats are worth looking for on what weapons. A high-DPS cross-bow with DEX and a socket is worth much, much more than the same DPS crossbow with strength and INT on it. So know what works for which classes and invest accordingly.

How can you make money off of this?!

First and foremost, knowledge is power. By knowing how weapon DPS is distributed, you can get an idea of whether an item is good or whether it is really good. With the gold inflation and botters running rampant, prices for best-in-slot items will only go up, so if you have a best-in-slot item, or near that, you can afford to err a bit on the high side when you put it on the AH. If your item is a bit below best-in-slot, you should price it aggressively to move it fast, since you are also up against the market, which will continue to pump good or great items in to the economy and dump the prices on these.

This effect is most clearly seen in weapons. Around launch, a 1000 DPS weapons was insane and worth millions even then. Now you can easily get a 1000 DPS weapons for less than 100,000 gold, while the highest end items have exploded in price and will continue to rise. And if you get a 1600 DPS weapon….the sky is the limit. Well, 250$ is the limit on the AH, so you might actually be better off selling it for gold and buying pieces to resell on the RMAH. But that is a whole ‘nother kettle of fish!

So that is how iLvl 63 weapon DPS is distributed in Diablo 3. Good luck finding those best-in-slot weapons…so get farming, ya lazy bum!

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