spatch

You know, I've played Diablo 2 off and on since, oh, 2000. Each time I take at least one character through the game in both Normal and Nightmare mode. Sometimes two, if I'm infatuated with the game long enough. If I'm not playing with friends I already know, I play solo. I venture into Hell when I'm good and ready but honestly, after the resist-fest that is nightmare, I don't get very far.

But in all that time, I don't think I've ever seen a single solitary Stone of Jordan drop or show up in a gamble.

So much for "u giev soj", eh.

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From:

sanityfaerie.livejournal.com

The Stone is one of the best uniques in the game. Once upon a time, it was also the most common unique in the game. Back when uniques were fairly commong out of the gambling halls, high-level characters would burn off gold gambling for SoJs. A certain amount of time put in on gaining gold and a certain amount put in on gambling (and one each of the other two unique rings to make sure that "unique ring" meant "SoJ") and you could be pretty much guaranteed of getting one or two. They were pretty portable, easily traded, and worth more money than most characters could carry, so they became the basis of the high-level player economy (Aside from some messing around with gems, and the occasional one-off trade, a low-level player economy didn't really exist at that point, nor has it since.) Of course, since there are so many of them, they're also eminently dupable. They faucet got turned off with the expansion pack, but the residual SoJs in the economy persisted for *years*.

Doing *really* well in the endgame involves having a plan, to be sure, but it also requires that your plan be based on reasonably functional skills. No one's going to get much of anywhere with a primary attack based on Teeth or ravens, and picking good skills as your primary damage-dealers rather than mediocre ones (particularly for the sorceress and elemental druid) can make a pretty big difference. That's more a matter of reading in-game spoilers and basic math than checking out tha buildzz online, though.