Marrowwalks Explained:The Charge/Synergy Bug

Marrowwalks Explained:The Charge/Synergy Bug

A question I pose to those interested.

I'm going to post this "guide" into two sections. I'm doing this because I might have went in too much depth concerning the nature of the bug than this thread needs and, as I finished writing it, I realized the second section/post could stand well on it's own without the intro action.

The question you ask? I guess none really. I'll just link to the short and happy Marrow stuff for those looking for it quick...but I was gonna ask if you all think the first part is cool or should the second section stand alone as a short to the point sticky? Yes that's it. Whatcha all think?

(I personally like the first section but I thought to pose the question. We can repost the info with out this Pre-post if all agree/disagree.)

 

Marrowwalk's Explained

With the addition of the 1.10 patch comes new featutes to the game. With new features, inevitably comes new bugs. I’m sure almost all of you guys have heard of the, now infamous, “Marrowwalk bugâ€. But do you know what the bug actually is? Or what it does? How about how it works? No? Yes? Well here's my post either way, and your allready here so I'd say joo got some reading to do mang.

It adds to your skills and works through charge granted skills. This bug is not exclusive to Marrowwalk’s but works with all items that grant skills. All will be explained. Let’s start with a little background on when this bug was first noticed. If you'd like to jump straight to the marrowwalk-talk, click....here.

Terms to be used
Charges-You will see charges appear on items. Grants a limited number of a limited number of a skill rechargeable through merchants by use of gold.
Clvl-Character level.
Slvl-Skill level
Synergy-A new system of skill bonuses added in the recent 1.10 patch
Bug-An in game affect bot intended by the designer/programmer.


A Beta Bug

I remember, back in the Beta, when I had first noticed the bonus to bone skills given by simply equipping Marrowwalk’s. I quickly posted a thread called; “Those new boots and synergiesâ€â€¦barely anyone seemed to give a flam.

Patch neared release and a thread called “Bone spear maxed with synergies†was up, discussing max bone damage. I posted how at clvl 83 I could easily quest hell with around 3500 spirit, 2500 spear. The other posters where confused on how I got such damage with the equip I later listed. I made mention of making use of a “bugâ€. ( or, what I had thought/hoped at the time, a possible feature.)

I kept it down low at first but then thought, to Hell with it, and blurted out some Marrow info. I showed how one couldn’t get any higher bone spell damage using anything but marrowwalk’s and how you could easily reach high damage numbers at a pretty early clvl.

I wish I still had that post because it had all the relevant bonespell numbers layed out perfectly. The thread was wiped, in the most recent crash, though, so I’ll have to do it all over again. Before I do that let me explain the specifics; what the whole of the bug is, why this bug works and how it works.


What this Bug is

As was mentioned, this is a bug that affects your skills through specific use of charges on items. Marrowwalk’s are the most infamous of these new items, because of the sheer power of the charges on the boots (slvl 33).

Other items, of note, with high level charges of synergy involoved skills;

Carrion wind uniques ring
Slvl 21 Poison Creeper charges

Stone Runeword armor
Slvl ?? Molten Boulder charges

Venom Runeword
Slvl 1? P.explosion
Slvl-1? P.Nova

Metalgrid unique amulet
Slvl 2? Iron Golem


The Apparent source

-From the 1.10 Patch read-me-

· Items that grant skills bestow a lower skill level to those character classes who natively have the skill in their skill tree. Note that Charged items receive synergy and mastery bonuses, but don't receive bonuses by assigning extra points to the skill.-Blizzard Entertainment-

The first sentence doesn’t really involve our topic, directly. The second, however, seems to be the most logical source of the bug itself. This is only educated speculation, but it seems the programmers simply got the intended affect backwards somehow.


Utilizing the Effect

Ok, so now that we know what it is and how it likely is, here’s the simplicity of how it works. We go into this section knowing that this bug, in effect, gives you extra skill points to, essentially, “placeâ€, for synergy purposes.

It’s simple really.
Step1-You desire to utilize this bug.
Step 2-You get an item, which grants high level charges of a synergizing skill, native to your class. Such as the items listed above.
Step3-You max the skill that you plan to synergize.
Step4-Important:You do not place any points into the skills granted by your item, or the charge bonus WILL NOT take effect.


Conclusion

There we go. I layed it out about as good as I could. It might still seem confusing, to some. Don’t worry though it’s not vital information. All you need to do is follow the above listed steps and you’ll be set.


Reflection

This “bug†is more of a “misunderstandingâ€, in certain terms…it doesn’t devastate or terribly, unbalance, the game, on the whole. In short, it is not the evil guided pierce, or the overpowered critical strike bug of 1.09. It’s just a little extra bonus, which works only through a very small amount of items. No big deal.

It does however benefit, almost exclusively, Necros and Druids, with the items available. A source of Justice, in a way, since these classes were definitely among the weaker builds of 1.09.

Maybe a Rogue programmer, took it upon himself to, “reverse†the code, and is develishlly laughing at the carnage he has set loose.:evil:
We might never know….


Is it permanent?

Because of it’s relative minor nature, this charge/synergy effect will likely never be patched. That’s just another educated guess though, so don’t count on your bugged out Marrowwalker, or Flamin’ Rabies Druid to be immortal.

 

Marrow Specific Information

Here we go, we’ve made it to the probable reason why you’ve entered this thread. The numbers. Get ready to be in the know and be forever changed.


Marrowwalking

A synergy bonus is currently granted to a necromancer who equips the unique boots Marrowwalk.The synergy is given through the slvl 33 Bone Prison charges, and only works if no points are placed into Bone prison itself. (<This specific element again pointing the text in the read me in mixed up way) If you read the previous sections, you know that stuff already. So what next right?

You might be wondering just how much of a difference using Marrowalk’s makes. Let’s take a look.

Quick note:When implementing the Marrow charge bug there are three main purposes;Bone damage/Armour boosting, Armour boosting, or Hybrids.


For the Bonemancer

Now the biggest difference in using Marrow’s, as opposed to just maxing Boneprison itself is the fact that a slvl 33 synergy is impossible to achieve without the boots. Synergies are capped at the max of your skills which is 20. Marrow gives 13 extra synergy which equates to;

195% extra, of base without synergies, on to Teeth damage
81% extra, of base without synergies, on to Bone Spear
78% extra, of base without synergies, on to Bone spirit
195 extra hitpoints given to Bone Armour

These bonuses run off the base damage of each skill, without taking into consideration synergy boosts, and plus skills. This is important when judging the worth of using the unique boots, over just maxing prison.

To calculate your marrow bonus just multiply the above percentages by your necromancer's base skill damage. (basically, that is....the numbers seem to vary slightly, but seemingly, not by that much. Needs a lil' more testing.)

Here's what the effect of the 13 extra synergy bonuses, granted by Marrow's, has over slvl 20 Bonespells. These amounts are added to the total of maxed synergies.

Teeth
195% times 31=60.45
BoneSpear
81%times 218=176.58
BoneSpirit
78%times 413=322.14
Extra Bone Amour
195

Not much really, but the advantage comes in at the early clvl's. No need to wait till clvl 89 and above to have max synergies...just pop on a pair of Marrowwalks as early as clvl 66!

In identical gear, without points in prison you will have more damage than a lvl 99 char at that humble lvl of 66! O ya and 195 more Bone Armour than the high lvl. Not more life though.....:I


For the Armour Boost

This one’s easy. For each point in one of Bone Armour’s synergies, Armour receives a flat 15 hit points onto it’s total. To calculate how much Amour you get for using Marrow’s just do this;

33 times 15=495

Pretty good ey? One of the best bonuses 1.10 has to offer. Requiring no points besides the 1 point in Bone Armour. The only downside to using marrow’s for the purpose of Armour boosting is tht you have to give up your boots spot for it. O ya, and the Srength req is 118.


Hybrids

A variety of hybrid builds can be made feasible, soley with the use of the charge/synergy bug. In a necro’s case, the popular hybrid choice so far is the Bone/Summoner. See Angst’s stickied guide.


The End

I think that should do for the moment. Any suggestions, comments, observations, declarations, lamentations, obfiscations, please direct them to yourself because I don’t give a fruck! (j/k…Just post em here or PM me. )

 

There's a few more bug examples beyond what you have listed, eg..

* Wolfhowl + Crescent Moon + Beast runewords - Barbarian only

* A sword or ring with the suffix "of Fire Bolts" (charges of level 10 firebolt) combined with Trang-oul's Partial Set bonuses - anyone can do this with 2 peices of Trang's

* Bonehew + Marrowwalks - any char can do this too

* Moonfall on a fire sorc w/maxed Fireball

* Holy Thunder on a lightning sorc w/maxed Lightning

etc. There's actually quite a few applications, it's just Marrowwalks is the easiest and the best.

 

do note that the 195 extra points that bone armor gets is actually

195 x 3

which actually makes it 585 extra damage absorb, a big deal indeed

Another important thing I think would be the fact that marrowalks save you 20 skillpoints, I think you should note that in there too

good faq BB! Shame they'res STILL marrow questions popping up

 

Word from Blizzard on Marrowwalk - http://www.myimgs.com/data/eltoro/Screenshot096.jpg
(I still need a host for that)

 

That doesn't say much except for a Blizzard rep saying "really? wow."

The implication seems to be that it is unexpected behaviour, eg, a bug. Might even get fixed soon

 

And then, hell would freeze over. Just included that for the people who think it's a feature.

 

Allright guys thanks for add-itions.


A list proper could be made of Charge/Synergy applications and added on as an appendixe type of deal I think.


The 195 is the value of 13 extra synergy points Necrochild. The whole number value of Marrowarmour tm. is (33 times 15) 495, as I put in the section discussing Marrow's for Bone Armour boosting.


I was going to add in your link Fen I just forgot. Thanks for adding it, allthough it still means hardly anything. I guess it could mean all of Blizz has no idea but that would mean that they ignore every forum on every fan site...unlikely.

In any case it's all we got from a Blizz employee on the subject atm, so it goes here.


And so, you guys all think it's cool in it's long form, or should I post only marrow stuff here and write up a different "guide" using the first section, specifically for charge/synergy bug and post it in community or whatever?

I like it the way it is but one person must also agree with me, for me not ask again.

Thanks ya
-Bb-

 

The intended effect actually works. Meaning, the spell charges recieve synergy bonus. So the bug is probably just a side effect of this intended effect.

(you probably know that, but your wording doesn't make it clear)

I do not expect Bliz to fix this, it seems it would take too much effort involved in fixing the programming.

 

Hmm, Prion, thanks for pointing that out...I didn't exactly know that, no. I didn't think that the boneprison charges actually get the beneficial affects of, say, 20 points in Bonewall...

I heard (and think I saw how) masteries affect charges, like Golem mastery and the Iron golem charges, or Hydra charges and fire mastery, but the synergy to charges, like the read says should happen I wasn't sure of....

We'll have to test it and then I'll revise that.

Thanks Prion.

:drink:

Edit: I just tested it out and, yes, Boneprison appeared to receive synergies form both Bone Armour and Bonewall like it's supposed to. I will edit that info apropriately.

 

Lets not forget that the bug doesn't work if there are no charges left, as the skill is officially "removed" from the selection (as if it doesn't exist)

 

can someone confirm the rumor that if you lose 1 dura, the bug goes away? been hearing it from alot of people not sure on whether its true or not

btw BB, once you get this all nicely done, ill gladly host it if you wish, still working on ur massive necro guide lol

 

From what I know, the bug doesn't leave with either all charges gone, or the 1 durability thing, but I haven't tested that out yet. I'll find out. I'll have to adress these specifics in the update as well.

Ya, souless, once again that would be cool.
Still on the handbook? Man I need to rewrite a few of those things pretty soon.

You will be able to update the material once you have it up won't you? Wouldn't see why you wouldn't be able but ya...there will be changes as time goes by.

If you see it taking too much of your time I wouldn't worry about it if I was you. I mean it would be nice to have it set-up the way I originally invisioned but it's ok if it you can't finish it. I could get what I need to get it done sometime maybe. It's not like your getting paid, or anything.:music:

Cheers
:drink:

 

bb, I think that necrochild was saying that since there are 3 bone things circling around your char, the damage listed that gets blocked is multiplied by 3: one for each bone armor piece.

Bone armor, however, does not work that way in 1.10. All 3 of those pieces contribute to the one final damage reduction number necrochild... so it actually is just 195 more dmg absorbed, not 195 * 3.


--fatty

P.S. my marrows have had 1 durability gone on them before, and I did NOT lose the synergy. I specifically tested it after I noticed the durability point gone. So that's just a rumor.

 

Yes, I've found the same so far. I also saw for myself that, once the charges are gone, so is the synergy.

 

yes! I can confirm that as well.

I also confirm that I am awesome. :drool:

--fatty

 

Hehe. Erik_Sucks (*thefatty).:8D

 

god damned, now im really thinking of rebuilding my necro (keeping old one in hibernation ^^) he got just like 5k spirit, and its the best of my 7 dueling chars (scnl), +1k damage and 20 sparing points would be nice

ty for explanations

 

I heard from some guy on US WEST that the marrowalk bug was fixed like 2 weeks ago and he claimed to have noticed it because his spirit dmg dropped significantly. Some other guy said that the same thing happened with him.

So is it true? Is the marrowalk bug patched already?

Help would be greatly appreciated