Perfect Sand Hawk Farming

[stevenash2005]

Late in the game, but I decided to do some OP10 Sand Hawk farming before turning in the quest Whoops permanently. Wasn't very optimistic but results turned out to be surprisingly good, so I figure I should share with the forum guys who are still interested.

First some fundamental stats about Sand Hawk RNG rates:
Each accessory (e.g. Flying prefix) has about 1/26 probability to spawn.
Each element other than NE (e.g. Shock) has 1/14 probability to spawn.
Each manufacture grip (e.g. Dahl) has 1/5 probability to spawn.
Each manufacture stock (e.g. Dahl) has 1/5 probability to spawn.
Scope spawns with 2/6 probability with either 2.4x or 3.1x zoom.

They are all independent events. In theory, a Flying Shock Dahl grip Dahl stock will appear once every 9100 runs, while a simple Flying Shock spawns once every 364 runs. On my PC, each run (loading, running, turning in, quitting) took about 18 secs, so I could do 200 runs an hour. Did about 10 hours on and off during last week totaling a little short of 2000 runs. Longest single sitting was about one and half hour so I never felt boring at all (probably due to encouraging results too).

My results for individual parts largely agree with the theoretical numbers above, so my outcomes are either due to pure extreme luck or some hidden correlation mechanism. Christmas is coming after all. Anyway, here they are.

2 Flying None Elemental Dahl Grip Dahl Stock (Perfect)
1 Stopping None Elemental Dahl Grip Dahl Stock
1 Deft None Elemental Dahl Grip Dahl Stock
1 Skirmish None Elemental Dahl Grip Dahl Stock
1 Flying Slag Maliwan Grip Dahl Stock (Perfect)
1 Flying Incendiary Dahl Grip Dahl Stock (Perfect)
1 Stopping Incendiary Dahl Grip Dahl Stock
1 Flying Corrosive Dahl Grip Dahl Stock (Perfect)
1 Flying Shock Tediore Grip Dahl Stock
1 Flying Shock Hyperion Grip Dahl Stock

So the only element for which I don't have a perfect one yet is Shock, but I consider Tediore Grip a close runner up after a Dahl Grip, and is even better for up to the third or fourth mag. Anyway, it's time to move on.

[I-Chi]

I think, except for the first few attempts, it might be a lot more efficient to just use Gibbed to get perfect gear...

[z00t]

They are not at all common, but they do happen. Very occasionally. : a perfect OP10 All Dahl parts Flying Sand Hawk, non elemental.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1780749840

[z00t]

I was very, very, very pleased when I finally accepted that it wasn't a major hallucination and I was looking at The Real Deal.

[stevenash2005]

Yeah, I supposed that discussion about Gibbed will come up soon, but didn't expect it would be the first.

As the other post asked, why is this game so good and addictive? My answer, the Random Number Generator (RNG, aka fate). It could be the most cursing and blessing mechanism in any game, or even in real life. Would you give in to it? I know I wouldn't.

[Casurin]

Originally posted by Butt Stallion:

I think, except for the first few attempts, it might be a lot more efficient to just use Gibbed to get perfect gear...

Well duh - it will always be "more efficient" to just directly cheat in the item you want if you base the evalution on the time it takes.
But for perfect weapons? I would not want to farm them, but i also do not want to use editors either. If you really want those it takes really long.

[Renfrew]

People who read-only farm make no sense. Just use gibbed and get the item you want instead of wasting 3 hours of your life, just to provide mental gymnastics about how your gear is "legit". On the other hand items that aren't quest rewards don't need to be read-only farmed and can be obtained without such needs.

[stevenash2005]

Well let's not develop this thread around Gibbed or any discussion around "legit". It's like trying to trash others' objectives or claiming the game is ultimate failure or boredom if not played your way. How do you know what's fun or not for others any way. This is happening too much on this forum already.

[Renfrew]

Don't read too deeply into it, if you want to waste 3 hours of your life go ahead.

[stevenash2005]

Certainly no misunderstanding from your use of word "waste" over and over. Many people who are not into gaming will call you waste your entire time with bl2, but with us gamers who think otherwise, we should at least have self respect among us.

You will never understand the joy z00t and I had which is worth every second we spent on it.

[Abderrahman]

For me i wasn't agree about read-only farm, but after level cap things changed, i would not spend days to get perfect sandhawks, love thumpers ect..

Gibbed can break the experience, Farming with read-only is worth.

[I-Chi]

I think about grinding a lot as I've been using the Grinder in TPS to grind for an Absolute Zero. It comes down to how much I or others benefit vs how long it takes. For instance, if there are 100k permutations of a drug, one of which I know for certain can cure all cancer, then I believe it's worth while grinding through all of them.

On the other hand, if I have to spend 15 years to get some virtual game item, 15 years during which I'll only be doing something brain dead like clicking on quit then restarting game, then I would consider that not worth the time.

So then it becomes a personal question of: how much time am I willing to spend doing something brain dead for something virtual which I probably won't remember a year down the road?

[stevenash2005]

Originally posted by Butt Stallion:

I think about grinding a lot as I've been using the Grinder in TPS to grind for an Absolute Zero. It comes down to how much I or others benefit vs how long it takes. For instance, if there are 100k permutations of a drug, one of which I know for certain can cure all cancer, then I believe it's worth while grinding through all of them.

On the other hand, if I have to spend 15 years to get some virtual game item, 15 years during which I'll only be doing something brain dead like clicking on quit then restarting game, then I would consider that not worth the time.

So then it becomes a personal question of: how much time am I willing to spend doing something brain dead for something virtual which I probably won't remember a year down the road?

You set up the model well. Next step is to calibrate the parameters, for others. Thing is, you can't, so it doesn't matter. You knew that and that's why you use extreme examples with obvious cases.

For people who can think independently, the only thing that matters is information. Let them do their own judgement.

[Renfrew]

Originally posted by stevenash2005:

Certainly no misunderstanding from your use of word "waste" over and over. Many people who are not into gaming will call you waste your entire time with bl2, but with us gamers who think otherwise, we should at least have self respect among us.

You will never understand the joy z00t and I had which is worth every second we spent on it.

What is this mumbo jumbo?

Don't read too deeply into it, if you want to waste 3 hours of your life go ahead.

These paragraphs you keep writing show that you this is needlessly upsetting you, despite me literally agreeing you can do whatever you want.

[Starbug]

Any sandhawk farming must make use of read only farming. It's a quest reward, so the alternative would be to reset the entire playthrough each time. Read only farming is legit. Gibbing it in isn't.

[stevenash2005]

Originally posted by ꧁Renfrew꧂:

Originally posted by stevenash2005:

Certainly no misunderstanding from your use of word "waste" over and over. Many people who are not into gaming will call you waste your entire time with bl2, but with us gamers who think otherwise, we should at least have self respect among us.

You will never understand the joy z00t and I had which is worth every second we spent on it.

What is this mumbo jumbo?

Don't read too deeply into it, if you want to waste 3 hours of your life go ahead.

These paragraphs you keep writing show that you this is needlessly upsetting you, despite me literally agreeing you can do whatever you want.

Oh you don't upset me at all. You don't need to assume everyone is fighting with you in every post. Everything I replied is based on your post before it. It's called a conversation. Since you don't welcome discussion I will ignore you going forward.