In all my years of playing Silkroad Online I’ve never found an SoS, SoM or SoSun drop. I trained a character to maximum level and never found a single SoX drop. When a friend of mine created a new character to try the game out he got an SoS drop from a Mangyang within about 10 minutes of starting the game. This was on vSRO though if I remember correctly, since at the time iSRO was impossible to get into without a premium ticket.

My theory is that each character has some kind of hidden “luck” statistic that determines how often a player gets equipment drops and maybe even how often mobs drop quest items. Sometimes it seems like the quest items never appear (like that Stolen Sword quest from the Blacksmith in Jangan at Bandits). I got to level 80 without botting even a single time, bought lots of Astral stones and still failed over 9000 times to make a +7 level 72 glaive before getting banned for 100 years for nothing more than using a no DC client. The most infuriating thing about that is I used the no DC client because back then, every time you tried to log in but weren’t able to do so due to the server being full, you were required to close the client, open the launcher program and then start the client again. Each time required a CAPTCHA code and some amount of loading time (especially since I had a slower computer at the time). They’ve since changed the client so that there’s a “waiting list” to log in and not only do you not have to close and reopen the client, but you don’t even have to type your username and password in more than once. After failing to log in, you can relax, whereas in the old days it could literally take hours of typing in your username and password, typing in the CAPTCHA code, failing to log in, closing the client, reopening and repeating ad infinitum.

There was nothing bad about using a no DC client, which merely allowed you to keep on hitting “enter” without closing and reopening the client. You still had to type the CAPTCHA code and wait like everybody else.

Anyway, I digress. I started playing iSRO again a few days ago. They’ve added three new servers located in USA and they’re not very crowded, so it hasn’t been difficult getting on without a premium ticket. This new character seems to have a high “luck” statistic, if such a thing exists. I say that because I’ve already found so many equipment drops that I’m having quite a difficult time of selling them. When doing quests that require the collection of quest items moreover, it seems that mobs drop the quest items with a higher frequency than I was used to.

I think I may have proven my wild theory about the “luck” stat to myself today by getting an SoS drop from either a Gun Powder or Meek Earth Ghost behind Donwhang. I was doing the “Big Win” quest for the alchemy merchant in DW for the third time when I found it.

I’m not sure if it was a Meek Earth Ghost or a Gun Powder that dropped it, since I killed one of each at about the same time. I wish I had taken a screenshot of the box it came in, which is different from the usual reddish-coloured equipment box, but I was so frantically hitting the “g” key to pick it up that I forgot to take the screenshot. This screenshot was taken about one second after picking it up.

I am a full STR glaive user, just like my character that got banned.

Why you do me liek this, Joymax?

I miss my old account. I really was 80, you know. I just can’t find screenies from then.

I’m only level 32 at the moment though. When I get to level 37 and can use a full 5th degree equipment set I’ll switch permanently to garment. At the moment though prot/armour is working best since I’m still very low in level. I’m not sure if I’ll continue playing or not. School will keep me busy I suppose, so if I do keep playing I’ll have to just go ahead and bot. Screw Joymax. They banned my legit character so I have no reason to play legit anymore.

…although I may still have to buy some silk for a PT…