f13.net

Not to rain on your parade, but if my understanding of how magic find works is correct (and it may be not) it seems unlikely that you have seen enough kills to notice the difference any increase in magic find can offer. 100% magic find means doubling the mob chance to drop a magic item, so a 1% chance becomes 2% etc. Is this right?

Also I had my blacksmith and jeweler maxed out around the same time. I have some +magic find and +gold find gear, but I don't pick gear that has it, I just appreciate it when it comes. The benefit from selling blues seems marginal too, especially since mobs in Act I of nightmare are already routinely dropping 200+ gold each. I'm not saying that having a supplemental income selling blues would be a bad thing, but I just wonder whether it balances out the slower speed and more deaths that comes from having (nominally) less-optimal gear.

So I have tried out gold find to see what happened, here is a small sample of results:

All this is done on the last part of ActI Nightmare, up to the death of the Butcher.

Run 1:

40 minutes
30,187 Gold in drops
28 Blues (4177 Gold)
2 Rares
1 Gem
5 Pages of Crafting

Run 2:

20 Minutes
12,761 Gold in drops
12 Blues (1670 Gold)
0 Rares
1 Gem
3 Pages of Crafting.

This was with 90% Gold Find and 0% Magic Find.

Based on what I have seen here (caveat, very small sample size) it seems like gold find should beat out magic find for gold farming. The variable that is hard to factor is the value of the rares. If they sell on the AH then that could mean that the net gold from items is higher. If the don't sell, it's lower. Note, I didn't actually find any upgrades here, and given that you can only list a maximum of 10 items on the AH at a time, it seems like the revenue from items may be more unpredictable and variable than income from gold.

YMMV

I really wish they had stuck to their original idea of either removing MF completely, or only having it present on one item such as the leg slot. It always frustrated me that I could farm all this ace gear but as it didn't have MF on it it went into the bank or was for alts only.

Magic Find in this game has thus far - on normal - not been at the detriment to other equipment. You can do searches for Max Magic Find in the market place for your level along with your key attribute and Armor Rating at pretty high values.

Me thinks they're just throwing the stat around too much.

I can't vouch for nightmare mode yet, but I imagine it's entirely possible to still stack Magic Find gear, it'll just be harder to absolutely maximize it.

What is the market like for shimmering essences?  Are nightmare magic items work more than normal based on essence quality?  I haven't really delved into much of this stuff yet because I am of the opinion that until we see how it all functions at level 60 it is basically irrelevant.  Getting 50% more gold at level ~35 seems less important to me than stacking the absolute best gear you can find and blasting through to level 60 ASAP.

Even though the stat works i still see no good reason to stack either gold or magic find, as neither is really needed to make enough gold to buy whatever ideal equipment you want and just kick more ass.  Edit: before endgame that is.

The difference in drops is astounding.  Again, based on my observation, I am needing to dump my bag in town at least 3 times more then peeps I group with. 

Magic find is averaged based on everyone in the party.

All I have to add is that normal drop rate can't be 1% or something similar.  I have nearly no MF and I am getting way more than 1% drop rates on magic items.  My complete guess is at solo I'm getting like 30%.  I know this because I had been picking up everything and going to town when full.  1/3 of my pack would have magic items.

I've since stopped picking up greys and whites just because they sell for absolutely nothing worth carrying them around. 

My point is that if you can stack even a modest level of MF, it wouldn't probably be a bad thing.  Even at 50%, that could go to nearly 50% chance of a find.  *shrug*

My observation is it's a pretty iffy stat from 30~59.9999.   The turnover rate on gear is atrocious.   The gear feels extremely normalized with level reqs.   Anything really good is outdone 3 levels later by a cheap blue from the AH.

Magic find is averaged based on everyone in the party.  Bluepost: http://www.diablofans.com/blizz-tracker/topic/218401-follower-gold-magic-find-equipment/

My observation is it's a pretty iffy stat from 30~59.9999.   The turnover rate on gear is atrocious.   The gear feels extremely normalized with level reqs.   Anything really good is outdone 3 levels later by a cheap blue from the AH.

Think I'm running at like 103% I'm not sure it wouldn't be better spent on gold find and not bothering until higher levels.

Except what's the point of playing other than seeing that yellow and brown text pop up occasionally.

Oh so you have to get to max level to have fun? Where have I heard that before?

60% does seem to be the breaking point.  Rolled a new toon and messed around- once I hit 60% MF the Purples flowed.

Purples?

If you can find gear with Primary Stat, Vit, and MF I don't see how you're sacrificing all that much. That gear is pretty hard to come by even on the AH though. A topaz in the helmet is ~20 more free MF too.

fyi- followers add to MF also, but to a lesser amount.  Like 10% of the MF you stack on them (at a glance).

I've been doing okay so far with 100~ MF (AIII Nightmare), but maybe being a wizard makes it easier to sacrifice defensive stats like that when you don't get hit all that much.

I dunno about magic find, but I'm not getting rare drops from bosses anymore on act 2-3 nightmare. I'm getting them still from the elites, but bosses only drop blues. Even though it's my first time through.

Once you're 60 and can get the Nephalem Valor buff, boss kills are quite lucrative. (assuming 5 stacks)

They fucked loot up.  You are only guaranteed rares from the first kill *ever* of a boss. That means normal mode (unless you leapfrog bosses via a friend.) 

4. Summary / Conclusion

Bringing all the pieces together provides us with:

    Magic find increases the class ("item-color") of the gear found.
    Magic find does not increase the number of items found.
    Magic find does not increase the iLvl of the gear found.
    The guaranteed rare drop from Nephalem Valor is an additional drop and it is possible to roll a legendary for the drop.
    The guaranteed rare drop from Nephalem Valor is applied to goblins as well.
    Nephalem Valor is superior to magic find; it devalues the effect when compared to farming without the buff, but magic find is still an effective affix.
    Whether or not magic find affects affix rolls is not investigated here, but there is no reason as of to suspect that magic find would increase the stat rolls. We're currently investigating if magic find has an affect on the number of affixes rolled on average per item.
    Last and most important: Future data collection may help to provide data for computational research on magic find that can be used for farming efficiency.

Maybe i just suck but i am getting wrecked in nightmare for stacking MF.  Skeleton king is one shotting me, that can't be intended.

MF will apply 100% of its benefit to Blue items, 30% to Yellow items, and 10% to Legendary and Set items. This means someone with 300% MF will end up finding roughly 30% more Legendary and Set items than someone with 0%. The design intent is to make things like Topaz gems in helmets or the Nagel Ring an option without them actually being mandatory.