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Guide to Muling

The following is meant as advice on safe(-r) muling, and is in no way a Basin policy.  For a statement on the Basin's policies regarding item transfers in Basin games, go here.

There are two basic types of muling: self-muling and coop-muling.  The following is a description of steps that make these processes as safe as battle.net will allow. Regardless of which method you use, take your time and allow at least 5-10 seconds to pass between each exit and entrance to a game. If you switch characters too fast or too frequently the game will 'tag' you and bar your access to bnet, typically for anywhere from 10 minutes to over an hour.

Self-muling

Sometimes a player needs to transfer items from one character to another without the help of another player.

1. Start by creating a private game with a password in normal difficulty.  It takes 5 minutes to "age" a game.  Once this time has passed the game will stay up for a time after you exit it.  Type

   /time

   in the chat window to check for time.  However, when the 5 minute period has passed it is not yet safe to drop items.
2. Exit the game and attempt to reenter without using the password.  Sometimes game passwords don't "stick," so otherwise you might mule in a public game without knowing.  This is not very common, but happens from time to time.
3. If you can't enter the game without the password then you knows it's safe, and can now reenter to start muling.
4. Drop items in town, leave the game, and reenter with another character from the same or a different account to pick them up.  You can repeat this any number of times.

The game will stay up for approximately 5 minutes with no player in it.  After that it disappears with any items left.  The game can also crash at any time due to a battle.net hiccup.

Some general advice for self-muling:

• Only mule items this way that you would not be heartbroken to lose.
• Mule in batches.  Instead of dumping a lot of items in one game and sorting it out, transfer them in smaller doses.  It takes longer, but if a game accidentally crashes you lose less.

Coop-muling

This is done when two or more players decide to mule together.  One of the advantages of this method is that the game does not have to be "aged."  It's still not stable before 5 minutes has passed, so only one player can leave at a time for a while.

There is another good reason to always have one player in the game: if a player gets the "game full" bug, and is prevented from reentering, it’s possible to message the other player and have him/her take care of any items left in the game.

Also, a player could get the "realm down" message, or lose internet connection.  Any conscientious player whose muling partner has disappeared for an unusually long time will pick up leftover items and store them until the rightful owner is found.

Again, it's a good idea to repeat step 2 of the self-muling process, and check if the game really has a password.

There are various styles of coop-muling.  Some players alternate.  Others let one person hold the game, while the other mules.  This is up to the players involved.  However there are some common sense etiquette issues: You cannot generally expect another person to spend half an afternoon holding a game for you, while you are reorganizing your forty mules.  There are certain situations, like when one player goes afk for an extended period, when such an endeavor is acceptable.  Otherwise, it's polite to mule quickly.

When a player has a very valuable item to transfer and/or battle.net conditions appear to be unusually unsafe, it is customary to ask another player to "hold" it.  This means the item is not dropped on the ground, but exchanged through the trade window.

Unfortunately items can be lost even using this method.  A character is automatically saved upon leaving games, but characters in games are saved at certain intervals.  So, if player A gives an item to player B and leaves, and the game then immediately crashes, player A's character will be saved not holding the item, while player B's character might have been saved last before receiving the item, and thus the item is lost.  This does not happen often, but is a definite possibility.  There is a way to circumvent this in most cases: if player B immediately leaves and reenters the game after receiving the item, it will be saved in his inventory.  This takes time, but could be worthwhile when transferring highly valuable items.

General advice for coop-muling:

• Only mule with people you know and trust.
• Only mule highly valuable items with people you really, really trust.