What are the statistically most likely places to buy certain items from merchants?

Question

I'm looking to (eventually) get into crafting, and while I've saved a lot of jewels, gems, and runes, I'm lacking in certain magical equipment. Namely:

• sharkskin gloves
• vampirebone gloves
• sharkskin belts
• vampirefang belts
• mesh belts
• mithril coils
• demonhide boots
• wyrmhide boots

Rather than hoping for a bunch of these to drop, it would be much easier to buy them from merchants. But which are statistically most likely to sell these? I can't find any information about which vendors are most likely to sell specific items.

Answer 1

Given the items that you need I'd recommend using only Elite items(more about Normal/Exceptional/Elite items here) because it has the highest ilvl.

On the same page you can see the following:

Elite Items first appear late in Nightmare Difficulty and become more common as you get to higher difficulty levels tied to monster levels. Magic Elite Items can be found at the Vendors at higher Character and Difficulty Levels. Rare Elite Items can be Gambled.

So I'd recommend checking out vendors in Hell difficulty. If you need just cheap Elite items check some blacksmiths:

• Act 1
  • Charsi
• Act 2
  • Fara, Elzix
• Act 3
  • Asheara, Hratli, Ormus
• Act 4
  • Halbu, Jamella
• Act 5
  • Larzuk, Malah, Anya

These are the ones that sell armor, so you might find some gloves, belts and boots that you need.

You can also gamble these items, but it would cost a lot more(but the gambling page refreshes every time you look at it, so you won't need to create that many games and teleport between acts).

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If you do have time and patience I'd recommend checking the vendors.

If you have enough gold go for gambling(a Travincal in Act 3 is an awesome spot for gold farming if you need it. I've heard about people making over 1 mil gold in 1 run).