EXP drop offs

[YoungDbl]

Hey SPF,
I want to know your leveling strategies. I also want to know where the drop offs are for:
Norm Nm Hell eldritch
Hell pindle
Nm baal
Nm Hell meph
Hell pits or ancient tunnels

Ok my routine is as follows
Normal:
Players8 all the way through. Clearing some side areas like cave and ancient tunnels. Grab all wps and do all quests. Finished ~lvl45
Nightmare:
Platers8 all the way through. Some nm meph runs but not for exp. Clear baal and do all quests and all wps. Run eldritch to about lvl75 or so.
Hell:
players1 clear all the way through with all quests and wps. Run eldritch for a few levels and run pindle to 90. Run baal for further levels.

So share your routine and the drop offs please. I would like to no if im over running places or underrunning.

Also what is everyones view on baal running in hell with a cl/fo sorc? What gear would I want to use on her. Would I want 10 skill gcs or life/mana? Also how would you kill baal? The stats on mine are currently 75 str and around 300+ in vit. Dex and nrg are base. So am I doing ok for a baalrunner or should I start changing something. I have 20 FO 5 CM , 10 L 20 CL and ~10 LM. +4 all +7 cold skills. What do you think?

Thanx
Dbl

[Hp_Sauce]

Norm:
Generally I do this between /p3 and /p6 depending on how strong my character is, sometimes I'll move up to /p8. I do this because I'd rather spend 30 minutes running an area twice (if I need to catch up), rather then 30 minutes clearing the area once.
Finished: Usually 40-42. After this point Experience from baal runs gets slow (and boring) and it also really slows down Act 1 NM experience (making it boring as well).

NM:
This is the same as norm for me usually, I just balance my limited patience with experience gains.
I usually fight the ancients around level 63-65, so if I'm low in levels and my build is weak I'll run Eldrich and/or Pindle for a bit to catch up.
Finished: 70-75, it's been closer to 70 recently because I don't have the patience for baaling to 75, and again, it buggers up experience gains in Act 1 Hell. If my merc is really getting trounced I'll return to NM and level up some more though.

Hell:
/p1 all the way (except I've been doing /p3 or 5 with my Hammeradin, but that's only one character). No real set pattern here, just whatever I feel comfortable with.

I've never played a CL/FO sorc so I can't say. I think that it will be slow going if you want to up the /p setting at all. But thats just a guess.

-hps

[Chasmyr]

In normal I usually run Baal until 50. Up until 50 I get a level a run. After that is when that lovely "One run, one level" mentality I love drops off.

Nightmare I play all P8, then do NM Baal until 75. I usually don't run pindle or meph unless I'm specifically playing a MF character.

Hell I play (usually) all on p8 if my chosen character is powerful enough. I just recently took a brief little tour of Hell on p8 with my up and coming Kicksin and she does just fine :) Then I'll just run Baal til whenever.

[sirpoopsalot]

(substitute /p1 for whatever is the highest 1-2 hit kill setting that a particular character can achieve).

1. /p8 until lvl30 (late Act3)
2. /p1 until eldritch
3. /p8 Eldritch until 38-42 (build specific)
4. /p1 until Baal's minions
5. /p8 minion/Baal runs until ~50+
6. /p1 until Eldritch
7. /p8 Eldritch until ~68
8. /p1 until Baal/minions
9. /p8 minion/Baal runs until 75-79 (build specific)
10. /pX hell (depends on the build power and challenge I desire).

[TedDeeBoy]

Usually clear at /p8 until I hit Baal, then re-run Baal until lvl 50.

Depending upon the build I might scale the players settings but never enter hell before 75. This is not the fastest but I try to clear NM on at /p7 as you can some nice rune,charm and jewel drops by the end of A2 NM.

Hell , while usually the underground area are gving XP I the char there, until the build is complete then Pat/Mat, I play up to /p7 no higher.

Youngdbl, if you decide to use her as Countess runner she will level nicely, I ran the Countess 1K times with a CL/Orb Sorc on /p1 and went from 80 to 87 even with a couple of deaths. I found CL/L takes a while again /p8 NM Baal, maxed Orb does good damage with about 17+ CM after + skills.

[jiansonz]

I want to know your leveling strategies.

Normal: one-pass full clear on /players 8. Gets me to level 49.

Nightmare: one-pass full clear on /players 8. Gets me to level 75.

Hell: one-pass full clear on /players 1. Gets me to level 85.
(Strong characters are played on /players 3. They reach level 87 in the end).

[grogs]

So share your routine and the drop offs please. I would like to no if im over running places or underrunning.It depends on what you're doing, if you're mfing it doesn't really matter so I'm assuming you mean to level. If you want to get to 95ish, then pindle is probably the easiest target, if you want to go higher then it makes no difference where you start running, in the end you'll be at Baal, the time taken to get to 97 is nothing in comparison to the last 2 levels.

So you can't overrun or underrun any levels, as it makes no difference in the long term (assuming you want to get to 96+).


So am I doing ok for a baalrunner or should I start changing something. I have 20 FO 5 CM , 10 L 20 CL and ~10 LM. +4 all +7 cold skills. What do you think?
CL is a terrible kill skill for a single target, CB or Lightning would be better options, personally my light sorc very rarely uses CL as Lightning is the perferred skill for killing mobs and single targets alike.

Unless you have fantastic gear, then you'd be better off with a pure lightning sorc imo.

[Mursilis]

Normal and Nightmare are run the same way for me. /p8 for the entire difficulty level with two exceptions. The Ancients are sometimes run at /p1 and the Chaos Santurary is run at /p1 for physical melee characters (dying 10 times to Iron Maiden is just not fun, 3-4 I can handle though). All quests are always completed but all waypoints are not found. Only those waypoints that are needed or that I happen to stumble across are obtained. Depending on my mood sometimes the extra caves/tunnels are cleared, sometimes not. But full clears are definitely not attempted, even though it happens alot just looking for things like the hellforge and countess tower. At the end may run Baal a few times for experience to get to level 45 in Normal and ~75 in NM.

Hell difficulty is a bit different. All quests are attempted, although Nil is sometimes skipped until the character is a mat/pat. Run at /p1 for the first act by everyone, then increased for those that found Act 1 too easy to /p3 or higher if possible. I already have a specific magic finder so things like the Tunnels in Act II or the Pit in Act I are not always run, again that depends on my mood at the time. Most characters finish around level 83 or so.

[Skinhead On The MBTA]

The Ancients should always be run at /p1 - they always give the same amount of experience, regardless of the the player setting, so all you do by increasing it is increase the amount of life they have, which is just pointless.

[Deaddave]

The Ancients should always be run at /p1 - they always give the same amount of experience, regardless of the the player setting, so all you do by increasing it is increase the amount of life they have, which is just pointless.

i actuly try to take on the ancients on as higher player setting as i can in normal and nightmare(sometimes hell depends on build) i just enjoy the challange

[Sint Nikolaas]

Hm.. can't believe no one gave this (http://strategy.diabloii.net/news.php?id=551#Experience) yet. Look at the area levels below (a bit below the table I gave) and use the table which I linked to see where you can level best.