Leveling Paragon outside act 3

[Critter5592]

I am aware and accept that act 3 is without a doubt comprised of the quickest leveling routes, however, is there any route outside act 3 that is at least somewhat competitive?

[Halabash]

The end of Act 2, and the beginning of act 4. Really Act 2 and 4 will be competitive but they can be annoying depending on your playstyle.

[bjornh]

Here's a good one for Act 2:

- Choose The Black Soulstone quest in Act 2 from the menu.
- Enter game, go to Desolate Sands, find Vault of the Assassin.
- Enter the zone and get the 'Checkpoint' message.

Vault of the Asssassin has 5-7 elite packs, 0-2 goblins and is a nice fast clear. Finish that and TP to town, clear Black Canyon Mines, TP to town and clear Road to Alcarnus. This is the entire run, you'll have 8-12 elite packs total and it can be done in 5-7 minutes depending on your gear and what MP you play on. Exit to menu and Resume Game, you'll have a portal straight to Vault of the Assassin, round and round we go.

You can of course choose to go other places after clearing those 3 places if you wish, Dahlgur Oasis for the Keywarden for example although that'll take some of the edge out of the effectiveness. Make sure you don't enter the Archives of Zoltun Kulle though or otherwise you'll overwrite your checkpoint.

[BenBos]

The end of Act 2, and the beginning of act 4. Really Act 2 and 4 will be competitive but they can be annoying depending on your playstyle.

read : too difficult.

[Deleted]

The essence farming run in act 2 can work: Desolate Sands,find vault of the assasin, clear black canyon mines and road to alcarnus. Next game you'll have a portal to VoA so no need to search for it again

[announced]

Here's a good one for Act 2:

- Choose The Black Soulstone quest in Act 2 from the menu.
- Enter game, go to Desolate Sands, find Vault of the Assassin.
- Enter the zone and get the 'Checkpoint' message.

Vault of the Asssassin has 5-7 elite packs, 0-2 goblins and is a nice fast clear. Finish that and TP to town, clear Black Canyon Mines, TP to town and clear Road to Alcarnus. This is the entire run, you'll have 8-12 elite packs total and it can be done in 5-7 minutes depending on your gear and what MP you play on. Exit to menu and Resume Game, you'll have a portal straight to Vault of the Assassin, round and round we go.

You can of course choose to go other places after clearing those 3 places if you wish, Dahlgur Oasis for the Keywarden for example although that'll take some of the edge out of the effectiveness. Make sure you don't enter the Archives of Zoltun Kulle though or otherwise you'll overwrite your checkpoint.

your doing it backwards if u want exp. the bulk of experience comes from normal mobs... not small elite packs.
Black canyon mines>Road to alcarnus-> Vault of the assassin-> done.

do the keywarden if ur desperate for keys and/or at a high monster lvl.. personally i find its a waste unless ur on mp6 or higher and keyhunting as the oasis is vast and finding the warden can take another 5-10 mins.

[Pendulous]

The essence farming run in act 2 can work: Desolate Sands,find vault of the assasin, clear black canyon mines and road to alcarnus. Next game you'll have a portal to VoA so no need to search for it again

What quest? I should probably take some time to get my Act 2 keys anyway.

[Deleted]

What quest? I should probably take some time to get my Act 2 keys anyway.

I believe its quest 8 the black soul stone the 3rd part of the quest

[traen]

Nothing is faster than act3 exp farming.

And exp farming itself is pretty useless. You need to farm gold first of all. Because more gold - more gear - faster farming on higher MP - more exp.
The best way to get gold is to sell items on AH. To get items you need to kill as many elites with 5nv stacks as possible. Act3 provides significantly more easy to reach elites than act2.
Extending your route from 10 to 15 elites effectively doubles your income, while taking just 1.5x more time. Good act3 item-farming routes give you 20+ elites per run. And you get almost as much exp/hour as on pure exp runs.

[Bad Ashe]

as long as you arent concerned about keys/essences; i've had success with A4 myself, with the xp boost on the last patch. i dont really play that often anymore, but there's just stuff coming from everywhere w/o you having to run around that much to get its attention. it seems to me at least as much killing as the crater/tower in a3.

the only downside is doing it on high MP for that godly-xp, the elites can sometimes be unavoidable and nearly impossible.

[Pendulous]

I'm liking this route now. Get Vault of the Assassins checkpoint. Do Black Canyon Mines and Alcarnus. Which will be 3-5 NV stacks. Do Vault. Then for me I head to Oaisis and go for the Keywarden.

It's quicker than my Act 3 run, so I feel like I can get more done (even though I'm not). I get a little over a full inventory of rares, and seem to have pretty good luck getting browns for some reason. the only problem is, the wasps in Black Canyon and the dervishes elsewhere are a pain. The Keywarden has one-shot me before, and it wasn't even spinning.

[traen]

From patch 1.0.7 farming VOA itself (or even crypt of the ancients) gives almost as much experience as old XP routes.
You just kill white mobs on mp10 skipping elites and reset the game. Great source of legendaries as well, I get 5+/hour in average and even had 3 legendaries in a single run several times. Not bad, considering that such run takes less than 1.5 minutes...
Extremely boring though... well, its not like farming act3 was very exciting...

[Aelfin]

Act 1. Broken Blade Quest. MP10. Go to CotA in fields of misery. Get the checkpoint. Do CotA over and over. 80M xp/hr, easy.

Ignore the elite pack if you have to, just quickly kill the skellies and get out. Leave game. Go back in, you have the checkpoint portal to CotA entrance.

Each run last maybe 2 mins, more like 1.5 if geared well. Very boring but very efficient. Also good for gold and legendaries. Not for DE.