The great experience challenge

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Okay, no theorycrafting this time. Just a plain ol' competition.

Who gets to a highest experience point total at the end of the Normal mode? Consider it a high score of sorts.

TL;DR edit: Allowing for respawning monsters seemed to be a grave mistake, so the challenge lost quite a bit of relevance.

Rules of engagement:
1) No squatting or muling. (That'd be just retarded.)
2) Starting exp (for ECL races) will be deducted from the total.
3) Use the "perfectly balanced" EXP table to remove anomalities caused by the "at least some vs zero" exp per kill boundary.
4) Mods are OK to use as long as they don't affect the amount or type of monsters encountered during the playthrough or give humongously powerfull items such as Killsword.
5) You're NOT required to start with six members, but once you add new ones, they cannot be removed. Also, all members must stay alive at all times (to avoid yet another exploit).

Infinite monster spawns are still a major pain for a competition like this, so let's adhere to the following additional house rules:
- Only up to one random encounter per map due to resting (quicksave before rest to control)
- Repeated killing of respawning monsters (such as Worgens at the Horde Fortress and Restless Dead in the Fell Wood) is only allowed for one rest period* per area. In cleartext: Once outside the Fortress, once in the Warrens (either one of the sub-areas but not both) and once in Fell Wood. Any other passage through these areas must be done using the shortest possible route.

* Rest period is the time between two rests. You may reapply buffs and heal as long as you have spells remaining but let's leave one-use items (such as potions) and regenerative items out of it. You're NOT allowed to Power word: Reload to cheese perfect combat rolls between waves of enemies but you ARE allowed to reload the latest quicksave prior to one of your party members dying.

Any takers?

Edit: Some sort of a recap on the strategy used to get to the final sum total is also needed as it'd be practically impossible to tell if someone is posting a figure out of thin air otherwise.

 

Well, it seems this challenge pretty much boils down to devising a strategy for how to be able to keep on killing Worg Riders and/or Restless Dead for as long as possible.

My first round of Worg Riders (outside the Horde Fortress) netted me pretty close to 30,000 exp. That's just shy of 100 kills with 375 and later 300 experience per kill. The second round right after the passworded door went even better with almost 50,000 exp gained, since the Worgs didn't seem to want to spawn near my Sorceress. That's just short of 200 consecutive kills at 269 or 225 exp each, nearly three hours (!) of real time and a whole lot of patience.

I decided to go with a three-person party here - two DG tanks (Banite and Rogue/Illusionist types) and a human Sorceress. They had just enough firepower not to be overwhelmed by the Worgs, just enough AC to be hit rarely enough, just enough spell buffs (Mage Armor + Cat's Grace for all three being most important) to last through the ordeal (20+ straight hours game time) and most importantly, only one character that was even remotely unsafe to tank with.

I could've gotten a whole lot more exp per kill by bringing in more people, but the "spawn a Worgen at random party member" thingy is just impossible to control and would most likely have ended up with a dead newbie (a.k.a game over) pretty soon. Been there enough times to know that. Besides, I wasn't really getting into any serious exp reductions yet anyway, even if I only had three members there.

Restless Dead will, however, be plowed down en massé by my six-person party, trained for their upcoming destiny since the start of Chapter Two. Edit: The extras being the usual suspects with a druid (Human to be able to take a side course in Banite and Monkish) and two Drow battleclerics.

 

I'm not going to participate, but the best strategy involves starting with one character, then adding the rest at key points. The skill comes in figuring out what the best points are to add each character.

 

6 characters start to finish will get the highest experience point total. 6 Deep gnomes would have an advantage in XP gain, because they stay low level for longer.
Extra XP is gained if your party members are lower level, but being lower level means you haven't amassed much XP yet. The only other factor, is the Effective Character Level. ECL races get an advantage in XP gain without requiring them to be behind in levels.
Mule characters that can't be removed, won't add up to a gain in XP in the end.
I won't join in the challenge, because I doubt I could consistently adjust my playing style to meet the rules.

 

It seems I grossly overestimated the ability of the Restless Dead to whittle down a party. While the energy drain arrows are nasty, the mobs themselves are total pushovers so they almost never hit. They only have +1 attack bonus (Normal difficulty), so everyone in my party, including the Sorceress diplomat, has full AC coverage against them.

I've been grinding them for four levels (average level 9 to 13) straight without breaking a sweat. So far I've only needed one Heal and have three more in store. In other words, any half-decent party should "easily" get to average level 13* as soon as they reach the Fell Wood. Takes a while, yes, but it's no worse than doing complete Battle Squares. Although you don't get much (if any) exp in the next few areas, anything gained from there on is icing on the huge exp pile you've already secured.

* Level 13 is the highest you can get to if you're using the standard EXP table since the Restless Dead are CR5 monsters, thus you get zero exp for kill from them at level 13.

I also noticed that level 9 party spawned only two undead in AR5026, four at level 10 and six at or above level 11. Similar spawn patterns most likely exist for most areas in the game, you just never notice them since you don't see monster respawns.

Seems like one needs to ban any and all exploitation of respawning/random monsters if the experience point competition is to have any relevance. Right now it seems more like a test of endurance than anything else.

However, I did enjoy the challenge provided by the Worgen drums. You need a carefully balanced party to even survive the initial onslaught of the mobs that charge you when you're spotted, much less be able to grind on them for any length of time afterwards. The Worg Riders aren't pushovers with their +10 attack bonus - that's mighty tough cookie even for DG tanks considering you need to have that AC constantly for upwards of tens of game hours. Even more so for any other character due to the in-your-face spawns.

 

Coiny, you're absolutely right that 6 DGs is the way to go.

Even better, I think, is to cripple some of the characters with multiclassing xp penalties -- although they will personally earn less xp, the reduced average party level will improve xp gains. In the long run, dynamic xp will try to bring APL to 16 or 17, so you want as much disparity as possible between the characters.

This is also why I think adding characters along the way is best. A simple way would be to play most of the game with a duo, then add four new characters all at once. The party will be something like 4x12 & 2x27 by the end... APL 17, but much more total xp than 6x17.

Jukka, honestly I think this challenge is busted. I'm much more interested in a speedrun (game time) challenge, though I can't participate immediately.

 

Yeah, the challenge kinda lost its point when I realized that the Fell Wood undead aren't much of a threat. In fact, my party kept on slaughtering them until I had accrued a massive 423,000 experience point boost (over 70k per character) - ALL of it without resting. Yes, that's stupid - was just interested to know HOW stupid, exactly.

Interestingly enough, it's neither lack of healing nor missing spell buffs that'll finally do you in there. It's the stacking Energy Drain. The DC on the saving throw against the drain seems to be 20 or thereabouts, which you can expect to make rather comfortably most of the time. But once you do fail it once, things go from slightly irritating to bad to worse surprisingly fast, since each drain also lowers your saving throw bonus, among other things.

Of course you could memorize some Restoration spells to be able to carry on, but that'd be beside the point. It's just way too easy exp - I more than doubled what I had accrued so far, the two grind sessions with the worg drums included, in just one grind session. No matter how you slice it, that's just about as retarded as doing extensive level squatting or stuff like that.

Also, Infinity engine seems to run into rather serious slowdown problems once you have a few hundred corpses laying around. And if you keep pushing it despite the slowdown, you'll start seeing crashes to desktop. I actually had to alternate the grind area between two different spawn points after every ~200 kills to let the bodies get purged out of the area maps before coming back to the first area.

Edit: Oh yeah, almost forgot. AR5026 spawned me whopping NINE undead at a time as soon as I reached level 13.

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While the idea is right, you're actually better off (total exp wise) adding just one person at a time rather than several at once. While you do get to lower APL immediately after adding several new characters, you can't stay there for long since the new characters go up in levels much faster than the old ones. Mathematical proof of this is left to the reader, but it's rather straightforward.

 

Well, I played my own way, which certainly didn't involve squatting, but did involve being thorough and completing every single quest I possibly could, and killing almost everyone who deserved to die (truly evil folk in league with the Severed Hand).

My entire party ended the game at ECL 17, with my bard/barbarian nearly at level 18 (he read manual of adventure that grants an extra 10k experience). It seems like making it to level 18 would require some more drastic strategies. I didn't think to write down my XP total after defeating Isair and Madae, so I'd have to fight the battle with them and their cronies again to get exact totals. Perhaps I will have a go at that later today. I somehow suspect that Sir Rechet will do far better than I did.

 

A quick thread resurrection: I abandoned the idea of a competition/challenge but the baseline question, of how much exp CAN one actually acquire during the game with all the known "safe to kill" extras and other, more obscure stunts thrown into the mix still remains unanswered. WITHOUT resorting to respawns in any way or form!!

I'm "fairly sure" (=testing as we speak) that I've been too fond of keeping quest exp at its absolute highest when, in fact, properly tuned average party level management with strategically placed character additions seem to trump it many times over. For example, you could squeeze a bit over thousand more exp in Prologue by including a healer, a diplomat and someone with 15+ Constitution, but it seems you'll get much more than that if you can start solo. Not immediately, but a while later down the road.

My selected spots for character additions are thus:
- Start with the Illusionist DG tank.
- Add a DG Druid after returning Emma's Moonblade (a boatload of quest exp just prior to that, plus level 7 starts to hurt exp)
- Add a Drow Sorcerer after completing Yquog's delivery missions (lots of prior quest exp plus I'm expecting to reach 8 average right about then - needs to go DOWN since Horde bosses and Chp 2 are imminent)
- Add a DG Banite decoy upon entering the Cold Marsh (extra spawns with extra kill exp, yes please)
- Add a Drow battlecleric after Eight Chambers (loads of kill exp coming up)
- Finally, add another Drow battlecleric as soon as the effect of adding the previous one lingers off (ie. right after reaching a menacingly long high average level plateau)

Will be back with detailed reports later on, stay tuned!

 

Success!

I'm already very slightly ahead of my previous record at the first checkpoint, after completing Yquog's delivery missions. I've gathered 106,926 exp by now and just added the third character. Yet I haven't battled a single random spawn anywhere and I missed quite many quests in Prologue:
- Heal Reig yourself (300 exp)
- Bless the recruits (300 exp)
- Inspire the recruits (300 exp)
- Expose Phaen's masters (400 + 100 extra exp)
- Veira's secret stash (requires a Dreadmaster diplomat, 300 exp + magical dagger)

One unexpected bonus from playing solo all the way until returning Emma's Moonblade is that I got double spawns of both zombies and slimes in the cave behind Torak. Seems like it kicks in once you're level 6 by the time you get there. So instead of getting the usual 300 exp for each, I got 2 x 225 = 450. Guess that makes it one of the only places in the whole game where being at a higher level does NOT turn into a direct exp loss.

 

Oh drats, my system HDD decided to bail out on me. However, I count myself lucky for getting a whole six years of intensive use out of a striped RAID 0 bundle, with the expected average life span of three to five years for a standard HDD these days... But here's the recap of what I managed so far, nevertheless.

Playing solo and adding one right after returning Emma's Moonblade instead of going duo from the start is a net gain in exp. Not only is you average level fairly low all the way to the Horde Fortress, you can double-dip into monster spawns by utilizing the Deep Gnome tank's Invisibility ability. You do that by sneaking all the way to the map prior the Shaengarne Bridge battle BEFORE adding a new character. That way you get some extra spawns (like two Verbeeg and two Highland Snakes instead of just one) for being level 7, but get to actually kill them at average level 4.

Thus, the question becomes: where are the spots in the game that you can actually sneak by most, if not all monsters to spawn several maps just prior to adding fresh newbies?

For example, Chapter Two could conceivably be sneaked through all the way to the lower level of Ice Temple, with very few hitches along the way - Remorhaz Queen, Sherincal and IIRC one of the priestesses on the upper level to be able to get down to the lower level. Just add a newbie and whammo - you get four consecutive maps to clear with extra spawns?

However, there are several 'buts' foiling the idea for this specific spot: 1) You have just passed a similar spot, with the Horde Warrens and the preferred sneaky way of going about Yquog's business, so you're quite likely still at a low average level. 2) Quite a few spots in early Chapter Three are quite indifferent about your average level, since you WILL see a lot of extra spawns to compensate for your higher level. Especially going from avg level 9 to 10 and again from 10 to 11. (See above.) 3) It's only the lower level of Ice Temple that actually has a significantly different amount of monster spawns, depending on your level. Hence, there's an incentive for entering it at a higher level with the exp from the prior three maps. 4) Even if you decide to postpone cashing in the numerous quests in Chp2, there's still a metric ton of them right at the end of you need to cash in.. or forfeit. Not a situation you want to end up in at a low level, when you should instead be killing stuff.

For the record, my previous attempt ended with my trio at the end of Chp2 being just 10k exp behind my exp benchmark for a quartet. That's supposedly* more than compensated by having three (instead of two) "get out of high level killing your exp gain" cards remaining.

* = Not sure yet, but that's exactly what I'm trying to test.

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Oh, for the record. A disclaimer:

I'm quite aware that the potential gains (or losses) in adjusting the spots where you add in the extras is are marginal at best, insignificant at worst. Besides, this method prioritizes exp point total, possibly at the cost of proper party level management and definitely at the cost of doing it the "easy" way. So no need in pointing that out, I'm doing this out of academic interest.

For most gameplay purposes, powergaming or not, all you need to know that some character builds benefit more from ending the game at a higher level compared to others, and adding characters as you go is the "proper" way of adjusting it, together with proper ECL penalty management. I.e. don't make a Drow your party's primary Sorcerer in a party of humans and other ECL zero races, even if it has that +2 CHA.

 

I am in awe of your patience and dedication to this seemingly pointless endeavor.

 

I finally made myself endure through the complete Battle Squares, with the extra spice for reloading so that I'd get an exp reward for every level (yes, all 50 of them) instead of some junk to sell. My trio got exactly 101,000 exp for that, going from 11 average to 13.

Not only that, but every level reward works the same as kill exp. It's the same as killing a monster with a CR of (Rank of the level completed + 5). To put that into perspective, the topmost three ranks alone put together are the equivalent of FORTY FIVE golems in the same general area in terms of kill exp.. !!

Suffice to say, that's such a huge chunk of exp that it has ramifications for the party add order. In fact, it's by far the largest consecutive patch of kill exp ANYWHERE in the game, bar none. It vastly surpasses the exp fest called Underdark + Zhinda Citadel, and I've usually added TWO new members just to cash in big on that one..

However, no one says you need to fight it all as soon as you get there. In fact, considering the top ranks are duels almost exclusively against game's toughest demons and such, there's an actual incentive to pick up the exp once you've finally added the last members of your party so that your average level is low.

Back to the drawing board with this one, it seems.

 

Looking good so far.

My prediction about Chapter Three showed to be true: There's very little point in trying to enter or play through it at a low average level, at least not until the Cold Marshes map. And by that point the Monastery with its HUGE quest exp point count is right around the corner. My trio appended with a fresh Drow (at the Marshes) only managed to squeeze out 38,500 exp out of the most monster-populated maps of all of Chp3, ie. from Cold Marshes and onwards. The body count is impressive, yes, but none of the monsters are of high CR, so there's not much to optimize anyway.

However, I guess there's further optimization to be done. Just as it's a good idea to cash in quest exp at the very latest opportunity, the exact opposite holds for killing monsters. Now, normally you would just bump into mobs as you go and dispose of them in short order.. but there are good many you can skip entirely on your first pass through the area. Even more so if you apply a more stealthy approach.

But why on earth would you WANT to skip mobs to begin with? Well.. you COULD kill them at your current, often unsuitably high average level, or wait until you've reached the point where it's prudent to add newbies to bring the average level down again, return there and THEN proceed with the slaughter. Skipping mobs on your first go is a triple win - you get (a few) more spawns due to being high level with a small party, you get more exp for killing them and most importantly, you get to pile all the quest exp on your first members instead of using it to skip a portion of the low levels you ought to utilize in slaughtering stuff.

Such examples include:
- Many golems in Chp2 can be sneaked by, both outside and inside the Ice Temple.
- The trolls "guarding" the Remorhaz that swallowed Zack Boozenburry are entirely optional until it's time to free him.
- The group of Talisman warriors trapped in the Soul Trap mirror at lower level is an optional fight and can be postponed.
- The wolf den just west of Wandering village can be skipped entirely.
- A few complete areas in Fell Wood need not be traversed to get to the heart of the forest.

Together with the Battle Squares that behaves like 5 static CR6 to CR15 fights in terms of exp (with a "bit" of reloading involved to get the reward you want), you can essentially prepare a HUMONGOUSLY large pool of monsters for killing once you've added all six party members. Sure, your trio will be at average level 12-13 or thereabouts once you complete the Eight Chambers.. but you're back at around 7 once you add in three newbies. That's 8400 exp for your first Iron Golem after the fact, or why not 16,800 for a Rank 10 Battlesquare?

For the record: My party with the add scheme discussed above is 70k exp past my previous record at the end of Chapter Four right at the moment. Most of this is due to the 101,000 extra exp I squeezed out of Battlesquares, although it DID has put a dent on my exp gain ever since. Hence, only 70% of the benefit remain..

 

Success!

I'm at the end of Normal mode, and reached a grand total experience point count of 1,050,488 (starting exp deducted). That's a good 80k more than my previous record, and by far most of it was caused by doing the Battlesquares with reloading so that I only got exp awards. Even then, the extra exp decay due to the higher average level was quite modest compared to some wild assumptions I've seen before: "Optimizing stuff doesn't matter in the end anyway since the dynamic exp system will just flatten it out" -- WRONG!!! I made an extra 101k in Chapter Two and still retained well over half of it to the end of Normal. (After deductions for extra NPC kills I didn't know were possible before.)

Here's the exp layout at the end, just prior to the final battle sequence:
DG Illusionist tank: 305,976 (started solo)
DG Druid: 255,024 (added after returning Emma's Moonblade)
Drow Sorcerer: 223,176 (added after Yquog's quests)
Drow Battlecleric #1: 117,814 (added upon entering the Cold Marsh)
Drow Battlecleric #2: 89,449 (added after Eight Chambers + delayed quests)
Drow Battlecleric #3: 89,049 (added after Eight Chambers + delayed quests)

Some general notes, in no specific order:
- A trio is very handy group to tackle the early game. You can fit in a tank, a healer and a diplomat easily, and they get a good head start in their skills by doing so. An extra plus if your tank is a DG Illusionist spellsword variant, that way you also get a full-blown thief AND an early access to massively powerful arcane area of effect spells due to the higher level.
- Surprisingly many NPCs can be killed safely after having completed their related quests. Most of Severed Hand is free for all, except for the Mage Tower, and almost everything in the Time Loop can be slaughtered every day spent there. Bring +3 or better Bludgeoning weapons with you if you want to take on Lord Pyros.. twice.
- Adding new characters pretty much anywhere in Chapter Two or Three is a Bad Idea (tm) if optimizing exp gain is considered. UNLESS you both want to cash in big exp from Battlesquares AND want to have a large party upon entering Chapter Three for some inexplicable reason, of course.
- The gains for starting solo and expanding to trio prior to Chapter Two, instead of just starting as a trio, are rather marginal. Which is kinda nice, considering how tough life can get for a solo tank early on - a single stun and you need to reload, for example.
- As long as you have your obligatory basics covered (tank + healer at least), my preferred order in which to add new members is Mages > 1st Cleric > Druid > misc junk you want to put into test > rest of the Clerics. Mages come first since they're the only class that actually benefits from going beyond clvl 20 in a meaningfull way.

Rechet over and out.

 

Interesting. I never really thought about slaughtering everyone in the Time Loop. Normally just do the quests and leave.

Do you get XP every time? I mean, if I kill Pyros twice, will I get XP twice, then?

 

Yes. Pyros is also CR17, so it really pays off to kill him twice for double exp. You can do it during "days" three and two, ie. just prior to taking care of Izbelah in timed mode. But those annoying Flamewalkers are ripe for destruction starting from the first day you see them around.

Also, some quests give bigger profits for solving them the violent way. Vunarg and his pack in Horde Warrens is often times worth more in kill exp compared to the 700 you get by convincing him to leave. Likewise, there are quite a few high CR mobs in the Severed Hand barracks, so poisoning them via the food supply isn't such a bright idea if you're up for another large scale fight. However, the second meeting with Yquog is best handled by flustering him with a collection of bodies you're carrying around, unless you REALLY, REALLY want some loot out of him.

 

Hmmm, I've never tried that before. So how big is his pack? Any good loot?

Hmmm, again, thanks. I always poisoned them, because I figured the quest experience outweighed the XP from the fight. If it doesn't, then there is no reason to be sneaky.

Ha! I stopped carrying the bodies years ago, since it just seemed like a pain in the butt to carry these things around. I think I remember once flustering him and then managing to fight him before he left the room, but I may be wrong about that.

I also found it useful to convince the monk archimandrite and her boyfriend to leave, and then attack them before they can get out of the building, since they have some interesting items and are worth decent XP themselves. This is at least partially because I find the trials in the basement to be so tedious that I don't even start them and I just kill all the monks once I've finished the "upstairs" quests. (Always a fun fight, incidentally, though one gets little XP out of it).

Thanks to this thread it occurs to me I've skipped out on lots of XP throughout the game. Not that it seems to make much of a difference. My 6-man parties are still about 16th or 17th level every time I take on the Twins in the final battle.

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By the way, what is Viera's "secret stash"?

I'm playing my first Dreadmaster right now and I couldn't get anything to happen (I mean, I was able to banish her, but that was it). Is there supposed to be a different conversation tree? My Dreadmaster has a low INT (5, I think), and a mediocre (12 or 14, I think), CHA. (She's not my real diplomat, who is my sorceror).

 

I'm not personally interested in XP optimization (I'm more about operational efficiency than performance), but if most of your XP gain comes out of battle squares, you might want to delay Battle Squares until Nicodemus summons you back for the second time.

 

You can't do the battle squares any more in chapter 5 even if you get there.