How To Level Quickly In Diablo III: Reaper Of Souls

With the release of the Ultimate Evil edition of Reaper of Souls earlier this week, many players may be exploring Diablo III for the first time or returning to the game after not playing since the core game’s PC release in 2012. With that in mind, we’ve gathered together some of the most important tips for leveling at an impressive pace.

We’re purposefully focusing here on smart practices for playing the game well, especially if you’re new to the game. If you’re looking for power-leveling exploits, many of which involve repeating certain tasks over and over, other online guides are likely to be a better resource.  Also, while our guide here is targeted towards players of the new console release, most of the strategies below work equally well on PC. 

Start A Hero, and Stick With It

One of the most enjoyable ways to play Diablo III is through exploring alternate characters and their powers. However, once you settle on a character class, play him or her all the way up to the end of the campaign before investing too much time in alts. While you’re at it, consider taking that initial main hero all the way to level 70. 

Why? There are lots of reasons. Higher difficulty settings don’t unlock until you’re partway through the main campaign, and you’ll want those higher difficulty options for some of our later tips. Adventure mode doesn’t unlock until at least one character has finished the campaign storyline. A level 70 hero allows you to start developing your paragon levels, which carry over to new alts, giving those new characters a boost from the start. Plus, level 70 characters have access to the best gems, which can be shared with your low-level alts as soon as they begin acquiring socketed items, which can make a big difference in speeding up progression.

Play Together

This somewhat obvious point bears mentioning if you’re new to the game. Diablo III can be fun on your own, but the fun is magnified with more players. In fact, Blizzard provides an XP boost that increases with each new player that joins the party. Beyond that simple boost, every aspect of the game is easier with more players, and you’ll simply move through the game faster. And have more fun.

The other big reason to play together (or at least be on other player’s friends list) involves the new social features of the Ultimate Evil Edition. Player mail lets you share items with other players; while that might not be common practice among strangers, good friends can send each other aid to support the leveling drive. More friends also adds up to more opportunities to get nemeses from your friend’s game (which drop good loot) and for that friend to receive a special gift targeted to your account, which they can then send to your mailbox. 

Capitalize On Apprentice Mode

The new, currently console-exclusive apprentice mode is a blast for a lot of reasons, but it’s also a ridiculously fast way to advance a hero. If playing with a group of friends, figure out which member of your party has the highest level hero, and request that they play that character while you’re grouped up. 

The other heroes in the group will see their stats boosted to an appropriate level to survive, even if the absence of higher level skills and gear won’t make them quite as powerful as the mentor character. The high level character helps assure the speedy dispatch of monsters, while the apprentices soak up the increased rate of XP and gear.

[Next Page: What difficulty should I play on?]

Push Against The Difficulty Wall – But Not Too Hard

Reaper of Souls has an approach to difficulty modes that is different from many games, and it’s changed a lot since the original release of Diablo III on PCs in 2012. To progress expeditiously, and to simply enjoy the challenge of the game, it’s essential that you constantly challenge yourself to move up the difficulty scale. 

Unlike many games, difficulty in Reaper of Souls can be changed at any time. If you’re only moving one step up or down, you can even do it from the pause menu without exiting your session. New difficulty modes add dramatically increased XP rewards, gold, better gear pick-ups, and the chance to acquire better gems. 

There’s no hard and fast rule for what difficulty mode you should play on, but here’s a solid rule of thumb: If you or your group is smashing through resistance, killing monster groups in mere moments, and no one’s health is ever taking much of a hit, then you’ve got things set too easy. Push up the difficulty slider until monsters are presenting a real challenge, but don’t go too far. There’s a tipping point where monsters are just too strong, and you start either dying all the time, or taking way too long to finish off a single fight. You’re looking for the Goldilocks slot, where the difficulty feels just right. 

Slot A Ruby In Your Helm

As soon as you get a helm with a socket in it, put a red ruby in that slot. While most gem bonuses increase core stats, your head slot is the only place that provides a flat percentage XP bonus when slotted with a red gem. If this is your first character, that XP bonus may be relatively modest, but the power of a slotted head ruby for leveling alts is extremely powerful. Your high level character can collect or craft a high level ruby with a great XP bonus, and then pass that gem (through your stash) to your new alt. 

If you have a helmet without a socket, and you’ve gained access to the Mystic (she shows up in Act V), you may be able to re-enchant the head piece to get rid of an unwanted bonus and get a socket instead.

Pursue Massacres

Some of the greatest moments in Diablo III are when you wade into a huge sea of monsters and take them all down in one titanic fight. Fortunately, those moments also provide a chance for optimizing XP on those kills, and the opportunity shouldn’t be ignored. 

When engaging a large group of baddies, look for opportunities to push past them and pull in the next group down the hall (or in the next room) so that you maintain a continuous flow of combat. The XP bonus increases as you roll more monsters into a single fight, and especially if the chain happens to include some more powerful enemies, that final XP total is worth the extra effort.

[Next Page: Spending paragon points]

Play Adventure Mode

There’s nothing fancy about this piece of advice, but once it’s unlocked, adventure mode is absolutely the way to way to go to advance characters quickly. Available once you complete the campaign, adventure mode lets you jump between bounties quickly, and work towards gaining access to special rifts that contain even better opportunities for XP and loot. As soon as you’ve finished the campaign and seen Blizzard’s storyline reach its conclusion, do the rest of your playing in adventure mode.

Be A Paragon

Once you have a level 70 character, XP acquired by that or any other level 70 character begins to go into a shared paragon level pool. Only level 70 characters can increase your account’s paragon level, but every hero on the account gains the benefits, no matter their level. Each level brings points to apply into one of several categories (core, defense, offense, and utility), further customizing and improving your hero. With 20 or 30 paragon levels, you can offer a new alt a significant boost to their leveling speed. 

Each character gets to distribute paragon points for themselves. There’s no hard and fast rule for how to spend your paragon points for each class, as it largely depends on your build. However, if you’re going for fast farming and progression, movement speed (in the core tab) is generally accepted as a great way to go. And don’t worry about messing up – you can respec paragon points at any time.

Split Bounties

Once your group is playing in adventure mode and has advanced into playing on the mid-tier difficulties (Expert, Master), consider splitting bounties. 

Traditionally, player groups enter bounties together, killing a certain number of monsters or a boss before moving on to the next bounty. However, you can instead split your group up, sending one or two players to one bounty, while other players head to another. Each bounty results in shared progression toward caches you get for completing all the bounties in a given Act. 

For this trick to work, you’ll likely need to lower the difficulty to slightly below where you normally farm. That’s because in a group, monster power is boosted up. If you’re facing those monsters alone, you’ll be a tad underpowered. However, even on the lower difficulty, this strategy can accrue significant rewards fast. 

While splitting bounties can be a great path to big rewards, it’s also worth noting that it’s sometimes just not as fun. Diablo III is best played together with friends, so splitting up in the name of increased rewards defeats at least part of the purpose of playing together. 

These tips should put you well on your way towards some fun, fast progression. Thanks to paragon levels, high-level legendary items, and nephalem rifts, some of the most fun to be had in the Ultimate Evil edition awaits you at level 70. Enjoy the trip to the top. And if you have some of your own tips to share, add them in the comments below.