Exp speed

[larsbars]

I’m really interested in how fast various types of leveling are at different levels. I’m seeing about 1 yellow per hour soloing at 20. Grouping around 12 I was getting about half that in blackburrow. Would love to hear from people how fast they’re able to level in various situations if only to plan out my future and strategy.

[Dolalin]

Depends on which zone you're in, because some low level dungeons and zones like HHK have very unclassic ZEMs from the PoP era.

[Asteria]

In my limited/humble experience leveling on green, many classes' soloing exp rates will be brutally slow compared to a decent group. Get as many fangs as you can off those blackburrow gnolls for Captain Tillin in Qeynos - they are VERY good EXP in the early and mid teens.

[Wallicker]

3-4 yellows an hr 8-21 in unrest soloing on bard, down to 1.5 yellow an hr quadding reds in a non zem zone now at lvl 23

[akagami]

Should try to at least aim for 1ish hour per orange, all the way to 50 (excluding hell).

Sol A UGuk / HHK might get you exp much faster, but you’re also at the whim of your group’s performance and whether or not there is any asshatery going on in the zone.

[Baler]

5 hours per level is pretty much the norm till you hit hell levels.
3 hours or less per level and you're doing great.

[Asteria]

Oh sorry, level 20 now...even solo, you could expect at least 2 yellow exp an hour in Upper Guk, possibly 3 in a duo or trio. Exp gains in Upper Guk, Highkeep, and Befallen are almost or actually literally double that of most zones in the game.

[BenDerisgreat]

Oh sorry, level 20 now...even solo, you could expect at least 2 yellow exp an hour in Upper Guk, possibly 3 in a duo or trio. Exp gains in Upper Guk, Highkeep, and Befallen are almost or actually literally double that of most zones in the game.

An ungodly amount of gnoll fangs would also work. Tillin might run out of breath blowing his horn...

[mittens69]

3-4 yellows an hr 8-21 in unrest soloing on bard, down to 1.5 yellow an hr quadding reds in a non zem zone now at lvl 23

Reds take forever to kill.

[mittens69]

Should try to at least aim for 1ish hour per orange, all the way to 50 (excluding hell).

Sol A UGuk / HHK might get you exp much faster, but you’re also at the whim of your group’s performance and whether or not there is any asshatery going on in the zone.

I dont think 1 an hour is doable for most classes outside of druids who can quad or maybe some good enchanters?

[Wallicker]

Reds take forever to kill.

Yep takes 4.4 minutes to kill 4 reds currently but it’s about 1/3 a yellow per kite

[Baler]

1 hour per yellow is do-able with all classes. excluding hell levels.

edit: if you're new to p99 and or are starting with zero gear. You probably won't be hitting that mark. For myself and others. we have a ton of prior knowledge about mobs, spawns and p99 mechanics that enable us to gain exp at this rate.

editedit: classes that are less gear dependent can more easily achieve faster exp per hour.

[WaffleztheAndal]

These threads just turn into brag fests. Going by these posts you’d think everyone in the game was just breezing through all their levels on cruise control, but there are tons of people in game struggling far more to progress. The forums are a really bad indicator of the entire community a lot of the time.

[Mercius]

no hybrid is getting 1 orange an hour outside of HHK

[Baler]

I think it's good for people to know what's achieveable. Yeah it's easy to say how fast you can get exp but maybe someone else is getting way less. Information is power.
https://wiki.project1999.com/Players:Adventure

That's a good point hybrid penalty is really rough, maybe I spoke too soon on their behalf.

[Wallicker]

no hybrid is getting 1 orange an hour outside of HHK

No hybrid outside a bard.

[akagami]

I’m not accounting for hybrid penalty.

1 hour / solo is for most classes that can solo very efficiently.

1 hour / group can be done too. Group doesn’t have to mean 6 people also. Like Baler said, having experience (pun intended) will help you. Duo-ing/Trio-ing certain camps can get you there. But just showing up to the zones that everyone else LFGs at and LFGing and expecting to get carried will not always guarantee this. And let’s face it, most people do this and do not take leadership in “earning” their exp.

In general as solo you’d want to lock down two 6:30 minute respawns and kill them fairly quickly. If you’re doing this then that’s roughly 16 kills in an hour. So in a zone with a ZEM of 100 (133%) math would play out like this:
Level 37 character requires ~4,800,000 exp
Soloing deep dark blues of level 34 = 86,700 *1.33 = ~115,300 * 16 = 1,844,976 exp per hour.

Without a zem this would be 1,387,200 or still quite faster than an orange a hour. This seems a little bit faster than what I actually got around these levels, so it might average out to fewer kills per hour (like 12-14). The bare minimum to get an orange a hour would be 4,800,000 / 5 / 86,700 = 11 kills per hour.

Moral of the story:
(1) Don’t be a hero and waste time soloing high cons.
(2) Try to always aim for 11+ kills per hour.
(3) Factor in your kill time as it’s very important. For example, a necro should decide whether to be more mana efficient and fear kite, nuke, or some combo to achieve a favorable combo of kill time : mana efficiency. Druids and bards will need to factor in how long it’s taking them to effectively kill their targets.
(4) Deaths, trains, drama ... — anything that STOPs your killing destroys your xp/hour efficiency. The tortoise vs hare story holds very true here.

[Baler]

Excellent Post Akagami,
Locking down those 2 spawns solo is pretty key. Not taking a bigger bite than you can chew. Someone may be able to kill a 3rd before the 1st repops but their mana or health may not be able to keep up with that. Generally waiting for the 1st repop after the 2nd allows for a smooth and steady stream of exp.

Knowing one's limits and capabilities is important.

[Arogarn]

Over the past weekend I have bumped into 6 powerleveling duos claiming camps in popular leveling zones, displacing would be groups / adventurers. So far Teal has been pretty anti-social or cliqueish, but I did meet one really cool friendly mage that welcomed some company at bandit sisters.

[Siege]

I feel like my buddy and I are getting more than the average one bubble an hour when we duo in in areas where he (a Mage) can chain pull without stopping and I (a Cleric) can Meditate fairly safely while he chain pulls. Unfortunately, most areas where this is possible are either camped 24/7 or popular enough that we have to invite other people into our group, which destroys our XP rate. The only way to avoid this is to go to zones like the Karanas, which have plentiful mob spawns, but they're all over the place so I go OOM due to not being able to sit on my ass in one spot and Meditate.

[mittens69]

1 hour per yellow is do-able with all classes. excluding hell levels.

edit: if you're new to p99 and or are starting with zero gear. You probably won't be hitting that mark. For myself and others. we have a ton of prior knowledge about mobs, spawns and p99 mechanics that enable us to gain exp at this rate.

editedit: classes that are less gear dependent can more easily achieve faster exp per hour.

I'm okaying a necro, level 45 now. Not since my early 30's could I get exp like that, even with a good camp.

[Baler]

I'm okaying a necro, level 45 now. Not since my early 30's could I get exp like that, even with a good camp.

I made some more posts after that one you quoted. level 45 you're looking at esentially 2 levels in 1. it'll be about 10-12hrs + for level 45 in my experience.

I have a 50 necro on green, I managed 5-6 hours per level 46 to 50. It was truly more about the right mob, two spawns and never delaying between kills. within 10-30s of a mob popping I was killing it. I run multiple monitors so I'd keep EQ open on one while I went about my normal irl routine. Using a strict snare/fear/dot rotation I was able to avoid been OOM by the next pop.

I don't share many exp/plat camps because I want to use them for alts or close friends. I've also been on and off P99 since 2010, despite this accounts join date of 2014. So there is many years experience on mobs and mechanics.

ps. Buy two egg timers from the grocery store. When you kill a mob set one to a bit less than the respawn time. The physical object in real life will keep you alert and ready.

[Vormotus]

ps. Buy two egg timers from the grocery store. When you kill a mob set one to a bit less than the respawn time. The physical object in real life will keep you alert and ready.

Love this idea!

https://i.imgur.com/LgHOZZT.gif

[Velerin]

I think I could get better experience per hour if I didn’t die all the time.

[Balimon]

As a mage solo I was getting about 35-40% per hour level 20 - 30. 30% or so up to 35. Past 35 it's been hard to beat 20%. I did find a spot today that was about 30%

20% per hour is a good rule of thumb. Remember the cap is 50, it's not a race!

[larsbars]

Thanks for the informative responses everyone! Helps me realize that higher level people really have just put in insane amounts of time into the game and I’m not missing out on some secret awesome strategy to gain multiple levels quickly. Generally I’m getting around 1 yellow per hour soloing while root dotting with my shaman and doing other crap while I med back to full mana. It’s not so bad but yeah it’s gonna take a while to hit 50 :P. I may go hit up guk around 24 and see if it’s more fun at least haha.

[solleks]

If you want to help the feeling of ticking clock find someone to hang out with and get exp with it goes by faster ( not sure if that's good or bad but it does seem to)

[azeth]

If you want to help the feeling of ticking clock find someone to hang out with and get exp with it goes by faster ( not sure if that's good or bad but it does seem to)

i feel the opposite. suddenly i need to small talk versus watching youtube between spawns.

[red_demonman]

On a semi-related note, is the "pet does 50% dmg and takes 50% exp" in effect right now?

[Dolalin]

On a semi-related note, is the "pet does 50% dmg and takes 50% exp" in effect right now?

Yup. It was in at the release of original EQ and was not changed until PoP years later.

[cd288]

3-4 yellows an hr 8-21 in unrest soloing on bard, down to 1.5 yellow an hr quadding reds in a non zem zone now at lvl 23

If you're quadding from 8-21 as well, then this isn't really an applicable answer for OP's purposes

[Wallicker]

I’m really interested in how fast various types of leveling are at different levels. I’m seeing about 1 yellow per hour soloing at 20. Grouping around 12 I was getting about half that in blackburrow. Would love to hear from people how fast they’re able to level in various situations if only to plan out my future and strategy.

How does quadding not apply?

[cd288]

How does quadding not apply?

Because the speed that you get EXP while killing 4 mobs at once with extremely little downtime (if any) is totally not relevant to the EXP rate of a player either grouping or soloing a single mob at a time. Not rocket science.

[Wallicker]

If he wants to roll a bard it’s 100% relevant.

[Wallicker]

1.5 yellow/hr quadding through first hell at lvl 30... confused now how bard was last to hit 50 lol