Farming - The 300 ALT Challenge

Just to put some numbers to the grind, I thought I would record all the currency I find along the way while mapping my way to getting 300 ALTS, which I'll sell for 1 EX. I'm going to do it 3 times with low level, medium level, and high level maps. Here's the results from round one of low level maps:


Character: Split Arrow / Puncture Ranger - 43% IIQ / 158% IIR + Flask


Maps ran: 35 (I bricked 3 rolling phys reflect which I don't do)
71 - 7
72 - 18
73 - 10


ALTS - 303

Armorer Scrap - 109

Whetstones - 59

Chromes - 121

Alchemy's - 17

Jewelers - 119

Fusing - 11

Glassblowers - 3

Chisels - 12

Blessed - 1

Scouring - 4

Regals - 2

Regrets - 2

GCP - 1

Vaals - 3

Chaos - 10

Divine - 1


Sell-able Items I found along the way:

Empower Gem
Ledge Unique Map
18% quality Increased Crit Damage Gem



ESTIMATED TOTAL: 300 ALTS + 3.5 EX in currency + 1 EX in items - 38 Alc's on maps


So my first 300 ALT run earned me around 5 EX


Feel free to do your own 300 ALT run and post results !

Just curious, how long did it take you to run these 35 maps (time estimation including selling and stuff)?

"

zSavage wrote:

Just curious, how long did it take you to run these 35 maps (time estimation including selling and stuff)?

Well my times would be biased because I use a character that probably has the fastest clear speed in the game. Including selling stuff, it probably averages about 5 minutes for linear maps and closer to 10 minutes for maze style with temporal chains mod.

I don't take much time when selling. I'll look at boots, wands, daggers, and ES helms and shields, but everything else I don't even glance at it. I just shift ID em and control sell em. Takes 15 seconds tops.

The big thing is that I make about an alt a minute from doing solo dominus runs with little to no MF. (Not counting other orbs). I've found that if I want raw currency and not EXP, dom seems to be the quicker (though more boring) way to go.

With your speed on maps (I'll assume 7.5 min map average w/ selling), then it took you about 4.4 hours to complete the set, averaging 8.65 alts per map.

I've averaged 4 or so alts/dom run solo in my recent runs, which take about 4 min each. It would take ~5 hours for me to reach 300 alts from farming dom (something like 75 runs or so).

I haven't had the best luck farming currency from maps. But I'll see if I can do this tomorrow :D

If you are farming just ALTS and other currency, then yeah you have to look at your ALTS / hour average and make the call.

However, one benefit from farming maps, especially higher end ones which I almost always do aside from that experiment, is you get to level your character and 6+ gems. I always have 20% quality gems on switch getting leveled, so of course in the long run you have to add that in.

Round 2:


Character: Split Arrow / Puncture Ranger - 43% IIQ / 164% IIR + Flask


Maps ran: 32 (I bricked 2 rolling phys reflect which I don't do)
73 - 9
74 - 9
75 - 14


ALTS - 307

Armorer Scrap - 84

Whetstones - 42

Chromes - 117

Alchemy's - 19

Jewelers - 84

Fusing - 10

Glassblowers - 1

Chisels - 11

Blessed - 1

Scouring - 2

Regals - 1

Regrets - 4

GCP - 2

Vaals - 2

Chaos - 10



Sell-able Items I found along the way:

A pretty nice Rathpith Globe
18% quality Blood Rage
18% quality Arctic Breath
decent Deresso's Armor



ESTIMATED TOTAL: 300 ALTS + 2.7 EX in currency + 2 EX in items - 34 Alc's on maps - 22 Chisels


So my second 300 ALT run earned me around 4.5 EX


Feel free to do your own 300 ALT run and post results !

Hey vix, thanks for the synopsis about alt hunting in maps.

dude... you are pretty damned fast.

I have personally noticed that fuse are far more prevalent than alchs,
looking through your numbers:

run 1: 303 alt, 119 jewl, 11 fuse per 17 alts found
303 / 8 + 119/4 + 11 to 17
38 + 30 + 11 to 17

79 fuse per 17 alchs

run 2: 307 alt, 84 jewl, 10 fuse per 19 alchs
38 + 21 + 10 to 19

69 fuse per 19 alchs

average fuse per alch farmed
1: 4.6
2: 3.6

average across both runs, 4.1 fuse per alch.

I presumed on average I was getting 10 fuse per alch that I found,
without even considering the deals you get from eleron and vorici

but its closer to 4.1 most likely, from your data.

with vorici/eleron deals it goes up probably to 4.5 - 5.0

damn yo... considering alchs are worth less than fuse on the market,
clearly people are using mass mass fuses all day long.

"

VixTrader wrote:

I don't take much time when selling. I'll look at boots, wands, daggers, and ES helms and shields, but everything else I don't even glance at it.

To everyone else: don't do this, with little practice you can identify sellable rare just by glancing over it.

I used to look at em, and in all the time I've played I've never found an armor, shield, sword, mace, two handed shit, or any of the other garbage items in the game worth selling. There's only a handful of rares that can even be worth anything, why bother looking at the rest...

"

damn yo... considering alchs are worth less than fuse on the market,
clearly people are using mass mass fuses all day long.

Yeah some prices are clearly because people are using them. I find jewellers and chromes to be the most over valued item in the game. They are SO easy to find, yet they sell pretty well.

On the flip side, I find Regals and Chances to be the most undervalued in the game. It takes forever to find enough Regals to sell for an EX. And chance orbs are one of the only ways to get wealthier. I've found so few valuable items, but I've chanced a couple of the most valuable in the game.

Personally, I'd never sell my Regals and Chances. I have no idea why people do.

"

dude... you are pretty damned fast.

Yeah, the key to fast clear speeds is kind of obvious but it's amazing how often it's overlooked. It's not damage, it's run speed. With 3 attacks per second, even if I did have to shoot 1 extra time due to lower damage, that's only 0.3 seconds slower per pack. But if you can boost your run speed, that makes a HUGE difference.

I have 66% natural run speed, and 101% when I pop a jade flask which I pretty much do every 6 seconds or so.

Have you tested your build in the Gorge Clear Speed challenge?


There are some rules, but the gist of it is there has to be less than 10 minions left and the boss has to be dead. (oh, and Headhunter belt is banned, as are use of all Shrines in the run)


The record from before is LL Spectral Throw with a clear time of like 1:25 or so if I recall. (checked the thread: 2nd place ST again at 1:28, then Low Life Windripper and Wander both in the 1:30s)


It's a good test because it does account for the necessity of movement in these clears - Wander actually out dps's ST pretty hard standing still, but the ST can move quicker and has the crown.




Would be interesting to see how your Queen of the Forest running compares to the top clear times. (seen as you mentioned you thought it was the fastest clear - beat that 1:25! hehe)

QoF can certainly stack that movement speed high (ala Ghudda run speed build lol) so it's just a careful balance vs still having enough damage to be moving constantly and just out race the Whirling Blades.



These builds all scale way into 78 maps as well ofc - they clear essentially the exact same in a 78 as in a Gorge, Gorge was only picked for the challenge because it is linear and fairly consistent.


Imo there is potential out there for a perfectly built Flicker build to defeat them all in clear speed - maxed out for movement using Whirling Blades, etc all the fast stuff, and just OHKO right through any map with the Flicker also adding free movement. So far all the Flicker attempts at the GCS have fallen way short of beating the top times.




Edited: added the GCS thread for you if you want to try it out

http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/971403