After finishing the quest in the ministry (switching to my Wisdom bonus equipment [+8 total] when there were a couple seconds left on the timer for the main floor), I headed to the fjords to do the seeds quests, which brought me up to level 35. After that I reported back to Crabbe about clearing the mine, and got the quest to send a zeppelin for him.
In the Primordial Cave, I had poor luck with the first malachite vein, taking nearly 15 minutes to get 2 malachite gems; the second vein only required 2 or 3 minutes, though. In the Depleted Ore Mine, I got 2 gems with only 2 or 3 tries, so decided to reload some more, and got 3 gems on the second try after that. The second vein also gave 2 gems relatively quickly (a minute, or two), but a few reloads after that proved futile.
The platform puzzle in the mine was redesigned a bit from D2:ED, so it was easier, but at first glance looks like it would be harder. It took me a couple tries to find the right approach at the top, and I had to reload for a couple miss-jumps (faster than resetting the platforms), so saved when I got to the second disappearing platform. I didn't expect the loot to be great since I left it so long, but my third try gave an elder helmet slightly better than the one I was wearing (+11 Vitality, +11 Spirit, 0/4/4 Melee/Ranged/Magic Armour Rating).
In the Lost Tomb, the treasure wasn't that great (only reloaded once), but I got 2 malachite gems out of both veins (in 2 or 3 minutes each). Next I headed to High Hall to get my 4 malachite gems for killing Zagan, and after using the merchant's secret passage to loot some Drudanae, sent Gwyn off to visit Groth in the Red Hammer tribe cave.
At the harbour, after turning in the remaining zeppelin parts and getting a zeppelin sent for Crabbe, I entered the harbour building to toss Svadilfari's head onto the desk of the champion's leader. Reporting back about the High Hall trolls and turning in the bounty hunter quests brought me up to level 36. After talking to Crabbe again on top of the harbour building, I headed to the slayer camp.
Does killing Saul make me evil? I tried freeing him first, but unlike in D2:ED you don't get a reward that way. Maybe if I wiped out the slayers at a relatively low level the experience could have been comparable to that from the quest reward, but leaving it this late I was getting a pittance. Is it worse if I know the almost 8k quest experience isn't going to make any difference at all when I head to the Hall of Echoes, and will be irrelevant after that, due to areas with resawning opponents?
First I'm extorting money from an innocent soldier to stay on the good side of an ok merchant, and now this...
After that I headed to Dragon Cliff Castle to visit Orobas. Except for a couple dragon skill books, the loot in and after the crypt was pretty mediocre. After that I swung by the Red Hammer Tribe to finish off that quest and finally get in to Groth's room, and got the keys for the chests in the main cave (also with mostly mediocre loot).
Turning in the battle tower servant quests brought me up to level 37. When talking to Sassan after turning in the second round of quests, I got the achievement for fully upgrading the battle tower when I still had to talk to her about the second enchantment platform upgrade. After that I visited my trainer, and spent 108k gold upgrading the level caps of my most used skills (that I would, or potentially could, eventually max). I didn't check how much I spent the first round of upgrades, when I boosted most skills I use to level 10.
In the Gremory treasure chest I got 3 divine charms and a couple pieces of equipment I couldn't use. On the second try I got an epic bracelet (+3 Poison Arrow, +8 Dexterity, +9 Ranged Damage) with 3 charm slots and 3 enchantment slots. I use splitting arrows (which is on my current bracelet) more than poison arrows, so except for the extra enchantment slot this wouldn't be a great upgrade. The forth try gave epic earrings (+3 Ranger Strength, +7 Dexterity, +7 Ranged Damage), also with 3 charm slots and 3 enchantment slots. Another 4 or 5 tries (while I was doing something else) gave two epic pieces of jewellery: earrings (+3 Splitting Arrows, +8 Dexterity, +5 Heightened Reflexes, 3 charm slots, 2 enchantment slots), a good upgrade for my current legendary earrings (+2 Poison Arrows, +8 Dexterity) and a bracelet (+3 Explosive Arrows, +8 Dexterity, +7 Ranged Damage, 3 charm slots, 3 Enchantment slots), an upgrade for my current one (+3 Splitting Arrows, +10 Dex, +6 HR).
Out of curiosity I loaded a save at level 30 and checked the Gremory chest again, getting pretty comparable equipment to level 37. The same was true in a level 25 save (a couple equipment pieces showing up with a level 28 requirement). I guess next game I will go open the chest soon after I get the battle tower.
I couldn't remember if you could unseal the door to the Hall of Echoes and complete that quest before actually entering, but I had a recent save, so tried that on the way back from the Gremory chest. It turns out you get the experience as you enter, so I decided to check out the Hall of Echoes, even though I had a couple minor things left to do.
In principle the changes to the memory eaters looked good, but the difficulty spike seemed insane. A Fire Sphere could only do about 5-10% damage, and unless they were at the far end of range, there was no way to avoid their seeking attacks. I started doing ok once by taking out the first couple nests and then circling around the area high up, but by the time I took out the first memory eater there were half a dozen more, making it impossible to survive.
After dying several times, I exited to the main menu rather than load a save, then decided to give it one more shot before I went to bed, so loaded the auto-save. The game seemingly changed the difficulty level (the setting remained on Nightmare) as this time the memory eaters were easy to defeat, attacks were relatively easy to avoid and the nests seemed slower spitting out opponents. I kept going when I was done, and the arena was also fairly easy.
The next day I reloaded the save at the Gremory chest, and double checked the difficulty setting, not wanting to make it through the Hall of Echoes only because the game decided to make it easier.
Earlier I had avoided mindreading Sepp on the harbour building, since (not counting possible Wisdom bonuses) you need to have the associated skill at level 7 to get back more experience than the mindread costs. I have two pieces of equipment with +5 Mindread bonuses combined, so was originally going to put 9 points in, but in for a penny... I put 14 points in to max Mindread (bringing me down to a scant 15 spare skill points, but with another 6 available from the Hall of Echoes).
Next I returned to the battle tower and retrieved a couple pieces of dragon equipment from the chest, that had a shield skill bonus (and I put my 3 spare points into that skill), as well as the +40% defence bonus leggings (which I didn't end up needing). Earlier I removed all dragon equipment except for the Bone Dragon Cuirass (+40% hit points) and Bone Dragon Leggings (+40% offence) once I could max Firebreath, Fire Sphere, Dragon Spirit and Dragon Burst without the need for equipment spell bonuses.
I only had about 10 each of healing and rejuvenation potions, so farmed for enough ingredients to make a stack of each (while wearing my +3 Master Herbalist earrings, of course), as well as gold ore to add some enchantments to my new jewellery. The earrings had a level 4 Healing Aura enchantment, so I left it and changed the other to Static Charge; for the bracelet I removed all 3 enchantments and added Static Charge, Magic Damage Aura and a Healing Aura (my second malachite gem used).
Returning to the Hall of Echoes, the memory eaters were tough, but not nearly as much as in my first attempt (the Dragon Shield spell also helped a bit). The killers could be killed with 2 (or sometimes 3) Fire Spheres, while the generals needed 3-5, depending on how much they healed; attacks at mid range (that I could see coming) could usually be avoided. Two memory eaters at a time were not too dangerous, especially if they were close together. Three increased the difficulty, and 4 started to make things quite dangerous.
Unlike D2:ED, it was ineffective to circle around nests while using target lock (and having a flaky target lock in DKS didn't help either). I found it best if there was a memory eater in the distance when going after a nest to try and sit on the opposite side while using Firebreath (to hopefully block any seeking attacks), then hightail it out of there to avoid taking too much damage from the memory eater if it got close (fly, heal, then turn and use Fire Sphere).
The arena was fairly challenging. In the previous play session (when the game made things easy) I didn't even summon my creature, and think I only needed 1 potion. This time combat became much more hectic, with more and tougher summoned minions, which required more potions and strategic running away tactics in a couple places. My creature even died, which hasn't happened very much when it started off a fight at full health.
I'm assuming the difficulty level when I first entered the Hall of Echoes was a glitch, and the second was how it was meant to be. I don't see how it would be possible to take out all the nests with Fire Sphere doing so little damage to the memory eaters (the nests didn't seem to be particularly resistant to Firebreath). I also had a problem the first time I encountered the large group below the Grand Knight teleporter shrine in the fjords, where opponents barely took any damage, especially at long range (the next day I loaded the same save and tried again, and they took normal damage).
In Ygerna's memory, my first attempt lasted about a second, with the Divine Rush Attacking me as I jumped backwards, and me dying before I could heal. The next try I jumped back slightly sooner after the conversation ended. I still got hit with a Rush Attack, but didn't take as much damage, and jumped off to the side and got around the corner before using a healing potion. Lucian was quite dangerous at medium range; at long rang there was time to react, and at short range he didn't use Rush Attack, so I could usually get off some Splitting Arrows, before running away (often needing to heal). My creature and a couple explosive arrows took care of most of the weaker opponents, with a poison and normal arrow finishing off a couple that survived. When I defeated Lucian, Zandalor was closing in, so I had to run around the room again, to give me time to grab the loot bag and pick up the skill book. My creature apparently diverted Zandalor's attention on the opposite side of the room as the entrance, so once I had the loot I got first shot in, and we traded a couple arrows and spells until I finished him off. I tried circling around when his health got low, to see if I could use a close range splitting arrow to finish him off and have time to grab any loot, but the cutscene started immediately.
Before defeating Zandalor I was level 37.47. In D2:ED I finished at level 36.75. At least part of the difference was due to balancing changes in DKS. For example, in D2:ED I got to level 18 in the fjords before heading to Sentinel Island, while in DKS I made it to level 22. The difference in experience on those two levels from mindreading the island was still only 11.7% of the experience needed to reach level 38. There was also additional experience from quests in DKS, though not a lot (I never tried to figure out how much), according to a Larian comment on quest experience balancing to make it easier to level at the start of the game.
In D2:ED I delayed turning in some quests, but didn't really go out of my way trying to level. I used the Talisman of the North for quite awhile, and between about level 13 and the Hall of Echoes got Wisdom up to level 9 or 10, 4 or 5 of which was from equipment bonuses (equipping Rothman's Bow to turn in quests). Before the Hall of Echoes I boosted it to level 13, to see if I could get to level 37 before the end of the game, thinking the area might be larger than it was. I reloaded for some useless mindreads, but not all.
In DKS I specifically tried to do all the mindreads first, then clear opponents as much as possible and then turn in quests, to maximize the experience given. I didn't learn Wisdom, though did eventually collect jewellery with a combined +8 bonus. I deliberately mindread pretty much everyone.
Neglecting the balancing and island mindread differences between D2:ED and DKS, at best (assuming only a modest increase in quest and opponent experience levels) my efforts brought me from level 36 and 3/4 to 37 and 1/3.
It seems there is a slight benefit trying to maximize experience, but not enough to worry about if you need to turn in quests early to level, or simply wish to do side quests as you get them, etc. If I wanted a more exact idea of the difference I'd play again doing side quests as early as possible; I can't see that happening for my next character, but I will not be as strict about delaying quests.
At the end of the Hall of Echoes, I had 98 unused stat points (base stat values the same as they were at level 15), and 21 unused skill points.
equipment with without
hit points 942 306
mana 639 222
vitality 53 14
spirit 22 2
strength 21 21
dexterity 51 36
intelligence 7 7
damage 281-425
magic damage 114-133
melee resistance 22.1 10.4
ranged resistance 38.5 16.6
magic resistance 37.2 3.7
conditioned body 21 21
heightened reflexes 74 36
indomitable will 7 7
Ranger Strength - 10
Explosive Arrows - 6+8
Splitting Arrows - 7+3 : these 3 I should probably max soon
Poison Arrows - 1
Stun Arrows - 1 : secondary skills
Death Blow - 1
Evade - 1
Healing - 1
Regenerate - 1 : tertiary skills
Lockpick - 5
Ranger Stealth - 5
Mana Efficiency - 6
Mindread - 15
Before the battle tower I had a couple points in Poison and Stun Arrows, as well as equipment bonuses (recently replaced some +2 Poison Arrows earrings). Both still come in handy, but mostly just as a way to pause and select a specific target, then come out of pause attacking (a normal ranged attack doesn't unpause the game).
I'll probably boost Death Blow when I have lots of skill points I don't know what to do with, and after that possibly Regenerate, then Healing.
Lockpick will get maxed when I can raise the level cap. Unless I start upgrading to equipment without mana bonuses, I will not need to invest any more into Mana Efficiency.
To be continued...
eventually.
