Experience

Experience gain is one way of gaining power and prestige in Diablo 2 Resurrected. Not only does your Character become more powerful with each Level gained, but reaching the final Level 99 is an achievement that few people actually accomplish in their entire Diablo career. The ability to farm Experience efficiently empowers your progression at all stages of gameplay.

How to Gain Experience

There are three ways for a Character to acquire Experience (XP) in Diablo II: Resurrected.

1. Monsters dying in the vicinity of the Character. Whether it's the Character and their Summons or Mercenary, or any Partied unit within 53.33 yards (Roughly 2 screens on the native 800 x 600 resolution of vanilla Diablo 2), Experience is shared.
   • Monsters which have been turned (By Skills such as conversion and confuse) that kill another monster, grants the Character Experience.
2. The Ancients Quest line gives a set amount of Experience when completed.
3. You regain a percentage of lost Experience from Character Death in Nightmare and Hell, when you retrieve your body.

• Generally speaking, killing high Level monsters quickly is the fastest way to gain XP. Baal runs and Chaos runs allow you to kill large amounts of the highest Level monsters in the game. Look for these types of games on Multiplayer when you're trying to blast the Leaderboards on Season start.
• Experience is gained on the first kill of a monster which can be resurrected by another monster. For example, a Fallen resurrected by a Fallen Shaman, will not give any XP on the second kill.
• Tentacle Beast tentacles give Experience individually from the head of the monster. If the head is killed first, the two tentacles also die, but not award Experience.
• Suicide Minions do not award Experience if they die of their own explosion Skill. If they are killed before that triggers, they do award Experience.
• Monsters which are spawned from a spawner do not award XP when killed. This list includes:
  • Baal's Festering Appendages
  • Blood Hawks from their Nests
  • Diablo's Bone Prisons
  • Demon Imps from Evil Demon Huts
  • Hungry Dead from Blood Raven
  • Ice Spawn from Nihlathak
  • Mummies from Sarcophagi
  • Sand Maggots from Coldworm the Burrower
  • Sand Maggot Eggs from Sand Maggots
  • Sand Maggot Young from their Eggs
  • Vile Children from Vile Mothers

A monster's Base XP =

Monster Level (mLVL) * MonStats (from MonStats.txt game file) / 100

The XP gained from a monster goes through multiple modifications before it is awarded to a Character which we'll cover below.

Each individual equation must round down to an integer, because the game cannot award a non-integer value as XP. For equations with portions in parentheses, that section is rounded before moving onto the next portion of the equation. The sections are in the proper order for the total XP calculation, and how the modifiers apply.

Monster Modifier

Discussed in greater detail in our Elite Groups / Bosses resources, certain special monster types increase the Experience they award when the monster is killed. These are known as Elites, and they encompass Champion and Unique monster types.

• Champions award 300% of their base XP when killed, and calculate their Monster Level (mLVL) as if they are +2 Area Level for the XP tier.
  • The Berserker Champion type awards 500% base XP when killed, and calculates it's mLVL as +3 of the Area Level for the XP tier.
  • Champions that spawn with Minions award 300%, while their Minions grant 500% base Experience.
    • Example: Fallen Shaman or Fallen Champions spawn with Minions, which give 500% base XP when killed. The Champion itself will only give 300% XP when killed. Additionally, the Minions calculate mLVL as +3 of the Area Level for the XP tier.
• Uniques and Super Uniques award 500% of their base XP when killed, and calculate their mLVL as if they are +3 Area Level for the XP tier.
  • The Minions that spawn with them also award 500% of their base XP when killed, and calculate their mLVL as if they are +3 Area Level for the XP tier.
• Bosses also award 500% of their base XP when killed, if they spawn with random Elite Affixes in Nightmare and Hell difficulty. Because of this, there are only three monsters which do so:
  • Griswold
  • Radament
  • Nihlathak

Players Count / Settings

As the number of Players in the game increases, the Experience a monster awards is modified with increasing value up to the maximum of 8 Players. Each additional Player increases the Base Experience by 50%

These XP modifiers also affect when the Player Settings are changed in Single Player. In Multiplayer games, the XP awarded to each Character is further modified.

Party Bonus

How many Players are partied in a game, and their relative distance from your Character when a monster is killed, further modifies the XP awarded from monster kills.

• If you remain un-Partied in a game with Players 8 count, the monsters you kill will award their full modified XP value. This is a very strong method of gaining XP for Characters who are strong enough to kill monsters efficiently on Players 8 count.
• Any Partied unit within 53.33 yards (Roughly 2 screens on the native 800 x 600 resolution of vanilla Diablo 2) increases the XP awarded up to the total of Partied Characters within the same distance. This bonus is calculated as follows:

Bonus Experience = abs(((# Party Members - 1) * Experience¹) * 87) / 256

1. This XP is the modified value of monster XP value after any other modifiers, prior to the Partied Bonus XP value is added.

• After the Bonus XP value is added to the modified XP value, it is divided by the total Level sum of all players within range. This new value is then multiplied by the receiving Character's Level and awarded to that Character. For an example, let's look at the XP gain for a Level 80 Character that is partied with 7 Level 90 Characters. The resulting kill would award 10,000 XP. This is assuming every Character would receive 100% of the XP value without additional modifiers.

Experience Received (Lv 80 Character) = ((Modified XP + Bonus XP) / (80 + 90 + 90 + 90 + 90 + 90 + 90 + 90)) * 80
Experience Received (Lv 80 Character) = (10,000 / 710) * 80
Experience Received (Lv 80 Character) = 1,126
If the Character was Lv 90 they receive = 1,267

This portion of the calculation was implemented to stop high Level Characters "power-leveling" low Level Characters in Normal and Nightmare difficulty. It's almost always better to farm Experience with Characters around your Level.

Experience Cap

The Experience a Character can gain from a single monster kill is capped at 8,388,697.

• Because of this cap, some monsters cannot award additional XP regardless of the Character Levels, Party Bonus, or Player Settings. The awarded XP can be modified by other effects, such as an XP Shrine.
  • Diablo killed by a single Player with Player count of 7.
  • Baal killed by a single Player with Player count of 3.
  • Diablo Clone killed by a single Player with Player count of 3.
  • Lilith killed by a single Player with Player count of 7.
  • Uber Duriel killed by a single Player with Player count of 6.
  • Uber Izual killed by a single Player with Player count of 5.
  • Uber Mephisto killed by a single Player with Player count of 4.
  • Uber Diablo killed by a single Player with Player count of 3.
  • Uber Baal killed by a single Player with Player count of 1.

Character Level Tiers

To generate a "natural" game progression, Diablo II: Resurrected modifies the amount of Experience gained from a monster kill. It takes into account the Character Level (cLVL) and compares this to the Monster Level (mLVL). If your Character is much lower Level, or much higher Level, this modifier reduces the amount of XP awarded from killing that monster. This was put in place to stop people from "Power Leveling" a Character with the help of overly-powerful gear or higher Level friends killing the monsters for you.

The game breaks your cLVL progression into three tiers.

Tier 1: < cLVL 25

In the first tier, killing monsters that are more than 5 Levels below or above your cLVL will result in diminishing returns of XP awarded. Each additional Level is modified by a set variable divided by 256 to determine the % of the Experience you receive. This tier is designed to negatively impact the Player if the mLVL is significantly higher than the cLVL.

mLVL	x / 256	Percentage %
> cLVL + 9	5	1.953125
cLVL + 9	38	14.84375
cLVL + 8	92	35.9375
cLVL + 7	174	67.96875
cLVL + 6	225	87.890625
cLVL + 5 to cLVL - 5	256	100
cLVL - 6	207	80.859375
cLVL - 7	159	62.109375
cLVL - 8	110	42.96875
cLVL - 9	61	23.828125
< cLVL - 9	13	5.078125

Tier 2: cLVL 25 to cLVL 69

In the second tier, killing monsters that are more than 5 Levels below your cLVL results in diminishing returns of Experience awarded. Each additional Level is modified by a set variable divided by 256 to determine the % of the Experience you receive. Monsters with higher mLVL award less XP, but the reduction is greatly diminished.

• To calculate Experience awarded by lower level monsters, you multiply the value by x / 256 where x is determined by comparing their mLVL against your cLVL.
  • Normally: [Experience * x / 256]
  • Xp > 1,048,576: [Experience / 256] * x

mLVL	x / 256	Percentage %
cLVL to cLVL - 5	256	100
cLVL - 6	207	80.859375
cLVL - 7	159	62.109375
cLVL - 8	110	42.96875
cLVL - 9	61	23.828125
< cLVL - 9	13	5.078125

• To calculate Experience awarded by a higher level monster, you multiply the value by cLVL / mLVL.
• If the Experience awarded would exceed 1,048,576 then the way the game calculates the value changes.
  • Normally: [Experience * cLVL / mLVL]
  • Xp > 1,048,576: [Experience / mLVL] * cLVL

Tier 3: > cLVL 69

In the third tier, the XP awarded is further modified by a set variable divided by 1024. With each increase in CLVL, you receive a diminishing value of the Monster's XP value.

• If the Experience awarded would exceed 2,097,152 then the way the game calculates the value changes.
  • Normally: [Experience * x / 1024]
  • Xp > 2,097,152: [Experience / 1024] * x

cLVL	X / 1024	Percentage %
70	976	95.3125
71	928	90.625
72	880	85.9375
73	832	81.25
74	784	76.5625
75	736	71.875
76	688	67.1875
77	640	62.5
78	592	57.8125
79	544	53.125
80	496	48.4375
81	448	43.75
82	400	39.0625
83	352	34.375
84	304	29.6875
85	256	25
86	192	18.75
87	144	14.0625
88	108	10.546875
89	81	7.91015625
90	61	5.95703125
91	46	4.4921875
92	35	3.41796875
93	26	2.5390625
94	20	1.953125
95	15	1.46484375
96	11	1.07421875
97	8	0.78125
98	6	0.5859375
99	5	0.48828125

Experience Gained Stat

The last modifier to the Experience awarded for killing a monster is +xx% Experience Gained. There are three sources:

• Experience Shrine: Award +50% additional XP while the Shrine is active.
• annihilus: Grants 5-10% additional XP while in a Character's Inventory.
• ondalswisdom: Grants 5% additional XP while equipped.

All three sources together increase the final Experience awarded by up to 65%. This makes swapping to ondalswisdom and having an Experience Shrine active when high value monsters are killed the ultimate strategy for pushing Experience at high Character Levels.

• If the XP awarded is > 1,048,576 the operation is: (Experience / 100) * Bonus %
  • Otherwise: Experience * Bonus % / 100

Experience Loss

Characters lose Experience in Nightmare / Hell difficulty when they die. Check out our in-depth article on Death for more details.

• 5% XP of the total XP required to reach the next level, is lost when the Character dies in Nightmare.
• 10% XP of the total XP required to reach the next level, is lost when the Character dies in Hell.
  • 75% of the lost XP is recovered when the Character retrieves their body in the same game within which they died. No XP is recovered if the body is retrieved after Save + Exit and entering the next game.

Ancient's Quest

The Ancient's Quest in Act 5 will award an amount of XP needed for the Character to reach their next Level, depending on the cLVL and the difficulty the quest is completed in. The Ancients themselves do not award Experience when they are killed. If the Character is of a significantly high cLVL then the maximum value of the quest completion is awarded.

• If the Maximum Experience awarded is > the amount of Experience needed to reach their next Level, then the Character is awarded up to the amount needed to reach the 2nd NEXT level's Experience requirement. This causes the Character to Level and give them a small amount of the XP needed to reach the 2nd next Level.
  • Example: A Character that is Level 50 needs 4,650,593 to reach Level 51, and then 5,059,147 to reach Level 52.
    • This Character completes Nightmare Ancients which awards <= 20,000,000 XP.
      • The character receives 5,059,147 Experience which brings them from Level 50 to Level 51, and adds a small amount of progress towards Level 52.
• If the Maximum Experience would not cause the Character to Level, the total amount is awarded.
  • This Experience is not modified by any of the previously mentioned calculations. It is awarded as a flat amount.
    • If a Character receives a G-Rush which saves the three Ancients Quests, they could bank a large amount of undiminished XP at Level 98. In total this method gains you 61.4 Million Experience which is ~21.1% of the Total XP required to reach Level 99.

Experience Required to Level

This table contains the amount of Experience required to reach each consecutive Level from 1 - 99. It also shows the total cumulative Experience you have at each new Level.

Level	Current Experience	Experience Needed to Level
1	0	500
2	500	1,000
3	1,500	2,250
4	3,750	4,125
5	7,875	6,300
6	14,175	8,505
7	22,680	10,206
8	32,886	11,510
9	44,396	13,319
10	57,715	14,429
11	72,144	18,036
12	90,180	22,545
13	112,275	28,181
14	140,906	35,226
15	176,132	44,033
16	220,165	55,042
17	275,207	68,801
18	344,008	86,002
19	430,010	107,503
20	537,513	134,378
21	671,891	167,973
22	839,864	209,966
23	1,049,830	262,457
24	1,312,287	328,072
25	1,640,359	410,090
26	2,050,449	512,612
27	2,563,061	640,765
28	3,203,826	698,434
29	3,902,260	761,293
30	4,663,553	829,810
31	5,493,363	904,492
32	6,397,855	985,897
33	7,383,752	1,074,627
34	8,458,379	1,171,344
35	9,629,723	1,276,765
36	10,906,488	1,391,674
37	12,298,162	1,516,924
38	13,815,086	1,653,448
39	15,468,534	1,802,257
40	17,270,791	1,964,461
41	19,235,252	2,141,263
42	21,376,515	2,333,976
43	23,710,491	2,544,034
44	26,254,525	2,772,997
45	29,027,522	3,022,566
46	32,050,088	3,294,598
47	35,344,686	3,591,112
48	38,935,798	3,914,311
49	42,850,109	4,266,600
50	47,116,709	4,650,593
51	51,767,302	5,069,147
52	56,836,449	5,525,370
53	62,361,819	6,022,654
54	68,384,473	6,564,692
55	74,949,165	7,155,515
56	82,104,680	7,799,511
57	89,904,191	8,501,467
58	98,405,658	9,266,598
59	107,672,256	10,100,593
60	117,772,849	11,009,646
61	128,782,495	12,000,515
62	140,783,010	13,080,560
63	153,863,570	14,257,811
64	168,121,381	15,541,015
65	183,662,396	16,939,705
66	200,602,101	18,464,279
67	219,066,380	20,126,064
68	239,192,444	21,937,409
69	261,129,853	23,911,777
70	285,041,630	26,063,836
71	311,105,466	28,409,582
72	339,515,048	30,966,444
73	370,481,492	33,753,424
74	404,234,916	36,791,232
75	441,026,148	40,102,443
76	481,128,591	43,711,663
77	524,840,254	47,645,713
78	572,485,967	51,933,826
79	624,419,793	56,607,872
80	681,027,665	61,702,579
81	742,730,244	67,255,812
82	809,986,056	73,308,835
83	883,294,891	79,906,630
84	963,201,521	87,098,226
85	1,050,299,747	94,937,067
86	1,145,236,814	103,481,403
87	1,248,718,217	112,794,729
88	1,361,512,946	122,946,255
89	1,484,459,201	134,011,418
90	1,618,470,619	146,072,446
91	1,764,543,065	159,218,965
92	1,923,762,030	173,548,673
93	2,097,310,703	189,168,053
94	2,286,478,756	206,193,177
95	2,492,671,933	224,750,564
96	2,717,422,497	244,978,115
97	2,962,400,612	267,026,144
98	3,229,426,756	291,058,498
99	3,520,485,254	-

Summary

• There are tiers to Character Levels that intend to create a natural progression through the game. Reaching Level 25 prior to Act 5 Normal maximizes your potential Experience gain going into Nightmare.
• Partying with large groups of people, or playing on high Player Settings is a great way to increase your Experience gain. Leveling with Characters that are much higher Level than you decreases, the Experience you gain.
• +xx% to Experience Gained is applied after the entire calculation. Get your hands on an annihilus and make sure to check for Experience Shrines.
• Baal Runs and Chaos Runs are some of the best ways to gain Levels in Multiplayer. Find a good group and blast them as fast as you can!

Now that you understand every facet of Experience you are ready to strategize and plan your next Season start. Have fun blasting all the way to Level 99. I look forward to seeing you on the Leaderboards!

Credits

Written by MacroBioBoi
Reviewed by Teo1904