Is there an ideal level to grind AAs? I’m not sure if more camps are available earlier on (51) and whether it might make more sense to to get a whole bunch before later levels.
In almost all cases it is best to max level before working on AAs. Technically I think level 62 might be a “sweet spot” for grinding at POV but it would probably be easier to find groups and other stuff to do at 65 that balances it out. There are probably a few niche exceptions for example if you are a full time solo Druid with no plans to group/raid I guess it might make sense to stop at 63 or whenever you get your last charm and just grind frogs in PoStorms. Now that being said if you aren’t in a rush feel free to grab some AAs if you’re having fun doing stuff.
Inb4 the lvl 63 guy with 300 AA. But yeah, being level 65 is a bigger power bump than any AA, so unless you aim to never leave a specific lower level hunting ground, why not just go for max level first.
I don't know the answer, but I do think it's an interesting question for e.g. a ranger alt who you don't really want to play until it's good at bow stuff. Might it be faster to grind AAs at e.g. level 52 when you can mass slaughter level 55 red-cons?
It's debatable at what level to start AAing from 60-65 but it's not a good idea to get AAs before 60 because the experience required for an AA is static and the high level kill experience bonus is capped when the player is under level 60 such that you could end up getting less experience from the same mobs in some cases if you are under level 60. At 60 the answer is not as simple since high level experience bonus is based on your level compared to the mob's and only occurs when the mob is within 5 levels of the player. You will want to only kill mobs within 5 levels of the player (inclusive). This bonus is large and scales with level. You will get more exp per kill at level 60 killing level 62 PoValor NPCs for example than you will killing them at level 65, and you will get MUCH less exp killing level 55 NPCs once you level to 61. So depending on where you're fighting, it could make some sense to delay leveling a few levels; particularly if you're grouped with level 65s who are carrying you to some degree. But generally speaking the power gains from leveling will outweigh the benefit and it requires some understanding of how the experience algorithm works and the levels of the NPCs so the best general advice is to just level to 65 first.
I'd posit that there are only 3 AA points which are debatably more powerful than the equivalent amount of leveling-up experience: Run1, Run2, Run3.
I've paused a toon or two to hit run speed because keeping up in situations without SoW was a headache. QOL AA
A lot of us here are used to the fastest xp possible and would be grouping with our own characters for this new toon, so you always have to put that into perspective. Someone not with a great PL setup or able to easily get BoT or Tactics access may need a lot more time to level. With that said, generally speaking I feel that getting to 65 (with the appropriate zone access for the better xp mobs) is the best bet. There are exceptions I feel though, like SoS for a Rogue may be worth stopping for a bit to get, especially if access to tier 2+ zones isn't there.
On the Triwizards I stopped at 62 for run3 and Druzzil Harvest, and then I stopped again at 63 for SCM3 while waiting for the backflag cycle for HOH. For wizard, lvl 63 is when you get access to maximum efficiency, and unless you have POFire access, you get 1.5 % more AA per level 63 kill than you do at 65 in a four man group In kitable tier 2 POP zones (the 1.5% constitutes about 30% more AA/kill). So, it's worth considering plowing out core AA at 63 before leveling to 65 while waiting on backflagging calendars With POFire access, I would argue resist rates at table incentivize finishing the level grind to 65 foremost. On that note, AA rates work differently here than they do on official servers. On official servers the AA rate of the players in the group is determined by the highest-level-in-group vs mob-level. On here, the AA rate is dynamic to your-level vs mob level and it doesn't matter if you have 65s in group at 63 since they "carry" without nerfing your AA-rate. PoFire tables exp is also less than it was on live servers, where a solo quad netted 96% AA per solo quad, whereas here it's closer to 80% of an AA but that's a different matter
Fire table exp was well known on AK and no attempt was made to reduce this. It's accurate as far as I'm aware.
Perhaps that may be the case. But 96% exp per solo quad, in era, is absolutely reflective of literally every other server
Well if it's 'reflective of every other server' then perhaps you could provide a citation of some sort. Everything I come up says otherwise. This is Ravenwing's AK post: A Graffe 2004 post says 15% each and 56% for a quad. I have personal 2003 (post ZEM reduction) and 2004 logs from PC servers and I took the time to add up the kills between AAs and estimate exp per kill. The numbers aligned with expectations. Note that in June 2003 Sony nerfed PoP ZEMs at the same time they increased the group bonus, so less solo experience after that is expected but not 40% less. AK had both the larger ZEMs and the larger group bonus and bugged group bonuses at 4-6 members and a 20% server bonus. So this server should always grant more exp than any 20 year old Live example. Also the fire tables NPCs have individual experience modifiers on them. I had to code in a new exp multiplier field for NPCs to accommodate the experience gains seen on certain PoP NPCs. Tables mobs seemed to have +60% modifiers which fit the data. It's possible these were changed and I think Sony nerfed PoStorms frogs at some point mid-PoP. I could conceive of a scenario with Sony possibly have granting tables NPCs more (like 100%) and reducing that in June and AK had the Post-June version of the zone when Hobart supposedly updated it but if it was that severe I'd think there would be posts about it.
