I ran 144 Sekhemas, so you do not have to do it.
Hello Exiles!
Long story short: This league was intended to farm currency in the first weeks to acquire a Temporalis, but went from being worth 440 divines to over 8,000 in just one week. Farming 440 divines was posible to me, but 8,000 was out of the question.
The Temporalis went from being worth 440 divines to over 8,000 in just one week. Farming 440 divines was possible, but 8,000 was out of the question.
Since it was impossible for me to farm that amount of divines (I play for two hours a day after work), the idea for this project began to take shape: farm 144 Barya of Time and then compile statistics on Zarokh drops/chests.
So how did it go?
No gear / No relics [ lvl 65 ]
Once acts and interludes were finished (around level 65), I levelled up a few times by making maps, including some Untainted ones. Please note that the Baryas on the 4 floors are level 80. If you enter right after finishing the campaign, it will take you between 0 and 0.1 seconds to lose the trial for any mistake (low life and no relics)
Farming gear for start this project [ lvl 77 - 85 ]
I started farming Test of Time Baryas at level 77. Interesting stuff:
- Between levels 77 and 79, you gain almost one level every time you complete the third floor. It is a fairly easy, quick, and safe way (safe in the sense that you will not lose experience by dying) to level up your character.
- Test of Time Baryas sold instantly (merchant tab), first at 2 div each, but then at 5 divines. As of the date of publication of this thread, they are at 25 div each, to give you an idea.
- Although I obtained some relics during these initial runs, each run up to the 3rd floor took me about 25 - 30 minutes.
Start of the project [ lvl 85 - lvl 96 ]
Once I had farmed 100 divs in the previous stage (about 20 baryas), I was able to buy an Headhunter belt (52 div), change my bow, quiver, and basically all the equipment I had used to reach level 96.
Things to note, In my opinion, Headhubter is BiS for farming Sekhemas, for two reasons:
- There are rooms where there are always rare enemies. If you steal Haste and GMP, you will kill everything at lightning speed.
- Most importantly: There is no enemy in Sekhemas that does not have the teleportation aura. Kudos for that.
In this stage, the time to complete the first three floors dropped from 25-30 minutes to 16-19 minutes, depending on the rooms types.
The relics I used in order of priority were:
- 90 % honour resistance (capped)
- % Increased defences
- % Increased quantity of relics dropped
The summary spreadsheet on this thread contains more detailed information about the relics used and other tips.
Collecting the data
Once I had obtained the 144 Test of Time Baryas, I copied all their attributes (Ctrl + C) and generated a text document. I created a Visual Basic GUI to parse that file and obtain information about the boons and afflictions from those 144 previous runs. That data is located in the summary sheet (as Raw data link to pastebin)
Completing the 4th floor
The 4th floor can be completed in just 5 minutes. It will depend somewhat on the boons and afflictions obtained previously.
About the 4th floor (tips based on my experience doing this project) :
- There is a type of enemy (it looks like a salt shaker) that goes into berserker mode and shoots rays that take away a lot of your honour. Avoid that enemy or kill it quickly.
- Although it may seem otherwise, gauntlet rooms are among the least dangerous. With a total of 90% honour resistance, the loss of honour from hitting a trap is minimal.
- If you are using a Headhunter, try to make sure that the last room just before Zarokh is a Chalice type, whenever possible. You will get at least 3 auras that will make the final battle much faster.
- If there is a merchant in the penultimate room, you can gamble to see if you have the Moment's Peace boon (you will not take damage).
- Make sure you have at least one golden key. If there is a Grand Spectrum Chest and you don't have a golden key, you'll be banging your head against the wall.
CLICK HERE for the 144 run spreadsheet (Minor Boos, Major Boons, Afflictions, and drops)
About the drops:
- I started noting down the Time-Lost chests, but when I saw that they were quite common, I stopped noting them down.
- Balbala never sold me a good relic
- I did a few parties with a friend (Liz) with 510% inc. rarity gear, and the relic drops didn't seem to be any better or worse than doing the run solo.
- In all parties of 4, 5, or 6 players, the unique relics were those of 1 ex.
- The Desperate Alliance relic fell twice as many times as I thought it would.
99 x Peacemakers, 97 x Burdens, 24 x Changing, 58 x Desperate Alliance, 3 x Emerald, 3 x Ruby, 1 x Sapphire, and... 1 x Last Flame on 7th run.
I don't quite understand why the Desperate Alliance (44 div) has more than double the drop than the Changing (1 ex), but the data is what it is.
Is it worth it? Final thoughts
Well, as someone said, everything is relative. In terms of profit, probably not, unless you are infinitely lucky. However, I put fun before profit. And the truth is, it has been great fun to help hundreds of exiles obtain their third or fourth ascension points a completely selfless way while doing this project.
