I have found the following route:
-VOTA 6-9
-Sewers 1-2
-Black Canyon > peeking in the zone to the west for pack/event 1-6
-Stinging winds 1-5
-Alcarnus 1-2
-Ruined cistern 1-2
-Dalgur oasis 2-7
-Ancient ruins 1-4
-Path to oasis 0-1
to yield 20-25 packs per 25-30 mins every run.
This is roughly 40 packs per hour sitting on 5 stacks, which according to blizzard should yield 19 i62/i63 rares per hour (that's including guaranteed and I'm assuming 10% base rare drop rate for the other 3-4 items and including 100 mf for simplicity to double that).
Is there a run in act 3 that is even close to that? I can't skip trash in a3 in my gear and frankly I don't see how it's possible to get enough stats to *never* die in act 3, on any class. Which back in my dh days I know is a very serious issue there since spawn points are usually many screens away from the pack which drastically cut efficiency.
Act3
all nubmers are aprox.
keeps 1-2-3 dunno about 10-12packs
barracks another 4-6
another 6 for going to siegebreiker
2-4 if you find a cave
after siegebreiker:
each level 1-3
not a theorycrafter so i dont real pack numbers ! but pretty much same packs and you do runs in 45-1hour + more lvl 63 items.
Pretty simple ! act3 better you are just not good geared thats all.
pretty sure the range of packs in keep depths is 1-4 per level and each floor is HUGE, like as big as dalgur oasis but with the possibility of running into dead ends having to backtrack. based on the assumption that rares are 20% drop rate with 100 mf (including nv) i would have to kill 20 packs per 30 mins (15 packs with nv) for it to match. barracks is similar to depths in size and number of packs, again with the issue of backtracking.
you listed about 25 packs in 45 mins to an hour which isn't even remotely close to the efficiency of act 2. i don't mean to sound rude or arrogant lol, and yeah i don't have gear to do act 3 like i do act 2 e.g. skipping all trash and never dying, but i'm not going to upgrade my gear if there's no point. whole point of this inquiry is if there's any specialized runs that can find and kill at least 20 packs in 30 minutes as that's about all i'd be willing to spend in a single sitting.
according to the drop rate of 20% rare @ 5 nv with 100 mf
at 25 packs/run in act 2,
-12.64 i62 rares/hr
-6.3 i63 rares/hr
at 19 packs/run in act 3
-9.5 i62 rares/hr
-8 i63 rares/hr
maybe i'm undervaluing i63 gear because weapons are the only thing noticeably better than i62s but i don't have good luck with those lol
e: it looks like at 16 packs per 30 mins you get the same amount of i63s as act 2, with significantly less i62s. still, keep depths and barracks don't see worth it no matter what and i'm not familiar with the other areas.
bought a shield and tried act 3 since it's been like a month and a full gear upgrade since i last tried that. killed like 7 packs in keep depths and the bunker, went stonefort and died like 100 miles from checkpoint because i was under the impression tempest rush was fixed (it's not, shocking i know). rage logged for 2 days after that ;p
yeah mixing it up is good.. but that just reminded me why i shelved the dh. dying to unavoidable mechanics far far away from the spawn point just completely ruins the fun for me for days, which tends to happen a lot in act 3 even with 98% damage reduction ;(
it isn't so bad with a friend to res each other though i suppose.
My A3 run is quite similar (listed in the order I do it):
Sewer 1 (leave after first pack)
Black Canyon 3-5
Howling Plateau 1-4 (always go down into Sirocco Caverns if it spawns)
Singing Winds 3-8 (including Ruins/Temple of Idol)
Alcarnus 1-2
Ruined Cistern 1 (leave after first pack)
Oasis 5-7 (including ruins)
Vault of the Assasin 6-7
Archives of Zoltan 5-8
Zoltan Kulle
I start my run at quest 8, Soulstone Chamber. In the above numbers I count goblins as 1 pack. If you count Zoltan Kulle as 2 packs (since he has 2 guarenteed rares) this run gives me on average 40 packs and takes about 45 minutes. An important part of making it fast is to not clean out the maps, as soon as you have done most of a map (and found a reasonable amount of packs) its time to move on. I also pick up very few items, for weapons only ilvl 62-63 (for 2handers only 63) and armors ilvl 61-63. I do a quick search on blues, picking up only stuff that sells fast, mainly high amounts of goldfind. All other stuff stays on the ground. I don't salvage anything, just vendor the crap rares. I use a WW/sprint barb with 10% MS boots. I die perhaps once every 2-3 runs, usually due to mistakes on my part (WWing in beams and having moltens explode on me etc). I don't skip any packs.
Comparing to A3 I get a lot more drops doing A2 runs, but the quality is a lot worse also. The biggest difference is on weapons, as only ilvl 63 weapons sell for any meaningful amounts of gold. Only real advantage of A2 is that (due to much higher kill rate) I get a lot more plans. I'm not realy sure which is most effective, they seem to be about equal. I do both A2 and A3 runs for some variation. From time to time I also do ponies, but the only good way to do ponies is with full mf gear, which barbs are less good at (unless you have amazing gear).
i noticed that you didn't mention desolate sands so i'm assuming you start the run in the vault. i use the belial quest since it lets you take leah and adria with you, and its not much but they do a little damage and keep elites engaged if you die (in outside maps that is)
1st half A3 has chance to spawn demonic tremor elites
2nd half A3 has chance to spawn big ogre elites
almost guaranteed phasebeast elites
soul lashers
birds
elite birds
invul elite birds
Keep lvl2 bombs sometimes spawn after you are into an area
lvl3 does not spawn 4 packs, ever
lvl2 and lvl3 have good chance to spawn a demonic tremor champ on your ass
chance to hit icefall cave instead of cavern of frost. Cows like oppressors need close attention or repair bill
when it spawns cavern of frost there's good chance you get the dual wield big fkers that go berserk on you and kill you
chance for bridge store elite or the tower event not to spawn
1/2 of the goblins run away in A3 unless you don't use an add and do not range
2.5 hours to clear A3 with 2 bosses (siege azmondan) vs. 1.5 hours to clear A2 with 3 bosses
loot is trash
demonic tremors
I honestly find better stuff in act 2 in VoA, I feel the concentration of elites is very good in act 2, and it is much better the concentration of elites in act 3
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which according to blizzard should yield 19 i62/i63 rares per hour
I was doing that and i had 1-3 lvl 63 per run, i don't care about 62ilvl.
I switched to akt3 and i had about 5~~10 lvl 63 per run (battleground,barracks,bridge,icefall caverns, siegebreaker).
I do act 3 in 1.5 hours.. with ghom cydea and azmodan clearing every area and i die on a bad run 10 times then it takes a little longer up to 2 hours
With enough runspeed and/or vault/sprint build you can clear it in way less than 1 hour. But it's not about bragging or new records, just check your stopwatch and run every act several times and count those elite you kill on the road. Sadly rare/minute won't work on such a small sample sice so i wouldn't use that to messure that is best suited for you.
ya the stress
and lowering mf
From the MF stats thread we know going from 200 to 300 MF is 50% more rare.
So running A2 with 300% MF (1 hour per complete clear, 50+ packs) > running A3 with 200% MF even if you could clear A3 in under 1 hour (and you not going to get 50 packs). You'd get couple more rolls on lvl63 doing A3, in exchange of some deaths and repair bills. Statistically speaking that is, and considering the fact ALL drops are poop.
However, the chance to get a 500m worth item is significantly greater in A3, even with 200% MF.
So for the long term perspectives, despite all the drawbacks of A3, I still farm it.
And it's 2 hours for a complete clear. You can do 1.5 if you skip some of the levels, and run it full stress. What's the point...
There is a point where act 3 can be better than act 2. This is not to say that act 3 will always be better for any specific individual, but there are those that have demonstrated time efficiency in act 3 clears, doing full clears in less than 40 minutes. This is 50+ elite packs and 3-4 bosses in under 40 minutes.
After a certain point, with high dps and dps uptime, transit time between elite packs becomes considerably more significant than elite killing time. Transit time doesn't really change much between acts, but the drop rates on i63 do.
i would like to see a 40min A3 clear that killed 50+ packs
Stream or youtube vid.
Kripparian has done multiple sub 40. I think his best is 34 min (video on demand may be required to see stream proof). Some wizards have also done sub 40, but I don't think as fast.
I just timed my last run: 51 minutes. The run was also longer than normal due to having more-than-normal run away elites (I think 4x ogre magi packs) and having to double back from dead ends in the barracks and icefall caves. Considering I did the run with +326% MF (after 5 stack), I'd say that's considerably better than act 2 rates I've read reported. No elites or goblins were skipped.
Areas cleared:
Skycrown Battlements
Stonefort
Keep Depths 1-3
Ghom
The Battlefields
The Barracks 1-2
Cryder's Outpost
The Bridge of Korsikk
Fields of Slaughter
Icefall Caves 1-2
Rakkis Crossing
The Underbridge
Siegebreaker
Arreat Crater 1
Tower of the Damned 1-2
Heart of the Damned
Arreat Crater 2
Tower of the Cursed 1-2
Cydea
Core of Arreat
Azmodan
[...] Transit time doesn't really change much between acts, ....
Yes it does, at least for tornado/ww barbs. With increasing DPS, transit times also increase in lower acts due to "one-shotting" trash mobs with tornados. Hence your fury regeneration drops, so does your sprint uptime. I realized this in act1 after reaching 20k DPS, and now I have some trouble with sprint uptime in act2 with 20k DPS (unbuffed).
Also: The majority of places in act3 are overcrowded with trash mobs, giving you a almost 100% uptime to springt and more than 50% uptime of beserk.
For act3 I need almost twice the time that I need for act2, but I nearly get twice the loot (but more 63s and 62s).
While I agree that for WW barbs, transit time may actually increase as acts get easier, I think that's only with a gear/skill set optimized for DPS. Transit time for earlier acts can be improved with gear and skill changes.
For example: a barb capable of farming act 3 has more than enough dps and defenses for act 1. Max gear +run speed is obtained, at the cost of some dps/resist losses. War cry isn't necessary and instead swapped for leap (for shortcut jumps) or charge (to generate fury for sprints). A mighty weapon replaces current main hand (probably a mace or axe) for greater fury generation and the undying passive is selected to stop fury degeneration altogether.
i would like to see a 40min A3 clear that killed 50+ packs
Stream or youtube vid.
Kripparian has done multiple sub 40. I think his best is 34 min (video on demand may be required to see stream proof). Some wizards have also done sub 40, but I don't think as fast.
I just timed my last run: 51 minutes. The run was also longer than normal due to having more-than-normal run away elites (I think 4x ogre magi packs) and having to double back from dead ends in the barracks and icefall caves. Considering I did the run with +326% MF (after 5 stack), I'd say that's considerably better than act 2 rates I've read reported. No elites or goblins were skipped.
Areas cleared:
Skycrown Battlements
Stonefort
Keep Depths 1-3
Ghom
The Battlefields
The Barracks 1-2
Cryder's Outpost
The Bridge of Korsikk
Fields of Slaughter
Icefall Caves 1-2
Rakkis Crossing
The Underbridge
Siegebreaker
Arreat Crater 1
Tower of the Damned 1-2
Heart of the Damned
Arreat Crater 2
Tower of the Cursed 1-2
Cydea
Core of Arreat
Azmodan
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xbOIDdfwziw
finally fixed the lag issues with recording so i recorded the vota run i do, i just fixed the shakiness plugin i didn't notice they applied so they video should be better quality later.
i'm nowhere near what i would consider the best diablo 3 player but as you can see in the video i don't really suck. thing is, in act 3 trash hits literally 5x as hard as they do in a2. same thing goes for elites. death in any of my farming zones requires at most a 10 second run back. dying in skycrown battlements? have fun running 983749587435 miles back to that shielding molten arcane vortex molok pack. what, a fast horde molten nightmarish tremor pack in the fields? yeah. have fun with that ;p
I do act 3 in 1.5 hours.. with ghom cydea and azmodan clearing every area and i die on a bad run 10 times then it takes a little longer up to 2 hours
With enough runspeed and/or vault/sprint build you can clear it in way less than 1 hour. But it's not about bragging or new records, just check your stopwatch and run every act several times and count those elite you kill on the road. Sadly rare/minute won't work on such a small sample sice so i wouldn't use that to messure that is best suited for you.
However, the chance to get a 500m worth item is significantly greater in A3, even with 200% MF.
So for the long term perspectives, despite all the drawbacks of A3, I still farm it.
And it's 2 hours for a complete clear. You can do 1.5 if you skip some of the levels, and run it full stress. What's the point...
This kind of belief is just so funny and misleading. Nowhere is there proof that item quality is better in one act vs another. An i63 in Act 1 has the same chance to roll out a high value item as an i63 in Act 4. So the bottom line is how many i63s can you make per hour in Act 2 vs Act 3?
My gear is far from the best but I roll through Act 2 with 300 mf. My last run which I recorded with real numbers and not just a 'feeling' is 71 minutes, 51 elite mobs, 97 rares. Not as efficient as the OP but I like to do all of Act 2 which is almost every single elite and possible goblin, so I don't waste time farming stacks.
From the MF post we know that over 1000 items the drop rate for i63 will average out to 9% in Act 2. So I will average 7-8 i63s per hour. If you have super godly gear and can roll Act 3 with ease in 300 mf then it's probable you can do better than Act 2. But it wouldn't be 'significantly greater'. And for the 99% of players that do not have godly dps/mf gear and cannot clear Act 3 in 40 minutes, it is even more unlikely you will be getting far better drops in Act 3 vs Act 2.
For each individual needs to determine which is better for them. Taking information away from the MF analysis you can assume the following.
Average base drop rate is 3.5 items per elite
Base rare drop rate is 10% from elites
5NV = +1 additional drop which is guaranteed to be a rare.
Act2 has a 51.2% chance of dropping a ilvl61+ and a 9.3% chance of it being ilvl63
Act3 has a 65.1% chance of dropping a ilvl61+ and a 16.3% chance of being ilvl63
Those are the facts, so I'll do some calculations for my own chr which has a base MF of 200%. An Act2 VoA run which hits nearly every waypoint takes me ~54 minutes and the last time I took down 38 elites/goblins. I personally keep all ilvl61+ rares to ID so we'll go with that for this calculation. Keep in mind that "base" MF on charachter is 0% so 200% MF actually equals 300% in calculations.
300% Base MF * 10% rare drop rate * 3.5 items per elite * 51.2% of it being ilvl61+ = .538 rares
Then increase the base MF by 15% each kill due to NV until you complete the 5th kill so in this case the 2nd elite kill will be:
315% MF * 10% rare drop rate * 3.5 items per elite * 51.2% chance of it being ilvl61+ = .564 rares
Then lastly, and the most imporant part of trying to calculate this out. Once you hit 5NV you get that bonus drop which is a guaranteed rare.
(1 bonus drop * 51.2% chance being ilvl61+) + (375% MF * 10% rare drop rate * 3.5 items per elite * 51.2% chance ilvl61+) = 1.184 rares per elite.
Thus for my run in Act2 I take .778 rares per minute that are a ilvl61+ rare. Now, if I apply the same methodology for Act3, where I still need to clear trash unlike Act2, my siege breaker run yields .376 rares per minute. But if you only care about ilvl63 you just need to recalculate out as it's not a linear relationship between the drop rates but even so for myself it's not worth doing Act3 just chasing ilvl63.
Edit: Corrected the base drop rate in calculations
For each individual needs to determine which is better for them. Taking information away from the MF analysis you can assume the following.
Average base drop rate is 4.5 items per elite
Base rare drop rate is 10% from elites
5NV = +1 additional drop which is guaranteed to be a rare.
Act2 has a 51.2% chance of dropping a ilvl61+ and a 9.3% chance of it being ilvl63
Act3 has a 65.1% chance of dropping a ilvl61+ and a 16.3% chance of being ilvl63
Those are the facts, so I'll do some calculations for my own chr which has a base MF of 200%. An Act2 VoA run which hits nearly every waypoint takes me ~54 minutes and the last time I took down 38 elites/goblins. I personally keep all ilvl61+ rares to ID so we'll go with that for this calculation. Keep in mind that "base" MF on charachter is 0% so 200% MF actually equals 300% in calculations.
300% Base MF * 10% rare drop rate * 4.5 items per elite * 51.2% of it being ilvl61+ = .691 rares
Then increase the base MF by 15% each kill due to NV until you complete the 5th kill so in this case the 2nd elite kill will be:
315% MF * 10% rare drop rate * 4.5 items per elite * 51.2% chance of it being ilvl61+ = .726 rares
Then lastly, and the most imporant part of trying to calculate this out. Once you hit 5NV you get that bonus drop which is a guaranteed rare.
(1 bonus drop * 51.2% chance being ilvl61+) + (375% MF * 10% rare drop rate * 4.5 items per elite * 51.2% chance ilvl61+) = 1.376 rares per elite.
Thus for my run in Act2 I take .911 rares per minute that are a ilvl61+ rare. Now, if I apply the same methodology for Act3, where I still need to clear trash unlike Act2, my siege breaker run yields .442 rares per minute. But if you only care about ilvl63 you just need to recalculate out as it's not a linear relationship between the drop rates but even so for myself it's not worth doing Act3 just chasing ilvl63.
One error in your calcs. The 4.5 drops per elite includes the guaranteed rare so what you really see is 3.5 drops per elite. Also, from what we've found in the MF thread, rare gains is not linnear with MF and in fact has some slight diminishing returns. In other words, if you get 35 rares from elites at 0 MF, 0 NV, you do not get 350 rares at 900 MF, you would get less, and likely more like 250. I think at 400 MF the DR ends up turning the rare chance from 10% to about 40%, whereas if it were linnear it would be 50% (10% base + 400% of the base). The non-linnearity comes from the individual affix drop % for rares.
The idea is still right, if you want to ignore the affix distribution. If instead you want to just get 5+6 affix drops, the calculations get a bit more complex but a similar approach can be made to make a good approximation. My educated guess on that matter of affixes is if you're deciding between one act with high MF versus a later act with no MF, the high MF act will yield more rares with more affixes if rare collection rate is the same for the desired ilvl range.
But really, like the above says, each person will need to do their own calculations and make their own decisions. Some people might think the fewer rares is worth it for the chance at the 6 prop patterns, since they don't drop in Act 2, for example.
One error in your calcs. The 4.5 drops per elite includes the guaranteed rare so what you really see is 3.5 drops per elite. Also, from what we've found in the MF thread, rare gains is not linnear with MF and in fact has some slight diminishing returns. In other words, if you get 35 rares from elites at 0 MF, 0 NV, you do not get 350 rares at 900 MF, you would get less, and likely more like 250. I think at 400 MF the DR ends up turning the rare chance from 10% to about 40%, whereas if it were linnear it would be 50% (10% base + 400% of the base). The non-linnearity comes from the individual affix drop % for rares.
Oops, accidentally took the base drops from treasure creatures and not elites. Will fix above. And while I do agree with the diminishing returns principle and the fact that's probably what most will observe it's really, for aspect of just which act to choose, just isn't worth the calculations as one rare creature not appearing will have more of an impact than the diminishing returns.
Has it been proven that Act3 provides more 5-6 prop ilvl63 items as a % of the ilvl63 drops? If that is the case then it very well might be more efficient to start farming Act3 once you hit approximately 75% [arbitrary # out of the air] of the Act2 rares per minute efficiency especially farming for money due to the rarer plan drops along with the higher drop rate of 5 and 6 prop ilvl63 rares.
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-VOTA 6-9
-Sewers 1-2
-Black Canyon > peeking in the zone to the west for pack/event 1-6
-Stinging winds 1-5
-Alcarnus 1-2
-Ruined cistern 1-2
-Dalgur oasis 2-7
-Ancient ruins 1-4
-Path to oasis 0-1
to yield 20-25 packs per 25-30 mins every run.
This is roughly 40 packs per hour sitting on 5 stacks, which according to blizzard should yield 19 i62/i63 rares per hour (that's including guaranteed and I'm assuming 10% base rare drop rate for the other 3-4 items and including 100 mf for simplicity to double that).
Is there a run in act 3 that is even close to that? I can't skip trash in a3 in my gear and frankly I don't see how it's possible to get enough stats to *never* die in act 3, on any class. Which back in my dh days I know is a very serious issue there since spawn points are usually many screens away from the pack which drastically cut efficiency.
pretty sure the range of packs in keep depths is 1-4 per level and each floor is HUGE, like as big as dalgur oasis but with the possibility of running into dead ends having to backtrack. based on the assumption that rares are 20% drop rate with 100 mf (including nv) i would have to kill 20 packs per 30 mins (15 packs with nv) for it to match. barracks is similar to depths in size and number of packs, again with the issue of backtracking.
you listed about 25 packs in 45 mins to an hour which isn't even remotely close to the efficiency of act 2. i don't mean to sound rude or arrogant lol, and yeah i don't have gear to do act 3 like i do act 2 e.g. skipping all trash and never dying, but i'm not going to upgrade my gear if there's no point. whole point of this inquiry is if there's any specialized runs that can find and kill at least 20 packs in 30 minutes as that's about all i'd be willing to spend in a single sitting.
at 25 packs/run in act 2,
-12.64 i62 rares/hr
-6.3 i63 rares/hr
at 19 packs/run in act 3
-9.5 i62 rares/hr
-8 i63 rares/hr
maybe i'm undervaluing i63 gear because weapons are the only thing noticeably better than i62s but i don't have good luck with those lol
e: it looks like at 16 packs per 30 mins you get the same amount of i63s as act 2, with significantly less i62s. still, keep depths and barracks don't see worth it no matter what and i'm not familiar with the other areas.
yeah mixing it up is good.. but that just reminded me why i shelved the dh. dying to unavoidable mechanics far far away from the spawn point just completely ruins the fun for me for days, which tends to happen a lot in act 3 even with 98% damage reduction ;(
it isn't so bad with a friend to res each other though i suppose.
i noticed that you didn't mention desolate sands so i'm assuming you start the run in the vault. i use the belial quest since it lets you take leah and adria with you, and its not much but they do a little damage and keep elites engaged if you die (in outside maps that is)
1st half A3 has chance to spawn demonic tremor elites
2nd half A3 has chance to spawn big ogre elites
almost guaranteed phasebeast elites
soul lashers
birds
elite birds
invul elite birds
Keep lvl2 bombs sometimes spawn after you are into an area
lvl3 does not spawn 4 packs, ever
lvl2 and lvl3 have good chance to spawn a demonic tremor champ on your ass
chance to hit icefall cave instead of cavern of frost. Cows like oppressors need close attention or repair bill
when it spawns cavern of frost there's good chance you get the dual wield big fkers that go berserk on you and kill you
chance for bridge store elite or the tower event not to spawn
1/2 of the goblins run away in A3 unless you don't use an add and do not range
2.5 hours to clear A3 with 2 bosses (siege azmondan) vs. 1.5 hours to clear A2 with 3 bosses
loot is trash
demonic tremors
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Final Fantasy 7
I was doing that and i had 1-3 lvl 63 per run, i don't care about 62ilvl.
I switched to akt3 and i had about 5~~10 lvl 63 per run (battleground,barracks,bridge,icefall caverns, siegebreaker).
ya the stress
and lowering mf
From the MF stats thread we know going from 200 to 300 MF is 50% more rare.
So running A2 with 300% MF (1 hour per complete clear, 50+ packs) > running A3 with 200% MF even if you could clear A3 in under 1 hour (and you not going to get 50 packs). You'd get couple more rolls on lvl63 doing A3, in exchange of some deaths and repair bills. Statistically speaking that is, and considering the fact ALL drops are poop.
However, the chance to get a 500m worth item is significantly greater in A3, even with 200% MF.
So for the long term perspectives, despite all the drawbacks of A3, I still farm it.
And it's 2 hours for a complete clear. You can do 1.5 if you skip some of the levels, and run it full stress. What's the point...
After a certain point, with high dps and dps uptime, transit time between elite packs becomes considerably more significant than elite killing time. Transit time doesn't really change much between acts, but the drop rates on i63 do.
Stream or youtube vid.
Kripparian has done multiple sub 40. I think his best is 34 min (video on demand may be required to see stream proof). Some wizards have also done sub 40, but I don't think as fast.
I just timed my last run: 51 minutes. The run was also longer than normal due to having more-than-normal run away elites (I think 4x ogre magi packs) and having to double back from dead ends in the barracks and icefall caves. Considering I did the run with +326% MF (after 5 stack), I'd say that's considerably better than act 2 rates I've read reported. No elites or goblins were skipped.
Areas cleared:
Skycrown Battlements
Stonefort
Keep Depths 1-3
Ghom
The Battlefields
The Barracks 1-2
Cryder's Outpost
The Bridge of Korsikk
Fields of Slaughter
Icefall Caves 1-2
Rakkis Crossing
The Underbridge
Siegebreaker
Arreat Crater 1
Tower of the Damned 1-2
Heart of the Damned
Arreat Crater 2
Tower of the Cursed 1-2
Cydea
Core of Arreat
Azmodan
While I agree that for WW barbs, transit time may actually increase as acts get easier, I think that's only with a gear/skill set optimized for DPS. Transit time for earlier acts can be improved with gear and skill changes.
For example: a barb capable of farming act 3 has more than enough dps and defenses for act 1. Max gear +run speed is obtained, at the cost of some dps/resist losses. War cry isn't necessary and instead swapped for leap (for shortcut jumps) or charge (to generate fury for sprints). A mighty weapon replaces current main hand (probably a mace or axe) for greater fury generation and the undying passive is selected to stop fury degeneration altogether.
still could not find a vid of 40 min A3 clear...
finally fixed the lag issues with recording so i recorded the vota run i do, i just fixed the shakiness plugin i didn't notice they applied so they video should be better quality later.
i'm nowhere near what i would consider the best diablo 3 player but as you can see in the video i don't really suck. thing is, in act 3 trash hits literally 5x as hard as they do in a2. same thing goes for elites. death in any of my farming zones requires at most a 10 second run back. dying in skycrown battlements? have fun running 983749587435 miles back to that shielding molten arcane vortex molok pack. what, a fast horde molten nightmarish tremor pack in the fields? yeah. have fun with that ;p
This kind of belief is just so funny and misleading. Nowhere is there proof that item quality is better in one act vs another. An i63 in Act 1 has the same chance to roll out a high value item as an i63 in Act 4. So the bottom line is how many i63s can you make per hour in Act 2 vs Act 3?
My gear is far from the best but I roll through Act 2 with 300 mf. My last run which I recorded with real numbers and not just a 'feeling' is 71 minutes, 51 elite mobs, 97 rares. Not as efficient as the OP but I like to do all of Act 2 which is almost every single elite and possible goblin, so I don't waste time farming stacks.
From the MF post we know that over 1000 items the drop rate for i63 will average out to 9% in Act 2. So I will average 7-8 i63s per hour. If you have super godly gear and can roll Act 3 with ease in 300 mf then it's probable you can do better than Act 2. But it wouldn't be 'significantly greater'. And for the 99% of players that do not have godly dps/mf gear and cannot clear Act 3 in 40 minutes, it is even more unlikely you will be getting far better drops in Act 3 vs Act 2.
Edit: Corrected the base drop rate in calculations
One error in your calcs. The 4.5 drops per elite includes the guaranteed rare so what you really see is 3.5 drops per elite. Also, from what we've found in the MF thread, rare gains is not linnear with MF and in fact has some slight diminishing returns. In other words, if you get 35 rares from elites at 0 MF, 0 NV, you do not get 350 rares at 900 MF, you would get less, and likely more like 250. I think at 400 MF the DR ends up turning the rare chance from 10% to about 40%, whereas if it were linnear it would be 50% (10% base + 400% of the base). The non-linnearity comes from the individual affix drop % for rares.
The idea is still right, if you want to ignore the affix distribution. If instead you want to just get 5+6 affix drops, the calculations get a bit more complex but a similar approach can be made to make a good approximation. My educated guess on that matter of affixes is if you're deciding between one act with high MF versus a later act with no MF, the high MF act will yield more rares with more affixes if rare collection rate is the same for the desired ilvl range.
But really, like the above says, each person will need to do their own calculations and make their own decisions. Some people might think the fewer rares is worth it for the chance at the 6 prop patterns, since they don't drop in Act 2, for example.
Crusader DPS and EHP Spreadsheet, meant for Crusaders
My Wizard
Has it been proven that Act3 provides more 5-6 prop ilvl63 items as a % of the ilvl63 drops? If that is the case then it very well might be more efficient to start farming Act3 once you hit approximately 75% [arbitrary # out of the air] of the Act2 rares per minute efficiency especially farming for money due to the rarer plan drops along with the higher drop rate of 5 and 6 prop ilvl63 rares.