Season 14 of Diablo IV dropped on June 30, and players have already mapped out a leveling path that cuts the grind to level 70 down to somewhere between 2 and 4 hours. The method combines two of the season's new systems, the War Plan perk tree and Hellwyrm farming, in a way that stacks experience gains faster than almost anything else currently in the game.
The War Plan setup that makes it work
The whole strategy depends on unlocking three specific perks before the real farming begins. Two come from the Helltide skill tree and one from the Undercity tree. The targets are Hellmouth (Helltide level 1), Writhe and Rot (Helltide level 2), and Jade Epiphany (Undercity level 1).
Writhe and Rot is the centerpiece. It causes Hellwyrms to spew Maggots when they appear, and those Maggots drop experience orbs when killed. Jade Epiphany adds a parallel XP stream during Undercity runs by spawning experience orbs every time you hit an Attunement level. Together, they turn two of Season 14's core activities into a near-continuous XP engine.
Getting there takes roughly an hour of War Plan completion. The catch is that War Plan activity lists are randomized, so you may not always see Helltide objectives on the board. When that happens, Kurast Undercity runs fill the gap while you accumulate War Plan points toward the Helltide unlocks.
The difficulty switch that doubles your War Plan points
Here's where the method gets specific. To earn 43 War Plan points per Helltide activity (instead of the standard amount on Normal), players need to collect their Aberrant Cinders (75 per chest) on Normal difficulty, then switch to Penitent before opening any chests. Opening the chests on Penitent is what triggers the higher point reward.
Dying before you open a chest costs you half your Cinders, so the difficulty swap carries real risk. Most players running this method stay on Normal for the Cinder collection phase, confirm they have what they need, then bump difficulty before heading to the chest.
For Undercity runs, no difficulty manipulation is needed. The goal there is simply to hit all four Attunement levels per run to maximize the Jade Epiphany orb drops.
Hunting Hellwyrms once the perks are live
Once Writhe and Rot is unlocked, War Plans stop mattering. The grind shifts entirely to Helltide Hellwyrm routes on Hard difficulty. Hard is the recommended setting here because it provides a meaningful XP multiplier without the death risk that higher difficulties introduce when you're still building out a fresh character.
Hellwyrms don't spawn until the Helltide bar is roughly two-thirds full, and their spawn locations are fixed per zone. The community-built Helltides Event Timer site tracks active Helltide zones and marks the specific spawn points, which makes routing between them straightforward. Not every marked location will have a Hellwyrm on any given run, so covering multiple points per Helltide cycle is the play.
The loop itself is simple: fill the Helltide bar to the two-thirds threshold, travel to the green spawn markers, kill whatever the Hellwyrm spews, collect the experience orbs, and move to the next point. Repeat until level 70.
For players who want to break up the Hellwyrm loop, periodic Undercity runs with Jade Epiphany active provide a solid secondary XP source. The Season 14 Death Awakening questline walkthrough covers the full seasonal content flow if you want context on how Undercity fits into the broader progression picture.
What this means for the Season 14 start
Four hours to level 70 is fast by any standard for an ARPG seasonal reset. It means players who put in a focused evening session this week can skip straight to Paragon point farming and start engaging with the endgame build optimization that most of the playerbase actually cares about.
The method does require the Lord of Hatred campaign to already be cleared on the account, which gates it from brand-new players. For returning players and veterans, though, the War Plan perk setup is a one-time unlock per character, and the Hellwyrm route is repeatable for every seasonal reset that keeps these systems in place.
If you're planning your Season 14 push, the full Diablo IV guides collection has everything from build breakdowns to activity-specific tips to keep your momentum going past level 70.
