Endless Dungeon balance and dying (a lot)

[llys]

Hello, I'm a new player.

So after some blood and sweat I managed to get one of my characters to about lvl 40 and have unlocked the Endless Dungeon. From the looks of it, it seemed like a nice sandbox to try some builds and character ideas and what not.
But, behold, just after spawning on the very first level of the dungeon i walk too far into the fog of war and just instantly die to 2 lvl 30+ ranged minions? I don't even have any gear yet, this is literally the first level... is this thing just impossible to clear without casting remote vision at every single corner, or am i just fantastically unlucky?

[smithfield]

Yeah, you were unlucky.
On the other hand, that's a typical ID run.
ID is its own form of meanness.
As I understand it, the rules for what can and can't spawn will allow the ID to generate mobs up to lvl30 on the very first level.
This is usually in some form of vault, but there are vaults which are 'open'.
You absolutely cannot fight such stuff.
Recognize and avoid is the only workable strat, preferably never entering LOS.
Combined w/ the Geo/Pyro/Cryomancers and its often a rough start.
ID teaches extreme caution.
Its OK to skip chest vaults and anything that's got the possibility to spawn OOD mobs.
At least for the first 2 or 3 levels.
Eventually, you will learn that some areas are more risky and some more (potentially) rewarding than others.
Vanilla ID has some problems that you can just simply accept, OR,
This addon is pretty good.
There are several other addons which do similar things, but I've played this one many times. It's very stable as I recall.

If ID ever gets just a little bit of TLC from the devs, I might never play anything else.

[anp]

I'd suggest two other addons here:
https://te4.org/games/addons/tome/IDIC
https://te4.org/games/addons/tome/elkansidtweaksfixes

The best option would be to abuse branch dungeons a little bit: when exploring the ID, you will be finding the "earth" stairs which lead to the main campaign dungeons (T1 like Trollmire, Korpul, and more, then T2 Daikara, etc). The thing is, the basic monster level is tied to the ID level and then these dungeons seemingly have monster levels tied to your character level. Also you can infinitely use the back and forth levels in these branch dungeons to level a bit. The boss of the branch dungeon won't respawn. If you visit the random vault which is a separate level (these can spawn in trollmire), you will be kicked out of the branch back to the ID.
This way, I usually did like lvl 15-17 in the first 2-3 branches (basically rolling trollmire for those vaults because they always have 1+ fixed artifacts or t2-3 items). After that, you're way ahead of a dozen ID levels so the ID quests become very easy. You then stick to the next branch dungeon and level for as long as you wish (iirc they have the maximum monster level cap tho).
Not sure if that's the bug of the addons, I just don't remember playing vanilla ID since leveling past lvl 50 is too much fun

Here's my possessor for reference:
https://te4.org/characters/77557/tome/2 ... 81cf4a89e4

Hope that helps