It looks like Blizzard's warning that things might be a bit more "broken" than usual in Diablo 4's patch 2.0 Public Test Realm was valid, because mere hours after going live, it's been discovered that you can hit level 60 in just 20 minutes.
In a game like Diablo 4, you're definitely not meant to be able to do that, but content creator and streamer Raxxanterax has demonstrated the entire process in a video on YouTube. It's thanks to some broken Stronghold mechanics currently in the action RPG's PTR, which Raxxanterax shows off at the Omath's Redoubt Stronghold in Kehjistan.
With a group of players, Raxxanterax accepts an invite from one at a time and gets transferred to party leadership before the other player leaves the party. Then, the streamer interacts with the Wanderer's Shrine, which immediately gives four levels on the very first attempt. Repeating this process over and over is an incredibly efficient grinding method, as you can tell by the fact that, again, the content creator went from level one to level 60 in just 20 minutes. You can check out the entire thing in the video below if you want to test the method yourself.
While this might be a viable method for now, we shouldn't expect it to be present in the actual DLC. Over on Twitter, Raxxanterax writes: "Luckily Blizzard watched me do this and it will be patched for the expansion launch." Squashing bugs and ironing out issues is what every PTR is about, after all, so there's no doubt that the devs will be relieved that this has been caught now rather than later down the line.
Diablo 4's Vessel of Hatred DLC is set to launch on October 8, and its devs have already pledged to be "very reactive to the community."
Be sure to check out our guide on how to level up fast in Diablo 4 for some methods to use outside the current PTR.