Alternate to 250?

[Estebar]

The pile of gravel is almost soloable. If you can get past the two guards at the door by Guardian of the Seal, you can probably solo gargoyles in the tunnel between there and the field/tower.

I haven't seen gravel drop off the two guards at the bottom door. If it did then that would be pretty nice cause they repop fast.

The Hole is also one of those high exp zones now, so you actually can get some exp too.

SoE made the master's armor path nearly impossible by defining "pile of gravel" as component to it - they are not soloable. Whereas for tailoring its shissar scales - no problem whacking these snakes till they dropped a stack or two.

[Wyvernwill]

Actually, I'll disagree on the pile of gravel not being soloable. That depends on class really, I guess though. Then again, I have no idea what level/gear you have so that may be another factor against soloing them, but i'll tell ya what I know.

At lvl 60, my necro twink was able to solo pull the mobs off the top spires around the entire castle without adds. The easiest place to set up for killing them is just outside the castle wall where there's 5ish Gargoyles sitting on the spires.

My 70 Paladin (the human working with smithing) easily solo's them, and I have nothing really better than DoN crystal gear (arms and sword) and OoW 1 groupable loots from wos and dek greaves. All in all, I have nothing really special. You're right though, Pile of Gravel are a very tough means of skilling up, but I have seen it as more favorable than doing BD Cultural as I can't stand farming oot.

[Tomic]

So I should have no problem, 69 SK time geared

[lyandras]

A very little used route, but one that requires no farming, is Pure Velium Bars. This recipe is part of the aid Grimmel quest. I forget the specifics, but its 3 velium bars, a mana vial, and pure water. Very easy to do, costs some 800pp a combine, and results in a no drop item that you will never use. I was so sick of farming things, and doing thousands of combines, that when i decided to go 250 to 300 in smithing i just blew the PP and did this recipe.

[Phantron]

Infernal scepters for the GoD progression quest work too. All storebought but about 2k per combine.