The main issue I am struggling with at the moment is health. Trying to level on knows is a nightmare
Hi. I basically soloed to 190(mostly on just knows) so I know a few tricks to it.
But I don't know what level you are referring to for help with so I'll give some general words of wisdom.
Use ONLY the amount of hp you need to survive. Anymore isn't doing you any good and is wasting damage.
Damage is op. Think about it, if you do more damage you kill faster, so you take less damage and get more xp per lix.
Go for double kills with firestorm/ice blast when possible. If you can start a new mob when another one has low hp, and finish off the old one and hurt the new one with aoe. Anything to increase speed increases productivity.
Only take defensive options if they outweigh the benefits of damage. E shield can help you lower your hp so if the focus gain helps enough use it.
Bear helms are extremely op, and are better then shields in most cases ON A HEAD SLOT! You have to wear the right resistance though, but if you do you get a massive boost.
At lower levels aim to max damage skills as high as possible. Of course picking up focus, ability and dmg bonuses along the way when possible. When you max the skills aim to get the damage even higher with focus/direct skill bonus/magic abilty.
For soloing, I found that some novelties aren't that bad. Namely the freeze ability ones, if you can afford them. Giving you regen, a free travel lix, a useable auto, and a free panic button. At a high lv focus and such won't give you as much due to the plateau bonus(still worth stacking though), so not having a focus offhand/mainhand isn't as bad as it seems(10700--->11500 for me w 475 focus/300 ice magic from grims). Skulls/gele wands are above novelties for sure though, but for 100-then it's viable.
Welp that's about all I can think of atm.