Does it get rid of the post 50 grind? No? Well, three you have it 
They stated that it will take 40% less time to reach 100 than it was for S1
A 40% reduction in leveling time... and isn't that all accomplished with changes to the post-50/Tier 3-4 game systems? That sounds like a huge change in the late game. Short of outright deleting levels 51-100 I'm not sure what else they could do on that front.
I haven't been able to watch the full livestream, just check out a couple summaries. Are they changing enemy level scaling at all? Having the world lag 5 levels behind you most of the time really makes wandering around and finding side quests and stuff a LOT less interesting than it should be. Maybe the buffs to Helltides and the new vampire Helltide will give us enough to do. And the Paragon changes might give us more flexibility to use that content for early leveling, when the regular world is actually mechanically relevant.
https://news.blizzard.com/en-us/diab...
Experience and Monster Levelling
Decreased the time spent to reach level 100, making the journey about 40% faster. The experience gained from killing monsters at level 50+ has been significantly increased and rises steadily as you level.
Prevent Monsters from being less powerful as character level increases by making Monsters in World Tier III and IV match the current player level at a minimum after Levels 55 and 75 respectively. This increases the overall experience of levelling, making it much smoother.
Incenses now grant a bonus to Experience and persist after death.
Increased the potency of Experience bonuses (Elixir, Season Blessings) by making them multiplicative with the World Tier bonus.
Awesome!
And thank you for pulling that out for me.
This PC Gamer article does a great job of calling out some of the big improvements in Season 2. Personally, I’m glad I don’t need to beat the campaign to progress in the season.
I finally got to 100. I finished a nightmare dungeon and was 29 xp away from 100. After I finished laughing, I walked out of town and punched one monster.
For reference, I'm pretty sure I was 50 by the end of the first day of the season.
I believe I have all the gear to put together a Lilith killing build so I might try that tomorrow. That's what I was shooting for as a season completion goal but, at this point, I kind of feel like getting to 100 was enough. There is a secret achievement for completing all of the season objectives but I would also need to kill somebody in PvP and I'm not sure how feasible that would be.
I will say, after going back to Diablo 3 for the last new season, I think I appreciate Diablo 4 more than I did before. The only thing Diablo 3 has going for it over 4 right now is that shit just explodes because of the decade of power creep on all of the set builds. Rifts are just as boring as nightmare dungeons to me and at least Diablo 4 has helltide and whispers (both of which are getting buffed) to do for variety.
You should be able to get the pvp achievement with a friend who is willing to help you out. Pick a relatively dead time and go at it. They can help escort you too if need be.
I'm not a PVPer really - I did get that seasonal legitimately fighting off someone who was flagged and attacked me, but was able to help a friend by doing the following:
• Join up as a party
• Travel to a PVP zone
• Leave party
• Find a quiet area, one person flags for PVP and whoever needs the achievement kills the other person
If you decide you want the achievement, that's a pretty quick way to do it
A much better explanation than mine, thanks!
For some reason, I had assumed that you couldn't kill someone in your party. Anyway, that would require somebody else to be online and I don't think I've seen anybody on my friend list or the clan be online at the same time as me within the last week.
So, if anyone is willing to trade PvP kills with me, I'll likely be online pretty late tonight (probably after 10 central) and tomorrow afternoon (probably 2-5 central and maybe later if I can't get the Lilith kill).
For some reason, I had assumed that you couldn't kill someone in your party.
You cannot. There’s a “Leave party” step in my list (partying up in the first place is how I ensured we were on the same instance, though there may be a more elegant way to do that).
I’m not in the GWJ clan but will look for you in those windows tomorrow. (gamertag is tenzochris).
There’s a “Leave party” step in my list
Which I apparently completely missed.
Won't need help with the PvP kill because Lilith is going to take more effort than I care to put in.
Rolled up a Barbarian this evening. Didn't quite get to the point where the new season is making much of a difference in my character, but I like what I've seen so far. Skipping the campaign started me in a different town, which was interesting, and the first quest happened to take me through the new Vampire Helltide so I got to see how that worked.
Considering how studiously they ignored the Nephalim in the main campaign, they sure do seem eager to return to the "early children of Lilith and Inarius" well...
Well it is holding my attention. More than likely because I got my god damned hydra sorc back.
I still don't understand why it took them so many patches to reverse the neutering.
I'm level 37 already after ~6 hours. My highest sorc is 41 from launch. So leveling has been pretty quick. It does seem to be slowing down. So I am concerned that I will still only be able to stomach leveling to the 60's maybe 70's despite the %40 decrease in leveling to 100. It is even on the table that I will still stall in the 50's
I am working my way through a chain lightning sorceress build and having lots of fun. I skipped the campaign and am up to about 25 or 30 and still having fun. Forgot the need to go through and claim all the zones again though to get the region bonuses.
You just need to login to a non season character and your region bonuses will carry over to the season. At least some of them will.
I am running a hydra sorc. I hit 51 and will say 50+ is better. I wouldn't actually say it is "good" and I doubt I will make it to 60. I think at this point I just want to get higher than my main which is a 54 necro.
I may fire up a pet necro as I see some neat things they got this season.
Bonuses including the teleportation circles?
BRB
Nope. Teleportation circles not included.
Not all of them but certainly more than none 
On non-hardcore, map exploration does carry over (though as mudbunny found, most waypoints will still need to be re-activated).
Renown bonuses should also carry over, so if you've unlocked all the max obols buffs, you'll start with a limit of 1000 (for example).
You'll need to earn renown to unlock the gold & XP renown bonuses each season, but I'm finding that happens naturally and those aren't the important bits of renown (at least for me).
I'm enjoying S2 quite a bit so far, and the Blood Harvest events drop stupid amounts of very good loot. 
Not all waypoints are activated but i think everything you've explored is shown. The non active ones show up as grey. First playthrough you don't see them at all.
Ran's got it right. The waypoints show up but they are gray and need to be activated if they are not a major hub or the one right next to the tree of whispers.
I am finding the Whisper chests drop MASSIVE amounts of gold.
And the vampire powers? Stupid cool and fun.
So, it appears I can no longer use pacts to give armor (even those with no pacts on them) pacts.
This really, really makes using the vampire powers impossible.
Edit to add: Never mind. I'm an idiot. It's not like gems, where you drag and drop. You need to right-click.
Each piece of armor does have a limit too. But take heart, you are not the first to have made that mistake.
I am switching from the leveling chain lightning to the endgame chain lightning. Didn't realize there were so many aspects and things to keep track of. I also regret ditching all of my rare items.
blood harvest, blood harvest, blood harvest...
Not only does it give you the resource to level up your blood powers, which is a requirement this season, but an over abundance of gear, and an easy way to complete tree of whisper tasks. Which is where you get your gold this season.
Thanks!
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