First off I am new to the Diablo/Dianlo 3 community. I have never played Diablo 1 and 2. So even though I have well over hundred hours of in game time in Diablo 3, I have never played the other two games. I am no expert in this game or it’s lore and I do understand this has a very old following and long history. This suggestion is therefore meant for beginners like me and I am willing to take any advice you senior players might have.
First I play one of my NPC’s to the end of the game so I can have lots of gold and jewels. I have already maxed out my jeweler and blacksmith and you should to, my opinion. I have started taking every Saturday as a maintenance day. I take all my NPC’s unload all their jewels into my stash. I then use one NPC to update all my jewels to as high a level as I can. I also go over all my gear and sell, stash or give my blacksmith any gear I do not need. I take time to look each of my six NPC’s over to make sure they are at their strongest and meanest. I also use this time to make sure my follower is at his/her best. After all this is when I get rid of any of that gear I do not need. It is now that I decide which NPC’s I am going to play and load for the next week and I only load my best jewels. One more thing if you finish at least one of your NPC’s you have many advantages for your other lower NPC’s.
This is just an ideal I have that works for me, nothing more. BTW as an old Skyrim fan I love this game. Sorry for not using the proper Diablo language.
First off, welcome to the Diablo 3 community, Nephalem!
A bit of friendly advice for you–combining/upgrading any gems below marquise or imperial grade is actually a waste of time and resources. Once you hit level 61 with any of your characters, the imperial & marquise gems pile up fairly quickly. And since there are no level requirements for gems, your lower-level characters can also use them.
Getting all your artisans (Haedrig, Shen, & Myriam) to max level (12) is always a priority.
I’d suggest that instead of worrying about a maintenance day, you should focus on getting any one of your characters to level 70 and properly geared (full class-specific set and supporting legendary items or Legacy of Dreams build) and use that character to farm gold, crafting materials, and blood shards for your other toons. (Having a somewhat ranked up Boon of the Hoarder legendary gem helps a LOT with cash flow issues!)
My personal preference for a speed-farming build is a Demon Hunter with the Gears of Dreadlands build–it has a wicked fast move speed, is reasonably tough, and deals out a good enough amount of damage for farming. There are other effective speed farm builds as well–check out Maxroll for ideas.
It sounds like you’re having fun doing what you’re doing the way you’re doing it, and I wouldn’t want to you play differently and not enjoy the game.
Send me a friend request and I’ll be glad to play with you and help you out. I’m on PC, Americas servers. Happy hunting, Nephalem!
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No problem.
But, just so you know: In any game, NPC is an acronym for Non-Player Character. This could be a game Character that temporarily joins us for a Quest, our Follower/Hireling, a Vendor or just someone that helps populate an area. They are not directly controlled by us. They are controlled by the computer game AI.
The Character we play is referred to as Player Character or PC. But, since PC is also an acronym for Personal Computer, we usually just say Character when referring to the Character we’re playing.
Welcome to Sanctuary! 
Good D3 RNG and good hunting! 
Asᴋ ɴᴏᴛ ᴡʜᴀᴛ ʏᴏᴜʀ ɢʀᴏᴜᴘ ᴄᴀɴ ᴅᴏ ꜰᴏʀ ʏᴏᴜ;
ᴀsᴋ ᴡʜᴀᴛ ʏᴏᴜ ᴄᴀɴ ᴅᴏ ꜰᴏʀ ʏᴏᴜʀ ɢʀᴏᴜᴘ
I do not hide from my enemies.
I do not run from my foes.
I seek them out; I hunt them down;
and then they’re quickly disposed.
~ 𝑃𝑒𝑟𝑢𝑠𝑜𝑒
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You missed the most important first step:
Go into Options and enable Elective Mode (which it seems you have not done). And while you are there, enable Advanced Tool Tips.
Once you have completed the campaign, you should switch to Adventure Mode as soon as possible. Also, the best way to level your alts is to get one character built up enough so it can breeze through T16 rifts and bounties, and do mid-to-high level GRs (70+) in decent time. You will be able to farm gold and crafting mats much better at those levels, which will help you other characters far more than if you level all of them up simultaneously.
There are no level restrictions for gems. Once you have a level 70 character and are able to craft flawless royal gems, the lower level gems are obsolete. That is yet another reason to get one character to 70 as fast as possible.
If you are spending an entire day for maintenance, you are doing something seriously wrong. Other than learning the class skills and runes, their gear becomes obsolete quickly as you level up, and will be replaced often. No need to keep them. Cube or salvage the legendaries, and salvage the rest.
You certainly have your work cut out for you if you are trying to raise all 7 Classes simultaneously.
There are so many skill and gear options that your brain may explode keeping up with them.
Classes are divided into Dexterity, Strength, and Intelligence.
If you narrow the focus, you will find that gear for one of a related class can help another.
Ex: Monk&DH, Wiz and Necro/WD, Barb&Crusader.
Some gear will cross over. e.g., An Echoing Fury that dropped for Monk can be enchanted at the Mystic to change Dex to Str for use by a Barb.
As was mentioned in an above post, almost all of the gear that you find on the way to level 70 will end up either salvaged or extracted to Kanai’s Cube and any Gems below Marquise level will be sold.
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