Is there a way to target farm low level “leveling” uniques by either restricting the loot pool, killing specific mobs, or farming in specific areas? Can this be done with the nemesis system? LP is not a requirement for this.
I ask because I’m looking to get a Firestarter’s Torch ( https://www.lastepochtools.com/db/items/UAwhMA5SA ). This would work well for leveling my paladin. I don’t have any high level characters or characters in monoliths, and I’m playing off-line.
You have 2 ways to target farm it:
-Prophecies for sceptres
-Nemesis in early maps of the campaign
Both should work, but I’d say prophecies are probably easier and will likely give you LP as well.
Buy it from the AH.
While AH definitely fulfills the “target” part, it doesn’t relly fulfill the “farming” one 
No access to factions as I have not reached them yet. No access to monoliths yet. Is there a way to control or influence what uniques are offered by the nemesis?
No. I think they’re limited by area level only, meaning that high level uniques won’t show up in low areas.
You can ask for someone to portal you to observatory/bazaar depending on which you want (or act 9 Maj’elka and you choose for yourself).
Works particularly great when you are offline.
Use Rune of Ascendance on Scepters.
I actually missed that as well.
This is the OP’s best chance indeed.
Maybe I’m lucky, but I drop a phantom grip ring from nemesis on almost every char during the leveling. But not the fire torch.
You can try target farming items during the campaign, but it’s a waste of time IMO. If you just keep playing you unlock many ways to get an item you want. In MG you can buy it pretty fast. CoF has prophecies. Higher level areas drop more and rarer items, and also more runes of ascendance.
I believe the easiest way will be the classic one. Farm the stolen lance for unique scepter rewards. Get the Increased Sceptre Drop Rate from the Blood, Frost, and Death mono, and unique drop rate from the Fall of the Outcasts (or XP for CoF prophecies). Get to the highest corruption, where you feel comfortable and don’t die often, and sit there. There are also more advanced strats with clever mono web resetting to maximize loot, as well as dedicated gold / favor farm strategies for MG / CoF, but you still need to get to empowered monos first.
Edit: Sorry, missed the offline part before replying
Pfffft, details.
I actually got one on a new character yesterday. It got 2 fire related affixes (fire dmg and fire pen) and it’s for a build that uses that as endgame weapon, so I’m happy with that 
Do you mean you LPed fire dmg and fire pen onto the torch?
I am asking because so far I shied away from using the torch due to its low spell damage.
No, Nemesis gave me one and upgraded it to legendary.
Lucky bastard! I am Level 100 and still use an exalted from early monos.
I checked it, it was actually spell damage and fire pen. Still good.
https://www.lastepochtools.com/planner/B53nZEgA
That’s what I was going to type, but if they didn’t even reach factions yet, I would be surprised if they has one of those already. 
Has anyone done any testing/data gathering on drop behavior/drop rates? For example, I’ve gotten:
The above is just while running through campaign areas. I’m wondering how the low level areas would react to a high level character with blessings and CoF prophecies active that would up the drop rates. This might actually be profitable (to a degree) assuming the above buffs, high level damage, and mobility. Most players won’t do the above because farming monos allows for layered farming efficiency. Also, the devs seem to push out updates to the game that require additional patching which could easily skew the game’s behavior.
Anyway, I was delaying the start of my paladin, but I got lucky. I got the following drops and got very excited about doing a twinked leveling run to 50+ on paladin:
Firestarter would have me pretty well positioned.
Lenses don’t affect drop rates, only prophecies.
Drop rates are tied to area level, so you could go to the level 10 areas as a level 100 character and you’d still only have low level uniques drop or show on nemesis.
Even with the CoF ranks, you’d just get better odds of getting a unique, but the unique pool would stay the same.