A few of my heros were made this way. I think it was my sentry or jugg that got no kills till I was LVL 52 so I have experience doing the complete opposite as well.
The biggest problem is it's more efficient to be where the people are so you get xp faster. Even if you see 5 people on rag on a good map you are better off going into a almost full normal server.
Now as you found out I'm sure even if you can't join the main run on the I'd as you are not LVL 32 or 39 just join it with a hero that can. At one point I had a lower lvl for normal + hard and had one over 39 for rag.
One thing I would want tested is beginner servers as I guess if I did this today I would try to stay on them till I have the xp for hard. So I would be LVL 27 ish and need the xp for LVL 32. Am I wrong thinking that could be a lot faster if anyone played on the beginner servers.
The biggest problem is it's more efficient to be where the people are so you get xp faster. Even if you see 5 people on rag on a good map you are better off going into a almost full normal server.
Now as you found out I'm sure even if you can't join the main run on the I'd as you are not LVL 32 or 39 just join it with a hero that can. At one point I had a lower lvl for normal + hard and had one over 39 for rag.
One thing I would want tested is beginner servers as I guess if I did this today I would try to stay on them till I have the xp for hard. So I would be LVL 27 ish and need the xp for LVL 32. Am I wrong thinking that could be a lot faster if anyone played on the beginner servers.