What is the best leveling path right now?

[Micronetic]

Hellfire Ramparts, the TBC 5-man dungeon.



Did you follow the guide for this character?

Yes I followed your guide. The TBC heroic solo runs were crazy xp

[Dudas]

Was the friend that was helping you higher level than you? I've only ever gone in solo, so I don't know how the dynamic works for shared experience in a group. It may not be worth it to do those runs in a group.

And yes, chain pulling packs of 3-6 enemies for 2k a mob is definitely better exp per hour than normal mobs+questing. That's between 6k-12k a pull, which takes maybe 10-20 seconds to AOE down. There's virtually no travel involved. And once you get your path down, it's REALLY fast. Basically each pull is like it's own individual quest turn-in. VERY few quest chains are going to be able to keep up with that level of efficiency.

Will try again tomorrow at 75 to see if it was because lvl 72 that I couldn't kill them or because party regarding the xp... if I get your values means it needs 73/74+ to be able to work and solo.

[SirCowdog]

Yes I followed your guide. The TBC heroic solo runs were crazy xp

I asked mainly because it seems like your time was a bit high for only being 84.

- - - Updated - - -

Will try again tomorrow at 75 to see if it was because lvl 72 that I couldn't kill them or because party regarding the xp... if I get your values means it needs 73/74+ to be able to work and solo.

I recommend 74. At 72 you were technically still in the level range to take full damage and not get the overlevel bonus for your own damage. At 73 you're treading the line. But even with the god awful AoE that an Enhance-Shammy has I was able to clear reasonably fast at 74.

This why some classes with really good self healing or damage can start clearing trash early. But 74 is definitely the recommended starting point.

At 75 you should be able to blaze through at speed with few problems.

[shadowmouse]

I've been doing Eastern Plaguelands and I'm thinking of trying out Western too on the next pass. I used to stick with the caravan buff for loot, but I've been going with the 2% XP buff on the theory of "every little bit helps". The towers are all quest hubs and linked by flight paths. I've been doing them as Alliance, but if I recall Horde should also work decently. I'm sure it has been mentioned but I find taking Herbalism and Mining adds a flow of extra XP for just grabbing what you see going through zones, remember that we have an easier time with both now because we can harvest fragments. At least on our servers, nodes being up for multiple people to hit seems to make it pretty easy to mine and herb without having to go much out of your way. Just see something and whack it in passing.

For anyone simply blitzing through for heirloom armor, in that same vein remember that Monks (I suspect it is no accident that Monks are class options for the allied races) get an XP buff early on that can be stacked by parking the character for a few days to fill rested XP. The quest to get the buff is a daily, so I've been parking in a city and doing that along with the cooking and fishing dailies when those aren't too draggy (Thunder Falls may go die).

[SirCowdog]

Afaik EPL is identical for both horde and alliance since all the quest hubs are neutral.

[Micronetic]

I asked mainly because it seems like your time was a bit high for only being 84.

Maybe I was a bit slacking in the 20-60 range I don't know, nonetheless your guide makes it faster! Thank you very much for that!

[Weeps]

Stranglethorn Vale is a really good leveling place because each hub gives you A LOT of quests to do BUT... there are a lot of "back and forth" to the quest hub nonsense. You'll be returning to the same exact area you killed for the quest previous to the one you're on... that's one example.

[Thirtyrock]

[I]
SNIP

I love you and your guide, SirCowdog! I salute you

[SirCowdog]

Stranglethorn Vale is a really good leveling place because each hub gives you A LOT of quests to do BUT... there are a lot of "back and forth" to the quest hub nonsense. You'll be returning to the same exact area you killed for the quest previous to the one you're on... that's one example.

We've argued about STV a lot in this thread. It's good if you can get in while no one is around. But the sheer volume of players makes it difficult sometimes, and you'll probably end up wasting time waiting for respawns. And if you don't get your pathing and planning right, like you said, you can easily waste a LOT of time running back and forth.

I don't know, nonetheless your guide makes it faster! Thank you very much for that!

I love you and your guide, SirCowdog! I salute you

Thanks guys. But I mostly just took what other people were saying and checked it before putting it together in the guide. By the players for the players.

[SirCowdog]

Quick update. Just finished leveling to 60 with a bear druid, hitting each dungeon with random queue up until Dire Maul(because that place is garbage).

It took me almost exactly 17 hours to reach level 60 from level 1. This is using potions, enchants, food, and 50% heirloom experience.

I'm still not entirely sure how whatzisface reached level 60 in 9 hours. I'm beginning to think that must have been a screenshot with either potions, the old RAF, or something else. I just can't account for the time difference, because I'm not exactly a slouch when it comes to leveling.

My zone progression was: Teldrassil -> Bloodmyst Isle -> Darkshore -> the first parts of both Winterspring -> Loch Modan -> Westfall -> and Northern STV.

This means that Method 0 is still the fastest route that I've been able to personally verify @ 13 hours to 60. If anyone can document and provide details of something FASTER than that, I'd love to see it.

[Azerate]

I can't believe how horribly slow Northrend (60+) is. It's just unfathomable. I went Howling Fjord to start with and it's already taken me 1,5h to go from 60 to 61. What is this? Are there any plans to address this somehow?

[SirCowdog]

I can't believe how horribly slow Northrend (60+) is. It's just unfathomable. I went Howling Fjord to start with and it's already taken me 1,5h to go from 60 to 61. What is this? Are there any plans to address this somehow?

That seems unusually slow. Quest exp should be between 11k-14k per quest at that level(I literally just did this today). You should be getting a level about every 20-30 minutes on average. 15 minutes if you're fully enchanted/loomed/buffed and flying, and not screwing around.

Howling Fjord is ass. Go to Borean Tundra, regardless if you're horde or alliance. It's hands down faster. (Boat from Stormwind, or Zep from Org)

Also, I highly recommend staying in the old world until you ding 62. As soon as you ding 60, go train flight then zoom around completing quests on EZ mode.

You can also begin queuing for TBC and Northrend dungeons at 58 iirc. It might take awhile to get a group, but one completion should get you most of a level, if not more.

But to answer your question:. I don't know of any plans to address the speed of leveling besides maybe war mode in BfA. Scaling is still a little wonky. Make it work for you instead of against you.

[Rorke]

Howling Fjord is good if you know which quests to skip and if you have 70 flying. The pirate area in particular is really good for exp, easy quests and a lot of them are close together.

This is from alliance experience. Borean Tundra is better but Howling Fjord is easily one of the best Northrend Zones if you know what you're doing.

[splatomat]

Optimizing leveling? Really?

What about just questing in the zones you like most?

You know, to have fun with the game.

Omg this tired refrain. Please stop saying things like this. You sound silly.

If you've been playing for 14 years you probably have 8+ alts. Hell, you probably have way more than that. Grinding through Stockades AGAIN and Duskwood AGAIN and Stranglethorn AGAIN and Eastern Plaguelands AGAIN and Hellfire Penninsula AGAIN and Shadowmoon Valley AGAIN and Hyjal AGAIN and Pandaria AGAIN and - oh hey, they're reusing Hellfire and Shadowmoon...? - AGAIN...it's a hundred times more tedious than it was to write that sentence. None of that questing journey is fun for some people. None of it is new or novel, and doing it on an Enhanced Space Goat makes it no different than doing it on a Regular Space Goat. It's not new since like 2010 or whatever. It's not new content.

Please just stop acting like this is somehow baffling to you or confusing in ANY. WAY. WHATSOEVER. It's not difficult to understand at all. It's really really really really really really simple. Please just accept that many people don't like doing the same thing over and over as much as apparently you do.

[Brewhan]

leveling 60-80 gave me mild autism i believe. I'm so glad I was able to solo kara trash at 73-81 and save myself.

[SirCowdog]

I play for 13 years and have 20+ characters. And level only if i think it is fun.

Some people just forget that this is a game, and that there is nothing you actually are forced to do.

I"ve posted this before in another thread, but here we go again:

[BicycleMafioso]

Quick update. Just finished leveling to 60 with a bear druid, hitting each dungeon with random queue up until Dire Maul(because that place is garbage).

It took me almost exactly 17 hours to reach level 60 from level 1. This is using potions, enchants, food, and 50% heirloom experience.

I'm still not entirely sure how whatzisface reached level 60 in 9 hours. I'm beginning to think that must have been a screenshot with either potions, the old RAF, or something else. I just can't account for the time difference, because I'm not exactly a slouch when it comes to leveling.

My zone progression was: Teldrassil -> Bloodmyst Isle -> Darkshore -> the first parts of both Winterspring -> Loch Modan -> Westfall -> and Northern STV.

This means that Method 0 is still the fastest route that I've been able to personally verify @ 13 hours to 60. If anyone can document and provide details of something FASTER than that, I'd love to see it.

https://twitter.com/WarcraftDevs/sta...44085551890432 Second heirloom ring (5% here is questionable since phrasing doesn't acknowledge the ring even though it says so in absolute terms), Darkmoon Faire (10%), Guild standard (15%) are things you are missing then?
Raf clearly doesn't work.
Doing Stratholme, dual boxed with a non-capped secondary character (90 in my case), rotating each character's guild standard, cheesing log-offs to conserve time on DMF buff (and also because of the real intent, trying to get a foot into two different servers' enchanting auction houses, something that failed), counting to level 58 instead of 60, so say 12.5 hours, divide by 1.3 (I am assuming those buffs stack additively and not multiplactively), apply luck and cheesing online-time with buff conservation... How far off are we?
And okay, yes, Lunar Festival elders gave a boat load of exp (not sure if that scaled correctly..?) but that is not something you can rely on repeatedly.

I mean, I'm not the fastest leveler in the world. (I still don't know how to quest in Outland/Northrend effectively so I try to dual box that too but that went significantly slower. The revamped older zones are so amazing to level in by comparison, I was groaning when I was leveling past them.) But even I know how to kill mobs in a dungeon.

I also watched someone do a stream of them doing a Stratholme with 4 appropriate leveled characters and one 101 druid with bear tartare (youtube so no vod saved, or at least I don't know how to get to it), and they were getting even more experience than I was. Without the guild standard. Granted, bear tartare is a difference in speed, but they also got more in pure amount, 60% of one level in just the end bonus.

[SirCowdog]

https://twitter.com/WarcraftDevs/sta...44085551890432 Second heirloom ring (5% here is questionable since phrasing doesn't acknowledge the ring even though it says so in absolute terms), Darkmoon Faire (10%), Guild standard (15%) are things you are missing then?
Raf clearly doesn't work.
Doing Stratholme, dual boxed with a non-capped secondary character (90 in my case), rotating each character's guild standard, cheesing log-offs to conserve time on DMF buff (and also because of the real intent, trying to get a foot into two different servers' enchanting auction houses, something that failed), counting to level 58 instead of 60, so say 12.5 hours, divide by 1.3 (I am assuming those buffs stack additively and not multiplactively), apply luck and cheesing online-time with buff conservation... How far off are we?
And okay, yes, Lunar Festival elders gave a boat load of exp (not sure if that scaled correctly..?) but that is not something you can rely on repeatedly.

I mean, I'm not the fastest leveler in the world. (I still don't know how to quest in Outland/Northrend effectively so I try to dual box that too but that went significantly slower. The revamped older zones are so amazing to level in by comparison, I was groaning when I was leveling past them.) But even I know how to kill mobs in a dungeon.

I also watched someone do a stream of them doing a Stratholme with 4 appropriate leveled characters and one 101 druid with bear tartare (youtube so no vod saved, or at least I don't know how to get to it), and they were getting even more experience than I was. Without the guild standard. Granted, bear tartare is a difference in speed, but they also got more in pure amount, 60% of one level in just the end bonus.

A few things I considered when comparing leveling:

Darkmoon faire isn't always available.
Most people don't or can't dual-box or bring a pile of friends.
I honestly didn't even think of the guild standard, but with a 10 minute cooldown it's only going to be useful in specific situations(like the end of a random queue dungeon, probably)

So there probably ARE a lot of things I could be doing to speed things up in perfect, ideal conditions. But those conditions are not always available to everyone. Still, I suppose it's worth noting for people who want to take things to the extreme, and only level characters when the planets align.

[BicycleMafioso]

No, absolutely. I fully agree and stand behind that, but also understand that my humble-brag screenshots also were humble-brag and, as you so correctly pointed out, "when planets align".

That post was more because I got a bit touchy at being whatzisface

[SirCowdog]

No, absolutely. I fully agree and stand behind that, but also understand that my humble-brag screenshots also were humble-brag and, as you so correctly pointed out, "when planets align".

That post was more because I got a bit touchy at being whatzisface

LOL! Sorry! I was a bit out of patience when I posted that. Had been responding to idiots all day and got called into work on my day off too. I couldn't remember your name and couldn't be bothered to dig through the posts for it.