Ding! 70!
by Chris Miller 
Feb 6th 2007 at 7:05PM
My warlock hit level 70 during one of the horrendous trash pulls in the Auchindoun's Shadow Labyrinth. It took about 2 weeks, a little over but for the first four days my server was unplayable. I have a few suggestions for those of you who are trying to get 70 in the minimum amount of time spent. First, get out of Hellfire Peninsula as quickly as possible. There are so many people in that zone that I spent way too much time waiting for spawns. Second, unless you are a mage getting powerleveled with the help of a entire guild, quests are the way to go, not grinding and not instances. Finally, my pattern was Hellfire Peninsula to Zangarmarsh to Nagrand to Terokkar Forest to Blade's Edge to Shadowmoon Valley. I did Nagrand first Terokkar Forest was very heavily in use, and I wanted to stay out of that mess. They're about the same level, so it works out. I haven't even been into the Netherstorm area. Why did I skip Netherstorm? I'm a warlock. Shadowmoon Valley is full of demons. I was completely playing to my strengths.
I started The Burning Crusade with about 150 gold on my warlock. I ended with a tad over 1500, not counting green items (sold via my bank alt) but counting all consumables, repairs, flights, and other expenses. Whenever there were quest rewards with no usable options, I picked the 2 handed weapon or the plate armor, those items tended to sell better. Unless you blow all of your cash on tradeskills, you should have basic flying mount cash very quickly.
I managed to find groups to finish nearly all of my group quests on an ad hoc basis. On a couple of quests I got help from in-guild. Now that I've finished leveling, my goals are to finish up all my keys, do some instances, and help the rest of the people in my guild level.
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, The Burning Crusade, Leveling
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Afroloop Feb 6th 2007 8:44PM
Grats. I hit 65 last night, but so far have not been in any rush, I'm trying to savor the moment and do all the quests.
David Apr 11th 2007 3:59AM
Netherstorm is no more filled with demons than Shadowmoon Valley. Netherstorm = BEs and Ethereals.
Ehud Feb 6th 2007 9:09PM
Actually, these days if you're on a medium or low pop server, Hellfire is relatively devoid of people, you'll probably be fighting more with people in Terrokar and Nagrand than Hellfire and Zangarmarsh. I don't have a toon on a high population server, but My alt priest is powering through quests in Hellfire after I had the overcrowding issue with my main.
crsh Feb 6th 2007 10:45PM
"Second, unless you are a mage getting powerleveled with the help of a entire guild, quests are the way to go, not grinding and not instances."
Funny, I went exactly the same way - I must admit I did not bother with any of the pre-70 5-mans to level my rogue to 70; the quests are pretty easy, there are some really good rewards even for my AQ40-geared rogue, and money was just flowing in without even trying (an oh-so nice change on Blizz' behalf).
Even better, BoE drops were sometimes very worthwhile pieces for alts I want to level up to 70 (I honestly haven't tried to sell anything given everybody post-60 gets rewards and drops, I've DEed what my toons could not use for enchanting mats).
Onto my priest now, I think I'll follow just about the same road (and not try to run through Netherstorms at lv63 just to see the scenery this time, those were some costly deaths lol).
Griimnir Feb 7th 2007 3:16AM
Grats on the 70. Undead Warrior here, nearing halfway to 66. I've been doing the same thing, quests quests quests, however I do them slower since i'm a warrior (no scorn, just a fact, warriors are not a very strong class anymore.) and am lvling quite fast, even for me. It's hilarious when you pick up a green and it's better than that epic you farmed MC for, makes you cry sometimes too. Hopefully I can get to 70 within the next week or two, so I can start farming Aldor rep for the Destroyer DPS armor set.
John Doe Feb 7th 2007 4:58AM
Ref: 'Netherstorm is no more filled with demons than Shadowmoon Valley. Netherstorm = BEs and Ethereals.'
Thats what he said in the first place - read the post properly before commenting.
Seltor Feb 7th 2007 6:11AM
I hope the other posters don't think it's necessary to create a newspost just because they hit 70 too...
Pzychotix Feb 7th 2007 6:24AM
Shadowmoon Valley is hardly filled with demons either. In fact, it's even less. At least in Netherstorm, there are multiple Force Camps with nothing but demons. Shadowmoon Valley only has Legion Hold IIRC. The other places are filled with BE's, Draenei, Fel Orcs, and the like.
Mats Feb 7th 2007 7:13AM
I have to agree, Netherstorm is the better place to level, due to it having more quests and more general variation of mobs. Shadowmoon however is packed with wandering 71 elites and to many group quests.
And Netherstorm has more Demons due to having more force camps.
Surtr Feb 7th 2007 8:23AM
I personally feel sorry for you - even if they don't have the best XP/hour, missing out on all the mid-range instances is a loss of a lot of interesting visual elements and nifty experiences. I suppose you can go back at 70 and run them with friends, but that's like going back for a quick run through second grade as a high-schooler. Finger painting's more fun when it's at the top end of your skill range :-)
But then I usually play tank/healing classes. Maybe PUG instances aren't worth the effort for dps classes.
Russel Feb 7th 2007 9:44AM
Just a tip -- if you're picking a quest reward to vendor trash, have auctioneer installed. While some people don't like this addon, it does have the benefit of telling you the Sell to Vendor price on mouseover. Sometimes one of the rewards could net you 2+ gold over the other items when vendoring. :)
Wartoad Feb 7th 2007 10:13AM
I agree, in Outlands, heavy quest grinding nets you more exp/hour than just Mob grinding. I've definately seen that. Plus more profitable. Blizz finally fix that issue.
zeronine Feb 7th 2007 10:18AM
Grats! It's nice to hear that your gonna help other guild members lvl up.
I'll have better luck winning the lottery then getting any help from the highier lvl's
risingstar Feb 7th 2007 10:21AM
"Second, unless you are a mage getting powerleveled with the help of a entire guild, quests are the way to go, not grinding and not instances."
While this is certainly true for leveling, remeber that you get so much more gold when doing quests at 70, you're missing out on at least 4k worth of easy gold by doing the quests.
Todd Feb 7th 2007 10:29AM
I did Zangarmarsh, Terokkar, and Nagrand with healthy doses of Hellfire Citadel, Coilfang and Auchindoun from 60-69, then did pretty much exclusively Shadowmoon and Auchindoun for 70. The big decision for me to go into instances was server instability. Out in the world doing quests, I was getting disconnected for hours on end during primetime for the first week. Inside the instances, we could group and still have fun while the outside world was dealing with world server outages.
I still have all of Blades Edge, most of Hellfire and most of Netherstorm to feed me cash - eyeball estimate is doing the quests late will net me 1500-2000 gold. I kinda dig that.
chris Feb 7th 2007 11:22AM
@14
Yeah, I completely plan on going back and doing all the quests in Netherstorm and finishing up the ones in Shadowmoon Valley. There is a great caster staff reward from a chain quest in Netherstorm that I'm interested in.
jaffer Feb 7th 2007 2:34PM
Wow, weird. Just last night I dinged 70 on my warlock. Stranger yet I followed the same area path (cept flip terokkar and nagrand.) I, however, spent a good portion of time in and out of 5 mans with friends and guildies. I also found questing to be quite profitable, making about 1500 gold from drops alone in the 60-70 jump. I have to agree with those that say it is now incredibly worthwhile to quest-grind, instead of just grind. It makes you tons of money and the best xp comes from those quests.
Clementure Feb 7th 2007 3:25PM
Don’t you think that running the instances first, up to honored rep (when the rep incoming stops) and then doing quests and leveling would get you your keys and attunements quicker than a straight shot to 70?
And now, at 70, you have to grind rep the hard way.
rocketscientist Feb 7th 2007 3:19PM
Oh, I'm hitting all the midrange instances.
The rep grind is much easier when you've got 5 levels on the mobs (I get no resists on anything), new spells, new levels of old spells, and upgraded gear There's no downgrading in reputation reward for having a higher level, and even if there was I can plow through mobs faster, so I can still get reputation faster.
I completed Revered/Cenarion Expedition (as high as I will go, they have no rewards worthwhile to a caster/engineer/tailor) last night. Next up is Honor Hold.
physcho Feb 8th 2007 6:26PM
i would disagree with some of your article
since all your going to be doing once you hit 70 is instance anyway - for the rep, the gear, for well..everything ;p why not start them abit earlier?
i managed to quest till 65 then did basicly nothing but instances till 70 (dinged last night)
Benefits
i still have 70% of the quests in nagrand to finish
still have All the quests past that in shadowmoonvalley that zone north of the marsh and area 52. these quests will now net me gold instead of xp i would have grinded from instances anyway
im revered in 3 of the 4 reps i need for my heroic keys and almost 2 of the other item based rep's
had 6 upgrades to get into at 70 and well better gear than the average leveler on the way up (quest rewards are great but have you seen the drops in old hillsbradD!!)
now the only issue is.. not everyone is part of a guild or group of friends that can set up runs like this. sure you could try pug them, but as my hordie friends found out.. while they area wiping 3 times on a certain boss.. ive alrdy gone and finished that instance and moved to the next one.
so my advice: take your raiding guild and start cracking on your instances! its more fun! you get better rewards ! (rep AND xp instead of just plain ole rep - believe me you'll be farming alot of it anyway)