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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsForum post of the day: Born with a plastic spoon
by Amanda Dean 
Aug 18th 2008 at 2:56AM
Aside from players that are bitter because they missed out on Recruit-a-Friend benefits, is there anything wrong with this program. Kuahs of Kil'jaeden has encountered problems with raising enough cash to keep up with gear and ability upgrades. He has a level 70 character, but rerolled with his recruit on another server. He can't simply send money down from his main, and is sitting at level twenty-two with level twelve abilities.
Many posters suggested sending down money from a main character, which isn't so helpful on a new server. Others made the usual suggestion of gathering skills for sale on the auction house. While this is a good suggestion, mining and herbalism will suffer the same problem of being outpaced by leveling. There is always the option of begging for gold in major cities, though I personally don't recommend this method.
My other concern is that the massive bonus to experience points will be detrimental to new players actually getting WoW experience. Not only are they leveling at a blisteringly rapid pace, but they also are also always joined by someone with more WoW time under their belts so that they don't have to learn how to get themselves out of sticky situations. Then again, the pattern that I've noticed is that recruits are infrequently new players. Most of the people recruits I know are actually secondary accounts by veteran players or folks looking for a good time to come back to the game.
In most cases, folks will roll on their main servers with this new system, which eliminates the problem. I'm afraid the RAF bonus will encourage gold buying in the end. What suggestions do you have for folks outpacing their gold production with their experience?
Filed under: Leveling, Making money, Alts, Forums, Forum Post of the Day
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 4)
matt Aug 18th 2008 3:38AM
Gold exchange rates dropped pretty low after SSO dailies and such. Maybe this will push them back up? (While pushing account-sell prices down. :P )
Shawndra Aug 18th 2008 3:39AM
OK, so you took a gathering profession, or two. If you only play with your buddy, and you only have time to level, this does leave you at a loss. My husband and I have found that, unless we take the time out from the leveling to grind up our gathering professions, we are broke.
I really believe this is a great program to help get your friend, who would otherwise feel left out of the fun, up to a level where he/she can join in in a hurry. But it does require a support system. Whether that is a high level character bank rolling the skill ups, or some time taken out of the hurried leveling to pick Peacebloom for copper... We find we prefer the former.
geneve Aug 18th 2008 3:41AM
Yes, you out-level your professions pretty fast, but thats okay since you are always grouped with the other person for questing.
If you have some free time when your leveling partner isn't around, head back to a zone you've done (where the mobs are grey) and grind your herbs/skinning up.
I rolled my alt on my main server, but it's actually a really fun way to hoard up herbs for my deathknight's inscription.
Have the new person pick up enchanting and mining, and you've got dust to sell from quest rewards and any random greens, as well as ore which always sells fairly nicely.
Moongoose Aug 18th 2008 3:44AM
It is interesting that it's now so easy to level that it's difficult to support paying for the things you need while you level, i.e. skills, supplies.
Yes, grinding gathering skills can make it easier to afford those things but it's not exactly fun for all, and things that aren't fun don't help to keep new players.
I'm sure Blizz will fix this problem with adding mounts at lvl 10. They'll also let everyone being with 12 slot bags filled with food and some sort of tokens you can redeem for skills.
Memzer Aug 18th 2008 4:25AM
Making enough gold for your mounts is not at all an issue with the current economy on most servers.
While raising your level make your primary professions mining and skinning. Make sure you level the professions as you level. AH virtually everything (even stone from mining sells, engineers need it).
Keep a close eye on any 'bind-on-equip' items you pick up while you're questing. If you see an item with any of the following:
Cloth: +int; +sta
Leather: +agi +sta
Mail: +agi/+str +sta
Plate: +str +sta
Sell it on the auction house. When you're trying to work out how much to sell them for just have a quick look on the Auction House for the price of items with similar statistics in the same level range. Generally though for greens:
Lvl:Price
Larry-Steve Aug 18th 2008 4:49AM
I recently rerolled my first Hordie on a PvP from playing Alliance PvE (Horde leveling's harder, that's no longer a debate for me) and I took mining and skinning.
Skinning seems to be the best way to go, as you will normally have something in every zone that you need to kill for a quest that needs to be skinned. Mining can be difficult, but if you make a rule for yourself, it's not so bad. I actually picked up mining, skinning, and all the secondaries because I'd never actually had maxxed skills as I was grining and always wondered if it'd go faster should I have worked on these skills.
I know with 3x exp, things are going A LOT faster, but I found that if you shoot for 5 profession levels per 1 level, you can stay in the right ballpark. I'm leveling with a friend as well (no, we're both active players and cheap, so no 'recruit a friend' bonus for us) and during that 10-20 min break he takes to get food or what have you, that's when I get those 5 levels.
Ironically enough, all skills except mining are way beyond my '5 levels per level' idea with mining still making the most of my money at the AH. It may sound rudimentary and 'noobish' and I believe its even a tip on a loading screen, but SELL EVERYTHING. Not just whites you recognize as rare; not just the mats you've collected; EVERYTHING. I've gotten as much cash for selling raw fish, cooking raw whites, old bags, and extra cloth lower than my current FA skill as my ore and leather.
The only thing that can be annoying is spending a good 10-15 min at the AH checking prices, which should be allieviated by an AH addon. Or if 3 NE rogues decide to infiltrate into the UC and kill all the auctioneers. One day... when I'm 70... I will kill... your acutioneers...
Wimpkin Aug 18th 2008 4:47AM
RAF is a good idea period.
It's a marketing stratergy from the boys at blizzard to get a crutch to new players so they don't lose intrest when they first start out making it seem like they are achieving something in record time.
Although i don't know who the hell that is in the article but they are obviouslly noob/newb due to the fact that can't even afford spells or abilities every 2 lvls.
But what I think has happened is they have made lvling so easy people are skipping huge chunks of quests in areas thus missing out on gold from completing the quest and the vendor trash from the mobs they'd have to kill to complete the quest thus removing a large chunk of their lvling revenue.
This making it fast an easier to lvl crap needs to stop here, although tbh i don't think it will. they may even introduce the ability to create a lvl 50-69 character if you have a lvl 80...
Which is when I'd decide to re-think playing the game even though I Love It, and it would be all because of the Mindless Drooling Handicapped Casual on and off players. Which plague many good game titles. People like that should just stick by their demi-god Nintendo and not disturbe us normal players from having a good time.
Seriouslly Casual on and off players should have no right to have any input into development, seeing as they only play it for 30mins a month!!?!?
What about us True Gamers, the real people who enjoy and relish in good games. Who love playing them. We are the real victims of dumbing down games and making everything so much easier, Blizzard needs to stop now they have the largest player base ever, they need to stop making WOW easier and start making it better e.g. more complex, more RP, More PvE, More LORE...
Your Lovingly
Arch Mage Wimpkin (the 3rd)
xxxx
Kieran Aug 18th 2008 5:23AM
"Seriouslly Casual on and off players should have no right to have any input into development, seeing as they only play it for 30mins a month!!?!?"
They pay the same monthly fee we do and use much fewer server & network resources. Why wouldn't Blizzard love them?
If you want more of a say in things than casual players, you should lobby Blizzard to charge by the hour, not a flat monthly fee. Sound good?
Lios Aug 18th 2008 4:56AM
For new players I don't think it's a good thing. They indeed don't learn how to play properly and have a huge money shortage. It's also harder to find quests appropriate to your level, as you pass up on a lot.
For old players it's bliss. Me and my husband bought 2 extra accounts and are leveling 4 alts at lightning speed and giving 30 extra levels to alts number 5 and 6 :-) Money and experience are not a problem as we already have a few 70s, even leveled before 1-60 became easier.
I want 9 70s by the time WotLK comes, so this helps a lot ;-)
Guy Aug 18th 2008 2:20PM
i disaggree
altho a few turned grey on us. me and my wife(doing the same thing u guys r) did every quest in elwynn,westfall, and redridge.(i skipped the cooking quest, cause farming double livers,snouts,eyes,etc IS a pain but she did do all 4) we even did deadmines quests. we just hit 30 and r right now in darkshire inn about to start darkshire. atmitedly this isnt the BEST way to lvl seeing as alot of mobs r now coning green to us and im sure we could skip deep in STV but u dont HAVE to miss quests in zones.
Radiophonic Aug 18th 2008 5:13AM
It's important to get new players to high levels quickly so that they can join us at 60-70, play with us in instances and not know a damn thing about their class. (end sarcasm)
Ever play on a private, high-rate server with a bunch of level 70's who wipe in SFK? Let's hope those who have been recruited don't wind up like these people.
Leandar Aug 18th 2008 5:40AM
Your leveling at triple speed and then QQ about not having enough gold? You are spending less time leveling so you can spend more grinding proffs. I think the mount and summoning was all the RAF needed, faster leveling just means that they get annoyed when leveling their second alt and have to spend time and have no idea what to do.
Sivar Aug 18th 2008 7:31AM
Nice typo on the picture. Will "worr" for gear.
Cute.
Tridus Aug 18th 2008 5:44AM
There's a ton of things wrong with this program, the main one being that its really a cash grab to get people to pay for a second account for a mount and cheesy fast levelling.
If any new players actually do get it, they're going to be in for a very rude awakening once they hit Outland and the XP bar suddenly fills up at 1/9th its previous speed. Not to mention that they're missing half of the game by going so fast.
If Blizzard wants people to bypass Azeroth this much, they should make an option to just start at level 58.
kritical Aug 18th 2008 5:59AM
Make trial account,
Dual box your level 1 lowbie summon when you have alot of quests to turn in.
The thing is 1-60 content is hopelessly outdated especially for those of us with a fair few alts. Unless they make the 1-60 lightning fast for all people will stop rolling alts with the prospect of 80 tough levels ahead.
Imo a cumulative xp boost based on number of high level toons would be a good solution.
hpavc Aug 18th 2008 6:24AM
Who did this guy gift levels from, his other level 20 alt? Sounds like anti-RAF BS to me.
uncaringbear Aug 18th 2008 7:27AM
I recently rolled a new toon on a PvP server just to see what it was like, having spent all my previous time on a PvE server. Sure it wasn't as easy leveling up without a cashed-up main to help, but getting gold was not an issue. I took up mining and skinning, and by the time I hit 39, I had over 600g. There is simply no excuse at all for anyone to complain about making gold. The only reason to not make gold is because you're lazy.
Merry Aug 18th 2008 7:29AM
My husband and I recently got second accounts through the Recruit-A-Friend program, as we're trying to level up the characters we always wanted to play (but didn't want to play enough to go through 70 levels). We're both double-boxing two characters - one on each account, obviously. The increased XP gain is nuts - in about 4 hours of play time, we went from 1 to 17. Of course, we're both experienced players, and we know where to go (and where not to go).
We've found that you do quickly outtrain what little money you get from leveling. Neither of us, though, want to take time from leveling to level a profession - we'll powerlevel one at a later time. So we're bankrolling these alts from our main characters, and it seems to be working out well. And it's a great way for us to spend time together!
Jimmy12 Aug 18th 2008 7:46AM
Unfortunately this is just another friendly reminder that Blizzard's primary objective with WoW is to make money: the more players there are, the more money they rake in. If Blizzard can prove in the boardroom that RAF will translate into greater profits then they will quite happily go for it even if it is a flawed system that may be detrimental to other aspects of the game. And the only reason they want players to reach 60 is not so that they can join those already between level 60-70, but so that they can sell more copies of TBC and eventually WotLK.
Yes, unfortunately Blizzard is just another corporate that is milking consumers for as much as they can.
If they were really interested in touching more people's lives with WoW, then perhaps they should lower the monthly playing fee? That way, everyone gets the same playing experience; and everyone, both old and new players, benefit - oh wait, except for Blizzard.
RedBoyke Aug 18th 2008 7:48AM
one of the ways of preventing wow gold if blizzard puts a cap on how much an item is worth on the auction house. Selling an epic for 4000gold is just asking for people to buy gold.Blizzard should fix this so the markets are equal on all servers. it' s the auctionhouse that makes people buy gold.they are many unexperieced players that buy all there gear from AH those are actualy the same people that go begging in the main city's for gold to buy something they dont need.