Low-level dungeon quest experience nerfed
by Alex Ziebart 
Nov 30th 2010 at 5:30PM
ZarhymWe are applying a hotfix today to all level 1-60 dungeon quests for Kalimdor and Eastern Kingdoms dungeons which will significantly reduce the amount of experience they award.
While dungeons should remain integral to our evolving storylines, and great places to collect gear in cooperative environments, we need to make sure each player's questing progress remains relevant as dungeon quests are completed. In many cases we're seeing players enter dungeons to complete quests, only to come out ahead of the leveling curve for the zones they're in.
This change should allow players the opportunity to reap the benefits of running dungeons, while not outpacing the leveling flow from levels 1-60. At this time there are no plans for making any adjustments to dungeon quest experience for Outland, Northrend, and level 80+ Cataclysm dungeons.
You can find a list of all of the latest hotfixes here: http://us.battle.net/wow/en/blog/1232869
While dungeons should remain integral to our evolving storylines, and great places to collect gear in cooperative environments, we need to make sure each player's questing progress remains relevant as dungeon quests are completed. In many cases we're seeing players enter dungeons to complete quests, only to come out ahead of the leveling curve for the zones they're in.
This change should allow players the opportunity to reap the benefits of running dungeons, while not outpacing the leveling flow from levels 1-60. At this time there are no plans for making any adjustments to dungeon quest experience for Outland, Northrend, and level 80+ Cataclysm dungeons.
You can find a list of all of the latest hotfixes here: http://us.battle.net/wow/en/blog/1232869
Filed under: News items
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 7)
Avan Nov 30th 2010 5:34PM
Not to be "that guy," but shouldn't this have been noticed back when this patch was on the PTR? Or while the beta was active?
NekoDaimyo Nov 30th 2010 5:56PM
Optimally, yes, it would have been caught then. However, it is most likely that on the beta/ptr, people were spending the majority of their time on the 80-85 characters, and not levelling lowbies.
Vociferouss Nov 30th 2010 6:03PM
really i as with a lot of blizz changes i fail to see who blizzard fail to see this problem with PTR or beta... come zeh uck on.. are you sleeping
Aris Nov 30th 2010 6:21PM
There's a lot of things you just can't get a good feel for how they play until they go live. PTR and Beta players represent a very small fraction of the total player base. The majority of the stuff I saw being reported from the beta all revolved around how play was at level cap, specifically in heroics and raids. So it seems that most people probably played either high level premades or copies of their high level mains. This means that you now have only a small percentage of that initially small fraction actually leveling toons through the old world. Once it went live without the new high level content, millions of alts suddenly started flying through levels and they got a much clearer picture of the curves.
Additionally, there's always tweaks to numbers after things go live. Look at casters immediately after the patch. Even after fixing them, they still just had to refund talent trees on the healing classes to balance heals. If you're annoyed by the leveling nerf, look at it for what it really is, a balance. Like shadow priests and the short lived SW: Death spam, leveling has been dialed back so it isn't quite so OP now.
Avan Nov 30th 2010 6:34PM
The SW:D nerf could have been done better. Spam it too much and you kill yourself. Any good healer worth their salt would notice that you're suddenly losing 23k every 1.1 seconds and just let you die, or at least tell you to stop wasting their mana. The problem would have solved itself!
Yomamma Nov 30th 2010 6:42PM
Is everyone reading something different than I am? The XP nerf is just to the quests for the low level dungeons. Run dungeons all you want to level....you will only be nerfed on the quests associated with them.
brammage Nov 30th 2010 9:38PM
It wouldn't hurt to nerf dungeon XP a little harder. The other night I gained two levels in a single run of Deadmines. Un-rested, no +XP heirlooms.
I'm actually going to turn off XP for a while until I get caught up on quests.
NecDW4 Nov 30th 2010 11:30PM
Not to be that guy either, but since the entire old world experience has been streamlined cant we just go back to the classic experience instead of the buffed rewards and nerfe reqs to actually slow things down in general, especially with all the heriloomed out people running around.
Yeah, people who've done it before can probably blast through a bit faster but newer people would probably benefit from the added time to learn their class. Unless we want the whole "wrath baby" thing to happen to cata too.
thatguy Dec 2nd 2010 11:07AM
Boo. And I am already "that guy" so you are off the hook.
bloodfyr Nov 30th 2010 5:35PM
I like this change. On my first post-Shattering alt, I had to make the decision to not run dungeons at all. Even a single BRD run was enough to push me into a new zone halfway through the one I was in. I still want to run dungeons, but I want to quest in the new world as well. I don't think it should be an either or thing.
Owachi Nov 30th 2010 6:05PM
How is it "either or"? What is preventing you from doing the quests when they turn green or gray after a dungeon run?
Prophetik Nov 30th 2010 6:24PM
I'm with you. I ran a couple dungeons, did a few quests in my 10's/20's and it really screwed up the zone leveling pace. Big fan of this change.
Maribel Nov 30th 2010 6:51PM
Me too. After I completely leveled an alt past Northern Barrens with three dungeons, I decided it was time to stop running randoms. I haven't bothered with heirlooms, either.
Nipah Nov 30th 2010 7:16PM
Indeed... I've been trying to run each dungeon once using the LFD, mainly because I want the loot bag + drops + quest rewards, but I ended up skipping quite a few (and removing my heirlooms on my Mage) because I was leveling too fast and out pacing the content.
I'll go quests when they're green, but once they go grey it feels like I'm a highschooler running around punching children in the face.
When the mobs aren't even giving XP anymore, its time to move on to a different zone...
Jonathan Nov 30th 2010 7:26PM
I'm on board for this change as well. I'm finally getting around to leveling a Paladin and dungeons are killing the curve even at low levels. I've run three dungeons total and combining that with heirlooms, I've effectively leveled my way to close to 25 without leaving Azshara which means I'm going to be effectively skipping a zone to Stonetalon. I COULD do the grey/green quests as mentioned above, but that's going to feel pretty broken and boring when I'm over-level. The point of all this new content is to experience it at level.
Helston Nov 30th 2010 7:26PM
@Owachi
It's an either thing, because before the hotfix you would be outleveling your questing content if you ran a single dungeon. In a run of Deadmines, I gained almost two full levels with absolutely no XP bonuses. I returned to Silverpine Forest, only to find that my quest log was full of green quests, and although I stuck with them, it took some time for the green quest log to finally become yellow.
PonTelon Nov 30th 2010 8:04PM
Just hopping into agree. I hated that two dungeons moved my yellow quests to grey in Silverpine. ><
I'm still worried that normal XP gains from dungeons will still cause a problem. I hope this change will be enough for me not to fear the dungeon finder. Being afraid that I'll outlevel faster than I already do.
Tomatketchup Dec 1st 2010 3:18AM
I'm an incredible altoholic and I level a lot of characters merely to get them to level 80 (yeah, I know..), and suprisingly I'm completely ok with this. In fact, I think this is a great idea. I do like questing but it feels kinda wrong that after healing through Deadmines once my character suddenly was 3 levels higher than my average mob. It was easy and well-suited for a disc priest DPS but it just felt not-so-challenging. I really look forward to this change.
Cheeselandman Nov 30th 2010 5:35PM
Thank god. I know not many share my opinion, but I like to experience as many zones as I can before leveling up. I like the stories the quests tell, and some of the writing for the quests is absolutely stunning. This way, I can run instances that belong to certain zones and not feel pressured to abandon the quests at the end.
Schadenfreude Nov 30th 2010 6:52PM
This. My new tauren priest positively catapulted to 45 in this past week and I've been playing for a few hours at a time. Doing dire maul once got me a level, and I got another when I turned in the five dungeon quests. Wow.