World of Warcraft leveling guide

From AJS.COM

This is my World of Warcraft leveling guide. It is designed to help new players quickly level from 1 to 70 (80 once the expansion lands). First, let's cover some frequently asked questions:

Q: What class should I play?

A: They're all good, for the most part. A pet-using class (warlock, hunter) can be the easiest to solo with; a healer (priest, druid) can be the easiest to get groups with later; a tank (paladin, warrior) can often be ideal for getting mid-level instance groups.

Q: Will I miss out on the fun by leveling too fast?

A: Not at all. You'll go through most of the quests anyway, and that's most of the fun. The biggest drawback to leveling fast is that it can make you feel pressured to go even faster. Just make sure you take plenty of breaks, and don't feel like getting that next level is too important.

Q: I heard that I'll get addicted to WoW

A: Well, anything that's fun can be overdone. Again, take plenty of breaks and remember to keep having a real life. WoW will be here when you get back.

OK, now on to the good stuff:

Contents 1 Mods 2 Starting off: 1-5 3 The big move: 6-10 3.1 Starting areas 3.2 Talents: level 10 4 Moving on: Levels 20-40 4.1 Getting flight nodes 4.2 Horde 4.2.1 Undercity 4.2.2 Orgrimmar 4.2.3 Barrens 4.2.4 Thunder Bluff 4.2.5 Stonetalon Mountains 4.3 Allianc

Mods

You will want to download and install a few "mods". Blizzard provides a way for software authors all over the world to write new tools that work with the game. There are hundreds of such tools, but only a few will be essential to you:

• Cartographer
• Auctioneer
• FuBar
• QuestsFu
• TomTom
• LightHeaded

Install these by unzipping the files under your World of Warcraft directory's Interface\AddOns subdirectory (World of Wacraft installs by default into your C:\Program Files directory).

These mods will do three basic things:

1. Display a more complete and interactive map of the world when you press "m"
2. Manage your quests and allow you to view user comments about every quest in the game from the Wowhead site
3. Track prices in the auction house (the in-game economy between players) so you know what to sell your items for

Starting off: 1-5

When you start the game, the first NPC in front of you will have a quest, and that will lead to others.

Follow these NPC's directions and perform the quests as directed. Some tips for this process:

• Whenever an NPC drops an item that you can use, check to see if it is better than what you have, and use it immediately if it is. At first even items with gray description text will be useful to you, but as you level those will just be useful for selling to vendors.
• Try to complete multiple quests while you're away from the town area, before returning to turn them in.
• Monsters that have a yellow nametag will not attack you unless you attack them first. At first all creatures are like this. Monsters with red nametags will attack you when you get close enough, so be more careful and try to bring them to you if you can.
• If you are playing a melee class (like warrior or paladin), and have a choice between two-handed weapons and single-handed weapons early on, go for the two-handed weapon. Rogues are the exception. Daggers are key to the abilities of a rogue.
• If you use mana, don't use spells too much. Try to hit creatures with spells to start, and finish them off with weapons. This gives you time to get your mana back and be ready for the next fight.

Once you are given the quest that takes you to the next area, go ahead and take it. On the way, there will be another quest which you should take as well.

The big move: 6-10

If you are not a Draenei or Blood Elf, you want to get to their starting areas around level 5 (as soon as the run is fairly safe). Here's a guide for each race (remember to turn in any quests that simply involve going to the next town for free experience):

Undead

Simply run north along the road from your starting area, into Brill, then directly north over the hill, and past the zeppelin tower. Once inside the large fortress-like structure, you will see a statue in the middle of a courtyard. Turn right and go up the steps. Click on the large glowing sphere to teleport to the Blood Elf starting city, Silvermoon City.

Orc, Troll

Run due north along the road from your starting area, through Razor Hill and the canyon beyond. Once you see the gates of Orgrimmar in front of you (you can't miss them, trust me), you want to turn right and head to the zeppelin tower. Go to the top of it and wait on the south platform for the zeppelin (it looks like a boat tied to a hot air balloon) to go to Tirisfal Glades. Once you arrive, make your way down to the bottom of the tower and follow the Undead instructions above for how to get from the tower to Silvermoon City.

Tauren

There are two ways to do this. First, you can ask in trade channel if anyone can port you to Silvermoon City. Just go to Thunder Bluff by heading due north from the starting area, and going through Bloodhoof Village, then type this once you are in the city: "/2 Newbie looking for port TB->Silvermoon. Don't have money for tip yet." It's important that you explain that you don't have much money yet so that people don't get mad when you can't offer anything for the trip. If that doesn't pan out, you can run. Head east along the road from Bloodhoof Village until you cross into the Barrens and enter Camp Taurajo. Now you want to look at this map and plan your run north. You will almost certainly die along the way. That's OK. Ask the spirit healer at the graveyard to resurrect you and continue on your way. Normally that's bad because it damages your equipment, but you're so low level that repairs are cheap (you will want a few silver on you before starting out, so don't spend it on goods in your starting area). Once you get to Crossroads, you want to follow the road north and then east into Durotar and further east into Razor Hill. Then follow the instructions for Orcs, above to get from Razor Hill to Silvermoon City.

Night Elves

Go south and then west along the road from the starting area. to the main city. There is a pink portal there that takes you to the boats. You want to take the boat to Auberdine (ask the dock workers, one of them will tell you which boat is which) and then to Exodar. Once you land on Azuremyst Isle, make your way north to the gates of Exodar and then east along the road to Azure Watch.

Everyone else

All other alliance races are locked on the eastern continent until around level 15-20, so you will need to get a port like the Tauren. Simply run to your nearest city (Ironforge to the north for Dwarves and Gnomes, Stormwind to the west and then north for Humans), and once there type "/2 Looking for port from [city you are in goes here] to Exodar. Too poor to tip just yet." Because you can't tip it might take some time. Just be patient and don't repeat your message any more than every 2 minutes or so (to avoid annoying people who might help you).

Starting areas

For alliance, you will quest from 6-10 in Azure Watch. See the map at WoWWiki for details on the area. For Horde, you will start off at the Ruins of Silvermoon to the west of Silvermoon City (you have to leave the city to the south and travel west if you came from another city). The quests in these areas will lead you through the different places you will need to go. For alliance, this will eventually take you to Bloodmyst Isle around level 10. For the horde, this will eventually take you into the Ghostlands around level 10-12. Overall the Burning Crusade quests should take you all the way up to level 20 and give you much better gear than anywhere else at those levels.

Just gather all of the quests in an area as suggested above. The starting area quests are fairly linear, leading you through a story line that takes you all the way up to level 20.

Talents: level 10

At level 10, you get your first talent point. It's time to think long and hard about what kind of character you want to be while leveling. For some classes the choice is easy:

Hunter

See typical hunter specs for more detail on exactly how to level.

Mage

See Mage specs for leveling for more.

Paladin

See Paladin specs for leveling.

Priest

You want to focus on the Shadow talents unless you're going to be leveling with a group.

Warrior

Anything but protection is fine.

Check your class forum on the official site for more detail on what specs might make sense. This is a decision that will follow you around for a long time, so be sure to put in a little time on choosing the right spec. Ideally, you won't have to re-spec (pay gold to drop all your talents and choose again) until you get close to max level.

Moving on: Levels 20-40

As you leave your starting areas around level 20, you will need to start exploring the world. For the Horde this is easy. For Alliance, it's a little bit trickier, but not too bad.

Getting flight nodes

It's a good idea to run around at this point gathering up what flight nodes you can so that you can travel faster between areas. You will already have your starting city (the city closest to your starting area by race), and you should have picked up the flight nodes in the Burning Crusade starting areas (Silvermoon City and Ghostlands for the Horde; Exodar and Bloodmyst Isle for the Alliance). Follow the directions below to pick up the others that you will need to get started, and then just pick up the flight nodes in each new area that you visit.

Horde

Undercity

Start by going to each city. From Silvermoon City, you can teleport to just outside Undercity. If you're not undead, run forward from the teleporter and then right to go down into the labyrinthine Undercity. Once you get to the elevators, go down and follow the passage out into the open bank area (it's a huge open area with a ring around the outside and ramps down to a central platform). The flight master is on the outer ring. Once you've gotten his flight node, run back up to the elevator and leave the way you came in, but don't go back to the teleporter. Instead run past the teleport area and leave the city. Once outside, you can turn left to run south along the road into Silverpine. Grab the flight node about half way down the zone (about a 2 minute run), turning right after a little wooden bridge. Then run back to the main road and continue south into Hillsbrad. Hillsbrad is a bit dangerous at level 20 (mobs are about level 24-26), but just keep running. If you die, don't worry about it. Just resurrect ("res") and keep going along the main road. The turnoff to the town with the flight node is at a small, partly ruined tower on your left (there's one on your right before that). Turn left up the road and continue until you see a village on your right. Turn right and grab the flight node.

Once you have the Hillsbrad flight node, take the bat back to Undercity and leave the city again. Once outside continue straight up the hill in front of the city entrance to the Blimp platform in the tall, gray building with guards outside. Go up to the second blimp platform and wait for that blimp. This takes you to Grom'gol Basecamp in Stranglethorn Vale. This is a high level area, but you can safely grab the flight node and head right back to the blimp without trouble. The blimp platform has a north and south side. Go to opposite side that you came in (you can talk to the goblin there to ask which platform goes to where). You'll head back to Orgrimmar now.

Orgrimmar

When you arrive, head west to the entrance to Orgrimmar and go north into the city. You'll see a large open area with multiple buildings. Just head straight north past the first building on your left and into the tower behind it. Go to the top of the tower and get the flight node there. Now head west along the rope and wood bridge (if you started in Orgrimmar, you won't need the flight node, but you still want to go up the tower because you're going to leave a different way than you came in). When you get to the other side of the bridge, turn left (south) and follow that path all the way out of the city. You will eventually end up crossing a bridge and entering the very northeastern part of the Barrens.

Barrens

Head south from here until you reach another bridge at a tower. Turn right and follow that road until it comes to an intersection and then turn right to follow the Gold Road south into Crossroads which has the first of three Barrens flight nodes. You might already have this node if you started in Thunder Bluff and ran to Orgrimmar, but go to Crossroads anyway.

From Crossroads, you will make a side-trip. Go east along the road into Ratchet and get the flight node near the docks. If you are doing this at level 20, get the quests in Ratchet that involve going to Stonetalon Mountains. Then head back west to Crossroads again.

Camp T. is south of Crossroads. Run along the road for about 3-4 minutes. You will cross a small bridge and enter Southern Barrens. The camp is a small outpost just west of the road that has 3 or 4 buildings and a road extending west from it. Get the flight node here.

Thunder Bluff

If you are not a Tauren, you will need to run to Thunder Bluff. If you are a Tauren, you already have that flight node, so don't bother.

To get to Thunder Bluff, go west along the road from Camp T. You will enter Mulgore. Keep running along the road until you get to Bloodhoof Village. From there take the road north to the elevator at Thunder Bluff. Get on the elevator, go to the top and proceed forward to the large totem-like tower. The flight node is at the very top of the tower (you spiral around the inside to get to the top). Once you have the node, talk to the flight master and go to Crossroads again. From Crossroads, run west along the road, into Stonetalon Mountains. This will be your last stop.

Stonetalon Mountains

Get the quests at the entrance to Stonetalon, and then continue on. You should run about half way through the zone in Stonetalon. There is a small village west of the road called Sunrock. There's a small sign on the road outside it, but you have to run past a spider to get there, and then through a small canyon in the cliffs.

Allianc

TBD...