World of Warcraft: From Zero to Hero

This guide walks you from level 1 to level 60 as horde or alliance - where to go, what to do, and what to avoid.

This guide is not meant to be used for your first WOW character - better to just play the game, explore, read the quest text, enjoy the story and have a good time the first run through. Don't worry about how fast you level or anything else, just have fun. Nothing beats the feeling of your first Griffin ride, for example, so take in the sights and have a good time. You can pick a PVE (Player vs Environment) server for this run - its basically a very fun RPG game that allows you to team with other people on quests.

Once you have had your initial toon's fun, and you want to create another one (an "alternate") and want to power level, then this guide is for you. This guide is also geared for PVP (Player vs Player) - so its not for the squeemish - be prepared for battle.

General Principles for Power Leveling Getting down to business, there are some principles to adopt to power level:

Always know your XP per hour. Power leveling is about shooting up from 1 to 60 as fast as you can. Knowing your XP per hour is a critical piece of knowledge - it will help you choose areas to "grind" in that provide the largest bang for the buck. Use Cosmos's clock which shows you XP per hour very easily. Use the MFO WOW FAQ for how to get Cosmos, Thottbott, WOW world map, and other goodes.

Bum cash or load your toon with money ("Twinking"). Having a few G of cash when you are level 1 is HUGE. It is critical to get good weapons and armor as soon as you can. A buff level 5 acts like a normal level 8 player - get the gear and upgrade your gear constantly. You may need to bum cash from friends or send some over from another toon you have.

Also, if you don't have a cash influx, you will waste a *lot* of time generating basic economy to upgrade spells - its a serious time sink if your trying to power level. 1G minimum, preferably 10G or more to power you past level 20 quickly. The process of getting yourself uber gear or enchantments is called "twinking" and can work wonders (+100 health on chest and Fiery Weapon that hits for up to 200 damage per fight at level 25? nice).

Another power strategy - have an alt parked at the AH and use it to get equpiment for your power leveling toon (then use in-game mail, of course). This saves you the trouble of trekking back to the AH all the time and becomes very handy when your toon is not on the same contienent as the AH (starts to happen often around level 25).

Know where you are going. You don't want to be exploring or searching for quest locations. Know exactly where you are going. Two things make this happen: (1) use the WOW world map (see our FAQ for a link) - it shows all areas, all fly points; and (2) use Thottbot.com's quest search feature - you can easily pinpoint the exact location of NPCs and quests. Use Cosmos's coordinate system in conjunction with Thott to get exact in-game locations as you play.

Queue up the Quests When you are in the Barrens, for example, you can be doing 6 to 8 quests at the same time. In addition to monster kill XP, you gain a massive boost in your XP per hour by turning in quests fast and furious. Your mindset is key - you have to be aggressive and working on many at once. If you only do one at a time, you are going to take way too long to level.

Be +2 levels for Questing. If you want to sail through quests, be +2 levels from the monsters in your quest areas. You kill faster, take less damage, and motor through... Remember, its about speed, not ego.

Run as many instances as you can (once that is). If you can afford the sequential time (need to block out about 4 hours to assemble a team and complete an instance), then by all means do them! Good cash, quest XP, and item drops. If you can instance often, you will gain about 5 levels in your journey to 60, just on instances... rockin.

Don't be afraid to Grind. "Grinding" is sitting in one spot and killing the same monsters for a long period of time. If you are in a spot where questing is not overflowing, you may have to just grind it out for a while. Of course you will be monitoring your XP per hour, so you can properly evaluate grind spots.

Copyright 2006 Steven Golden