Realistic Leveling expectations and a quick introduction

[Giya]

I just want to start off by saying hi.

Hi...

I just joined the PM team as an app and thought there was some insight that I could share about the legion leveling process. I have been playing the beta extensively since early March. I have leveled quite a few characters to 110 and gone through the gearing process. My last run was a full blown launch trial to confirm my launch plans. The important thing about what I am planning on doing is that I am not looking to do any one thing as quickly as possible. I have set medium-term goals for myself which will lead to long-term success. This involves both a main and alternate character.

Main:
- Complete profession, order hall, and 3 artifact quests as I level. They give decent XP and although it will slow down the grind to 100 slightly I will need to get it done no matter what.
- Level through zones only until hitting friendly with the associated zone faction. At that time I will move on.
- If after completing the above I am not level 110 I will go back and finish up zones to get there.
- At level 110 go into Suramar and hit friendly to open up world quests. Finish the emissary chest as fast as possible. Make sure to do the one which will be ending that day. You can go back to the others later if you have time. These chests are the best source of legendaries based on drop rate over the beta.
- This needs to be done in the first 33 hours after launch (noon Wednesday for WQ reset).
- Some people are trying to rush to complete that first chest in that first 9 hours after launch. I don't feel this is realistic given the almost certain issues at launch. You will also sacrifice your progression in other areas to do this. IMO it's not worth that one chest.

Alt:
- When I have completed above I want to get my alt to the point that I can start doing artifact research ASAP.
- I will also start on the time gated portions of the order hall quests to open up the 3rd relic slot.
- This character will be my farming toon with herbalism and mining. I can funnel those mats to my main to start getting oblitarium.
- At this point, my alt will fall by the wayside while I do what needs to be done on my main. The important two things are happening in the background.

Main:
- Start hammering out world quests and heroics. While waiting for queues run Suramar.
- The dungeons in Suramar are mythic only and drop the BIS necks and rings for most classes. They are a mini set with a bonus. Don't underestimate how long it will take to open these dungeons. The Suramar questline is quite extensive.
- Once I hit i830 which should happen a few days in you should be able to complete regular mythic dungeons in a PUG. If you have an organized group you can do them at i825 fairly easily.
- My goal by Monday evening following launch is to have all the mythic dungeons completed and be sitting somewhere in the i835-i840 range.

..... a week and a half later....

Main:
- by this time I should be ~i850 if things go well. I will have cleared all the dungeons on mythic 3 times and will hopefully have one legendary.
- At this point, I will look at purchasing crafted gear and leveling it up to i850 a few days before raids open. Ideally, the price of oblitarium and crafting materials should have dropped a little. However, if you wait too long there will surely be another spike as people last minute buy to be ready for raids. Also, by this point, my gear will have settled down so I know what will be worthwhile purchasing.
- Even with moderate play my main artifact should be at least lvl 20 with two golden traits and my alt artifact will have 14 with one golden trait. If you are only worrying about one artifact you won't be too far behind. In general, you will stop at lvl 14 on the second which won't hinder your main too much. Realistically, I should have my main artifact at around level 22 without going too insane. Some people may have theirs as high as lvl 24 at this point.
- After raids open aside from doing Mythic+ dungeons and raids you are done with group content. Even doing regular mythic dungeons won't give you upgrades that aren't titan forged. Keep doing world quests for the emissary chest as well as ones that reward AP and order hall resources.

Alt:
- At some point get to level 110
- Keep doing what I need to in order to complete the order hall questline and get that artifact research done. For the most part, this character has been unplayed because the majority of my time has been spent on my main character to ensure that it not only has gear but that it has adequate artifact power for at least 20 traits on the main weapon and enough order hall resources to start the research for the 2nd legendary slot as soon as it becomes available.

As I said previously, this is something I have done already (with the exception of getting crafted gear) while playing on the Legion Beta.

Hopefully, some people will find this useful. There are plenty of min/max guides when it comes to leveling but for most that style of leveling is unwanted and unneeded. If you have any questions please let me know.

[Pretolkos]

Thanks for the insight, Giya!

[Evolutious]

This is good stuff, Giya; thanks for sharing

A lot of what you have posted is exactly what I plan to be doing as well, including working my class hall and professions while I level (it influenced the zone order that I will be following). That is wonderful to hear that it is realistic that we can hit near 850 ilvl by time raids open as we do have some on the team that are heavy hitters and will put in the work to make that happen (not expected of everyone, however).

Oh, and Welcome to the team! I look forward to raiding with you in Legion. Feel free to review the team expectations post and let either of us RLs know if you have questions.

PM Raid Team Expectations for Legion

[Evolutious]

Oh! Also, I wanted to add one thing to this that will help make things faster if you are trying to get to 110 as quickly as possible.

If you have the option, go and queue up 25 quests in Nagrand along with the 3 bonus objectives in Negrand, the 5 bonus objectives in Talador and the 3 bonus objectives in Arak. Turning this all in will take about 10-15 minutes but will give you between 50-60% to 101. Testing this, I was able to hit 101 by time I had my class hall established, which meant I went on and started my class hall campaign right away before going to any zone to start leveling. You do not necessarily need to start your class hall campaign as i will be, but it will still give you about an hour boost in leveling for the cost of about 10-15 minutes.

[Giya]

I won't be able to do that. This was the character I did everything on in WoD so every single quest and bonus objective is done. I will be doing that on my DH which is going to be my farming toon though.

One other thing which needs to be said is that it is very easy to fall out of favor with RNJesus.

My first Hunter at one point was sitting there with an average item level of i842. Now, you may think that's decent. However, my artifact was at i817 because relics didn't exist and I also didn't have a legendary even after 100+ complete heroic runs, 30+ mythic runs, and probably 20+ emissary chests. Since that time I know what world quest rewards were changed to reward relics more often. I also think that something was done to increase the drop chance for your first legendary. The later is speculation though. Blizzard has remained very guarded about legendary drop chance. It's really unfortunate that crafted relics are almost completely useless. It would have been great to see these as being upgradable.

[Danawhite]

Forget ever waiting on queues, it pays off to be a healer and your buddy a tank.

[Proof]

Oh! Also, I wanted to add one thing to this that will help make things faster if you are trying to get to 110 as quickly as possible.

If you have the option, go and queue up 25 quests in Nagrand along with the 3 bonus objectives in Negrand, the 5 bonus objectives in Talador and the 3 bonus objectives in Arak. Turning this all in will take about 10-15 minutes but will give you between 50-60% to 101. Testing this, I was able to hit 101 by time I had my class hall established, which meant I went on and started my class hall campaign right away before going to any zone to start leveling. You do not necessarily need to start your class hall campaign as i will be, but it will still give you about an hour boost in leveling for the cost of about 10-15 minutes.

Heads up they stealth nerfed the xp gains from WoD quests @ lvl 100 into the ground making this not a viable option.

[Giya]

I know they killed using treasures. However, I thought you could still load up your quest log like you have been able to every XPac.

[Evolutious]

The quests front load is fine. I tested this last night and while it will not get you to 105 now, it will still get you well through 100, near 101 in less than 10-15 minutes.

[Linax]

I am not going to lie, leveling seems like its going to be a long grind.

[Giya]

Even if you take your dear sweet time it's at most 15 hours. Most people will easily be done in 12. Leveling this time around is going to be a little longer than WoD

[Mata]

I am not going to lie, leveling seems like its going to be a long grind.

The questing in Legion is some of the best of all expansions. No grind at all.

[Giya]

the first time certainly isnt a grind. i can imagine on the Nth alt it will be though. my only criticism about the leveling process and open world design is that it is far too vertical. because of the very dynamic nature of the terrain you need to run around a damn mountain or something which appears to be just next to you. through regular questing this is ok but if you happen to die there are some truly unforgiving corpse runs. i mean REALLY unforgiving. Stormheim is probably the worst. There have been times when you need to navigate either around or up a massive mountain to get back to it. Sometimes this is so ridiculous that I instead opt to just take resurrection sickness and stop playing the game all together. IMO when a run back is so annoying that you would rather stop playing the game for a while then do it there is a problem. I have made suggestions through the feedback system in game as well as on the beta forums about this but obviously nothing has been done.

[Avellyra]

Forget ever waiting on queues, it pays off to be a healer and your buddy a tank.

yup we have a healer and 2 dps in my group. we are starting a bit later than we wanted to

[Proof]

You really should just level through the legion zones. Boosting straight to 101 means you'll miss out on artifact power from the quests you would do from 100 to 101 and if you plan on raiding competitively the rep from those quests will be quite necessary as well.