With the changes in 3.3 instance boosting still viable?

[blbjtb]

Using my pally to gather mobs and AOE them down (slowly im sure but still) is it faster then questing? I would be using existing accounts BTW. Just kind of wondering the fastest way to level this alt team up?

[F9thRet]

I find it is. For example, at lvl 45 or so with rested, it takes about 2-3 runs in scholo on my 80 pally to level each person 1-1.5 levels.

From there at 55 on to ramps, and it keeps going up from that.

Level 65-66, I go out to Valgarde keep, position my toons where the bad guys are coming through the wall, and just tag them, let the guards kill. up to 68 in an hour or two. From there, UK is easy to multibox, as you have your 80 +4 others that you can draw on for firepower.

Stephen

[Drizzit]

i just power lvl my druid 32-60 using instances. When i was doing my power lvling i just made sure that my toons dots on the mini map where still showing and i was getting xp (i am a worry wort so i always have them close).

It depends on your money situation and how fast to lvl them. I had a lvl 32 that i wanted to be 80 (read 60-80 best questing) and found it a lot easier to just buy 1 more account (original $20) and link it to the lvl 32 toon. I then created 2 new toons and at 32 i switched in my other toon. At 59 i made sure my "friend" toon dinged first (1 bar from 60 on other toon, just to be safe) and granted him a lvl so now he was 1 bar away from 61 and just doing the welcome to outland quest i was 61. It took me about 3 days to do, but was looting when i did ZF and Start for cloth. Then i granted my other 32 to lvl 60.

[Kicksome]

I think it's faster from 1-60 to boost, but after 60 the quests in outlands are crazy fast. Especially when you can get a flying mount at 60. Also, at 61 start Qing for AV, that's excellent exp. I did 61-70 over the weekend with 0 collection quests - crazy fast with a flying mount at 60. I think I got as far as finishing Nagrand.

Boosting is really slow after 61, I think you get like 7-8% of a level per instance in Northrend and maybe even Outlands. I was able to get Cold Weather flying at 70 since you can buy it on your main level 80 and send it to the same account on your alt (heirloom item).

Flying in Northrend speeds up questing a crazy amount. I think it's much faster to quest in Northrend vs. Grind instance (unless you are a machine). With flying at 70 - there's no doubt in my mind.

[Drizzit]

what where the changes in 3.3 that affected boosting?

[Ualaa]

In quite a few dungeons, your alts need to be a lot closer to the action, to get experience.
So you cannot leave them parked at the zone in, in say Shadowfang Keep and then go and clear the place on the main.
That kind of thing.

[EsaJunttila]

Yeah, I noted that too in a worst way. In Gnomereggan there is a miniboss who drops nice 2H-mace for feral Druid with 33% change. I did two runs toons in follow but noted that they died thanks to some aoe. Therefore I left them to post and used master loot. Then I get this mace at third run and surprice, I can't pass it to toons. :(

I did 20+ runs in 3 hours (twice waiting for 15 mins a system to allow me enter new instance) and then I gave up. I got second mace at run #12 and that's it. Call that a bad luck.

[Boylston]

I have been powerleveling my 4xPally team up with a Druid since the patch, and here's my observation.

First off, I don't notice any difference in the XP range that has impacted my pulling that much. I have used the following alt-park-spots so far:

Shadowfang Keep: Faces pressed up against the entry gates. 1 spot, no need to move them.
Scarlet Monastery: Cathedral, 2 spots: at the end of the first hallway but inside as I pull the lower courtyard, then second spot is faces pressed up against the waterfall spot between the two walkways up to the top level (for the upper level+cathedral pull). Same as I've always run.
Zul Farak: I drag them with me and kill the first pathway up until you have the right/left split in the zone, then park them there. They are not in full XP range for the entire rest of the instance, but I can drag mobs from the furthest reaches southward a bit into the XP range.

The big change for 3.3 is the AoE damage capping, which heavily penalizes DPS for more than 10 targets. I can imagine that this is a decent nerf to pallies, but it is not so severe for Bears, since swipe can be done on the run.

Using ZF as an example, pre 3.3, I would gather up 50-70 mobs and get them all into one pile and swipe them down mostly all at once. This is still possible in 3.3, but it takes significantly longer (and forces you to deal with the healing totems one way or another). Instead, I find myself pulling using travel form or kitty (for the extra speed) and trying to make a much longer snake-like train of mobs so that only 5-15 mobs are near me at any given time when I start killing. This allows them to take more damage and die faster, so that I can kill off the pack more efficiently than dealing with the cap (and generally allows me to kill them away from the healing totem trail that the casters have dropped).

I haven't gotten them to Scholomance yet, so I don't know if the XP range will impact the gate parking spot right before the first room, but I suspect that clearing that place will be fine from an AoE perspective since I can just swipe spam and never have too many loaded up at once.

I can imagine Pallies and DKs are at a significant disadvantage since they have to stop to drop consecrate and other AoE skills, but Bears aren't terribly impacted. It's still WAY faster than questing, in my opinion, and you don't have to deal with any of the gear issues until they are done.

My personal plan is to grind out ZF to 45, Scholo to 55, maybe a few runs of Ramps/Blood Furnace until they hit 58 and can Hellfire quest, then add in my level 64 DK and start instance runs+questing the rest of the way. Personally, I think I will have a significant learning curve in the outlands instances since I am a complete DK newbie. I figured the team composition isn't even worth trying out whole-heartedly until the pallies are 60+ and have divine storm.

They sure do look cute in their Mail from SM, though!

[Lepz]

Yea, Boylston, it's pretty much like that for me too. I did however get to do Scholo, and I can sure say, that went faster than I expected. The best part is you can keep them parked right at the start, and never move them. I got over a level each run until 55 and then i started getting maybe.. 70%, I took them to 59 however, and my runs didn't last more than the required, 12.5 minutes. I didn't know you could keep them parked at the entry gates, I am about to do SFK so I am glad I read that, thanks.

[Boylston]

Good to know I won't need to move them. My newbies just hit 45 last night and I'm starting Scholofarming this weekend...

[drevil]

(max range changed from around 310m to 250m)

i boosted my 4 pala toons this way - 3.5 days played without RAF or rested XP

Quests 1-14
Deadmines 14-19
Stockades 19-22
Scarlet Monastery 22-40
Zul'Farrak 40-45
Scholomance 45-55 (best booster ever)
Hellfire Ramparts 55-62
Sethekk Halls 62-65
Utgarde Keep 65-70
AV+Quests 70-80 (quit AV if takes over 10 min)

.

[blbjtb]

(max range changed from around 310m to 250m)

i boosted my 4 pala toons this way - 3.5 days played without RAF or rested XP

Quests 1-14
Deadmines 14-19
Stockades 19-22
Scarlet Monastery 22-40
Zul'Farrak 40-45
Scholomance 45-55 (best booster ever)
Hellfire Ramparts 55-62
Sethekk Halls 62-65
Utgarde Keep 65-70
AV+Quests 70-80 (quit AV if takes over 10 min)

.
LOL this makes me love you right now =P what kind of toon did you use to do your boosting though?
Edit* Question would it be better to send them to the zones a little bit earlier? like ZF @ 35 instead of 40? does it make a difference? do you get more xp if your more in level range?

[Boylston]

I recommend the following:

Quests 1-10
SFK 10-20
Scarlet Monastery 20-35
Zul'Farrak 35-45
Scholomance 45-55
Hellfire Ramparts 55-58 (Blood Furnace is also a wonderful place)

Hellfire Questing at 58-60 to gear out everyone

Either quest or continue to BC powerlevel from there.

[blbjtb]

Thanks Boylston hehe I was thinking that it was gonna be a nightmare to get them gear lol cause all they are going to have when they hit Hellfire is their shoulders chest and weapon hehe. How is your 4 ret and a dk coming along?

[drevil]

LOL this makes me love you right now =P what kind of toon did you use to do your boosting though?
Edit* Question would it be better to send them to the zones a little bit earlier? like ZF @ 35 instead of 40? does it make a difference? do you get more xp if your more in level range?

tank was a T8 prot pala.

yes you get more XP for a larger level range, but it's all about the dungeon layout and mobs.
SM is better for boosting till 40, even if you can enter ZF with 35.

btw only loot bosses, saves so much time and mobs under 70 won't give much gold anyway.

[Boylston]

Thanks Boylston hehe I was thinking that it was gonna be a nightmare to get them gear lol cause all they are going to have when they hit Hellfire is their shoulders chest and weapon hehe. How is your 4 ret and a dk coming along?


The team is slowly plodding along. I have 2 small kids plus a newborn, so my playtime is pretty limited these days!

I had a L64 DK from a past powerleveling experience, I made him solely so he could help a single warrior I was powerleveling get group XP bonus. I have played him only very occasionally, but he's standing by to lead the team. :)

I also have an old paladin from long ago (used to be my Pally tank for the quadbox shamans) that is L70 and geared up in Ret stuff, waiting...

So the three little newbies just hit L55 last night, and I made one quick run of BF with my bear tank to get them a little XP.

Plan is to get them to L58, run hellfire quests to make them not quite so naked and maybe skill them up a little bit, then I will probably merge everyone together and start putting together macros and instance running. Team should then look like:

64 DK
70 Ret Pally, 60x3 Ret Pally

I figure there's no point in doing instances until there is 4xDivine Storm available to heal the DK. Unsure if L70 pally will out-threat the DK tank, but I figure I can always throttle his DPS back with a gimp weapon or something.

I have an option of subbing in an 80 warrior with 232ish gear for the ret pally and instance powerleveling the 64 DK and other pallies, but I think I'd rather quest or do level-appropriate instances than do too much more powerleveling.

I'm excited to be able to catch the new pallies up near the DK and at least try some DK+3Ret battleground action...


So... Long winded answer. Short answer is they still need to be caught up a bit and geared.

[Ghallo]

tank was a T8 prot pala.

yes you get more XP for a larger level range, but it's all about the dungeon layout and mobs.
SM is better for boosting till 40, even if you can enter ZF with 35.

btw only loot bosses, saves so much time and mobs under 70 won't give much gold anyway.


This.

ZF is horrible for boosting imho because you have to move so much and the healing totems really suck up time. You'll eventually down the mobs, but I found myself actually having lowbies wand the totems just to speed up the runs. SM has nothing like this and you can burn the whole instance very fast. Here's the trick for SM:

Clear the first little hallway in Cath.
Run your team to the end near the arch to the courtyard and park the lowbies (not too close, don't want them to aggro)
Run your main to the Cath door avoiding as many mobs as you can.
Open the door, run straight to Mograin and aggro him.
With Mograin in tow, make a small circle in the upper courtyard area. He has a "shout" that will aggro all the other mobs up top.
I usually park at the top of the waterfall, with my back to the ledge. I can then see everything but nothing can get behind (regardless of level, mobs behind can't be blocked/dodged/parried and that means less mana for my pally).
Kill everything up top and Whitemane will run out to res Mograine. I then jump down and run a circle around the lower courtyard - again with the bosses in tow the aggro radius is much larger so I can quickly pull everything to me.
Wash, rinse, repeat.
Really, there is no better XP/Time than SM :)

[wougoose]

I actually prefer the following boosting route, and have had my best times /played:



1-10 Questing
10-20 SFK
20-45 SM

20-40 SM Cath/Armory
40-45 SM Cath only (Log out to wait for reset timers)


45-58 Scholo
58+ Outlands


My reasoning is simple. The amount of time it takes to move instances and change pulling flow/etc doesn't make sense. I found that my times were best when I did the minimal amount of instance swapping, and RAF summoned toons between instances...virtually eliminating travel time. 40-45 in SM is the slowest, but it is still faster after you factor in moving your toons. Not only that, but SM Cath is much easier to deal with imo than ZF.

Following Fenril's videos (http://www.dual-boxing.com/showthread.php?t=26813), you can still leave toons at the entrance of all of the above zones by changing the following:


SM Cath: Pull Mograine back to the stairs right in front of the double doors. Kill him, wait for his rez, then pull the entire instance to the beginning hallway.
SM Armory: Pull Herod all the way to the bottom of the stairs and kill that first group. Pull the rest of the instance to the entrance.

I'll try and get a good guide up soon. It took a few teams and some recording to get it to what I feel is the most efficient I can be. Many thanks to Fenril, his videos are excellent paths and only take minor tweaking post 3.3.

As far as AOE nerfing since 3.3, I didn't really notice much with my 80 paladin boosting. Consecration still hit for 280 a tic to all targets, no matter how many there were :)

[blbjtb]

(max range changed from around 310m to 250m)

Utgarde Keep 65-70
AV+Quests 70-80 (quit AV if takes over 10 min)

.

how did you boost in UK those bombs rape my teams face or did you only use the tank?

[drevil]

how did you boost in UK those bombs rape my teams face or did you only use the tank?

well if the enemy group only has 1 bomb-npc (forgot the name), simple nuke him.

if you face 2 in a group, you have several choices:
- attack only with tank
- slaves self heal thru the damage
- move slaves right/left, if the bomb (debuff) icon shows up

remember that you can stun, silence, etc these mobs :-)


and always use LFG TOOL for super fast dungeon reset :-)

[Frausty]

(max range changed from around 310m to 250m)

i boosted my 4 pala toons this way - 3.5 days played without RAF or rested XP

Quests 1-14
Deadmines 14-19
Stockades 19-22
Scarlet Monastery 22-40
Zul'Farrak 40-45
Scholomance 45-55 (best booster ever)
Hellfire Ramparts 55-62
Sethekk Halls 62-65
Utgarde Keep 65-70
AV+Quests 70-80 (quit AV if takes over 10 min)

.

3.5 days to ...80? without RAF? veerrrry nice

[Frausty]

I find it is. For example, at lvl 45 or so with rested, it takes about 2-3 runs in scholo on my 80 pally to level each person 1-1.5 levels.

From there at 55 on to ramps, and it keeps going up from that.

Level 65-66, I go out to Valgarde keep, position my toons where the bad guys are coming through the wall, and just tag them, let the guards kill. up to 68 in an hour or two. From there, UK is easy to multibox, as you have your 80 +4 others that you can draw on for firepower.

Stephen

Do you get full xp for the kills just by tagging? hmmph, must check this out!

[F9thRet]

Do you get full xp for the kills just by tagging? hmmph, must check this out!

Hi Frausty, It seems to be full xp. I tried it again earlier, with two pallys at around 63-64. Was easy clearing a bar every 5-10 minutes or so.

Stephen

[mikekim]

i have just done 63-68 on my locks by running Sethekk Halls 34 times.
the locks only had to be moved once throughout the whole instance (the second location is the 90 degree corridor just before the first boss -Darkweaver Syth) this gives you XP throughout the second half of the instance.
I also managed to get the 22sp ring from 50 spirit shards while doing the grind :P

68-70 will be a case of questing in Northrend. 70-80 will be a mixture of Questing, AV and instances