Goodness of Monkey Runs - 14M exp per hour x 4

[Mercurio]

I am shocked and amazed at how quickly Monkey Runs level up a team of level 85+ characters.

With WoD approaching, I thought I might look at leveling up a few of my teams that I haven't touched since Cataclysm. I tried a few outdoor spots that people on the interwebz said were awesome and incredible and... I really wasn't excited with the results. Figured I'd run my guys through the two level 85 dungeons and complete the two quests in each for additional exp.

What I found was that just doing the Stormstout Brewery up through the first boss, then leaving the dungeon and requeueing for it again was just crazy experience. I am doing it with an ilvl 565 level 90 hunter and the other four level 85-ish characters helping as they can. The runs average about 2 minutes and 45 seconds over time (including requeueing and reloading) and give about 600K exp for the four followers per run. This is about 14M experience per hour. In about an hour I get four characters from level 85 and zero exp to halfway through level 86. I'm stopping when the followers run out of rested exp and waiting for it to build back up.

There isn't any limit to the number of times you can queue up for a specific dungeon per hour so this works until you get tired of it.

I can't believe how much better this is than doing all those mandatory collection quests in MoP!

Anyway, others might be in a similar spot (leveling up from 85 to 90 in preparation for WoD) so I thought I'd share.

[Xixillia]

This is roughly what I did until lvl 88 or so and then I did the krasarang (i think) and then finished up with the klaxxi quests in dread wastes. Very quick leveling indeed.

[tundra622]

oh wow thank you for posting this!! i was questing up on my teams taking about 16 hours from 85-90. this will cut down on that time quite a bit!!
to bad you need atleast a class that can tank and heal in the group to do this but still better than anything i have so far, you rock

[zenga]

How do you queue up with a 90 in the group for a lvling dungeon? I was under the impression that was not possible.

[Andreauk]

You can if it's a specific.

[Andreauk]

@Tundra662

You can always show up there and reset.. I think the cap on instances per hour has been raised.. I think I got locked out on 8 runs per hour.

[Ughmahedhurtz]

[edit] Nevermind.

Was replying to the sidebar discussion about queueing up for lowbie instances. :p

[luxlunae]

I did this for a few hours today, killing the first boss and then disbanding my group, reforming when I had 3 minutes left on the heroism debuff rinse repeat. I found it alternated well with cleaning the kitchen.

[Wubsie]

I thought they nerfed these? Or was that elemental runs in Temple of the Jade Serpent? Also, is this using any XP buffs? Guild banners, etc?
If not, I might need to set up a boosting group for my shammies with my DK. Did try the bug creatures on timeless before that were supposedly very good XP, but found them to be quite bad, especially on a realm where the 4x lowbies are target practice.

EDIT:

Did try this just now and it does work fairly well I must say. I think I could squeeze in a run + reque in just over 2 minutes with minimal effort. My DK isn't even slightly set up to be a part of a multibox team so I guess there is even room for improvement. Came up with a little less XP per run (tagging issues?) but still a good 4-5% of a level per run at 86, so not too shabby at all.

[Mercurio]

Also, is this using any XP buffs? Guild banners, etc?

Nope, just rested exp for the followers. Still great XP.

[Mercurio]

Boosted a bit more today and thought I'd add a 2.5 min video

Monkey Run for Boosting

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IL4mklPwa58



I found it alternated well with cleaning the kitchen.

I'll attribute the zen-inducing musical accompaniment to Luxlunae.

[Wubsie]

I was doing some random dungeons for the quests on a team I'm leveling (3x Ele, 1x Restosham + Bear droo) and might have stumbled upon a possible alternative to monkey runs: The first floor of Siege of Niuzao Temple. I happened to notice that the Resin Flakes (low-ish health yellow blobs) give a rather substantial amount of XP. On top of that the damage buff they give when they die is not too shabby, so I decided to test it out.

All toons are around 405 ilvl and my macro work is shoddy at best. I'm also not dealing with the reasing weave stuns very affectively. however I still manage to clear the first floor, including the boss in just under 3 minutes if I manage to keep stacking the buff given by the blobs to make sure the boss goes down fast. With rested XP and a guild banner I got 749 890 XP for the run, of which the boss is around 220 000. The strat if you can even call if that was simply to clear all the way around the boss to the last blobs and keep stacking the buff and just AOE the adds down then use DPS coolies on boss. Granted this is with Bloodlust, which could only be used 1 out of 4 runs, but I honestly don't see it being that much slower without it. Especially if you have a geared toon dragging the others through.

Here's a small proof-of-concept video. Sorry in advance for the low resolution, but my rigs has seen better days so recording at full resolution was not an option. Also: This is not by any means played to perfection. I'm mainly yoloing through it since it seems to work out decent enough.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lrLhL87lXn8

[zenga]

I was doing some random dungeons for the quests on a team I'm leveling (3x Ele, 1x Restosham + Bear droo) and might have stumbled upon a possible alternative to monkey runs: The first floor of Siege of Niuzao Temple. I happened to notice that the Resin Flakes (low-ish health yellow blobs) give a rather substantial amount of XP. On top of that the damage buff they give when they die is not too shabby, so I decided to test it out.

All toons are around 405 ilvl and my macro work is shoddy at best. I'm also not dealing with the reasing weave stuns very affectively. however I still manage to clear the first floor, including the boss in just under 3 minutes if I manage to keep stacking the buff given by the blobs to make sure the boss goes down fast. With rested XP and a guild banner I got 749 890 XP for the run, of which the boss is around 220 000. The strat if you can even call if that was simply to clear all the way around the boss to the last blobs and keep stacking the buff and just AOE the adds down then use DPS coolies on boss. Granted this is with Bloodlust, which could only be used 1 out of 4 runs, but I honestly don't see it being that much slower without it. Especially if you have a geared toon dragging the others through.

Here's a small proof-of-concept video. Sorry in advance for the low resolution, but my rigs has seen better days so recording at full resolution was not an option. Also: This is not by any means played to perfection. I'm mainly yoloing through it since it seems to work out decent enough.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lrLhL87lXn8

The 'problem' with this is that you lock yourself to the dungeon by killing the boss, and thus are limited to 10 instances per hour (unless I'm wrong). Whereas the monkeyruns you can queue up an infinite amount of times since you dont kill the boss.

[Wubsie]

The 'problem' with this is that you lock yourself to the dungeon by killing the boss, and thus are limited to 10 instances per hour (unless I'm wrong). Whereas the monkeyruns you can queue up an infinite amount of times since you dont kill the boss.
At least in Cataclysm it did not require bosses to be killed for the lockout to happen. I used to farm leather in the Lost City of Tol'Vir instance and would reset after killing the first trash mobs and would get locked out after a while. So, at least then it was a fresh instances/hour based limit of sorts. Not sure if they've changed it since, so might be different of course.

+ I have no idea how using the que system instead of simply running in and out of the instance factors in to this, or whether it even does.

[luxlunae]

I never hit instance caps doing the first monkey boss, but we all know I don't have the attention span to spam the dungeon ten times in a row anyway. I also wasnt' running in and out, but queuing through LFD, don't know if that makes a difference.

[Mercurio]

The 'problem' with this is that you lock yourself to the dungeon by killing the boss, and thus are limited to 10 instances per hour (unless I'm wrong). Whereas the monkeyruns you can queue up an infinite amount of times since you dont kill the boss.

For whatever reason, this isn't a problem any more. I've run the Brewery at least 30 times in a row with basically the same set of toons multiple times over the last few days and never have an instance lockout. That's including killing the first boss and with a average run time of 2 mins 33 seconds.

[Khatovar]

This was a patch back in April.

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/blog/13021019/547-hotfixes-april-7-4-7-2014

Under April 7th -


Raids, Dungeons, and Scenarios

Each World of Warcraft account can now create a maximum of 10 instances per hour (up from 5).

http://wowpedia.org/Instance#Limits

[Kicksome]

Merc pointed this out in the original post - if you use the "Dungeon Finder" vs just walking in, there's no "reasonable" limit at all.

However, if I have 5 mages - for example, I can't use the Dungeon Finder, and have to walk in, and thus! I am subject to the 10 instance limit.

-Kicksome

[Ughmahedhurtz]

However, if I have 5 mages - for example, I can't use the Dungeon Finder, and have to walk in, and thus! I am subject to the 10 instance limit.

-Kicksome
Yep. "Your group failed the dungeon check because it is not viable." ORLY? I just cleared it in heroic mode. #$&^#*@$^^@$#

[sorrowharvester]

Yep. "Your group failed the dungeon check because it is not viable." ORLY? I just cleared it in heroic mode. #$&^#*@$^^@$#

It would be nice if all characters in your group are on your account or in a guild together or something, it just unlocked LFD.
I guess they want people to be sociable though :)

[Korruptor]

Thanks again Mercurio for help with tanking my team of 4 through some of the Monkey runs the other day! I completed my Alliance team through questing the Pandarian story line to 90 after that.

Now with my Horde team I was thinking of using a WoD 90 boosted Death Knight to do Monkey runs with the other three tagging along. I've been gone a while so I'm not familiar with a DK's current state.

Would this be viable in terms of speed of clearing the instances?
My tentative class line up currently is
UD DK
UD Hunter
Orc Shaman Or Mage ?
Orc Shaman ?

[Mercurio]

Sure, Korruptor, glad I could "boost" your leveling experience :p

As far as the 90 DK leading your team, you should have no problem at all. With a full set of Timeless Isle gear the runs should go pretty quickly. You could even speed it up with weekly Ordos and Celestial kills or even some LFR runs to enhance his gear even further (and have some fun in between boosting runs).

[Korruptor]

I think I worded that badly. I meant, how will would that DK do with just the gear provided from the level 90 boost that comes from the preorder of WoD for boosting the team through Monkey Runs?

Pardon my ignorance. I'm still catching up on a lot of information after being gone since circa 2010. I see that a 90 gets a set of greens and gets dropped off at the Timless Isle. Well I could get some exp for the team while gearing up my level 90 for boosting them the rest of the way. I really didn't want to spend a lot of time gearing one character to boost the team when, in that same window of time, could level the whole team to 90.

[sorrowharvester]

It really doesn't take that long if you spend a few hours there.
See this post (with links)
http://www.dual-boxing.com/threads/51572-Timeless-Isles-Chests-made-(relatively)-Easy

It's what I did for my 90 and then continue to boost my other toons.

Your point is valid though. I get a little tired of pulling them along instead of just hitting LFD with all 5 and running the dungeon, but, it's nice on my lazy days where I don't want to think :)

[hannibal]

I am only getting 1204 xp for the elites and either 120 or 228 for non-elites, all with rested. Did the xp get nerfed or am I missing something? Seems really low even considering the squish.

[Multibocks]

This might be subject to diminishing returns for killing the same thing over and over?