5 man multibox team team vs 2 separate smaller teams

[Mmrwowboxer]

I know this may be a stupid question, but I never really played vanilla so I have no idea about anything.

Will it be more efficient leveling 2 separate teams of 2 or 3, then to level a single team of 5 at once? It probably isn't, but how much more tedious do you think this plan would be?

An example would be to level say a Paladin and Warrior to level 20, maybe 30, and then level 3 mages to level 20-30, only to join them up later to make a 5 man dungeon team.

My personal reasoning would be that I find it easier and more fun running small teams of 2 or 3, so I can quest easily and not worry about lugging a whole team around in the lower levels, and then 5 box when the content gets harder.

We are starting from scratch, so I will have to set up add ons, keybinds, macros etc. The early level zones population is probably gonna be insane, so gather quests would be much easier this way too.

[Ughmahedhurtz]

Will it be more efficient leveling 2 separate teams of 2 or 3, then to level a single team of 5 at once? It probably isn't, but how much more tedious do you think this plan would be?

I don't see how doing two separate teams would make anything go faster over the long run. Your kill rate w/5 will be faster and you have less risk of deaths due to higher-level stuff or tripping on adds, so you are quicker on the move through mobs, instances, etc. The only slowdown would be those gathering quests, which (if you're leveling through quests) will be the same speed as you are gated by things like number of people gathering/killing in the area, number of gathering nodes, whether you have run speed, quest item drop rate, etc.

As an example, I was soloing down in the south barrens for the Lok/Kuz/Nak skull quest and those mobs (by the time I got the quest) were about +4 to +6 to me. If I'd have been a full group, I'd just have mowed through there and finished the quest while it was still red to me. Good xp, loot appropriate or even a little ahead of me, etc.

So, I personally prefer 5 in all cases except perhaps one: when you have a mix of classes that cannot start in the same area or that you would prefer to start in another area for better quest progression.

[Mmrwowboxer]

Doing those gathering quest on launch day with 5 toons is gonna be a nightmare... I dunno I'm just hyped for the release and I'm running scenario's through my head. Like I said I personally find it more fun to run a small team of 2, 3 tops but multiboxing is like Jello, there is always room for more.

[Ughmahedhurtz]

Doing those gathering quest on launch day with 5 toons is gonna be a nightmare...

By way of example, I remember a thing that used to happen when I was leveling as a 5-boxer back then. Something like this:

Run out to quest mob area or gathering node area (e.g. mushrooms in barrens).
Start blowing stuff up in job lots.
Soloer(s) come in to kill/gather.
I kill my way through a pack or clear out a node and start looting.
Soloer(s) get annoyed and try to kill faster.
Soloer(s) get ganked by two+ mobs.
Two mobs run back to pathing spot and reset.
I kill those two mobs, loot their quest drops, and continue.
Soloer(s) corpse-run back and /rude @me.
Soloer(s) grab aggro and try to train extra mobs onto me while I'm killing.
/me /whispers @soloer(s) "Thanks for the extra loot!"
Soloer(s) grab even more aggro to try to train onto you but die before they get to you.
Soloer(s) /whisper lots of angry insults because they died and you didn't and corpse runs are long in vanilla. /theymadbro

Sure, the starter and early areas will be pretty packed early on but I would hope Blizzard is getting that feedback in the stress tests and will take steps to attenuate that a bit through increased respawn rates, etc.

[nodoze]

Doing those gathering quest on launch day with 5 toons is gonna be a nightmare... I dunno I'm just hyped for the release and I'm running scenario's through my head. Like I said I personally find it more fun to run a small team of 2, 3 tops but multiboxing is like Jello, there is always room for more.

You may find this post from another thread helpful with your concerns:

Well half the work is done for you already! A guy on the wowclassic subreddit has a fedex/exploration route that gets you to level 10. His profile is (u/awesometographer) Would probably be faster for those gnomes then questing them together. I will be leveling them separately and meeting them up in Mulgore at around level 8 so my kill questing path is starting there. Then around 12 or 13 pushing RFC. I am doing only a single collection quest for a decent ring. Hopefully wed can determine if it slows me down to much. I would recommend looking for odd items (rings or weapons) from quests that outshine others to get before doing dungeons should help with speed. Also if you want to try aoe farming look at wowclassicaoe . com better then guides because you make the choice on what is a really good spot or not.

Based on Christaphonz's recommendation I looked into u/awesometographer's posts in reddit and while I found the sporadic posts in various threads confusing at best I do think there may be a method to his madness...

After doing some hunting/digging I found these URLs that seem to have key aspects of his work/recommendations:

Key Spreadsheet for 'FedEx' leveling: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...it?usp=sharing

A questing planning site he recommends: https://www.vanilla-questing.me/

A JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) that he recommends plugging into the questing site: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1O1m...uDeltXg4T/view

I did all that and it looks really nice for at least my 5box party to hopefully avoid the congestion. Unfortunately for other races the JSON is optimized for Humans but once loaded it could be a start for others. The data in the JSON came from the spreadsheet and the essential info is there for most other races...

[Moorea]

A questing planning site he recommends: https://www.vanilla-questing.me/

A JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) that he recommends plugging into the questing site: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1O1m...uDeltXg4T/view

I did all that and it looks really nice for at least my 5box party to hopefully avoid the congestion. Unfortunately for other races the JSON is optimized for Humans but once loaded it could be a start for others. The data in the JSON came from the spreadsheet and the essential info is there for most other races...

wow this is a nice site ! (https://www.vanilla-questing.me/) and that json has indeed what I was considering doing (got some training doing the Pacifist wow challenge) - thanks for gathering this !

[Lewsifur]

Id say run the five, perhaps some bottlenecks but you can move bag stuff around and keep your gear together as a group. Also as a five, just mow through mobs for cloth etc and come back later for quest bottlenecks.

[nodoze]

Id say run the five, perhaps some bottlenecks but you can move bag stuff around and keep your gear together as a group. Also as a five, just mow through mobs for cloth etc and come back later for quest bottlenecks.

I agree and if Alliance I would use the FedEx spreadsheet to break away from the pack and avoid the bottlenecks (let us know if someone makes/finds a Horde FedEx equivalent):

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...it?usp=sharing

There is a JSON for humans that is essentially the same info as the human tab on the spreadsheet but Gnomes/Dwarves and Elves currently don't have their own JSON (they do have their own spreadsheet tabs with similar info though)...

The trick will be if you are running multiple races. I am thinking of switching from 5 Humans to 4 Humans and 1 Night Elf so I will need to figure out the best way to meet them up. If I followed the JSON route correctly with the 4 Humans I end up in the Night Elf area for Exploration XP so worst case the Elf could join the group then. If I follow the JSON from there and let the Humans Hearth per the guide then I will need to let the Humans sit in the Inn while I figure out how to get the Elf to their Hearth spot. Once the 5 are rejoined I can give the Elf the same Hearth and then they will all be in sync.

TLDR: The 5box team is likely more efficient BUT if you run with 2+ Races you may need to run separate until you get the full band together and then get their Hearth Stones recall locations in sync.

[Baltyre]

As night elf, you could take a look at this : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMpJK-4fLFE&t=14s
It takes 40min for a night elf to get level 4 and be at the human starting zone.

[nodoze]

As night elf, you could take a look at this : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMpJK-4fLFE&t=14s
It takes 40min for a night elf to get level 4 and be at the human starting zone.

Thanks I will study that as well.

So far my plan has been to just do the 4 Humans FedEx style and then pickup the Elf as the FedEx route heads pretty quickly from the human starting zone to the Elf zone (and I could streamline it further to get there faster to minimize the XP gap). From there the Humans are supposed to finish the elf stuff in Darkshore and Hearth back near Ironforge. At that point I planned on the Elf taking the DarkShore boat to Menethil Harbor and use the following shortcut to get to the graveyard near Ironforge which is close to the Human's hearth point:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVjjLozBC2g

This shortcut is essentially the reverse of the one the humans should be talking to get to the elf area:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5sjX0tdHHY

From there I was thinking I would go retrace the human fedex via tram from Ironforge to stormwind and do any quick quests I could for the elf and then hearth back to the humans and they should be pretty much in sync XP and hearth locationwise. Then the party of 5 would continue on the Human Fedex plan... That is the best I have come up with so far.

Edit: I watched the video in 2x speed and it is pretty much the reverse of the human route so that is a great find and very appreciated. I am not sure which I will start first. My understanding is that the human starting area is the most congested so I am thinking maybe I should still start with them and then pickup/meet up with the Elf but I will think further on that.

Thanks again !