1-50 Leveling in Pre-Patch/Shadowlands

[z0k]

I spent some time on PTR and wanted to share what I know about leveling in pre-patch (so far) since this information is kind of disjointed.

1-10:

Everyone gets access to allied races. Allied races start at level 10 now. No matter what. If you don't give a shit about races, this is the obvious choice.

For non-allied races, there's a new starting zone. When you create a new character you get to choose between new starting zone and the character's natural starting zone. I did the horde one, it was pretty neat, I recommend doing it at least once. It took me 90 minutes to get through the horde starting zone, roughly. There were very few pickup quests. I would probably always choose the new starting zone since the questing experience is more similar to the new quest styles that are easier on us. I don't have any numbers to compare it to on leveling 1-10 through the other starting zones. My expectation is that they would take a little longer. Most of them have at least 1 or 2 annoying pickup quests that might be tough to skip when xp gets normalized.


Death Knights:
DKs still need to do their starting zone, and start at level 8. The exception is for Allied race DKs start at level 10 and instantly go to their main city hub. You'd have to really hate yourself to spend the time doing the DK starting zone.

DH:
There is no allied races for DHs. The starting zone isn't bad, but you also start at level 8.


10-50:
You are not married to the expansion you choose. In fact, you can swap your adventure on a total whim. The dungeon queues available to you change immediately and Chromie is in the middle of the Stormwind and Org. You don't get flying until level 30. Fast Flying isn't until 40. Please keep this in mind as you think through the possible strategies here.

Someone is going to figure out the absolute quickest path. I don't really care much about being 100% fastest if I'm being perfectly honest. I'd much rather do it in a way that keeps me sane rather than sleuthing to take 30 minutes off my 12-16 hour leveling experience. There are 6 options. You'll notice there is no "classic" option As you level from 10-50, more dungeons from each expansion will come open. Please keep in mind they're going to re-balance all of this content. I am assuming the balance of how difficult/quick things are today will be the same as they are in prepatch. It's all being done based on mathematics, so while the spectrum may change, every dungeon's relative place on that spectrum is unlikely to change(personal anecdote).

BC - Some dungeons are really quick/easy, some are very difficult or long. At first you'll get ramparts, blood furnace, and slave pens. 10-20 will be very easy in BC, but at 20, the harder dungeons start to come out.

Cataclysm - This option grants you access to the Classic Dungeons as well as the Cata dungeons. Best part? They're separate queues. You can go from 1-50 spamming normal classic dungeons. Classic dungeons are quick and easy for the most part.

MOP - Potentially viable. MOP dungeons were kind of long. Even if they weren't particularly difficult. In some cases they're not balanced well. I kinda remember MOP as being Mists of Pickup quests. I've done Hyjal from 80-90 for the past few months, so I'm not sure I will ever touch MoP unless someone gets creative and comes up with something neat for it.

WOD - The WOD starting is amazing. You can also fly there now whether or not you got pathfinder. This could be viable depending upon how the bonus objective quest xp plays out. Keep in mind you can just skip past the Garrison part.

Legion - I can't think of why you'd put yourself through the weapons questline if you didn't absolutely have to - I suppose this could change, and that stupid questline no longer becomes required. Pathfinder no longer required.

BFA - Pathfinder still required. You do not get flying at 10. I know these dungeons very well. Most of the dungeons are a total joke at normal difficulty if you know them. This could be a fast path if you got Freehold carries in. Freehold spamming may fall into the sleuthing category and for some reason I'd rather have 3 paladins on one account on one server than level 4 characters at once instead of 5.


Please share if anyone knows anything beyond this, I can update the OP.