Heya guys!!  So one of the biggest things about leveling any toon in WoW is “What spec do I use?”  Believe it or not, it is one of the most common questions out there.  So lets dip into this question briefly?

Why briefly?  Well, I full intend on a massive post about this in depth later.  So let’s just stick to the highlights for now eh?

Level 55-58

You are basically working through the DK specific quest lines here and can spec however you wish, but as you will hear me say throughout this entire post avoid Frost like the plague (pun intended).  Using either Blood or Unholy will suit you fine.  The strong points of each coming later in the post.

Level 58-70

OK, so you actually have a few options here.

1. Random Dungeon Queue as Tank – depending on your Battle Group you will see varying results in this level range.  If you get instant queue times, this will be crazy efficient with the random bonus rewards.
2. Power Level – You can easily 2 box (or run 2 versions of WoW at the same time on your own computer) if you have 2 accounts.  Just go to the BC instances and start burning through them.  You will level stupidly fast.
3. Questing – If you’ve got 20% exp bonus from heirloom items and have an idea as to what you are doing, this might be the fastest way to level in game now.  With the in game quest help it’s hard to ignore this as a viable option.

IMHO power leveling yourself with 20% exp bonus from heirloom items is the fastest system out there.  But depending on play style, questing play style, etc…you may find better results with a different system.

Level 70-80

Power leveling becomes less of an effective direction to take by this point.  While doable, you’d be better served taking the other two options.

1. Random Dungeon Queue as Tank – You will get instant queue times making this crazy efficient exp with the random bonus rewards.  Heirloom items just makes it that much more ridiculous.
2. Questing – If you’ve got 20% exp bonus from heirloom items and know what you are doing this should be the fastest way to level.  It is important to note however that if you spend a lot of travel time and “poking around time” not exp’ing, then Random Dung’s will be far more efficient in the end if you’re a quick tank.

Personal Experience

I leveled up a 2nd DK on my server a few months back.  Her name is Skeleton Jill, and she is a Blood Tank.  I personally was unable to take advantage of Heirloom items as I had to make this on my 2nd account with my old shaman Bigeasy.  Since I only had 1 80 (Skeletonjack) on my primary account, I was boned.  Though from doing enough random dungeons I did get the heirloom shoulders at level 76.

• Lvl55-58 I did the DK quest line.
• Lvl58-70 I did the Power Leveling.  I used Jack (primary account) and pl’d Jill (secondary account) through BC instances.  I also ended up bringing along several guildies and pl’ing them for several levels as well.  I found that Sethek Halls was by far the most efficient dungeon to use after trying a bunch of them.  If you look at that armory link you can see how many times Jill kill x end bosses.  Or even look at Jack considering he never did those instances until Jill.
• Lvl70-80 I did the Random Dung que.  I purchased the mats for a full set of the green BoE Cobalt tank plate pieces (8 total).  From then on all I did was level up in dungeons.  I only ever left to pick up a quest for a dungeon and to get flight paths.  I did one quest at level 70 to get a green LK quality weapon, and that was it.  Pretty sweet when you think about it.  I never even had to quest or grind an area once.

Spec Notations

So the first note is avoid Frost like the plague.  Seriously, do not go there.  Yeah, yeah…you CAN level as Frost just fine.  But a Holy Priest can level just fine as well.  But that doesn’t mean you should fricking do it now does it?  Frost tanks are not gonna be on par with Blood tanks, and Frost dps is inherently subpar leveling due to the extreme lack of hit on leveling gear.

Tanking

If your goal while leveling is to tank, go Blood.  What?!?!  SJ is pushing BLOOD?!!?  NOT UNHOLY!?!?  ZOMG!!  The world is ending!! 

The fact of the matter is I started off tanking as Unholy.  And then after one level of it I swapped to Blood and the difference is night and day in a 5man.  Running Recount I often found myself doing 50% of the total healing of the 5man healer.  Yeah, 50%.  So if he did for example 100,000 healing for the entire run (including healing other people) I would do 50,000 healing on the same run just healing myself.

Often times when the healer dc’d, needed mana, or I just pulled without realizing the healer was AFK I would survive on a full pull so long as I understood my mistake early enough.  Popping CD’s with the massive amount of self healing, comboing in a Death Pact/Raise Dead while Vampiric Blood up, and Death Strike spam usually = win.  Not even talking about AotD when needed.

DPS

Go Unholy.  For the love of God just please listen to me for once and don’t think you know what you’re talking about.  Because you don’t if you think anything levels better than Unholy.  Yes I understand Blood has the least downtime of all of the specs, staying nearly at full health permanently.  That’s good, but it’s not as good as Unholy.

Of note in Unholy are 2 major talents often overlooked.  And when I say “Often” I really mean almost ALWAYS.

On a Pale Horse and Improved Unholy Presence set Unholy far and above well beyond any other leveling spec in game if you are DPS’ing and not staying in dungeons.  It will shave off hours, literally hours (possibly days depending on your play style), from your level time.  Because you ALWAYS get to your destination faster.  You get to the mob to loot it quicker.  You get to the quest turn in faster.  You get to the next zone faster.  You get to the mob faster.  Etc…

The thing you have to remember as Unholy while leveling is to use Death Strike (even though you have the nifty Scourge Strike) and to pull packs of mobs (3-8+) at a time.  The strength of Unholy (besides movement) is massive AoE dmg.  You can literally kill twice as many mobs as Blood can at the same time.  So while you might have a bit more downtime than Blood, the improved AoE killing capacity more than beats it.

Talents

1. On a Pale Horse
2. Improved Unholy Presence
3. Desecration
4. Morbidity
5. Improved Death Strike
6. Bloodworms
7. Heart Strike

In order those are the most important talents (from a leveling perspective only) for a DK.  If you are a tank in dungeons, 1 & 2 don’t count for squat.  So following that list if you take the first 4 it means you will be Unholy spec for DPS.  However if you are a tank (ignoring 1 & 2), you can then see you could just skip 3 and by going Blood get every other talent.

Summary

Per normal I expect to see varying cries of condemnation to these opinions.  But they won’t change one thing.  That I’m right.  *smirk*

If you’re tanking, go Blood.

If you’re dps’ing, go Unholy.

If you go Frost, you’re Wrong.

-Suffer Well Brothers and Sisters…

Tags: Power Leveling

So you wanna level Blood? I say go for it. No really. The Death Knight Blood talent tree has a lot of great skills that’ll help you level your Death Knight. Since the Blood tree has both DPS talents and self healing talents, you’d still be able to do enough damage to get you through quests without skipping the self healing talents that’ll help you solo a lot of content. Also if you take on some skills from the Unholy tree you’ll also be able to throw out some AoE.

The upside to leveling Blood is that with all of the self healing talents you keep your health bar green.  Which means less time spent eating or bandaging, and you can save on pots. The downside is that the loss of Unholy Blight, Impurity, and Ebon Plaguebringer from the Unholy tree means that Blood’ll do a little less AoE damage. But by grabbing DPS talents from the Blood tree it is going to hurt when you land a hit.

The Spec: 41/13/17

Since this is a leveling spec, you’ll see that a lot more of the talents chosen out of the Blood tree are DPS based. But Geist, why? Ok, I’ll spill. When you’re leveling you’re grinding mobs for quest items. And without a good amount of DPS you might as well be running around naked and hitting mobs with a club. Not that there’s anything wrong with that if that’s your thing, but safe to say it’d take a LOT longer.

There’s also some spots where self healing talents are taken over DPS talents. Why’s that? Well unless you’re lucky enough to be running as a meat shield for someone leveling a holy Priest, then let’s face it. You’re gonna take some damage. If you take less damage though, you’ll see less downtime and be able to outlast some of those nasty elites that you’ve gotta plow through.

This build also dives into the Unholy tree to pick up some of the same favorites used in the Unholy Leveling spec. By hitting talents that buff AoE damage like Epidemic and Outbreak, you’ll be able to throw out Pestilence after landing Icy Touch and Plague Strike. This’ll make the diseases last longer (more damage) and boost the damage you’ll deliver when you hit Blood Boil. You’ll also have Corpse Explosion to hit as the bodies hit the floor. The bonus to this is that you can still take on a pack of mobs. The downside is that without deep Unholy talents you’re not going to see the mobs drop quite as fast.

The build also picks up talents like Death Rune Mastery that’ll give you a better chance to use Rune Tap to self heal when you need it. It also hits skills like Subversion and Bloody Strikes that’ll let you dish out more damage. Once you get up to Sudden Doom in the talent tree, you’ll also be able to toss out free Death Coil’s whenever Death Trance pops.

Now hitting Rune Tap is a little controversial. I mean you could use that talent point to beef up some DPS if you’re going to be leveling with someone who can toss some heals now and then. But yeah, let’s face it, most of the time you’re probably not going to be leveling with someone.  And as a Death Knight, you don’t have to. That’s the beauty of DK’s. When running solo, RT is a nice addition to the rest of the self heal talents in this build while also giving you extra tools when you take on some of those elites.

This is your Rotation:

1. IT -> PS -> HS -> HS -> OB -> DC

2. OB -> HS -> HS -> HS -> HS -> DC

If you do not have the Heart Strike talent yet, sub HS with Blood Strike until you get it. You’ll also want to substitute Obliterate with Death Strike if you’re health gets low, or if you do not have Annihilation yet and the mob is over 30% health.  Until you get Annihilation, OB is reserved for finishing off mobs basically.  Realistically you will use DS the vast majority of the time leveling to ensure that you stay high health. You can also use your Death Runes to fire of DS’s when needed. 

This is your Rotation on AoE:

1. IT -> PS -> Pest -> DnD -> DC

2. DS -> BB -> BB -> DS -> DC

Why the difference? Here you’ve got Death Strike in the rotation as a default to keep you’re health up because you’re getting hit more often. When the self heals kick in you can trade Death Strike out for Obliterate to finish off mobs. Oh and don’t forget that you’ve got Corpse Explosion as well.  The moment mobs start dying, you’ll want to hit it.

From Cradle to Grave:

For this build you can start off filling the Unholy tree first to get On A Pale Horse (and get those quest turned in faster), as well as buffing your AoE abilities. Since you’ll be leaving Archerus in a full set of blue gear, you shouldn’t really have a need for the bulk of the Blood tree’s self healing talents until you get a little further into the Outlands. You will have Rune Tap on hand pretty quickly in the build though, so you won’t go totally without healing when you need it.

Then the build works it’s way up into the Blood tree for additional damage, a Stamina boost via Veteran of the Third War, and the self healing talents like Bloodworms.

1. Level 58 – 32/0/17

2. Level 67 – 41/0/17

3. Level 80 – 41/13/17

And Fin

In closing you can level just fine with a Blood spec. While you may not have the same AoE damage you’d have using an Unholy build, you’ll still do some serious damage and level up quickly.

-Geist

Tags: Geistig, Power Leveling, Specs

Personally I’m a big fan of the Unholy talent tree. I’ve tried them all, but always come back to Unholy. Each one of the trees has pros and cons when leveling. A big con with an Unholy build is that you don’t get a lot of the self healing that you’d get from the Blood tree or that sexy burst damage from the Frost tree. Nope, leveling Unholy is all about steadily killing anything dumb enough to aggro. Oh I love that!

So here’s the benefit of Unholy leveling – Area of Effect (AoE) baby! This tree is all about bringing the pain to anything in range. Sometimes this even includes frogs, Eleks, Clefthoof, the random Elite mob… I think you get my drift. The downside of an AoE build is that sometimes you’ll end up pulling one more mob than you’d planned. The thing about the Unholy is that you can pull that one extra mob AND NOT DIE. (Insert evil laugh – here)

The Spec: 19/0/52

Some things you’ll notice about this build are that it skips Summon Gargoyle and picks up talents like On A Pale Horse and Anticipation. This spec also runs over into … bum bum buuuuuuum… the Blood Tree. Why? Well let’s start with the Unholy side and then get back to the Blood.

Ok, so in the last build for Dual Wielding we picked up Summon Gargoyle, but this spec doesn’t. It’s really more of a gimme talent because while leveling you will tend to not use it. In this spec you want to stick with 2 Handers, Axe, Sword, Mace, whichever. You want it to be slow and you want it to hit *hard*.

By dipping into the blood tree, we’re also hitting the Two-Handed Weapon Specialization talent. That adds a little extra oomph to your white hits and your Strikes. So if you miss a rotation because a guildy is asking a question, you can still kill pretty efficiently. We’re also grabbing a little self healing via Vendetta, and we’re getting more chances to land a critical hit (ie more damage) by grabbing Dark Conviction.

So now on to the talents that were picked. On A Pale Horse and tanking talents? Why? Ok, so yes you can get from place to place a lot faster, but read the description for On A Pale Horse a little more closely. This talent also reduces the effects of Stun and Fear effects. So when you’re doing Ring of Blood in Nagrand to pick up the very sweet Honed Voidaxe, you can do just a little more damage because you don’t spend as much time knocked out by the stuns some of those elites throw at you. !@#$!@#$!!

But realize that OaPH and Unholy Aura will make you level faster than any Blood or Frost build simply because you will get everywhere a million times faster. Call it your running shoes!  And those tanking talents?  AoE means lots of mobs.  Standing in one place to AoE them means they have to be hitting you.  Not taking damage long enough to kill them = well, you get it now right?

Paving a Swath of Destruction

Since this is an AoE build, its not only easier to take care of that extra mob you might have pulled, it’s also easier to just tag and bag more mobs at a time without having to slow down. So just like last time, the quicker you kill, the quicker you turn in, the quicker you ding.

You’d get the most out of this build by taking on more than one mob at a time. I’m usually able to take on at least three mobs at any one time, and rotate one in as soon as I knock one off.  If you practice at it, you should be able to take on 5-8 mobs.

Rotation

IT > PS > BS > BS > SS > UB

SS > SS > SS

If you’re AoE’ing you’ll want to use Pestilence and DnD are up to help add more damage like so:

IT -> PS -> Pest -> DnD -> UB

DS -> BB -> BB -> DS

Don’t forget to use Corpse Explosion as soon as a mob dies off to give you a little added AoE Damage. Now you can repeat this until you run out of mobs. Once you hit 66 you can train for and use Death Pact to sacrifice your Ghoul for a quick heal.  You can also swap out the DS for the AoE rotation with SS if you do not need self healing.

From the Starting Line

Ok so now you’re probably thinking, ok, all of these talents are great, but where do I put what talents as I push though levels. Ok, I’ve got you covered there. I’d recommend starting out putting your talents in the Unholy Tree first and then working your way over to the Blood Talents as you go. I pretty much suggest this because you’ll be able to grab Master of Ghouls, Bone Shield, and Unholy Blight a little bit sooner. Then you’ll be able to work your way over into the Blood Talents to help out with the Elite quests as you finish up in the Outlands and on to Northrend.

Talents at 58: 0/0/51
Talents at 71: 11/0/51
Talents at 80: 19/0/52

Summing Up

Ok, so tying it all together. This is an AoE build that will make leveling a lot faster by letting you kill a lot of stuff quickly. It also takes advantage of the Unholy tree’s faster movement speeds. Starting out you’ll want to move up the Unholy tree first and then branch out from there. You’ll also want to take advantage of using your AoE abilities as you’re working though the mobs.

Next up I’ll give a run down on Blood Leveling, but I wanted to get this one up first because Malék asked for an Unholy leveling spec in the comments of my last post.

-Geist

Tags: Geistig, Power Leveling, Specs

Hello, I’m Geist.  And yes, I am a chick that plays WoW.

Ok so now that that’s out of the way, on to why I’m writing for SJ. My Main is Geistig, an Undead Death Knight. While I have played a few classes, the Death Knight has been my favorite character since I rolled Geistig the day WotLK was released. I liked the fact that I could choose a viable leveling build from any one of the three talent trees. I liked the fact that I’d be able to pick a viable raiding spec out of any one of the three talent trees. And I liked the fact that Death Knights could serve as DPS or as Tanks.

When I rolled Geistig, everyone was still figuring out the Death Knight class. You couldn’t find a ton of information about Death Knights that wasn’t beta material. And to me…this made the Death Knight class that much more fun. It was still getting figured out. Fortunately folks like SJ leveled up quickly, and I gathered up their ideas and experiences while leveling my own undead knight of death and destruction!

Granted, I’ve taken a lot longer than pretty much everyone else (still not quite 80). But I’ve taken some detours along the way. I’ve spent some time experiencing what it’s like to be a Death Knight Alliance side, I’ve hung out with SJ over on BB leveling some shaman and druid alts, I’ve been testing Dual Wield leveling viability, and taking advantage of the Death Gate to get back into the Old World and help out some friends that kept getting eaten by something.

That’s the one awesome thing about being Undead. After you kill it, you get to bite it back.

Right now I’m working on leveling Geistig to 80 and getting all the gear, enchants, glyphs, etc that she’ll need for end game. Unlike SJ though, I prefer to Dual Wield!! The Undead DK Dual Wield animations are awesome. Geistig practically does some Kung-Fu style moves you’d usually only see on Night Elves. Pfft… why should they get all the fun? I’ve got your Kung Fu Fighting right here!

Dual Wielding

Ok aside from that, there’s a ton of DPS to be had using the 0/33/38 spec. That’s totally on my to-do list. I’m not stoked with the PTR changes to Dual Wield and I’ve tested what I can with a Death Knight that hasn’t hit 80 yet. So I’m hoping that Blizz doesn’t tear up Dual Wielding so badly that it isn’t raid viable (I mean Shadow Priests are raid viable, come on Blizz!!), but hey I play the game. I don’t build it. I don’t think it would be a deal breaker for me if Geistig had to carry a big two hander over dual wielding a pair of hefty axes, but I’d have to say that I’d have a few choice words to say about it (insert mature language filter… here…).

Can you Dual Wield while leveling? Hells yeah! Though I’ve put off Dual Wielding here and there whenever I picked up a really sweet 2 handed weapon just because the improved dps of a brand new blue weapon would cut through mobs all that much faster. When you kill quicker you get XP faster from the kills, speeding up questing in general. Rocket science right?

Weapon drop rate aside, there’s some gearing issues to deal with when you Dual Wield that you don’t have to deal with when working with standard 2 handers.  Such as making sure that you have enough +hit and +expertise.  If you want to land some extra damage with your offhand and make sure that each hit with your main hand makes contact (and brings on the pain), you can’t just slap any green item on. Here and there, you can find some gear that helps out with these factors.

Realistically you don’t want to cheat your performance by trading out a weapon with +strength for two weapons that just have +stamina and +hit. They’ll boost your hit points and they’ll help make your weapon land on the target, but that +strength would have put a little more oomph behind it. Not to mention the fact that you’ll want to select talents that’ll boost DPS, but that aren’t as reliant on pure weapon damage.  DW builds will never do as much damage on Strikes as a 2H build.  So focus on things that increase your spell damage, or can proc damage before focusing on Strike talents. With DW you’re not going to get as much damage per hit.  And the list goes on and on.

Personally, my favorite leveling tree has been Unholy. I love the perma Ghoul, Bone Shield is just hawt!, On a Pale Horse gets you to the quest turn ins a lot faster, and pulling extra mobs with AOE overflow just adds XP. Yep! Nothing like killing a Clefthoof in Negrand, having Desecrate proc, and aggroing a Elek wandering by minding it’s own business. Poor guy didn’t stand a chance.

So in future posts I’ll offer up more details on current Death Knight leveling specs as well as post some basic Death Knight leveling gear recommendations (with some notes for folks that have the Dual Wielding bug too).  But for now I thought I’d leave you with this to enjoy.

3.0.9 DW Leveling Build

• Try to find a slow MH weapon for Death Strikes when you need the healing.
• Use Death Runes for either IT, DS, or BB as needed.
• Use HB and Corpse Explosion whenever you can.  Combined with BB, this will blow things up like the 4th of July!

ST Rotation

IT -> PS -> HB -> BS -> BS  -> Dump

IT -> PS -> HB -> IT -> IT  -> Dump

AoE Rotation

IT -> PS -> Pest -> HB -> BB -> Dump (repeat)

Now before you go, “Are you crazy?”  This spec is 2 things.  One a rough draft, and Two exactly the same premise as what SJ normally recommends.  Some tanking talents go a really long way when leveling, especially when you want to AoE!!  Which I love doing.  SJ mentioned 3.1 will probably come out within the next few weeks, so I’ll try to get working on some 3.1 leveling specs too.

-Geist

P.S.  This is what my sexy Death Knight looks like:

Totally hot?!  I know right?!  You totally dig her bones. 

Tags: Geistig, Power Leveling, Specs

Heya guys!!  So you’re not gonna get a whole lot out of me today, I’m helping a friend of mine with leveling in WoW and just hanging out!!   But, while they are getting their 2nd toon up to level 10 to enter Deadmines, lets talk a little bit about Power Leveling options available to you, the Death Knight.

**Addendum as I am writing…  OK, you’re gonna get a lot out of me today.  Correction.  Still waiting on the second toon to get to 10, so I’m writing my lil heart out here on this PL’ing guide.

Recruit a Friend

While most would scoff at the Recruit a Friend package put forth by Blizzard as a way to just eek more money out of their consumers, I have to say it is an amazing offer.  Even for just the solo player who will use both accounts for their own purposes, this package is just amazing!!  And a hell of a lot of fun.

Summoning

The summoning is one of the best parts really, though no competition to the 300% exp bonus.  For example, today my friend had her primary toon at level 11, but had not started the 2nd one yet.  So I took her down to Deadmines for a run to just have some fun real quick.  But once we were done, and she rolled the 2nd toon, I wanted to help her reduce travel time while giving her an idea how to use the account summoning to her advantage.

I went to Dalaran and left her at Deadmines (on the level 11).  I got a buddy of mine to log in his Lock and meet me up at Dalaran then, while I had her get the level 11 and the level 1 online.  I had her use the account RAF summon on the level 11 to summon the level 1 to Deadmines.  Then we used the Lock to summon her to Dalaran.  Once her Hearth was set, we then used the level 1 to use the account RAF summon to bring the level 11 back to DM.  Then she hearthed on the level 1 back to the newbie zone to continue leveling.  We left the level 11 logged out at Deadmines, and when she finishes leveling the level 1 to 10, the level 11 main can then summon the second character through the account RAF summons back to DM.

So we’ve managed to completely cut out almost all travel time, which would have taken at least an hour of real life time to complete.  And on top of that, the main toon can now summon other toons to Dalaran later on and let them set their Hearth there as well.

Bonus Exps

Basically the way this works is that you get +300% exp.  But it’s not that straight forward.  So let’s look at this in depth for a moment.  When you group with another player you lose some of the exp.  It basically gets halfed.  But then you also get the group bonus exp as well.  But the group bonus and penalty does not impact your Quest exps ever.  Which means that you do get a full 300% bonus from Quest exps.

When you run the math on it all, if you keep both toons together and the same level you get roughly a permanent +170% to 220% exp bonus in reality.  The range comes more from how much you actually quest.  The more you quest, the more effective your exp bonus becomes.  You get the full 300% modifier on all quest bonuses, and all quests below level 60 grant bonus awards now.  The more you just grind exps however, the less exps you will end up generating.

Being power leveled through instances by a higher level toon will still be the most effective choice.  However outside of that option, Questing will always beat Grinding for exp gains now whether you are using RAF or not.  With RAF it just becomes vastly superior.

Always remember that you only get the bonus exps if you are the same level or lower level than the other grouped RAF toon, and it has to be in exp range.  More than a 3+ level range also means no bonus as well.

Special Mount

If you get a RAF and then pay for 3 months total, you get a free special mount.  To most people this is a sign of “being a sell out”.  However honestly it’s a unique mount, and a lot of people like it.  Personally I’m not a huge fan because it has no barding to speak off, making it look….chinky….in my book.  But I know lots of people who would love it.  And if you’re an achievement whore, this is a mount that is not easy to get.

A 3rd freebie level 60?!?

One of the other big advanatages to the RAF account is the freebie levels you can grant to another character.  And a lot of people use these improperly.  So I’m going to tell you how to use this correctly.  The most common use is for the person who spends the most time playing to be on the account that can grant free levels.  That way if they outlevel the other person too much, they can just give them free levels until they are within 3 levels of them again.  This is a bad move.

Go start up a 3rd character.  Whether you 2box with the RAF account or not is immaterial.  It’s really dependent on whether you want to work on a 4th+ toon.  But even if you don’t, having a RAF follow you around will be a faster exp train in the long run.  But that is up to you. 

Basically you level up a 3rd toon on the side to level 30 on the account that cannot grant freebie levels away.  Once there, you park that toon and sit on it.  Once you get both of the primary toons to level 60, then you gift the level 30 with 30 free levels from the primary 60.  I didn’t read the fine print, so I’d maybe do this when they reach level 59.  I know at some point you lose the ability to gift free levels away.  I can’t remember if it’s just time sensitive, or if you lose it when you get to 60 or 61.  You can read up on RAF to double check though.

Cheap City!!

So you don’t have a lot of real life cash to spend?  As long as you don’t mind ignoring Alliance Shaman/Draenei or Horde Paladin/Blood Elf choices for the secondary toon on the RAF account there is a cheap way to do this.  You can go pick up a basic copy of WoW from the site itself.  Assuming you’ve already got it installed on your comp this is the easiest thing to do as you don’t even have to go to a store to find a copy.  Spend $20 (the first month is free) for a new account and just finish using it withing 30 days.  Simple.

So long story short, if you get a 2nd account and RAF it up, you can actually get 3 level 60’s in the time it would have taken you to level 1 60 solo.  Pretty crazy eh?

Power Leveling

There are a lot of approaches to this concept, and likewise a lot of them work.  But I’ll tell you the best ways.

2 People

You can do everything on your own, but it will never be as efficient were you to do this with one other person.  If you have 2 people you have 2 options in front of you.  If you’re both newbs to WoW, then you can both play the toons.  Faster kill times, more teamwork, less downtime, etc…  You will basically exp at a much faster rate than if you 2box’d two level 1’s to 60 on your own.

If one of you is not a newb however and has a higher level toon, then you’re ready for super easy mode.  If one higher level toon runs through an instance killing mobs, the speed at which they can do this greatly outweighs the exp penalties for bringing the higher level character into the instance.  You basically have one person run the two lowbies.  Keeping them out of agro range, but following closely enough to be in exp range.  And then the other person runs the high level character killing everything in your path.  It’s really good stuff.

Teleporting

Now this is a lil known trick, even though most people are aware of the mechanic.  So I’ve got a way for you to teleport to the beginning of an instance easy mode style!!  Once you’ve completed an instance, have all toons in the party who are not the leader log out.  They then log back in, but are no longer members of the party.  Since the instance is saved to the party leader, they are then teleported to the entrance of that instance in a fresh one that is reset.

These toons must then zone out.  Once zoned out, the party leader invites them back to the group and they zone back into the instance.  Once this is done, and they are in the same one as the leader again, you pass leadership to one of the toons at the entrance.  Once this is done, the previous leader who is still deep in the instance logs out and logs back in.

Again, this kicks him from the party and he is now in a fresh instance at the entrance.  At this point everyone zones out and reforms the party.  The current leader resets the instance, and you all zone back in and start over.  Depending on the instance you are running, this trick can save you as much as 5-20 minutes per run, greatly increasing your leveling speed.

Easy Transport

There are two easily attainable mounts in game that allow you to transport multiple toons at once.  They just cost a crap ton of gold.  If you really want to “Be tha Man!!” at pl’ing this is a necessary step.  Go get an Engineering Bike or a Super Mammoth, and now moving on from one instance to the next becomes a breeze pre-level 30.  If not, at least transportation will only be an issue for about 30 levels until they can purchase 60% movement speed mounts.

As a side note, if you are a DK and you’re doing this, go spec Unholy.  You can skip On a Pale Horse if you want to and just get Unholy Aura.  Because they are vehicles, UA will apply to them.  Admitedly it’s only a +15% movement speed instead of 20%, but this will allow non-PvP specs to not have respec for raids, etc…  And also UA will let them run faster and you, making travel time and instance running go faster!!

Easiest Killing Methods

Honestly, any spec will do until you get to about the 40+ range.  And even then, I still think any spec will do.  This is going to be easy mode for you as a DK.  The main trick?  Tank gear.  That’s right.  TANK GEAR!!!  Don’t wear dps gear, and don’t stay in Blood Presence.  Go into Frost Presence and stay there.  You don’t need the extra damage.  In fact taking less damage will allow you to collect more mobs at once and have less down time.

Depending on the level range you are at, you will find certain methods work well at different points.  For example, running around in Deadmines constantly using Unholy Blight while keeping your ghoul on agressive will annihilate everything pretty easily.  But as you get higher up, the mobs will begin to become more difficult to kill in just a second or two.

Try dual wielding for one.  Whether you are a DW spec or not.  Faster attacks spreading damage out more evenly will be more effective than slow high damage attacks from a 2H.  Also when they become harder to kill you want to group them all up before attacking.  Hence the need for tank gear and Frost Presence.

Run through the mobs while your pet is on passive.  This will agro them.  When you have 10+ on you, use Horn of Winter.  The act of buffing causes threat generation, so if your lowbies get too close by accident, so long as they do nothing the HoW agro will keep them on you.  Run around till you get a solid pack of 20-50 mobs, and use corners to get ranged attacking mobs to get in melee range.

Drop a DnD and then see if you can Pestilence out a IT/PS to some mobs, and watch the incoming exp fly.  PURE WIN!!

No Higher Level Toon?!

Quest, quest, quest, quest, and more questing!!  All quests have an added exp bonus of roughly 30% to the base number, and the required exp to level to 60 has been reduced by approximately 20% overall.  Questing is now the most efficient leveling tool in game outside of being power leveled through instances.  Whether you have a RAF or not, you need to be questing when outside of an instance.

Going on a run with people you don’t know?

Whether you paid someone x amount of gold for so many runs through an instance, or you decided to group with some random newbs to do a real instance run, never ever ever stop questing/leveling up until everyone says they are ready.  It is the worst thing ever to head to an instance ready to go, and then sit there for an hour waiting on other people to get there.

Finito!!

So that’s about it.  I hope this helped.    If you have more questions, leave comments and I’ll try to help as much as possible.

-Suffer Well Brothers and Sisters.

Tags: Power Leveling

Heya guys!! So Blizzard recently talked about how the majority of the WoW playerbase still isn’t level 80 yet, and on top of that, I got some e-mails from players still on their way to level 80.  Do we hear DK leveling specs, rotations, and glyphs incoming!?!?

I thought it a good time to revist some old leveling tips.  Besides…it’s the perfect opportunity to use this pic. *points up*  I’m still laughing looking at it.  Ahhh…men.  Toilet humor still amuses us, heh.

Leveling Spec: Blood

1. Level 58 – 32/0/17
2. Level 68 – 41/0/18
3. Level 80 – 53/0/18

The ideal Blood Rotation is:

1. IT -> PS -> HS -> HS -> OB -> DC
2. OB -> HS -> HS -> HS -> HS -> DC

Glyphs

• Major: Obliterate, Death Strike, Icy Touch
• Minor: Pestilence, Horn of Winter, free pick

Leveling Spec: Unholy

1. Level 58 – 0/0/49
2. Level 68 – 5/0/54
3. Level 80 – 16/0/55

The ideal Unholy Rotation is:

1. IT -> PS -> BS -> BS -> SS -> UB
2. SS -> SS -> SS -> DC

Glyphs

• Major: Scourge Strike, Death Strike, Raise Dead
• Minor: Pestilence, Horn of Winter, free pick

AoE Rotations

1. IT -> PS -> Pest -> DnD -> BT -> BB -> UB (UB if Unholy)
2. DS -> BB -> BB -> DS -> DC

Leveling Rotations

There is no “leveling rotation”.  Why?  You can’t account for every situation when dealing with “trash” mobs.  So you basically have rules.

1. UB is used when 1 target will be in the effect for 20 seconds, 2 targets will be in the effect for 10 seconds, or anytime there are 3 or more targets.
2. Whenever a DC is called for in a rotation, that is a RP dump period.  Drop more than one DC if possible.
3. When dealing with 2+ mobs, always lead off with IT -> PS -> Pest.
4. When dealing with 3+ mobs, always use DnD, UB, CE, and BB when possible.
5. Replace OB/SS with DS when applicable.  Make sure you keep your health over 50% at all times when possible.  If you have plenty of health, then use OB/SS when possible.
6. When in a fight lasting more than 10 seconds (with multiple mobs) remember to Pestilence again.  Preferably pick a mob that is low health to Pest so that you have fresh diseases on your other mobs.
7. Blood’s ideal rotation is assuming Frost subspec, and I forgot to double check on the Unholy one.  However, that being said, while leveling up once you’ve already done that much dmg to a target, whether they have diseases on them or not should no longer be an issue.

Previous SJ Reference Material

Anything in these posts that is contradicted by something in this post should probably be ignored.  This post is more recent, and has more information based off of what I’ve learned since.  These new specs are more effective for leveling purposes than the old ones I listed.

• http://www.skeletonjack.com/2008/11/18/death-knights-a-true-aoe-class/
• http://www.skeletonjack.com/2008/11/14/death-knight-specs-for-leveling-up-in-wotlk/
• http://www.skeletonjack.com/2008/11/15/answers-to-death-knight-questions/

Level up Where?

Nothing detailed here really, just the short and skinny.  Run to BC at level 58 and ride BC out till level 68.  When you hit 68 go to the Borean Tundra and ride that out till 70-71.  Then swap over to Howling Fjorde until you’re done questing there.  From there out, you can follow zone quests where you like.  A solid rule of thumb is that if you start getting a lot of quests that are all equal and lower level for you, it’s time to move on to the next zone.

Abbreviations

• IT = Icy Touch
• PS = Plague Strike
• Pest = Pestilence
• OB = Obliterate
• SS = Scourge Strike
• HS = Heart Strike
• BS = Blood Strike
• BT = Blood Tap
• BB = Blood Boil
• DC = Death Coil
• UB = Unholy Blight
• DnD = Death and Decay
• DS = Death Strike
• CE = Corpse Explosion

Disclaimer

This is a leveling post.  Not an end game post.  PLEASE REMEMBER THAT!!!  This is for getting to 80, not for playing at 80.

Why no DW or Frost specs?!!?

I’ve said it before, and I will say it again.  These are not leveling friendly.  Insert random gamer quote who must know better than me:

I leveled fine as a Frost/DW Death Knight!!  It’s super easy and quick and blah, blah, blah, blah….

I’ve never claimed that Frost and DW specs can’t and won’t level on their own.  It is still a DK, and DK’s are massively overpowered when it comes to leveling, even with a gimped out spec.  But the fact is, you want to get to 80 quick right?  You want to be playing with your friends who only had to level 10 levels, while you’re powering through 25?  Blood and Unholy get you there *SO* much faster.

And remember…I even gave Frost props.  Some people are reporting Frost as best ST Boss dps spec in game.  Mad props yo!!  But at the same time, it’s not so hot for leveling.  Frost and DW are more heavily gear dependent than the other specs, and this hurts them for leveling purposes.  You’re welcome to stumble along on your own if you’re that stubborn…but I’m not going to promote that by putting my name next to it.  Ya know?  Would you want your name next to a bad quality product?  Not me! 

Contact Me!!

If you have questions, ideas, or just wanna say hi…here’s my e-mail.  I do forget to check it sometimes when I get wrapped up raiding and writing posts.  So if it takes me a few days (2-4) to respond sometimes, don’t worry.  It’s just me being scatter brained, heh.

Skeleton.Jack@hotmail.com

Tags: Power Leveling

OMFG YAY!!!!   WOOT!!!  CHEER!!!  YEEESSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I dinged level 80 at 1AM Central time US.  So that is a full 6 days and 1 hour from release.  It was in 3 days, 16 hours, and 51 minutes of /played time.  /happy    So outside of WoW I spent 57 hours of real life time on me.  2 hours went to purchase/install time.  5 hours went to my friend Eriss catching up on good times and the whole marriage dealio!!  4 hours went to some good old fashioned TV watching.  10 hours went again to Blogging/Posting (damn you Tues morning maintenance!!!).  Leaving a solid 36 hours of sleep (an average of 6 hours of sleep a day).

Did I break some kind of record?!  Nopers.  In fact because I delayed leveling some I came in at 4th 80 DK on my server instead of 3rd sadly.  But hey, Top5 ain’t bad in my book!!

So, my personal torture is now over!!!  And the FUN BEGINS!!!  We’re bout to hit Naxx10.  Some of our guild already popped in for some bosses.  I’ll be talking to you guys about that and other goodies as well.  I’ll be going full time into Jewel Crafting as well for profits, rep grinding some gear, working into heroics…you name it!!!  LET THE FUN BEGIN!!!!

P.S. Edit:  If you post a comment, and you curse and/or use vile language, your post will be marked as Spam.  End of story.  While I never mind people who disagree with me, flaming inflamatory posts following “forum troll” concepts will simply be wiped out.  Thank you and have a nice day.

Tags: Power Leveling

Congratulations go out to Dessembrae of Mazrigos-EU, who is reportedly the first level 80 Death Knight in WoW for the WotLK expansion!!  There could be someone else, but at this moment grats go out to Dessembrae.  No one else has popped up claiming the title with a Screen Shot of the feat.  With only 2 days and 10 hours of /played time, this is truly an amazing accomplishment.

Tags: Power Leveling

Heya guys!!   So, I made it to level 79 in 3 days 11 hours /played time.  This is the 18th, the Tuesday morning after the Wed night midnight release of WotLK here in the US.  So that’s like what, 5 days and 7 hours of time of rl time since release?  I would be 80 by now…my duo partner is.  But I finally crashed.  And I mean I CRASHED HARD.  OMFG.  I just went to bed while he and I were leveling and shut down for 12 hours of sleep straight.  But, on the upside, I do feel much better.  /happy

As you can see I RUSHED to get this screenshot in as my server was shutting down!!!  *raises fist*  DAMN YOU BLIZZARD!!!  But for those of you who think I’m bragging…

I AM!!!!

LOL, it’s my blog and I’m proud of what I’ve done!!    But, for those of you who think my head is overloaded with ego, here is the reality check.  OK?  The first level 80 Death Knight in the world was Dessembrae.  This player did this in 2 days and 10 hours of /played time.  Did this person use “real” power leveling tricks and get help from other people?  We don’t know.  But the feat in and of itself is damn impressive isn’t it?!!?

So no, I don’t think I’m breaking some record here or anything.  I’m sure plenty of peeps will have a better /played time than I will.  I’m not hyper efficient at leveling like some of the people out there in the world.  But short of messing something up, I will be the 3rd level 80 Death Knight on my server, and that makes me damn proud.   Here’s my current Armory link!!

That being said, here are some more leveling tips!!

Corpse Explosion, the finer things in life…

OK, so lets talk about Corpse Explosion.  I said don’t take this leveling up because the one spec I used it on Beta….it was…well awful.  It stunk.  But since then…omfg!!  First off, THIS IS FUN!!!!  Pure unadulterade fun!!!  BOOM!!!  BOOM!!!  BOOM!!!  BOOM!!!

You will find yourself after an AoE pull still blowing up bodies I promise, lol!!  And on top of that!!!  Have you ever been unable to click on something because a corpse was HUGE and on top of it?!  No longer!!!  CE that body and BOOM!!!!  It’s the right size now!!  And on top of that, with all of the AoE grinding you can do, even while on quests, this baby is a nice addition.

Undead Chickens!!  You too can ride Col. Sanders worst nightmare!!

Now, lets talk about the UNDEAD CHICKEN OF DOOM!!!!   Yes, the Winged Steed of the Ebon Blade as some of the ninnies out there like to say…  /sigh

OK, so you are about to hit level 77 and you’re waiting for your mount?  Lets cover a common mistake many DK will make.  I happened to avoid this only because I have a level 70 mage at my fingertips.  You hit level 77, but you don’t want to stop leveling.  So the idea here is that you will go back and get trained in Artisan Flying Skill and Cold Weather Flying.  And then hearth to get back to Dalaran so you can head back to your leveling spot.  But wait, didn’t you just hearth back to Dalaran to get to Shat, so you could get the Artisan skill?  How do you get back to Dalaran?

Short of a kind Mage, you don’t.  So, make sure you either have a mage on standy before you ding, OR go train up your Artisan Flying Skill early.

BLOWIN’ !@# UP!!!  A gamer’s pastime…

This was going to be a little addition to this post…but well…I got into it.  And I realized it deserved it’s own place…  So now it’s got it’s own post!!

See you guys on the flip side!!

Tags: Power Leveling