Another boost for WOW levelling

By Oli Welsh Published 24 July, 2008

60-70 progression will be faster.

World of Warcraft lead designer Jeff Kaplan has confirmed in a forum post that Blizzard is "planning on speeding up levelling in the 60-70 range" in next expansion Wrath of the Lich King.

The 60-70 range encompasses all the high-level content from the current expansion, The Burning Crusade. Players levelling Death Knight hero characters in the Lich King beta test had noticed they were making faster progression in Burning Crusade's Outland.

Kaplan, posting under his famous alias Tigole, said that the team was "still adjusting" the change, and sought feedback from players.

Late last year, the Gods of Zul'Aman patch increased the levelling speed in the original game from levels 20-60, to hasten players on their way to Outland. It now seems that Blizzard intends to do the same for the road to new continent Northrend.

In other WOW news, Eurogamer MMO finally managed to log on to the Lich King beta last night, and we stayed up past our bedtime playing it. We'll bring you our impressions soon.

Picture of Oli.

About Oli Welsh

Oli is Eurogamer's acting deputy editor and reviews editor and likes to take things one word at a time. He is among the best dressed people in South London.

Read more articles from Oli by visiting the Oli Welsh archive page.

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Comments (13) Latest comment 4 years ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Svecke #1 4 years ago

    Woohoo! Maybe it won't take forever to get my lvl 25 Paladin (my highest level toon) to Outland and beyond after all! :D

  • Goodfella #2 4 years ago

    Now they do it, just as I'm at level 67!

  • Benno #3 4 years ago

    hehe

  • Dezm0nd #4 4 years ago

    I can't keep up with the WoW terminology, a TOON? I'm sure they used to be called Alts back in the day.

    Nerds!!!!!!!!

  • spammage #5 4 years ago

    Toon is so not a wow-ism. Char and alt ftw!

    Gief beta account plx :D

  • FunkyRenegade #6 4 years ago

    Good!
    This'll make my DK levelling a hell of a lot nicer :D

  • wowami #7 4 years ago

    BAH - WoW is sooo a casual gamer MMO
    Hardcore grind FTW!!

  • Pirotic #8 4 years ago

    this is the problem with the leveling structure. In order to sell the expansions you have to have a big enough audience of people who've already reached the current cap, so in order to get more people at that cap you have to make it quicker/easier to reach. To me, that's a kick in the balls for anybody who slogged it originally and undermines the whole exp/leveling system.

    why bother leveling from 70-80, why not just wait for the next expansion to be near release and get it done in half the time. Why can't they add some non-level based battle grounds (so where everybody is the same spec) in order to appeal to more people, rather than helping push all the low levelers up via changing the rules.
    Edited by Pirotic at 24/07/08 @ 12:20

  • rodpad #9 4 years ago

    New Level > You.

  • rudedudejude #10 4 years ago

    I don't mind this, just dinged 70 last month and enjoyed every minute of it. If this means I have more people to party up with from 70-80 then that's great.

    Levelling is not the difficult part, its the gear/rep that takes hard work once you hit 70 if you want to raid, etc.

  • Lemming81 #11 4 years ago

    @Dezm0nd: Toon is just another term for any character or avatar (a reference to characters in cartoons being referred to as 'toons').

    An alt is something else entirely. an alternative character (ie. not your main one).

    As far as I know those references have been around since UO.
    Edited by Lemming81 at 24/07/08 @ 13:03

  • sneetch #12 4 years ago

    I'm with farticusmaximus.

    I'm glad I levelled my warlock in the old style rather than the current way. I enjoyed every quest along the way, but I'm now levelling a pally to join my lock, rogue and druid and I'm glad it's not the same slog. It's important to provide this quicker method for newcomers so they won't feel as intimidated by the prospect of trying to reach 80 to group with their friends. It really only affects new comers and alt levellers.

    Removing most of the outdoor elites in the older content is also a good idea; even a hogger group can be hard to find.

  • sneetch #13 4 years ago

    @pirotic
    "why bother leveling from 70-80, why not just wait for the next expansion to be near release and get it done in half the time. Why can't they add some non-level based battle grounds (so where everybody is the same spec) in order to appeal to more people, rather than helping push all the low levelers up via changing the rules."

    Well, although this isn't a serious question, the main reason would be so that you can actually enjoy the expansion with others, levelling up while others are doing so will be a whole lot more enjoyable, you can find groups for instances easier. Or would you rather until "WOW: The Angry Expansion Name" is released so levelling is easier and run around a ghost land? A lot of Azeroth play's like a single player game now, you don't see another player from one day to the next.

    "Hey, I'm finally here in Outland, I'm level 70 and I'm... completely alone".

    Basically, levelling isn't the game and isn't such an onerous task that you need to wait until it's easier. It's just nice to not have to go through quite that slog again in order to get to level 70 on an alt so you can start enjoying the new expansion with that character.