Grinding Guide

Common Grinding Guide

Mage Grinding Guide

Common Grinding Guide

A few tips you should always remember when grinding:

1.: Always remember bandages and food, grinding is no good without it.

2.: Getting into big discussions/chats in the /gchat or /wchat or whatever is always fun, and it definitely makes the grinding less boring, however it will slow you down… You can go from 40k/hour to 30k/hour just by having a conversation in the chat which doesn’t seem to take up a lot of time… Keep that in mind if u really want to lvl fast.

3.: If you can’t stand to grind non-stop, just combine it with some questing to ease it up a little…

4.: If you go back to IF/Orgrimmar every half lvl to check AH, you will lose a lot of time with the travelling… Although u may have your hearthstone there, the trip back again will cost you a lot of time…
There’re many reasons to go back to the main city during your grinding, but I guarantee you most of them can be done with a lvl 1 char sitting in the main city, just to check the AH and buy stuff for you… You mail some gold to it to do your dirty work, and it can mail the items back to you.

5.: Always remember to sit your character at the nearest Inn when you log off, to gain rested time… It is really worth it, or rather: Not worth not to do it .

6.: I am very well aware of there’s some very good grinding spots in AV, however I highly discourage this, you will take up a spot in the battleground and you will not help ur team… You will actually help the opposing faction win, which is just stupid… Do not do this if you have any respect for your own faction!

18-20: Bristlebacks just north of Camp Taurajo in Barrens, there’s so many of them you can’t run dry, and they die quick… If your horde you will have a couple of quests here as well, and if your alliance, Well, you don’t wanna be here if your alliance.

21-23: Duskwood, cemetery, south of Darkshire, half casters half warriors, an alright grinding spot with good drops… I always find my first blue item here on all of my chars. Wool and silk cloth are also a nice addition at this lvl. This place is mainly for Alliance though…

22-24: Dunhold keep, in Hillsbrad foothills, not a very known place, rogues and horde have a quest there, but that’s it… they are humanoids, die really fast, drop a nice amount of cloth and there’s tons of them.

28-32: Centaurs, in thousand Needles, a little north of Freewind post. There’s 28-30 centaurs outside the cave, and 30-32 centaurs inside the cave, a very nice place, they die really quick and drop nice silk cloth. Although this is a horde dominated area, it work for alliance as well, there isn’t as many horde as you would think.

29-31: The underground of raven hill cemetery, in Duskwood, there are 2 areas of underground, one with skeletons and one with zombies, and they are connected through a small and hidden path at the end. This is a very good place to grind, start from one end and go to the other, then back again. It’s an alliance area so if you do it at primetime, you will have some problems if you’re Horde. I did it with my shammy though, and it still works, usually if you leave them alone they will leave you alone as well.

32-34: Beasts, and lots of them, do the hunter quests from Nesinwary’s camp in Stranglethorn Vale, and then keep grinding those beasts after you have done the quests… Especially the Mistvale gorillas, these are probably the only beasts in Stranglethorn Vale that you don’t get a quest to kill, and funny thing, they are the best ones to grind.

34-36: Kurzens compound, all these fellows are really good to grind, specially once you get the sword from Scarlet monestary. They also drop fadeleaf from time to time which is always appriciated. A chest spawns every 15 minutes, can contain blue items, overall a very good spot!

34-37: Basilisks, yes, you heard me, basilisks, the shimmering flats in Thousand needles. Go the ruins all the way down south of the shimmering flats, those are the ones you want!
They are pretty good to grind at these lvls, you’ll never run dry cause there’s just so many of them, they don’t have much life and drop some decent vendortrash.

37-38: The water elementals on the haunted island in stranglethorn vale is very good grinding at these lvls, the only downside at these are the drops, they really suck, but u don’t grind for loot, u grind for xp.

39-41: Earth elementals down south in the badlands are awesome here, so easy to kill, despite the fact that there’s no casters amongst them, and the stones they drop will make u rich by the vendors.
There’s also lesser elementals a little east of Kargath, which are a little lower in lvls, but doesn’t drop quite as good, and there’s usually people on those…

40-44: Feralas grimmtotem camps, the tauren there die so fast it s almost pathetic.

42-43: Nagas at the southern beach on the island of the feathermoon fortress, we all love nagas, and these are quite good, many casters among them, only bad thing is the disarm they sometimes do, but considering their low armor/health it’s still a very good place!

44-47: Nagas are simply the best thing to grind, here u move on to the cave on the isle of dread also in Feralas, it’s the fastest grinding I’ve ever done there, so awesome… Only very rarely do other players come, and those that do come, come to do a fast quest then they leave again!

44-45: Ogres down south in Badlands, next to the earth elementals, they drop a bit of mageweave and silver, but as all other ogres they die really fast, so they are nice to grind. A lot of casters amoung them which is always nice.
Mithril spawn in the cave often and a chest every 15 minutes.

45-47: Ghosts at Azshara lvl 45-46, Good at that lvl, half casters, half warriors, none of them have any special attacks so it’s very easy and u won’t get surprised by some high damaging spell.
Should u decide to want to grind these at an even higher lvl, u should keep in mine that there aren’t a lot of them, so u’ll have to combine it with the satyrs just north of there… But at 45-46 there should be plenty to keep u going on them alone!
Good mageweave drops, some silver and an occational rare mob.

46-49: Feralas, ogres down south at the big ruin. 45-47 is their lvls, drop decent mageweave, and if u go down to the cave all the way down at the bottom, u will almost only see casters inside.
Because of the packs u may get, I suggest not going here til the stated lvls, instead of when ur the same lvl as the mobs which would usually be my suggested lvl range to grind them.
Also the warlords call for help when they get low, attracting other ogres that are near.

48: Quests in Searing gorge, u should gain an entire lvl if u do them all, very fast, can be done in a matter of a few hours!
And ofc the trinket reward "Luffa" u get from one of the quests is not to be underestimated when u as a rogue fight a warrior (Or farm gold at Deadwind pass ;), damn that rend they got)!

49-51: the cactus-guys way down southwest of Tanaris, those die so fast it’s hardly believable… very good grinding here!
If ur a fan of Un’goro u can always combine with some questing there, it’s right next to it, and is good at that lvl.

The deadwood village in Felwood is also very good at these lvls, but it’s always filled with both horde and alliance, so no point in going there unless it’s at some hour where the server is almost empty ;)

One thing you should keep in mind after hitting lvl 50, is that reputation with Argent dawn can be a pain to get, so it might be a good idea to start grinding a bit in western/eastern plague lands, the latter at a higher lvl since it is a tough place to grind.
Make sure you do not turn in the stones you get before reaching 6000/12000 honored reputation, because after you reach that point you will no longer get reputation for killing mobs, only by killing bosses and turning in stones… So you’ll get more out of it if you save your stones until you reach that point!

50-53: Nagas at the beach in Azshara, they die relatively quick due to their low armor/hp, just as any other naga in the world.
Unfortunately they also drop as bad as all the other nagas, the silver is alright, but that’s about it,
Unless ur lucky enough to find a golden pearl in one of the clams they drop.
A good place to go if the satyrs are taken and u don’t feel like wasting your trip to Azshara.

50-53: Another option is satyrs in Ashaera, these are 51-53, but die so quick they can easily be grinded at lvl 50. I did this, combined with searing gorge and the cactus guys, just because some lvl 60 is always on the satyrs, and there isn’t enough for 2!
The fact that they drop Felcloth and traveller’s backpacks and cards for the faire is just a nice bonus.

51-53: Sorrow hill in western plague lands, some people like this place although I don’t hink it’s very good, due to the fact that there’s no casters. It’s all melee mobs, and they don’t drop very fast. If u want rep with Argent dawn however, this may be a good place to start. Good runecloth/silver drops and Librams have a decent chance of dropping here as well.

52-53: If u haven’t done them at an earlier state, the quests in Un’goro would be excellent here… Even if u did do some quests earlier, u can’t have done them all cause there’s a lot of 52-55 quests which are almost impossible at lower lvls unless u go with a group.

53-55: The blood elves in Ashaera die really fast… They’re the same lvl as the satyrs, however they all do this nasty AoE which can get a bit too much if ur not high enough lvl… And they’re placed kind of tight some places, which inevitable makes u aggro one too many… However still very good to grind, they drop a lot of runecloth and silver as well, being humanoids and all.

54-57: Ghosts by the lake in Winterspring, these are a little tricky for a 54, due to the DoT the give u, which prevents u in bandaging, but still good to grind!
These can be grinded all the way to 60, I’ve seen it done and it works fine… Although there are better places after 57…

55-57: Furlbogs just south of the entrance to winterspring. Decent amount of hp/armor and throw faerie fire on u, but there’s good things aboiut them as well… Good silver drops, good chance of blue drops, a chest with guaranteed green item (And often healing potions) and everyones favourite potion: Winterfall firewater drop pretty often from them, although this should change in patch 1.9 according to the patchnotes.
Give reputation with the timbermaw faction as well each time you kill one, if you’re interested in that.

56-60: The birds in Deadwind pass, These are very good to grind, they die relatively fast, and drop very good vendortrash… The only downside is that they hit rather hard and put rend on u all the time which makes it almost impossible to start with an ambush… But if u use swords that won’t be a problem.
There are also very often other people grinding on these, and to be honest there’s just not enough for 2…

57-60: Yetis in Winterspring are very popular to grind, there’re tons of them and can be skinned for thick/rugged leather, they also drop silver… They do however have a lot of health points, which makes them a bit harder to kill, but if ur saving for ur epic mount, this will be a good place to get some good xp and some steady gold flowing…

58-60: The ogres in Deadwind pass, very good, just like all other ogres they die pretty fast… The amount of runecloth they drop is just unbelievable.

Mage Grinding Guide

Before reading this guide, check out this excellent video:
http://www.warcraftmovies.com/movieview.php?id=44168

AoE grinding

In case you’ve been living in a hole, AoE grinding is a very famous type of grinding only available to mages, and sometimes good protection paladins.
It’s famous due to its insanely fast xp gained, as you can kill 10+ mobs in almost the time it takes to kill 1, so you get 10x the xp.
It’s also incredibly fun – the sight of seeing your ungodly destruction on 10 mobs, or watching other people’s reactions when you utterly omgwtfpwn them is amazing.
However, it’s not easy, and it does require fast reactions, quick thinking and lots of training.

Here is what’s in my little guide.

1) Pros and cons of AoE grinding, why it’s good or bad.
2) What kind of talents you need!
3) How to do it.
4) Notes on (3)
5) Some good places to try it out!
6) Other things, such as gear.
7) Tauren meat.

So I’ll start with the pros and cons.

Advantages:
- It’s fun, and fast, boosting you through the horrible grind between 55-60, or if you want, your entire journey between 1-60. I haven’t tried doing 55-60 as fast as I can, but I’ve seen friends level ridiculously fast.
- Much better than normal single-target grinding.
- Gives a lot of gold, and cloth (you’ll be generally grinding on humanoids or undead)
- Also the advantages of grinding, as opposed to questing.

Disadvantages:
- It’s hard, and you’ll often die, especially in the beginning. You’ll look like an idiot, rounding 10 mobs and then just dying >.<
- You need to spec to a certain AoE spec, which essentially wipes out your single-target DPS.
- You might have to miss out talents which you may really like.
- Also the disadvantages of grinding, as opposed to questing.

So firstly, we come to the talents. Generally we pick the frost tree due to Blizzard and CoC.
Flamestrike and Blast Wave IS possible, but that’s IMO harder to do, so I’ll focus on the frost spells.

I also prefer Blizzard AoEing than CoC kiting AoEing, as it’s easier to do. However, if you do want to do CoC kiting, these talents are still more or less valid, but you’ll want more +crit, and less imp blizzard.

Teh epix spec - http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=RZZMhMIsf0sro
You can either fill in the rest of the frost tree, or spec somewhere in arcane.

Now is the actual process of AoE grinding. The killing part is really easy. All you need to do is press a key, aim, and then unleash hell on your foes. And watch the purple numbers fly.

I wouldn’t recommend actually grinding before lvl 40 or so, but that’s just me (I prefer questing, it means more for the game to me – yes, I know, I’m writing a grinding guide….). But if you insist, I really recommend only grinding when you hit 26. This is when you get Arctic Reach 2/2 and Imp Blizzard 3/3, which are vital talents. Otherwise you’ll only fit in 1 full Blizzard.

Pick a place where there are 5-10 MELEE mobs, of your same level.
All ranged classes murder you, as they interrupt your blizzard casting and generally mess everything up. If you’re lucky, and there’s only one, you may be able to sheep them, but this is risky.
STAY AWAY FROM RANGED! There should be space for blinking around, running around, and also a good place to flee just in case. I’ll suggest some good places later on.

DO NOT put Ice Armor on! This has the same effect as frostbite because it disperses the mobs. You want them clustered! So use MAGE ARMOUR instead, and if you don’t have it, just don’t put a shield on.

However, if you are truly skilled, it is possible to use Ice Armor. But it is, imo, considerably harder to do so, so try this at your own risk.

Here is the entire AoE process, and I’ll explain how further below.

• - Choose a good spot, where you can see 5 or 10 mobs, and a good space for you to run around.
• - Pop up Ice barrier, or mana shield (not recommended – ice barrier doesn’t waste mana)
• - Mount up if you have a mount
• - Take a deep breath and hope you don’t die.
• - Run into the mobs – try to get the mob furthest away from your original position first, to the mob nearest to you.
• - After you have the mobs you want, run around in spirals for a few seconds to cluster them together. If they’re not in a group, run back and circle them until they are.
• - Dismount. (Or just hit the next spell, ie. Ice Block or Ice Barrier - dismounting is now automatic)
• - Put Ice block on, if you have it. Otherwise, put on ice barrier (just to be safe).
• - Once they are all hitting you, frost nova, and blink away. Anywhere, so long as it’s not off a cliff, or into more mobs. Strafe away about 16 yards, or a few seconds. This is your max range for Blizzard.
• - Hit the key, and aim the green circle so that the edge furthest away from you touches the furthest guy at the back.
• - When the first blizzard is about to be over, hit the key again, and aim the green circle so that the furthest edge away from you is just IN FRONT of the guy CLOSEST to you.
• - Ice barrier if you want to be safe. You’ll probably run out of mana around here, and you still need mana for one more blizzard and a CoC. Eat a mana gem if you want.
• - CoC, then frost nova and blink TOWARDS the enemy (so you’re now behind the mob who was furthest away from you – or you can blink away, but you have to check there IS space. Generally there isn’t, and just to be safe, you should blink towards your mobs)
• - Blizzard again, and they should be dead. If not, finish up with a CoC, and if the infidel still insist on living, you can wand them down, AE, Fire blast, etc.
• - Hooray! You killed them all!

Here is a nice video guide that someone made explaining how to do it, similar as listed above (thanks nyuu).
http://warcraftmovies.com/movieview.php?id=30092

It’s a very long video, showing the same tactic again and again, but it’s ‘part of the learning process’

There are always people who want to be ‘heroes’. Make a macro telling them not to help. Chances are they’ll aggro 3 or 4, then fail to kill them. He’ll either die or run away, leaving the mobs to go after you again and ultimately kill you. At best, it’ll take you longer to kill your mobs as they’ll be out of the Blizzard radius.
So shoo the heroes!

Notes on the tactic above

The killing part is very easy to master. It simply involves blizzard, blizzard, CoC, nova, Blizzard, and maybe another CoC.

The pulling part requires precise movements and reactions, as you are being hit by 10 mobs of your same level. Ice barrier is pretty important, as you can lose a lot of hp much faster than you think.
You don’t just charge in like a crazed gnome either, you should tag the one furthest away, then work your way to the front. Keep going back to the first tagged mob once in a while, so they keep their aggro on you. Once you’ve tagged them all, you must run around in spirals, and if there are ones which aren’t with the group, you need to run to them, then run back to the group.

The biggest area for dying is the part between the dismounting and the blinking away.
This is why ice block can be very useful. It needs to be done quickly, but not rushed.
The second you dismount, you must frost nova, but you have to nova all of them.
If there is a mob you know who’s outside the nova range, don’t bother wasting your nova. Just run around in circles (very dangerous) until you can, and immediately blink away. If you’re lucky you might be able to pop up a CoC just before you blink, but this is depending on how good you are.

The first few tries you WILL die a lot. It’s a sad fact, but you have to accept it. Just keep practicing and practicing until you get the times, CDs, and movements right.

Oh no, it’s all gone wrong!

Things can go wrong. Not every run is going to be perfect, or identical. Part of the challenge is to deal with these problems (usually involving running away as fast as you can :D).

Here are some things which can mess up, and some solutions:

Nova (after the pulling) does not freeze all the mobs - either through resisting, or just out of range
There are 3 ways of approaching this
- Cold snap, and then nova again
- Summon your elemental, and freeze the extra mobs
- Run away. This is actually probably the best idea, for several reasons.
- It’s still early in the AoE run, so there’s not much to lose. You’ll have mainly full hp and mana, so just try again
- If you CS/Elemental and nova again, the extra mob(s) is away from the main group, which may lead to difficulties later on. You’ll also have lost precious seconds refreezing.
- All the mobs are frozen, so it’s very easy to run away.

You’ve eaten your gem, drank your pot, but they’re still living and you have no mana
Don’t panic. Just pop up ice barrier, and evocate. If you don’t have the barrier, freeze and blink away (hopefully you have mana to do this - if you don’t, just pray), then evocate. If they’ve still got more than 50% hp, there’s something wrong with your tactic, you’re burning your mana far too fast.

Help! An add!
Generally, just leg it. You can try to follow the nova tips (elemental/CS + nova), but the adds will be far from your main group, and have full hp. Freeze your friends and blink out of the area.
If the add is a ranger/caster, run away as fast as you can. Don’t even try to fight back, unless your main group is dead and you have a decent amount of mana left to single-target the guys. Do NOT AoE range/caster adds.

If you’re evil, run towards some unsuspecting player. He’ll either run away, or try to help you, or do some heroic last stand. If it’s the last two, then well done, you’ve saved your life and killed a player.

Places to grind in:

These are mainly alliance regions, but unless you’re on a pvp server, most should be accessible by horde anyway.
There is a nice list of ALL AoE spots (inc Horde) at the bottom too.

I’m assuming you’re at least lvl 26 or so for the talents, so I’ll start at around this level.

27-30
Raven Hill or Tomb. Duskwood. Good Undead mobs to grind on, lots of them and fast respawns. Watch out for casters, and there may be limited space to blink around in. Lots of quests for killing these guys. Undead so no runners.

25-30
Gnolls in Redridge. Pretty good, generally not too much ranged.

30-35
Witherbark Village. Arathi Highlands. The trolls are great to grind on, but watch out for ranged. There are quests for here too in AH. Look out for runners.

32-35
Yetis in Yeti Cave of Arathi Highlands. No ranged or casters, good to grind on. However, they may be quite spread out, so be careful during pulling process.

35-38
Hillsbrad farms. Horde only, this is an amazing place. Lots of meleeing weak male farmers - annihilate them! Watch out for the mages, though. The farmers run too, so get ready to wand. Work your way to the north, then go south again, etc.

34-37
Farms in Arathi Highlands. Lots of humanoids here, no ranged. Be careful for runners, but generally quite good. Kill the civilians!

36-40
Murlocs in Dustwallow marsh. These have no ranged and are easy to grind on, since they have no special attacks. This is where AoE grinding starts to kick off, excellent place to grind. There’s a large camp of around 40 murlocs north east of North Sentry Tower, with fast respawns.
Over the hill there are another 40 too, but these guys give poison, so watch out.
However, the aggro radius is pretty big, so watch out on this as well, They also run too. Gurgle

40-44
Murlocs in Swamp of Sorrows. Read above. Gurgle.

Some people are having lots of trouble here, I’m not sure why. The important thing is to find enough space amongst the vegetation, and no ranged. Lots of mobs doesn’t matter, more doesn’t necessarily higher chance of dying.

44-50
Pirates in Lost Rigger Cove, Tanaris, or just in Tanaris (watch out for the ‘locks though). Some ranged, and they run.

42-45
Trolls in Hinterlands. Not that great because there are lots of ranged mobs. Only really choose here if you have a quest, or you hate the pirates.

50-54
Undead in Sorrow Hill. Great place, this is where the speed of AoE grinding really kicks in when it boosts you to 60. Very fast respawns, and the mobs generally cluster in 5s or 6s in the first place anyway. Lots of runecloth/money drops, and no runners. No ranged. This can be a busy place though, so try to find a quiet time in the day, eg late at night or early in the morning. Weekdays ftw.

53-60
Undead in Dalson’s Tears. This is a great place to grind, no ranged at all. Even faster respawns than Sorrow Hill, and good drops too. Nice place to grind for rep for AD, watch out for fears though. This will take you all the way to the infamous 60. This is less busy than Sorrow Hill, so come here when you can.

Hellfire Pennisula

Bonestripper Buzzards (53-59)
Bonestripper Vulture (57-62)
Rogue Voidwalker (58-61)
Uncontrolled Voidwalker (58-61)

Zangarmarsh

(This zone is quite tricky because you don’t often have a lot of room to manouevre)

Daggerfen Assassin (61-63)
Ango’Rosh Brute (62-63)

Terokkar Forest

Shienor Talonite (58-63)
Timber Worg (59-63)
Dreadfang Lurker (59-64)
Bone Crawler (60-65)
Lost Spirit (60-65)
Boulderfist Invader (64-65)
Auchenai Warrior (might be the initiate I mean but the ones with no mana!) (64-66)

Nagrand
Most animals there are good for AOEing, watch the Talbuk’s however as they have a nasty charge which can bring tears to even the most highly talented AOEers out there…

GEAR – if you can, invest in stamina and intellect.
Eagle gear is good, as it focuses on these 2 stats.

Spirit is the only other valid option for a mage, but since you’re casting 100% of the time, all it’ll do is less downtime, but you can drink anyway. Mage armour allows a bit of mana regen (30%), but you’ll need a lot of spirit for it to have any effect, so it’s not worth it.

Mana/5s - like spirit, you need a lot for effect and it’s better to take intellect and stam since you’re doing burst mass damage, not slow endurance damage.

+damage does not affect blizzard much in comparison of the other spells. It’s good, but tbh Stam and Int is better, and imo it’s more important to get those. But if you think you have enough hp/mana, grab some +dmg for some extra pew pew.

You need lots of intellect because of the high mana usage, and lots of stamina since a lvl 50 being hit by 10 lvl 50s is quite deadly.

1 int = 15 mana
1 stam = 10 hp

Don’t take strength or agility, etc. You need a lot for the effect.

Try to get a rune of perfection from the wsg pvp vendor, as it makes your mobs resist less. It’s a trinket.
If you can, try to up your +hit, but don’t sacrifice your int/stam for this.

Apart from that, the main thing is to have fun! AoE grinding is meant to be fast, fun and exciting, so if you hate it, don’t force yourself! However, DO remember you die a lot in the first few tries, so don’t let that put you off. Once you learn it, you can’t forget, and you’ll be racking in the xp by the 1000s.

Enjoy this guide, and I hope it’s been of use. Have fun in AoE grinding, and may you always be a blink away from danger!

Warrior Leveling Talent Builds

Glad that you decided to roll a warrior. Warrior class doesn’t suit everyone, because the first 40 levels are a little bit boring, you have to respec your talents often and we need very good gear, to be very good in something.
I’ve decided that this is a good thing, because a well geared warrior will by pass some classes in soloing for example with strong gear because all warrior’s damage in mana free, warrior’s have high armor and warriors can interupt spell casting. Caster classes have to balance their spell casting in order to stop themselves from using all their mana quickly while a warrior can keep on pushing forward, until bandaging. (Affiliction warlock? Yeah i know..)

GET STATS IN THIS ORDER: Strenght > Stamina > Agility. Easy, simple, and fun. Most of your damage comes from auto attack so strenght is the most important stat. Don’t be left on too low health either. Agility weights more with Deep arms build which i will talk a lot more soon, because your crits make your targets to bleed as well.

10-20:

Quests: Your defensive stance quest begings from the warrior trainer at once when you are level 10. You must complete it, and it’s not a long quest or even hard.

Talents: Depends on what is your style. 3 different types of specs i am using in this guide are: Deep arms, Dual Wied fury and 2-handed fury. With both deep arms and 2-handed fury look for yourself a fast 2-handed weapon. With DW, the weapon speed doesn’t matter much, but slow main-hander is better for whirlwind for example.
For start you will use what you got. You won’t learn DW until level 20, and DW isn’t a very good choise before you get it improve with talents. So stick with 2-handers for now.
DEEP ARMS: (You will repsec at level 40 for Mortal strike, so more crit is better for now)
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LGZV
FURY (recommended):
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LZVV
(Unbridled wrath can proc on heroic strikes and cleaves as well, making it the best of t2)

TIP: Collect intellect gear while you are questing, because you will face sitsuations when you’ll have to level your weapon skill. Intellect helps in this task, a lot. And if you have to level 2-handed mace skill for example, check AH for a faster 2-handed mace. If you have a one-handed weapon to level, use dual wield. Always spam hamstring.

20-30:

Talents:

Just a few words for those now.. Since this guide has been written long before 2.3 changed some parts of the talent trees some info here might sound a little bit odd. Speaking of level 10-60 levels in here: Arms is for those who don’t know nothing about anything, and that think it’s the best tree to pick.. They are wrong! 2-handed fury, with a very fast 2-hander is a lot better, but i do understand arms warriors because they maybe want to do some PvP every now and then. Deathwish and Mortal strike are in there.

What makes 2-handed fury so wonderful it’s the fact that your attacks usually also hit the target and you can have a stronger spec earlier on, before DW fury passes 2-handed fury at some point deep in the tree. But if you do spec DW now, you also have to fight against mobs 2-3 levels lower than you to make most attacks hit the target.

Deep Arms:

http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LAMZV

Improved charge is a filler, so you can put those points elsewhere if you want… I know that some low level warriors like rend, the downside is that you must use talents to buff it up, and even then rend damage stays too low. Avoid like plague! If you are a "cleaver grinder" imp. thunder clap is much better.

DW Fury:

http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LZVVzmx

Another alternative for Commanding presence is imp. Cleave. You can live without Piercing Howl too, but it gives a lot for only one talent point. Can be used as an escape tool for instance.

2-handed Fury:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LZVVzm0x

The idea on this 2-handed fury is, that you save points when you don’t have to take imp. dual wield. Besides you don’t need as much hit rating either.

30-40:

Time for berserker stance quest! Pick it up from the trainer and go to isles west of The Barrens. The quest is easy if you bring a potion and good bandages along. Renember to use your retallion. I won’t spoil the fun, by telling more details.

http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/quest.html?wquest=1792

Here are 3 of the most famous weapons in our warrior community. This is going to take some time if you decide to solo. The trolls you have to kill are around 30-39 levelled in Stranglethorn Vale. The elementals you have to kill are around level 37-39. Liferoots can be bought from AH. When you have these, go back to Alterac and speak with the troll again. Now you have to face a level 40 elite mob, which can be killed by 2 people or you can ask some high levelled player. They will help for sure.
Pick the mace if, you you have followed my Deep arms talent spec. Axe, if you haven’t and you are poleaxe specced. Sword, if you are 2-handed fury. I chose the mace. Most people take the axe.

Talents:

Deep-arms:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LAM0dAroZV

DW-fury:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LZVVzmxxoV

2-handed-fury:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LZVVdm0goV

40-50:

Quests: Well there isn’t any, which is nice for a change.

Talents:

Arms respec this:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LVMcdAioz0dZVM

DW-Fury should look like this:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LZVVzmxxoVuV

2-handed Fury looks like this:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LZVVzV0gkquV

Around some level 50 or so you should drop 2-handed fury and spec either arms or DW_fury because those specs have more crit.

50-Outland:

What level do I have to be to enter the Outlands and when should I go there?

You need to be level 58 to enter the Outlands and should (IMO) go there pretty much as soon as possible. If you find mobs too difficult at 58, get to 60 in Azeroth before moving on.

How hard are the BC mobs?

The mobs you’ll encounter in the first zone, Hellfire Peninsula, are as hard as any lvl 60 mob in Azeroth. I’ve heard of people stacking up on healing potions - you won’t need that. But you should try to bring some food/bandages since you’ll see some downtime.

Thunderclap and demo shout are very useful here - a good idea would be to get imp. thunderclap if you’re arms-specced.

As you level up, you’ll start fighting mobs with more hp, armor and dps. Some of them also have pretty nasty special abilities, so always have a finger on the pummel/shield bash key. Well, maybe not always, but you get the idea.

How long will my current items last?

I’d say the magic number is level 65. At that point you might start seeing blue items of quality equal to or better than rank 14 weapons and similar gear. The rank 12-13 gear will last quite a while, mostly because it has high stamina which is a good thing, what with most upgrades in BC being stamina-related and all.

Some of your gear (tier 3 in particular) will last a bit into level 70 but you will obtain some very nice tank gear prior to that (legs with 60+ stamina, for instance). AQ-gear will last quite a long time as well - tier 2 less so, then tier 1 and least of all level 60 blue and green items. Scroll down a bit and you can see the kind of gear you can expect to get at lvl 60-62.

Can I grind XP or do I have to quest?

You can indeed grind XP but there are many reasons not to, especially if you’re a fresh 60. I will cover these a bit later. In short, there are three ways of getting XP:

Grinding
Questing
Instance grinding

How much XP do I need and how much do I get?

Assuming you have rested XP - you will start with no rested XP in BC but will aquire it normally from there on - you get roughly 1000 XP per mob (of equal level to yours) and 8000-12000 XP for most quests. To get a level up you will need several hundred thousand XP; I needed 680k from 64 to 65 and 710k from 65 to 66.

Grinding?

Grinding is a valid alternative to questing as long as you have rested XP, but I would really not recommend *only* grinding since you’ll lose out on a lot of items (and eventually, gold) this way. It gets boring fast and will not be very easy during the first week after release.

Is instance grinding OK?

Instance grinding is pretty rewarding, especially if you have rested XP. Even if you don’t, you get a good amount of XP per run. This will be one of the more popular ways of levelling up, especially for those with instance builds (prot, holy, resto etc), but also because the "beginner" zones will be overcrowded during the first few weeks, so questing might be a bit rough at times.

I will not list all the items you can get in instances but rest assured, there are a few nice things in the first two instances, Ramparts and Blood Furnace (plus all the instances in the other zones, obviously).

From what I’ve seen, most instances should take 1h 30 min to complete, longer if it’s your first run, shorter if it’s a farm run with a good group. This makes instance grinding an even better choice for many people.

How should I spec for fastest grinding/questing?

In my experience, a full DW fury build worked best. Even if you don’t have good DW weapons you will get a very nice pair once you become honored with Thrallmar/Honor Hold.

For that, I would recommend a build like this:

http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=pZVVzVgxRiuVoc (0/48/3)

TM is not a must but I like it, so don’t get it if you want to spend points else where.

How should I spec if I want to do quests/instances/grinding?

I would suggest a DW build build with full deflection, like this:

http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=TVZVVuVMxoiuVo (5/44/0)

Put the remaining 2 pts where you want.

How should I spec if I want to be a decent tank but still be able to do well solo?

You can get either a 31/5/15 or 5/31/15 build, depending on whether you prefer arms or fury:

http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=pVZVVzVRxoVzZcEzo (5/31/15)
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=pVMjdhbog0zZVZcEzo (31/5/15)

You can obviously change some talents, such as moving a few points from cruelty to second wind and defiance etc, but that’s up to you.

How should I spec if I want a good tank build?

I’d personally get something like this if you aim for high mitigation but also want some threat:

http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=TVZZ0EpoIMzcest (5/0/46)
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=TVZVZ0EpoIMz0esu (5/5/41)

You can still tank instances without a tank spec, this is just for those who like prot and want to spec that way.

How should I spec if I want a good arms build?

Personally I’m considering speccing this, since I don’t like endless rage and consider piercing howl a must:

http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LVMsdAbog0dbZE0zZc (31/11/3)

http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LVMsdAbog0dioVZc (41/5/3)

Second build is for those who want endless rage.

Arms is VERY MUCH viable in BC, both for instances and grinding (and PvP, obviously). So if you’re arms now, there’s no need to go DW fury in BC. Just saying that if you want the fastest possible grinding, then you may want to consider DW fury.

Warlock Leveling Talent Builds

Level Grinding

1. Affliction Grinding to 60 Build (41/0/10)
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=AVMrVRfkqtboZxx

This is the best grinding build up to level 60. Put all 41 of your first points in Affliction, then decide what to do from there. Make sure you get Dark Pact as soon as possible; this talent is what makes drain tanking truly effective. Finally, make sure you have a significant amount of +dmg gear before you put any points into Empowered Corruption. The last ten points after getting Unstable Affliction are debatable; some would prefer to put them in Suppression and/or Demonic Embrace. Getting Bane like in the build shown will greatly improve single target DPS in instances, and at 61 you can get Shadowburn, which is nifty. Suppression will help you take on higher level mobs better and will improve the overall DPS of your DoT’s. Demonic Embrace will give you a good amount of health.

During the grind, Affliction is chosen over Demonology and Destruction for many reasons. First of all, there are the strengths of Affliction. Affliction uses instant casts and channeled spells that are given protection with Fel Concentration. This reduces the amount of time wasted attempting to cast on an enemy beating on you and also makes it so you are not reliant on pet mana/agro to grind. The DoT’s are very mana efficient, and with +dmg gear, Drain Life is extremely powerful. On top of this, you have Life Tap and Dark Pact to keep your health/mana pools consistently high; you shouldn’t have any downtime. Also, Affliction does well against multiple opponents.

Destruction isn’t taken because it has a lot of downtime and does not deal with multiple mobs as well as Affliction does. It kills single targets faster and is probably better for instancing, but soloing is a pain. Demonology isn’t taken at the early levels because it lacks DPS talents lower in the tree. Demonology’s powerful DPS talents aren’t found until you are deep inside the tree, and even then they are not worth getting until you have some points left over for Affliction.

After 60, you can work your way downDestruction from the shown tree to become a UA/Destructive Reach build, or you can place points into Demonology for more health and Demonic Aegis. It really doesn’t matter, though I prefer UA/Destruction Reach builds because they are extremely versatile and do well for both grinding and instancing.

2. Felguard Grinding Build (20/41/0)
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=IVMbZ0gczIizceszxx0z

A Felguard pure-grinding build. I would not recommend this build until the mid-60’s (or 60 at the very least), because the investment of points in Demonology causes you to miss vital talents like Improved Corruption or Bane until higher levels. The Felguard build is an alternative to a heavy Affliction build for grinding. Both are very effective, and neither have significant downtimes in normal grinding. Affliction is more efficient at dealing with multiple mobs, but Demonology grinds down single targets better - this makes it very good for easy zones like Nagrand.

There are many variations of this build, and it completely depends on what you plan to do during your grind. The build shown has most of the vital talents in Demonology. Some would debate the use of 3/3 in Mana Feed, but I believe that it helps to have that third point to maximize grinding efficiency. A Felguard who can’t spam Cleave as much as possible is a lower DPS Felguard. Demonic Tactics could be valuable, as crit Felguard Cleaves with Demonic Frenzy stacks can deal nice damage.

The build shown has a balance of DoTing and nuking power. The strength, in my opinion, of Demonology for grinding is that you are capable of choosing between an efficient or a quick kill. An efficient kill would send the Felguard to the mob, DoT with CoA/Corruption, and then Life Tap -> Drain Life until the mob is dead. A burst kill would send the Felguard to the mob, maybe throw up DoT’s, and nuke the mob down. Thanks to the Felguard’s tanking ability, you can alternate between these methods of killing.

The main hassle of the Felguard is the rate at which is health drops at higher levels and his mana-sucking abilities. These flaws can be mitigated by Health Funneling during combat with your target DoT’ed and by takiing points in Mana Feed and using Life Tap -> Drain Life instead of a wand.

One final note - I take Improved Drain Soul in this build. Casting a Shadow Bolt and using Drain Soul on the mob as the bolt is traveling towards the target is a very effective way to improve killing speed, as you’ll usually get more than the mana you spent back from Improved Drain Soul. I consider it important for grinding with the Felguard.

Shaman Leveling Talent Builds

Here are your options: Elemental, Enhancement and Restoration. First, if you are leveling your shaman to be a healer, do not level it restoration. Restoration is absolutely horrible for leveling unless you plan on having at least one person helping you. The restoration tree has some nice goodies, but it is designed for end-game healing and not for leveling.

So, that leaves two other trees for leveling: Elemental and Enhancement.

Enhancement is likely the more popular talent spec for leveling. Enhancement is a melee Shaman that specializes in hitting people up close in their face. So, if you like melee, up close and personal, then Enhancement is for you.

Elemental is nice for people who like spell-casting hybrids. While leveling, you are likely to still melee some, and you can’t really keep mobs at range. However, you like doing spell damage using your shock spells and lightning bolts, and if you get the chance in a group, you like to stand back farther casting from behind. If you like more ranged spell damage, then elemental is for you.

Keep in mind that talents are really a place for you to invest in the spells and abilities that you use the most. So, what you find as the best spec for you may be completely different from what I suggest here. Feel free to comment, as I take player suggestions seriously. However, this is what I found to work the best through my experiences.

Elemental Talent Spec (not recommended):

Some argue enhancement is better and faster for Shaman. So, you can skip over this part if you have no interest in being elemental. However, I leveled my shaman this way, so I feel confident that it is possible (and rather easy) to level an elemental shaman. Others also argue that the early points in elemental end up being better at lower levels.

Level 10-14: Convection:
Reduces the mana cost of your shocks, lightning bolt, & chain-lightning spells. This is useful since at low levels you don’t have much mana. This gives you less downtime between killing things. I am a big fan of talents that reduce mana costs.

Level 15-19: Concussion:
Increases damage done for your shocks, lightning bolt, & chain lightning spells. This is nice since more damage means you kill things faster.

Level 20: Elemental focus:
Reduced mana cost after a critical spell. This helps give you more mana and is very useful in combination with other talents in the tree.

Level 21-25: Reverberation:
Reduces the cooldown of your shock spells. This helps you be able to use your shock spells faster, which means you do more damage. I mean, you did create a Shaman to be able to frost shock people, right? Just kidding! A lot of talent builds skip this talent, but I use my shock spells all the time, so why not make it useable faster? This may be less useful at high levels, but I find it very important for the way I level.

Level 26-30: Call of Thunder:
Increases your chance to get a critical strike with Lightning bolt and chain lightning. Since lightning bolt is your primary damage spell, this increased crit chance is important, and it unlocks a talent you will need later.

Level 31: Elemental Fury:
Increases damage done when you get a critical strike. Basically, instead of doing the typical 150% damage on a crit, it increases your damage to 200% of your normal (non-crit) damage. What the talent says is somewhat confusing, but it basically means your crits will now do twice your normal spell damage. (so a 500 damage spell now crits for 1000 instead of 750).

Level 32-34: Eye of the Storm:
When you suffer a critical hit, you can cast without being interrupted for a few seconds. I find this useful for getting off heals or lightning bolts when I’m getting hit a lot when soloing. This may be less useful at high levels, but it is good for leveling.

Level 35-39: Lightning Mastery:
Reduces the casting time of your lightning bolt & chain lightning spells. Since you cast lightning bolt all the time, having a shorter casting time means it does more damage.

Level 40: Elemental Mastery:
When you cast this spell, your next spell costs no mana and has a 100% chance to crit. I love this spell, and I frequently use it when I get low on mana and the fight isn’t over yet. This has saved my life many times.

Level 41-43: Elemental Precision:
Increases your chance to hit with fire, frost, and nature spells. Having a higher hit percentage means you will miss fewer spells allowing you to kill things faster. There is nothing worse than dieing because you missed your damage spell.

Level 44: One point in Unrelenting storm:
Basically, you have to spend one point to be able to unlock the next talent, and I (personally) will go back and fill this in more later. You can put this one point in pretty much any other talent you want in this tree to unlock the next talent.

Level 45-49: Lightning Overload
When you cast your lightning bolt or chain lightning spell, you have a 20% chance of doing twice the damage (casting a 2nd spell of the same type for no extra damage). Basically, this is a nice extra bonus of doing extra damage randomly.

Level 50: Totem of Wrath
Gives you a fire totem that increases your spell hit and crit chance by 3% each.

This is what your build would look like at level 50:

http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=hE0zEc0kAot

Level 51: At this point, you have picked up all the talents I consider to be important in that tree. You have several options.

Option one: Fill out Unrelenting storm to increase your in-combat mana regen.
Option two: Invest 5 points in Enhancement to pick up Ancestral Knowledge (increase your maximum mana by 5%). You can skip this talent if you want to put more points in restoration.
Option three: Going straight into the restoration tree and pick up 20 points.
Improved Healing Wave: Reduces the casting time of your healing wave spell. This will make it easier for you to heal yourself as you are leveling.

Totemic Focus: Reduces the mana cost of your totems. Lower mana cost means that you have more mana left for doing real damage.

Totemic Mastery: Increases the range of your totems. There is nothing worse than running out of range of your totems all the time.

Nature’s Guidance: Increases your spell and melee hit chance. More hits means more damage, and you will be able to skip this stat on your gear for the most part if you have a ton of +hit from talents.

Tidal mastery: Increases the critical hit chance of your healing and lightning spells. So, lightning bolt and chain lightning have a higher crit chance. This is a nice talent if you go this far in the tree.

For PvP, ancestral healing or Healing focus may give you more survivability. You can switch out Nature’s Guidance or totemic focus if you are focusing on PvP instead of PvE, since you may need survivability talents more.

Here is what your build would look like at 70:
41/0/20
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=hE0zEc0kAotZx0ek0x
If you really like Nature’s Swiftness, you can also go 40/0/21 with the same basic build.

40/0/21
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=hE0zy0MqqoxZx0ek0xo

45/5/11
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=hE0zEc0qAotxZx0xz

42/0/19
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=hE0zE00qAotZx0ek0L

45/0/16
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=hE0zEc0qAotZx0ed

Enhancement Spec (recommended)
People call this the more efficient leveling spec. It is still a melee/casting hybrid, however the emphasis is more on the melee and less on the casting. You care more about having high weapon DPS, strength, and agility to do lots of damage and have lots of big critical strikes. The following is where you can invest your talent points to increase your melee damage and make leveling more fun.

10-14: Ancestral knowledge
Increases your maximum mana by 5%. A lot of builds take Shield specialization instead, but even as a melee shaman, having mana is important. If you are going to dual wield later on, you won’t have a shield, anyway.

15-19: Thundering Strikes
Increases your critical strike chance by 5%. Having extra crit is good, and it unlocks a talent you will need later.

20-21: Improved Ghost Wolf
Reduces the casting time of your ghost wolf spell by 2 seconds. This will be the best way to get around until level 40 when you get your mount, so this talent will be really handy at least until you are 40.

22: Shamanistic Focus
After you crit in melee, your next shock spell has a reduced mana cost. This is nice for being able to throw out extra damage along with interrupts and slowing effects for less mana.

23-24: Improved Lightning Shield (2 points)
Increases damage done by your lightning shield orbs by 15%. You can put points somewhere else, but you have to spend two points to unlock the next tier in the tree.

25-29: Flurry
After you get a critical strike, your attack speed is faster for the next 3 swings. This goes nicely with the talent increasing your critical strike chance.

30: Spirit Weapons
Gives you a chance to parry attacks and reduces threat generated by melee. Parry is an ability like dodge and block that prevents you from taking some damage.

31-33: Elemental Weapons
Increases damage done by your rockbiter, windfury, flametongue, & frostband weapon buffs.

34: One point Improved Lightning Shield
You have to spend one point to unlock the next tier. You can spend this maxing out imp. Lightning shield, or if you skipped that talent, put it wherever you want.

35-39: Weapon Mastery
Increases damage done with weapons by 10%. More damage is always better.

40: Dual wield!
Finally, you can hack and slash your opponents by equipping a weapon (instead of a shield) in your off-hand.

41-43: Dual Wield Specialization
Increases your chance to hit while dual wielding. You really need this talent since missing all the time is really not fun.

44: Stormstrike
Instantly attack with both weapons. Increases nature damage done by the next two spells cast on that target in 12 seconds.

45-47: Mental Quickness
Reduces mana cost of instant cast spells, and increases spell damage based off your attack power. Now, you may think “but I don’t cast spells!” However, if that were true you would be a warrior. You should be using your shock spells to do additional damage, interrupt casters, and slow movement speeds. Reducing the mana cost and increasing their damage is good.

48-49: Unleashed Rage (2 points)
Increased mele attack power buff for the group after you get a critical strike. This is a nice bonus for everyone in your party if you instance a lot, and is still nice when you are solo.

50: Shamanistic rage
Reduces damage done to you and gives you a chance to regenerate mana. This helps you a lot, so you should pick it up before you go back and finish…

51-53 Unleashed Rage
It’s better to pick up SR at 50 and then come back to finish up this talent. :o)

This is what your level 53 spec would look like:

http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=hZxVfzV0sAuqo

At this point, you should move on to the restoration tree and pick up a few talents over there:
Improved healing wave
Totemic Focus
Totemic Mastery
Nature’s Guidance
& a few points in Healing Focus

This is what your build would look like at 70:
0/44/17
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=hZxVfzV0sAuqox0eu