Compilation of AOE leveling locations

[Kelaan]

{This is currently a work in progress. I am level 73, so can't tell much about higher level stuffs. I'll try to update the initial post to include information on other grinding locations.}

Goals: Locations and strategies to let us get more xp/hour than questing.

Levels 71-73: Iron Dwarves in southeast Howling Fjord.
Level 70: ____ xp/hour (untested)
Level 71: ____ xp/hour (untested)
Level 72: ~800-1000k xp/hour (I was rested for part of this, so I can't really be sure. Early on I was getting like ~1.2M xp/hour, and )
Level 73: ~450-500k xp/hour (unrested. I believe I can quest at more xp/hour than this.)

How to get there: There's a large cliff face on the eastern coast of the Fjord. The cave you want is about halfway up, and has two openings -- either will work. You can go down the scaffoldings until you see it, OR you can jump off the cliff, (bubble) and look up to where it is.

They are spawned by an alliance quest, where someone will walk by in an Iron Construct (looks like a westfall robot). If you can't trigger it yourself, it can take a while to get the pump primed (so to speak). A statue will appear, and dwarves will spawn on the upper and lower levels. Tag the top ones with a consecrate, and then body pull / hammer / shield toss the lower ones -- if they pray at the statue too long, ir maybe it was if I fight them too near him, they get despawned at the end of the quest event. Early on, I was unable to keep both groups tagged, so I was only dealing with half-spawns... so XP/hour is probably better for lower levels than what I reported.

Other notes:
Iron Dwarves are ~68-70ish in level if I recall correctly; they were green to me at level 73. My limiting factor was in speed of killing them -- my best results were with using the PLG. Having reckoning helps with getting more SoL procs; JoL didn't seem all that useful as things often died too fast. I tended to use it as a damage judgement more than a "I need heals" one. They only hit for ~200 damage (golems hit for more ...), so you'll want to emphasis block rating and defense more than BV.

Having a second person didn't seem to help -- apparently, if you kill them too quickly, they might not respawn, or something weird like that.

Limiting factors:
I was limited by how fast I could kill things (WTB mana dump for infinite mana situations! ), and to an extent how fast I could self-heal. Looting tended to screw my damage intake; between bubble+heal and FotC+Dabiri's, I wasn't always still able to keep up -- I used a couple potions and a LoH or two for safety. As I experimented with techniques, I found better ways to get healed: fight on the upper spawn point, and when I got low I'd jump down the ledge. Landing in the very NW corner behind the pillar, I'd have enough time for 1-2 holy lights before the back would get back to me. (Less if the lower spawns were up and noticed me first.) After finding that trick, I had few health worries.


Levels 73-76: I don't know yet.

Is something like soloing Shattered Halls going to be viable (or competitive) at this point in quested/crafted gear? They are elite, and thus should give ~1600 xp/each -- but also have more health (and casters! {hate}) so perhaps the kill rate would make xp/hour less good than I'd think?


Levels 76+: Mjordin Combatants in NW Icecrown
____ xp/hour (no reported xp intake rate).

Wanted: XP/hour for levels 76+, as well as techniques for self-healing. Is bubble+heal the only way, or are there terrain/pathing techniques you can use?

[Kelaan]

Update: A google search turned this up:
http://frostisthenewblack.blogspot.com/ ... nding.html

It's from a frost mage perspective, but I will be investigating some of the 73+ locations. If anyone wants to post results from these locations, let me know.

72-73: Wastes Diggers, Dragonblight
72-73: Scarlet Onslaught, Dragonblight

74-75: Highland Mustangs, Grizzly Hills
75-76: Venture Corp., Sholazar Basin

While these don't look like infinite respawns, they sound like they respawn quickly -- and can likely be looted more easily than the iron dwarves, at least.

[BubbaBill]

72-73: Wastes Diggers, Dragonblight

Found these guys on my own. Not bad but not great. They are undead which is nice. 1 human spawns in the middle but easily handled. The problem here is it's high traffic with plenty of people coming through questing which really messes your rythm.
They spawn in groups of about a dozen/trench. I found very little downtime between pulls. I would run in gather them all up and fight in the middle of the trench, loot, head out, heal up(if needed) then within a few seconds they would all be respawned.

I did these guys for a bit. It wasn't bad but at 72-74 you will still get more xp and easier(completely mindless) doing the dwarves in HF.

[guillex]

I'd love to test out the Scarlet Onslaught spot ... But I need an XP tracker.

[Kelaan]

I finally installed Fubar and ExperienceFu expressly for this purpose.

[samoa]

Mobs outside of BT is a good way to lvl 70-73. Haven't tried it yet been busy on me mage. But as soon as i respect back to tankadin gonna try it out.

[Belloc]

Mobs outside of BT is a good way to lvl 70-73. Haven't tried it yet been busy on me mage. But as soon as i respect back to tankadin gonna try it out.

If you meant the black temple, I didn't care for the XP out there.

[Kelaan]

Note that Jame's questing guide was givingme 450-500k xp/hour following that as ret. I'd like to make sure that farming these things gives noticeably better returns. Questing was low-maintenance and low-stress; aoe farming was mildly harder and more annoying -- if it gives us worse returns, why do it?

[Fridmarr]

Mobs outside of BT is a good way to lvl 70-73. Haven't tried it yet been busy on me mage. But as soon as i respect back to tankadin gonna try it out.

If you meant the black temple, I didn't care for the XP out there.

Borean Tundra perhaps?

[Belloc]

Mobs outside of BT is a good way to lvl 70-73. Haven't tried it yet been busy on me mage. But as soon as i respect back to tankadin gonna try it out.

If you meant the black temple, I didn't care for the XP out there.

Borean Tundra perhaps?

I don't think that's what he meant.

[amunstorr]

im gonna try the mobs outside of BT (Black templ) tonight. just to see. Northrend is full of groups of allies and i quest alone
...because no one likes me

[Veilan]

Hm... I liked the Kvaldir landing site near Unu'pe, where, with the proper rhythm, you can keep both longships, each containing 5 kvaldir, tagged. I did not measure xp/hr though, as I just did it to grab some cloth .

[guillex]

I like where this thread is going ... If people could start posting their findings, I'm sure that it would be a great resource for those of us who like to break from the quest grinding.

Get some more info in here

[majiben]

Well this spot is better for ret than prot but the courtyard infront of the argent stand in ZD, is full of undead that come in small packs of 2-4. High respawn rate and melee only.

[Sederia]

tagging so I can find this tomorrow