Level 58: Time to go to Outland?

For a long time now, I have watched players run straight into Outland the second they hit 58. Either they have heard about how great the loot drops are there or they experienced it themselves with their mains and now that their alt is 58, they choose to take the exact same course they took the first ( or second ) time through. They level quickly through to 60 while in Hellfire Peninsula, and move into Zangarmarsh or Terrokar Forest at 60 or 61. They love the new zones, the new quests, the speed at which they are leveling. And then they finish up these three zones at level 64 and move into Nagrand and they hit the wall at 64 miles an hour.
Not all classes will hit that wall. Some will only be slowed down. But Nagrand is the spot that they all feel their leveling to 70 has become a grind again. So they realize, they have to go out and grind a level to get back on track.The question is why? The answer is very simple, and some even knowing the answer, still make the jump to Outland at level 58.

The issue is this: Hellfire Peninsula was designed for a level 60 character, and the zones that follow were designed to build off Hellfire. What this means is, if you enter Hellfire at level 58 and start doing those quests, you are using them for the wrong level. And thus, you will be using Zangarmarsh and terrokar Forest for the wrong levels as well.

With Patch 2.3, Blizard tried to fix this for people by both decreasing the experience needed to level all the way to 60 and increasing the experience acquired from quests. This took zones like, Eastern Plaguelands, Winterspring and Silithus and made them excellent places to level from 58 to 60. But, because Blizzard didn't say specifically to stay out of Outlands until level 60, players, in general, ignored the change post level 58 and entered Outland. Some entered believing they could get to 70 faster, some believed the great gear in Outland was the reason to move out of Azeroth, some entered Outland for a much needed change of scenery and still others moved into Outland because they had done most of the quests in one or two of the 55-60 zones and were frustrated with finding more quests for the zones to level. Each of these reasons all stem from the same source: Impatience.
Player want to level. They want to be 70 so they can take part in the end game content. And let's face it, with the complete lack of players to level with or run level appropriate instances with, who can really blame them? They want to play with their friends or just be able to run the content to make some friends. What these players do not know or understand is, with that lack of patience comes a price they must pay at level 64 and then again at level 70.

If a player moves into Outland at level 58, they are effectively leaving thousands of gold untouched that could be theirs at level 70. They are planning to use Shadowmoon Valley and Netherstorm to hit max level, when if they were patient they would have hit 70 before ever entering these zones. Imagine for a moment if you hit level 70 while halfway through the Blades Edge Mountains quest lines. That would leave all of the quests in Netherstorm and Shadowmoon Valley with level 70 gold only rewards. How many thousands of gold is that? How much further along would your grind to 5000 gold be if those quests were used for gold and not experience? Every time I am in Netherstorm and I see someone below level 70 there questing, I cringe for them. I know what a mistake they have made and there is no way for them to fix it now.

The worst part is: The mistake is usually made somewhere in the characters 40's or 50's everything stems from there. Boredom and impatience leads players to move out of a zone before it is complete. They can handle the next zone so why not? The zone their in is driving them nuts and they decide to move on. But they leave all that experience untouched and therefore need other zones/quests to replace it. So it's replaced with experience that would be better for other levels, until finally, they move into Outland and lose out on thousands of gold they need for their Epic Flying mount.

I recently leveled a mage to 70. It's my new maina nd my new favorite class in the game. I leveled fairly quickly, though I spent alot of time talking to people, going to guild meetings and such. In other words , many hours of leveling missed. But I was able to get to 70 in 11 days, 14 hours, 30 minutes and 52 seconds. I have included a screenshot of hitting 70 to confirm the time. Now, there are leveling guides out there that claim they can help you level to 70 in just about 10 days game time. The guides can be very helpful and I won't say don't use them if you find them useful. But, they are not needed, in my opinion. Just grab all the quests and do them. Turn them in and do all the quests that are made available at that point, and just keep going. Then at 58, stay out of Outland. Go get to 60 or even 61 ( as I did with my mage ) before hitting Outland. I hit 68 in Nagrand and used Blades Edge Mountains to reached 70. That meant every quest I had not yet done was a huge gold reward and I was able to get my epic flyer in no time at all.

If you are patient, you will hit Outland stronger and the leveling will be smoother and quicker. You will hit level 70 with literally hundreds of quests left to do and thousands of gold just waiting to be yours. Yes, the 25 daily quests per day can really help out with your gold grind to 5000. But if you are a marathon session player, those dailies run out fairly quickly and then what do you do? You do the quests that others have done to level and you make tons more gold. I have my epic flyer on two characters, on two seperate factions and on two different servers, so I have had to grind out 5k gold twice, with no help, no loans and no in game gold purchased with real life money. And, I can say from experience, a little bit of patience, put me so far ahead that the time "lost" at level 58 - 60 was more than returned to me at 64 and at 70.

- Grimme