f13.net

Eve is right now level 3 courior missons and too scared to go back to low sec.

SO right now I'm 20 hours away from getting the download for the WoW trial. Couple of newbie questions:

Whats more wanted in groups, Rogue or Hunter? Which one is better at soloing? In groups? In raids?

I'm going to go Allience as WW2OL has beaten out any joy of being on the outnumbered side. Does race matter in any way for finding groups as far as different allience races go? Eve has givin me a great experience in NOT being able to find groups to join (F13's corp is cool, but usually not on when I am). Whats the most and least popular race for Rogues and Hunters?

Any particlaur server I should join or stay away from? Any guilds that could be recommended? (joining thr F13 corp in EVE when it was in allience space was nice). Non PvP, but what abour a RP server?

Welcome (soon) to the Dark Side :evil:

I'd join a PvP server, the times in Stranglethorn Vale are so much fun. And well, non-PvP sort of kills an random element in the game. RP is ok, didn't do too much of it, but I noticed alot of kids trying to kill the fun, I guess it depends upon the guild. Rogue is more wanted in a group, if I'd be starting it. Hunters are better at soloing stuff though. But if you want to be WANTED, roll a druid and go all in for healing.

I'd warn you away from alliance, I played both sides and Horde was... well, so much more fun, both times. Don't really know why, maybe it just feels better beeing a big Minotaur compared to a Gnome. Well, if you want something truly unique; Go go female dorf rogue  :-D

Try leveling as a feral Druid on the Alliance side.  Rogues and Hunters are a dime a dozen.

For instance, here are the stats from a sample of the launch servers:

PvE:
http://tinyurl.com/g8lb7 (http://tinyurl.com/g8lb7)

PvP:

http://tinyurl.com/hjdlp (http://tinyurl.com/hjdlp)

RP:

http://tinyurl.com/fwheh (http://tinyurl.com/fwheh)

The nice thing about the Druid for a new player is that it exposes you to all the traditional roles such as Melee DPS, Ranged DPS, Healer and Tank. Not really the best at any one role, but you can respec to try each one as opposed to rerolling and starting from scratch.  You can play as a cat (Melee DPS) when you are soloing, switch in to bear (Tank) form when you get an add, switch in to travel form when you get another add and then switch in to Elf form to heal or pop off a ranged attack to finish off a runner.

Just remember, if you are about to join a group, tell everyone that you are a 0/0/X spec healer.

Specing as a Restoration Druid prior to the BRD/xBRS/Scholo/Strat/DM instances is just asking for trouble unless you have a constant DPS leveling partner.

Perhaps the best post on the forums that sums up the Druid is:

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=11491411&sid=1 (http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=11491411&sid=1)

Best of luck and grats for ditching eXvCeL.

Be warned, though, that all I've ever heard from druids is they are slow as hell at leveling.   No idea why, but it's been a common complaint.

The only time race REALLY matters is for priests.  If you're going to roll one and want to be wanted (regardless of actual skill or ability) roll a dwarf for fear ward.  People get so set on ez-mode raid encounters they often overlook the fact that the player sucks, or is a complete jackass just because of that one spell.  (Or they see you're not a dwarf and say "sorry, we need priests but only DWARF priests are being accepted."  Wtf?)

The least-played Alliance races are dwarves and gnomes for all classes. If you're dead set on hunter or rogue roll as one of them.

Night Elves are the most popular (and therefore most hated) race.  Night Elf Hunter gets you auto-labeled as a noob jacktard 14 year old with ADD.

As mentioned, rogues and hunters are a dime a dozen.  If it's a class that appeals to you and you're not interested in doing group dungeons or endgame stuff a lot, go for it.  If you just want to do DPS mages and locks are great and always in a mid-level of demand. (Mages moreso for their CC and water/food summoning abilities)   

Out of the rogue/ hunter I'd say rogues are probably more often wanted for dungeons.  The auto-labeling above seems to lead some people to believe hunters can't dps. 

Stranglethorn Vale is not fun.

-------

Any server will do if you want to play Alliance.

General rule of thumb on Classes (from what little I know): If you want to be wanted in groups, AND want to play a dps role, then the wise thing to do is not pick a Hunter or Rogue. You'd have a better time with something else (especially the higher level you get). Pick a mage or warlock.

A warrior can dps too, but you'll be much more appreciated if you go sword and board for tanking instances (Not a big deal. It doesn't require a respec at least).

Another option is: Pick a new server if you want a Hunter or Rogue. More than likely, you'll have a better experience because of it.

----

As for Alliance Hunters.... I hate to say it, but Night Elf for sure. Dwarves aren't bad, but they can't compete with +dodge and Shadowmeld. The only other race with abilities that perfectly compliment a Hunter is the Troll on Horde.

----

Pretty much all Alliance races are good for Rogues, but general "wisdom" puts Humans and Night Elves on the top of the list.

Humans get a sword bonus and can gain faction rep quicker. Depending on your spec, +swords works out well. The faction gain bonus is the real plus, though it's just a general all around good skill. Nothing rogue specific.

Night Elves get a higher percent to dodge, higher base agility (but not much), and Shadowmeld (which isn't as crucial on Rogues as it is for other classes).

Dwarves can dispel poisons (among other things).

Gnomes are a harder to see and can break snares. In the end, they are only Alliance race that's worth a damn.

I suggest Orc.


[edit] Don't listen to Oban. If you want a Rogue, or dps in general, do NOT roll a Druid. I have one. It's not a Rogue....And playing Feral for the cat is about the dumbest mistake you could make as a Druid anyways.

Interestingly enough, undead (proportionally) make up a far larger majority of the horde than NEs do of alliance. I can't be arsed to check warcraftrealms again, but priests/warlocks/mages/rogues were like 75+% undead and the rest divided among the other eligible races. That said, elves do suck.

Go gnome or go home!!!11


-- Z.

I can believe that. The Undead are everywhere.

I don't see a lot of Undead Warriors though (my first choice when WoW launched).

Both Oban and Stray are right.  Stray is right when he says "if you want a dps class, don't roll druid".  Oban is right when he says, "druid gives you the flavor warrior/rogue/healer without having to reroll".

If you are looking to roll one character and stick with it, pay attention to what Stray says.  If you are looking to roll a solid low-level char (assume you'll need to play to about 25ish) to give you an idea of how tank/dps/healbot play, and then make a decision about long-term char, druid is a good choice to give you the flavor of each.

Seeing as you are asking for dps and ease-of-leveling, I'd say hunter is a little easier to level after the first 15-20 levels (the pet improves survivability quite a bit).  I'd also say that (for me) mages play a bit more entertaining then either (however, you have to expect to be mobile, the mage has to be played as a mobile class when solo), and you are likely to have an easier time findiing groups (food/water and int buff).

I should add: I like the Druid. I would agree that they're a good intro to the game. It's just that since he mentioned Rogues and Hunters, I figured he was leaning towards the pure dps side.

Technically, Druid powers in catform can achieve about 80-85% of what a Rogue's damage does, but without the high dodge rate, stunlocking, poisons, extreme item scaling, and the ability to add weapon procs, your damage comes nowwhere near what a rogue can do. Not only will you not dish out similar damage, but you'll take more damage too.

Even with the big heals, it doesn't compensate. Druids are not "Rogues with heals". They're something entirely different, and should be defined by all their forms. Not just one.

If you want good PvP, I'd not recommend PvP servers, but rather PvE ones and focusing on BGs. From my perspective, it's not like Eve where you at least had a good chance of bolting if baddies came to play. WoW is too level-centric for you to have any chance, of winning or bolting, unless you're in a good strong-ish guild. Loss is a joke in WoW comparatively of course, but it sucks to get continually prevented from leveling/questing up. Basically, if you want to experience the really excellent PvE game (I'd say superior to Eve in a number of ways if you can like a class-game) and then do PvP as an endgame, PvE first to 60 then BG.

Any server should do. I have no idea where your greater chance to group is. I'd invite you to Icecrown and my guild, but we're mostly on the upper end of levels and most of us are going to be focusing on quests in Outlands, 70 and the new BG once BC launches. We do have some lower levels, and some of us do plan to play lower level classes on off time, but nothing official yet. One thing: the new races seem to cap out on unique content around level 20, so thereafter they're in lands their players have already been before. If you join any guild based on people you know at F13, and don't feel like rolling a new race while they do, you'll end up meeting up with them in the mid-20s anyway.

Rogues and Hunters are in adundance, but the reason is that they can be very desired for groups. I can't speak for PvP because most of what I do there is PUG stuff. But for PvE, both classes, and Druids, and really most anything, come with enough usefulness that only the Club Fus/Afterlifes of the world would turn someone down purely based on class (and their equipment and spec) alone. While I think Rogues out DPS, either my guild's Rogues aren't as equipped or the Hunters just are, but in our Alliance it's always the Hunters that do the tops. Or maybe that's just because we include pets in the damage (whereas I hear sometimes people dont', which is retaaded).

Yes, before the expansion comes out, your life at 60 as a Druid will be spent as a Restoration spec Druid...or as some of us call it, professional whackamoler.  Although, now that Blizzard disabled emergency monitor and decursive I guess we need a new title.

Level 60 raiding Feral Druids are rarer than legendary weapons and most of those are bears.

I think the fact that the expansion turns restoration Druids in to trees is very telling...  I want to be a tree when I grow up!

Anyway, the important thing is that you play what ever makes you happy, as long as it is not a pink haired female gnome.

the visuals are pretty different and fresh compared to the low level zones, so it feels like a big step up. And the zone is HUGE, full of pretty nice and interesting quests. The other option being Desolace, which is.. well Desolate :p

Gotta say STV is more fun as Horde though, easier to group up and generally more Horde around (on my serveratleast).

As they say; Horde gets ganked in STV, Alliance gets raped.

If you want a class thats always in demand and can do some pretty nifty dps; Warrior is the way to go. Almost every single instance run requires one, and as horde, you're the only one wearing plate :) Otherwise expect to compete with Paladins for some drops. Warriors are as said, always in demand, you seldom see an instance group without one (But you'll often see an instance group with one that can't tank). So basically, if you want to take charge and have a smooth ride, roll a warrior.

I did, since I don't really like relying on others when it comes to a bad pull that might wipe the group.

----

On Feral druids in endgame:

We had a Feral Druid doing alot of tanking for our guild. They do come  in handy at certain encounters like; Broodlord, the MS can't crit so he can eat at least one and then get the knockback (since his avoidance is so low). Starting with one on Vael gives you one more warrior executing. Jin'do almost requires one, since one unlucky polymorph + Mindcontrol = complete aggrowipe. They're good on patchwerk, for eating hateful strikes. They also are good inthat they can some considerable dps or add some healing to the raid. Maybe not the best for MT healing, but raidhealing with HoTs and some good +healing makes them more then viable.

Might be the shortshightedsness of some raidleaders, that has gotten people into the mode; Feral = Useless.

Dude, that's like the best thing Alliance has to offer.  :-D

Seriously.

Cool looking zone, yes. Wish they made a BG there.

As for the quests, meh. Quests suck in general. And beast killing sucks. Go go powergaming. Better drops seem to come off humanoids and demons. Desolace might look like crap, but it's the better place to grind.

...

I recently ran though STV on a Horde character actually. No Horde but me. Just me and a bunch of cackling Night Elves. I'm talking 1 to 20 ratio here.

That was a on a PvE server. In the past, STV was the sole reason why I got turned off on the idea of WoW's world PvP. It's not fun as Horde, in my experience.


I had no idea "they" said that.

Hmmm..

Guess it's just me that got lucky with my realm  :-D (http://www.warcraftrealms.com/census.php?serverid=619)

Hey, that's pretty cool.

And strange. Seems like it's the case for a lot of EU servers. Wonder why.

Hell, looking at EU Darksorrow, it says Alliance is 16% and Horde is 84%. That's whack.

PVP servers are a lot closer to 1:1. My server is 1:1.2 [horde:alliance] in terms of characters, and 1:1 in terms of activity. I know I got ganked a hell of a lot while levelling, and barely saw any other alliance... but that might just be a timezone thing (I'm European, but play on a west coast server).
PVE and RP servers are horribly skewed though... which makes trying to pvp as alliance sucky at 60, since BG queues take 30 mins to an hour, while horde queues are instant (in the entire battlegroup).


-- Z.

I'll be perched somewhere off in the distance, watching with interest when the expansion is released, listening for the horrified shrieks of alliance-haters when they realize that the entire horde is now elves.

I thought I'd extend an olive branch and say that you're welcome to come to Shadowsong.  I just restarted to roll a druid and he's not that far in yet (level 12, which is 2 days of leveling or less).  I'm on horde and usually play around 10PST.  Normally I wouldn't suggest coming, but I'm in the rare situation of actually planning on getting this alt to 60.

Problem is my server is extremely backwater: low pop and extreme population imbalances (70+% aliance).  And it's PVE.

It's funny coming back and trying to play casually.  People keep looking at my gear and trying to get me to raid  :|

Druid is fun, but you have to reach level 20 to really get any feel for the roguish aspects.  It would be much easier to start with a Rogue if that is what interests you.  If you like versatility, they are great.  I do have to carry an extra set of gear if I am the healer, however I often fill whatever roll we are lacking in our group and no one has ever complained that my less specialized skills hurt us.  (And has frequently saved us when I switched rolls mid-battle to adapt to a bad situation.)

Hunters and Warlocks are great if you like doing decent DPS and enjoy pet classes, yet they play differently enough to give you some choice.

As much as I love stealth classes, I have never been able to get into Rogues, so I cannot offer much on them.

My 2c.

What ever you do, dopnt play Night Elf Hunter or Rogue. As the others have said it gets you labeled as a 14 y.o. ADD kiddie. I heard mages are in fairly high demand right now. I would stay away from Warlocks as they are the new warrior, in the sence that lately every one has been killed by a warlock, so they go out and roll one. From what I can tell right now, warlock is the most rolled alt. Warriors are really fun, because they can tank and dps fairly well with the same spec. Hunters and rogues are great solo'ers, so if you want to solo you cant go wrgon with ether, hunters being the easiest solo'er in the entire game.

Shaman is very fun to level up, but if you plan on playing at 60, a lot of the time you get lumped in to the "healbot" roll. Same with Druids. Even if your specced full feral, people will still expect you to heal in instances. If you dont plan on getting to 60 and raiding, then basically play what you want and have fun. Just know that any class that can heal, will be expected to in instances.

Fixed that for you.

Try BE Warlocks. Pretty much every time the topic comes up of what class your BE will be, 90% say Warlock. I am thinking of making a BE shadow priest.

I'm currently thinking Draenei Shadow Priest as my alt. My Mage will continue to 70 and all that, but I'm thinking my alt post BC is going to be BG-focused PvP. The great thing about my alliance is they've got all the healers they need, so much so a few priests specced Shadow.

Generally, Rogues are more wanted, and for groups considered better as Hunters have a habit of not being able to control their (fucking) pets which leads to a bias against them unless you know them.

Rogue is pretty good at soloing, though I think Hunter is probably superior.



Shemale Hunters are the most popular. Shemale also applies to male Night Elfs
I see a lot of NE and Human rogues. Gnome not so much (though they do rock). Can Dwarves even be hunters?
No-one cares about your racial choice though. Ever. Except when they're giving shit to a race in general (Elf hate, Gnome Punts, etc) and that's just people fucking around.
[/quote]



Druids are a good way to see the variety in the class roles, but be warned that in groups you'll often be expected to heal and will be invited on that basis. Nothing pisses people off like a group with a warrior, rogue, mage and 2 druids who constantly bleat "but I'm feral" and try to dps and tank instead of healing.



Merusk is correct on the Dwarf Priest thing. The auto-labelling in my experience about Hunters isn't so much because people think Hunters can't DPS, rather it's because they can't (fucking) control their pets. (your experience may vary).




Stranglethorn Vale can be a ton of fun. On a PVE server at least there's a shitton of interresting and fun quests there. Generally the playerbase are morons in that level and zone, but you can easily ignore them, and the playerbase are morons everywhere you go. I have no problems with the zone, it's got a lot of variation and character.

Stray is right in that Mages and Locks are always in demand. I found Warlock grating to level, while Mage is awesome fun. Still, play whatever class appeals to you.

DPS-focused warriors tend to annoy groups. Since you generally need someone of some kind to tank, it's always nice to find a warrior who is focussed on actually tanking as opposed to being a "rogue in plate". Kind of like druids who refuse to heal "because they're feral) mentioned earlier. (In that instance I had to tell them "look guys, we have a def spec warrior for tanking, a mage and rogue for DPS. I'd go healer, but I can't actually heal, so if you guys could take care of that it'd really help a lot.")

What Stray says about race choice is all true. Except that while Elf Hunters may have some stat/ability advantages over Dwarfs, they also have the "you're probably a fuckwit" bias far applied more often. Gnomes do rule, however.


about STV:

It makes sense when viewed through Stray's perspective here. If you want to just powergame and grind to +max level, then STV might not be great for you.
Don't be put off it by posts like this however if you plan to quest and enjoy the ride, because it's a great zone for that (and you'll have nothing do to but grind at level cap, so you may as well enjoy getting there). Whatever works for you, however.



Morph is totally correct here. Though you can also throw Pally into the same situation that Shammies have at 60. It's because of the nature of the game's setup that the Tank/Healer/Everyone else dynamic is present, so as one of the two classes that can (properly) heal, you'll be invited to instance groups on that basis, since the other members of the group are a warrior, and the final 3 slots in the group are being competed for by every other class (and any double-ups).

In my experience, hunters are generally more useful in groups (they generally seem to deal more and take less damage than rogues), but I can't speak for public opinion on how desired they are or anything.  I'd say both are pretty much fighting for last place.

Soloing, I'd say hunters are probably faster and easier due mainly to the pet.  But, in PvP, I'd say rogues are probably more interesting.  Stealth is extremely handy when they're alone, and their stuns are very useful when they're in groups.

I wouldn't worry about choosing Horde, if you see a race or class you want.  On a PvP server, as others have mentioned, populations tend to be fairly balanced.  And on a PvE server, it's not that big a deal playing on the underpopulated side (maybe you have to wait longer for groups, I haven't really noticed).

If you're looking for stats on what is most or least frequently played, I find sites like Warcraftrealms (http://www.warcraftrealms.com/quickstats.php?PHPSESSID=abef759ceb525ca67eb32ea3e28f77fd) to be fairly useful.


Seconded.

Let me just add another stone on the 'Don't roll a druid with an eye towards being feral' stack.  To be a successful feral druid you need top-notch gear if you don't want to be the joke of the party, and there is crap for feral druid gear in the game.  What decent gear there is is all in high-level raid instances or from painful rep grinds.  If you want to be a respected DPS class, the top two are rogue and mage.  If you want a pet, then for the love of god learn how to control it.  I've been with more than one idiot hunter/warlock whose pet went charging off to aggro a room full of monsters because they didn't know how to call it back to them.

Bind the 'pet attack' command to one mouse button/hotkey.
Bind the 'pet follow' command on another.

If the pet decides it's pissed off at some monster and starts going after it, click key #2 to recall it to you before it causes a train.

People who don't know how to put their pet on Passive vs Defensive or Aggro are also major irritants.   90% of the time if there's a problem with pets it's because they didn't have the pet on passive - which it SHOULD ALWAYS BE in an instance unless you're with a group you're completly comfortable with. Even then it should never be on Aggro (except for possibly Jin'do)   Ctrl-1 isn't THAT hard to press and is the default 'pet attack'

Like Az said, pet management is the #1 reason hunters are labeled as twits.

Hey Comstar, welcome to the support group.  :roll:

I thought I'd give some info based on my personal play experience. 

I think I am oh so very qualified with noobler tips because I am a chronic alt maker and server hopper.  I just restarted Hordeside on Echo Isles actually.  I have probably 15 characters spread over a dozen PST servers.  I've levelled characters on PvP, RP-PvP, RP and PvE servers up into the 50's with my poor old mothballed Dwarf Priest at level 59 gathering dust on Ner'zhul. (My first character)  Same for factions.  I have upper and mid-level characters in both factions, barring Night Elves because I refuse to ever play one.  Ever.

Other than waaaaaay back toward release when I was involved in a guild with a few people I knew in real life, and the short lived glory days of the Emerald Dream F13 guild - I play solo almost exclusively.  I never have any extra funds or guild alts or trades characters to help me.  I hop on a new server and do it up the old school way.  *shrug* I sort of enjoy it more since I can focus on just playing in a way that's fun for me personally.


So after all that crap here's what I learned:

PvP versus PvE servers

1. The actual game play is the same.  You won't start to see much "open" or world level PvP until 20ish anyway.  Still the majority of your actual playtime (killing monsters) is the exact same as on a PvE server mechanically.  Except.  Except that your levelling/questing/tradeskilling can and will be interrupted by opposing faction players.  This can not only slow down your levelling time, but actually determine some things that you absolutely can and cannot do.  (Like say...walk into STV and expect to get any questing done) Some people really hate it.  Other people see the ability to go out and do unto others as they do unto you as the price you pay.  The majority of my playtime has been on PvP servers and I enjoy it.  However as a brand new player I'd recommend a white server for you.  Your going to be walking around looking at things and generally enjoying the game as it was meant to be enjoyed.  I'd try it out first and then if you want to draw a little blood you can always jump to a PvP server, or get involved with the Twinkgro... I mean Battle Grounds, before you're on a PvP server and out in Ashenvale killing Furbolgs and generally having a gay old time when Gangstakilla and UnclePappy hop off their epic mounts and slice you to bits just because they can (And well, to be honest Blizzard encourages it.)

2. The most important thing to factor in when thinking about servers is this: On PvP servers every decision you make revolves around your PvP viablity.  Your class, your talent build, your gear, your professions.  I won't say this is a limiting factor exactly, but I will say that playing on a PvE server is more relaxing.  If you want some whacked out talent build, or a lame ass Hunter pet, what difference does it make unless you're hurting your group or your guild?  You just have a bit more freedom to explore the game like you want without having to worry about making yourself into (more) a walking target.  A lot of PvP server life boils down to min/maxxing and making decisions based on fighting off the newest FoTM class build.



Class Choice 

I won't go too much into depth here as I've rambled on already but, again, especially if you're on a PvE server - who cares what class you are?  The only time your class choice becomes an issue is if you join a hardcore raiding or instance running guild.  And considering you don't even own an actual copy of the game yet those kind of situations are light years away for you.  Just play something you find fun or interesting.  That being said, yes, Hunters are very beginner friendly and easy to level up.  But yes you will be 1 of 39847983761964 Hunters on any server and it may hurt your raiding prospects eventually.  And just don't be a Night Elf, just don't.  Have some self respect.  :lol:

My personal experience with Druids is that they are actually slow levellers until level 25ish due to the talent spread.  They are always wanted in groups as they are great healers in most 5 man instances if you are strapped for a priest.  They are statistically the least played class.  They have a lot going on with forms, heals, nukes etc.  I'd say the learning curve for Druids is actually fairly steep.  The highest I've ever toughed a Druid out to levelwise is 35, I just could not get into a groove with them.  They really are one of the true "hybrid" classes of WoW (like Shamans) that you really have to play exstensively to learn their full potential.  I wouldn't recommend them as a starter class for a 10 day trial of WoW I guess is my point.

Go high population PvE server unless you want a thrill / additional playing difficulty / like being repeatedly kicked in the balls. PvP servers are like being in 0.0 space all the time in a noob ship. There WILL be some douchebag that makes it his life's goal to sit and kill people who are doing quests for fun, until you log off or leave. They can't do any permanent damage to you, the only thing you lose is time. They will be far too high for you to even damage them, and will more likely than not kill you in one hit. If you think it's fun to have that thrill, trying to sneak past, or get away from people like that, then by all means have at it. Otherwise, pick a PvE server. You want high population becuase high = mature economy (good for you) + alts (people who know how to play to party with, often on their second characters). Low population = ghost towns, no fun there.

Go alliance because it has the far superior PvE experience. As an added bonus, you won't get to experience the visual diversity of the barrens, or the "diversity" of "barrens chat". If you absoloutely must be horde, be a Tauren, becuase out of all the horde they have the best starting area/quest chains.

Any class can be fun, and all of them are easy to level. WoW will be the easist to level, bar none, that you have ever played. It's part of what makes it so casual friendly. The difference between a 'hard to level' class and a 'easy to level' class is, very small, especially if you take the correct talents.

When you hit level 10, you start investing in talent points, one per level, to enhance your abilities. It's like diablo2. You will want to spec one specific way. One of the (oft repeated) crappy things about the game is the talent trees which on the surface show a lot of options, but realistically boil down to one or two talent specs per class, and generally a single spec while soloing/leveling up. You can be a unique snowflake, or you can read up on a leveling spec and make your life a WHOLE LOT easier. Liken this to creating a Eve character with rank 4 frigates to start. You don't HAVE to, but you will regret it later if you don't.

Race can matter, but if you are set on staring at a hot woman avatar ass, then by all means, go for it. It doesn't matter THAT much. This is diku for the masses, remember, all advantages are marginal. Except for talent point spec.

Learn to love wow wiki (http://www.wowwiki.com), alla (http://wow.allakhazam.com/), and thottbot (http://www.thottbot.com). Use the first for general information, use the second for zone maps / general info, and use the third if you're trying to find something in the game world (like finding where that damn quest giver was). Don't be shy on tabbing out to look. Head to the class forums (http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/?sid=1) with blinders on. Read the stickied posts. Ignore the rest. A lot of this stuff has been CC'd to wowwiki if you feel your intelligence draining away by osmosis.

Never buy items from a vendor. Specifically don't buy weapons and armor. You'll be sent to a main city around level 7-10. Once there, find the AH (ask a guard) and do your shopping there. Buy some bags first, they will make your life a lot easier. Pick up and sell everything to a vendor. It all adds up. While you're in town, train some professions and weapon skills (at the weapon trainer). Take at least one gathering skill (mining or herbalism), and if you want to rake in the cash take one of those and skinning as well.

Abuse the hell out of your hearthstone. It has a 60m cooldown. Use it often. Why walk back to town after killing that last bunny? You can just hearth back and save yourself 5-10m of travel. Make sure to bind at an inn in the town you're questing at, and make sure you log off there to gain rest experience.

When you get settled in, try out a UI mod compilation such as CTMod. Check out Curse Gaming (http://www.curse-gaming.com). It has a lot of 'convienience' addons, such as a quest level next to your quests, instead of just being green (easy) yellow (moderate/even) orange (hard) red (impossible).

Summary:

1) Pick a server. Pick a high population server. There's no reason to pick low, and you want a mature economy, not a deserted game world. Check wowwiki's server page for that server for more information. Go alliance.
2) Pick a class. Don't agonize too much, just spend 10m reading  up and pick one. They are all useful late game, easy to solo, and you can find a good guild with your general interests if the server's high population. You can get to level 10 in about 3 hours of game time, so try a few out if one doesn't feel right. If you go druid/shaman/priest/paladin you will get lumped into healing role late-game. Be aware of this, but don't worry overmuch. The expansion is coming and with it many changes.
3) Check wowwiki or stickied forum posts to find the appropriate powergaming race for your class, or just go for nightelf/troll/human female if you like wiggling butts.
4) Get to level 10. This involves bunny bashing in the newbie starting area, and a journey to a town near the "main" towns - Ironforge/Stormwind or Thunder Bluff/Oggrimarr
5) If you like the class, head back to the stickied/wowwiki to figure out what to put your talent points in. Trust me on this. Don't be a unique snowflake.
6) Hit your main city, introduce yourself to the AH (Auction House), buy some bags, train your professions.
7) ...
8) Profit!

If you happen to pick a server one of us are on, we can send you some cash you can use to buy bags, if nothing else, that will make your playing experience much more enjoyable early game.

Thanks for the info everyone.

Dwarf Rogue and Human Hunter, I shall try.

First two talent points into sinister strike. Godspeed. When you hit 10-15, and feel you want to do more, let us know what server so we can pass down some cash.

I forgot to mention. Learn first-aid, make bandages for healing, this will save you time for both those classes. It's a "secondary profession" along with fishing and cooking, and you can train all secondary professions, but you can only pick two 'main' professions. I still say go mining/skinning or herbalism/skinning. You can always dump skinning later for a 'real' profession, but for now you need the cash.

In sort of reply to fabricated: 

Sell gathered materials, then buy gear on AH. It's both cheaper and more expedient to do so than trying to craft your own. Crafting is unfortunately a frustrating mess, with 100 different blueprints/recepies and about 3 that are worthwhile. You won't be able to keep up your crafting level to match your character level, so you will always be able to buy better stuff, either dropped or crafted, on the AH than you can actually make. Stay away from enchanting.

I hate people so I solo'd to 60 except for instance running. I'm not social but he's right, if people just aren't working out, don't feel bad about saying "see ya" or "I have to go, my cat is on fire." and dropping group. For questing, everyone gets credit for kills, so it's advantageous to party up for the "kill 10 bears" quests. It can also be fun, if WoW's population wasn't 95% mouthbreathers. This is another reason to go high population, you have a much higher chance of it being their second character, thus possibly having a clue of how to play. Make sure you do deadmines, it's the first and one of the best instances in the game. Do it for the experience even if you outlevel it.

My recommendations for a totally new WoW player:

1. Don't really agonize over what race to pick. They're all fine to be honest. Some races have starting areas that are more/less fun than others, but you honestly get those first 10 levels in what feels like 2 hours, and then you're usually done with the base newbie areas.

2. I'd recommend playing alliance for pure PvE enjoyment since the horde areas for 10+ are just awful IMO. This is 100% personal opinion though. Also, more people.

3. If you want maximum enjoyment, don't play it like some catass for your first 15-20 levels. If you just can NOT find some quest doodad, ask in general chat before hitting allakhazam or thott. Don't worry about min/maxing or being an EXP earning machine. Do. not. grind. for. exp.

The first 10-15 levels of WoW for me were just amazingly fun despite the fact that nearly all the newb quests are the "KILL/COLLECT <X> of <Y>" deals, because I had no idea what I was doing and I didn't really have my eyes set on being the most uber of uber characters and getting that next shiny. I just wanted to see more stuff, the shiny was just bonus. Play it like it's a damn GAME.

4. If you're not getting right into a guild from start pick a profession that supports your character. If you're a warrior, Blacksmithing/Mining is the way to go, Tailor/random gathering skill for casters (enchanting is a gigantic pointless moneysink for new/unguilded players), leatherworking/skinning for hunters/rogues. It makes life way easier, trust me. You could probably just buy better equipment off the AH by using two gathering skills to make cashola but then you're just grinding and grinding sucks ass.

5. Leave shitty groups. There is something to be said for being socially open and not bailing on groups just because they aren't getting you that shiny as fast as you want, but shit groups will just make you hate the game.

You can't be a Human Hunter. Dwarves and Night Elves only (and soon to be Dranei).

I disagree with the Alliance bias for ease of levelling.

I won't deny that statistically speaking there are probably more people where ever you may be as an Alliance newb, which I guess can equate to easier grouping.  However to say that simply picking Alliance over Horde will make you level faster is total horseshit.  I won't deny that some starter areas are laid out better than others for 1-10 (on both sides) but how much time do you (or should you?) be spending at <10?  An hour? 

Admittedly I have way more experience as a Horde player than as Alliance, but I have levelled both factions at least a dozen times to 30ish.  In my humble and respectful opinion the reason you get the "Alliance is laid out much better" arguement from people is that there are more Alliance players than Horde players >> Link (http://www.warcraftrealms.com/census.php?PHPSESSID=6c8e4ed149576e9e020ade9649dde883)<< 

Ergo you get more people saying that their side is "easier".  I can tell you from many long, boring, brown-filled hours of levelling that The Barrens is actually just as efficient as it's Alliance counterpart zones.  No disrespect to anyone here but there's a fair amount of egocentrism going on regarding what's "best".

For example as a new player I wouldn't want to start on an established server (well caveat knowing what I know now) because everyone is an alt that is probably a twink, and they tend to have little to no patience with anyone new that is just online to play and not level as fast as humanly possible to get into HIGH END RAID ENCOUNTERS, because you know the majority of fun in WoW resides in the post 60 game - everyone knows that.  :roll:

Just play and try and enjoy yourself, it is a GAME afterall.  Use the 10 days to see as much of it as you can, so you can determine of you want to the rest of the money to begin losing all your freetime heh.

Yeah, and youre an Aussie arent you Comstar?  In that case, I suggest either pick Proudmoore (PvE) or Blackrock (PvP) as servers.  They are the 'unofficial' Aussie servers and have good populations in our peak times.

There are official Oceania servers - Khaz'Goroth and the like - but they are overpopulated I find.  7pm weeknights you can get 300-400 person waiting queues (yes, you have to sit and wait in line to log onto the server), and up to 700 on Saturday/Sunday arvos.

Yeah, the levelling disparity isn't as bad as presented, but alliance DO have an easier time (I levelled horde toons to around mid-30ish, and alliance toons to 60). You can't really beat westfall or even darkshore for xp efficiency. Also, as horde you'll have better access to lower-level instances... you can visit almost all of them, while alliance can really only visit 2-3, as running past lv37-ish mobs in order to get to the barrens isn't exactly a good idea, even with the recently added Ratchet flight path. (there are NO pickup groups for any Kalimdor instance that's not ZF or Maraudon on my server) Of course, doing pickup instance runs might quickly sour you on the game, so this isn't necessarily a good thing. :p

As alliance you'll miss out on Ragefire Chasm (sucks except for quests), Razorfen Kraul (eh), Wailing Caverns (good), probably Blackfathom Deeps (not bad, a bit long), Shadowfang Keep (one of the best instances in the game imo) and Razorfen Downs (pretty good). Getting to Scarlet Monastery will be a royal pain too, but at least there are regular pickup groups going there.
As horde you'll miss out on Deadmines (very good), Stockades (horrible), and possibly Blackfathom Deeps, that's it. You can teleport to Gnomeregan from Booty Bay.

OTOH, with BC just around the corner, these instances will become less popular quickly.


-- Z.

I'm back in Australia and just started up again on Terenas (edited to correct server name) to try and play with some buddies.  I think they're all 50+ now so I'm just tooling around.  The ping times are painful (hello 400 vs 100 in the US) which gives occassional loot and combat lag.  A new Oceania server opened last month (on the Oceania tab) which might help that.

I'd avoid Proudmore since I've only heard bad things about it.  There are also a few Aussie players/guilds on Silver Hand which may be an option.

Dwarf/Gnome is a great starting area - really well put together, nice graphics and look, and interesting quests (kind of)
The Tauren area is also great, mainly because it's probably the most imaginative fantasy race in any computer game (IMO).
Undead aren't bad since there's some spookiness in design and it's an interesting twist on "hmmm brains" undead.
Elves are OK but be prepared to look at tree terrain for the next 30 levels.
Human is a total pass. 

Proudmoore is fine. It's just another server. I'm on it and so are a couple of others here.

I leveled an orc warrior on one of the reroll servers last year and managed to get a group to go to deadmines. I saw a lot of people looking for deadmines groups in chat and the guild I joined had groups going there a lot too. Maybe my server had a lot of ex-alliance rerolling as horde, I don't know, but not many ppl we asked were put off by the swim up from gromgul

Bllackfathom Depths is practically a horde only instance imo. Much less chance of finding alliance interested in going there. You could put together a full group of night elves from dark shore I guess but I haven't seen near as many as the horde side. Heck, you get sent to the nearest flight point to it as part of the go to ashenvale quest horde side.

I kind of like reroll servers up to 30 or so. Lots of people making fresh starts who already know how to play and a lot less bs over loot because they are used to doing pickup groups at a higher level. I hear the drama starts up around 50+ but I've never stuck around to see.

Yes, South Park lied.

Yeah I'm another Proudmoore Aussie. But I've been out of WoW since July (lost interest, may go back for expansion). I agree it's just another server, but the downside to Proudmoore Alliance is that it's one of the most Alliance-heavy servers ... the Horde levelling zones feel very empty. That means more lag and competition in Alliance areas, and very long waiting times for BGs. However, Proudmoore recently had a major hardware upgrade (via a scheduled 36-hour downtime) so it should be performing well. My ex-guildies are complaining about weekend login queues again, but they're only around 200-300 people (queues in the olden days were over 1000). As the original unofficial Aussie PvE server (before there were Oceanic servers), there are still a lot of Oceanic players on Proudmoore. Multiple Aussie-based raiding guilds at every stage of the game, etc.

I'm also another Druid (healer spec, raided to mid-BWL, but did minimal instances outside raids and never set foot in a BG - which is wierd as I spent 18 months as a hardcore PvP raider in SWG). I would also recommend the Druid class because it means you don't really need any alts. You have most of the abilities of a warrior and rogue, with strong healing and OK nuking abilities. And you can spec and respec with a bias towards whichever is your favourite at the time. The downside to that is needing to maintain multiple sets of gear for each role, but your spec generally determines what you wear most of the time (I usually just ran round in my healing gear, with a handful of tank/dps items to switch out).

Hey Comstar - I haven't read all the replies here so apologies if I excel at repetition. However as an EVE player and an ex-Windhund officer I think I might have more insight into what you're looking for than others. If not: oh well.

First - you seem dead set on Aliiance. Fine. But that's a mistake. For reference I have a 60 Tier 1 rogue and warlock Alliance/Stormscale server and a 60 Hunter Taranis Horde. Whether levelling is easier Alliance side is kind of irrelevant - levelling in WoW is pretty easy either faction. But even with the new clustered Battlegrounds Alliance characters can still have a 5-20+ minute wait while most servers for Horde are now insta-PvP. The better quest and zone alignment of Alliiance is all in the first 40 levels which really are irrelevant anyway IMO.

Second - Class. Rogues and Hunters are desireable in groups as much as any other class mostly - ignoring the tank and priests. The problem in most cases isn't demand-side, it's supply-side. In almost all cases in WoW - particularly 10 - 40 man instances - you want Hunters and Rogues. They're extremely useful. The issues is that they're also extremely common. It's much harder to get into a end-game raiding guild with a rogue or hunter not because they're less desirable - but because they're way more common.


Third - Timezone. If you are an aussie don't be fooled by the Oceanic servers. They may or may not be better for your time slot. For example I have 2 alts in an Aussie Alliance Guild on Stormscale called "Crikey" just because I play odd hours. There are many APAC guilds on PST/PDT servers just as most of the population on the Oceanic servers are PST/PDT folks.

Good luck and good hunting.

Don't go into the Warsong Gulch battleground until you're at least 16. Level 10s get killed by rogue twinks before they can finish typing WTF?.

My crafting level (except for enchanting) always far outpaces my character level.  Every character I have had has been blocked by the level 20 and 35 skill caps, frequently within a few levels of passing the last one.  I have also made good money selling select wares, even at low levels.  Maybe not the massive amounts going herbalism would allow, but enough to get by.

Of course your milage may vary, but don't be afraid to go with a crafting class if you enjoy that sort of thing.

I have a 60 nightelf hunter, a 60 human priest, a 42 human warlock on a pvp server, and a 53 undead rogue languishing on a pve server.  The rogue got boring for me.  I blamed it on the pve server, but left it before BGs came out.

For alliance hunter, Nightelf is a good choice because of shadowmeld.  So what if most hunters are Nightelves?  Sometimes the popular choice actually is the best choice.

Take skinning and mining for professions and sell it all on the AH for a cent less than what it's going for that day.  At 40, after you buy a mount, switch from skinning to engineering.  You'll want it so you can make ammo later, since you cannot buy the best ammo in the game from anyone but engineers.

(I recently switched from herbs to engineering because I couldn't find thorium arrows for less than 1g/stack at the AH.  Now, Thorium Bars run 1.8g to 2.8g/stack.  Dense stone runs 75s-2g/stack.  So I can make 10 stacks for 48s each if I buy when prices are highest, or I can stock up when prices are lowest and make them for 25s.  The next best ammo at 60 is the ice-threaded bullets and arrows from AV supplymaster at 40s/stack.  I sell arrows/bullets for 60s/stack, and sell between 20 and 40 stacks a day, paying for my own ammo as well. If they don't sell, though, then I have to eat 22s/stack.  This is the AH deposit for thorium ammo, and it's totally out of whack.  I think a stack of greater fire protection potions that sells for 10g has a deposit of only 12s or something.)

One problem with either a rogue or a hunter is that neither are in demand for groups pre-60, and they've very common - but that's because they are fun.  Post-60, rogues are probably more in demand.  Are rogues more gear dependent than hunters levelling up?  It seems so to me, but I was a poor rogue - not much of a dance/move around quick reflex kind of gal (I am improving as a hunter, at least).  I have enjoyed my hunter way more than my rogue; hunter fits my playstyle better.

With regard to pets and instances - pets should always be on passive or dismissed.  The "follow" command is not the one you want to use to get the pet off something, you want to set the pet to passive, then direct what it attacks.  (I bound shift-T to pet-attack, since T is bound to me attacking).

Beastmaster spec is great for levelling up.  Then switch to some kind of marks/survival combo probably.  You won't use your pet much at 60 but for farming/grinding, probably.  Or AV, which is a hunter's paradise.

Also, you might want to consider warlock.  I'm enjoying it more than I did levelling my priest, which didn't get fun until 40.  (She's a tailor alt, so I went to 35 so she could make mooncloth, then decided a mount would be nice, then it started getting fun so...).  I pretty much just grind rep and play bgs on her.  Shadow specced, but rarely go into shadow form in a bg.  I realized I was nothing more than a warlock-wannabe so I made the warlock.

First night: Fun

Human Rogue. Fun, though there's no in game notes I can see that tell me how to use the "moves". I'm not sure I'm doing it right. I was epecting...some tutorial or something. Either I missed it or the game dosn't need it(?).

It will always be Night when I play right, unless I join a server in another time zone? I got on the new(?) Oceania one.

Got to Level 5..and I need a silver coin to train? Is that 100 Copper (couldn't find any mention of that on the WoW site).

Grouped up a bit with a warrior. Warriors look pretty boring.

I shall try a Dwarf Hunter later, perhaps on a server other people from here or I know are on. Thanks for the tips.


Fiannly: What's more fun till level 20, Horde or Allience? :)

Alliance probably. Its defenetly faster. The most atmospheric zone is the Undead starting zone though.


As to the rogue, you will have combo moves and finishing moves. Sinsiter Strike builds your combo points (up to 5) and then eviserate uses those points, the more points, the more damage eviserate does. 100 copper is 1 silvers, 100 silver is 1 gold. Just pick up every thing the mobs drop and you should have eought to train ever 2 levels. You should get your first gold around level 10-12.

Not much to explain that early yet. Just build up your combo points and Eviscerate. Fairly straightforward class until 20 or so (also, I recommend that you solo till 20. Then get into the Deadmines).

Moving around is more important to PvP.


Instead of Horde or Alliance, I'd say the races of the Eastern continent are more fun in those early levels. This includes Dwarf and Gnome zones, Human zones, and Undead zones on Horde.

Night Elf and the Orc and Troll zones are boring.

Tauren zone, while on the Western continent, is kind of inbetween (but it merges with the Orc and Troll zones, i.e. the Barrens, at level 12).

It doesn't need it. Read the tooltips of the special moves and soon you'll have a feel for it. Rogues are either all about positioned attacks (Backstab, Ambush) or sword attacks (Sinister Strike, Hemmorage). You use those to build Combo Points (the little red dots on a target) and then spend those points on finishing moves that either do big damage (eviscerate, rupture) or stun (kidney shot). The subtlety with a rogue comes in deciding what combo route to take - what opener to use on certain targets, such as Ambush for big damage or Cheapshot for the 2 combo points and the stun - and then what follow up routine. That depends on spec alot - but by the time you have the talents to make a difference you'll know what to do.


I don't think so - I believe they've modified the realtime day cycle somewhat. But it's still mostly aligned with realtime - i see a lot of night. Anyone know if this has changed?


Yup - 100c = 1 s, 100s = 1g. If you're not twinking read the description of skills carefully, some aren't worth training until you have spare cash. The rogue skill "Gouge" for instance - it's a mez that also does a small amount of damage, but since the damage is trivial and the mez duration doesn't increase with skill rank you can leave it at rank 1 for a while because there's really no benefit to training it up past that if you're short on $.


At low levels Warriors are pretty auto attack - although not as bad as paladins. Once they start to get talents though - around lvl. 30 - they become pretty fun to play. Not as twitch or fast as rogues, but still fun melee class. Oh and Warrior's can currently output a tonne of damage at level 60 with good gear while retaining their defense. A very gear dependent class though due to the way they scale.


Hunters are an awesome solo class - best in the game IMO. Warlocks are also good solo - but my hunter levelled faster than any of my other characters with the least amount of deaths. Great damage, strong pets, good utility (solo - feign death, traps). The problem with hunters is that there's a lot of them and they aren't really that great in raid level end-game content. That'll change with the smaller group instances in the xpac i think.



In my experience (and i know you asked Fiannly - i'm verbose) Alliance is better 1 - 40. Better quest chains, less zone travel and above all no Barrens chat. Barrens is a low level Horde zone that is both a little dull visually and for some reason has the most inane global chat conversations anywhere. Really idiotic - no idea why the Barrens is afflicted with such a high noise to signal ratio whereas the equivalent Alliance zones (Darkshore/Elwynn Forest/Redridge) aren't.

Minor aside:  Barrens chat seems to be largely fixed now, at least on the servers I play on.  The population of the zone is lower, and most of the jackassery has moved to the "Looking for Group" channel, which is global.  So, regardless of where you level, stay the hell out of the LFG channel (unless you really, really need a group) if you value your sanity.

The character should start with tutorial tooltips popping up above your right hotbar as exclamation marks. Unless you clicked don't show tooltips on one. If you did, hit esc, go into interface options and click on reset tutorial to get the tips back.

Day 2...well...how can I put this...

The server is Down? ALL the servers are down? For 5 hours of maintance? WTF? Eve I can understand. Asteroid's have to placed. 30K players on one server and all that.

But Shessh. All the servers AT the same time!?!? For my work time, it means I'm not playing one night a week. BAH. I hate blizzard already.

There's a reason why Lum made it a keynote in his rant. It sucks. It's down for half a day every week. Yep.

And sometimes it doesn't take as long as they say it will.  My server's currently up an hour and 20 minutes before 11am.

But what is it that they do, I wonder?

They run all the indexing/efficiency/garbage collection procedures on the database, run the procedures that caluclate and tabulate the honor totals, and do any hardware swapouts that need to be done.

Have they ever explained why they can't just have twenty minutes of downtime every night at like 4am?

I imagine some of those database procedures take hours to run by themselves (other games like UO and EQ don't have to deal with this because they used a flat file system) and I'd imagine hardware replacement probably takes a bit more time than just hot-swapping a disk drive or controller card.  I'm not sure, but I'd guess the nature of the database work wouldn't be helped by portioning it out to 20 minutes a week and like bhodi said.. honor calcs.

Downtime has never really bothered me other than patch day (which can fuck up the entire day easily) due to living in the US and having a 9-5 job. I know for the couple of Aussie guilds on my server downtime runs straight over their scheduled raid times.

It only gets me if Tuesday ends up being the only day that week I have time during lunch to actually have lunch (and play). Otherwise, yea, Tuesday Maintenance has never affected me really. Rather, it's them darned kids, since I don't play until they're in bed :)

I was under the impression that the server maintenance today was a little unusual, since most of their outages haven't affected all servers for six hours. 

As an Aussie, yeah Tuesday nights can be a writeoff - in winter the server goes down at 10pm Sydney time every week.  Summer aint too bad, its midnight.  Of course, this is when they have their 'normal' times of 5am PDT to 11am or whenever it is.  A lot of times they ahve extended downtime which invariably starts earlier - and that can write off Tuesdays completely.  Our guild just doens't bother scheduling anything on Tuesdays.

Its the rolling resets of servers that suck hard when they happen.  They reboot the server, so its only down for 30 seconds or so, but it resets any instances you are in.  That can suck.

What server are you on comstar? I have alliance chars on 2 of the oceanic PVP realms and can throw you some gold to help you out if you like. Barthilas I think is the "new" oceanic server, as in the newest, so chances are you might be meaning that one. In which case it's my main server.

Day...4?

Westfall sucks. Kill 20 of that. Kill 30 of them. Kill 500 of them to get the last furry donkeyball.

If the rest of the game is as bad as Westfall, I won't get past 20.

Yep. Lots of quests start looking like that. The best you have to look forward to are the dungeons (and it's not like those are 'OMG it's so great!!' either).

If you're already 17 or so, I suggest doing Deadmines for awhile.

Either that, or go to Darkshore (Elf area....It sucks even worse) or Loch Modan (Dwarf area....But it's rarely populated).

Rest of the game is in two parts:
1. Levelling, which you are currently playing - a grind from 1-60 made more bearable by constant questing and Blizzard-style gaming. It's a relatively short grind by MMOG standards, but still long enough that mass media articles about WoW think levelling is the main game.
2. The much larger post-levelling game of acquiring upgrades, beginning at 60. It's so unexpectedly different to levelling that many people quit at 60 in shock, then return to the game a few weeks/months later to try it.

I agree about Westfall, it's less interesting to me than the Horde equivalent (The Barrens). However, I don't think I did Westfall with my night elf character - there's enough to do between Darkshore and surrounds that I didn't really need Westfall.

The story in westfall wasn't all that interesting. Sure, Deadmines was a great story-dungeon but the quests leading up to it were just crap.  Every single one was "kill a different flavor of Defias!"  I liked Darkshore's overall story (investigating the corruption leaking in from Felwood, which in turn is coming from Hyjal), and Loch Modan didn't have one at all that I noticed.

Redridge is kind of meh. Lots of little stories, no real big picture.  Ashenvale wasn't too bad, though fighting all the Murlocs made parts suck.   

Overall best story zone was Duskwood.  It's worth pushing through to the 23+ range just to go there and do them. I wish whoever thought up all that was prolific enough to do most of the zones. 

I''m guessing you haven't been to the Dwarf lands yet, and therefore haven't been to Ironforge. It's worth the trip.

I like the Dwarven lands a lot for early leveling, they tend to be less crowded and a little more diverse than Westfall, especially once you get around Loch Modan. Just come back to Westfall around 17 or 18 and look for a group doing Deadmines - it's a whole new experience over the whack a foozle of hunting outdoors.

Oh, and once you start getting a little money, hit the auction hall. Many newbs make the mistake of ignoring it at low levels.

Duskwood is easily my favorite zone in the game, either faction. And Ironforge still wows me when I walk around in it. In fact, it's what sold me on the game (even though I went Horde at release); I remember being in beta and thinking, "Holy fuck, why didn't the other MMOGs I played look like this?"

Not that I'm a huge WoW-booster, but what they said.  Skip Westfall entirely and go to the equivalent-level zone in dwarfland.  Westfall sucks.

Westfall, what is that, late-teens? Yea, ditch that action and head over to, err, Dun Murogh, Loch Modan or grab your local Mage to send you over to Darnassus so you can hit Auberdine>Astranaar.

Auberdine was my favorite place in the mid-teens. Just seemed the most content complete. Later on I thought Redridge Mountains was also good. Then, Duskwood. While I liked the stories there, the constant trans-zone runs between that haunted graveyard and Darkshire got to me just enough I vowed never to do it again.

They fixed it by adding an additional graveyard at the, er, graveyard. I leveled 1-60 recently and yeah, it's much better now.

As for westfall, skip it. Go to stormwind, and take the tram from the dwarven district to ironforge. Then go exploring. It's neat. If you want a feel for some later zones, get the flight point in ironforge and watch the trip stormwind<->ironforge. If you get bored or a zone sucks, well guess what there are generally 2 other zones of that exact same level quests (http://www.wowwiki.com/Regions_by_Continent) that you can head to...

I went to the drawf area, and it's all very...empty of people to group up with it seemed, though it could be I was used to the wide open plains of Westfall. Redridge Mountains is nice though (for some reason I think its labeled at 20-30 on WoW's site, but 15-25 listing on the Wiki makes more sense).

I also did the intro to deadwood(?) mines with the escort misson, which was a nice change.

Best quest so far: Picking up the treasure map of a dead murlock in Westfall and just following the clues. Upon finding the treasure chest on the island, I had a big smile on my face.

There's a few quests like that, really well thought out (compared to the generic Kill/Collect type). My favorites were the Darkshire series, the one that leads up to Onyxia's Lair and, in the early days, the Auberdine buzzbox series. I'm not a story hound in a game about xp and loot, but it's nice to see the extra mile gone by writers and the like.

Nice. Finally. The other part was the constant run back for quest updates (particularly that one with like five or six marks, can't remember who with nor about), but with a gy right in the gy, that probably cuts 75% of the running done in the early days.

Maybe I head through their with my Draenei Priest someday then. Did like the stories. And while some hate Stranglehorn Vale, I liked it enough to do again.