What do you think about leveling specs in general? Anything from BM hunters going MM the minute they ding 60, shadow going holy, enhancement going resto and so on.

My point being, if you want to immerse or develop your characer wouldn’t you want to either 1> stay your spec i.e. raid as feral or shadow etc., or 2> level as holy/resto/marksman to get a good feel of it, learn that spec from the inside out? Why choose an ”easy leveling spec” (that you don’t plan on keeping) when the journey is awesome anyway? (If you think pre-60 is just a chore and the game starts at 60 you don’t need to comment).

I don't think the game begins at 60, but I still prefer an efficient leveling spec on the way there. Since I will spend most of my time questing and occasionally world PvPing, I prefer to cater my talents proportionally to those tasks. I'll have a second set of gear for my dungeon-specific role, which for my Pally will be healing.

I mean, leveling to 60 is kind of a chore, but so is nearly everything in this game. Guess I just like the grind ;^). However while leveling I enjoy the journey and the feel of progression, and leveling as resto would just result in me getting frustrated and eventually would end in me not enjoying it anymore. Someone who likes running might enjoy it less if he had to use bad shoes and extra weight.

The whole point of talents is to make you better at what you're doing. I think of leveling specs the same way as a pvp spec or raid spec. Blizz wouldn't have let you put points into multiple trees if they thought it interfered with class identity.

Healer leveling just sucks way too much for me.

There's so many reasons to level BM and switch to marks. Both are fun at all levels, mix it up.

Leveling as a healer would be a very slow and laborious task. I think it can be good from a certain level on to switch to full time healer (say 50+) as you can grind dungeons to 60 and gear up and learn your role fully on the way to 60. 1-50 as a pure healer would be very very difficult.

To be honest, it's totally your choice. I know people who leveled as a resto druid, raid specced, from 10 to 60. And other people I knew respecced 4-5 times from 10 to 60. It's all on what you want to do.

I, personally, commit to one leveling spec and then will respec at 60 if necessary. For some classes, leveling spec and 60 spec can be the same (bear druid or rogue) but doesn't have to be. I would highly recommend to anyone, though, to go for a leveling spec. At the end of the day, yeah, the game doesn't begin at 60 and leveling is a great experience, but if you get burned out before you get to 60 because you're playing a class or spec you don't like, then something needs to change. Play something you can level to 60 and enjoy, and usually playing a spec that can level easily is a great path to an enjoyable time in my eyes.

I leveled between discipline or shadow. (Enjoyed shadow so much more, but there was not much of a market for shadowpriests back in the day)

It took a long time to get to 60, but I also toyed around with other classes to see what I liked. This time around, if I go Priest again, I'll just suck it up and go all in on it. (Had previously settled on my primary vanilla alt -UD WAR, but now I think I need to be a Priest again. The Original Dolamite must be resurrected.

So, whether its mindless smite spam or actual decent damage as shadow. . . I'll just play it by ear and see what gives me the most damage and survivability to level with. Pretty straightforward concept I think. Lol

I think a major problem is that though you may wish you could be a certain spec, some specs have some major problems that make it hard to level as what you'd like to. For example:

Dagger Rogue - unless on a bugged server where you can strafe backstab. Also, most weapons you get, especially on Horde, are swords!

Marks Hunter - Gear Dependent, and not many bows/guns ever drop. You use greens from engi or a drop often times, plus you need a very slow weapon to make aimed work...just not plentiful.

Survival Hunter - Main Damage Dealing Talent is one of the last available sets in the tree. At 60 when you can easily reach this, that's fine, but at 30...not so much. It's also a really gear dependent talent.

Destro Warlock - Spell crit is not plentiful until like, 60.

As you can see these specs have one thing in common: gear limitations. Any class that has a spec that doesn't need gear makes that spec very appetizing. For classes that don't really have a way to bypass gear (warriors), leveling becomes quite painful.

Already once leveled a priest using shadow spec; this time around I am gonna go for holy/disc spec with a focus on, well, holy damage, primarily smite, with some AoE via Holy Nova; overall maybe slightly less sustained dps compared to 40+ shadow, but at the same time still great mana efficiency, and much easier healing for grp content.

Any leveling priest needs wand spec and spirit tap

It's going to be difficult to keep your wand up-to-date on a new launch, provided you're not too far behind the curve.

William wrote: ↑

6 years ago

It's going to be difficult to keep your wand up-to-date on a new launch, provided you're not too far behind the curve.

If you're in a guild with some coordination/motivation you can boost a designated Enchanter to make:

• https://classic.wowhead.com/item=11287
• https://classic.wowhead.com/item=11288
• https://classic.wowhead.com/item=11289
• https://classic.wowhead.com/item=11290

This will keep all your casters up to date with wands from 5-30+ (then it gets a bit harder).

I found this was the case even on some private servers, guildies can be so helpful and considerate - especially when everyone is working together to each others benefit/enjoyment. Bring on the classic community!

Yeah I'll definitely try and keep an Enchanter stocked. It's an expensive profession and they'll need help.

I'd take it myself but I'm going to have my own hands full with Tailoring.

Gonna level as BM with my loyal companion and then I'll switch to MM once I have the right gear. I've been trying out the MM spec in Retro and it's damage is nuts

i do get your point. you level as a spec, by the time you're max level, you know the spec backwards and front. my counter argument is that, 1. some specs are just horrible for leveling. a holy priest is going to get nowhere fast if they dont have a buddy to play with. 2. getting to 60 takes a while. i'd argue that, by the time you get there, you should know your class inside and out, not just one spec. maybe there will be a slight learning curve at 60 if you swap, but for the most part, you already know how it works and what you'll be doing.

for example, ill be playing a resto druid.......except i'll be leveling as feral. why?
1. with a good back-up set of +int gear, i'll still be able to heal decently well
2. feral is just a billion times more efficient for leveling.
3. feral gives me 30% movement speed in catform, starting at lvl 21. that is HUGE for leveling. even after i've gotten a mount at 40, the efficiency of insta-cast 30% movement speed is nothing to scoff at.

so when i hit 60, yeah, i'll probably switch talents immediately and never go back. but you should play whichever seems the most interesting/fun to you. if youve never played vanilla, then my advice is to just dive in and figure it out as you go along. thats how the rest of us did it.

I really like enhancement shaman: fair survivability, fair dps and can tank dungeons around if used properly. A good jack of all trades

@fendor you're right, enhancement is fun. Akin to feral druid leveling. Although I will likely stay feral/resto at 60 for versatility (1/32/18). That way I can tank, heal and pvp. Not amazing at healing/dps, but certainly viable.

@Selexin usually I play warrior for blacksmithing alone, but it's time for a change, so I will go shammy this time (still a blacksmith of course :D)

fendor wrote: ↑

5 years ago

@Selexin usually I play warrior for blacksmithing alone, but it's time for a change, so I will go shammy this time (still a blacksmith of course :D)

Like you've said elsewhere, leveling and investing in leatherworking is very rewarding, which I completely agree with and plan to do again. I always go tribal leatherworking (devilsaur drooooool), but have considered elemental for some of the nice BoE epics.

Selexin wrote: ↑

5 years ago

Like you've said elsewhere, leveling and investing in leatherworking is very rewarding, which I completely agree with and plan to do again. I always go tribal leatherworking (devilsaur drooooool), but have considered elemental for some of the nice BoE epics.

Even if 90% of their item are useless if you don't plan to raid, when I played hunter I used to made dragonscale because I loved the idea of farming dragons :D

My very first character was a druid I leveled from 0 to 60 as a resto. Never again.