1-60 in 20 minutes

by Zach Yonzon Sep 1st 2008 at 9:00AM

When I first read about Blizzard's new Recruit-a-Friend program, I thought it was a great way to get friends to catch up quickly. The zhevra mount was just a silly little bonus. The feature that lets players grant a level to a lower-level friend with every two levels had so much potential that it had some players crying out in the forums. Well, WoW Insider reader Brian has actually gone out and done what those players had feared -- he leveled a character from 1-60 in less than 20 minutes using the level granting feature.

Certainly, it can be done much quicker, as Brian didn't have to run into Stormwind's trade district or stop to show the talent points panel for the video. At this point, speed leveling records from 1-60 don't mean anything anymore, anyway. Of course, Brian had to level two characters to 60 on his recruited account to get a total of sixty level grants. With Level 80 fast approaching, I think it's really cool that new players or characters will have a way to rush towards the endgame. After all, there's still Levels 61 to 70 -- and later 71 to 80 -- to slog through. Let me see how many friends I can wrangle up now...

Tags: 1-60, Blizzard, Leveling, Recruit-a-Friend, Swift-Zhevra, Zhevra-Mount

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Blizzard, Leveling

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 5)

UBD Sep 1st 2008 9:15AM

I... I dont get it.... how DID he get those 60 level grants then?

naranjar Sep 1st 2008 9:42AM

WoW Recruit-A-Friend FAQ:
"For every two levels the new player earns, the new player can grant one free level-up to a lower-level character played by the veteran player."
"[The] recruit may not grant a level to a character that is level 60 or higher."

WoWInsider Article:
"Brian had to level two characters to 60 on his recruited account to get a total of sixty level grants."

So. The WoWInsider Author created a 2nd WoW Account with his primary WoW Account being the recruiter. On the recruited account, he levelled 2 characters up to 60. Every 2 levels, he gained one grantable level. 30 on the first character and 30 on the 2nd character for a total of 60 grantable levels.
The grantable levels were then given to the paladin on his original account. Technically, 58 levels were given to level up to 59. The way the terminology reads on the WoW FAQ it sounds like level 60 must be obtained by normal means, however, it may not be programmed that way because it looks like the character was in fact able to reach 60 via the granted levels.

So.

Account One:
Have a level 61+ character

Account Two:
Recruited by Account One
Level 2 characters to 60

Account One:
Create a brand-new character
Use 60 grantable levels on brand-new character

Thus, instant level 60 character... after spending time to level 2 others to 60 on a recruited account.

F0REM4N Sep 1st 2008 10:47AM

This is stupid, WoW has jumped the shark! They have stepped over the line and are selling out what was respected about their game now.

skakillers Sep 1st 2008 12:35PM

or, level twelve characters to ten. would that work?

evilgrin Sep 1st 2008 6:46PM

why not leveling 12 x Chars to lvl 10
grant all the levels to a new class on your main account ...

delete all those 12 Chars ...

and start over again

leveling 12 Chars to lvl 10 ...
grant all the levels to *another* new class on your main account ...

you would end up with lvl 60's of *every* class on your main account

Nathan Sep 1st 2008 8:31PM

The level grants can only be given to a character on the veteran account that is below the level of the character granting the levels.

E.g.

A Level 10 character could only grant their 5 levels to another character that is level 10 or lower.

So, no. Levelling 12 characters to 10 will not allow you to gift 60 levels to one character, you would have to share those 60 gifted levels amongst whatever characters on the veteran account were under level 10. Once they reached level 10 you wouldn't be able to gift anymore unless you created another character under level 10.

If that makes sense.

Guy Sep 2nd 2008 11:36AM

me and my wife have been doing the RAF for a few weeks now. as we alrdy had an account each, we now have 4. here are our experiences:
1. we got our first pair to 60 this weekend using her primary and secondary accounts. time was 62 hours and 58 hours to hit 60.
2. after that we had 2x druids waiting at lvl 30 for the granted lvls. i summoned her druid to SW and started chain granting lvls. it was freaking pple out. she got spammed for 30 mins after that about if she was a gm or a hacker. she switch over but was not able to grant me lvls. ok this is the important part ONLY THE SECOND ACCOUNT CAN GRANT LVLS. so anyway my wifes druid got to 60 in 16 hours 10 mins.
3. the lvl grant thing is nice but the real sick part is the triple XP. we were getting 20-40k xp per quest. that was doin yellows and oranges. by ourselves. we had a 70 run us thru SM cath once and we lvl'd twice. either way, be duo, multibox, or boosting with a 70. u will lvl so freaking fast.
4. the summoning thing works for all toons on both accounts. so we just have alts in each city to summon us. its like having a mage to port us anywhere.
5. i cant comment on the mount because we havn't decided who to give them to yet.

Caffeine Oct 28th 2008 1:22PM

Here is what I did:

I had to start my WoW career from scratch as the accounts I was playing all got robbed from me (and weren't in my name), so:

Playing both recruited and recruiter (linked) accounts at the same time and being within 4 levels of each other grants 3x normal XP. So I Dual boxed my way to 60 with 2 chars, in just 60 casual /played hours (alt-tabbing, not "real" dual-boxing, or i could have gone a lot faster), then dual-boxed 2 more chars to 30, and got my original accounts level 30 to 60 in 15 seconds, now I have a 70 with /played 5 days, a level 62 and a level 60, soon to be 3 70s all in time for Wrath.

And I end my story with a "WOOHOO!!"

Demizeus Sep 1st 2008 9:16AM

lol omg this would b a good way to lvl my friends to my hunters lvl lol
(quessing thats the idea)
u could make an entire raid with this in under a month lol

Daikin Sep 1st 2008 11:57PM

NEEDS MORE 'LOL'S

Guy4242 Sep 1st 2008 9:17AM

why didnt you just summon him?
also you shouldnt waste the points on the first 30 levels, lol, those are the easy ones to get

Kieran Sep 1st 2008 10:03AM

Seriously. For every RAF that hits 60, you get 29 levels up to 60 to grant, so if you're smart you'll level each "receiving" toon to 31.99 before you get gifted.

Nick S Sep 1st 2008 11:29AM

Exactly. I've got 3 toons waiting for their RAF levels, and they're all over 30. Using the free level-ups on levels 1-10 is pretty wasteful if you plan to ever level another toon.

I'm actually planning to start at 40 so that my 60 levels will get me 3 toons to 60, skipping the hardest possible levels.

Demizeus Sep 1st 2008 9:19AM

explaining to first post
they did a friend recruit and the new feature in that is a lvling thing (don't know the exact lvling rules) but this gave me a grand idea lol

Darsh Sep 1st 2008 9:19AM

That's not really a fair timing... From the looks of it he had to level two new characters on the recruited account to 60 first. Even with triple XP, that had to take quite a bit of time.

Wither Sep 1st 2008 9:53AM

Indeed, I just leveled 4 accounts from 1-60 using multiboxing and the RaF feature. My played time was 3 days 19 hours, by all means pretty poor... Of course I was not powerlevelling by any means (no help of a guild) and I spent some time doing class quests and instances, etc (having fun).
I used the 3 RaF accounts to grant three level 30 alts straight to 60. Effectively giving me 7 level 60s for the played time.
I found skill costs from 30-60 cost about 150g, obviously depending on class. Additionally there are costs for a mount (both regular and eventually epic) and new equipment. The "virgin" accounts practically have no reputation with any faction as well.
I tend to think that folks should have the option of starting at level 55 myself, it's effectively the same thing. However the huge variety of spells and talents available at 55 make this entrance into the game very formidable for any new players.