20th for Idemise

Well I did it. Time was not impressive tho.

19 hours and 2 minutes

Longer then Brains system. My first impressions for this section would be excessive travel. He starts you in the elf zone around Auberdine. Then around 16th level he had me make the trip to Westfalls. A trip that takes forever. Not to mention the death march through the Wetlands. 24th level crocks nipping at your heals the whole way. After finishing several Westfalls quests, many of which I like and do normally without a guide, he then takes us back to Auberdine to finish up to 20. Or does it? Once again as I finished up the quests and was half way through my 19th level, he states...."Now you should be 20th level...and maybe even 21st level by this time"...
Excuse me? I'm not even 20th yet. So I went back checked everything, and sure enough, I didn't miss a thing. Some how I just wasn't 20th.

So I just went on to doing his next part of his guide, but I cant help wondering how low level I'll be for when I'm suppose to be level 25.

One more thing these blogs are going to become less frequent just because it will take longer to make 5 levels as I climb the ladder to glory. Maybe I can stop in for a little update as the reach for the next level.

20th

Well I played Brains guide and finally made it to 20th. Time so far:

18hours 54 minutes

Not to bad I suppose. I'm still in the Dreani zone, hadn't realized how big it was. They definitely made it bigger then most the starter zones. As to the guide, the one thing I hate about these leveling guides, is that there written for contest speeds. There's usually no time given for professions, and don't even think about going to a main city to auction your stuff. I know they say have a mule toon and I do, but it just doesn't feel the same to me when all my gold is on another toon. Also Brain doesn't like to turn in quests. He saves them up to turn in for speed. But even tho I'm using all 10 slot bags, I find them almost constantly filled with quest items that I would prefer to be loot.

So unless your going for a record, I would suggest making stops in town more frequently just so you can sell your stuff. I actually had to go back to town for ammo once. I think they should but side notes for the casual player, like head for town if you wish were about to do 15 quests and rest stop breaks. Anyways I'm up to 20!

15th level using Idemise

Drum roll!! 10 hours and 4 minutes.

So far so good. I'm currently doing Dark Shore quests while Brain still has me doing Dranei quests. I guess there are more Dranei quests then Night Elf quests. I've done Brains guide before, tho I never timed myself, and i noticed that Idemise is doing all the same quests at Auberdine. I wonder when it will actually go in another direction. I suppose there are only so many quests to choose from at the lower levels. I Do know I hate the fact that all the guides make you head for the Night Elf zone. Running through the wetlands is such a pain when your under 20th level. In this instance they both want you to run there at 12th. Those of you that haven't heard, the WoW warchest is out now. Good price for both the burning crusade and WoW.

Brains 15th

Well the title says it all. Today I hit 15th level using Brain's guide.

Time: 11 hours and 15 minutes.

The guide seems reasonable done, and so far hasn't been too much of a challenge. Biggest problem I had this run was I chose a Ravager for my pet. Unfortunately it took me a long time to find a vendor that sold meat. None of the mobs dropped meat. So i wasted probably 10 minutes in all looking for some meat. But since it was a burning crusade character, I wanted a burning crusade pet. So to be fair that 15 minutes is most likely the extra time I took. I bought another guide that seems pretty good as well, "Zygor's seems pretty good. and its cheaper then the other guides. I may have to add it as well sometime.

Idemise level 10

4 hours and 13 minutes to level 10. Now this time is misleading. Idemise has some serious typos so far. I got to the point in the night elf guide that goes, " you should now be level 8" Which is fine, except the very next line it says "do these next two quests and now you should be 10th level." Well as you should know, that's impossible. So I re read it and read further on to see where I should be, maybe the 10 was a typo. But nope, he really expected you to be 10th level. So I had to make up for the lost two levels to get back too the guide. So I followed my own system I've been using to finish of the last two levels. So that first time is definitely not accurate. I'll just have to see if this works out at later levels.

His presentation is a little bit confusing so far, but this could just be me. Hard to say at this point. Anyways I'm level 10 in both characters now, most likely I'll report the time at 15th, unless that goes real fast then I'll let you know when I hit 20.

Level 10 for Brain Kopps

4 Hours and 46 minutes to level 10 using Brain's guide. I decided to go with a Dranei as I don't have any that are high level and I figured I should have one. I also decided to go with just gathering professions so I don't slow the contest up, but still make money for a mount at 40. Hunters are the strongest pve class in the game, and so to be fair, I decided to make both toons Hunters. Boring leveling two of the same class but more fair in terms of seeing who levels faster. As I look at both guides and use them I see one thing that both seem to fail at. Brains more then Idemise. They fail to take into account the skill level of the average player buying their guide. Sure maybe Brain can play like a master player, but not most people who would want to buy a guide I'm thinking. So I find myself wondering why they chose the order of quests that they do, when there are easier ways to order it, and thus level faster, at least in my opinion. Maybe I should level a third toon and see if it competes following my path with these guys. Three toons?...maybe not, two at once is enough I'm thinking.

The Beginning

Well hi all. Today is my birthday, and I figured I'd start this project as part of my fun. Hopefully some of you will find this useful. If it works out well then I might give a few other guides a try. As I level I'll give a report on my progress each day I play. I'm going to use a hunter for Brains guide as it is specifically made for a hunter. As to Idemise, I'm leaning towards a Warlock, but I haven't quite decided yet. Anyways wish me luck.