For the most recent updates, including into Mists of Pandaria and beyond, see our new Warrior leveling guide. That's the page that will be updated for all future patches and expansions. If you have a link to this page please change it to the new page.
While this page is updated for the latest Cataclysm patches, it will not be updated further.
Changes are coming with Mists of Pandaria.
This page will probably be left up for legacy sake.
We now return you to your regularly scheduled guide:
Warriors are one of my favorite classes to level and they provide
the fun gaming style of non-stop death-dealing combined with a decent
overall leveling speed that can come in narrowly behind rogues and hunters,
if done correctly.
Warriors do need to be
geared well at all times, perhaps more than most classes, but Auction
House gear will serve you well. Keep your weapons updated and you
will level quickly enough to have a great time.
Then you charge, main, rend, mutilate, crush, kill, and destroy the
opposition. They don't run, dodge, heal much, or otherwise avoid any
situation where they can smash things. At higher levels you become
a whirlwind of death, what's not to like? PvP, raiding, you can do
it all and you'll be doing it with two 2-handed weapons. You're not
a tank, healer, or cowardly Rogue. Your job is to crash into the enemy
and destroy
them.
Buffs and Nerfs: As the world of Azeroth moves through
the Cataclysm all of the various classes will suffer from the buffs
and cheer at the nerfs... waitaminute... reverse that. The point is
that if at any point Warriors are the Gods of SMASH! or doormats
probably isn't something we'll comment on here.
Why? Because it will likely change in a couple of days due to a hotfix.
Looks for the same buff/nerf stuff in Mists of Pandaria and the patches and expansions that come after that.
Warrior Leveling -Quick Notes
This section covers the Warrior basics, more detail is available below
this section.
Race: Pick the one you like. They all have
something that will benefit a Warrior, either in PvE, PvP, or both.
The Troll's increased damage Vs. beasts will allow them to level a
bit faster than other races.
Stats: Lots of strength and Stam , regardless of spec.
At 40 you'll wear plate. Never wear cloth or leather. 50+ avoid mail armor.
Weapons: Slow, high DPS hard hitting weapons in both hands (if you're Fury.)
Big honking slow two-hander, if you're Arms. Slow, high DPS weapon
and a Shield if you're Protection.
You won't see gem sockets until 60+. Just get cheap Strength (or
Stam) gems to put in all sockets.
Enchants: Sometimes enchant scrolls can be found for cheap on the
AH. Get those that add Str, Stam, or Attack power. Don't worry about
it if you don't have the gold.
In the end-game (raids, dailies, PvP) you can use the +40 Str (or
+50, if you're rich) gems.
Food, Potions, Etc.
Always carry the best food you can afford.
Consider keeping a stack of healing potions on your action bar.
Since Cataclysm, all of the WoW races can be warriors. Of course,
only Humans, Night Elves, Undead, and Orcs can be real Warriors,
but there you go. Yes, even Pandarens can be Warriors.
Most of the racial abilities will make very little difference
while leveling, and not even that much in the end-game. 1% Hit or Crit
or some escape ability just doesn't count for much while questing.
If a Gnome or Goblin works for you, then go for it.
Blood Elf: You have the best hair, does that count?
Arcane
Torrent restores some rage and interrupts casters, so is
actully a pretty decent Warrior ability for leveling, PvP, and
Pve.
Goblin: Two goblins were shipwrecked and stranded
on a small island. When rescued they had both become rich by trading
their boots back and forth.
Increased Haste is actually a so-so ability
for Warriors and Rocket Jump is a nice escape which might
set you up for a Charge/Intercept.
Your size is actually a virtue in PvP. Some people click their targets
and being short makes their job a bit more difficult.
As a tank your size makes you a bit hard to find in a crowd.
Orc: Big, gnarly, and just the right attitude for
war.
Enrage actually is a nice ability while
leveling, since you can pop it when you need it. Add it to a macro
to use when you charge and/or with your opening strike.
Resistance to stuns
is good if you're PvP leveling, and is pretty situational if not.
Increased expertise with axes (and fist weapons) has its uses.
Tauren: Besides being cute, cuddly, and well horned,
they can do a...
War Stomp, which stuns nearby opponents. This is a
generally useful ability.
The increased health is nice at mid-levels,
but doesn't scale well at very high levels.
The herbalism skill has a small heal and the Tauren's get an herbalism
bonus.
Troll: Best tusks, laid back, but make pretty good
warriors.
Berserking is a good leveling
ability. Add it to a macro with your opeining attack(s.)
Increased damage Vs Beasts, while it doesn't apply to Worgen,
may be the best of all leveling racials given the vast number of
beasts you'll be killing on the way to 85.
Resistance to movement impariing
effects, like the Orc ability, has its uses in PvP, but less so
elsewhere.
Undead: You're one of the prototypical Warriors and
you can um, well, er... Well, Ok, you have nothing that increases leveling
speed, or DPS, or anything, but you look right and that's
what really counts.
Canibalism can reduce downtime and means
that you don't have to carry food along while leveling.
Will of the Forsaken is
a very nice PvP ability, but you'll find little use for it elsewhere.
There are a few underwater quests in the old world and more when
you hit higher levels. Your nderware Breathing ability will help in
those areas.
Draenei: Your (male) shoulders make a human look
puny.
+1 to Hit racial is a good one for all situations.
The self-heal is nice while
leveling and in other situations. It's not a big heal, but every
little bit helps.
Dwarf: So Runt, Ya wanna be a Warrior?
Your Stoneform washes
away bleeds and reduces damage, making life just that much tougher
for that Rogue who just popped up. Also helps elsewhere, when too
many mobs appear.
Expertise with Axes is nice if
an axe is the best weapon available.
Human: You look good in the right armor. Now go kill
a blood elf, because she looks better than you. It should
be easy since your sword arm (and those 36" biceps) is bigger
around than his/her entire body.
Your escape ability is nice for PvP
and it allows you to use two DPS trinkets, or grab more Resilience,
but the ability is pretty situational when leveling.
Diplomacy if great is you have
any interest in building Rep with any of the bazillion WoW factions.
Expertise
with Sword/Mace might have some end-game value.
Gnome: Besides being the butt of "short jokes" your
size does have PvP value in that some people click on their targets.
As a tank your size makes you a bit hard to find in a crowd.
Expertise with
daggers and small sowrds means that you should have picked a Rogue
as your class.
Escaping from Speed Altering Effects (slows) has
its uses in PvE and PvP, but only rarely while leveling.
Night Elf: You look good in armor and you know it.
Shadowmeld will let you drop out of combat
or lurk in wait for a Charge out of the shadows. It's not Vanish,
but it has its uses.
2% increased dodge is nice while tanking.
Worgen: One word: Fleas. Ok, another word: Snuffling.
Just a note on leveling builds - the idea is to kill mobs ASAP, with
as little downtime as possible. This means that your leveling build
won't usually be the same as your level 85 PvP or Raid builds (although those builds will work just fine.)
In a
Raid setting you will, as Fury, focus far more on damage and much less
on survivability talents, since some healer will be keeping you healthy. Tanking, of course,
requires major damage mitigation skills and the ability to keep the
Boss's attentions away from everyone else. PvP requires more survivability
and control.
For leveling (questing) you want some survivability and
as much damage as you can get.
When you hit level 10 you pick from one of the three specializations:
Arms, Fury, and Protection. Once you pick a spec you are locked into
that spec until you buy 31 points worth of talents. (You can reset
everything, and change specs, at your trainer, anytime, for a small
charge.)
You do not have to buy the top tier talent to open up the
other trees, you just need to have spent the 31 points.
Picking up the dual build ability at 30 (10 gold) gives you the choice of picking two builds. Tank a dungeon as Protection, or DPS as Fury, then switch to Arms and smash some face in PvP. (You do have 10 gold at
30+, right? If not, check out our gold
guide or our tycoon
addon review. )
Picking a spec at level 10 also gives you some bonuses. Each spec
of each class will have its own bonuses and each one will have a Mastery ability.
That ability increases some aspect of your other abilities. For example,
for a Fury Warrior, Mastery buffs the benefits you get from being Enraged.
Note: After you get the 31 point talent and start
grabbing talents from the other specs you do not get the special
abilities from those trees. For example, if you go 31 fury & 10 Arms
you do not get Mortal
Strike.
Mists of Pandaria will completely revise the talent system, again, and will also do away with Prime glyphs. In addition, abilities will change and glyphs will change.
You will get a bunch of general Warrior abilities, as you do now.
You will get ten or so abilities unique to your spec (Arms, etc.)
All Warriors will be able to pick talents from a common pool. There are six tiers (at level 15, 30, 45, 60, 75, and 90) with three choices each. Any warrior can pick any of the three. At level 90 you will have six talents.
There are no points to spend in any abilities or talents. When you pick one up you pick up the whole thing.
You will have six total glyphs, down from Cataclysm's nine. New glyphs will be introduced and some old one's will be changed and others might disappear (as they did when Cata launched.)
Fury Warrior Leveling Spec
Remarks
Fury is the dual-weilding engine of destruction. You're a
berserker with no fear of death. Eventually you get Titan's Grip and
can weild a 2-handed weapon in each hand.
Upon picking Fury you will recieve Bloodthirst as your level
10 ability. Bloodthirst is a hard hitting strike that heals
you slightly. As you progress you will eventually pick up:
Precision: Increases your chance to hit and your auto-attack
damage.
Mastery: Unshackled Fury - Various enraged/berserker abilities
provide a benefit and Mastery increases that benefit. Additional
Mastery Rating increases the benefits further.
Cataclysm Fury Leveling build
7/31/3 (click
to view)
2/2 Cruelty - increases the crit chance of Bloodthirst,
Shield Slam, and Mortal Strike by 10%
3/3 Battle Trance - various strikes have a chance
to cause the next special attack cost no rage.
2/2 Executioner - Your Execute strikes
have a chance to hasten you by a small amount for a few seconds.
Can stack for greater speed.
2/2 Booming Voice - Reduces the cooldowns of Battle & Commandingshout by
30 sec and generates additional rage when using them.
Piercing Howl - All enemies within 10 yards are
dazed for 6 seconds, reducing movement by 50%
Death Wish - 20% more damage at the cost of taking
5% more damage
3/3 Flurry - increases attack speed after dealing
a critical strike
1/3 Enrage- Your melee hits have a chance to Enrage you,
giving you a damage bonus for a few seconds.
Raging Blow - Strike with both melee weapons
Rampage - increases your crit by 2%, increases the
group's crit by 5%
2/2 Die by the Sword - 100% parry for a few seconds
when dropping below 20% health. No more than once per 2 min.
2/3 Enrage
2/2 Meat Cleaver - damage done by Cleave and Whirlwind increases
further damage from those two abilities.
2/2 Intensify rage - reduces cooldown of Berkserker
Rage, Recklessness, and Death Wish by 20%
3/3 Enrage
3/3 Bloodsurge - Bloodthirst hits have
a chance to make your next Slam instant.
2/2 Skirmisher - reduces cooldowns of Heroic
Leap and Intercept
Titan's Grip - Weild 2-handed weapons in one hand or take SIngle
Minded Fury which gives you added damage and slam hits
when you use two 1-handed weapons.
You can now pick talents from the other specs.
3/3 Incite (protection) - 15% added crit chance
to Heroic Strike and guarantees that the next three Heroic
Strikes are crits.
3/3 War Academy (Arms) - Added damage to Heroic
Strike, Cleave, Visctory Rush, and Slam
Levels 81-85:
2/2 Blitz (Arms) - Charge generates more
rage and stuns an additional opponent
2/3 Deep Wounds (Arms) - Your crits cause the opponent
to bleed
Glyphs are learned permanently. Buy all that might be appropriate and switch them in as the situation demands.
In order to swtch them you will need some supplies from your friendly neighborhood Inscription Supplies Vendor.
Glyph of Bloodthirst - Increases the damage of Bloodthirst
by 10%.
Glyph of Overpower - Increases the
damage of Overpower by 10%.
Glyph of Raging Blow -
Increases the critical strike chance of Raging Blow by 5%.
Major Glyphs
Glyph of Cleaving -Increases the number of targets your
Cleave hits by 1.
Glyph of Long Charge -
Increases the range of your Charge ability by 5 yards.
Glyph of Death Wish -
Death Wish no longer increases damage taken.
Minor Glyphs
Glyph of Bloody Healing -
Increases the healing you receive from Bloodthirst by 40%.
Glyph of Enduring Victory -
Increases the window of opportunity in which you can use
Victory Rush by 5 sec.
Glyph of Battle -
Increases the duration by 2 min and area of effect by 50%
of your Battle Shout.
Stats
Strength
Crit
Cruelty provides us with a staple damage
increase. It also gives us the much needed critical strikes that become
oh-so-very-important at the later levels, largely due to Flurry. It’s
probably one of the best talents in the tree despite occupying the
first tier. By the way, that added 10% crit is very hard to get at high
levels.
Flurry is the real killer, however. It
rounds out the build's damage abilities with a massive, consistent
increase of damage throughout practically every fight. Just one
thing: you might not notice it being quite as good as I’m playing
it up to be, until you’ve
- A) maxed it out, 3/3, and B) built up a decent critical rating.
Are you going to cool your heels and explore
the new world? Or are
you going to blast to 85, leaving a trail of dismembered bodies in
your wake? Scroll down for gear notes and leveling tip.
You're the two-handed weapon expert, smashing down your opponents
with the best of them.
Once you pick Arms as your talent specialization you will
get Mortal Strike as your "bread and butter" attack.
As you progress down the Arms tree you will automatically get:
Two handed weapon specialization - your damage from 2-handers
increases by 12%
Anger Management - Gain 1 Rage per 3 seconds and 25% extra
rage from damage dealt.
Mastery: Strikes of Oppoprtunity - Grants a chance for your
melee strikes to trigger an additional melee strike for 75% damage.
Additional Mastery rating increases the chance of this happening.
Note: For those of you who just have to be pure Arms, 39 talent points
buys everything in the Arms tree.
3/3 War Academy - Added damage to Heroic Strike,
Cleave, Visctory Rush, and Slam
2/2 Blitz - Charge generates more rage and
stuns two extra opponents
3/3 Deep Wounds - your crits cause the enemy to bleed
2/2 Second Wind - getting hit by a Stun or Immobize
effect causes you to gain rage and some health
2/2 Impale - Increases the critical damage bonus
of Mortal Strike, Slam, and Overpower
Sweeping Strikes- For 10 seconds your melee attacks
strike an additional opponent
2/3 Taste for Blood - Greatly improves the crit
chance of Overpower and gives your Rend damage
a chance to pop Overpower
2/2 Blood Frenzy - Your bleeds cause the target to
take a little more physical damage and quite a bit more bleed
damage. You auto-attacks now have a chance to generate additional
rage.
Deadly Calm - for a few seconds none of your abilites
cost rage, though you willcontinue to generate rage.
3/3 Taste for Blood
1/2 Field Dressing- get more from any healing effect.
Juggernaut - Your Charge is now usable in
combat, but the coolddown is increased by 5 seconds. In addition,
your next Slam or Mortal Strike has a 25% increased
chance to crit if used in the next few seconds.
3/3 Lambs to the Slaughter - After your Mortal Strike
hits your next MS, Overpower, or Slam will
do 30% more damage
1/2 Sudden Death - Keep 5 Rage after using Execute and
your melee hits have a chance to reset the cooldown on Colossus
Smash
2/2 Wrecking Crew - Your Mortal Strike crits
will Enrage you, increasing all damage by 10% for 12
seconds.
Throwdown - Slam the target to the ground and stun
it for 5 seconds
2/2 Sudden Death
2/2 Field Dressing
Bladestorm - become a whrling storm of destruction
You can now pick talents from the other trees
2/2 Cruelty (Fury) - increases the crit chance of
Bloodthirst, Shield Slam, and Mortal Strike by 10%
3/3 Battle Trance (Fury) - various strikes have a
chance to cause the next special attack cost no rage.
Levels 81-85:
3/3 Blood Craze (Fury) - After taking any damage you
have a chance to regenerate some health
2/2 Tactical Mastery (Arms) - Retain Rage when switching
stances
One of each glyph is obtained at
levels 25, 50, and 75. Here is a suggested glyph set and the
order in which to take them.
Prime Glyphs
Glyph of Mortal Strike -
Increases the damage of Mortal Strike by 10%.
Glyph of Overpower -
Increases the damage of Overpower by 10%.
Glyph of Bladestorm - Reduces
the cooldown on Bladestorm by 15 sec.
Major Glyphs
Glyph of Long Charge -
Increases the range of your Charge ability by 5 yards.
Glyph of Sweeping Strikes -
Reduces the rage cost of your Sweeping Strikes ability
by 100%.
Glyph of Cleaving -
Increases the number of targets your Cleave hits by 1.
Minor
Glyphs
Glyph of Battle -
Increases the duration by 2 min and area of effect
by 50% of your Battle Shout.
Glyph of Enduring Victory -
Increases the window of opportunity in which you
can use Victory Rush by 5 sec.
Glyph of Intimidating Shout -
All targets of your Intimidating Shout now tremble
in place instead of fleeing in fear.
Shield
Slam - Whack the opponent with your shield causing damge, high
threat, and dispelling one magical effect. When fighting bosses
you should be slamming all the time.
Sentinel -
Increases Stam and Black chance, increases Rage generated by attacking
targets that are not attacking you.
Vengeance -
Damage taken increases your attack power.
Mastery:
Critical Block - Improves your chance to block
Protection Warriors aren't so hot in the questing department, though
with decent gear you'll be Ok. It's a damage thing. However, you will
do quite well in the area effect damage. While questing you can round
up groups of mobs and kill them well enough to more than make up for
any single target issues.
Where you'll blow
the doors off of everyone else is in the dungeons. Master the tankage
and you'll have very short waits for dungeon queues and you'll level
quickly. You'll be able to level all the way to 85 without even leaving
the city.
Recruit
a friend and get 3x XP when you and your buddy are together.
You're the tank, she's DPS or Heals, you're both getting 3x XP, how
soon do you think you'll hit 85? Pretty darn fast.
Two of our group used Heirlooms, a
leveling guide,
and Recruit a Friend and went 1-85 in two and a half days (in-game
time.) A Prot. Warrior and Friend in the dungeons should be able to
match that.
Take a look at our protection
warrior page for info on builds, tanking,
etc.
Gear, Stats, Leveling Notes for Warriors
Attack Rotation:
Keep in mind that, while questing, your opposition will frequently
expire before you finish any kind of rotation. Too bad that doesn't
happen in PvP, hmmm?
Really basic rotation:
Charge, Smash, Victory Rush next opponent, smash, Charge, Victory
Rush...
Charge > Rend > strike > strike > chop
off head (Execute)
Start with charge to generate initial Rage.
Use Hamstring whenever you're fighting opponents that
live long enough to run
Use Victory Rush whenever you can
Warriors can fight several opponents effectively with the use of
their cooldowns, for example: Retaliation. Use them, do not
save them "for later," unless you have a specific fight coming up.
When they activate and it's appropriate use them.
Start attack macro - this will initiate your attack
even if you don't have the rage to use your opening attack. This way
you can switch targets or attack new ones and start whacking them before
the rage builds.
You can
use this with Bloodthirst, Mortal Strike, Shield Slam, or any other
attack you might use to initiate combat.
Ranged: Get a bow (or gun or throwing knife or...)
Use it to pull mobs from groups or to shoot runners. You're not a
Hunter and you're not trying to do damage, just get their attention.
So any weapon will do. Body-pulling (moving just close enough to
attract one opponent)
has its uses, as well.
Weapons: At the very least keep your weapons as
up to date as possible, it will make a big difference. Other gear
can slide a bit if you're broke (and go read our gold
guide if
you are.)
Get Mounts at 20 and 40 and 60. Get them, don't
ask questions. If you can't afford them then get mining or herbalism
and work those skills until you can afford your mounts. They're not that expensive.
Epic Flying, at 70, is nice is you can afford the price.
Stats:
Top 3 Stats: Strength, Strength, and then more
Strength.
Stam if you're tanking or PvPing.
Resilience only if you're PvPing
Secondary Stats:
You don't really have to worry
about these until high level. Hit's nice because missing isn't.
Hit to 8% (7% for Draenei) if you're tanking, 5% for same level PvP.
Attack Power if you can find it.
Dodge & Parry if you're tanking
Crit is always good.
Expertise (ignores opponent's dodge) is nice, but don't worry about
it too much until the end-game.
Mastery starts at level 80, but don't worry about it until the end-game.
Forget Agility, Int, and Spirit forever. Warrirors need power,
not brains, and dodging is for rogues.
Al low level: stack Stamina. The one or two points
of Stength that you can pick up aren't worth nearly as much as Stam,
though they frequently come with the Stam anyway. Of the Bear is
good gear to look for.
Mid levels - gear with decent Strength starts
to appear. Strength at this point is your first priority,
it increases attack power, and in doing so, your base damage values. It
also increases your Parry.
Stacking massive amounts of strength
is effective at mid levels and slowly improves up until 80, then with
the new Cataclysm rules Strength starts to scale up more quickly. Keep
the Stam and get more if you're constantly getting smashed (as in hit,
not drunk.) (Mining increases Stam by a bit.)
Higher levels - Attack power, crit rating, and hit
rating start to appear.
At level 40: you get to use plate mail gear, but
you may find that a chain item has better stats, depending on what
drops off mobs of the Auction House.
One practice that has been followed occasionally at higher levels is
the usage of mail and/or leather armor that possesses the greater damage
stats. Cataclysm has a system to award wearing the "correct"
armor, which you get at level 50 and which adds 5% to your Stength,
which should mean fewer 40+ warriors in leather.
Offense Vs. Defense? Unless you are doing a lot of
PvP and/or tanking you will find the offensive stats to be much more
valuable than the defensive ones. While leveling stick to the massive
offense and carry enough food (unless you're Undead) and bandages with
you to minimize downtime. However, you should stack enough stam that
this doesn't become painful.
For Fury Warriors: Critical rating and raw Attack Power come
at about an even par. However, in the end I’d say Critical Rating
edges out +Attack Power, because Crit Raing increases how often Flurry procs,
thereby increasing white damage significantly. (The Skinning profession
will increase your crit rating. )
For Arms Warriors: Stength and Attack power rule.
Everything else is "the rest.".
Note on cash: Petty cash means one thing if you have 3 gold
to your toon's name and another if you have 100k (you'd be surprised
how many do.) See our Tycoon guide
review or our gold guide if you
need help in that area.
The better buffed you are the faster you'll level. See a buffing class
running by? Ask them, nicely, if they'll buff you. Make a
macro:
/say Excuse me, Oh Awesome One. Can you lay upon my lowly self
some of your excellent buffage?
First off, can you afford the extras? If gems, enchants, etc. are petty
cash then go for it. Twinks will spend hundreds of
gold on weapons and enchants for low level PvP and that enhanced
gear certainly won't hurt while leveling. If you can't afford it
then don't worry abut it. Green gear is fine and if you keep your
weapons up to your level then you'll be Ok.
Potions & Scrolls: Buy and keep a bunch. Healing,
stength, health/stamina. Troll's Blood pots don't look interesting
at first, but in the long run they'll save you from using a lot of
bandages. Prices vary on the AH. If they're expensive now just keep
checking every now and then and buy a pile when you can.
Scrolls of Strength are frequently dirt cheap. You can also check
with an Inscriber (Scribe) and have some made for you.
Scrolls and potions do not stack. You will have to use one or the
other.
Potions of water breathing will help with underwater quests or gathering.
Usually the quest-giver will give you something, but not always.
Glyphs - prices vary wildly. One day your glyph is
at 2g, the next day it's 200g (or more.) Wait for sales (or pay my
inflated prices, please. ;) ,) buy all your glyphs, and then stock
some vanishing dust to swap them in and out as you need to. You can
probably get all of your warrior (or any class) glyphs in
a package deal from your friendly, neighborhood scribe and pay a lot
less money (and get them faster) than AH browsing.
Food: Pretty much the same. Lower level foods will
buff Stamina, which is great, the highest level foods will buff stength,
attack power, crit rating, etc. If they're not readily available on
the AH then it may be worth your while to get cooking.
Enchants: Can you afford them? Get health/stam at
low levels, and whatever fits your needs at the high levels.
Str is best for any flavor of Warrior, followed by Attack Power.
Movement speed enchants are nice.
Are you tanking your way to 85? See the Protection
Warrior page for
notes.
Gems: Gem slots are rare before 60 and occasional
afterwards (while leveling.) Gem for Strength, Attack Power, and Crit
Rating. Stam if you need it.
Like enchants, Str and AP before all else. For any flavor of warrior.
There are a variety of heirloom items available. Some or bought through
your high level guild, others with honor points, and so on.
Important note: Some of the heirloom cap at 80, others
85 (such as the helm and cloak you buy from your guild vendor.)
Do enough PvP so that at level 70 you can get decked out in level
70 purple (epic) PvP gear from the Legacy Arena Vendors. The gear
is cheap, not a lot of honor is required.
At 77 buy your green Cataclysm gear. The stats on these pieces are far better
than any non-Cataclysm gear else you'll get, short of the best raid/pvp
stuff. When you buy your Cataclysm cloak and Helm you will send your
Level 80 Heirlooms to your next alts, or bank them.
At 81 put your level 85 Heirlooms back on. At 85 you can put them
away when you start doing dungeons and PvP.
Questing over Grinding: Do the quests, grind a bit
when you find the right areas. grab all the interesting quests (the
ones you want to do) and group them so that you can knock of several
at the same time in the same place. Save the city quests until you
have a few, then knock them off all at once when you train.
Grinding: There are times when the grinding is good,
however. Some camps of mobs have a fast respawn rate and you can spend
some time there just mob-mashing and practicing your skills. This is
especially effective if you have rest XP from your stay at
the Inn.
Dungeons: If you have the time and interest and are
Ok with groups, then dungeon
leveling can
add some fast XP. Just Queue up for the dungeon finder and go for it.
You also will get some nice items out of it.
Learn to tank. Your wait times will be near zero and you will
be able to level all the way to 85 without leaving the city. You
might have to go back and get your flypoints and such later.
Damage/DPS: Your wait times will be longer, so mix it up with watching
YouTube videos or questing/grinding/farming/gathering.
PVP: If you like PvP then you should know that the
battlegrounds have their special weekends where double honor and double
XP are awarded. (Just look at the calandar by your mini-map.) If your
team wins you can get some insanely fast XP.
Even when it's
not the Holiday weekend, winning the Battlegrounds is still very
fast XP. Losing is maybe faster than questing, but more frustrating
(for us, anyway.) See our Warrior PvP page for tips.
Bags: big bags are good, bigger bags are better.
Banker: make an alt to live at the Auction House.
That way you can mail white or better stuff to the alt instead of having
to travel to the city to unload it, or dumping it at the vendor. This
is a big hassle saver. Here are a few more gold
tips.
More XP: Always log out at an Inn. You get the 2x
"rest XP" when you come back. A longer rest = longer duration fo the
rest XP.
The Titan
Panel Addon has an "XP per hour" function. This lets you
know how efficient you are at picking up the XP.
Now, if you have full heirlooms and if you are
a tank and you are dungeon leveling and you have a buddy doing
the RAF thing with you... You'll be 80 before you know it, and 85 not
much later.
If you have to level a skill then go for Blacksmithing andMining.
Blacksmithing will get you into some good gear, but it gets expensive.
At high level you'll be able to make some nice stuff.
Mining is a great
money maker that also provides raw materials for Blacksmithing, as
well as Jewelcrafting and Engineering.
First
Aid is an essential skill (for when you smash your hand
with your Blacksmithing hammer.) Keep it maxed
at all times.
Generally, skip
the crafting professions while leveling (even Inscription,) unless
you have, or can generate, plenty of gold.
Skinning gives you extra crit rating
Mining gives you more Stamina
Herbalism gives you a small heal and a Haste effect.
Here is a list of other money-making and useful professions:
Inscription -
There have been some big changes to this profession. Many glyphs
have changed and all classes get the two big changes:
Once you install a glyph you have learned it, you will
never need to buy it again. By them all, learn them, and swap them
with Vanishing Dust (bought from the Inscription supplies
vendors, or on the Ah at an inflated price.)
All classes can now learn nine total glyphs at level 85, three
each of Prime, Major, and Minor.
Cooking - A good skill to take. You'll be able to cook up foods that buff str, stam, and other stats.
Fishing - A good way toslow downyour leveling speed. It does provide mats for cooking, and some fish are good gold makers (oily blackmouth, deviate fish, etc.,) but it is time consuming.
At level 85 all of the crafting professions provide self-only buffs
or items that provide about 80 extra stat points. If you really want
to go the min-max rouite then grab two crafting profs.
Alchemy - get 80 Str more from your own Str potions. Also get better
effect from your other potions.
Blacksmithing -
Can add an extra gem socket to gloves and bracers. Drop a Str gem into
those sockets.
Enchanting - Add a 40 Str enchant to each of your rings.
Engineering - Besides
various nifty gadgets, the Synapse
Springs widget adds 480 to Str for 10 seconds, which is awesome
for burst.
One of the commonly seen questions in the forums and in the game
chat is something like, "Where do I go to level...?" You
can always grind endless groups of mobs, which a fury warrior
does very well, and fall asleep from the tedium, or
you can follow the quests as you find them, perhaps looking for
quest details on some website.
A better option is a full blown Warrior
leveling guide. Step by step, from the starting area (or anywhere else) to
the end, the
guide will semi-automates that
path for your Warrior. You'll never again wonder about where
to go or what to do.
What if you've never played before, or you're not level
1? Or you want to do some dungeon or PvP leveling along with
your questing? Or you have full heirlooms and you and a pal are using Recruit-a-Friend?
No problem. Dugi's guide will automatically adjust
and send you to the right place. Don't want to do a quest chain?
Or you'd rather level in easy mode (or hard more?) Go into the
options, click a box or two, and you're set to level the way you want
to.
You just pick your starting point
and the guide automatically updates and advances to the next
step as you complete each step and quest, and also sets the
next waypoint arrow automatically. In addition, all of the important
quest info is included in the guide window. Tasks are tracked
and you'll never need to switch back and forth from the quest
log or any online site.
All you have to do is follow the arrow and check the guide (with
its in-game window) to see what you have to do. You'll knock
off the quests boom, boom, boom and you'll level with a surprising
lack of stress. Get to the max level fast and join your friends and guildies
in that yummy end-game content.
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