Tuesday, August 26, 2008

DING!, or "Speed Level to 60 for Cheapzors?"

I love it and hate it. That any referred account gets a huge experience bonus, and so do you if you quest with the new account. It seems ridiculous to give huge perks to people who've never played the game before, and just plain cruel to overlook those of us who've hit the level cap and would like to level our alts to 70 before the expansion hits.

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BUT here are the facts and the ways I and many others are using the system to speed-level characters that otherwise would just be moldering in our creation screens.

Linked accounts for bonus xp lasts 90 days.
  1. I send a friend invite to my husband. (You can also send one to yourself if you're in the mood to try multiboxing.)
  2. He creates a trial account and a character.
    • He is limited to races from the original game (must buy the Burning Crusade expansion in order to play Draenei or Blood Elves).
    • I create a character to play with him.
      • As long as our characters are in CLOSE proximity (there is a physical distance in the game that is too far) you share 300% experience bonus and thus level 3x faster.
      • All of his characters have the ability to level 3x faster if the invitER is with them.
    • At 23 I either continue the character I started with him or switch to Birdfall (level 23), and she will begin to share the 300% experience (it doesn't matter which character the invitER uses, it just has to be same server and faction). We can also summon each other to wherever we are once an hour -- like a special hearthstone set to that other player.
  3. Once we're both 60, we pay the $25 to transfer my husband's character from his new account to his regular account.
    • Restrictions for moving characters from one account to another.
      • The "subscriber" must be the same person on both accounts.
      • Trial accounts cannot transfer characters, they must be upgraded to a "paid" account.
    • I need to verify that this can be done without buying the full version of the original game, but it's what my brother and his wife are planning on (got my info from them).
Other perks:
  1. If the referred person signs for 1 month of subscription, you get a free month (so if it's your trial account, you break even that first month).
  2. If they sign for 2 months of subscription, you get a Zhevra mount.
  3. They can give any of your characters bonus levels, up to 30 levels. (Must verify specifics.)
Why You Might Be Interested
  • You save a ton of time and effort with the experience bonus.
  • You've wanted to try multiboxing but didn't want the level grind all over again.
  • You really want a new main for the expansion.
  • You really want every class for the expansion.
  • Your significant other or best friend wants a character leveled and you love leveling together.
To be honest, it just saves a lot of time and doesn't seem to cost that much.

Pricing

Your friend gets the account:
  • They buy at least a month and you save $15 and benefit from the xp bonus on any character if you play together (their xp bonus is less if you're not with them, a good incentive to stay with you).
You are paying for the second account:
  • To get the full 90 days out of it, you pay $35 (3 months) more than normal.
    • First Month Subscription = $20
      • If you buy the game, it's $20 and the first month free.
      • If you upgrade to a subscription account online, it's $20 and the first month free.
    • Month Subscription x 2 = $30
    • Free Month for Getting a Referral to Buy 1 Month: -$15
  • Optional character transfer: $25 per character.

4 comments:

  1. Having looked into this myself (a lot), I figured I'd pass along a bit of what I know.

    1. You're not going to be able to do this without buying at least the original game. The problem is the level 21 cap on trials, other than that it would work fine.

    2. If your characters are different levels, the 300% bonus only works for the lower level character. This negates the idea of running instances to level the invitees character using the 300% bonus. Also works against using a trail account following you around past level 21 for bonus exp.

    3. You can grant one level to an inviter's (lower level) character, per 2 levels gained on the invitees character. However, levels you earn like this have to be granted before you hit level 60 or they're going to disappear (hence you can't use this trick past level 60 either).

    4. Given point 3, a good strategy is to level another alt to level 30. Thus you can grant those extra 29 levels to the alt, pushing them past the 30-59 grind (saving the most leveling time).

    5. Another point on the gaining levels. When I tried this with a trail account, I noticed that when a level is granted, the xp bar remains the same number of bars full. Hence, If you get almost to 31, before granting those levels, you can save even more time, and wind up just before 60.

    6. Another benefit is that you can summon one another (as long as the one being summoned is below level 60), with a 60 minute cooldown. Aside from being obviously useful if you choose different starting races, you can use it to share hearths. Basically, when you need to hearth, one of you does it, and summons the other. Then the other still has a summon and hearth available for next time. 2 hearths per hour instead of one.

    7. Another benefit of the summoning is, that if you have a character in Outland, you can go to Shatt, summon your friend (and later have them summon your alt), and set your hearths there. This allows you to move very quickly around the old world.

    I'm sorry about the horribly long comment, but as I said, I've looked into this a lot, and figured I should share. :)

    More details on the specifics found here: http://us.blizzard.com/support/article.xml?articleId=20588 .
    Good luck with the powerleveling. :)

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  2. Thank you for the info! :)

    #2--> I reran the numbers and it's just $5 more than I thought it would be ($35 instead of $30) for referring yourself and buying the subscription (the original game is bought in lieu of your first month and is $20). My husband already upgraded his trial account so we could level past 20 (and so I can trade him gold to pay for his skills) and we're both level 8 after less than an hour's work.

    #4--> That's kind of an awesome idea. :) I have a 54 mage I'd like to avoid the 54-59 grind for, and after her I have a level 10 warrior who could use some love.

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  3. Yup a friend in my guild invited someone to join and he is leveling soo amazingly fast. My cousin has been playing for most of the summer now and he has already been passed up lol. I wish I would have had that option when leveling my character! Although maybe for your first character it is just nice to level normally and really get the feel of things. I really enjoy reading your blog, it was one of the first WoW blogs I found...well needless to say I thought it was a great idea, so I made one myself. I am linking you. :)

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