Using Dungeons For Leveling

When World of Warcraft was released about 5 years ago, people didn't run many Dungeons. It was something that guilds did, but not something that general players got into. It was extremely difficult to find other players who were willing to party with you then travel half way across the world just to enter the Dungeon. Having a Warlock in your group was pretty much essential for teleporting people to the dungeon, otherwise your group would never get started.




There are so many awesome lower level dungeons but most players never get to see them because it is even harder to find lower level players to group with since everybody in the server was already level 80. But all that has changed now with the new Dungeon Finder system in Patch 3.3






If you hop into World of Warcraft right now and hit your button for the old Looking for Group window, you'll get the new 'Dungeon Finder' instead. It looks kind of close to how the old one was laid out. You've got your role selection at the top of tank, healer or DPS. You've also got the option to be the leader of the party.



The system will automatically find a group for you and then teleport everyone inside the dungeon to begin playing immediately, how cool is that!



If you ever follow the quest story line in World of Warcraft, you will know that eventually the story will lead you inside ….you guessed it Dungeons. It was frustrating back then to have these awesome quests sitting in your log book that you’re dying to complete, but can’t. Waiting until you’re a high enough level to solo it yourself pretty much takes the fun out and the rewards are no longer useful.



I saw the potential when Blizzard released their new dungeon finder and I knew this tool was going to help with my leveling A LOT. Now it is actually a common thing to do. So many players get to level 15 and then they do literally nothing but random dungeons until level 80…



While this is a legitimate strategy to leveling, I do find it somewhat boring only doing dungeons. It still feels like grinding to me, just killing monsters over and over again with no purpose. The original design by Blizzard of dungeons is that it would be the last place that you visit to complete your quest line, and that is exactly what I did.



I always collect all the quests required for the dungeon before entering a dungeon, there are always about 3-5 quests available per dungeon and some of them require you to complete a chain of solo quests first before you can get them.



Dungeons quests are considered more difficult and reward you with double experience points and rare (blue) quality items, it is amazing because completing 5 quests in a dungeon is like completing 10 quests solo.



The combination of the fast grinding experience in Dungeons plus the Dungeon quests gives you the fastest leveling ever. I often get about 1 full level just by turning in my quests. I would get about 1.5-2 levels completing the dungeon then get another 1-1.5 levels just by turning in quests and I will get rare (blue) quality items comparable and sometimes better than Heirloom items.



There are some resources out there such as wowhead and wowwiki to help you find and complete these dungeons, these were helpful until I stumbled upon Dugi’s Dungeon Leveling guide.



It is a step-by-step guide for Dungeons at every level, for example I’m level 15 and I want to complete the Ragefire Chasm dungeon with quests. I simply select the Ragefire Chasm guide and follow the step-by-step guide, which contains all the pre-requisite quests for Ragefire Chasm













The guide also instructs me when I should zone, queue and begin the dungeon, and once I have completed the dungeon. The guide automatically gives me full instructions as to where I should turn in the quests and how to get there.



Once I complete one dungeon I can move on to the next dungeon guide which is Wailing Caverns, and all this time I have leveled at a very fast rate. Having the guide viewable inside the game is a god send and it makes it is so simple and easy, I wish Blizzard had made something like this built in. I guess it would probably make the game too easy J.



Dugi’s Dungeon Leveling Guide skips all the non-essential solo quests and get’s you to complete the pre-requisite dungeon quests. I noticed that Dugi sometimes adds in solo quests that aren’t necessary for a dungeon but that’s because I was going to be questing in that certain area anyway so it was definitely a good idea to complete the extra solo quests at the same time so I’m glad he added those in.



This was my level progress for my new Orc Shaman from using this guide, with the help of Dungeon Quests I steadily gain 2-3 levels per dungeon and I didn’t have to run each dungeon more than once which would have been boring.



Level 16 Ragefire Chasm

Level 18 Wailing Caverns

Level 20 Shadowfang Keep

Level 23 Blackfathom Deeps

Level 25 Razonfen Craul

Level 27 Gnomeregan

Level 29.5 Scarlet Monastery Graveyard

Level 31 Scarlet Monastery Library

Level 33 Razonfens Down

Level 35 Scarlet Monastery Armory

Level 37 Scarlet Monetary Cathedral (I actually ran this twice because I didn’t get the items that I wanted the first time)

Level 40 Uldaman

Level 43.5 Zul’Farrak

Level 46 Mauradon

Level 48.5 Sunken Temple

Level 53 Blackrock Depths Prison

Level 55 Sholomance

Level 57 Stratholme



At level 58 I could have just went straight to Outland but I didn’t want to abandon my group so I leveled to almost level 59 before I went to Outlands.



Well that is my progress so far, and I have been loving every minute of leveling. World of Warcraft felt like a brand new game. Some of the storylines in these Dungeons are truly epic, it’s hard to pick a favorite but Uldaman really stood out to me as my first Epic dungeon experience.



I hope blizzard would revamp these dungeons for Cataclysm because it would be a shame to lose them forever. I highly recommend you complete these Dungeons before Cataclysm comes, so you can truly experience the rich storyline in World of Warcraft.



I have also seen many players reaching level 80 and yet still don’t have a clue on how to play their class. Leveling in Dungeons is the best way to learn your class because as you level up, the dungeon gets harder and harder and you will gradually learn on how to play your class role so that once you reach level 80 you won’t get laughed at or kicked out of guilds and raids because you didn’t know how to play your class in dungeons.



If you’re interested with leveling faster than ever before then I highly recommend Dugi’s WoW Leveling Guides.

Understanding Dungeon Leveling

With Wrath of the Lich King, we’ve seen power leveling on World of Warcraft come to an all new level, thanks to the new dungeon finder tool. WoW players are getting to level 80 faster than ever before. They’re having more fun and getting better rewards than they ever did before the dungeon finder was introduced.


The dungeon finder is not just for level 80 characters. Dungeon leveling through the finder has become an integral part of power leveling, and it’s changed the game of WoW forever. In fact, instance leveling has become so important that most of the leveling guides players have used for years are now obsolete.

Even though many of the lower level dungeons are located in Horde territory, both Alliance and Horde players can now easily reap the benefits of the Classic and Burning Crusade dungeons, thanks to this amazing new tool. The dungeon finder pulls together players of the same faction from many different servers. It sends you into your dungeon automatically without the hassle of having to run through enemy territory to get to the dungeon. This means Alliance characters are now experiencing some of the Horde dungeons, while Horde players are also experiencing Alliance dungeons. It also means it’s much easier for both Horde and Alliance players to complete the quests that are in dungeons located in the opposite faction’s territory.

Completing the quests inside of the dungeons is an important part of dungeon leveling. Blizzard wanted to encourage more players to actually set foot inside of dungeons before they reach level 80, so they increased the amount of experience and the quality of rewards you get through instance leveling. Completing a single dungeon quest gives you double the amount of experience you receive when you complete a solo quest, and the rewards from the dungeon quests are much nicer than those you receive from the solo quests.

In addition to better rewards from the dungeon quests, you’ll also have access to much better gear simply by killing the bosses in the dungeons. There are plenty of unique bosses located in every one of the dungeons, and they drop gear that’s best in slot for your particular class and level. You won’t be able to find this gear by questing solo, so you’ve got to go into the dungeons in order to get it.

Another aspect of killing the unique bosses you’ll find by dungeon leveling is simply the extra fun. Who doesn’t love a new challenge? Instead of the dull grinding involved in some parts of power leveling, you have unique opportunities to kill bosses you wouldn’t be able to otherwise.

Dungeon leveling depends entirely on working as a group, and it’s just a glimpse of all the fun you’ll have when you finally do reach level 80 and can play some of the end game content. Playing in a group with other people makes every single encounter just a little bit different than the one before, and you’ll level so fast that you’ll truly understand what it means to power level.

The Benefits of Dungeon Leveling

For World of Warcraft players, the clock is ticking to the Cataclysm expansion. The entire world will change with Cataclysm, but for now there are some important benefits that you’ve got to take advantage of while you can. Right now dungeon leveling is the perfect way to reach level 80 quickly and efficiently, and that could all change when Cataclysm arrives. The new expansion will completely reshuffle the WoW world, and some of those old Classic and Burning Crusade dungeons will disappear. You’ve got a limited time to experience these dungeons, and instance leveling is the perfect way to do it.


There are many reasons instance leveling helps you reach level 80 much faster than traditional solo questing and grinding. The most basic reason is that you gain experience much faster. You don’t have a lot of down time when you’re leveling through the dungeons because you’re pretty much killing mobs nonstop. You don’t have to spend a lot of time running to a new area in between levels because the dungeon finder takes you right to your instance. In most cases, you’ll also spend a lot less time dead and running to retrieve your body. This cuts back on your down time even more, making leveling a breeze!

Dungeon leveling is also much easier than traditional solo quest leveling because you have many more opportunities to get even better gear. There are three ways you’ll have access to better gear through dungeon leveling. First, the gear you receive from doing the quests that are located inside the dungeons is far better than almost anything you’ll get from solo questing. Blizzard wanted to make the rewards for dungeon leveling even more appealing than solo power leveling because running instances is more difficult. This is why the gear you earn as a reward for doing the dungeon quests is so much better than the gear you get for doing solo quests. Blizzard also granted twice the experience for completing dungeon quests, as opposed to solo quests.

Whenever you’re instance leveling, you also get the chance to kill a lot more bosses and elite monsters. These unique creatures will drop much higher quality gear, which you will never have access to if you don’t learn all about dungeon leveling. The third way you can get better gear by dungeon leveling is the special bag you get upon completion of your first random dungeon of the day. The contents of the bag won’t always benefit your character, but sometimes they are exactly what you need.

Another great thing about instance leveling is that it gives you a chance to explore areas of the game that you can’t go into when you’re power leveling on your own. Of course solo questing certainly has its place, but you’ll need four other people to go into the dungeons and take advantage of all they have to offer. After all, you’re going to run across a lot more elite monsters in the dungeons, and they give a lot more experience than just killing regular creatures.