Outland Instances vs. Leveling as Fast as Possible

[Revelin]

Hey guys. My guild recently started an Alliance chapter on a new server (instead of the one the old Horde guild is on). I got to it a few months late and now most are at 80 or close to it. My Pally is just 64 and he's gear is all quest rewards and AH bargains (in other words, its sucks!). He does fine solo as Ret and is leveling pretty fast. My question is, as my guild starts raiding should I just put my head down and level as fast as I can, or spend time trying to upgrade my gear with Outland instances?

As for posting in the newcomer help forum, I really am pretty inexperienced with the game. I haven't done the majority of instances since I just started playing last fall (and this is my highest guy). It would be nice to take my time and see all the old content, but I don't want to fall too far behind the curve compared to the rest of my guildmates.

[elsegundo]

Hey guys. My guild recently started an Alliance chapter on a new server (instead of the one the old Horde guild is on). I got to it a few months late and now most are at 80 or close to it. My Pally is just 64 and he's gear is all quest rewards and AH bargains (in other words, its sucks!). He does fine solo as Ret and is leveling pretty fast. My question is, as my guild starts raiding should I just put my head down and level as fast as I can, or spend time trying to upgrade my gear with Outland instances?

As for posting in the newcomer help forum, I really am pretty inexperienced with the game. I haven't done the majority of instances since I just started playing last fall (and this is my highest guy). It would be nice to take my time and see all the old content, but I don't want to fall too far behind the curve compared to the rest of my guildmates.

your guild is going to raid level 80 content, not level 70 content. so it behooves you to get to 80 before delving into instances and raids.
if you dont mind taking a little longer to reach 80, just take your time, but do those instances at least once. they're good experience and have some decent quest rewards even if you dont get drops.

at level 64, hit Underbog and Slave pens. then skip on over to auchindoun and do auchenai crypt and mana tombs. by 66-67 go to nagrand, do ring of blood and durn the hungerer. do nessingwary quests for the libram. do old hillsbrad foothils and you should be in northren immediately after that, with some decent gear (to replace, sigh)

[mesonm]

My question is, as my guild starts raiding should I just put my head down and level as fast as I can, or spend time trying to upgrade my gear with Outland instances?

Get to 80, and then do heroics...

Forget the lower normal instances, if your goal is to be able to raid soon after getting to 80. They only slow you down.

[clevins]

Level. Outland is easy to level in - you should, if you can play a few hours a day, be 70 in a week. I did about a level a day from 60-70.

Go to Northrend at 68. The quest XP is double that of Outland.

Your issue will be 70-80. That's 15 million XP and it's going to take awhile. Nonetheless if you can play regularly most days for at least a couple hours a day you can be 80 in a month.

DO run instances in Northrend of course - the XP is good.

[Revelin]

Thanks guys. My guild has enough 80s they are starting to do the end game raids right now. There are still a fair number in their low to mid 70s, so I think I'll try to invest enough time to catch them if I can. There's just a couple below me (DK alts mainly), so I really do need to catch up with that main group. I can always go back later and "play tourist" on the stuff I missed.

/sigh, guess that's what happens when you come to an established game late!

[Mazhulsage]

Quests... FOREVER... Will be faster than instancing. The thing is, if you can do an instance fast enough, it will be NEARLY the same speed, but still slightly slower in 99% of all cases... The added bonus with that though, is that you go from quest greens (Or lower) to an instance blue, which is just above quest blues in most cases. Which, in turn, makes you level faster. So, it makes up for the loss in exp/hour.

[Wintrow]

Yeah, you should do every instance once (as long as you haven't passed it in level) for the chance to get some upgrades. Twice if the group is really good and fast (Utgarde Keep in 30 mins for example).