Top 10 Worst Leveling Zones in WoW

In this video we’re going to be discussing the worst zones to level in, taking into account classic and retail era.
Managed by Felplague
Video edited by Hiru
-The List-
Intro: (0:00)
10- Thousand Needles: (0:09)
9- Gorgrond: (1:31)
8- Swamp of Sorrows: (3:52)
7- Azshara: (5:19)
6- Blade's Edges Mountain: (7:35)
5- Desolace : (8:57)
4- Arathi Highlands: (10:55)
3- Vashj'ir: (12:43)
2- Crystalsong Forest : (14:44)
1- Silithus : (16:07)
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[@Sideshownicful]

If you are going to put Crystalsong Forest on your list, you should probably have mentioned Deadwind Pass as well. If there was no Karazhan raid, most people wouldn't even know this zone exists.

[@tnvmark2173]

Can agree on that. In wow classic, the only reason why we go there was because us Horde players (and later Alliance players) needed to traverse through a long pilgrimage from Stranglethorn Vale to Duskwood and to Deadwind Pass to reach the Swamp of Sorrows.

[@Vaelosh466]

I'm guessing he left it out because it was never marketed as a leveling zone, I don't think it even has any quests in Classic. A few leveling quests at least take you to Crystalsong.

[@Maximara]

I remember Deadwind Pass as my guild had imploded and my warlock didn't have good enough gear to raid and so became the place where I grinded my last three levels.

[@CMFoodFun]

Deadwind pass was my reliable source of income for a good part of classic. The Deadwind Warlock ogres in the caves have the +9str to bracers enchant formula, i sold a few hundreds of them over the time of classic. aswell as getting a mountain load of cloth and major mana potion and scrolls.

[@adub1300]

It was a max level zone though not a leveling zone

[@br2716]

Say what you want about 3-D combat, Vashj'ir was such a visually stunning zone and the soundtrack is top tier.

[@ChinnuWoW]

I leveled several classes there, ranged and melee, and it was perfectly fine for me. The little combat problems were trivial. Fuck the whiners.

[@KennySpace]

Like it too will put it in my interactive KZbin wow game one day hopefully

[@Commander_Pandashan]

I do love the idea and I can understand why there is some people enjoy the zone but it wasn't fun at all it gived me stresse whille playing it

[@nightzebra]

Absolutely.

[@toreole5831]

And thats the reason why i leveled through vashjir like 4 times

[@teaganwalsh7011]

I personally loved vashj'ir it was only mildly annoying to traverse, but it was so unique that it felt so cool after 80 levels of the same thing over and over. The lore was great too.

[@johaadganor1684]

Its 100% my favorite zone in all of wow. Had fun leveling there when it came out. Didnt run into pvp there since it seems a lot avoided it on launch.

[@FSGoingStraight]

Ive always wondered when people complained about having to level in vashjir. I was always like "hell i wish I could level there again" its really unique and so beautiful.

[@Pyromaniac_Akeks]

Agreed

[@astreanightfang2622]

same, but i also went thru it first on a druid so that may have helped

[@Pyromaniac_Akeks]

True. I forgot the slow start with restrictions on movement before you got the mount. Still was an interesting zone imo. Also my fave secret spots have always been the underwater caves etc.

[@discojoe3]

I actually liked Desolace in vanilla. It had this lonesome ambiance that was really cool to just chill out in. But yeah, the leveling cadence there was absolutely trash tier.

[@Zeralop]

You liked it cuz it was like you, lonely and desolate. It fits very well

[@Nerobyrne]

I really don't like how every single square inch of every zone in Old World is now crammed with content. Although, probably because I grew up with the game in the old state. It really had more of a "pioneer" feel to it back then.

[@reallordfluffybutt5636]

My thoughts exactly. I always enjoyed leveling there

[@reallordfluffybutt5636]

@@Zeralop damn, I couldn't have come up with something similar myself. Deep.

[@candlestyx8517]

I agree with this, its the same reason I enjoyed silithus.

[@MafiaCow01]

It's such a shame that Vashj'ir was so poorly received, I really liked it.

[@mariosblago94]

I think it's a very 'hate it or love it' zone. I really like it too. I think it might also depend on the class you play.

[@rdsasuke1]

It was an amazing experience.

[@catrinastars]

I liked it too, once you remember that: up = out, the zone is cake.

[@Spartanmomo]

It was dope AF

[@meggi8048]

i think its as this, people who enjoy leveling loved vashjr, people who not like leveling dislike vashjr. in vashjr you could not rush through so the zone is bad for them.

[@bighatbondquo863]

Vashj'ir is the one of the most unique, experimental, and visually stunning zones in WoW and Blizz will never do another one like it because players were so mad about 3D combat

[@AsbestosMuffins]

I think it was worse back then since melee didn't have the ranged options it has today

[@meltingatom]

It's not fun to pan your camera around 360 degrees to scan for threats or look for objectives. It also made map markers annoying becuase there was no real depth to the mini map or the map, no pun intended. But yeah it was cool for the first hour or so, very pretty

[@Slip151knot]

Vash is my favorite zone tbh. I never struggled with underwater combat and it was so pretty to look at

[@dfuher968]

Vashj'ir is an absolutely stunning zone, and I love it. But I always hated the questing there, especially coz there were and are so many bugs. A couple of years ago I set myself the goal, that I would try the few races/classes, I hadnt gotten around to despite playing WoW since early 2005, as well as try the new starting zones, fx. I hadnt levelled a gnome since Vanilla, so I wanted that experience too. Well, I took 1 of those new chars to Vashj'ir, coz its just so dang beautiful, and guess what, all the old annoyances were still there, including the bugs, in fact the 1 at the end with the submarine was so bad, that when finally a GM came back to me after 5 days of waiting, I got lucky and got a really good GM, who played himself from early on and really knew the game, and he tried for 1½ hours to make it work and had me do all kinds of things and log, so he could try all kinds of things, and none of it helped. At the end, he gave up and had to have me log off, so he could mark the quest as completed and manually give me the next quest. And thats why I love Vashj'ir, but also hate Vashj'ir. Its 1 thing to spend time on quests and going back and forth, but so much time wasted on stupid bugs like that, that they havent been able or willing to fix after 10 years? Nope, no such bugs in Mount Hyjal, so sadly once again, bye-bye Vashj'ir.

[@yoremothra9838]

Most of the people who hated the Vashj'ir content are just a buncha keyboard turning, button clicking clods. Yet, they never realized thier biggest mistake, was playing Cata in the first place.

[@Linkforlife199]

It is a shame Vashj'ir was so hated since it has so much remnants of the Night Elf civilization that was blasted beneath the waves during the Sundering when the Well of Eternity imploded.

[@de.k8918]

I loved Vashj'ir. The helpless and vulnerable feeling of the zone instantly hooked me.

[@dommguard]

I'm guessing you (would) love Subnautica. Most recent addition to my favourite games (base one, not Below Zero). If I buy new PC or just new SSD it installs on it immediately. Can recommend.

[@PredictiveMotion]

Vashj'ir was good, it was the first zone of its kind and set up the expansion nicely, i could also say the same about blades edge mountains but it got boring to look at since it was all brown

[@dommguard]

@@PredictiveMotion Vashj'ir overall was not good coz' of getting from 1 subzone to another. Doing quests and stuff from fine, but getting around in the WHOLE zone was bad imo. I still like it tho.

[@e.l.2734]

I find deep waters unsettling, and the zone captures the feeling well, which is interesting to say the least.

[@dommguard]

@@e.l.2734 Thalassaphobia perheps? I'm lucky, I'm not scared of it, I find it fascinating. If I was a kid/teen now, maybe I'd go for marine biologist. In Vashj'ir I can ignore the invonvinience of traveling from subzone to subzone, because I just love the atmosphere of it.

[@Tibainium]

I wouldn't even call Crystalsong Forest a ''leveling zone'', its just there to keep all the lagg from Dalaran out from the actual leveling zones. They wanted to put the tournament there but with how much lagg Dalaran caused it had to be moved to Icecrown.

[@ForsakenSanityGaming]

Well considering back then at least players weren't loaded in from Dalaran while just in the zone, had to be close enough

[@ChessJew]

7:57 Druids were the only ones who could get flying at 68. Everyone else was 70 when purchasing flying.

[@amethonys2798]

This one.

[@matt9618]

Yeah I wish he fact checked like half the stuff he says in videos. Swamp of Sorrows didn’t remove the Broken Draenei in TBC either, nor did the rivers dismount you (that’s Dustwallow)

[@krampuz1192]

Yes and thats exactly the problem with bladesedge mountains. you had to ride on your mount up and down and down an up, corpseruns we annoying af and even with the slow flying mount it was super annoying to be there. not mentioning the canons that would shoot you down if you were un aware, making your green equipted corpse lay in the middle of elite demons. you revive, get killed or shot down again and then killed :D

[@kylexile87]

@@krampuz1192 I think I spent about 10 minutes trying to level in bladesedge and then was like NOPE when I saw how long the corpse run was haha.

[@krampuz1192]

@@kylexile87 YH I remeber me as a teen trying to be smart, jumping of a cliff thinking it woukd be faster to do a corpserun insteat of actually going there. but nope. I ended up dying on a spike high above the ground, with the graveyard in the middle of a grey area of the map. I ran to my corpse but couldnt reach it so I had to run back to the ghosthealer. I even found a gryphon there but it wasnt connected to anywhere. my heartstone also was on cd so yeah bladesegde made me even log off for the rest of the day :D

[@duhg599]

11:08 “It left the player to find their own way around the world…” and I loved that! It was really engrossing for me to go exploring just to see what was out there, rather than because a quest told me to go there. In fact, most of these big, empty spaces were some of my favorites, because when I did discover something, it felt like an actual discovery, and there’s wonder and magic in that.

[@ZrodyApo]

"Thrall's balls they're everywhere !" Vash'jir was (still is) one of my favorite zones in the game with a sick storyline and funny moments

[@arforafro5523]

I kinda liked zones without many quests like Azshara, Silithus, Deadwind Pass and Swamp of Sorrows. In retrospective its clear they ran out of time to further develop those areas but when you're a noob they feel like such mysterious places and the few quests that send you there always feel like being sent to THE far away desolate zone, the place so dangerous most people avoid doing any sort of traveling to but you've got no other option. Azshara had that quest with you hunting down an elf and some demons for a guy in Orgrimmar, and it also had the Demon Hunter for the Blasted Lands quest chain. Swamp of Sorrows was also involved in the same quest chain and had the Sunken Temple quest chains for all classes. Silithus had the build up (for horde mostly) of the bug quests starting out all the way from the Barrens, 1K Needles, Feralas, Tanaris and Un'Goro before you walk into the massive hives and towering nests in Silithus and you figure out those bugs are the world threatening enemy in Kalimdor just like the Scourge on EK.

[@Razordreamz]

Azshara I really enjoyed. You could tell they had plans and then cut them short. So many interesting ruins etc.

[@duhg599]

+1 for calling out the long-term, gradual growth of the silithid threat across multiple zones. There was such a great sense of mystery, discovery, and revelation about them that I loved.

[@Ellthom]

Azshara is night and day for me pre and post Cata. Pre Cata it was one of my favourite looking zones but terrible to quest in due to lack of quests. Post Cata it was a great zone for questing due to the amount of quests but a horrible zone to look at due to the goblins messing it up :(

[@soulextracter]

The old versions had this ominous feeling of danger and the unknown in lack of better descriptors. I don't like that Blizz decided to "kiddy-fi" the old zones and make them more "friendly".

[@bisalissy3846]

I wish they would do Classic Plus and finally fix Azshara. It's one of those mystical zones that deserve more pre Cata lore. With Hyjal, the Naga and the Waterlords nearby, alongside certain nearly unknown areas like the Sea Giant's Temple and the presumed entrance to the Battleground, there's a lot of room for content ^^ I wish they would add content that sends you exploring the furbolgs and the naga, leading through long questchains over the last 10-15 levels. Kinda similar to Yehkina's Quests for Zul Farak, Sunken Temple and BRD.

[@Andrew-po8nt]

I didn't like any of the Cata revamped zones all the questlines turned into puns and memes, even the new zones questlines were cringe, and I waited forever to get Uldum and Hyjal and what I got was garbage, because WoW turned into a caracature of itself and didn't take it's lore seriously anymore.

[@sirflimflam]

16:30 At launch, Silithus had NO quests. It was a completely barren zone. There were places clearly designed to have story beats around it but there was ultimately nothing in there. I remember sometime, probably mid December-January 04-05 wandering around on my midlevel mage, admiring all the weird stuff there and wondering what Blizzard had planned. I vaguely recall the area being actually completely blocked off from Un'goro like a big stone pillar or something just on the path up and you needing to do some trickery to get around it, but my memory could be faulty there.

[@johnmarks227]

Yea, i couldn't get past that either. Forgot all about that.

[@Timmothy_plays]

Vashj'er: This zone showed us that the majority of players couldn't comprehend three dimensions, and anything slightly above or below them are invisible to them. It also showed us that even if almost all of the quests are basically ON THE GROUND! the idea that you have to swim slightly up or down to reach a mob higher or lower than you was too much trouble than just moving forward. Honestly in my opinion? looking at the history of WoW content it really shows that a large majority of the playerbase are completely against change.

[@Shikaschima]

Yeah. Yeah, the last bit is something you can see again amd again whenever anything new is introduced.

[@AsbestosMuffins]

I do remember getting absolutely lost because sometimes you had to go into a cave that was covered in coral and the entrance was completely obscured. they didn't have any good systems for finding where you needed to go back then

[@emmyloiselle9639]

Yeah, I really liked the story and the playstyle of vashjir. It was unique and different

[@AzureRoxe]

Not just that, but it's also one of the big moments where we see Blizzard say one thing before the expansion is out and do another. We were told multiple times about the Abyssal Maw Raid, only for them to scrap it and leave the entire story of the zone up in the air.

[@AzureRoxe]

@@AsbestosMuffins Addons existed back then and you could absolutely find everything with zero issues.

[@johnnyheast2615]

vashjir was the best zone for me of all sadly there never will be a zone like this :(

[@Shikaschima]

I am more heartbroken that Vashj'ir was unfinished. An entire Raidtier planned and just mot implemented, a (literally) dead zone in the west of the map, Neptulon just being abducted with literally 0 conclusion to it, the Naga we followed throughout the entire questchain never having an ending. Vashj'ir was my favorite Cataclysm zone, but they really could have made so much more with it.

[@jamesgoines4635]

I liked it a lot too but you can tell that the combat system wasn’t designed to handle it.

[@ChinnuWoW]

@@jamesgoines4635 The little combat problems were so trivial. I leveled several classes, melee and ranged, and it was fine.

[@jamesgoines4635]

@@ChinnuWoW The zone is very fun. I do wish it was received better. That water raid would have been fun.

[@19Szabolcs91]

@@jamesgoines4635 I totally agree. Btw there was that underwater fight in the Eternal Palace raid in BFA with the glowy fish that you need to grab and swim over the dark water. Great bossfight with great atmosphere.

[@violetlight1548]

Vashj'ir's actually a lot of fun as a Druid. It always amuses me how much some players just want to rush through leveling. Leveling *was* the game in Vanilla. In the vanilla + server Turtle WoW, they even give you an optional glyph to *slow down* your leveling, in return for a goodie bag every 10 levels. It's nice to just slow down and enjoy the journey. Oh, and Turtle WoW made the race track in Thousand Needles actually functional. In that you can race against other players in Goblin Pod Racers!

[@Ferreneh]

True, I took my druid there to level and it's actually pretty decent zone, although I still don't like the ambiance as a whole

[@ich3730]

It always amuses me how people try to put down the experience of others :D Why not let people play how they want instead of being condescending?

[@CrusherCanook]

Hard disagree on Gorgrond. The bonus objectives absolutely made the zone, even before the potion cheese strats. The lack of significant story lore was a bonus as you didn't have these long sequences of monologues and scripted encounters, which are fine sometimes but can burn out if done too often. It was amazing to walk in, grind a bit, and walk out with a very effecient couple of levels.

[@moneym2962]

Best zone in wod and quite possibly a top 10 zone overall imo

[@jette24]

gorgrond is one of my favs

[@29Rewind]

O

[@Tygram17]

i came down to the comments to find this after he said gorgrond. easily one of the best leveling zones

[@Dhalin]

Pre-flight, it was THE most annoying zone, bar none (other than Nagrand, which I skipped after doing it once). Constant aggro by the 10 million trash mobs (the ones that have no nameplates) that give almost no Xp and no loot is just ridiculous. They put way too much of that crap in the zone, reminded me of Valley of the Four Winds, that area with the ten thousand tiny vermin attacking you constantly. that crap got old, fast.

[@Biffbifflin]

Even with the nerf to experience gains in Gorgrond, I just love the zone for it’s atmosphere. It feels so primal and wild, way more so than any other jungle zone in the game for me. The lack of a huge zone story plays in its favor for me, as it really adds to the sandbox nature of the zone.

[@e.l.2734]

Agreed, and there's also the matter of lore quests always representing a risk to the lore itself. I don't mind that Blizzard doesn't act like every zone needs to be lore heavy.

[@TheZackofSpades]

I have fond Vanilla memories of Arathi just because that sense of “danger” from the elite mobs added excitement to my otherwise lonely level grind…it made the world feel more powerful to me back then.

[@johnmarks227]

Got my first pvp gear there outside the portal to highlands back in the day.

[@dcrauswell]

He may have been talking from an Alliance perspective; I know as Horde that there were a lot of quests there so I don't see why it would be considered a bad leveling zone for it. Never played Alliance there so there may not have been as much content.

[@tnecniw]

Honestly, even with having 0 contrent... I still love Silithus. Something about the atmosphere and feel of that zone gives me chills.

[@Shikaschima]

The Priestess of C'Thun questline remains in my mind to this day.

[@GranitWall]

Best zone ever.

[@jorenthar9186]

I liked the lore of Vashj'ir despite it being abandoned/having cut content.

[@1un4cy]

Before I clicked I was guessing Thousand Needles, but then expecting a "BUT the shimmering flats is pretty good exp even better for skinners" plus it helps get you to Gadgetzan's flight path for later

[@ChinnuWoW]

I love Thousand Needles, such a cool unique zone.

[@shmooperdoodle]

One of the best things about Classic for me was a return to grindy quests. So relaxing to just kind of zone out and kill stuff.

[@SummerFlowNightSleep]

I loved pre-cata thousand needles, the music, the difference in aesthetic, the quests werent special or original but it still felt good to me ^^" Vashjir was another one I absolutely loved, it looked so different, the music was amazing and while combat was a bit annoying when it came to melee specifically, honestly it wasn't much of an issue

[@soulsharts]

I liked Thousand Needles as well for the same reasons, and I remember seeing a shadow of a massive teetering rock at the top of a butte and wondering if there was a glitch, but then I aimed my camera up and and saw they actually programmed it that way. I thought that was cool and gave the illusion of wind very high up.

[@antonjohansson3819]

As ally the racetrack was something special to do at 30. A real big grind that got annoying after a few times but got you a ton of xp and most of them leading into chains that sent you all around the world.

[@dekaemployee]

Flying wasn't available to everyone in BC until 70. Druids could get their flight form at 68, but that was it.

[@jirkazalabak1514]

Yeah, which is why the Blade´s Edge was so fucking annoying. With a flying mount, it´s kind of OK, but without one, I thought I was going to hang myself every time I had to travel within the zone.

[@rasmusa9415]

@@jirkazalabak1514 Don’t swear

[@sarkaztik3228]

@@rasmusa9415 Shut up, you are not his parent. Plus, you're on a WoW video, you should be old enough and mature enough to swear. If you're not, you probably shouldn't be here.

[@rasmusa9415]

@@sarkaztik3228 that’s a report for you

[@matsen1153]

@@rasmusa9415 Snowflake, much?

[@TheNinjaLamb]

Very surprised Stonetalon wasn't on this list. It's super out of the way, no dungeons and has some insane walking. Even with the cata revamp it is annoying.

[@TuberoseKisser]

Stonetalon was literally boring and I couldn't stay in that zone for more than 2 minutes.

[@HassHansson]

What you mean dog? Stonetalon had tons of ok quests, some good pvp moments and wasn't that out of the way. There was a fp in the middle of the zone and you could get there pretty fast from Crossroads?

[@19Szabolcs91]

Well, every opinion is different. As for me, Stonetalon is one of my favorite zones, both versions. Vanilla mostly for the atmosphere, being on the border of foresty Kalimdor and deserty Kalimdor, as well as the Horde and Alliance areas. And the Cata version has an awesome story, engaging on both sides.

[@shadowpane70]

Ally stonetalon kinda sucks with the layout and less quests, horde have it pretty good. That is in its classic version at least

[@Lizard1582]

@@shadowpane70 yeah i played it on horde and loved it.

[@jeffwood1631]

I may be one of the only people that despised going to Dustwallow Marsh. That was one of the worst zones imo. Big and spread out meaning long corpse runs, everything is the same drab color, and some quests have absolutely horrific drop rates

[@GriffinPrather]

the worst part of dustwallow is the damned canopy of trees that would block your camera unless you had it parallel to the ground or super zoomed in

[@soulsharts]

@@GriffinPrather ha I was gonna say the same thing. I actually cursed at the screen a time or 2 because of that lol.

[@Lizard1582]

I actually dropped classic for along time after i got to this zone. but tbf, its also at the point where leveling slows down alot

[@tnvmark2173]

Also not really a big fan of the soundtrack from that place and Maraudon due to its disturbingly eerie theme.

[@Penoatle]

Dustwallow before, what, 2.3 was trash. Once they revamped it, it was okay. Better questing for either faction.

[@Dreanos]

Personally, I loved the unfinished Silithus. It gave you a mysterious vibe of how large and dangerous the world is: at the edge of the world, in a bug infested, strange orange desert, with crystals of unknown origin, alien looking bugs which you never seen before, and an ancient ruin at the end of it without any explanation of its purpose. It doesn’t neccesarily needed any quests, but you still would have questions of your own about it’s existence, and to create your own theories.

[@chouleo]

I get the the same vibes from Azshara.

[@joshmomyer1903]

Players never gave Vashj’ir a chance. Easily my favorite questing zone. I think blizzard need more stuff like this black water behemoth was an amazing fight. Fingers crossed next expansion Azhara comes back

[@Aggrofool]

I did give it 2 chances. Still hated it.

[@url4345]

The desolate vannilla zones like aszshara serve a useful function IMO. Because they have less going on, less people will go there to quest. As a result, players can be smart by going there to do proffesions, or even just farm without competition. And it varies the experience more if you run in to fewer people. I really liked playing in vannilla aszshara for these reasons.

[@glanni]

I loved vanilla Azshara! And the fact that fewer people were there also enhanced the lonely vibe. I also liked Desolace because the espionage quests with the centaurs were funny and unique, albeit repetetive after a bit of time.

[@akaroth7542]

💯 this. Vanilla Azshara was a mood

[@dontreplytome5665]

@@akaroth7542 azshara was a great place to farm mutiple things for gold. Made thousands there

[@johnmarks227]

Got a horde axe off a spider in Aszhara that shouldn't have dropped for an ally player. People used to ask me where i got it all the time.

[@Zack_Wester]

@@akaroth7542 Azshara was also a betifull zone. can´t say the same thing for desolate. and the quest there the centaurs quest felt like it was more running back and forth then actually questing and as the zone was always dead meant that you couldn´t chat whit people like you did in the Barren.

[@Marqrk]

I remember one of my friends pretended to want to give something rare to another one of my friends to troll her into going to vashjir without doing any of the intro quests, so after flying out and dying to fatigue 2-3 times and she reached the zone, she found out she couldn’t do anything cuz it was all underwater outside of those flight master islands and now it’s just a running joke that Vashjir is her favorite zone

[@AzureRoxe]

Honestly, i didn't even know Crystalsong Forest was an actual quest location. Since nothing leads you there and seemed to have no quests, i thought it was designed just to look pretty while you were in Dalaran.

[@Orgrimmar21]

Yea it was supposed to have quests, sadly it didn't make it. If you go to the zone there is a Sunreaver outpost and a Silver Covenant outpost too. Those were supposed to be quest hubs for horde and alliance players respectively but there's literally no interaction at all with the npcs there.

[@tomeekun]

Originally the Argen Crusade Tournament grounds were supposed to be in Crystalsong. That's why some of the dailies still send you to Crystalson to collect items.

[@Moonwalker117]

I think if you include Crystalsong Forest you include Moonglade, both essentially empty levelling zones, maybe the only 2 in the game

[@Ferreneh]

I remember that developers had to leave crystalsong a lot emptier than originally planned, because Dalaran was causing issues with framerates. Dalaran would have been an issue on other populated zones as well, so quiet crystalsong was the only place they could locate it.

[@riatorex8722]

@@Ferreneh I remember taking an average of 5 whole minutes just to finish loading up Dalaran. And that's pretty fast from what I know

[@thomassleziak1222]

I loved thousand needles, it was one of my favourites. I was doing only few quests in the upper area, because I farmed like 3-4 levels on centaurs, they had amazing drop chance for greens and blues above my level, so I basically farmed half of my equip for the next 7-8 levels and made tens of gold. And I loved the lower location, did all quests there everytime.

[@robertmarze6333]

In Vanilla, in Silithus, there was a mob in a cave that if she killed you, which happened a lot, you had the chance to have your corpse (If you were Alliance) to spawn in Westfall at a grave there. Talk about a corpse run.

[@EpicMarkus]

This can still happen in retail, had a guildi that died inside a raid and he ended up in sentinel hill

[@JJJBunney001]

I died recently going afk in the sea near grizzly hills and was revived in westfall too. Just seems like the place to be 😂

[@TheAckeePlant]

I loved Arathi personally, a lot of what you talk about can be solved by grouping. I played most of Classic with my dad so it was doable

[@mestrejedi7669]

Yeah, lol. Ofc it was nearly impossible soloing Stromgarde quests, they were all elite quests that you needed to group for in order to complete. Some of my fondest memories of WoW are from my experiences there.

[@TheAckeePlant]

@@mestrejedi7669 Exactly. Storming Stromgarde was so much fun. I loved all the elite little fortresses scattered about in Classic, like Stromgarde, the Dwarf fortresses in Hillsbrad or the Barrens, and of course the amazing troll city in Hinterlands.

[@jamesbaggett3655]

That's awesome.

[@willnox1]

Classic was/is just perfect for random places without much value except for experiencing the world and building character development if you’re an RPer it’s a paradise

[@ich3730]

@@willnox1 Not really? Character customization is very sparse, animations are stiff and often re-used, atleast the chat emote system works well. But saying WoW is "an RP paradise" is just so wrong xD

[@Viltreta]

The story behind Swamp of Sorrows and Azshara is actually really interesting. Originally the zones were meant to be pvp zones, with horde and alliance having hubs and objectives to complete. However the devs that were working on those zones did not like the pve focused direction the game was heading and left very early in development. This left the remaining devs with no time to flesh out the zones, so they and a few others were left in a very unfinished state. The devs that left went on to create an game called Exsteel, a mech based third person fps "mmo"....it was not very good and folded after a few years.

[@Deshavyn]

Where is that info from? Exteel appears to have been developed by the Lineage II team, who were based out of Seoul. WoW did lose about half of its developers after its launch, a mix of burnout and a forced layoff from their parent company, but most of those stayed within the area and moved on to studios in/near Irvine (Carbine, Day 1, etc.). NCSoft did poach a large number of those developers, but it was for Carbine Studios who went on to develop WildStar. I do recall John Staats (a level designer) mentioning either in his WoW diary book (a fantastic book which covers vanilla's development) or in a subsequent podcast interview he did that Azshara was essentially abandoned shortly after the exterior level designer finished it because it didn't play very well and they didn't have the resources to have another go at it. Azshara crater was supposed to be a battleground, but Staats outright mentioned in an AMA that it was abandoned in favor of Arathi Basin and never gotten back to. As for Swamp of Sorrows, the WoW Diary specifically mentions it as being finished in October 2002, over a year before the team realized they had to delay anything pvp related for after launch because of how much work was still left to do for the game. There's no mention of it being a PvP zone, and no mention of developers leaving due to not sharing in the vision of the game. There was such a case for Warcraft III though, where the developers fought over whether it should focus more on being an RTS game or an RPG game. Rob Pardo won the fight, and those pushing for the RPG side (Mike O'Brien, Patrick Wyatt, and Jeff Strain) left Blizzard and formed ArenaNet, the studio behind Guild Wars.

[@samwise1790]

@@Deshavyn a funny twist of fate that devs that left because of a lack of focus on rpg elements in favor of rts elements went on to create an entirely multiplayer focused game with more or less classic rts controls with completely irrelevant or inconsequential rpg/story elements

[@intensellylit4100]

"third person fps" lol

[@Viltreta]

@@intensellylit4100 ya looking back that is not the way to say it lul but the guy who I got the info from called it that so I just passed it on.

[@aroundthefur1210]

Thumbnail is one of my all time favorite zones to level up in, lol. I picked that over Mount Hyjal first time I played Cata because I always found the Naga to be so cool and an unexplored underwater empire is so damn cool. I really dislike the whole “let’s never do anything fun if it becomes even remotely inconvenient attitude.” Look at where that has gotten us today. If it weren’t for KZbinrs that make vids on WoW that bring up good memories than WoW almost wouldn’t even exist for me anymore. To all of my brothers and sisters of Azeroth, love you all, miss you and I hope one day we can adventure together again.

[@voidfyre5456]

Even playing as a rogue through vashj’ir my first time, id go back and do it again many times. I love that zone. Honestly that was and still is my favorite questing zone in the entire game. Now that we have the in-world quest markers it would make it much easier but once you get used to the zone and the different questing hubs it was really nice to play through

[@karstenkunneman5219]

To be honest, I really enjoyed thousand needles in classic, but I can see why it's objectively not very good

[@joywatson4812]

I always got lost there before the water

[@TommyDaGreatest]

I always enjoyed Desolace and Silithus because of their unique feeling of loneliness and desolation. Just like I enjoyed the moon-like shimmering flats. They made the zones stand out compared to the millions of lush green forests. The lushification of Desolace and the removed focus on centaurs both here and in Thousand Needles were a big nono! The centaur lore was always interesting and they haven't been touched upon for several expansions now.

[@sarkaztik3228]

Yeah, the changes to Desolace were a mistake. I don't mind the changes to 1000 Needles as much because it makes sense, but there was no real reason to touch Desolace outside of maybe the extra Naga... but those Naga should have tied in more with the Centaurs instead of the nonsense they went with. It shouldn't even be called Desolace anymore, to be honest. It's no longer all that desolate, so really isn't deserving of the same name.

[@flpaugusto8080]

Ive been subscribed and watched your vids regularly for a few years and Just realized i never stopped and said thanks or something in the comments. So, thanks for cheering me up with some great content about my favorite game. Keep up the great work Hiru

[@reduct_]

Silithus will always hold a special place in my heart, because in Classic it was basically how I hit High Warlord. My final few weeks of ranking were during Phase 6 of Classic, and the week P6 started my entire premade died. A bunch of them hit their goal ranks, and others gave up to raid Naxx. Starting in Phase 6, this stuff called Silithyst started spawning in Silithus, and it could be grabbed, walked to the horde camp, and turned in for 199 honor and some Cenarion Circle rep. The kicker was that you could drop the stuff on the ground, and other people could pick it up, probably intended for pvping for the stuff. Well, I had a good few friends who were willing to help me. Basically we would all go out, collect the silithyst, and they'd drop it for me to turn in. At one point I literally hit 40k honor per hour (that was with a group of 15 people after they had just got out of raid), whereas the highest I even hit with my premade was like 15k hph on a good BG weekend. It was very silly, and basically the entire reason I was able to clutch out that last week.

[@projectlifedog1459]

Since im a big draenei fan, Velens appearance in revamped Swamp of Sorrows made the questing totally worth of my time.

[@SIII021]

space goat

[@adamn2993]

During the original vanilla, I would swim around for hours on my rogue in a massive circle in the ocean and just mine Thorium. Just avoid the giants and i was making solid gold with little competition.

[@joyl7842]

Silithus had a lot of thorium veins, which could contain arcane crystals. Both were highly valued for crafting things such as legendary weapons. This alone had me spend a lot of time there without ever bothering with any quests. Also, from the beginning it was obvious that there was an intention for there to be a big raid.

[@lordcaedus8713]

I legitimately enjoyed Gorgrond, just the carnal, primal feel to it made you feel like anything and everything was out to eat you

[@Unleash_HP]

Classic Stonetalon should have been on this lists, because this zone was so bad. The quests were boring, low dropchance on items and you needed to constantly go to the same location multiple times with insane walk distance.

[@Frostwolf_103]

You also have to deal with the opposite faction A LOT.

[@UltimateGamerCC]

well since Cata Revamps come into play in these rankings, it likely didnt make the list because Cata Stonetalon is oh so much better.

[@LiamLefort]

Is it the orange boring mountain with the Kapitalrisk in Kalimdor ? I play on french server so I'm not sure if that's its name in english

[@Lizard1582]

its perfectly fine as horde and one of the best revamped cata zones. nah, it doesnt a deserve a spot here at all.

[@Frostwolf_103]

@@DisastrousIntentionally I have been on Alliance at Classic Firemaw months before classic TBC. The half fun comes from the community. I am level 60 warrior

[@kylexile87]

I still remember in early Silithus they had these mobs that had an ability that would launch you into the air. You could actually kite these mobs all the way to the AQ wall and have them launch you over the wall if you did it right so you could explore AQ and even get to other crazy places. I loved exploring in Vanilla wow getting behind walls and stuff.

[@billjohnson2307]

im kind of shocked 1000 needles was on here well atleast classic version. i enjoyed it better then the cata revamp which floods the zone. i dont think ive even touched 1000 needles ever since catas release and it really makes me sad cause i miss old 1000 needles

[@jonofrombc]

I feel like this is from the horde perspective, because alliance blade's edge was a phenomenal zone

[@katiesmythe4944]

Gorgrond is one of the BEST leveling zones. Particularly because the experience rewarded from quests is TWICE that of any other zone.

[@maximilianroth6435]

Damn classic Thousand Needles and Swamp of Sorrows were my favorite zones hahaha

[@trevman761]

I mean, deadwind pass deserves a mention, but that zone is still awesome aesthetically

[@johnmarks227]

The first time i went through there from duskwood i almost chit myself.

[@Jaymz007]

Most of my friends hated Vashj'ir but to me it was one of my most favorite zones of that xpack. I thought it brought an interesting, (or at least different) aspect to the game. Always wished they'd have done something more with Azshara back in vanilla. I really liked the zone.

[@hory-portier]

I played WoW until Cata came out. Desolace and Silithus were always a mandatory leveling zones for me. I didn't spend that much time there and skipped the more inefficient quests, but still this was a place where I had to level up a few times. The closer you are to level cap the more zones in the same level ranges you had to visit, so with some experience you knew how much time to spend in each zone for your leveling to be efficient. Especially in my case when I was always a solo player and some quests were intended to be made with a party.

[@sarahthewierdo]

I really liked Gorgrond. It gave so much insight to the rangari, mok'nathal, and entire incredibly dangerous and unique enemy, the botani/genesaur. It also helped Yrel's character development as you see her mature a little throughout the zone while arguing with rangari.

[@metallord999]

Vashj'ir was one of my favourite zones. The the changes between land and swimming depending on the quest areas, the story was cool and questing in 3D which people some how can do when flying but not when swimming ....., and most of all it was very different and pretty.

[@ChiliDawg97]

Your content is always so interesting - thank you. Topic idea: The history of the loot system, FFA, ML, Nb4G, /roll 100, the roll menu variations with the Disenchant function added, Greed added, etc, and perhaps external systems such as DKP, council, etc. Other ideas: notoriously difficult to get drops, such as the Bindings, Felstriker, Corehound Tooth, Baron Mount, etc.

[@FenerocityGaming]

Thousand needles was one of the first things my friend showed me almost 13 years ago. I bought the game the next day. That place will always have a special place in my heart.

[@edge6441]

I rly dont understand how Vash'jir made it to this list for the following reasons: its an unusual area to level, its beautiful, theres nothing like it in the whole game, it has this mystical underwater thing going and a multitude of quests in a vast space. Now maybe its the fact that i lvled in this zone when Cata launched so there were many ppl doing their lvling as well with me BUT the combat system wasnt an issue and it wouldnt be a thing for casters as theyd just lock on to smth and nuke it mind you this is my opinion as a melee class i played Warr bk in the day. Later on i can recall myself visiting the zone again and it felt pretty empty tbh but when i lvled there it was as if there was a big late night underwater party going on. Imho Cata was WoW's last breath of good quality content after that the whole thing started to regress and collapse.

[@vaxivop1]

Vashj'ir is probably one of my favourite leveling zones. Absolutely beautiful place.

[@trixzify]

You should see a doctor

[@swagpatriot696]

@@trixzify i like it too, maybe a doctor is a bit harsh

[@zyxwvutsrqponmlkjihgfedcba0]

We agree strongly on the look of crystal song forest. That place was beautiful. Reminded me of Secret of Mana haha

[@hookshot320]

Gorgrond was always my favorite zone to level in... :3 Granted, before WoD my favorite was Vashj'ir.

[@skyclaw36]

Gorgrond had that dope music tho!

[@matsen1153]

In TBC, you need to be level 70 to get Flying via Expert Riding; however, Druids get their Flight Form at level 68, so they get it early.

[@scwor326]

Have to remember that he didn't play WOW back then. Just acts like he does

[@brandoncastellano1858]

I recently explored behind what was behind AQ and it was super amazing! I do recommend going behind there in classic!

[@fadedtimes]

Gorgrond is still one of the fastest zones to level in current retail. Not sure if you are aware of this. Level 10-15: WoD Intro Level 15-30: Silverpine Forest Level 30-40: Hillsbrad Foothills Level 40-45: Gorgrond Level 45-48: Spires of Arak Level 48-50: Stonetalon Mountains

[@Styxer1008]

Redridge Mountains was my personal least favorite for a while because the level squish broke the new quest line. Also Vanilla Badlands was meh

[@19Szabolcs91]

Agree about Vanilla Badlands. It's actually one of my favorite Cata revamps.

[@TuberoseKisser]

Vashj'ir was perfectly fine it's just that people are so set in their ways they seen one thing different and became monkee brain and refused to accept it

[@sirflimflam]

Up until I stopped playing wow early this year, Vashj'ir was always on my leveling path for new alts. Most issues were ultimately minor at worst, and I never felt very hampered by it. Most questing took place on the sea floor, and your usual ground level kit was fully functional. It really does boggle my mind how much people hated it.

[@AirshipFury]

Man 1KN, Arathi Highlands, Crystalsong Frorest, and Silthis were some of my fave leveling areas pre-cata purely because they were barren and I didn't have to compete for mobs and resources. You could crank out a level or two in peace before heading back to the populated zones.

[@XXXmarquise]

On top of Silithus being a poor zone for leveling, the Loremaster achievement for it only has (or had) you do 19 quests in the zone to complete it. That is the actual amount post Cataclysm. But I do love Vashj'ir. It gives me chills because I have a fear of open water.

[@casseroledank]

Despite Thousand Needles being what it was, I really like leveling there. Its peaceful, I like the zone, and you can just relax for a bit. At least on PvE servers.

[@ColCoal]

I swear if Vashjir is on here.... IT WAS A GREAT INNOVATIVE ZONE! It was fine if you were ranged. It is just melee bohooing that they have to think in 41,253 degrees rather than 360.

[@Shikaschima]

Well, Vashj'ir is sadly very much dislike. I loved the zone, but yeah... players dun like change or innovation. Nor did Blizzard like the zone considering they abandoned it halfway through >.>

[@ChinnuWoW]

Melee was fine too ffs

[@TecTitan]

Wishing you happy late holidays and a bright future Hiru! been a long time fan of most of your content.

[@lingricen8077]

There was this thing unique to the Ghostlands where you’d enter it for the first time and be all nice in General chat, whilst receiving rude comments from people finishing up that zone. By the time you finish that zone, YOU are so ticked off that YOU are the one being rude to the next new guy who enters the zone. And this cycle would continue.

[@jeCktHeReal]

Subjective - Gorgrond was amazing. Even the "worst" of these zones are cool, I always liked desolace/silithus - kinda creeped me out when I was younger

[@KlockoArt]

So I actually really liked Thousand Needles and Desolace, and when Thousand Needles was flooded it annoyed me to no end because it was always one of my favorite zones in the game. The salt flats in particular were just such a nice place, i loved questing through it especially in the dead of night when everything was coated in this nice blue color. As for my personal least favorite questing zone: Classic Western Plague Lands. It's just super tedious with extremely high mob density throughout most of the zone. Normally that would be good but in classic era only a handful of classes can actually handle such intense density, which made doing the actual quests a complete drag.

[@Jyxero]

I remember I sent my Orc hunter to any tough, elite zone just to farm any skinnable mob, and by farm I mean lvl trough only kills, cause "it is the way of the hunter"... Was tedious but had it's charm Silithus made my "hunting skills" better, as I had to be careful to kite and lay traps properly, while keeping my wolf alive (From Ironforge, to separate from other hunters) The place that allured me the most was the mid section, as I felt those flying bugs will eventually come out and invade us, so I was extra cautious there Overall the empty place that is Silithus (Post Sands) made better the "Lonewofl" experience of my hunter, so I grew fond by it May this new year be successful and full of awesome surprises, and thanks for the great format in which you present these videos; I'll look forward for the top ten of foolish burial targets (or even cards that works as foolish burial, like Beatrice or Ranvier)

[@maliciousfry]

My headcannon for Silithus is that it was sectioned out to be a non-instanced max-level zone with world bosses like in everquest, but once the change to instanced content happened it took a while to get the resources and willpower to redo that part of the game.

[@skyreaperskyreaper6453]

Vash’jr is the best zone in the game. Love the ambiance, sounds, and overall vibe. Very upset we couldn’t see an ocean expansion with some kind of fantasy or alien ocean to play/ level in

[@dfuher968]

I love Vashj'ir for the same reasons as u, but I hate the questing, coz it was and sadly still is full of bugs, especially that quest with the submarine towards the end, where u basically had a 50/50 chance of whether or not the game would bug or let u complete the zone. So love the visuals, but never go there to quest, even tho some of the questlines were actually pretty fun.

[@feli_esmeralder]

One word: Outland I'm doing Loremaster, I really HATE all of these quest-zones

[@willnox1]

You ever get it?

[@feli_esmeralder]

@@willnox1 I finished Loremaster... Around the last week of February ;)

[@willnox1]

@@feli_esmeralder grats!!! Great accomplishment

[@feli_esmeralder]

@@willnox1 ty :D

[@gnami580]

I remember Gorgrond being my favorite leveling zone in WoD. Punting podlings was my favorite part of the expac.

[@Nebuhalanezar]

I loved Silithus and the Swamp of Sorrows… basically all the zones without that many quests. It made just sense that in a vast world there are areas that are not, well, full of action and stuff. I loved to explore all those zones!!

[@NightTheKittenn]

im so glad everyone has the universal opinion of "fuck silithus" I have to disagree about Vashj'ir though. I'd pick Vashj'ir over Hyjal any day.

[@paulallen9150]

I love how the tidal wave that came roaring through 1k neeedles left all the objects on the ground standing. Feels frozen in time.

[@dz0n117]

Desolace is great, it have great backstory with Princess Theradras and how centaurs were made, also is great when you play on pvp mega server because all the people are in Stv and Arathi

[@CueCN]

18:25 “A great ending to a horrible zone” got me chuckled 🤣🤣🤣

[@bingfisher]

Blizzard really needs to fix the level 1-60 experience on retail wow. Relying on boosts and max-level content does nothing for new players.

[@Shikaschima]

Yeah, they could learn from Square Enix here for sure...

[@KonLesh]

You are way to kind to Arathi Highlands. You are missing the most important reason why it was a horrible LEVELING zone. The level 60s. Arathi Highlands had some of the best drop rates for Essences which were needed to make the best protection potions. So it was always filled with 60s. On PvE this is annoying because you can't complete the amazing (IMO) Shards of Myzrael quest line. In PvP it is purely nightmarish. Level 60s just insta-kill you.

[@loiuhuiygny7guyguiygk]

Vash'jir is my favourite zone to quest in all of wow, love the story, the quests and everthing in the zone! especially the music. 3D never bothered me tbh..

[@Emisia13]

The only quest in Crystalsong Forest that everyone completed was the one that made you go through portal up to Dalaran and back down to Crystalsong Forest. 😎

[@SirKanti1]

Silithus is underappreciated in the way that it builds up anticipation for the zone. At level 15 in the Barrens you're sent to check out these weird insect things that have appeared which just have this alien feelings too them, you go to 1000's needles, Tanris, Ferlas Ungoro and keep encountering more of these bug things which all seems to be invading the land, creeping their way up the continent. So for 40 levels this quiet threat is building and building, until you venture into Silithus, and then you see the tower of bugs swarming around it right next to the only safe town in the zone. Then you see the elites wasps, the three massive hives filled with elites, and then the wall holding back the un numbered tide of bugs. You have no means of stopping this, no allys to help you in a hostile land devote of friendly life. You and Azeroth are doomed. They pulled this off again with ICC and Shadowmoon valley, but no other zone in vanilla had this threat that built up for so long.

[@19Szabolcs91]

This. This is so true, and I so felt this. Silithus felt like a culmination of all these alien bug quests from Kalimdor, and it absolutely delivered, especially with the 2 raids.

[@wowrampus]

1k Needles is one of my favorite zones in vanilla/classic. Retail version sucks tho

[@NCM89747]

Really interesting. I did not know that about crystalsong forest. Explains why dalaran was where it was in legion.

[@lisaleone2296]

I loved Vashj'ir, but I'm a caster. I can see melee types getting annoyed. As far as Silithus, it was not meant to be a leveling zone. It was meant for people to piddle around in while waiting for the raid.

[@captainshrike2627]

Damn. Never clicked So fast

[@discojoe3]

I hate it when people leave iterations of this comment.

[@iamlegion3093]

I came for the furries, I was not disappointed.

[@celticsuave]

Solid list, I agree with all the 10 picks (although i love post cata Thousand needles lmao, maybe I'm crazy).

[@bmack1708]

Just seeing those nagas infested ruins in Vashj'ir gave me shivers. That zone is gorgeous to look at, but questing in there? That was the worst. Once Silithus got stuff added in it with patch 1.8, it kinda became one of my favorite zone. I'd personally remove Desolace and Thousand Needles from the list to put Blasted lands and Deadwind Pass. Blasted Lands might have the Dark Portal and Kazzak, but otherwise it's a waste of time to go there. Theres only a handfull of quests to do and they are a pain to do at the back of locations full of enemies. Swamp of Sorrows is a pleasure to do next to that place. Deadwind Pass even less usefull than Crystalsong Forest. The place is so dead that the only advantage it has over 1.0 Silithus, is that the mobs have loot tables. At leat Silithus has giant bugs, that are more visually interesting than even ogres, grey birds and ghosts .... the upside down room doesnt count.

[@glanni]

Blasted Lands was so annoying to level in, omg. When I got my first character to around level 50, I really wanted to go to Outland soon, so I thought it was smart to just level near the dark portal. But daaaaamn, I hated the quests, they took so long and were uninteresting. I guess I was being impatient at that point though, so maybe my frustration isn't only about the quality of the quests, but actually my desire to rush through.