I have a friend who started playing on my server at my request, though she'd been playing elsewhere a long time. She has been leveling toons now on my server for about a year - none are at max level. Seriously, this girl just loves to level toons.

But what I find interesting, is that she seems to have some sort of personal system to it. For instance, I'm pretty sure she won't even bother unless she has a blue bar - which has led her to create several alts to level while another builds up blue bar.

Another aspect of her leveling system, is that she just loves getting runs through dungeons. I'm not actually sure how often she does dungeons WITHOUT a high level running her through. This always makes me feel awkward, because I don't want to tell her no (since she has been my friend since high school), but I actually don't like running ANYONE through low level dungeons.

The Dungeon Run

In one run I gave her through stockades, she actually had a group of four people when I joined the party. All were of relevant level, and the reactions when my level 80 priest joined the group were all across the board. It became apparent to me that this group had no idea my friend would be bringing in a level 80. This did not matter to most of the low levels, with the exception of one.

I was accustomed to running my friend through these dungeons, so I just barelled through everything. Near the end of our run, the low level priest in the group announced politely that he was dropping group, since he was obviously not needed. My friend lawled at him, asking why he was complaining - he was getting a free run! I, however, completely understood, and I sent him a tell afterwards with an apology, telling him I didn't realize that the rest of the group did not know I would be joining them.

My Own Personal Standards

I really do believe a lot of people would not understand why this scenario upset the pugged low level priest - but I do. Here's the thing - a lot of us actually play the game because we find it fun. We enjoy the process, the difficulties, the wipes, the learning. We don't WANT someone higher level to come through and make everything easy for us. The priest in question had likely been very excited about getting a chance to heal possibly his very first dungeon. It wasn't about the in-game XP for him as much as the player experience.

On my alts, I don't run dungeons for XP. I run them to try out my skills at my class and role. I run them to see a new dungeon, to experience it for myself. I don't WANT someone to churn through it all for me - I want to do it the "right" way.

In similar fashion, I hate running low levels through dungeons. It's a chore for me, it's boring, unfun, and since it was never something I wanted when I was a low level, I feel no "debt to the community" to do it for others. I actually enjoy professions, quests, and achievements a lot more than dungeons and raids anyway.

This used to annoy the hell out of my fiance when we were leveling together. All of our other friends were higher level, and eager for us to catch up back in the BC days. They often offered to help out by running us through dungeons, or quests, or things like that. As much as I knew they were just trying to be helpful, I didn't want the help - I wanted to do it properly, with other players at my level. My fiance didn't agree, and our two clothie toons ended up going their separate ways as soon as we hit the outlands.

When WotLK came out, and all of our guildies were leveling, many of them wanted to level via dungeon, and I was so not interested. I wanted to do all the quests! I'm one of those people who actually reads them.

When I level a new toon, I try out new zones that I bypassed on my previous toons whenever possible. This was another reason I wanted to start a Horde character - I had no experience with most of the Hordie lore and quests, and really wanted to get at least a taste of them before Cataclysm hits.

Has Cataclysm changed your view of the old world? Are you taking any steps to get in any old-world old-school goodness before it all gets esploded?

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