World of Warcraft is the reigning champ of MMO game,s with over 8 million subscribers worldwide. The Burning Crusade, the latest expansion upgrade for WoW, was released this week to the loyal fan base. One of the new features in the game involves the raising of the level cap from 60 to 70, and most hardcore fans estimated that it would take several months to level up to this ranking. But one French player has not only proven the experts wrong, but he accomplished the feat in record time–28 hours, according to Pro-G.
So how did he do it? According to Gullerbone, the gamer who accomplished this feat, he couldn’t have done it without the help of his fellow Warcraft friends. "Cau (the 1st European lvl 60) and I planned the experience route step by step, trying everything to make sure it was the most appropriate, the groups organization with the guild Millenium and their members. Each member rotated using a definite order to help me to grind on mobs, mostly with AE, surrounded with several guildmate healers, tanks, pullers etc…" His rapid rise up to level 70 was aided by using a technique called "tagging," in which he received experience points despite his friends actually doing the vast majority of the killing.
Gullerbone had a small band of friends initially helping him to achieve the level 70, but the numbers increased as his quest progressed. "Well at first we had only five (during the first 10 hours or so) so that 10 of the members could get to level 62. Then in the morning we were 15 in order to kill the mobs at a faster rate. Finally in the evening, everyone was involved and we could gather a 35 man raid to help me in Netherstorm with our new level 62 doing most of the job."
Did Gullerbone play the game non-stop for 28 hours? He said, "I sure did. I slept from two to 10pm on Monday (woke up two hours before TBC launch), so the physical preparation was a part of the plan."
Whether Blizzard will be taking steps to prevent gamers from advancing so fast is not clear at the moment. Now that the technique for advancing a character quickly is known, there will most likely be a small glut of level 70 characters appearing online in short order. However, some would argue that the quick process of leveling up defeats the purpose of playing the game–enjoying the experience of leveling up.
