One of the biggest advantages of World of Warcraft: Dragonflight? You no longer have to play Shadowlands – not even for leveling.
It’s not exactly glorious that one of the biggest selling points of the next WoW expansion “Dragonflight” is the fact that it is “at least not Shadowlands anymore.” But that’s how it has come to be. Many simply no longer want to deal with the Shadowlands and are yearning for something familiar, and the Dragon Isles should provide relief.
But a nice little thing that also comes with Dragonflight: You no longer have to play Shadowlands – not even during the leveling phase.
What will change? The “Chromie Time” will also be extended to the level range that is actually reserved for Shadowlands. That means you can now level from level 10 to 60 in any expansion you like.
Currently, at level 48, you are prompted to quest in Shadowlands – and from level 50 onward, it’s even indirectly mandatory, as quests in the rest of the world essentially no longer grant experience points.
With Dragonflight, this necessity disappears, as Chromie Time goes up to level 60. So, if you want, you can spend the range from level 50 to 60 in places like Outland, Northrend, or the Garrison on Draenor.
If you never want to see the areas of Shadowlands again, you won’t have to with the launch of Dragonflight.
The cinematic for the next WoW expansion “Dragonflight”:
What else is changing? In addition to this adjustment, leveling from level 10 to 60 will also be significantly faster. If the current values in the Dragonflight beta are not changed, leveling will take about 60% less time than before. This is primarily due to the drastic reduction in required experience in the range of level 50 to 60.
This is the normal step that typically happens at the beginning of every new expansion in World of Warcraft. Currently, leveling between levels 50 and 60 takes almost as long as leveling from 10 to 50 – after all, players should level “slow enough” to fully experience the areas of the current expansion.
With Dragonflight, you are likely to spend about the same amount of time leveling from level 10 to 70 as you currently do in Shadowlands from level 10 to 60.
Will there be another “squish”? With the launch of a new expansion, there’s always the question of whether WoW will conduct another “squish” – meaning a reduction of all character values to bring the numbers back to a smaller scale. That will not be the case. However, Blizzard wants to adjust the item level curve from level 10 to 60 before the release of Dragonflight.
Your characters will remain as strong as ever at level 60, but the item level will be significantly increased on the way from level 1 to 60, so that you won’t have huge item level jumps as you transition into the level 50+ range. This is aimed at ensuring a smoother item level increase during the leveling experience.
Will you still visit the Shadowlands while leveling with Twinks? Or will you always avoid this expansion in the future?
Also, the “Timewalking: Legion” will not return in Dragonflight – it was simply too successful.
