Leveling in Forever

Forever keeps vanilla’s XP table and vanilla’s zone level bands, then changes where the XP comes from. Dungeon kill XP is gutted and dungeon quest XP is tripled, so the 2019 Classic habit of spamming Scarlet Monastery for hours is dead. The 1,000+ new quests, four new zones and nine new dungeons fill the gaps instead. This page is the map of that system; the route pages, the dungeon list and the launch-night playbook are the turn-by-turn.

The XP table: unchanged

On 2026-09-18 Wowhead published that total XP for 1 to 60 was “reduced by 26%” in Forever. They retracted it the same week: “No changes to experience values in WoW Forever compared to Classic,” and “We made a pretty massive mistake with this post.” A forum poster showed the “reduced” table was just the original 1.12 table. verified

So every level costs what it cost in Classic. What changed is the source of the XP, and that is the whole story of Forever leveling.

Dungeon XP: kills nerfed, quests buffed

A Blizzard developer, quoted in a Sun interview and reproduced by Icy Veins, Wowhead and zockify: “the amount of XP you get from killing monsters in dungeons, we brought way down. But we made the amount of XP for completing dungeon quests much, much, much higher.” Stated intent: “Repeated dungeon clearing should not be the optimal leveling route.” verified changed in Forever

Beta numbers as of the 09-17 to 09-23 builds:

Thing	Forever beta	Vanilla
XP per elite kill, Ragefire Chasm	9 to 18	roughly 100+ at level
Dungeon quest reward XP	roughly 200% higher than Classic	baseline
Six Ruins of Lordaeron quests turned in at once	almost three levels for one tester	n/a
Tirisfal + RFC + Ruins of Lordaeron quests only	one tester reached 18 on those alone	n/a

Sources: wowforeverbuilds beta XP article, quoting the Blizzard forum threads “Dungeon quest XP is super overtuned” and “Dungeon XP nerfs are WAY too much”. verified

The beta forums already show the side effect: “skip-everything runs” where groups “run each dungeon once, skip every pack they can and never come back”, plus trouble refilling a group mid-run because “a second run is an abject waste of time”. Tanks and healers asked “How are tanks/healers supposed to practice on the way to 60?” verified

Open-world pacing

Blizzard’s stated design targets from the Deep Dive panel: verified

“a single solo creature should take 10 to 15 seconds to kill”
tanks are built for “three or four enemies, not a room”
crowd control “can be the right answer when there are too many enemies for a tank to safely control at once”
“There are no flying mounts, and no level scaling in the world.”

Grinding mobs is slow on purpose. When a zone runs dry, the answer is another zone or a dungeon chain, not a mob camp.

Quest density

Blizzard’s headline is “1,000+ new quests”. verified
The 09-17 client (build 1.60.1.69876) contains 1,795 new quest records, but that includes 150 Craftsman’s Writs profession turn-ins and PvP season journey quests. Real questing content is somewhere between 1,000 and 1,795. verified
Riverglades alone: “more than 150” officially, “nearly 200” in other Blizzard presentations. verified
Old zones gain less than the marketing implies. Datamined new quest markers: Tanaris 10, Westfall 8, Stormwind 5, Elwynn 2. The “dozens of new quests in every starting zone” claim on boost sites is overstated. verified
Beta players at cap 20 hit 20 without leaving the standard route once dungeon quest payouts are added. verified

The practical read: 1 to 30 is comfortably denser than vanilla, 35 to 45 gains a whole zone (Riverglades) plus two dungeons, and the 55 to 60 stretch gains Blackmaw Hold, Shaper’s Terrace and an expanded Azshara. See New zones.

Rested XP, campfires and food

Vanilla rested rules apply until shown otherwise: rested XP accrues while logged out in an inn or city, doubles kill XP (not quest XP), caps at 1.5 levels. vanilla baseline
Legacy perk Well Rested (Adventure tree): “increase rested experience gains and raise the rested experience cap, making it especially useful for leveling alts.” Legacy points are account-wide, earned from challenges, 16-point spend cap per character at launch. verified
Other datamined Adventure-tree perks that touch leveling: Talented (earlier talent points), Thrill of Adventure, Field Guide, Frequent Flier (flight paths), Field Medicine (bandages), High Alert (stealth detection). Resourcefulness tree: Reagent Economy, Gourmand (food effects), Permanence (longer buffs), The Quick and the Dead and Reinforce (cheaper deaths), Diplomat (rep). Point costs and unlock order are not confirmed. verified for names, unverified for effects beyond Well Rested.
Campfires: “Placing a campfire creates a campsite where players can rest and gain access to useful benefits.” verified Datamined item: “Lie in the Cozy Sleeping Bag for three minutes and you earn 3% more experience for two hours.” verified
Boost sites also claim outdoor campfires grant rested XP and crafted food adds an XP bonus. Plausible given Gourmand and the sleeping bag, but no Blizzard text says it. unverified

Whether Well Rested is reachable with zero Legacy points at launch is an open question. Legacy points come from challenges, and beta progress is wiped.

Mounts and riding

Model: Blizzard is “adopting the Burning Crusade-style mount-cost approach, shifting the up-front mount cost into training and granting a mount when players learn the riding skill.” Pay the trainer, get a racial mount included. Buying a different mount is then the cheap part. verified changed in Forever
Levels: beta mount records use level 40 (60% speed) and level 60 (100%), same as vanilla. Blizzard “has not yet published a formal Forever trainer-unlock table.” verified
Cost: not announced. “The gold cost has not been announced, and any figure you see online is a guess.” Boost sites quoting 60g or 80g are guessing. Vanilla reference only: 100g total at 40, roughly 1,000g total at 60, with Honored rep and PvP rank discounts. vanilla baseline
The Cerulean Prideclaw pre-order mount still needs the riding skill: “you still have to buy the riding skill in game before you can use it.” verified
Class mounts: Warlock Felsteed at 40 and Dreadsteed at 60 (Dire Maul chain), Paladin Warhorse at 40 and Charger at 60 (Scholomance chain). vanilla baseline New: “Forsaken Paladins get their own epic mount quest at level 60” with distinct lore. verified
Skyborne racial mounts are Galestriders, 40% at 40 and 100% at 60 in the datamine. 42 new mount models datamined. verified

Travel

Six new flight points in the client: Farholde Keep, Powderfuse Port and Rog’mar (Riverglades), Summit of Eternity and Tainted Foothills (Mount Hyjal), Tidegear Coast (Dun Morogh). verified

Three new boat lines, all from Blizzard’s panel: Stormwind Harbor to Auberdine; Menethil to Southshore to Auberdine; Steamwheedle Port in Tanaris to Powderfuse Port in Riverglades. verified The Stormwind-Auberdine boat alone removes the worst Alliance travel pain in vanilla, the Menethil detour to reach Kalimdor.

Skyborne leave Zephras Isle by airship from the Valanaar Skydocks: Alliance to Dalaran in Alterac, Horde to Skywatcher Plateau in Mulgore. verified

How long does 60 take

Every hour figure published for Forever is a guess. The beta cap is 30, so nobody has data past level 30.

Source	Figure	Worth
Vanilla, first-time player	150 to 250 hours played	vanilla baseline
Vanilla, experienced quester with a route	90 to 120 hours	vanilla baseline
Classic 2019 speedrunners, full dungeon cleave groups	roughly 90 hours (sub 4 days played)	vanilla baseline, and that method no longer works
timesaver.gg	“widely estimated at around 150 hours”	unverified
lfcarry	150 hours for “a quest-led route”, “every level from 50 on costs about 4.5 hours”	unverified
gamsgo	80 to 120 first-timers, 50 to 70 experienced	unverified, implausibly low

Forever pushes the inputs both ways: more quests (faster, especially 35 to 50), same XP table (no change), dungeon kill XP gutted (removes the fastest grouped method), slower kill design (slower).

Guild-facing estimate: 100 to 150 hours played for a normal person who quests with friends and does each dungeon once. Launching 11-04, expect the guild’s first 60s in the week of 11-16 to 11-23 from the no-lifers, and the bulk of raiders at 60 around the 12-09 raid opening. That is inference from the numbers above, not a source.

Solo, duo, or pod

Nothing official. Reasoning from the confirmed rules:

Solo questing is the baseline and is where the 1,000+ new quests pay out. It is slower per kill than 2019 by design.
Duo or trio sharing every quest loses almost nothing and gains a lot of safety. Kill XP splits, quest XP does not, and quest XP is the big number. Blizzard’s 10 to 15 second solo kill target makes a partner worth more than in Classic. This is the guild’s default recommendation.
Full 5-man groups are worth one quest-cleared run per dungeon at level. Then the group goes back outside. This is the inverse of Classic 2019.
Pod composition: one tank-capable (Warrior, Prot Paladin, Feral Druid bear), one healer-capable (Priest, Druid, Shaman, Holy Paladin), pets or ranged for pulling. vanilla baseline reasoning, but Forever’s talent changes (Holy Strike at 6 for Paladin, Mangle and Lacerate for Feral) make hybrid pods more viable than in 2019.
Crowd control is a stated design requirement in dungeons again. A Mage (Polymorph), Rogue (Sap), Priest (Shackle) or Warlock (Fear, Banish) in a pod is not optional the way it became in later expansions. verified for the design statement.

Two classic trios that work: two Hunters plus a Priest (friends-and-family), or Warrior plus Priest plus anything (dungeon-ready).

Leveling spec by class

Three independent community tier lists exist, all built from beta play at cap 20 to 30. No Blizzard guidance exists. The differences between them are noise; the agreement is the signal. The “8% faster” and “12% slower” percentages that lfcarry quotes are Classic-era reference figures, not Forever measurements. unverified

Class	Consensus leveling spec	Why	Page
Hunter	Beast Mastery (BM)	Pet tanks, lowest downtime, the safest first character for a rusty returner. S tier on every list	/classes/hunter/
Warlock	Affliction (aff)	“Life Tap remains one of the strongest leveling mechanics.” S or A on every list	/classes/warlock/
Mage	Frost	Fast but punishing: “One resist. One misplaced Frost Nova… sprinting toward the graveyard”	/classes/mage/
Paladin	Retribution (ret)	Called “overtuned” and “beta’s strongest leveler”. Holy Strike at 6, seals that survive Judgment and baseline Consecration at 20 fix the dead early levels. Prot is viable as a pod tank	/classes/paladin/
Shaman	Enhancement (enh)	A tier on every list	/classes/shaman/
Druid	Feral (bear 10 to 19, cat 20+)	Improved Mark of the Wild is baseline now. B tier solo, strong pod flex	/classes/druid/
Priest	Wand Discipline early, Shadow “once fixed”	B tier solo, best pod healer	/classes/priest/
Rogue	Combat	Fine, “just no escape from bad pulls”. B to C tier	/classes/rogue/
Warrior	Fury or Arms (lists disagree)	Slowest solo, “still lacks reliable escape tools”, best pod tank. C tier solo	/classes/warrior/

Sources: wowforeverbuilds (09-19), lfcarry tier list, 2upskill tier list. verified as community lists; unverified as balance past level 30.

Guild framing: pick what you will enjoy for 100+ hours. lfcarry says it best: “Pick who plays it.” Warriors and Rogues are slower solo and that is fine if they are in a pod with a healer.

Unknown as of 2026-09-24

Riding training level and gold cost, rep discounts, and whether the free mount with the skill is racial-only.
Whether Well Rested and Frequent Flier are reachable with zero Legacy points at launch, and whether beta Legacy points survive the wipe.
Whether campfires grant rested XP and whether crafted food adds XP.
Any hours-to-60 data past level 30.
Whether the dungeon XP tuning seen in beta (9 to 18 per elite) is the launch tuning. The forum backlash was loud and no blue post has answered it.
Class balance past level 30; all tier lists are cap 20 to 30 data.