Greedy Goblin

Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Boosting friends

Spinks said " if I have a friend and want to play with them, I don't see how it's bad to help them level quickly".

Few people despise boosting as much as I do. But this time the question was not about some random idiot spamming "lol cud u boost me in RFC XD". It was about a boosting a real friend. I assume a real world friend who started playing.

However it's no different. The bottom line is: he will get loot and XP for your effort. It teaches him nothing else than leeching. If you want to play with him on low levels, start an alt. BTW boosting is not even time-effective. With the elevated quest-XP and the rested XP, playing alone give more XP than the half of the boosted XP. Why half? Because boosting needs 2 people.

Why helping a friend is bad? In general it's not bad. However boosting is a very one-sided thing it's not like you tank him Loken, he DPS Keristrassa for you. It's like you help him, then you help him, after that you help him. He is below you in "power" in WoW, he is unable to return the favors.

Wait, he can grow up an become a strong and valuable member of the guild, right? Yes he could. But instead he chooses the easy way: leeching. I never-ever asked or even accepted a boost in my whole WoW carrier. If I was in a lowbie group and one called a "big friend" to boost, I left. If there is no challenge, there is no victory. If someone finds boosting an obvious way to get levels or gear, you will have no use of him, even if the character will be leveled and geared.

The main catch in boosting is that you invest your time into his character, and there are many ways he will not pay it back. The most obvious is that he finds the game not fun and leaves. The other is finding it worth taking more seriously and leaves for a more progressed guild.

To play together you'll need common goals in the game. Chances are pretty slim that you are on the same level of interest, unless you found each other exactly because of the same level of game interest. So most probably, after you wasted countless hours of boosting into him, you won't be able to play together with him, therefore your time investment is lost.

If you want him to level faster, give him tips how to play his class. Maybe he'll grow up slower, but at the end, he'll be a skilled player, who reached his levels and gear on his own effort.

55 comments:

Anonymous said...

You... really fail to grasp the concept of friendship don't you? You really don't know what it is?

So you don't have an equal exchange of value, or time, or whatever you want to quantify. So what? Who cares?

Some people.. just like their friends and help them because they want to help them.

To place the onus of your post back on you...

Do you and your Gf record every single thing you do for each other? Cus ya know.. you better keep it equal value or even make a profit!

Does she have to have sex with you if you clean the house? Help her with supper?

If you buy her flowers does she have to give you something in return? Because, that is after all YOUR money that is going to buy her things... she is mooching those flowers off you if she doesn't do something back.

You are trying to place business values on relationships, which are much too intangible to do that with. But... it does indicate (not prove mind you, only indicate)a seeming lack of social concepts and skills in yourself.

Sadly.. you will probably either fail to understand the argument and satire in this post, or just be insulted, and thus call it a troll and delete it.

oh well.

MLW said...

Yes, because the leveling experience is great preparation for the endgame, right?

Anonymous said...

@Anonymous
You totally missed his points.

1. Boosting is inefficent vs questing with 2 people
2. Boosting encourage the reciever leech on others
3. If you planned as investment for bring a friend in game, you'll fail

In conclusion, starting an alt and play together is better

This are his arguments

Saturas said...

With boosting, the guy acquires the blues from the bosses, thats why it is good. With these he can quest faster when you have other business.
And this: "it only teaches him leeching" is simply wrong. Think about reroll, what occurs quite often.

Elthy-san said...

Slight clarification: boosting is usually less efficient than questing.

6 minutes to clear all the quests in Stockades = good.

6 hours to clear all the quests in BRD = fail.
---

Also, regarding the second point from Zetka's summary, does it count as leeching if you give it without being asked? Because if any of my friends told me they were heading to Desolace to quest, I would probably tell them to meet me at ZF, instead.

Not even M&S deserve to have to quest in Desolace. ;)

Unknown said...

Lao Tzu - "Give a Man a Fish, Feed Him For a Day. Teach a Man to Fish, Feed Him For a Lifetime"

IF you were a REAL friend to a person, you won't just spoonfeed the person. In the end he'd just end up being useless and get used to leech stuff from you. If you do teach that person how to do things, then they gain something and improve. I think that is how a REAL friend would think.

Another analogy: In school, would you let a classmate copy your homework? I won't... But what I would do is try to explain to that person how to do the homework.

Kreeegor said...

Now lets see some math - boosting is the fastest way to level from lvl 30-40. Enter scarlet monastery with lvl 80 tank/ 4 30-sh lvl chars. Gather whole Cathedral on tank(takes 4 min) kill. Net XP gain = about 15-20% of a level. Rinse,repeat. no way you could beat that with questing(too much time wasted traveling). Of course there are some idiots that want to loot and waste time - kick them.

Oh and about learning - if anyone is unable to learn to play his class in 60 minutes reasonably well - he better vote for the republicans and marry his cousin in Alabama.

And especially old Azeroth is terrible. TBC is very enjoyable leveling as is northend. So boosting in some of the old world instances is recommended (stokade,SM, ZF) to shave almost 1 day /played from your char life.

pippen1001 said...

So what if you end up in this scenario, you have played the game through over and over again, i have a 80 and like 7 lvl 70:s

I decided to level a deathknight on a completely new server, where my friend resides. So when i hit 58 i went to outland did the quests and then asked the person in question to boost me through the instances cause i "know" it gives my char more exp to kill every mob you need to kill plus the quests inside the instance,
than to just quest around in the outside world. Infact i was level 65 leaving the hellfire peninsula with the achievment from just doing all the instances related to quests, plus i got better gear so i could sweep through the quests faster. Then i just skipped 2 zones and went to nagrand. and leveled the last levels i needed for northrend.

So if you know what you do eg, what instances are worth the time running through to get the quests done, why shouldnt you be able to "hire" a person to help you clear it. Its just a business transaction and in this case it happens to be my friend noone else who guided me through, infact he hadnt done any of the outland dungeons, and cause im a dungeon freak, i have done every dungeon loads and loads of times so i know every encounter and every optimal way to go inside the dungeons, so it was rather me guiding him and he killing off the mobs in our way.

Anyway i dont see the fault in gaining xp building friendship (you know we did talk during all of the time about nonrelated stuff) or paying someone as a business transaction to gain what you want xp/blues/greens all the greens i got i´ve sold for quite the sum, so also another good part.

Aluska said...

What do you mean you were never boosted? Right now you're paying a guild on a weekly basis to run you through raids...that's boosting, too.

It doesn't seem that you've thought this through nearly enough.

We Fly Spitfires said...

I actually agree with you on this one, Gevlon. I can understand boosting as a mechanic to gain some quick levels but I utterly hate it when I'm in a group and someone decided to pull their mate in to boost everyone. It's not why I joined the group at all.

My mind boggles as to why boosting is even possible in WoW. Most games got rid of it years ago. Blizzard should really implement a mentoring system like in EQ2.

Amithrar said...

@ Eugene

Make a man a fire and he will be warm for a day, set a man on fire and he will be warm for the rest of his life

Anonymous said...

"Run me through such and such, here's a taco"

Problem solved.

Warmonkey said...

As a rule of thumb I agree that the first few times you run instances then you should try to get a group of appropriate level, this way you are rewarded with a rich game experience and sense of achievement when you kill the bosses and pick up some nice new gear.

I disagree in being religious about it. It is often very difficult to find a group for some old world instances like Sunken Temple, BRD, LBRS/UBRS so while I don't like having an overpowered team member walking us through the instance it is often a tolerable requirement in completing certain objectives.

My other boosting point is that I rolled a DK with the intention to get some tanking experience since I usually play a shaman. I joined groups that were looking for tanks in ZF, Sunken Temple, BRD, etc and this works out very nice for me as I get to have a lot of fun learning to tank and trying to keep the mobs from killing the group and the group get an overpowered and chaotic tank to take them along.

As a final point, people forget that the game is also about having fun and in many respects it can be philanthropic to put a mate out of their misery of trying to get a group together for an unpopular dungeon and donating some time to have a laugh and hang out.

Unknown said...

Ive boosted 4 friends in total, all have 2x 80s today thanks to me.

On ally side i boosted from lvl 10.

10-15: Deadmines
15-20: Stockades
20-35: Scarlet Monestary (Armory/Cathedral)
35-45: Zul'Farakk
45-58/60: Lower Black Rock Spire

Then i randomly boosted them in outlands, letting them lvl their own characters, just so they could learn how to play their new class.

On horde side i did:
8-10: Ragefire chasm
10-20: Shadowfang Keep
20-35: Scarlet Monestary (Armory/Cathedral)
35-45: Zul'Farakk
45-58/60: Lower Black Rock Spire

This is how i do it, and it doesnt take long at all, this is my toon.
http://img3.imageshack.us/img3/6682/dinglvl80.jpg

Dechion said...

When I started playing several years ago I had a RL friend in the game already. I rolled on the same server and faction so that eventually we could run together.

Never once did he boost me, preferring advice instead. I never asked for boosting, not even knowing what it was at the time, and he never offered.

Later he said I would make a better player if I did my own work. I think he was right.

What he did for me is the same I do for anyone else starting out now. Once they clear the starting zone I head over and pass them 4 non binding bags, usually 14 slotters, and send them on their way.

I learned a lot more about my character actually having to play it.

Carra said...

I agree with you but for different reasons. Why would you be doing your friend a pleasure by boosting him? Levelling your first character from 1 - 80 is some of the most fun I've had in any game. Getting boosted all the way is no fun at all.

But you probably do it because you want to raid with him or do endgame content. If you want to play with him, just level a low level alt and play together. Give him a few levelling hints. Buy him a few 16 slot bags, it'll be a huge help.

Letting him level by himself will give him a lot more pleasure in the end. So what if it takes him half a year to get to lvl 80, he'll have earned it.

Besides all that you're right that there's a big chance he won't play with you in the endgame anyway. Maybe he won't find it as much fun as you. Maybe he's just not good enough for your guild. Maybe he's too good. And in all these cases your efforts are wasted.

Carra said...

Ugh, no edit buttons.

My main problem is quite simply that people seem to think op levelling as something incredibly boring they have to through to get to the fun part. Levelling a character, especially for the first time, is tons of fun. Why would you want to take that fun away? If it's to get him to raid with you at the endgame, you're being even more selfish then our goblin.

Wooly said...

I also dislike boosting: I have even left groups while I was still leveling because someone invited a high level friend for an instance. I get seriously pissed off when I see people whining for a boost anywhere..

Yet.. I have been boosted, and I have boosted others too. I do make exceptions. So why did I do it? Usually I just felt like it. Sometimes I just like doing an old instance again, if only to demonstrate my acquired powers to myself, and for the change of scenery. It can be this simple. I do keep a rule of not boosting someones first char, unless I think he/she could use an easy introduction to the concept of instances, but alts? why the hell not. If I think the person deserves it, AND I feel like it, I'll boost him. I rarely respond to requests though, I either offer it or it's not happening. I also don't ask for boosts, but when I'm playing an alt and I get offered one, I just might take it. The main reason must always be for fun though. I don't want to make an obligatory thing out of it though (like the "you boost me, then I boost you" stuff). Sometimes this game needs you to play seriously, sometimes it's just.. a game.. a mere waste of time and money anyway..

Anonymous said...

I've cleared up to Yogg which isn't top notch but few guilds on my server have downed him, so not too shabby either.

I'm rather well off ingame, and I value my RL. Therefore, when I wanted alts, I decided to go for the RAF (3x exp) and let a friend repay their debt of a few k gold by running me through instances.

This way, I hit 60 in about 24 hours played or less.

Who profits?

1. I save myself 168 hours compared with playing each char on its own without boosting.

2. My friend who enjoys this much more than other money-making measures (which I have suggested to them) gets to pay off their debt in a manner they prefer.

3. I have two new alts, which can learn professions which can make gold, which is nice for when the Saronite ore -> Infinite dust becomes boring.

4. My guild benefits from having more professions to help out ("anyone able to make an eternal belt buckle?"), or more characters to fill spots (I've been on and unable to go already having cleared something once that week).

5. Finally, I enjoy having two new characters, letting me not only play them but understand others playing those classes.

Finally.. You learn little while getting boosted. But what you learn from 1-80 is not much more than from 60-80, and only raiding and reading up on fights will teach you how to raid anyway, gathering coyote jaw bones will not.

Thus, you should tell your friend to not be stupid, use RAF, and hire a third party booster and save everyone time, which is the only thing you can't buy for gold or $, but you can turn into either of them if you so wish.

Larísa said...

Well, being boosted isn't the best way to see an instance imo. So I agree that especially new players are much better off on their own.

But sometimes you just enjoy spending time in game together with someone. If you don¨t have any chars that will match that perticular level (like a lvl 30), rolling a new one isn't really an alternative. Boosting can then be a way to have something to do together that still is somewhat "useful", if only for one in the party.

It's very much a social thing. But yeah, I know you're not much into that Gevlon... :)

Anonymous said...

You're wrong on one major point, it's not one sided. I have a good RL friend and I helped him boost his second char for a few levels and what did I get out of it? The satisfaction of doing a favour for a friend who has it happens does me a lot of favours in work, this was a small way I could say thanks for that.

The Chilly Hollow Needlepoint Adventure said...

Boosting player levels is bad for the game. On our server the number of higher level players who don't know anything about their character is very high. They had help leveling all the way to 50-60 (or even higher, maybe boosting is why Level 80s hang out in the low level instances waiting to kill low level layers?) and are lost.

DH was playing a Tauren druid this week, headed to a city, when a Level 55 Blood Elf started following him, spitting on him, making chicken noises, farting, etc. Low level harassment in other words. DH ignored the Blood Elf, thinking he was drunk or something. They arrive at the city and an Alliance player shoots two arrows into Blood Elf who falls over dead. DH paused a second, then resurrected Blood Elf, who jumped up and said, "OH! I thought you were Alliance. Sorry." And ran away. DH wondered if Blood Elf had a guild and checked. Yes, Blood Elf Level 55 belongs to a guild. Said guild is small but has 3 Tauren, including the guild leader who plays a Tauren druid.

When we quit laughing, we started to wonder what this says about the state of WOW when Level 55s can't tell Horde from Alliance. I blame boosting myself.

*vlad* said...

Your post assumes that the friend was a noob with no game experience.

Now, I recently rolled a Shaman, and my friend rolled a Mage. Due to different play times, I got to about lv 18 soloing, and he got to lv 12.
Just to make the point clear, we both have characters at lv 80, so neither of us is a noob that will not l2p.

We happened to log on at the same time one evening, we met up, and did some Barrens quests together. We had a lot of fun playing as a team, and I helped him complete some quests that I already did, and we did some quests together that neither of us had done.

Probably in your Goblin view of the world, I wasted my time, I could have got double the xp if I had kept playing solo.

Maybe I could, but playing solo is less enjoyable than playing with my friend. I don't give a shit about the xp loss, or that I boosted him, it's not an issue, and never will be.

Running pugs, which is something you have done yourself plenty of times, is much more likely to help leeches and m&s than helping a friend.

c0ke said...

I don't get it... Wouldn't it be a good business move to stay in the group for a free boost? That's free XP for just standing around and following someone. Even if it was some group that you wanted to join for the challenge. Free is free. What's your take on this?

Anonymous said...

There are leechers yes, but as I've said before were you good when you started?

People can improve. And yes if you actually take the time to help one of your friends get better at the game they will improve. That is unless your friends online aren't really your friends.

I've found that leveling them quick is good. Why? A lot of the moves my wife is using now are only available to high level chars. The rotation I taught her doesn't work at a low level.

Why should we waste time teaching the low level obsolete stuff???????????

Anonymous said...

I don't have an opinion one way or another on the topic, as it is a game and as long as all parties evolved are enjoying themselves as they see fit then more power to them.

i would like to read more blogs about wow economics and the business and what not. that's what drew me to the site to begin with.

Unknown said...

Again every one defines value differently. Myself and several friends are boosting characters mutually right now. We want to run level 29 twinks, so we take turns speed running instances with level 80 characters (4min for a full clear of SM: Cathedral, 6min for SFK) We are getting benefit, our tight knit team will play level 29 twinks in battle grounds together. Because we have a vent server, and experience working together (we are part of that 32% that have killed XT) we have fun in a different way together.

I repeat, define value. Your definition is difficult to maintain in the face of human society, which is why economic decision making always falls apart in real world applications, much to the confusion of economists.

Anonymous said...

long time reader, first time commenter. Anyway, I can agree on some points, I never got myself boosted on my first character and I never boost first time players myself, because it must be the biggest waste of time I can imagine.

But it all changes with alts... Every alt I made got boosted in some specific dungeons, like Stockades, or Zul'farak, because the rewards for them are great.(Alot of quests, short instance) Most other instances suck though.
So, when a friend boosts an alt of me there, i return the favor of boosting an alt of him if he wants.

But I find it quite pathetic when I see people offering their boosting services in trade, mostly some lvl 60+dk, too lazy to level. And they all say they get 'rich' from boosting, which is just lulzz

dozenz said...

BTW boosting is not even time-effective. With the elevated quest-XP and the rested XP, playing alone give more XP than the half of the boosted XP. Why half? Because boosting needs 2 people.

Incorrect. With my 80 warrior I can boost someone from level 1-60 in 1-2 days (say one friday evening and a whole saturday). If the boosted does RAF than it goes by even faster (and now I have 2 60s in that same time).

Than I can boost him to the low 70s in another week or so before I would require another friend (a healer) to boost them to the upper 70s, and by then we can run 5 mans together with the rest.

This is the most efficient way to get someone to 80, and once they are running 5 mans with your group they can fine tune their playstyle and learn their class.

Learning your class by leveling is no longer required (as it once was in Vanilla where I did refuse to boost people). Especialyl since so many abilities become obsolete by the end.

It doesn't take long to learn your class/spec. When Dual-spec came out I choose protection to go along with Fury. Did I need to relevel a warrior to learn it? No...I ran a couple non-heroics, and then heroics to learn the ropes. It was messy since I was not used to it but after a few runs I became good anough to MT Ulduar for my guild.


In the end I'd rather have a skilled player at 80 within 2 weeks than a skilled 80 within 4-6 weeks. In those extra 2-4 weeks he can trade his "I did this all on my own" achievement for Heroic Epics in each slot and some raid experience.


So Gevlon, would that not be the most efficient time spent?

Grinton said...

Based on your comments for this post, what are your views on the Recruit-a-freind system?
I personally love it for being able to try out other classes and get them to a point where I can get a good feel for them and my friend gets the benifit of not being alone in whatever zone he may be questing in. The old world is now empty, so it gets kind of lonel and boring sometimes.

Anonymous said...

When two of my wife's friends wanted to start playing, we all created new toons and started playing together.

We focus on the Kill X quests and 4-manning dungeons.

Levelling is fast and my wife's friends have become dungeon junkies.

In my opinuion, if it is unlikely you will have the time or the desire to raid seriously, levelling a 3 or 4-man group in dungeons is a fun and challenging way to play.

Three manning the room before the second boss in SL at 69 (with the hunter trapping two mobs on most pulls) gave me much more statisfaction than overpowering every boss in Naxx-25.

unnamed said...

I am in agreement with Gev in terms of boosting new players through content that they really should sweat out in pug groups on their own. It is correct that there is much lost in never having to deal with the pains and pluses of pugging (or i guess even doing guild alt runs) of now "obsolete" content.

There does still remain a legitimate reason to boost though at least at certain level ranges. This situation occurs when you have a veteran player rerolling and in need of some fast levels. Combined with recruit a friend, the experience gained through fast and efficient instance boosting is as if not more time effective than 2 person group questing. Furthermore, the veteran player is not deprived of any perceived learning experience, nor are they lulled into a leech mentality. This is all assuming said "veteran" player is not M&S.

Unknown said...

I started playing WoW about 2 months before Kara was nerfed. My buddy who got me into the game helped me by giving me some starter greens/blues for the first 10-15 levels, 300 gold, and ran me through an instance every 10 levels or so. By your logic I should be a terrible leech. Instead, I ended up leading raids and bringing people through Uld10 with the guild I'm in. I'm known for being a stellar tank, and an even better tree healer. To the point where no matter which role I chose, someone complains that I'm not doing the other one anymore.

Getting boosted doesn't teach leeching. You are either a leech, or not a leech.

p.s. Hate to jump on the bandwagon with your grammar and spelling, but how is it you have a supposedly well-paying job with the way you type? No hate/judgment, I'm just curious.

Larísa said...

@David: Gevlon is Hungarian. IMO he writes brilliantly considering that he's not native English speaking. How well would you blog in let's say for instance French?

If you haven't tried to write on a daily basis in a foreigh language you have no idea what effort it takes.

Anonymous said...

Hm... I love your blog mate ^_^. But sometimes boosting is not all about the xp. Just hanging out ingame can be fun..... Yes yes boosting might be bad for that but well.. Sometimes just helping someone else ( You don't have to boost him more than once ) can help him and you. But you are still a bit right with the leeching part.. I've boosted many souls ... most of them quit when they reach level 60 + because noone boosts them then.

Rob Dejournett said...

To be goblinesque, boosting can be a profit. Recently I was asked to run SM Lib for deadmans hand by a twink, paying 100g for 5 runs. That was less than an hour of work, and fun. So.. profitable!

I'll boost people on their third alts or whatever; it can be useful if you have a dungeon like ZF where you have 5 quests in, and can do the run in an hour. That usually gives a full level of XP to the boostee, and some nice blues to help them level faster. In turn that helps the guild becauase they are that much higher to actually contributing to the guild.

Now we have two people via RAF, they are already low 60s, having played for 3 weeks. I am hoping, but i never know, that they will start to pay their debt back to the guild for all the bags, gold, etc we threw at them (they played in vanilla so they know all the old content) But they are alot of fun to have around so they are already a benefit to the guild.

I always think of it as a long term investment. Maybe the person will gquit or wowquit, but maybe that person will end up an officer and a core member.

Unknown said...

@Larisa, Ahhh that makes sense. That is why I asked. :)

Townes said...

It all depends. You make good points, but they're not universal. For example, my wife and I each have raiding 80s, and may have fun boosting each others' alts. Further, we're doing it in low-level instances where you just can't find a group. Or maybe an instance where you can, but you don't want to run it 5 times the slow way just to get the caster gear from SM or something. Or my wife has a high-level Horde priest and a low-level Alliance priest - she's not learning her class less if I boost her Alliance priest - she already knows her class well. Ditto for someone who's just moved to a new server.

And if we're playing low-level alts together, the gear upgrades from a half hour in VC or Stocks or SFK can speed leveling a bit, I'll bet. For those without guildies who want to run low-level instances, a person might learn all they want to know about their class in a couple attempts at VC or WC, where the PUG usually falls apart as somone leaves before the end, at which point being boosted through does no harm.

You're probably almost always right about the time efficiency with the new fast leveling, but for some of the more gear-dependent classes, getting a quick sword or dagger or mace here or there might make leveling a lot faster for a little while.

Anonymous said...

There are very very few people I will boost and these people will ask me if they want to be boosted (and they very very often don't).

My two last boosts: killing Ahune for two level 60 friends of mine so they can have the achievement; and being the "tank" in Darnassus and Exodar so they can steal the flame.

These two "achievements" would be very very hard for people of these levels to get without outside help.

Hatch said...

Gevlon, you went a bit too far on this one. :)

The reward for us non-sociopaths is that we get to spend time with our friend. If WoW had a "sidekicking" feature like CoH where you could play the same content at a challenging level together, that would be one thing. But in WoW, the only other option is really to wait 2 months or so for your friend to level up, without getting to spend any time playing with them. In most cases leveling a character together isn't feasible because you have other things to do in-game while they are leveling (in your case, raiding and business).

Your job as a friend isn't to "teach". I don't give a crap if they don't learn the "lesson" of not depending on others. If they are my friend, they already know that. I just get to spend time with them in-game, and that's the entire point of them joining up.

So this one flew waaaaay over your head.

Anonymous said...

There's merit to boosting, especially alts, for certain classes the don't really come into their own until later on. (Ele shammy pre-60, for example). A friend just took my shammy through BRD twice this weekend, burning through all my bonus XP, and getting me up to 50. In exchange I provided him with some nice cut red gems for his hunter alt. It worked out well for both. I also got the residue which will be used on my pally for BS which will be used to create some gear for his toons. See how this works?

It's called friends, helping each other.

Heywood Djiblomi said...

Anonymous troll is anonymous. What a start to the comments...

I understand what you're saying, Gevlon, but one question: does this "no boost" rule apply for quickly leveling/gearing an alt for raiding purposes?

hermedes said...

can u look at my blog www.pallylord.blogspot.com its new and its about raiding and gold making

Graylo said...

Ok, so here is a question. What if your friend also had a level 80, and you had a low level alt. Would you boost him if he agreed to return the favor?

Obviously there is the trust issue here since boosting takes time, but would you find this an acceptable reason to boost?

Personally, I think boosting is pretty stupid as a whole. First of all it is not a fast way to level. You could do just as well by questing efficently, and there are plenty of free and pay guides to show you how to do that.

The only other reason to take a boost is to get gear, but that takes time and there is no guarentee that what you want will drop.

In generally I find that people underestimate the time involved to boost (they forget travel time), and overestimate the benifits of boosting. That is why I don't do it for people, and I will only take one if it is extremely convenent and free.

Densu said...

I agree with you. Wow will never grow in him if he is just getting boost, which btw is really boring. The only time i buy boosts is when my tiwnk need , yes needs, a item and i dont wanna get all the xp from the whole instance.

Unknown said...

"Boosting" is a tricky word. If Spinks is running his friend through a dungeon to pick up some better gear and get a few quests done, then I don't see a problem. This will help his friend level more efficiently by being able to kill mobs faster.
If Spinks is trying to help his friend gain X number of levels (thus skipping a zone or two), then yes his friend is not learning to play his character.

Unknown said...

There are benefits to helping someone level or gear up - the good, selfish, goblinly kind. For example, in the Naxx days, our guild (and every other guild trying to clear naxx) suddenly needed two shadow priests to MC tank razuvious. Hell, I was considering selling my services.

We were stuck there, me having the only geared spriest. We had to pug a priest for several weeks. Then BAM! A brand new holy guildy dings 80, just as we're putting the group together.

I whispered him. He told me his raiding history on other toons and that he wanted a change of scenery from healing. I made the call, trusted him, felt he would fit in well with our team, and asked the officers to put together every piece of epic hit gear we could make or purchase within 15 minutes. I wasn't even going to waste time asking him if he could pay for any of it. We needed him, and PUGGING the same thing everyone else needed was getting ridiculous. We got his hit up. I told him that he was welcome to run with us all night, but that the reason he was in there was for Razuvius, and if he handled that well, he'd be on the team permanently. And he wanted to raid.

It turned out well. I explained the fight, he listened, learned the ropes on the first attempt, and we nailed it on the second attempt. And he's been raiding with us since then. And he's a damn good priest - keeps me on my toes.

And though we never asked him to do it, he made or bought every piece of beginner epics we gave him that first night and put them in the bank.

It was a pure win-win scenario.

Wavemancali said...

What if it is the person's 3rd 80 and they know all the quests and the dungeons and just want the change of playing a new class?

Also, your objection goes against much of your previous writings.

A goblin can buy his way into an "elite" raid so why not? Instead of doing all the effort of gearing up in the traditional hard core raiding team. You are doing it yourself and bragging about it.

This is no different than boosting. You see a situation where you can avoid the tedious effort of putting in 40 hours of wow and still see the content you want.

The people being boosted are getting to the level where they can participate with their friends at the 80 level without putting in the 6-8 days of grind to get there.

Same concept. It doesn't take rocket science or 6 /played days to learn how to play a class well.

Molinu said...

Low level content isn't hard, it's just time consuming. Doing "kill 10 boars" quests don't help you learn to stay out of fire or keep a tank alive through Mimiron's plasma blast. Spending several hours in LFG for a low-level instance doesn't teach much either.

Obviously, if you boost your friend through every challenging thing in the game your friend will end up severely handicapped skill-wise. But dropping into to blow through an instance and grab some quest rewards could seriously cut down on total time spent leveling.

Unknown said...

What about in this instance? http://thekingdomofernor.com/serendipity/index.php?/archives/111-Lewt-is-80!-AoE-grinded-800,000-xp-per-hour.html

His enjoyment was on hold as long as his 2s partner wasn't lvl 80. He obviously knows his class very well. So what's the issue?

Firespirit said...

Gevlon:

Look for a post on my website tomorrow about this.

Anonymous said...

The time I spend with real life friends, sometimes boosting them, is actually enjoyable for me. At times it can be more enjoyable/rewarding than pve-ing, doing arena or farming the AH.

For example, riding a level 10 alt around in a mammoth does not seem like much (Explorer title), it does when you calculate the social aspect.

I do enjoy boosting them in instances as well, while talking about random stuff and letting them die a few times. I could even reward gold, like you do for raiding, for boosting them for example (not a great example, due to giving him something already in return).

Anonymous said...

I think i've cracked the fundamental flaw in your argument. You're assuming that 'the friend' is not a mature developed person. Such a person understands the difference between getting helped with something as a one off (and lets face it, when both friends are the same level they'll be having alot more fun together) and depending on people for the rest of his wow career.

I borrowed 1k gold to get my epic flying (which i paid back 2 days later incidentally) - Have I now suddenly become dependant on my friend to support me in wow? Of course not.

When reading your blog I often find myself wondering if the posts you write are your own cynically selfish perspective on the world or if it's simply a laugh to see the hordes of 'pinko leftist' reply indiginatly to each and every post. I truly hope it's the later although, like most things, its probably a mix of the two.

Anyway, cheers for the post, I still enjoy reading your blog even if I dont hold the same views.

Reylas (Azuremyst EU)

Anonymous said...

Its my friends fault I am Alliance, they were Horde on 2 servers, and the 1st thing they did was give me 5 gold ( on that servers toon) Besides think I was rich - I had also been dragged to main cities, and had no idea how to get back. I rolled Alliance and started on my own from scratch and learn a heck of a lot more my way - a little slower, but I do think its made me a better player, and made me want to play longer. However, I have had a friend that would call me every hour wanting my high level toon to run him through stuff or help him out on a quest, they were often reasonable requests, I helped him, but then he would log onto another toon and want help on him too. He didn't have the sustained interest in the challange of his toon, or the class mechanics because he only played when it was easy for him. I think helping a friend re roll because you need that class is a little different, and not as damaging as the bad habits you will teach a new player.

Armond said...

So there's nothing wrong, to you, with boosting a friend who's on an alt he already knows how to play and just doesn't want to waste his time grinding up the levels on his third paladin or whatever?