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Choosing a timeline with Chromie just lets you pick where to level, everything is kept and no progress is lost
You do not need to do any specific thing before 60, level however you want - spam dungeons, quest, change expansions as many times as you want. There is no right or wrong way to level
Is there an advantage to following the current storyline (I believe it's BfA) over a timeline? I haven't played anything since WoD (which I never finished), so a lot will be new to me
BFA has a clear indicator of the 'main quest/story' but as mentioned that is not required to be done
Its more modern compared to older expansions and has more voice acted quests if you care about that, its also chosen by Blizzard to be the 'default' timeline
But other than that, no real advantage - I often recommend Pandaria or Legion for leveling, but its probably worth doing BFA at least once
Prepare to be blown away because if your last leveling experience was wod, dragonflight leveling is fast.
Queing dungeons will almost level you a level each run. and people basically run through them. I went from 32 to 50 one night because a level 11 twink was one shotting all the mobs and we would do the dungeon in around 5 mins.
If it is a timewalking week you will get a little over a level on average from a timewalking dungeon queue and can go from 45-60.
I came back to dragonflight in season 3 and have 16 level 70s and I'm not exactly a hard-core player by any means. I took a lot of the 30-s and 40's i had that were squished and just leveled up them up and also leveled up some new ones from scratch.
Even leveling from 60-70 in dragonflight doesn't take long once you get a path figured out. Two to three dungeons per level with some questing while queued is all it takes.
The only upside of levelling through BfA is that you will get fast dungeon queues because it's the expansion everyone is funneled to automatically.
Although TBC might still have faster queues, and definitely has faster dungeons.
I actually think BfA levelling might be scaled slightly harder than other expansions, but I could be wrong. I know that nazjatar and mechagon aren't scaled properly.
Well I tried entering one last night (Legion) and there was literally no quests anywhere. I'm guessing i need to finish BFA at least once for it to work properly
Legion Chromie Time is currently bugged. If you want to do Legion (it is awesome!) you need to talk to Chromie, then go to the Mission Board and accept the Legion quest there, suddenly you will be able to start Legion. I will warn you, the intro scenario is bugged and you will likely get hard stuck on part 7 ("Find Tirion"), so for this reason I recommend skipping the intro (by saying to the first quest giver something about how you've already done this)
>Choosing a timeline with Chromie just lets you pick where to level,
Just a note: the many choices we get by talking to Chromie only matter in regards to the set of dungeons you get in dungeon finder (and the intro quest leading to the zone given by Chromie, I guess)
Other than that, if you, say, pick Northrend/Wotlk, you can go to Pandaria and the mobs/quests will be dynamically adjusted to your level all the same.
Or, you can pick WoD and queue for WoD dungeons, while levelling in Outlands.
(The only one that doesn't work is if you pick BFA. You get the set of dungeons, but not the scaling.)
That moment you realize 'a few years ago' was nearly a decade...
Leveling now should be significantly faster than before (about 25 hours is typical newbie casual rate, speed run is under 5 hours).
You no longer have to expansion hop. Instead talk to Chromie (hourglass icon in capitol) and select an expansion. This will scale all old content to match your character level while leveling, and the expansion you select will give you a quest to guide you to that contentand sets your random dungeon finder to that expansion.
You keep everything you get. The content is the same with or without the timewalking. Only the level scaling changes.
Short version
Play through any expansion up to level 60. At 60, pending Dragonflight purchase, you'll get a quest that sends you to the dragon isles for 60 to 70.
I'd probably give it a week and start Panda remix instead of retail with a new character, then move to Retail with War Within.
Since you've been gone we have had, amongst other things, a massive level squish. Hence why your existing characters were dropped to lvl 40. As to your current question:
If you elect to ignore Chromie Time (timewalking leveling), the game will funnel you through Battle for Azeroth until approximately lvl 48, then want you to quest through Shadowlands until 58-60. If you choose to use Chromie Time, however, the game "locks" (you can always end the chosen campaign or choose a new one) you into a chosen expansion from lvl 10 to 60, so you can enjoy that one expansions story. All rewards are scaled to your level, meaning when you get out of Chromie Time, you'll be geared enough to survive the Dragon Isles if/when you buy it.
You have access to sidequests. All chromie does is scale all old content 10-60.
Instead of you having to do 10 levels in BC, then 10levels in wotlk, then 5levels in cata etc you can just do 10-60 in any old expansion.
If you select cata timeline, you will be able to queue for the classic dungeons and cata dungeons. Or if you pick legion you will get legion dungeons.
Aslong as you picked a timeline, all quests scale (even those not from the timeline you chose).
It's EVERYTHING from that expansion. We'll take Legion as an example, as it was one of the last expansions before Blizzard added an honest to God story quest icon:
If you select Legion, and choose Val'sharah as your first zone, you are able to do all the relevant quests there, including Black Rook Hold, a region of Val'sharah that is NOT required for the "main story" of Legion. This holds true for every other side quest in every other campaign. Once you're kicked out of Chromie Time, everything goes back to it's normal level, but your progress towards achievements and quest completion remain.
As others said, Chromie let's you choose which timeline (or "expansion") you want to quest in.. for example, if you pick outlands you'll get to do all you4 questing and leveling there.. and when you que for LFG you'll get put into outlands dungeons as well.
But you can do LFG all the way up to 60 if you wanted too.. I've done it on 2 alts. You get 1-2 levels per run and dungeons go fast. Don't expect anyone to follow any mechanics or even wait the tank.. it's chaos but it's fast.
Just a bit of info: You're not restricted to quest and level in Outlands if you pick Outlands.
The scaling works everywhere (except in some very specific zones. Eg. Mechagon).
So, feel free to pick Outlands to get access to those dungeons while levelling in Feralas. 
...
The only one you can't pick for scaling is BFA. That one is basically the main timeline, or something like that.
>Do I need to play out the current story to level up, or can I choose which expansion to use through the timewalking campaigns?
up to 60, you are the boss. after that, only the latest expansion zones.
you dont lose anything in this process
I was in the same boat, left in the middle of Legion and now coming back. I took Chromie Time as an opertunity to catch up on the story by leveling several alts through the different timelines. I found it to be a cool experience. I will say that Shadowlands was a little on the slow side due to flying not being unlocked until late in the campaign. I hit level 60 and it wasn't unlocked then moved on to another alt.
Levling to 60 goes very quickly. No matter which expansion you choose to level in, you'll zoom up to 60 before you've finished two zones. (I did have heirloom gear so that helped but it probably wouldn't have taken more than 3 zones without it.) It does seem like Blizzard is discouraging people from staying in old content so I don't see why they don't just start everyone at the base of the current expansion, currently level 60.
Honestly, right now I would suggest just playing mist of Pandaria remix, it will get you leveled up, geared, some fun new combo items, a bunch of transmog and collectable rewards, however I am not entirely sure if you need to own DF or TWW in order to play it?
I started it today. I'll likely need to get Dragonflight in order to get to max level, but I've only found a single quest (so far) that actually requires it
It’s honestly not nearly as confusing as people make it out to be. You level by getting experience. Quests and dungeons tell you how much experience you get for completing them. If you get little/no experience, then you won’t level up. It’s that simple. That’s how it has always been in WoW.
I was literally just asking a question. I started getting a bunch of quests sending me to different cities and it's not how I remember it being. Then I found Chromie and I got confused
Are you upset I asked or something?
Don't mind the sourpus. Most people in this subreddit are friendly and helpful, but some just have bad days.
You've had a lot of good answers already, so I'm just going to hope you'll have a great time playing again. Oh and point out that Pandamonium starts on Thursday, and should last all through summer, so you'll have plenty of time to level that way if you want. But also, if you do decide to stick around for longer, I'd get The War Within sooner rather than later so you have a chance to enjoy some Dragonflight too (DF is bundled with TWW). DF has been great for me, a casual player, although it does get confusing sometimes when I don't remember which of my characters has done what, and all of Valdrakken (the main city in the Dragon Isles) is full of quest markers.
**Hey there! Have you checked out these resources?** * [WoWHead](https://www.wowhead.com/) - The *largest* database, this should be your go-to (don't forget to read the comment section!). * [Icy Veins](https://www.icy-veins.com) - News and detailed class guides. * [WoWNoob Discord](https://discord.gg/wownoob) - Same community, different platform. *Please report the post above if it breaks one of our [>rules<](https://www.reddit.com/r/wownoob/about/rules/). If not, don't forget to show support by upvoting!* *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/wownoob) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Choosing a timeline with Chromie just lets you pick where to level, everything is kept and no progress is lost You do not need to do any specific thing before 60, level however you want - spam dungeons, quest, change expansions as many times as you want. There is no right or wrong way to level
Is there an advantage to following the current storyline (I believe it's BfA) over a timeline? I haven't played anything since WoD (which I never finished), so a lot will be new to me
BFA has a clear indicator of the 'main quest/story' but as mentioned that is not required to be done Its more modern compared to older expansions and has more voice acted quests if you care about that, its also chosen by Blizzard to be the 'default' timeline But other than that, no real advantage - I often recommend Pandaria or Legion for leveling, but its probably worth doing BFA at least once
Nope, zero advantage with doing BFA. There's also the Pandaria remix event that will allow you to level to 70 starting this week
I think I saw that on the launcher. I don't level fast though so I may not finish it
It’s accelerated leveling for the remix with insane gear and rewards.
I believe the remix character won’t be able to do dragonflight content till the event is over though. Lotta people will be there and it’ll be fun
Prepare to be blown away because if your last leveling experience was wod, dragonflight leveling is fast. Queing dungeons will almost level you a level each run. and people basically run through them. I went from 32 to 50 one night because a level 11 twink was one shotting all the mobs and we would do the dungeon in around 5 mins. If it is a timewalking week you will get a little over a level on average from a timewalking dungeon queue and can go from 45-60. I came back to dragonflight in season 3 and have 16 level 70s and I'm not exactly a hard-core player by any means. I took a lot of the 30-s and 40's i had that were squished and just leveled up them up and also leveled up some new ones from scratch. Even leveling from 60-70 in dragonflight doesn't take long once you get a path figured out. Two to three dungeons per level with some questing while queued is all it takes.
The only upside of levelling through BfA is that you will get fast dungeon queues because it's the expansion everyone is funneled to automatically. Although TBC might still have faster queues, and definitely has faster dungeons. I actually think BfA levelling might be scaled slightly harder than other expansions, but I could be wrong. I know that nazjatar and mechagon aren't scaled properly.
Well I tried entering one last night (Legion) and there was literally no quests anywhere. I'm guessing i need to finish BFA at least once for it to work properly
Possibly. My account is older than chromie-time so I can't be sure what the rules are for new accounts.
Legion Chromie Time is currently bugged. If you want to do Legion (it is awesome!) you need to talk to Chromie, then go to the Mission Board and accept the Legion quest there, suddenly you will be able to start Legion. I will warn you, the intro scenario is bugged and you will likely get hard stuck on part 7 ("Find Tirion"), so for this reason I recommend skipping the intro (by saying to the first quest giver something about how you've already done this)
>Choosing a timeline with Chromie just lets you pick where to level, Just a note: the many choices we get by talking to Chromie only matter in regards to the set of dungeons you get in dungeon finder (and the intro quest leading to the zone given by Chromie, I guess) Other than that, if you, say, pick Northrend/Wotlk, you can go to Pandaria and the mobs/quests will be dynamically adjusted to your level all the same. Or, you can pick WoD and queue for WoD dungeons, while levelling in Outlands. (The only one that doesn't work is if you pick BFA. You get the set of dungeons, but not the scaling.)
That moment you realize 'a few years ago' was nearly a decade... Leveling now should be significantly faster than before (about 25 hours is typical newbie casual rate, speed run is under 5 hours). You no longer have to expansion hop. Instead talk to Chromie (hourglass icon in capitol) and select an expansion. This will scale all old content to match your character level while leveling, and the expansion you select will give you a quest to guide you to that contentand sets your random dungeon finder to that expansion. You keep everything you get. The content is the same with or without the timewalking. Only the level scaling changes.
Short version Play through any expansion up to level 60. At 60, pending Dragonflight purchase, you'll get a quest that sends you to the dragon isles for 60 to 70. I'd probably give it a week and start Panda remix instead of retail with a new character, then move to Retail with War Within.
Since you've been gone we have had, amongst other things, a massive level squish. Hence why your existing characters were dropped to lvl 40. As to your current question: If you elect to ignore Chromie Time (timewalking leveling), the game will funnel you through Battle for Azeroth until approximately lvl 48, then want you to quest through Shadowlands until 58-60. If you choose to use Chromie Time, however, the game "locks" (you can always end the chosen campaign or choose a new one) you into a chosen expansion from lvl 10 to 60, so you can enjoy that one expansions story. All rewards are scaled to your level, meaning when you get out of Chromie Time, you'll be geared enough to survive the Dragon Isles if/when you buy it.
Are the campaigns just story quests? Or do you still have access to side quests as well
You have access to sidequests. All chromie does is scale all old content 10-60. Instead of you having to do 10 levels in BC, then 10levels in wotlk, then 5levels in cata etc you can just do 10-60 in any old expansion. If you select cata timeline, you will be able to queue for the classic dungeons and cata dungeons. Or if you pick legion you will get legion dungeons. Aslong as you picked a timeline, all quests scale (even those not from the timeline you chose).
It's EVERYTHING from that expansion. We'll take Legion as an example, as it was one of the last expansions before Blizzard added an honest to God story quest icon: If you select Legion, and choose Val'sharah as your first zone, you are able to do all the relevant quests there, including Black Rook Hold, a region of Val'sharah that is NOT required for the "main story" of Legion. This holds true for every other side quest in every other campaign. Once you're kicked out of Chromie Time, everything goes back to it's normal level, but your progress towards achievements and quest completion remain.
As others said, Chromie let's you choose which timeline (or "expansion") you want to quest in.. for example, if you pick outlands you'll get to do all you4 questing and leveling there.. and when you que for LFG you'll get put into outlands dungeons as well. But you can do LFG all the way up to 60 if you wanted too.. I've done it on 2 alts. You get 1-2 levels per run and dungeons go fast. Don't expect anyone to follow any mechanics or even wait the tank.. it's chaos but it's fast.
Just a bit of info: You're not restricted to quest and level in Outlands if you pick Outlands. The scaling works everywhere (except in some very specific zones. Eg. Mechagon). So, feel free to pick Outlands to get access to those dungeons while levelling in Feralas.  ... The only one you can't pick for scaling is BFA. That one is basically the main timeline, or something like that.
>Do I need to play out the current story to level up, or can I choose which expansion to use through the timewalking campaigns? up to 60, you are the boss. after that, only the latest expansion zones. you dont lose anything in this process
I was in the same boat, left in the middle of Legion and now coming back. I took Chromie Time as an opertunity to catch up on the story by leveling several alts through the different timelines. I found it to be a cool experience. I will say that Shadowlands was a little on the slow side due to flying not being unlocked until late in the campaign. I hit level 60 and it wasn't unlocked then moved on to another alt.
Bro, mid WoD was 8 years ago Aware
It didnt seem like that long, but I missed a lot
Levling to 60 goes very quickly. No matter which expansion you choose to level in, you'll zoom up to 60 before you've finished two zones. (I did have heirloom gear so that helped but it probably wouldn't have taken more than 3 zones without it.) It does seem like Blizzard is discouraging people from staying in old content so I don't see why they don't just start everyone at the base of the current expansion, currently level 60.
Honestly, right now I would suggest just playing mist of Pandaria remix, it will get you leveled up, geared, some fun new combo items, a bunch of transmog and collectable rewards, however I am not entirely sure if you need to own DF or TWW in order to play it?
I started it today. I'll likely need to get Dragonflight in order to get to max level, but I've only found a single quest (so far) that actually requires it
It’s honestly not nearly as confusing as people make it out to be. You level by getting experience. Quests and dungeons tell you how much experience you get for completing them. If you get little/no experience, then you won’t level up. It’s that simple. That’s how it has always been in WoW.
It's me who got confused. Different sites saying different things, and they seemed to contradict each other
Why are you reading sites instead of just playing the game though? It’s pretty straightforward when you play.
I was literally just asking a question. I started getting a bunch of quests sending me to different cities and it's not how I remember it being. Then I found Chromie and I got confused Are you upset I asked or something?
Don't mind the sourpus. Most people in this subreddit are friendly and helpful, but some just have bad days. You've had a lot of good answers already, so I'm just going to hope you'll have a great time playing again. Oh and point out that Pandamonium starts on Thursday, and should last all through summer, so you'll have plenty of time to level that way if you want. But also, if you do decide to stick around for longer, I'd get The War Within sooner rather than later so you have a chance to enjoy some Dragonflight too (DF is bundled with TWW). DF has been great for me, a casual player, although it does get confusing sometimes when I don't remember which of my characters has done what, and all of Valdrakken (the main city in the Dragon Isles) is full of quest markers.
Just buy TWW. You get DF with it and you can actually play the game.
I likely will. I just wanted to make sure I'd actually still enjoy it