Icecrown or Lordaeron for a casual that wants to experience leveling

Hello!

I am a returning player and a casual. As I have never leveled past Azeroth whatsoever, I want to experience Outlands and Northrend. My intention is to level at a x1speed and quest all throughout the zones, do some professions and run some dungeons! I do not plan to raid, but I don't know how long the raids are in this expansion. If they're short I might give them a try.

On one hand, I'd choose Lordaeron as the xp rate fits exactly my needs, but the increased difficulty of content scares me. I've also understood the community is a bit more hardcore on this server and that is not what I'm looking for.
On the other, on Icecrown I can choose a x1 rate, but that means it's unlikely to meet other people while leveling because everybody just does it at mach speed x7. A lot more people on the server and also regular tuning for content results in easier group finding, I think.

Which realm should I choose? Are there people on Icecrown to meet while questing?
Also, on this note I'd like to ask what things are there to be done in WotLK except from Dungeons, Raids, and gold farming?

Thanks a lot :)

If donating the minimum amount to skip queue is not an issue, I recommend playing as Alliance on Icecrown. Even though you don't plan on raiding nor doing any type of PVP, it's still best to leave these options open. For many, the best part of this expansion are the endgame contents.

I would just suggest rolling on both to see how the experience is.

With regards to the "hardcore" aspect of Lordaeron. This is rarely seen during levelling. Most, if not all of the changes are to raids, and most of those changes are to ICC. So you shouldn't worry too much about that. Now I remember questing there were some drops which were changes to a ridiculously low drop chance. But they didn't seem to be any special quest and honestly it was probably a bug in loot tables. If I can ever work out which they were I'd report it.

In any case, you will have more problems with PvP levelling (on either realm) than anything to do with the hardcore aspect of Lordaeron. I would argue that the decision really should come down to levelling 1x or 7x and whether you want to buy gear etc with real money. Lordaeron only has a very limited set of items available you can buy (mounts, bags, cosmetics etc).

r00k1t brought up a good point about purchasing gear. I would like to add that, on Icecrown, you can obtain coins by selling gold, which gives you another way to "grind" for endgame items. On Lordaeron, you will have to sell alts and then buy a character with the gear you want, which arguably is still pay to win.

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Originally Posted by dccct

r00k1t brought up a good point about purchasing gear. I would like to add that, on Icecrown, you can obtain coins by selling gold, which gives you another way to "grind" for endgame items. On Lordaeron, you will have to sell alts and then buy a character with the gear you want, which arguably is still pay to win.

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Yeah, I don't like the idea of buying characters, but there is still a slight difference. You're buying the effort of someone else. Someone still had to get to 80 and get the gear. Whereas buying the gear just magic's the items into the game.

I don't have a problem with either on their own realm mind you. Just, if you're on Lordaeron either you're buying a character, or you're doing it the old fashioned way.

To be honest, on a server that is perpetually at end game 3.3.5, you can play casual and still slowly work your way to decent gear levels without buying anything. Just, it will take longer is all. But since there's no cataclysm coming and it'll be 3.3.5 forever then it doesn't matter how slow you go.

Spare yourself the pain and play on Icecrown, aside from ganking in the most popular zones it's fine - tons of people leveling new chars, grouping up for quests like the ring of blood, doing dungeons and stuff. And the end-game is actually doable with PuGs, you don't need to tryhard with a guild.

well i can say leveling 1x on icecrown will take u ages and the simple reason is griefers... i get its pvp server but i meet 80 lvls everywhere and i have no option to turn off pvp mode so even 7x takes ages from all of the ganks u will face and btw fraction doesn't matter u could be aliance or hord 1x on icecrown is torture so i will not recommend it

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Originally Posted by Spicybee

well i can say leveling 1x on icecrown will take u ages and the simple reason is griefers... i get its pvp server but i meet 80 lvls everywhere and i have no option to turn off pvp mode so even 7x takes ages from all of the ganks u will face and btw fraction doesn't matter u could be aliance or hord 1x on icecrown is torture so i will not recommend it

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Don't listen to him, he is beyond bad. Leveling on Icecrown with x7 XP ratio takes you somewhat of 16-24 hours from 1 to 80 in total.
And victims like him like to exaggerate situation with WPvP to extreme levels.
Even on x1 ratio you should comfortably level no matter what realm, while x7 is just rocket boost to level 80.
Just don't be brain-dead while trying to level in well known PvP zones.

I've leveled 10 characters to 80 on Icecrown and am currently leveling several characters on Lordaeron, and I have to say that Lordaeron is the better experience if you want to enjoy your time. If you're concerned about ganking then it's significantly less of a problem on Lordaeron aside from the typical trouble spots like Redridge or Tarren Mill. RDF queues are about equal since on Icecrown everyone uses x7 experience rates and the level brackets are constantly fluctuating in population. Join one of the many leveling guilds and you'll have people to talk and play with.