If you were to make a 'unpopular' zone leveling route list to 60, what would it be?

[Encroaching Death]

I'd probably do:

[Toxxulia Forest] to 5.

[Erud's Crossing] to 10.

[Qeynos Aqueducts] to 15.

[Najena] to 20.

[Permafrost] to 25.

[Cazic Thule] to 30.

[Surefall Glade] to 40.

[Splitpaw Lair] to 45.

[Kithicor Forest] (at night) to 50.

[Dagnor's Cauldron] to 54.

I dunno...[Burning Wood] to 60? I'm bored now

[DeathsSilkyMist]

Interesting idea. I'll make a challenging one:

Kithicor Forest 1-20 (can only play during daylight).
Runnyeye 20-35
Kithicor Forest 35-50 (can only play during nighttime).
Western Wastes 50-60

[Toxigen]

tofs

[Encroaching Death]

I was tempted to add that

[DeathsSilkyMist]

I don't think ToFS is that unpopular though. It's a more common zone for people in that level range who want to have an undead zone to play in (clerics/paladins/necros).

[Jimjam]

1-7 N Ro 7-12 nek forest. 13-36 Najena. 36-43 Sol A. 44-60 solb.

This is the path my red war has taken for most of his soloing. Not actually hit 60 yet. Any year now.

[Ghost of Starman]

Initial list looks decent, I'd replace CT (which is relatively popular for charming crocs and twinked characters mowing stuff down) with Runnyeye which seems like the less popular zone. Gorge also deserves to be on the list.

[Encroaching Death]

Initial list looks decent, I'd replace CT (which is relatively popular for charming crocs and twinked characters mowing stuff down) with Runnyeye which seems like the less popular zone.

Good switch.

Funny enough, Runnyeye was the zone I was thinking of when I created this thread. I didn't even include it in my list haha

[Trexller]

this thread got me thinkin, does EQ have a zone where you could do 1-60 without leaving the zone?

swamp of no hope?

west freeport?

obv you can go to other zones to buy stuff, bank, trade etc.

but could you grind out levels 1 thru 60 in a single zone?

[Encroaching Death]

this thread got me thinkin, does EQ have a zone where you could do 1-60 without leaving the zone?

swamp of no hope?

west freeport?

obv you can go to other zones to buy stuff, bank, trade etc.

but could you grind out levels 1 thru 60 in a single zone?

I once heard you could do 1-50 in the Qeynos Sewers.

Not sure if it's true, but it would make an interesting challenge.

[Trexller]

I once heard you could do 1-50 in the Qeynos Sewers.

Not sure if it's true, but it would make an interesting challenge.

agreed. this needs to be done.

[Jobaber]

I don't think ToFS is that unpopular though. It's a more common zone for people in that level range who want to have an undead zone to play in (clerics/paladins/necros).

its a great zone if you want to travel for like 45 minuets to find out there is 1 other person in the zone, and therefore you cannot exp in it with your group.

[Infectious]

its a great zone if you want to travel for like 45 minuets to find out there is 1 other person in the zone, and therefore you cannot exp in it with your group.

As long as you can get through the 2nd floor asap, you're fine. That 2nd floor, at that level range without twinking is pretty tough with all then enchanters stuffed together.

[eqravenprince]

Qeynos Aquaducts 1-14
Runnyeye 15-30
Dalnir 31-40
Kedge Keep 41-60

[eqravenprince]

I once heard you could do 1-50 in the Qeynos Sewers.

Not sure if it's true, but it would make an interesting challenge.

Getting to 16 would be pretty smooth. You could get to 19 on ring leaders which are occasional spawns in place of smugglers. But that's when options are limited to a level 17 and level 20 NPCS grouped together. If you have equipment or a class that can take those 2 on, then that can carry you to upper 20's. After that it gets to be an even worse grind as Vin Moltor is your only option and he shares a spawn with other mobs. Could possible level to mid 30's after a year of camping only Vin. So yeah, this is crazier than the dude that soloed a self earned dark elf warrior to level 50.

[Thugnuts]

The entire continent of Odus. A slightly deranged person could probably do 1-60 without ever leaving there.

[Trexller]

The entire continent of Odus. A slightly deranged person could probably do 1-60 without ever leaving there.

but what zone could you level 1 to 60?

[Ghost of Starman]

but what zone could you level 1 to 60?

I did some very basic research and it looks like Butcherblock is possible, regular mobs will get you to ~20, then you have a 23 dwarf NPC, then some 25 guards, then you have one named level 30 goblin with PHers, then a gap until 35 after which you have a good amount of named NPCs / guards to take you to 60.

Looks like the biggest pain will be going from the 25 guards to the 35 guards with only the named 30 goblin to bridge the gap, depending on rarity it might be a better idea to bow kite the 35 guards, neither sound pleasant.

[Trexller]

sounds like ranger would win the 1-60 same zone challenge over ench or shm lol

[Jimjam]

sounds like ranger would win the 1-60 same zone challenge over ench or shm lol

Ranger just needs a bow and a merchant selling arrows with npc that don’t cast too much nor summon. I remember on test server kiting red hill giants in east karana.

I reckon Everfrost is decent for 1-60. May need to group ice giants to start. Mammoths can take you to like 36 pretty easy or 39 if you really push greens. Giants start at 39.

I’d allow permafrost too tho as it feels an extension of the same zone.

It does feel like everfrost needed some more 30-35 mobs to round it out for transition between orcs/mammoths and giants.

[wuanahto]

[Dagnor's Cauldron] to 54.

What is even here for that?

[Ghost of Starman]

I reckon Everfrost is decent for 1-60. May need to group ice giants to start. Mammoths can take you to like 36 pretty easy or 39 if you really push greens. Giants start at 39.


Pretty good choice, you have some level 50 NPCs that would make the higher level grounds more bearable.

NK actually seems like it might be the best candidate if you can handle a level 4 mob at level 1, there seems to be an even spread of mobs, guards, and bards to take you to 60 without many gaps.

[magnetaress]

I don't think ToFS is that unpopular though. It's a more common zone for people in that level range who want to have an undead zone to play in (clerics/paladins/necros).

[Jimjam]

Will you be keying your cleric? There is xp to be had on the floor with summon bandage floor even in early 50s ;)

[magnetaress]

Will you be keying your cleric? There is xp to be had on the floor with summon bandage floor even in early 50s ;)

she was up there earlier most of it is green the tar goos i think are dark blue still, the named dark blue, i'd like to go if you need a bandage dagger we can make a trip )

[magnetaress]

hmmm unused forgottenquest zones fearrott>south ro>rathe mountains>najena>Cazic-thule>kaeasora>??? I DONT KNOW PERMA? G-d bless <3

TD is underutalized aswell especiall for the lvl 12-50 crowd

[Jimjam]

hmmm unused forgottenquest zones fearrott>south ro>rathe mountains>najena>Cazic-thule>kaeasora>??? I DONT KNOW PERMA? G-d bless <3

TD is underutalized aswell especiall for the lvl 12-50 crowd

I feel like they designed TD to be an extra zone for all subscribers and they were gonna make it so only subscribers could get on the big boats to kunark but then obv changed that idea.

[magnetaress]

They gave ppl who bought kunark lots of low lvl goodies in the form of cool stuff to do/loot in game/alternatives to old world camps was a good move

[pasi]

Lake of Ill Omen is a plausible 1-60 zone as well. Bloodgills being an overcon (i.e weak for their level) greatly aids the transition in the mid 30s. Greater Skeles/Tigers/Sarnaks -> Bloodgills + Gorelik, Chancellor, etc. The mid 50s would be a pain as the level 40 mobs have long respawns and the guards are going to be undercons. I'm not sure if that would be a better experience than North Karana or Everfrost.

[Jimjam]

Kunark city guards are insane.

[pasi]

Kunark city guards are insane.

Insane is an understatement.

You would probably have to find a way to train Deep to guards and then either zone/FD/Blur her. Then just try to kill steal the guard(s).

I'm not sure if they ever made her despawn quickly, but when I was selling demon fangs in 2013, we usually just left her up.

[ithaqua]

I did some very basic research and it looks like Butcherblock is possible, regular mobs will get you to ~20, then you have a 23 dwarf NPC, then some 25 guards, then you have one named level 30 goblin with PHers, then a gap until 35 after which you have a good amount of named NPCs / guards to take you to 60.

Looks like the biggest pain will be going from the 25 guards to the 35 guards with only the named 30 goblin to bridge the gap, depending on rarity it might be a better idea to bow kite the 35 guards, neither sound pleasant.

There’s three ~30 goblin/crazed goblin spawns on a 12 minute timer, a bit downtime between spawns but not that bad

[Swish]

1-5 The Feerott
6-9 Innothule
10-13 South Ro
14-20 Lake Rathe
20-23/24 Beholder's Maze
25-29 Ocean of Tears
30-33 Mines of Nurga
33-37 Iceclad Ocean
37-40 (or beyond) Crystal Caverns
41-45 Eastern Wastes
45-52 Western Wastes
52-57 Siren's Grotto
57-60 Cobalt Scar

Some of these zones are very fluid in terms of mob level/difficulty but for the sake of changing every so often that's a basic template of places you'll see little XP activity.

I would like to see someone do 30-60 Velious only and not quit.

[Nomand]

Me and a buddy decided to do this and went chanter/cleric. Neriak > Blackburrow < Gorge < RE < Najena < SolA < Dalnir - is the current zone and about to jump down to 3rd floor. Planning on Kaesora, Nurga, Droga (need that faction for Chardok)

[branamil]

this thread got me thinkin, does EQ have a zone where you could do 1-60 without leaving the zone?

swamp of no hope?

west freeport?

obv you can go to other zones to buy stuff, bank, trade etc.

but could you grind out levels 1 thru 60 in a single zone?

East commonlands, but pretty mind numbing.

[Trexller]

East commonlands, but pretty mind numbing.

could get to like 55-57 but then slate greens out

im wondering about paineel

[Swish]

im wondering about paineel

Paineel guards get slow after the mid-late 40s.

I did try some other NPCs after that but wasn't having a lot of luck. Neriak FQ on the other hand...

[Toxigen]

Me and a buddy decided to do this and went chanter/cleric. Neriak > Blackburrow < Gorge < RE < Najena < SolA < Dalnir - is the current zone and about to jump down to 3rd floor. Planning on Kaesora, Nurga, Droga (need that faction for Chardok)

great path

[jolanar]

I don't think I have ever seen anyone leveling in Dalnirs, at least on Blue. It has an insane risk/reward structure.

If you exclude the newbie yards which probably get used fairly often, Toxx Forest has the cat city which I believe can take you from mid teens to low 20s.

Emerald Jungle. Because why would you ever level there instead of City of Mist?

Gorge is also probably almost never used anymore, but it was very popular when they mixed up the ZEMs on green launch.

Aside from that I can't think of many other zones that don't get used to some extent. For example Permafrost, nobody levels on the goblins, but the bear pits are very popular. Or Swamp of No Hope which has 2 very popular camps, but other than those it's pretty useless. Najena is one of the better solo spots for mid 20s, but can't really support groups of people.

[Toxigen]

For example Permafrost, nobody levels on the goblins

Did 2 or 3 characters Warrens 1-22, Perma 22-32, then CT 32-43.

People are just bad. The ZEM is insane.

[Jimjam]

Permafrost is great! Especially when blocks were dropping and the xp mod was even better. The entrance mobs you can do from like 14. Great xp. Pretty safe. From there you can move deeper in, works well bottom feeding solo or as a group.

It is one of the few decent spots for shamans to use befriend animal at 29 too as there is a wolf there which is guaranteed level 24!

I always like to big up permafrost!

[jolanar]

Did 2 or 3 characters Warrens 1-22, Perma 22-32, then CT 32-43.

People are just bad. The ZEM is insane.

ha. Well nobody excluding long time veterans looking for somewhere new to level their 10th character. :p

[Nomand]

Runnyeye and SolA really blew me away, so many cool details in these zones when you fully crawl them. The Dalnir crawl we just finished was a fun experience also

[wittles]

Runnyeye and SolA really blew me away, so many cool details in these zones when you fully crawl them. The Dalnir crawl we just finished was a fun experience also

Back in classic I was a GUK guy. But in P99, I LOVE Sol A. Hands down my favorite zone either solo or with a group.

[Jimjam]

Race down
Ass / Sup.
That's the way we like to Guk!

[evilwizard]

Back in classic I was a GUK guy. But in P99, I LOVE Sol A. Hands down my favorite zone either solo or with a group.

did they ever fix the bartender area? i remember getting a ridiculous amount of trains in there around 2010ish

[Mystero]

Hey I loved Q aquaducts, Beholder Maze "or Gorge of King Xorbb" what ever you want to call it is a good sleeper zone.

[Vivitron]

How is post-revamp runnyeye, what levels is it good for?

Pre-revamp it's great through the 20s or so if you have a way to deal with Borxx, but he can ruin the zone if you don't.

[Zippit]

its a great zone if you want to travel for like 45 minuets to find out there is 1 other person in the zone, and therefore you cannot exp in it with your group.


Lolz... Iceclad portal Ring is a 2 min run from TOFS. Biggest reason TOFS doesn't have 25 people in it regularly is the Keys issue. People are generally lazy on p99 when it comes to things like this, furthermore, even if you do have keys and you die, the keys are not soulbound, thus making it even more challenging. The Zem and level range from which you can begin and end in the zone however cannot be beat (Level 24 can land spells on 1f for the most part, 28 will have 0 issues if a solo class) - and can stay there until 56 (Bats/vamps on 6b and 7)

There are zones that are easy and mundane, and there are zones that challenge your ability. TOFS definately is the latter, and if you enjoy the risk to get the better exp reward, its damn worth it.

Back to the OP question: ZEM plays a large part in my decisions on where to level toons, so I base alot of it off of that. HEre are my choices.
This assumes you arent a naked brand new player though and have adequate gear.

Paineel: 1-5 (Because its close to warrens)
Warrens: 5-24 (To 20 if you dont do the batling area and just stick to the Giant Bats past KIng room 6 min 40 sec repops - the ZEM here is godly)
Cazic Thule: 20-34 (Courtyard area to 24 then Gator Alley to 34 - 20 min repops - the ZEM here is 128%)
Tower of Frozen Shadow: 34-53 - 20 min repops - 122% ZEM
(34-36 1st floor)
(36-38 2nd floor)
(38-42 3rd floor)
(42-44 4th floor)
(44-46 5th floor)
(46-53 on Floor 6a - can go to 56 on 6b on bats/vamps though 1 hr repop.... perfect for semi afk work play)

53+ SolusekB, Velks, Hole, Kedge Keep and Permafrost Pits are your best ZEM 53+

There are a myriad of alternative zones as well, like Karnors Castle for example, but its ridden with a number of sh@tshow groups and the exp isnt all that grandiose. It is however the most populated group zone 49+.

[Ennewi]

Kedge is underrated, esp at #7 on the map, pulling from #8-11. DMF alleviates a lot of the issues; bring a necromancer along or have EB and Lev spells/items evenly distributed. Mermaids make for great pets and IIRC most of the other mobs are considered animals for druid charm.

[Gustoo]

TBH my favorite unpopular leveling places I don't really want to talk about because based on the reality of my playtime I will probably need to use the most efficient unpopular solo places so I can level without conflict when I have the time to do it, if I have any hope of playing.

So I am hoping for a popular server, so I can avoid people. /thumbsup

[Foxplay]

List needs to include

Dalnir
ToFS

[Potus]

but what zone could you level 1 to 60?

I think Ocean of Tears is possible.

[Topgunben]

There are some zones that I have been in where I have yet to see someone else leveling.

Kitty island on odus
Beholders maze
Eruds crossing

But with the change is ZEM, I have seen CZ, permafrost, runnyeye and a few other obscure zones come to life.

I think one of the original issues with live was that many zones just weren’t worth going to because risk/reward. At the same time that’s kind of what makes EQ so fun, the fact that just because something is hard to do, doesn’t mean it’s worth doing.

So for instance gorge of king xorb is just an all around shitty zone, that’s also hard to get to, that also has high hitting mobs and no good loot camps. Contrast that with estate of unrest, where every mob is like a piece of paper and exp is damn good.

[Zuranthium]

this thread got me thinkin, does EQ have a zone where you could do 1-60 without leaving the zone?

10 possible zones that I know of, approximately ordered in terms of viability (least viable = certain levels will be big wastes of time with the NPC's available, or outright impossible for some classes when solo and untwinked):

East Freeport
South Qeynos
Lake of Ill Omen
Butcherblock
Swamp of No Hope
Greater Faydark
Everfrost
Paineel
West Karana
West Freeport (totally unrealistic; from level 54+ the only blue cons are the Sir Lucan Dlere spawns 2x every 7 hours, LOL).

[Imago]

10 possible zones that I know of, approximately ordered in terms of viability (least viable = certain levels will be big wastes of time with the NPC's available, or outright impossible for some classes when solo and untwinked):

West Freeport (totally unrealistic; from level 54+ the only blue cons are the Sir Lucan Dlere spawns 2x every 7 hours, LOL).

Eh. Kroon and Inofus, as well as a few randos inside the militia house, can take you past 54. I've done it on a Bard, though it was like pulling teeth at the time. Totally solo, was my first toon on the box during 40% hybrid penalty.


Butcherblock

Completely untrue. Nyzil Bloodforge is Blue to 59 and doesn't have much HP. Hardest part is splitting him from his guards. Can be root rotted by a ranger, though arrows will get expensive if you don't have a Tolans bracer. Put 30% of 59 into that fucker back when 40% hybrid penalty was in play, and have never been able to fix my dwarf factions.

Unpopular zone leveling route to 60 lets go:

Steamfont Mtns 1-15
Gorge of King Xorbb 15-20
Dagnors Cauldron 20-25 (think of all the aqua goblins!)
Sol A 25-35
Great Divide 35-45
Cobalt Scar 45-50
Sol B 50-55
Plane of Mischief 55-60

[Zuranthium]

Kroon and Inofus, as well as a few randos inside the militia house, can take you past 54. I've done it on a Bard, though it was like pulling teeth at the time.

They don't give full exp at 54 though, no? So yeah you can exp on them, but it's very slow.

Completely untrue.

I'm not sure what you mean? I didn't talk about Butcherblock for the high levels. The bottleneck for that zone is some of the lower levels.

[jolanar]

They don't give full exp at 54 though, no? So yeah you can exp on them, but it's very slow.

Level 40 mobs are blue through 54, and turn green once you hit 55.

[Jimjam]

The first level a mob turns green they still seem to be reasonable xp.

[Fammaden]

Lots of people have used Gorge to level since they increased the Zem there. Its really fast. Not like a pick up grouping zone of course, but I solo leveled there a bit myself. You can single pull minos and mudmen near the EK zone side all day, and the occasional eye they aren't even all that hard.

[magnetaress]

whyy don't they make exp the same across all zones ? including dungeons

honestly dungeones shoiuld be less exp too - u go into dungeons for loot and poopsocking! not casual exps

[Shortin]

Back when I played I was thinking it might be possible to do 1-60 without leaving GFay. Don't remember if I figured out if it would be doable or not.