Did it suddenly get easier?

As I am part of a level 25 World of Warcraft Guild, I was able to buy two or three handy dandy BoA's, add another couple from the Honour Points system and I have a baby shaman running the dungeons, casting 'heals' where tanks, noobs and mages fear to tread.

Well, not exactly ' fear to tread', but surely splashing the healing mana on all who need it except for those who have decidely set about to piss me off.

My first character in World of Warcraft a few years ago, levelled up through questing, more questing and then some farming, and questing. Sometimes, the only way to be able to do questing was to find another area at your level, hop over there, log into a hearthstone home, and get on with yet more questing.

My Mage, I recall, spent level 56 to 58 farming in Western Plaguelands, then off to Honour Hold, failed, returned back to Eastern Plaguelands to farm another level or two.

Level 80 was an achievement of merit. We know the attrition for levelling characters is high, so to get to Dalaran at about 78, use the portal to get in for the first time was a genuine feel good moment.

A few months ago, I decided to run a character up using dungeons, and questing, it was easier, a lot easier. My partner watched and decided to create a human mage, drop a few 'looms' onto her and see if she could level up only using dungeons once she got past level 20. She reached level 20 in the first playing day, about 12 hours, now a week later she is well into level 70 killing critters with 'Arcane Blast', some Missiles and 'Presence of Mind', with a sprinkling of other spells so the keyboard doesnt get jammed up through lack of use.

I, on the other hand, am slowly raising a Draenei Shaman through the ranks and am sitting at level 52 with a 'played time' of 2 Days, 10 Hours and 7 Minutes. Not a record, but not slacking either. My biggest boost comes from realising that running Random Dungeons means that for the better percentage of my runs, they are going to be in dungeons that give me anything but the best xp (Experience Points), so I select only the top dungeons to run in. I don't get the bag of goodies, nor do I get any gold as reward, I do get huge amounts of bonus XP with each mob kill, so that so far, each dungeon run has netted me another level up in Blizzard's World of Warcraft.

Has it got easier, hell yes, way easier. Dumbed down dungeons, bloated xp returns, enhanced xp for BoA gear, extra XP and Rep for being in a good guild all combine to rocket me through the levels. Is it more fun, well, its different, there are no puzzles to solve, so no sence of accompliment. But if the object is to get the character to 85 and then teach it a craft, then yes, it is so easy.