Classes in World of Warcraft - Setting - Questing

Questing

A large amount of World of Warcraft revolves around questing. These tasks or missions are usually available from non-player characters (NPCs). Quests usually reward the player with experience points and in-game money that the character can then spend on buying new skills and buying new equipment. Some quests offer a selection of quest rewards, allowing the player to choose what would suit his or her character best. It is also through the use of quests that much of the game's story is told, with NPCs sometimes performing a small routine once a quest is handed in. Sometimes, quests of this nature are linked together by a common theme. Where one quest ends, another starts, forming a quest chain. A unique aspect of World of Warcraft is the use of a "rested bonus" system, increasing the rate that a character can gain experience points after the player has spent time away from the game.

Quests commonly involve killing a number of creatures, gathering a certain number of resources, finding a difficult to locate object, or delivering an item from one place to another. During this process, a character may get attacked and killed by a creature, becoming a ghost at a nearby graveyard. Characters can be resurrected by other characters that have the ability, or can self-resurrect by moving from the graveyard to the place where they died. If this location is unreachable, they can use a special NPC known as a spirit healer to resurrect at the graveyard, although Blizzard has had the foresight to automatically resurrect characters in some such cases. When a character dies the items being carried degrade, requiring in-game money and a specialist NPC to repair them. Items that degrade heavily can become unusable until they are repaired.

As well as gaining in-game money, items and experience points, many quests will also increase reputation with a faction. This may be one of the two main factions of Alliance or Horde, or another non-allied faction. It can also be possible for a player to improve their character's reputation with a faction by completing further quests or killing certain types of creatures. Enhancing a character's reputation can gain access to rare items, unique abilities and profession-based patterns and plans, as well as lowering cost of items sold by NPCs belonging to that faction

In one of the updates following the release of the Burning Crusade expansion, the rate at which characters gain experience from killing monsters was increased, along with reducing the amount of experience required to gain further skills and abilities. This was seen as an attempt to encourage newcomers to the game, as they would be able to play alongside more advanced characters much earlier than before.