What have been the worst grinds in twinking history?

The 39 who got the epic fishing rod looked / sounded horrible
 
So some stuff that I have played thru personally:
World quests for shadowlands rep gear xd

No one ever ended up looting that epic BfA Blackvenom Blade. one guy did loot a level 19 regular one. https://xpoff.com/threads/scaled-lvl-19-bvblade-looted-the-race-for-epic-20-is-now-on.89709/

Farming a vanilla epic weapon(destiny, hand of ed, skullflame) from SM or ZF will be up there, if it ever drops for the people out there farming it.


Multiboxing hillsbrad for 20+ hours just to get an i23 ring during bfa was pretty bad (i28 world farming)
 
Ethereum prison key farming/opening. I still have ptsd from doing this. 4-5k keys to farm, and it takes just as long to open them all.

Weekly dungeon championing for mop reps when it was just once per week.

Grinding out a key every week to run that trove of the thunder king scenario to turn in the pages for bop rep tokens to get exalted without knowing if all the vendors were phased. That was fun! I think it took me like a year of saved keys give or take and all the rep bonuses to get it on my 19 paladin when it was current content.
 
  • The Vashj'ir belt quest line for 80s, for which @youbeezy has never forgiven me (can't blame him). It's worse than even the Thousand Needles and Eastern Plaguelands questlines for Cata 39s. These questlines are all less than 20 hours, but there's something about those 20 hours that just murder your head..
No. No I have not. I have done damn near every bullshit grind from 19 to 84 or 89 or whatever bracket it was I played with chops, sock, and a few others. Swimming through that fucking hellscape of a buggy questline is by fucking far the worst fucking bullshit grind I have done. And it was for a fucking belt. A fucking belt. Fuck. That. Shit.
 
Going to be honest, I'm not even sure that fully gearing a F2P character this xpac is the hardest grind in twinking history.

I'm assuming we're including BFA zone farming for greens in that - but most classes can get their non-TBC dungeon socket gear from BFA dungeons. They're 3 ilvls lower than the zone gear, but they have virtually the same stats anyways.

My pick for hardest twinking grind would probably be Gloomshroud Armor in MoP on a F2P.


Edit - to add on to this, everything a F2P needs this xpac is grindable with clear progress. Talasite? You need 2000 adamantite ore or so. That should take about 8-10 hours. Ghost Iron Dragonling? The mining to get Cata 75 will take about the same. Satyr? Probably double that with the ring disenchant method.

All of that is measured and your progress is concrete. But going for a clearly insane item that has an almost speculated drop chance? Oof.
 
Last edited:
Going to be honest, I'm not even sure that fully gearing a F2P character this xpac is the hardest grind in twinking history.

I'm assuming we're including BFA zone farming for greens in that - but most classes can get their non-TBC dungeon socket gear from BFA dungeons. They're 3 ilvls lower than the zone gear, but they have virtually the same stats anyways.

My pick for hardest twinking grind would probably be Gloomshroud Armor in MoP on a F2P.


Edit - to add on to this, everything a F2P needs this xpac is grindable with clear progress. Talasite? You need 2000 adamantite ore or so. That should take about 8-10 hours. Ghost Iron Dragonling? The mining to get Cata 75 will take about the same. Satyr? Probably double that with the ring disenchant method.

All of that is measured and your progress is concrete. But going for a clearly insane item that has an almost speculated drop chance? Oof.
Gloomshroud was GFd from some point in TBC until some point in WoD. MoP the best you could find was shadowfang, which could only drop off bosses.
 
Going to be honest, I'm not even sure that fully gearing a F2P character this xpac is the hardest grind in twinking history.
Gearing a F2P to "good 'nuff" and getting actual BIS is a world of difference. Consider that just rings alone will require at least one (and in most cases 2) Legion epics with socket/tert procs.

That alone is a brutal, almost unimaginable grind. Nobody is getting a F2P to BIS this xpac.
 
Legion pre-patch invasions for the Felforged set (titanforged version). I barely slept for 2 weeks. Initially, the items couldn't upgrade, but they added the war/titanforging proc later on in the pre-patch, which made it even more of an RNG-hell on a very tight schedule. I had fun at the same time though, farming with some homies etc.

Other than that, BFA BoE epics and rerolling characters endlessly for quest epics as well.

Nothing ever came close to those 2 examples. Some other grueling grinds were BC dungeon drops for my 60 rogue (shoulders would legit just never drop, like ever).

When I farmed Gnomer for 29's in WoD, I got pretty lucky. x2 Charged Gear Of Agility, x2 Charged Gear Of Stamina, same with bracers and various other kinds all farmed within 8 hour timeframe.

For non twinks I used to farm Deadman's hand for my endgame mage at the time in TBC / WotLK. Just for shits n' giggles.

There were probably other farms that I'm overlooking (like rep grinds etc. although I wasn't much into that unless it gave me an actual item in the process, like Furbolg's for instance), but nothing really seemed as grueling as the aforementioned grinds.
 
Legion pre-patch invasions for the Felforged set (titanforged version). I barely slept for 2 weeks. Initially, the items couldn't upgrade, but they added the war/titanforging proc later on in the pre-patch, which made it even more of an RNG-hell on a very tight schedule. I had fun at the same time though, farming with some homies etc.

Other than that, BFA BoE epics and rerolling characters endlessly for quest epics as well.

Nothing ever came close to those 2 examples. Some other grueling grinds were BC dungeon drops for my 60 rogue (shoulders would legit just never drop, like ever).

When I farmed Gnomer for 29's in WoD, I got pretty lucky. x2 Charged Gear Of Agility, x2 Charged Gear Of Stamina, same with bracers and various other kinds all farmed within 8 hour timeframe.

For non twinks I used to farm Deadman's hand for my endgame mage at the time in TBC / WotLK. Just for shits n' giggles.

There were probably other farms that I'm overlooking (like rep grinds etc. although I wasn't much into that unless it gave me an actual item in the process, like Furbolg's for instance), but nothing really seemed as grueling as the aforementioned grinds.
i think i rerolled 40 times to get that god damn crossbow in the dranei starting zone to proc epic, absolute nightmare of a grind that was
 
Legion pre-patch invasions for the Felforged set (titanforged version). I barely slept for 2 weeks. Initially, the items couldn't upgrade, but they added the war/titanforging proc later on in the pre-patch, which made it even more of an RNG-hell on a very tight schedule. I had fun at the same time though, farming with some homies etc.
Yea, I've been trying to think of a way to articulate the difference between time sensitive grinds and just long term grinds.

Like, the whole of SL prepatch was murder. Just brutal. I dont think I slept more than 3 hours a night for a week or so. But it was also mostly over in the space of a month. I put more hours of actual /played into my gems but that didnt feel near as bad as that initial rush in 9.0 because there was no looming "end point" (that was further exacerbated by the stress of not knowing when certain nerfs were coming)

I didnt really hit the Legion invasion grind very hard (i lucked out with warforged and called it good enough) but that one was another one I understand as brutal just from general osmosis
 
buying 810 maces off the ah with no level requirement . had to go to ah and search for at least 20 seconds
 
Gearing a F2P to "good 'nuff" and getting actual BIS is a world of difference. Consider that just rings alone will require at least one (and in most cases 2) Legion epics with socket/tert procs.

That alone is a brutal, almost unimaginable grind. Nobody is getting a F2P to BIS this xpac.
As once when I 1st joined this forum, you told me that I had a negative view of everything and I wont last long here. And I took that to heart. Tried my hardest to gear a pure f2p character with all I have got. Took me 8 Warlock toons to successfully proc 2 Epic relics for my artifact. Re-doing Azsuna, Val'sharrah, Stormhiem and High Mountain main-quest line and every quest that rewards a relic for 8 times. There are actual times where a toon never procced an epic, not even once.
And to this day, I still failed to get the cogwheels for the ghost dragon trinket. Damned thing is rotting in my warehouse lmao.
But I gotta say, the masochistic experience was quite fun and thrilling.
 
Farming any BOE loot from Blackfathom Deeps as F2P in a random group. Very low drop chances and levellers which roll NEED on something they'll use a few levels.

https://classic.wowhead.com/item=1491/ring-of-precision
Got this 2 times on my resto druid. I cried all night. (2012's)

//Farming double Shadowfangs as F2P rogue in a random group. A few rogues managed to do this without any help.
FUCK I MISS THIS. The LAST TIME I had so much fun on retail.
[doublepost=1622350785,1622341447][/doublepost]Ridiculous farms by bracket (done 'em many times!) - a (hopefully?) comprehensive list in Classic and TBC. BoEs and "common" gear not listed.

Rep Farms
19/29 - Furbolg Medicine Pouch
59 - 100% Mount (Rank 11)

Single Item Drops
29 - Deadman's Hand
49 - Blade of Eternal Darkness

Suffix Drops
29 - Emissary Cuffs, Charged Gear
39 - Arachnid Gloves, Revelosh Gloves, Revelosh Armguards
49 - Dark Iron Ring, Fire Opal Necklace, Atal'ai Gear

19s have Furbolg Medicine Pouch - a pure kill grind for rep spanning over 2000 Furbolgs for a few points of Stamina (significantly reduced in TBC). In TBC it can be done at blazing speed, but in Classic it takes double the kills and you're not one-shotting 'bolgs at 60. 29s also occasionally do this grind on a Flag Carrier. Nothing else at 19 is super serious, only WSG gear in Classic and Honor farming in TBC is a little lengthy, but easily the shortest non-random grinds on this list.

29s have DMH - a low drop from the last boss that is so good I would go as far as to say it is a requirement for every single character (all the way up to 59!), unless you are stacking up Charged Gear stats. Emissary Cuffs - a suffix drop with many rolls for all non-Clothies from a Rare spawn named Dark Iron Ambassador in Gnomeregan. Charged Gears - which are pretty awful to farm without a rez (or at least I thought it was bad before BRD Coffers), drop off the final boss in Gnomeregan. Thankfully, you can clear 5 runs in an hour in most cases for both the Cuffs and Gears together, so the pain here is the labor and 30 instance lockouts for a roll that could takes a thousand or more runs. Less well known and merely an honorable mention because it is for a mostly irrelevant class, Jimmied Handcuffs are a 50% chance off a rare spawn in Stockades that I'd estimate from my farming (3 characters) to be around 1/20.

39s have the Revelosh set of items, of which only the Gloves and Wrists are relevant. On the surface, the farm seems not that bad since it's the first boss and most of the rolls are common. The issues comes when the stats are so high that Mail wearers want to roll one of the uncommon suffixes for themselves on a piece of Cloth gear. The chance of getting perfect Monkey gloves is about 1/300. The wrists aren't nearly as bad. There's also Arachnid Gloves, which can take equally long depending on the suffix you're fishing for (RIP your time if you needed Healing). 39s, depending on your choice of class, have quite a few very irritating suffix pieces to collect. In Classic, the Charged Gear farm is a 39s grind.

49s on the other hand, are a brand new form of hell. Lets start with the easy stuff. We have the Atal'ai assortment of gear that you may or may not need. Here's every piece. Belt, Boots, Legs, Shoulders, Gloves, Chest. With varying degrees of relevance, some pieces are immediately disqualified thanks to Shoulder and Leg enchants. The grind here is also rather unique, as there are 6 mini-bosses that all have a small chance of dropping a single piece of this gear. All told, I'd say expect to spend a good chunk of time looping this instance, which can easily be solo'd 5 times an hour. Of note is that the belt has a 40% chance to roll bear, squishing down the chances of getting any other roll significantly. The chest is the rarest of the bunch, at 3% a boss (vs 7% - 11%).

Now for the real juicy 49s farm - the BRD coffers. Pick the wrong class, and you will effectively never be BiS without becoming one of the sweatiest players in the game. You see, for every OTHER bracket's gear, you can at the very least use Group Loot or Master Loot and park the twink at a safe distance. Not so with Coffers, which are a 1/200 drop chance for either the Dark Iron Ring or Fire Opal Necklace - both of which can roll nearly any suffix in the game, and have an absolutely bonkers amount of stats for their level (the necklace is always BiS for everyone). You have to first collect Relic Coffer Keys which can be bought off the Auction House (best to do this in Classic of course!), and then use 11 of them per run inside Blackrock Depths on a high level character. With TBC, the keys will become very rare and hard to find, and even getting a single one of these pieces is likely to cost hundreds to thousands of gold on keys alone.

Quite tedious and useful even at endgame, Blade of Eternal Darkness is also an annoying yet amazing drop off the final boss in Maraudon.

Interestingly, the twink doesn't actually have to enter the instance until you find the item in the case of the coffers, which is a very different approach to the other grinds. But I assure you, the math is not helpful here despite this. A single BiS piece is going to run you hundreds or thousands of runs. Once you actually spot the item you need, you now have the monumental task of assembling a group to clear all the way to the coffers for the twink, while simultaneously having to park the coffer fisher there, opening and closing the chest every few minutes so the item doesn't despawn. You must do this the entire time to avoid losing the item and must not stop opening and closing the chest until the twink arrives to pick it up from the moment you see the item in the coffer chests.

59s has so many insane grinds in Classic/TBC, particularly the grandfathered 100% Mount for reaching Rank 11 in Classic. I have never personally played the bracket, so here my knowledge wanes. I know there's plenty to do on a 59 progression-wise, since they're T0.5 and tons of TBC gem goodies. I hope a 59 twinker can fill in the gaps here.

Wrath and Beyond I barely remember, but the F2P farms were lots of fun. Tree Bark Jacket and Ring of Precision PuG farming groups in BFD, and dedicated farming teams using the F2P chatting/grouping addon. Blizzard really did something awesome when they created the F2P "Self Found" bracket style of gameplay, and I miss it so much.

Brought to you by Thirkapedia™, a Twink encyclopedia
 
Last edited:
So some stuff that I have played thru personally:
World quests for shadowlands rep gear xd

No one ever ended up looting that epic BfA Blackvenom Blade. one guy did loot a level 19 regular one. https://xpoff.com/threads/scaled-lvl-19-bvblade-looted-the-race-for-epic-20-is-now-on.89709/

Farming a vanilla epic weapon(destiny, hand of ed, skullflame) from SM or ZF will be up there, if it ever drops for the people out there farming it.


Multiboxing hillsbrad for 20+ hours just to get an i23 ring during bfa was pretty bad (i28 world farming)

Oh my god ive sinked many hours into this farm. BVB. I even boosted a rogue to have him camped at the duskwood catacombs, bvbfarm is his name. Think i ended up at 100k+ boxes before i gave up for a while. And then the squish came. And now its only for swagpoints i guess . Got a total of like 7 daggers. Every single one except bvb.
 

Users who are viewing this thread

Top