How do you keep your leveling experiences unique?

With the introduction of Allied Races, I’ve made my first foray into leveling in a long time. And it didn’t dawn on me until recently just how long “a long time” actually was. Unless I’m forgetting some woefully uneventful leveling experience, the last time I leveled a character from start to finish was my Mage during the leveling stream — and even that ended about a year and a half ago.

Before that? Well, technically, I leveled characters via pre-Legion invasions, but that mostly consisted of standing around and gathering stupid amounts of experience for basically no work. But just leveling from start to finish, completely on my own… I’m not sure I’ve done that since Mists. And if I have, it wasn’t memorable enough to commit to memory.

All of the above is a roundabout way of saying leveling isn’t something I do often, and part of that is because it’s, well, the same. Once you’ve experienced the same zones more than once, it’s hard to find entertainment in doing them again — at least for me, anyhow.

That said, when I have leveled new characters, I’ve almost always preferred to do it at night. I’m one of those “give me darker nights!” folks, and leveling at night has always just felt calming in some way. Of course, if I want to marathon level an Allied Race, I can’t exactly only focus on night-leveling.

Which is why I’m in love with the Inky Black Potion. Even though it’s not exactly the same as a zone’s nighttime skybox, it’s still a lot closer than some of the brightness zones have to offer, even late at night. Popping one of these and getting on my way while leveling makes things… well, it makes them different enough that I’m more content in what I’m doing.

I know that all probably sounds silly, but hey — it’s the small things, right? For me, having a dark sky above and a nighttime appearance in a zone helps change up the leveling experience enough (at least for now). Maybe one day I’ll move on to the Iron Man Challenge or something of that nature.

How about you, though? What do you do to make leveling feel unique each time you do it? How do you spice things up?