World of Warcraft can be purchased a number of different ways, and some can save money depending on if your child is likely to stick with the game long enough to reach the higher levels. The game and expansion packs can be purchased from the Blizzard store, Amazon, Wal-Mart, Best Buy and just about any other place that sells PC game software. The table below summarizes the purchasing options. The links in the table below are to the Blizzard store, but they are not always the cheapest.
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Version |
Description |
Cost (USD) |
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The most basic package and the cheapest way to start. Good for the first 60 (of 80) levels and includes the first month of play (worth $15). However, two of the races are not available: the Blood Elves (Horde faction) and the Draenei (Alliance). The class of Death Knight is not available. (It is only available a level 55 or greater in any case.) Also, the Jewelcrafting and Inscription professions are not available. |
$17-20 |
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If the Original World of Warcraft was purchased standalone, this is the next logical purchase. Entirely new areas are added to the world along with new quests , which players can start around level 58. The level cap is raised to 70. Two new character classes, the Blood Elves (Horde faction) and the Draenei (Alliance), are added. The Jewelcrafting profession is available, but the Inscription profession is not. |
$29-30 |
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Includes the original World of Warcraft and The Burning Crusade expansion pack content plus the Blizzard strategy guides for both the new and 1st expansion content. Essentially it's a $10 savings over buying the two individually with the strategy guides thrown in for free. It's only a savings if the player wishes to play one of the two new races, the jewelcrafting profession and/or makes it to level 58 where they can start to enter the new areas. (This package should include the first month of play, but I haven't been able to verify that.) |
$37-40 |
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World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King (2nd Expansion Pack) |
This is the latest expansion pack and currently is only available as a standalone package. Both the original World of Warcraft and The Burning Crusade expansion pack (or the battle chest versions) must have been purchased prior to this expansion pack. The level cap is raised to 80. The Inscription profession is available. There are yet again entirely new areas to explore (starting at level 68). |
$37-40 |
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Total |
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$74-90 |
At the very least, the game is going to cost $20. That is enough to allow your child to see if they really like the game and will stick with it. Going that route, however, adds $10 to the final price of the game plus expansions. The Battle Chest is probably the route I would recommend. All the races are available to choose from (and the Blood Elves races is the most popular Horde race by far) as is the Jewelcrafting profession. If you suspect your child will make it to level 58 and beyond, the Battle Chest is the best bet. There is no advantage to buying the Lich King expansion right from the start unless you child has their heart set on the Inscription profession.
In addition to the boxed games, the original game and both the expansions packs are available as direct downloads from Blizzard. The catch is that you must have an account to do so, which means you must have installed (at least) the original box at some point. The nice thing is if you ever have to reinstall WoW and have lost or damaged your DVDs, the entire game can be installed from online downloads (assuming you have a very fast Internet connection). The entire game can also be reinstalled using only the World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King DVD. A word of caution about the installation process itself: it takes at least an hour to install WoW plus the expansions. The game is first installed like any other game. Next, the game downloads any patches and updates release since the version installed was pressed to DVD. These can take quite a while and require more than one download. I have spent as long as three hours installing everything from scratch.
One or two pieces of free software are needed in order to talk with other players over the Internet using a headset. These are Ventrilo and TeamSpeak. Most guilds will have their own Ventrilo or TeamSpeak server, but sometimes you may run a combined guild event or with a pick-up group using the other type of server. Since both are free, it makes sense to have both installed. Ventrilo seems to be the more popular of the two.
WoW add-ons are programs - usually made by a third party, but not always - that are installed into WoW to add some sort of functionality the game didn't provide originally. I already mentioned Auctioneer earlier in this article, but there are thousands of others. Some are specific to a certain class like Hunter or Mage. Others are specific to a certain specialty such as healing or a profession such as herbalism. Still others help during group combat and with managing a raid group. I used about a dozen such add-ons during my time playing WoW. Although there's no need for them for a beginning player, they quickly become very helpful. I don't recall ever seeing an add-on that requires any sort of payment, but I recall a few that allow for donations. In order to avoid viruses and Trojan horses hidden in add-ons, it's important to download them from a known site. A good site to start with is Curse Gaming. More than ¾ of the add-ons I used were downloaded from there.
This is the part where your children tell you how much they love you. After the first month (in the US), World of Warcraft costs $15/month on a month-to-month basis. There are lower monthly terms for paying for 3 or 6 months at a time, but they are not refunded if the account is closed (by you or by Blizzard). You will need to either use a credit card (Visa, MasterCard, Discover or American Express), PayPal, or PaymentOne (aka PhoneBill) to sign up for an account. Thereafter, the account can be paid with any of the above or with a World of Warcraft Prepaid Game Card (after cancelling the other payment method manually). The prepaid game cards are $30 for a 60-day subscription. Paying via a checking account is only possible if using a PayPal account that is tied to a checking account. Additionally, in the states of Illinois, Massachusetts, New Mexico, New York, Texas and Washington, state tax is charged.
Apart from the software and monthly fee, there shouldn't be any other costs required for playing the game. However, Blizzard has made a number of "services" available for a one-time fee. For example, characters can be transferred from one server to another for $25 (USD) per character. The name of a character can be changed for $10. A character's race (e.g., Dwarf, Gnome) or faction (Alliance or Horde) can be changed for $25 and $30, respectively. As these can add up (especially if moving 3 or 4 characters from one faction or server to another), you should encourage your child to take care when they start their characters. Visit Blizzard's support site and click on Character Services for a list of the services available.