R-A-F: Ludicrously Tasty

I've been 'sploiting the recruit-a-friend system in WoW for about a week now. Remember the rules:

-The recruited account is "linked" to your account.
-A pair of "linked" characters get TRIPLE XP from quests AND mobs while grouped and near each other
-Characters on the recruited account can "gift" free levels to characters on the original linked account, as long as the character receiving the level is lower level than the character giving it.
-Characters on the recruited account can "gift" one level for every two levels they themselves earn, starting at level 3 until level 59. Thus, a level 59 character will have 29 giftable levels.

So last Tuesday, I "recruited" a free trial account under my own name.

At the outset, my full stable of non-70 alts amounted to a lone level 23 mage. My original plan was to level a different pair from 1 to 59, then give all of the gift levels to the mage. Perhaps I would level him to 30 before gifting the levels, making it easier for him to hit 59 himself. After some discussion with my girlfriend (we were going to share the new 3rd account), we decided that I would make myself a hunter on my main account, and make a paladin on the shared account to level together. This worked especially well because horde paladins can only be Blood Elves, and I had already settled on BE for my hunter (my main is a troll, my druid is tauren, the mage is undead, and I didn't want an orc). What can I say, I'm a completionist.

There was some doubt expressed by my girlfriend that I could run two different WoW accounts simultaneously on the same computer. I wasn't entirely sure of this myself, but when I opened up two separate instances of WoW, then logged one in on my main account and one in on the new trial account, it worked! There was just one small hitch: trial accounts can't make Blood Elves, as Burning Crusade content is locked out for them.

Upgrading the account to a regular account would cost $20, and then another $20 for the Burning Crusade upgrade online directly from Blizzard. I decided I was already giving Blizzard enough money, and instead saved myself $10 by ordering the battle chest, which includes both the original game and the xpac from Amazon.com for $30. I have free 2-day shipping, so I was going to have to wait at least 2 days to get started on my Blood Elves.

But, enamored with the idea and eager to begin, I instead rolled two new characters...an Orc warlock and warrior pair, and began to level them while I waited. This experiment was so ridiculously successful, I quickly hatched a new plan to take optimal advantage of the system. I would still level the hunter/pally pair to 59. But I would also level the lock/warrior pair to 44. This would leave the warrior with 21 giftable levels, and the paladin with 29. As it turned out, 21 was exactly the difference between the mage's 23 levels and 44. And 29 was pretty much the difference between having 2 44 characters or instead having a 58 and 59 character. It all came together almost too neatly to be believed!

So, at the end of this 2-week project, I expect to have 4 new level 59 characters: a mage, hunter, paladin, and warlock, as well as a level 44 warrior.

The actual effort I will put in will be equivalent to gaining about 34 levels the regular way (59+44=103/3=34.3).

That's fucking ludicrous.