WotLK gear replacement, revisited

This is a post-launch followup to my earlier look at gear replacement. My best guess at that time (late September):

T4 gear doesn't start to get replaced until fairly late in the first zones, and will be relatively decent even into your mid-70s. T5 will last to your late 70s, and T6 won't be replaced until you get into heroics or the new Naxxrimas.

WoW Insider had a post on upgrading to greens, where the poster points out that it's not happening, flirts with complaining about it, but then counsels patience.

So what's the scoop? Blizzard did this on purpose. Flash back to the release of Burning Crusade. There, the design was that pretty much everyone would replace their gear with early quest rewards. Only Naxx raiders held on to their gear beyond even Hellfire, and even that T3 gear was replaced from midlevel quest rewards. For everyone else, their hard-won raid gear was gone by the time they dinged 62 or so.

New gear is cool. But this quick replacement had a few consequences:

• It devalued the hard-won raid gear, leading to a "what was the point?" reaction.
  
• The nicely matched tier gear was replaced with mismatched greens, resulting in the dreaded "clown suit" look.
  
• By amping up the equipment values so quickly, it created an inflation effect where each subsequent level — later quest rewards, dungeon drops, and BC tier gear — had to be more and more overpowered.

The experience wasn't good for players and created headaches for the developers. So they changed it.

Here's my graphic from the last post, showing the relative item values from various types of gear:


There's two big changes. First, the early BC purples are more comparable in value to the midlevel WotLK greens, so you'll hold on to those much longer. And second, the easy access to Badge gear means that even non-raiders will have some good gear that should last for a long time.

You will replace your gear eventually; how quickly depends on what kind of gear you had. Here's a quick summary:

Gear source	Replaced with:
BC quest rewards	early WotLK quest rewards
BC instance drops	early-mid WotLK quest rewards
BC Tier 4 gear	mid-level WotLK quest rewards
BC Tier 5 gear	late WotLK quest rewards, WotLK dungeon drops
BC Tier 6 gear	WotLK Heroic drops or Naxx gear

So what's been my experience? My starting point was a combination of T4-level and BoJ gear. I replaced a ring fairly quickly with a quest reward, but otherwise I wasn't very tempted by any Howling Fjord gear. Last night, I replaced my first decent purple. The [Life Binder Talisman] replaced my [Voodoo Shaker]. That was a bit sad; the Voodoo Shaker was a recent pickup, my last BoJ spent. But it is nice to have some new gear for a change. The two items aren't far apart, and that's probably true for a lot of the rewards I'm starting to see. But something like my [Grovewalker's Leggings], a 100-BoJ pair of pants, will probably last until I start running Heroics.

Have no fear; you'll get upgrades. Just be thankful that the transition is a lot smoother this time around.

Leatherworking: time to give it up?

First, the good news. Leveling Skinning is about the easiest thing you can do, at the launch of a new expansion. There's tons of dead animals all over the place, just ready to be skinned. I'm already at 450 skill for that, with probably about 150 Borean Leather in the bank so far. It's nice.

But I haven't made a single new leather item yet, and I'm starting to think that it's time to quit Leatherworking. That's really a shame, because I like it. The irony is that Blizzard has said that the profession changes were designed to route you to something you enjoy rather than something you felt you 'had' to take. I enjoy Leatherworking, but the available items are so bland and boring that I'm not seeing any use from the profession.

Leatherworking has always suffered (along with Tailoring and Blacksmithing) in that many of its products aren't consumable. Yes, you can make armor patches and leg armor. But the bread and butter of the profession — the leather or mail armor — is unlikely to sell for much. People just get better rewards from dungeons, rep, and badges. There are a few high-end items that you can sell, but those are pretty rare. Most things aren't worth the material cost. And the patches, while not bad, compete with enchants and aren't a huge money-maker.

The Bind-on-Pickup leather items used to be great, at least for me. I worked hard to craft my Windhawk set. It was a bit better than T4 and lasted me through all of Burning Crusade. (I didn't get out much.) Raiders got some good BoP patterns too. But it appears that Blizzard won't do anything this good any more, which really kills the attraction and value of Leatherworking for me. Even if there was comparable gear, I took pride in wearing something that I'd made myself; it marked me out as a leatherworker (though the models were crappy) and made me feel that the profession gave me something unique. Without that, my motivation is much less.

Drums were a Burning Crusade addition designed to make Leatherworking more attractive. And they did! The effects they added to battle were great and were a big advantage. Too big. Advanced raiding guilds had many of their players convert to Leatherworking so that they could chain-drum their way through challenging encounters. That is specifically what Blizzard wanted to combat (and rightfully so). So, they changed drums so that all drummers in a party or raid are subject to the same cooldown. Not a bad change, but as my normal party has three leatherworkers, we're really overstocked with drummers now.

So, Wrath has another answer: fur linings. These are crafter-bound wrist enchants, like the ring enchants that enchanters get. They're not bad. Compare Fur Lining - Spellpower to Enchant Bracers - Superior Spellpower. The fur lining gets you almost 125% more spellpower than the enchant. The attack power advantage is about the same, while the Stamina bonus is huge. There are also fur linings for resistances. It's all pretty nice.

But that's what Leatherworking reduces to: +37 spellpower for me. That's it. Beyond that, I've lost my unique (and pretty good) armor; any value from my Tribal Leatherworking specialization, and much of the utility of my drums. It's depressing.

I haven't looked at it, but I suspect that Blacksmithing is in much the same boat. Enchanting is probably about where they were before, as are the consumeable professions of Alchemy and Jewelcrafting. Tailoring at least gets their flying carpets, and Engineering gets their choppers and a host of other unique and cool items.

So will I switch? I'm reluctant, since Alamein has been crafting leather her entire career. I'm still hopeful that I'll see some useful changes with future patches. Besides, I don't have time to level another profession while I'm leveling up. So I'll probably hang on to Leatherworking for now, at least until I reach level 80 and/or the 3.1 patch comes out (and we see more recipes). But if things stay as they are, Alamein may have to become an Alchemist or Inscriptionist.

Druid leveling in Wrath: Resto and Restokin

I did want to add a note about my leveling experience so far, with two specs.

I started out with a 5/0/56 full Resto build. The story in short: Yes, you can level as full Resto. It's not horrible, but it is fairly slow. After a while, I became annoyed with how long it took to kill things. I watched Recount for a while, and I was doing about 350 DPS, which is pretty much crap.

So yesterday, I respecced to the 31/0/30 Restokin build I talked about last Friday. No surprise, it's a lot faster to kill things as a Moonkin than a basic Night Elf. I collected a variety of stats, and as a Moonkin, I'm doing something closer to 610 DPS. It's not double, but it's not far from it, either. Moonkin can take a beating too, which helps. It's just a lot faster and easier, and I don't regret it.

The only remaining question is whether a Restokin can heal an instance run. My biggest problem is that I'll miss Wild Growth. Mana efficiency may be an issue too. I'm hoping to get a run into the Nexus soon, and I'll report back on that.

Howling Fjord is Tapped

Last night, I more or less finished the quests in Howling Fjord. Sometimes, I am a completist to the point of OCD, and leveling in a new zone (one that I think is beautiful and fun) is the kind of thing that gives me the itch to get everything.

So even after I completed the Explore Howling Fjord and I've Toured the Fjord achievements, I kept working to complete the last few quest chains in the area. I finally completed just about everything last night, with the help of Firegrin and Wyrmm, when I finished March of the Giants and then Demolishing Megalith. On to Dragonblight!

I was stymied by a couple of bugged quests. The worst is I've Got a Flying Machine. It's a vehicle-based quest, where you take over a plane to haul bags of artifacts out of the Steel Gate excavation. Problem is, the bags appear to bug out over time. After a server reset, things are great, but over time fewer and fewer bags can be hooked. By the time I tried it, everything was borked.

There appears to be a similar problem with Seeds of the Blacksouled Keepers, though I was able to complete it anyway. The quest asks you to kill spores, then freeze the remains. The spores appear to progressively bug out, evading so that nobody can kill them. When I did it, yesterday around 2PM, about 70% of the spores I saw were evading. Firegrin and Wyrmm went after them around 10PM and only two spores were accessible; they had to camp those two and kill them repeatedly.

The only other quest I had trouble with was In Service to the Light. The issue here isn't bugs, it's spawn rate on the Deathless Watchers. The only spawn points I found were on the edges of two upper platforms; there's about 6 spawn points. But you need to kill 10 watchers, so everyone was running back and forth, tapping watchers instantly when they spawned. It took me about 20 minutes to get enough of the watchers to complete the quest.

Such is life in a new expansion. It's painful to run into quests like these, but on the balance it's a necessary part of trying new things. I would rather have Blizzard try new mechanics and add more quests. That added complexity comes at a cost; it's less likely that all bugs and issues will be fixed before launch. But I'd rather deal with that instead of killing a couple dozen more shoveltusks or whatever.

So, Howling Fjord is checked off. What are my conclusions? Here are my top awards for the zone:

Best quest: This one's tough, but I'll go with The Slumbering King. I also liked Sleeping Giants in the same area, which made it a lot of fun.

Best questline: The Iron Rune Constructs. It starts with The Human League, and runs several quests through Wyrmskull Village and Utgarde Catacombs. Then it heads to the Explorers' League Outpost with the Tools to Get the Job Done quest. It ultimately finishes by having you drive your own rune construct into Baelgun's excavation site. There's a lot going on here, both in lore, new quest designs, and new equipment.

Best new quest mechanic: The harpoon guns in It Goes to 11.... Though I'll give a special runner-up award to Send Them Packing. Threatening mobs with emotes, I love it!

Funniest quest: Absholutely... Thish Will Work! Note to self: don't trust a drunk alchemist.

Worst quest: Aside from bugged quests and poor spawn rates, I would vote for March of the Giants. It's fine if you're grouped up (as indicated), because the giants aren't bad to kill then. But I tried to solo it, and the frustrating thing is that I could solo it, if everything went right. I killed the first giant, no problem. But whenever I tried again, a giant would eventually break my roots, or a rune construct would get involved... I was about 1 for 5 before I gave up and sought help.

WTF? quest: The Way to His Heart.... You have to help... sea lions mate? I suppose it could be worse!

Most beautiful subzone: Ember Clutch. There's a lot of beautiful stuff in Howling Fjord, but the burning trees (using the new flame effects) are simply stunning.

Best-looking mob: The Vrykul are really amazing. As Wyrmm pointed out, it would be wonderful if player character models looked this good. It's tough to pick a favorite, but I'll go with Halfdan the Ice-Hearted, the Thane of Skorn.

Favorite NPC: Zeh'gehn, the incomprehensible troll at Scalawag Post. "Ye'll ku fer yerself with yer own deadlights, yahso." Of course!

Most amusing vignette: The "Thish will Work" quest above was pretty funny. But I was constantly giggling at the extra transport option you receive from Grezzix Spindlesnap with the Street "Cred" quest. Talk to Lou the Cabin Boy, and he'll give you a canoe ride to Scalawag Post. A tauren... in a canoe... as a taxi service? Too funny!

Now: on to Dragonblight!

Quests to catch in Howling Fjord

Yesterday, I got up and collected Eric at about 6:30 to head to Fry's. I wanted to get the Collector's Edition of Wrath, so I wanted to line up early. It turned out that there were about 25 or 30 people there, but almost 100 copies of the Collector's Edition, so we were safe. Still, it was fun to participate.

I had to work, but after I got home I quickly logged in and got cranking. Alamein had logged out in Menethil, so I headed to Howling Fjord and got busy.

I'll give a more detailed look at my thoughts eventually. But for now, it sums up as wow. My jaw hit the floor again and again as I came across new elements. I want to talk about the art and design in some detail eventually, because it absolutely kicked me in the teeth. It far surpasses my hopes.

The quest design too is amazingly cool, though there are a few rough spots and ho-hum "collect 4 pieces of meat" quests. (The latter are actually important in order to make the special quests stand out, but still: boring quests are boring.) But I'll highlight a few of the don't-miss quest lines that I came across so far.

Harpoon operation

This chain begins in Valgarde with The Path to Payback. The first parts look pretty standard, but at the end you get to take control of a couple harpoon guns and rain destruction on both buildings and attacking drake-riders. At one level this is simple training in operating siege machinery... and that's important. (Hint: look for the folded arrow icon on the right when you want to 'exit' the harpoon.) But it's also fun and cool. And there's an amusing coda at the end; as Eric described it, it's a real Dr. Strangelove moment.

The spirit world

This one begins in Valgarde with Into the World of Spirits. The first quest has you go diving for a bag found on a sunken ship, and I know that those quests can be annoying and skippable. Don't. The next two steps have some very cool stuff involved.

In the second step, The Echo of Ymiron, you enter the spirit world and observe a conversation. This is cool for a couple reasons. It gives you background on what's happening with the Vrykul, but it also just looks incredibly cool. But, there's more! I don't want to give spoilers, but while in the spirit world, you should wander around until you find an... important figure. It starts a cool scripted event that's well worth the price of admission.

The third and final step is similarly cool and informative. Well worth the time.

Falcon quests

This starts in the Explorers' League Outpost with the Trust is Earned quest. The first couple steps are pretty easy and harmless. The third step, Falcon Versus Hawk, is pretty annoying, because there aren't enough hawks around, so it takes forever. I almost skipped it, but the last phase is a lot of fun, and teaches you more about the new vehicle/minion control mechanism.

Iron Rune Constructs

This is a long chain, starting all the way back in Valgarde with The Human League. After a lot of work in Wyrmskull Village, you end up heading to the Explorers' League Outpost, where you'll eventually get Tools to Get the Job Done from Walt.

Walt will send you all over the place to get materials. (This includes the amusingly named We Can Rebuild It and We Have the Technology.) After that though, Walt will build you a small siege vehicle to finish the quests with. It takes a little work to learn how to control it, and it's pretty slow. But the quest is otherwise easy, and gives you a very cool experience at learning more of the new vehicle interface. Have some fun with this one.

So those are just a few questlines to look for. But I haven't found anything yet that I'd say you should skip anyway, so just do it all!

Restokin for leveling in Wrath

I'm struggling a bit with how I want to level in Wrath. I'm very hopeful to heal a good number of instance runs, so I want to keep my Resto build if possible. But I'm concerned that Resto will still be a bit too squishy for easy leveling. And respecs are still expensive, so I don't want to go back and forth too much, particularly when I need to save for Cold Weather Flying.

My current plan is to keep my Resto spec and see how that works for leveling. Maybe I'll try the slowest AoE grind possible:

1. Buff with Thorns.
   
2. Aggro a good group of mobs, maybe with Hurricane.
   
3. Pop Barkskin and drop another Hurricane.
   
4. Shift into Tree of Life form, and keep healing yourself while the remaining mobs kill themselves on your Thorns.

OK, that's a bit of a joke. Right? Ha ha? I've actually tried it a bit, and it does work... though it's incredibly slow.

If that plan fails me and I decide to move to Boomkin, I'll probably go with a Restokin build. That should give me the survivability and DPS I need to level, but leave enough healing power to heal instance runs. That's the theory anyway, and I'm hopeful that it will work.

I had previously guessed at a Restokin build. I think that's mostly right, but I came up with a new build that I think makes some key changes.

Here's the new build: Level 70 Restokin build: 31/0/30

Key changes from before are as follows.

I decided to take Genesis in Tier 1 of Balance. That helps a lot with healing, even more than DPS. But it comes with a cost, because you can't really afford to skip Starlight Wrath either. To do this, I sacrificed points in Brambles, Nature's Reach, and (most painfully) Dreamstate. I also put an extra point into Moonfury, since that now gets me to a full 3/3 in the talent.

On the Restoration side, the changes were less severe. I decided to move the build from Healing Touch to more of a Regrowth build. That meant that I stole points from Naturalist and Empowered Touch and gave the points to Gift of Nature, Improved Regrowth, and Tranquil Spirit (to make the rare HT more palatable). Regrowth is a more versatile spell than Healing Touch, and it has better synergy with Nature's Grace. It's less mana efficient, which makes Dreamstate that much more necessary. On the other hand, level 71 would likely see me pick up Swiftmend to add to my healing arsenal.

So that's my best-estimate Restokin build for leveling, starting at 70. I think my level 80 Restokin target would be 40/0/31 build, but that would depend heavily on what problems come up in both soloing and healing as I level.

Wrath: Where to start?

Here we are — one day away from Wrath of the Lich King. I'm eager to start exploring new zones, attempting new quests, and running new instances. But that all starts with traveling to the starting zones and invading Northrend.

With Burning Crusade, it was pretty simple. You jumped through the Dark Portal and hit Hellfire Peninsula. A quick quest would fly you to the starting city (either Honor Hold or Thrallmar) and you'd start picking up quests.

But Wrath will offer you a choice, because there are two starting zones this time around. Both Howling Fjord and Borean Tundra will start you off with level 70 quests, so you'll have to pick which one to head to first. Of course, it's not a major commitment (like Aldor vs. Scryer); you can switch back and forth between zones. Yet one way or another you'll have to pick a starting place.

I did a bit of research into it, to decide where to go. As far as I can tell, they're balanced quite well; it won't matter which zone you start with. I looked up quest rewards in both zones, and they shouldn't matter a huge amount. Most are green items at iLvl 138, which will probably not replace anything better than BC dungeon blues. Borean Tundra has quests that will give you one druid idol and a selection of blue weapons that might be more useful, but overall things look pretty comparable for druids.

So, it comes down to aesthetics I think. Here's a quick look at both zones, to help you choose.

Borean Tundra

Borean Tundra is on the west end of the Northrend croissant. Alliance can get there from the Stormwind harbor, while Horde will take the zeppelin from Ogrimmar. The Horde has a stronger presence here, but both factions have towns and quest hubs.


Borean Tundra is a grassy, barren environment. (It's... tundra, actually.) You'll see caribou, wolves, and mammoths wandering the plains. It's populated by Tuskarr, Taunka, Naga, and dragonkin. Oh, and you'll be working with the Murlocs too. D.H.E.T.A., the anti-Nesingwary group, has a strong presence here as well.

Howling Fjord

The Howling Fjord is on the other side of Northrend from Borean Tundra, on the easternmost peninsula of the continent. Alliance travel there from Menethil Harbor, while Horde will catch a zeppelin from the Undercity.


Howling Fjord is rocky and mountainous. Wildlife is dominated by herds of shoveltusk, and odd, stocky combination of bull and caribou. The NPC population is focused around the Vrykul, a viking-esque half-giant race. There's also a strong Scourge presence, leading the Forsaken to attack here in strength.

I really don't think there is a strong advantage to either starting zone. It all comes down to aesthetics and experience. I expect that I'll end up spending a good bit of time in both places, but Howling Fjord looks like the most appealing area to me. (I'm also a bit concerned about the effect of D.H.E.T.A. on the skinning profession in Borean Tundra!) My best advice is to pick whichever zone looks like the most fun, and don't worry about it too much.

I'll be logging out in Menethil tonight. See you there!