Patch 2.4 is poised to transform the face of PvP for the better, and as someone with two alts doing casual 2v2s, there's a lot I'm excited about.
By now everyone's probably aware that 2.4 heralds the removal of diminishing returns. This should increase honor gains dramatically, especially in turtling battlegrounds; Amanda Miller at WoW Insider has estimated that straight PvP combat will be nine times as lucrative than it is now.
But the thing I'm really excited is something that we saw in the patch notes, but I just recently found more information on: uncommon-quality PvP gear that will be available for purchase through faction vendors. The sets are ilvl 115, which makes them superior to the belt and legs from Halaa rewards but still inferior to Season One arena gear.
Although I'd initially been thinking this gear would be available via battleground reputation, it turns out that's not the case. Instead, each piece will be a reputation reward purchasable for gold from a different Burning Crusade faction. Shoulders and gloves will require honored reputation, but you'll need revered to obtain leg and chest pieces (strangely, hats seem to be inconsistent from one class to another).
The actual faction required for each piece varies from one set to another, but it looks like each set contains one piece each from the Sha'tar, Cenarion Expedition, Thrallmar/Honor Hold, Keepers of Time, and Lower City quartermasters. For the moment, you'll have to check MMO-Champion's screenshots or the PTRs to see which piece requires which faction, but I've linked to the Wowhead page for each set below.
Resto Druid - Kodohide Battlegear
Balance Druid - Wyrmhide Battlegear
Feral Druid - Dragonhide Battlegear
Hunter - Stalker's Chain Battlegear
Mage - Evoker's Silk Battlegear
Healy Priest - Mooncloth Battlegear
Shadow Priest - Satin Battlegear
Rogue - Opportunist's Battlegear
Resto Shaman - Seer's Ringmail Battlegear
Elemental Shaman - Seer's Mail Battlegear
Enhancement Shaman - Seer's Linked Battlegear
Warlock - Dreadweave Battlegear
Warrior - Savage's Plate Battlegear
As you might be able to guess from the names, it looks like all of this gear will share the same bonuses as the arena sets, allowing you to pair two rep PvP pieces with two pieces of arena gear for two +35 resilience bonuses.
For me, this is a really excellent addition that helps rebalance gear progression for new level 70s. I'm not one to cry welfare epics, but as previous seasons of arena gear have become available for purchase by honor, I've felt less and less compelled to send my alts into regular PvE instances at all. At the same time, the arena gear disparity at the 1500 mark feels so huge -- you can hit extremely well-geared players who have just formed a new team, or brand new 70s without any resilience or experience.
Providing a PvE reputation path to obtaining stepping-stone PvP gear will mean more folks running vanilla instances, will help normalize casual arena play so that it's more dependent on skill, and will reduce the currently massive time investment required to go from unbearably squishy to moderately survivable in PvP. As I see it, these are all fantastic outcomes.
February 14, 2008
Faction-Based PvP Gear In Patch 2.4
November 24, 2007
Adversarial Arakkoa
Let's talk Terokk.
I'm exalted with the Shat'ari Skyguard, but up until a week ago I, like Tobold, had never bothered with the Terokk quest line because it's rather poorly designed.
However, I now think the Skettis prerequisite quests, Adversarial Blood, and Terokk's Downfall should be on every new 70's short list of quests to complete ASAP. Not only are they a great source of gold and Skyguard rep, they also yield some really excellent pre-Karazhan blues and a shot at two great epic capes.
The Bad News
Each member of your party looking to complete the quest needs 40 Time-Lost Scrolls. You get these by killing invisible arakkoa which can only be seen with an elixir of shadows, which you get from turning in shadow dust dropped by the visible arakkoa. (You see how this could get annoying.)
Ten scrolls let you summon one of four mini-bosses at the skull piles scattered around Skettis. Once you've killed and looted all four, you get the quest Terokk's Downfall.
As if getting 40 x 5 scrolls wasn't bad enough, you actually have to summon each mini-boss not once, but multiple times so that everyone in your party can get the quest drop. Again, non-ideal, but stick with me here.
The Good News
Gezzarak, Karrog, Akkarai and Vakkiz are the four mini-bosses for Adversarial Blood, and they're all relatively easy kills. You probably don't even need a full five man for them, but be sure you have a tank and healer with you.
Each of them will drop a random BOP blue item from a shared loot table. The Boy's mage alt picked up two Skettis Bands of the Mind, which boast 11 int, 14 spell crit, and 29 dmg. They can also drop gloves, bracers, or belts along with the rings.
If you have five people summoning all four mini-bosses, that's a guaranteed 20 BOP blue drops, plus 2k Sha'tari Skyguard rep just for the kills (you'll get another 350 rep for turning in Adversarial Blood itself).
Terokk Himself
Once you turn in Adversarial Blood, you'll receive a Time Lost Offering to use with the quest Terokk's Downfall. He's a tank and spank until 25%, at which point you'll need to drag him over the blue flares dropped (intermittently) by Skyguard bombardiers in order to remove his shield of immunity.
In keeping with the spirit of this quest line, each player who wants to complete the quest will have to summon Terokk individually, which means that our hypothetical 5-man would have to kill him five separate times.
Much like the mini-bosses, though, this has both pros and cons. The annoying part is that to re-summon him, you'll have to wait 10-15 minutes for his summoning stone to respawn. On the other hand, killing him five times means 500 rep per kill plus five shots at his loot table, which includes these coveted items:
I've said it several times already, but I'll say it again: the quests leading up to Terokk are stupidly designed. You shouldn't have to kill things multiple times for everyone in your party to get credit.
But don't let Blizzard's poor quest design cause you to skip a really excellent source of gear and rep for new 70s. In spite of the flaws, I'll be doing Adversarial Blood and Terokk's Downfall on all my alts from now on, and encouraging my guildmates to do the same.
November 9, 2007
Post-Patch Planning
Real life and WoW have conspired against blogging in the past 48 hours, but that doesn't mean I haven't been thinking about you all. I've also been thinking about what I'm going to do first once patch 2.3 hits. I'm sure I'm not the only one compiling a list, but here's mine:
Update my mods.
Let's face it: even with the Ace Updater, mod tweaking could take up most of Tuesday night.
Respec my mage from arcane to fire.
Arcane's been fun, but the nerfs to the Lightning Capacitor and the Mystic Skyfire Diamond have put at least a temporary nail in the coffin on its viability for PvE raiding. It looks like we may see significant mage changes down the road, but for now, I'm looking to scrounge up 146 spell hit rating by a combination of regemming my current gear and swapping out some of my current pieces for +hit gear I've kept in my bank.
Buy some new gear with Badges of Justice.
I'll need 60 to purchase a Voodoo-woven Belt, which should help with the spell hit.
Buy my shadow priest her heroic keys.
She's made a lot of trips to Karazhan and even to SSC, but getting revered with all the factions was just too much of a time sink. I will have to remember to actually go buy the keys themselves, though. Thankfully they're cheap.
Go talk to The Rokk in Lower City and start the cooking daily quests.
Rogues are really going to need the Spicy Hot Talbuk recipe, which gives 20 hit rating, and hunters will be all over the new pet food Kibler's Bits. Skullfish Soup isn't bad either, and Stormchops will finally give us a use for Lightning Eels.
Take my shaman to Dustwallow Marsh.
With a bunch of new quests in the zone, I'll want to pick up the flight point at Mudsprocket, then head out to Tabetha's once-remote shack. All the XP changes should make leveling him much faster, and the new content out there looks fun.
Go fishing.
Crates and trunks you fish up in 2.3 will have a chance to contain a Weather-Beaten Journal, which will let us track fishing nodes on the minimap.
Head out to Zul'Aman.
My 25-man raid is still struggling to take down Vashj, but the 10-man Karazhan raid I ran back in the spring is reforming for our usual Saturday runs. The only question now is whether we'll try and squeeze a second day in to take advantage of ZA's 3.5 day reset. I'll also need to remember to stop and talk to Budd Nedreck outside the instance to get the quest for my Tattered Hexcloth Sack. (Free 20-slot bag? Yes and thank you.)
So there you have it: a compulsive raider and altoholic's to-do list. But why stop there when I can survey the GMW readers?
What's on your list of things to do as soon as the patch hits?
September 30, 2007
Site Review: WoW Reputation Calculator
Just wanted to bring this new WoW reputation calculator tool to everyone's attention. You input your character name and server, and it uses your Armory reputation page to calculate how many more instance runs and/or quests you need to get to the next rep level for each faction. Here's a shot of my mage's Sha'tar rep, which I've been trying to work up so that I can start turning in Marks of the Illidari for Shattrath Flasks of Supreme Power.
