WRUP: We have a lot of feelings about professions edition

Another weekend is upon us, which means it's time once again for WRUP! The journey through Warlords continues on, and as we've explored more of the game, a common complaint amongst the team has been about the game's profession changes. While Blizzard has worked to streamline professions, not all of us (or, really, any of us) are quite happy with the end result. So just what's wrong with professions? A lot.

If you want to see what we're doing in game this week -- plus a laundry-list of professions complaints -- read on. And, of course, leave us a comment to say just what you're playing this weekend... and let us know what you think about the state of professions.

Adam Holisky (@AdamHolisky) I'm opening up EVE Online again. Best not to ask. In WoW I'll be running more heroics and getting my healing set taken care of. As far as professions go, I love that I can make 30,000g off an engineering piece -- but I hate it otherwise.

Adam Koebel (@BendakWoW) I like the simplicity of the primary professions when it comes to crafting gear. I also like how you can re-roll the stats of an item or upgrade it, but the upgrades are pretty expensive for something that could be replaced any day now in Highmaul. It would be easier to swallow if my Barn could actually produce more than 0-1 Savage Bloods per day. Overall, I enjoy how self-sufficient I am without having any gathering professions.

As for secondary professions, I think the new fishing is a bit convoluted with 3 sizes of fish, fish flesh, and fish bait per type of fish. If I want to go fishing I have to make sure I have like two dozen slots open just to hold all this stuff. Cooking is not worth the effort of farming talbuks or boars for hours on end when I could just have my Barn churn out the best food in the game. I've only glanced at first aid at this point, but being able to make potions with it sounds pretty cool.

Anne Stickney (@Shadesogrey) I'll be writing this weekend, along with a bit of WoW in between of course -- and I'm thinking about picking up Dragon Age: Inquisition while I'm at it, because a lot of people have been recommending it. I'm not sure if I want to sink the time into playing it, but it does look really good, and I'm a sucker for those kinds of games, so maybe I'll pick it up to fiddle with.

As far as professions go ... I'm not really pleased with them at all. Every recipe I have takes a ton of pieces that can only be ground out at a rate of so many per day. The recipes are disappointing -- I saved up 100 crystals to make myself a necklace as an upgrade, and then got assigned bonus armor as a random stat (useless to me as a rogue), so I had to grind out another ten crystals just to reassign the stats of the necklace into something that was slightly more suitable (not ideal, but suitable mind you). There is no way to raise your profession level with any kind of expediency, it's all tied into creating elements with buildings on a timed schedule that there's no way to speed up. I just hit my first level 700 profession a minute ago. It was Archaeology. And I haven't even really tried to level archaeology beyond getting enough pieces for the ghost wolf puppy and doing the jumping puzzles in Spires of Arak.

I find it intensely ironic that the profession I accidentally got to max level first was the one profession I absolutely didn't care about leveling at all.

Dawn Moore (@dawnwow) The changes have impacted each profession differently, so I can't really say that I collectively hate or love the changes. Garrisons have taken away the uniqueness of engineering but I don't actually care that much that everyone can have a Jeeves or a mailbox now. The crafting side of tailoring feels the same as it ever was, so I guess I'm neutral or happy with that? I do dislike how raw tailoring mats are gathered now, though. In the past I always preferred tailoring because it was a low maintenance crafting profession; through the process of leveling my character I'd typically acquire all the tailoring mats I'd need to get to max rank and make myself a nice blue item or two. Now I either need to farm the mats or dedicate an extra building in my garrison to it, which isn't a huge trouble, but it is a lot more effort than I initially signed up for.

That said, I absolutely hate first aid now and find the whole profession dismal. Before WoD, first aid was always very accessible to the characters who needed it (read: my mage) since the mats were easy to come by. Now if I want a bandage I need to visit the auction house or go fishing. Seriously, you're going to make me fish to make bandages? That's just nonsense! I'm also quite peeved about the state of mining and herbalism. The terrain of Draenor is not conducive to gathering professions with its rocks, cliffs, and high up areas only accessible through one or two paths. That terrain, combined with the lack of flying mounts (which I'm fine with, by the way), makes gathering a slow and frustrating process. With how much raw material garrisons produce I'm struggling to see any perk in keeping these two gathering professions. It almost feels like Blizzard wants to phase them out.

Elizabeth Harper (@faience) This may be another weekend of Dragon Age: Inquisition for me -- I'm well and truly hooked there. But I'm also thinking about leveling an alt to do Herald of the Titans with my guild... if I could decide on an alt to do it with.

Professions-wise, I find them more tedious than usual, and they'd already been pretty tedious. As a leatherworker, my gathering profession is the only one that doesn't have an easy, in-garrison gathering method which means to feed my daily cooldowns I've got to spend what feels like a lot of time grinding for leather. In Mists, I'd combine collecting leather for cooldowns with doing daily quests... without daily quests, it feels even more out of the way to go off and collect leather. I tried the Barn to help with that for some while, but I've found trapping animals (only two animal types may be trapped for leather) to be even more annoying than just skinning things for leather -- traps don't always trigger and as you collect them, they don't stack, which means if you're gathering a bunch for leather you need to have a full bag open to carry them. And all of this so I can do one cooldown a day to collect the hundreds of burnished leather I need to make a single leatherworking pattern -- YAWN.

Elizabeth Wachowski (@leeatwaterlives) Thank all the gods and monsters, my computer has returned from Asus repair, so hopefully I'll get to play some Warlords for the first time since release day. Otherwise more DA:I fun with my Qunari mage.

Matthew Rossi (@MatthewWRossi) I've been ludicrously sick so I haven't played much of anything. I'm not really fond of the current profession scheme.

Sarah Pine (@ilaniel) I haven't done enough of the professions thing yet to have much of an opinion. But overall, WoW's professions have never impressed me, and I don't imagine WoD's vision will impress me, either. But hey, I can finally craft a LW mount, so that's something.

The weekend is the perfect time to kick back, relax and enjoy some game time. Are you an achievement junkie? Can't get enough raiding? Rolling a new alt? Considering taking the leap into roleplaying? Whatever your favorite way to play

World of Warcraft, let us know in the comments what you're playing this weekend!