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Blood Pact: Warlock professions
Blood Pact is your weekly warlock digest, brought to you by Dominic Hobbs. "The slightest loss of concentration is all it takes." -- Medivh. Selecting professions for your characters often comes down to a choice of utility; if you have several toons, you may want to make some gather and others be the crafters. If you only have the one character at 80, there is a greater desire to be self-sufficient. Professions are also one of those things that many people feel are a part of their character and help define them almost as much as their class. If you're uncertain which professions your warlock should take up then this is the place for you, as Blood Pact takes a look at all 14 and considers which are of the most use to the 'lock on the go.
Spiritual Guidance: The professional priest
Welcome back to Spiritual Guidance, hosted by the spectacularly dark Fox Van Allen. Though he should be preparing for his final showdown against gnome-sympathizer and lolsmiter Dawn Moore, he has chosen to instead pop a few Flasks of Vodka Tonic (with that sweet Mixology bonus) and spend all night kareoke-ing with Mike Sacco. He's not afraid of those sick 4000 damage crits that a holy priest can score with Smite! What's that? Casting smite *again*? Hard to do when your mind is flayed into pudding. We've bested Sartharion on a three-dragon run. We've looked into Sindragosa's icy maw and laughed. None of that is especially impressive if we're still living in our parents' basement cause we can't find a job. It's time to put that shadow priest of ours to work. The number one rated profession for shadow priests is being the WoW.com columnist, but since that job's already taken, the rest of you will have to settle for standard Azerothian fare. And, ideally, you're going to want the one that makes your pew pew skills look all the more impressive. When I was leveling my shadow priest, I wasn't thinking much about the end game. I grabbed a pair of professions as soon as the game would let me: Tailoring and Enchanting. They served me well through leveling. But a few months into level 80, I got to thinking -- did I make the right choice?
Frost Lotus drop rate increased
It's official -- Bornakk wrote on the official forums that Blizzard has increased the chance that a Northrend herb node will yield a Frost Lotus: The drop rate of Frost Lotus, from herbs in Northrend, has been increased by 50%. This will be a welcome change for many because with the increase in demand for raiding flasks that patch 3.3 brought, the supply of Frost Lotus on many servers has gotten quite low, which increased prices significantly. This change will go live on servers as they restart, so probably next Tuesday for most. The new drop rate should have an fairly quick effect on the number of Frost Lotuses listed on your auction house, however it always takes a few days of lower sales volumes before the big farmers start to drop their prices and undercut each other. My advice? Don't buy any Frost Lotus (or derivative flasks) unless you will use them the same day. Wait until the prices go down before stocking up! Also, if you are a herbalist, you can make a quick profit by spending some time farming now, and try to make some sales before the prices drop.
Insider Trader: Profession-specific buffs part 3
Mining Miners are given Toughness, an ability that at max rank, awards +50 stamina. This is a lovely bonus for tanks! A tank's talents will take this well beyond +500 hp, and stamina is also multiplied by buffs and talents such as Blessing of Kings (and not all stats are). This is also going to be helpful in PvP, where stamina is especially important. Herbalism Herbalists get Lifeblood, a self-heal, that at max rank, awards +2000 HP over 5 seconds on a 3 minute cooldown. This can be used in or out of combat, and the spell effect entails flowers sprouting up from the ground all around the character. It is difficult to gauge the actual benefit of this ability across classes and in different situations. In the last few seconds of a close fight, where it is you or them, even a small boost in HP could bump you up to victory. Then again, tanks benefit more from stamina due to talents that factor in your total stamina to then award you with extra stamina (Sacred Duty), increased power (Touched by the Light), and other benefits. It is also difficult to say whether an extra boost in damage might also be worth more than this small heal in a tough spot. Almost all classes find this ability helpful while leveling and soloing. Raiders will often use it to top themselves off or buy some time until their next heal. Skinning Skinners become Masters of Anatomy, and gain 32 critical strike rating, which is equal to 0.70% crit. This is especially useful to classes who have talents that boost stats based on your crit rating, increase your crit by a %, or where your crit rating actually grants you other stats, such as mana for holy paladins. The Skinning and Mining bonuses equate to about 2 gems worth of stats, and Lifeblood is all about how you use it.Conclusion and ComparisonAs you can see, for most of the professions, the benefits and stat increases are approximately equal. Let's use spell power to demonstrate this: JC: +39. Enchanting: +38. Inscription: +37. Tailoring: 250 SP for 15 seconds of every 45 seconds+. This averages to +83 SP in ideal conditions (meaning, it procs on your next heal after the cooldown is up). In fact, it will likely always be under, though somewhat near, this ideal. A more realistic average is +75 SP. LW: +37. Blacksmithing: +38. Engineers: +18 and a parachute. Alchemy: +37. As you can see, the profession bonuses are basically equivalent, and this is true across each stat. There are some exceptions. As I noted earlier, the Engineering enchants are not only meant to increase your stats, but also combine your gadgets, absorbing them into your everyday armor. Without this absorption, the only way to use them would be to take off your super special raiding/PvP gear in favor of a piece of gear or trinket that you carry around for special occasions. Because of this convenience, they seem to eat up itemization points. Still, there are several that are still worth taking, even over other options available for that slot. The Tailoring enchant noted above is currently being debated as OP, and may be subject to tweaking in the future. It is also worth noting that because this is a passive proc, it is not always going to be utilized. You might proc it near the end of a fight, for example, or when you're topping someone off between pulls, and waste most of the added spell power. Each week, Insider Trader takes you behind the scenes of the bustling sub-culture of professional craftsmen, examining the profitable, the tragically lacking, and the methods behind the madness. Check out part 1 of this Guide to Profession-Specific Buffs!
The Queue: Where's my bailout Blizzard?
Welcome back to The Queue, WoW Insider's daily Q&A column where the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Adam Holisky will be your host today. Dear Blizzard,I've spent the past year and a half writing about WoW. I need some gold. Can you bail me out?I can provide you with a promise I'll restructure my daily questing and resource farming, providing a leaner and meaner gold flow for my raiding activities. But I'm going to need some start up help.Regards,Adam.P/S: If I don't get my gold bailout, I'll Blame Canada and not you (which happens to be today's music selection).Athinah asked..."I'm so happy that signs of the new druid forms are coming out but...When exactly are they coming out? Is there a chance that they could come out sooner if Blizzard finishes them sooner? If not, what are the chances of the next patch coming out in a month or so?"
Blood Pact: How to be a professional Warlock
Blood Pact is a weekly column here at WoW Insider, where Nick Whelan delves into the darkest corner of the Slaughtered Lamb Inn, to take a peek at Warlocks and what they do. I've been thinking for awhile now that I'd like to approach Blood Pact a bit differently. Thus far the bulk of my posts have focused on playing a Warlock at level 80. Granted, a casual Warlock at 80, but still, my aim has been towards max level players. Aside from the obvious problem that raises of excluding lower level 'locks, this approach pointlessly limits my available subject matter. And that's just plain silly. So, since I still haven't wriggled my way into a new raid group, I think this is a good opportunity to delve into some of the topics I've been ignoring, with the goal of writing a more balanced column in the future.While pondering what specifically I should post this week, I perused the writings of some of my fellow class columnists, and discovered that most of them had, at some point, explored their class' profession choices. A topic which I then discovered had never been broached by Blood Pact. But then, since the topic of the post is rather evident in the title of the post, I guess there's no point in belaboring its introduction. I'll start with the secondary professions, move on to the gathering professions, and finish up with the production professions.
May's Brew of the Month: Springtime Stout
It's a new month and the new brew is here! May's Brew of the Month is a very simple Springtime Stout with a familiar side effect. When you drink one of your drinks, you have a chance to proc the buff called 'Flower Child.' The buff only lasts ten seconds or so, and as you run around with the buff, flowers pop up underfoot. Herbalists, you've seen something like this before.I try to give little factoids on the real life brews some of these are named after (such as the fact that Pilsners shouldn't exist in Azeroth), but stouts aren't very exotic, overall! A stout is a very dark, very strong sort of ale, and seems just like the sort of thing Dwarves would be mailing out regularly. I don't know about that whole 'flower child' thing, though. Seems more like something Night Elves would do to their ale.
Arcane Brilliance: Professions for Mages, the thrilling conclusion
Each week Arcane Brilliance brings you a column about Mages and all things Mage-related. That's right, Arcane Brilliance is nothing if not consistent. You won't find any server instability here. We're never down, we're always up, and you can always enter our instanced content. And the best part? Arcane Brilliance doesn't charge you 15 bucks a month. Although, donations are totally welcome.So how's everything? Did you make it through patch day unscathed? Did you log in, like me, and find that your Mage's face, forearms, and feet were gone, and there was a hole through his chest (pro tip: upgrade your video card drivers more than once every three years)? Are you running out of mana at an outrageous clip? Are your crit numbers from Molten Armor up or down? Did your guild manage to make it into Ulduar yet, and if so, did you manage to snag any phat loot? Did you dual spec your Mage so he can now both DPS and DPS? I went Frostfire/Firefrost, myself. When triple-specs hit, I'm taking a Frarcano-fire spec. Mark my words.All in all, I'd say 3.1 wasn't too bad. We have some new glyphs to play with, the Argent Tournament is good, clean fun, our mounts can swim, and we have a whole new batch of loot-pinatas to blow up. Our DPS seems to be down a bit, but we're still beating Warlocks, so I'm not going to mail any angry, expletive-laced letters to Blizzard just yet. I've written them--rest assured--but I'm not yet prepared to actually invest in stamps for them. Those things are like a buck apiece these days.So now we turn to the third and final installment in our guide to professions for Mages. If you missed them, the first two parts can be found here and here. This week we'll investigate the merits of Blacksmithing, Leatherworking, and Engineering. As an added bonus, we'll take a quick peek at the three secondary professions and enumerate the reasons for investing in them. Yes, even though you can conjure Strudel from the very air around you with but a word and a snap of your fingers, you still need to learn how to cook
Insider Trader: All about patch 3.1
Insider Trader is your inside line on making, selling, buying and using player-made products.This week Insider Trader will be discussing everything craftspeople need to know about patch 3.1. By the end of this article, you will know what you should be doing to prepare for patch day, what will be changing, and how the community is reacting to these changes.I have been covering these topics to the best of my abilities as information has been released and altered over the weeks, but as we draw closer to patch day, the post-patch scene is becoming increasingly easy to visualize.
Arcane Brilliance: Professions for Mages, part 1
Each week Arcane Brilliance thinks about its career as a Mage. It considers which profession to pursue, and polishes up its résumé:Previous job-titles: Sweet DPS, Table-whore, Sheep-botJob skills: Can blow stuff up good. Able to conjure 400 strudels per minute (depending on lag). Can teleport. Hates Warlocks...Now that the PTR class changes for patch 3.1 seem to have died down a bit, we can finally talk about other things. I asked last week for topic suggestions, and you guys responded in typically spectacular fashion. That's one of the best parts about writing a column for Mages: my readership is made up of freaking Mages. I can always count on you guys to be smart and insightful...as well as complete nutjobs. Suggestions ranged from relatively normal (PvP tactics), to angry and bitter (One guy is switching his main to a Death Knight because Mages apparently suck now), to mean (I should rename the column from "Arcane Brilliance" to "QQ"), to clever (the most effective places to AoE farm, since, you know, we are the kings of AoE), to disturbing (Top 10 ways to cook and serve Warlock on a budget). Okay, so I made the last one up. Several of you thought a column on profession choices for Mages would be a good idea. So, that's what you're getting this week. Well, the first part of it. I plan to do this in installments, which may or may not come on concurring weeks. The next part will probably be coming along next Saturday, barring any crazy patch-news or my sudden demise.Those of you who've been reading this column for awhile may remember the last time Arcane Brilliance dealt with professions for Mages. So much has changed since then--both for Mages as a class and for the professions themselves--that I felt an all-new multi-part guide was in order.
All the World's a Stage: So you want to be an Herbalist
This installment of All the World's a Stage is the twenty-ninth in a series of roleplaying guides in which we find out all the background information you need to roleplay a particular race or class (or profession!) well, without embarrassing yourself. In this world of constant war, you must choose your weapons wisely: you may be a blood-soaked warrior with a jagged-edge axe of phenomenal power, a maniacal warlock with a lust for forbidden magical knowledge, or a ruthless rogue whose stealth lets him kill his enemies before they even know he's there.You may also pick flowers.Indeed, if you are either an alchemist or an inscriber, picking flowers is probably exactly what you do, no matter how blood-soaked, maniacal, or ruthless you might be. To you, however, the term "picking flowers" may be the sign of ignorance on the part of people who fail to comprehend what powers they mock when they poke fun at the exalted science of herbalism. "Let them have their giggles," you might say to yourself, sheathing your axe in order to bend down and gather some lichbloom, "I'll be the one laughing all the way down the battlefield with my Flask of Endless Rage! Muahahahaha!"
WRUP: Do I lose my job if I say Warhammer? edition
Oh dear. It seems one of our own, Mr. Alex Ziebart, is abandoning the our for a weekend in Warhammer Online. Alex Ziebart: Do I lose my job if I say Warhammer? Oh, don't worry, Alex. We don't fire people for playing other MMOs. Not often, anyway. But regardless of Alex's fate, for the rest of the team -- and to let us know what you're up to in-game this weekend (Warcraft or otherwise) -- keep reading!
10 things I learned from a destitute alt on an RP realm
I have a few alts on an RP realm that I visit from time to time, and I remember thinking to myself at one point: "These characters are a bunch of deadbeats." I'd gotten too used to the alts on my main realm being a bunch of pampered brats, spoiled rotten by the presence of a hardworking main, so financial discipline had grown to be a thing of the past. Not so on another realm where you don't have a main, and I realized that unless I went back to a few monetary basics, my alts would wind up dancing naked on mailboxes in pursuit of gold. This is a fine tactic with a long and storied history, but when your most promising alt is a level 16 Undead Mage, you're up the proverbial creek. No one wants to see a rotting, naked corpse.So I started not being a deadbeat, and it was with surprise and delight that I logged on to find the little tyke sitting on a pretty respectable pile of gold by level 21 -- as in, he can afford to pay for his level 30 mount and training several times over, and still have enough left over to train himself all the way to 45 even if he doesn't make another penny.
Breakfast Topic: Lake Wintergrasp
Yesterday in our guide for Eternal Farming, it was made very clear that Wintergrasp is hands down the best spot for farming Crystallized Whatevers if you don't have Mining or Herbalism. That's not the only thing that's easily farmed there, either. It's packed full of herbs and ore. It's currently the only place in all of Northrend that you can find Frost Lotus nodes. Not just Frost Lotus dropping off of Icethorn or whatever, but actual Frost Lotus nodes.Now, I'm a PvE kiddie at heart. I'll PvP from time to time, but it's not exactly my favorite thing ever. I usually avoid it. Wintergrasp has totally sucked me in, though. The draw of riches has pulled me into the zone, and when the PvP starts it's legitimately fun. I originally thought it was silly that the best farming spot for everything was a PvP zone, but I've warmed up to it. I'm on a PvE server, but the element of risk and reward has become kind of exhilarating. I still have no interest on playing on a PvP server, however.
MapWoW maps Northrend
MapWoW is one of my favorite WoW resources online. I have to admit, I don't use it as much as some other helpers, but it's really well done -- someone put the Azeroth map inside the Google Maps interface, and added herbs, ores, flight paths and everything else you need to find on the map. If you've ever asked "where can I find..." in a chat channel, odds are that MapWoW had the answer already.And now they've got Northrend in the mix, ready to go for your exploring needs. It's a little spoilery, actually -- a pretty detailed bird's-eye view of all the new content in the expansion. They do have flight paths included, but they don't quite have herbs and ores uploaded yet -- we're told they'll be in soon.Don't get me wrong -- there's definitely something to be said for exploring: pretty soon, we'll have tagged and catalogued every single mob up there, so it is fun to just run around now while it's all still a new world. Don't depend on maps right away, because you never know what might be just around the corner in the land of the Lich King. But if you need it, there's your map.
Patch 3.0.2 guide to the new Gathering Profession Abilities
The new gathering profession abilities were undocumented in the patch notes, but they are definitely live in Patch 3.0.2. I was very pleased to discover that my Herbalist Druid has a new self heal and that my Skinner Rogue and Miner Paladin also had some unexpected goodies. Over the summer, Blizzard experimented with some abilities for all of the professions, but all that are live in the patch are the ones for the gathering professions. At least Mixology is trainable, and other ones may be available, though undocumented in the patch notes. This will be covered in a later post.Each ability can be found in your Spellbook under the General Skills tab. They have 6 ranks, with 5 being the maximum you are able to achieve before Wrath of the Lich King. The first rank is acquired with Journeyman or the skill of 75 and scales with your profession's rank. So, for example, a Master Herbalist will have Rank 5 of Lifeblood. Details for each ability are after the break.
Ask a Beta Tester: The Alchemist
Apologies to Paulo Coelho fans for borrowing his title, but we have two Alchemy-related questions to start us off today, in addition to questions on Blacksmithing, cinematics, and dailies: Horizons asks... Do the alchemy specializations in wrath still work the same way as they do now in BC? For example, will I still have a chance of getting 5 wrath potions even when I'm leveling starting at 375 such as Wrath Elixirs or Icy mana potions? And will transmute spec ever be fixed? Yup, alchemy specializations work the exact same way in Wrath. As a potions master, I've already procced a few, but don't expect to see the Runic Mana or Runic Healing potion recipes until...I want to say it's 410 Alchemy. You'll skill up on the array of new elixirs like Elixir of Mighty Thoughts and Elixir of Mighty Agility until then, but do save mats for the new Alchemy trinkets that become available at (I think) 400, like Mighty Alchemist's Stone. We'll have more information soon on materials you'll start getting in Northrend that you'll want to set aside for crafting.
Inscription details: Glyphs, runewords, and more
We found out a little bit about inscription and what materials it might need when the Wrath of the Lich King beta debuted last week, and yesterday we learned that they will be helping Enchanters use the auction house, but we were still left wondering about what was originally promoted as the central purpose of the new profession: enhancing spells. Thanks to the WotLK Wiki, we now have some information on that very intriguing functionality. Spells will be enhanced by Glyphs, which will be created by inscribers and will be tradable (though there may be some inscriber-only Glyphs). Glyphs come in three sizes: Minor, Lesser, and Greater. Minor Glyphs have small effects or cosmetic changes, Lesser Glyphs give moderate upgrades to spells, and Greater Glyphs give major upgrades to spells. Each character has six Glyph slots: two Minor, two Lesser, and two Greater. The screenshot shown here is the Glyph interface, available to every character. The slots at top and bottom are for Greater Glyphs, those at top-right and top-left are for Lesser, and the sad-looking ones at bottom-left and bottom-right are for Minor glyphs. There is an ability called Glyph Mastery that's categorized under Inscription which gives access to an additional Glyph slot for the inscriber, but it is unknown how this ability is attained. Maybe it's a specialization, like other professions have.
Passive buffs for gatherers
We've seen some interesting things come out of the Wrath beta already for some of the crafting professions, including Jewelcrafting, Alchemy, Enchanting, and the new Inscription. But what about us humble gatherers? Skinners, Herbalists, and Miners need love too. Well, it looks like Blizz is ready to give us some of that love, at least for Skinners and Miners. Check out the following spells: Toughness (categorized under Mining) Master of Anatomy (categorized under Skinning) Note that those buffs are passive. 35 stam all the time for all grand master miners, and 25 crit rating for grand master skinners. Each of those abilities have six ranks, which I take to correspond to the six ranks of profession skill: apprentice, journeyman, expert, artisan, master, and the new grand master. This is awesome stuff, if you ask me. My analysis is that these benefits are meant to stand in for the epic BoP items that the production professions get access to. Why there is no benefit for herbalism is something of a mystery; it might not be implemented yet, or it might be absent on purpose. Natalie pointed out that it might be because several herbs already give buffs when you pick them, so that's another possibility. I think these benefits are low enough that people with maxed-out professions aren't going to be dropping them just to get the extra 35 stam, but high enough to provide a meaningful, stabbity perk for those who've just about had it with skinning their ten-thousandth beast (who am I kidding, skinning is fun). Good change, and I do hope we see something for herbalism.
Making money along the way
My wife sold another Captured Firefly at the Auction House just a few minutes ago for 800 Gold. When I mentioned this in our virtual WoW Insider foxhole, Daniel remarked that he didn't have the patience to farm it. I don't have the patience to farm those things, either, but my wife surprised me by telling me that she doesn't farm for it. Instead, she makes it a point to kill all the Bogflare Needlers in Zangarmarsh on the way to her daily quests in Blade's Edge Mountains. She'll often end up with a bunch of Fractured Carapaces and Twitching Legs, but when she lucks out and gets the awesome pet, it's guaranteed Gold.I guess it's just a smart thing to do that I never really thought about. Killing those Needlers won't take most 70s too long and Zangarmarsh is along the way to Blade's Edge, anyway. Making a short stopover to take a chance on the Firefly is a prudent move as far as making money is concerned. It doesn't take too much time and the gray item drops are worth a decent amount when sold to vendors. Making money is easy if you make short stops along the way, such as fishing the pools of Pure Water on the way to wherever you're going for guaranteed Motes of Water. Engineers can do the same thing by extracting Motes of Air from the gas clouds in Nagrand while doing The Multiphase Survey in Osh'gun. Sure, they'll probably need to keep swapping goggles, but it doesn't hurt and gives players more loose change.
