valor-gear
Latest
Blood Pact: Reputable sources of warlock loot in patch 5.2
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Blood Pact for affliction, demonology, and destruction warlocks. This week, Megan O'Neill splits the warlock loot over two weeks to keep things light. Various people have been referring to Throne of Thunder as Thund'uar, a name I fully intend to steal and use. It's just a perfect blend of the new raid and its supposed raid model, Ulduar, with the expected troll-like apostrophe thrown in for good measure. But this week I won't be listing out the Thund'uar loot drops; I'll just drop in with a lighter piece covering gear miscellany and the new faction offerings. Next week, we can discuss how the PTR patch buffs and nerfs fit in with the expected performance of warlocks in Tier 15 while listing out the loot, instead of dropping a lump of lists in your lap.
Patch 5.2 valor gear not tied to dailies
Lead Systems Designer Greg "Ghostcrawler" Street recently tweeted the following: @stephenreis123 The 5.2 valor gear requires a rep, but it's not a rep you earn from dailies. (There is also a daily rep like in 5.1.) - Greg Street (@Ghostcrawler) January 12, 2013 This announcement will be music to the ears of many players who were not overly enamored with the gearing system at the start of Mists of Pandaria. Its focus on daily quests in order to purchase valor gear was a big change from Cataclysm, and not always popular, although it has many fans. Ghostcrawler is likely, though not certainly, referring to the Shado-Pan Assault faction. The patch 5.2 PTR notes had the following to say about this new faction: Join the Shado-Pan Assault in their singular drive to see Lei Shen, The Thunder King, defeated once and for all, and gain access to impressive Valor reward items. Reputation with this faction can be earned only within the Throne of Thunder raid dungeon. From this patch note excerpt and Ghostcrawler's tweet, it seems fairly likely that the reputation for the Shado-Pan Assault will be earned, not from carrying out quests within the raid, but simply from killing bosses and progressing. This is very similar to Firelands' Avengers of Hyjal, but the rewards earned from it will hopefully not purely be rings, trinkets, cloaks and belts.
Encrypted Text: Mists of Pandaria guide to a raid-ready rogue
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Encrypted Text for assassination, combat and subtlety rogues. Chase Christian will be your guide to the world of shadows every Wednesday. Feel free to email me with any questions or article suggestions you'd like to see covered here. I'm not a fan of gearing up. I hate watching my gear fade into obsolescence. I hate swapping out my legendary Fangs of the Father for a set of blue weapons that were given to me after I washed a few yaks and played the role of a pre-employment drug screener for some amped-up goats. Bill Gates infamously picks lazy people to do difficult jobs, because they'll find the easiest way to do it. I am that lazy person. I am always looking for the quickest way to get my rogue into raid-ready shape. The quicker that my rogue is geared up, the quicker I can get back to Eviscerating leveling players of the opposing faction. With a couple of weeks of grinding daily quests and some heroic dungeons mixed in, your rogue can be ready for the first tier of MoP raiding.
New craftables and valor BoEs for patch 4.3
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Gold Capped, in which Fox Van Allen and Basil "Euripides" Berntsen aim to show you how to make money on the Auction House. Feed Fox's ego by emailing him, tweeting him at @foxvanallen, or sacrificing your first-born to him. With every new patch comes new opportunity. And when patch 4.3 goes live today, there will be plenty of opportunity in the form of selling new i397 gear. But what's the right route to maximizing your profits? Tailoring snazzy new pants for the fashionable mage? Sewing wristpieces for all those boomkin who are really into leather? Or maybe you're going to trade comfort for fashion and have your blacksmith hammer out a pair of Truegold pants? Let's take a look at all your options, both crafted and BoE.
The Care and Feeding of Warriors: How to spend your valor points
Every week, WoW Insider brings you The Care and Feeding of Warriors, the column dedicated to arms, fury and protection warriors. Despite repeated blows to the head from dragons, demons, Old Gods and whatever that thing over there was, Matthew Rossi will be your host. Patch 4.2 is in full swing by now, with most players having unlocked either the Shadow Wardens or the Druids of the Talon for the various vendors. Many guilds are already working on heroic modes, and even more are fighting their way through the raid to one degree or another. And what does this all mean to us warriors? Well, it means new gear, for one thing. The past couple of weeks, we've discussed gear you could pick up in the Firelands raid itself as well as via reputation rewards and unlockable vendors (and a quest chain). Now, it's time to discuss what you can buy for valor points, since we're getting close to the third week and you should have been able to pick up some points as well as had a shot at Occu'thar. Before we go into the big list o' loot, I wanted to say that a couple of weeks in, I'm feeling like I'm getting a handle on how warriors perform in the Firelands raid. It's like I figured: Once again, warriors need to get geared up to equal other DPSers. I feel that for right now, arms DPS is the easiest to sustain, then SMF fury, and finally TG fury. I expect TG will pull ahead once I'm using a couple of Firelands weapons. On a fight like Rhyolith or Staghelm, I can sustain more DPS than on an Alysrazor or Shannox, where I have to target switch more, move around to chase down mobs or avoid damage and even interrupt. I think perhaps the nerfs to fury were more than was needed, but we'll see once a couple more weeks are gone and we're talking about set bonuses and Firelands level weapons. Speaking of set bonuses, let's start talking about valor point rewards.
Valor point awards for tier 12 bosses increased
There's terrific news this morning for those planning on raiding The Firelands when patch 4.2 launches: Blizzard has quietly increased the amount of Valor Points earned from downing tier 12 bosses and Occu'thar, the new boss in Baradin Hold. Patch 4.2 Public Test Realm Guide - [Updated 6/14] Valor & Justice Points The number of Valor Points awarded for killing a boss in the Firelands is 70 120 in 10-player mode, and 90 140 in 25-player mode. The number of Valor Points awarded for killing Occu'thar in Baradin Hold is 35 120 in 10-player mode, and 45 140 in 25-player mode. source The previous, lower values caused a lot of hand wringing on the official forums. As people rightly complained, they did not allow raiders to reach the weekly cap simply by running the new tier 12 content. Players would have to choose between five-man heroics and stale tier 11 content to cap their VP, something many considered a time-consuming tedium. The new values allow ten-man raiders to (almost) reach the new 960 980 point VP cap with a full clear of all new tier 12 content; 25-man raiders can reach the cap by beating any seven of the eight. The news is already rolling out for the upcoming WoW Patch 4.2! Preview the new Firelands raid, marvel at the new legendary staff, and get the inside scoop on new quest hubs -- plus new Tier 12 armor!
Lichborne: Tier 11 raid and valor point gear for death knights
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. Join World of Warcraft's first hero class as we head into a new expansion and shed the new kid on the block label. With 4.1 on the PTR, I've been hearing the usual grumbling. Why should we raid anymore? We'll just wait for the next tier of raiding and get all new good stuff. This argument always sort of strikes me as a little bit off, but it definitely doesn't apply to this patch. Not only is patch 4.1 heroic gear only going to be item level 353, but we won't get a new raiding tier until patch 4.2. That means you probably have multiple months left in which the best gear still comes from raiding tier 11 content. With that in mind, this week we'll look at all the item level 359 gear available in game and figure out what's best for the up-and-coming DPS death knight. This guide will primarily cover raid gear and valor point purchases, with BoE world drops and crafting and reputation purchases where they seem to fit well into the hierarchy of what to wear.
