The Care and Feeding of Warriors: Raiding Gear III the Gearening

And at last we finish our look at raiding gear, including emblem of valor and emblem of heroism gear. Last time while covering Naxxramas, we forgot (well, I forgot) to cover capes, so before we move on to Malygos and Emblem gear, we'll take a look at tanking and DPS capes for warriors in Naxx.

Naxx 10 provides three options for warriors: the Cloak of Armed Strife for tanking (dropping from Maexxna and Gluth, as we're by now used to), the Cloak of Darkening from Razuvious and Gluth as a DPS option, and finally Sapphiron drops the Cloak of Mastery for DPS as well.

Naxx-25 gives us the Shadow of the Ghoul, a very nice tanking cloak from trash, and the Cloak of the Shadowed Sun which drops off of four bosses. For DPS, we see the Drape of the Deadly Foe off of KT himself and the Aged Winter Cloak off of another quartet of bosses. This pretty much shuts the door on Naxx, allowing us to move on.

Before we get started, though, I should admit that I'm having one of my usual mood swings on the Horde/Alliance axis lately, so if I start posting a lot of pictures of a tauren here don't be alarmed. The fact that I'm done with raid content as a player and Ulduar is a ways away is also making me want to spend time Horde-side as well. Maybe get back to my prot roots. Maybe not, who knows?

Anyway, on to Malygos and Emblems.

The Eye of Eternity

Not to be confused with the Rock of Eternity, which is where the wizard Shazam hangs out and turns Billy Batson into Captain Marvel, the Eye of Eternity is where Malygos the Spell Weaver hangs out and turns Azeroth into a barren, lifeless ball of shattered rock. I wonder if they ever get each other's mail and have to bring it over.

Since this is a single boss fight, unlike Naxxramas, we'll just round up every drop of interest in 10 and 25 man and move on. For melee DPS, the only real options here are the Surge Needle Ring (boe, but very nice with hit, crit, ap) and Black Ice for arms warriors. Since druids can use polearms now, you'll be in contention against ret pallies, DK's, hunters and druids for it, and there's better weapons for you arms warriors in Naxx-10/25. Still, for completeness alone I mention it.

Tanking warriors will look at Hailstorm if they don't have better and it's not going to any rogues or hunters. It's a fast weapon with hit, agi and stam so while not loaded with defense or other pure tanking stats if you don't have better it's a pretty solid weapon for that role. However, tanks are really going to be looking to pick up Barricade of Eternity, one of the finest shields in game currently. It's simply astonishing.

Drops from 25 man Malygos of interest to warriors are the Mark of Norgannon, Legplates of Sovereignity, and the Melancholy Sabatons. The Mark of Norgannon is an incredible melee DPS trinket based solely on the amount of expertise on it, and the haste proc is simply very delicious frosting on an already kickass cake. The Legplates are very nice level 226 tanking legs, loaded with every stat you're going to want as a tank. And the Melancholy Sabatons are probably best in slot for a DPS warrior of either Arms or Fury, you'll most likely have all the hit you'll need on other gear.

These are basically all the pickings from Malygos, so I'm going to mention the rewards from the Focusing Iris quests. After killing Sapphiron in either 10 or 25 man Naxx you retrieve the focusing iris from his corpse, which leads Krasus to give you the quest to whack Maly. The rewards of interest to a warrior from the 10 man version of the quest are the Pendant of the Dragonsworn for DPS and the Drakescale Collar for tanking. The rewards for the 25 man version are the Nexus War Champion Beads for tanking and the Favor of the Dragon Queen for DPS. I'm generally a big fan of items with sockets since they provide viability for various options and that's the case here as well, these are all very nice.


Emblems of Heroism

My big complaint about Valor/Heroism purchases are that I don't think there are enough weapons, and the ones that are available tend to be offhand weapons of not much use to a warrior. Still, via emblems you can achieve a solid tanking or DPS neck, a shield, two pieces of 10 man Tier 7 and a very nice DPS or tanking trinket. So let's cover the options for Emblems of Heroism.

First off you can pick up the Chestguard and Gloves of the Lost Protector. This means that given sufficient time it's possible for you have 2/5 Tier 7 without ever setting foot into Naxx. It also means that a DPS warrior can get two solid tank pieces or a tank can pick up two solid DPS pieces without having to worry about drops. Tanks can also pick up the Chained Military Gorget, Crygil's Discarded Plate Panel, the Valor Medal of the First War and the Waistguard of Living Iron. These are definitely on par with 10 man Naxx drops/Heroic gear, giving you some flexibility if various other options just aren't dropping for you or allowing you to kit out an offset more easily.

Meanwhile, DPS will be able to fill their ranged slot with Lillehoff's Winged Blades, pick up an excellent DPS trinkey in the Mirror of Truth, their neck slot with the Pendant of the Outcast Hero and their waist slot with Verdungo's Barbarian Cord. I picked up several of these because I wasn't having good drop luck. The trinket is the best of the bunch, pick that up first.


Emblems of Valor

I'd really like to see a 2h weapon here: my drop luck in that area is simply abysmal. There's still quite a few options here for raiding, however, including some BoE options.

First off are the tokens for Valorous set pieces, the Legplates and Mantle of the Lost Protector. Since Emblems of Valor only drop in 25 mans there's no chance of getting these without running the big raids, but at least you can pick them up if your drop luck is bad or there's tons of competition for them.

Your BoE bracer options are the Bracers of Dalaran's Parapets for tanking and the Wristbands of the Sentinel Hunters for DPS. I believe they are so expensive entirely because they're BoE, allowing you to indirectly trade your emblems of valor for gear for an alt or cash money if you so choose.

The Platinum Mesh Cloak is a very nice tanking cape with a nice look and a really solid spread of tanking stats. Kyzoc's Ground Stompers are also fairly well itemized tanking boots, and the Signet of the Impregnable Fortress stands out as a balanced tanking ring as well. In general, the Emblem of Valor tanking gear seems to be itemized to work for just about anyone who tanks. It may bot be best in slot for a warrior tank for that reason, but it's usually solid.

The DPS options include the Bladed Steelboots (if you need hit and have the emblems there's not much better), the Hammerhead Sharkskin Cloak and the Ring of Invincibility. The cloak and ring are not optimal for a warrior, but they're still very solid pieces.


Okay, this covers the gear available through raiding, whether directly or indirectly. With the inclusion of Parts 1 and 2, we should be good to move on. See you next week!