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Category Archives: Death Knight

New Heirlooms in 4.3

01 Sep

In Patch 4.3 the Darkmoon Faire is going to get a nice little revamp (details here). I’ve never been too big on the faire beyond abusing the vendors there to get high selling mats for cheap vendor prices that I could toss on the AH for a quick, easy profit. My lack of interest almost made me ignore the information regarding the faire, but I was bored anyway (and about to leave work for the day) so I figured I might as well take a look.

Most of what the notes mentioned weren’t bad, but nothing that would get me otherwise interested in the DMF, until I stumbled onto this:

“We have adorable companion pets inludin’ a fez-wearing monkey, a plethora of profession recipes, toys, balloons, souvenirs, delectable carnival snacks and beverages, heirlooms for the little ones, and even replicas of long-lost suits of armor that we’re offering for your Transmogrification needs.”

Unfortunately for us, there’s no more mention of heirlooms in the article, so we don’t know for sure what it refers to. It could be new heirlooms, it could be existing heirlooms, or it could be other items all together that they simply used the word to describe. Without the details, one can only hope and imagine.

But wait… we do have details!

Not details about the DMF, but of heirlooms that have been sitting in the PTR database for over 8 months now. Heirloom Legs and Heirloom Rings, to be exact. I’ll throw out the disclaimer here, just in case you didn’t read the rest of this post: The heirlooms I’m about to mention have not been confirmed for patch 4.3 as of the writing of this post.

Heirloom Rings
There are four new heirloom rings in the Wowhead database that do not currently exist in the game. Each of these four puts the existing Dread Pirate Ring (DPR) to shame. So much so, in fact, that if you have access to any of these they will be better than the DPR even if you only have Strength rings and you’re playing a Mage.

I would like to see the DPR get an upgrade when/if these four do become available because of how much weaker it is in comparison. Whether or not they’ll do so remains to be seen, though I kind of doubt that they’ll change anything about it at all given that it’s from a previous expansion and an upgrade isn’t necessarily…well, necessary.

The important thing to note about these rings is that all of them are Unique-Equip, so you can’t wear two of the same ring. That’s not much of a problem for Strength-based melee classes since there are two Strength rings, and Agility-based classes aren’t too bad off since they can get at least some benefit from the Strength (Hunters less than others, of course). Casters get the short end here with only one ring that grants caster stats (sorry Healers, no Spirit here at all), so a second heirloom ring only benefits you so far as the secondary stats and stamina bonus are concerned.

Antique Myrmidon’s Signet: Strength, Stamina, Hit, Crit, +5% Exp
Burnished Dark Iron Ring: Strength, Stamina, Dodge, Expertise, +5% Exp
Gleaming Seal of the Archmagus: Stamina, Intellect, Crit, Haste, +5% Exp
Ornate Band of Accuria: Agility, Stamina, Crit, Haste, +5% Exp

Strength-based melee classes will want both the Antique and Burnished rings. Agility-based melee will want the Ornate and Antique rings. Hunters will want either the Ornate and Antique (Hit/Crit) or the Ornate and Gleaming (Crit/Haste) rings, but I’m not familiar enough with the Hunter to tell you exactly which one is better. All casters will want to use the Gleaming ring and either the Ornate (Crit/Haste) or Antique (Hit/Crit) depending on which secondary stats are more beneficial for their given class and spec.

Ring Enchants
There are a total of seven enchants that you can put on these heirlooms, and all of them require the character wearing the ring(s) to have the Enchanting skill and a skill level high enough to cast the enchant themselves (even if they don’t have the pattern themselves). Three of the enchants can be used with a skill level of 400, and the other four require 475.

The numbers in parenthesis below represent the Enchanting skill level required to activate the enchant.

Enchant Ring – Assault: (400) +40 Attack Power
Enchant Ring – Greater Spellpower: (400) +23 Spell Power
Enchant Ring – Stamina: (400) +30 Stamina
Enchant Ring – Agility: (475) +40 Agility
Enchant Ring – Greater Stamina: (475) +60 Stamina
Enchant Ring – Intellect: (475) +40 Intellect
Enchant Ring – Strength: (475) +40 Strength

Of the options available, you’ll get more use out of the first three options simply because of how many levels you can make use of them compared to the other four. As far as stats are concerned, the last four are definitely the more beneficial option as they’re roughly twice as good as the others.

Personally, I’d go with Greater Spellpower for the caster ring, and +40 Attack Power for all of the others. I would consider +30 Stamina for the tanking ring, though I’d probably stick with the attack power as I don’t often find Stamina to be high on my priority list while leveling.

Heirloom Legs
There are seven heirloom legs in the database, and up to this point we’ve had none. Legs can sometimes be a pretty hard slot to find upgrades for, so I’m pretty happy to see this slot get heirlooms. I couldn’t tell you how many times I’ve been to Outlands while still wearing level 20-30 legs.

There are Leg options for every class and spec. The stats that they offer follow the same pattern we’ve seen in the other armor heirlooms up to this point, so you’ll find that some pieces might not have the perfect stats for you but you’ll at least be able to find something that works well enough.

Tattered Dreadmist Leggings: [Cloth] Stamina, Intellect, Crit, Haste, +10% Exp
Preened Wildfeather Leggings: [Leather] Stamina, Intellect, Spirit, Crit, +10% Exp
Stained Shadowcraft Pants: [Leather] Agility, Stamina, Crit, Haste, +10% Exp
Mystical Kilt of Elements: [Mail] Stamina, Intellect, Spirit, Crit, +10% Exp
Tarnished Leggings of Destruction: [Mail] Agility, Stamina, Crit, Haste, +10% Exp
Burnished Legplates of Might: [Plate] Strength, Stamina, Parry, Hit, +10% Exp
Polished Legplates of Valor: [Plate] Strength, Stamina, Crit, Expertise, +10% Exp

Leg Enchants
There are a lot of options for leg enchants. The main question you have to ask yourself when deciding which you want to use is at which level you want to benefit from an enchant. The higher the level requirement, the larger the stat benefit (as you would expect), but of course the fewer levels you get to benefit from it.

If you’d like to take a look at the enchants available as a search, you can follow this link: Link. Just make sure there’s something inside that Source column, as those without a source are ones which can no longer be obtained. If you happen to have made/obtained some of those enchants back in the day when they were available then you can still use them, but I don’t expect many people at all to still have them sitting around (unless you’re an old school twink player). Also note that there are a few leg enchants that require an item level instead of, or in addition to, a character level and none of those can be used at all since heirlooms are considered item level 1.

In the list below, the number in (parenthesis) is the player level required to use the enchant. Rather than putting a full list here, I’ve gone through and listed the ones I’d particularly consider for my own heirloom legs. I’ve also categorized them by the types of bonuses that they give.

—Generic Bonuses—
Medium Armor Kit: (5) +16 Armor
Heavy Borean Armor Kit: (70) +18 Stamina
Savage Armor Kit: (78) +36 Stamina
Earthen Leg Armor: (80) +28 Stamina, +40 Resilience
Heavy Savage Armor Kit: (81) +44 Stamina

These will likely be the easiest for you to obtain as well as the cheapest. They all provide a decent bonus for their level range even if they’re not that impressive overall. If you’re planning to use them on low level twinks then only the Medium Armor Kit is useful to you, but if you’re going to level characters with them then you’re better off going for the Heavy Borean or Heavy Savage armor kits. If you really like PvP, then the level 80 Earthen Leg Armor is for you.

Personally, if I were going to choose between just these, I’d go for the Heavy Borean Armor Kit so that I could benefit from the enchant for 15 levels. However, I’d still prefer to pick an option that’s more class-specific from the lists below than any of these. But that’s because I’m a crazy min/maxing fool, and overall none of these bonuses are high enough for me to care about using them.

—Melee Bonuses—
Clefthide Leg Armor: (50) +30 Stamina, +10 Agility
Cobrahide Leg Armor: (50) +40 Attack Power, +10 Crit
Nethercraft Leg Armor: (60) +40 Stamina, +12 Agility
Nethercobra Leg Armor: (60) +50 Attack Power, +12 Crit
Jormungar Leg Armor: (70) +45 Stamina, +15 Agility
Nerubian Leg Armor: (70) +55 Attack Power, +15 Crit
Frosthide Leg Armor: (80) +55 Stamina, +22 Agility
Icescale Leg Armor: (80) +75 Attack Power, +22 Crit
Scorched Leg Armor: (80) +110 Attack Power, +45 Crit
Twilight Leg Armor: (80) +85 Stamina, +45 Agility

For your melee classes, I would lean towards the Attack Power/Crit options over the Agility/Stamina. The main reason for that is that Stamina isn’t that big of a deal for leveling, and the amount of AP you get from the Agility doesn’t match the amount given from the other options of the same level. If you choose to go for one of the level 80 enchants, then I might change my mind and go for the Agility instead (for Hunters, Rogues, and Shaman) since the stat does offer more than just attack power, but otherwise I’d stick to AP.

My personal preference for these would be Cobrahide, Nethercobra, or Nerubian; in that order. The difference between those three isn’t all that big, and there’s a 10 level difference between each of them. I’d lean more towards an enchant that gave me 35 levels worth of benefit over one that gave me only 15 levels worth and only 15 more Attack Power.

—Tanking Bonuses—
Core Armor Kit: (50) +5 Dodge
Vindicator’s Armor Kit: (55) +8 Dodge

The tanking enchants are available if you really want them. Personally, I’d just go for a melee enchant instead since the amount of Dodge on these things is so small. If you want survivability then go for one that offers Agility, otherwise stick to the AP/Crit options as I suggested for other melee classes. The only thing the AP/Crit gives you as a tank is better threat generation and easier solo play which may or may not be appealing to you.

Personally, I won’t bother with either of these for my tanks. I’d suggest you go with the melee enchants I listed above.

—Caster Bonuses—
Mystic Spellthread: (50) +25 Spell Power, +15 Stamina
Silver Spellthread: (50) +25 Spell Power, +15 Stamina
Golden Spellthread: (60) +35 Spell Power, +20 Stamina
Runic Spellthread: (60) +35 Spell Power, +20 Stamina
Azure Spellthread: (70) +35 Spell Power, +20 Stamina
Shining Spellthred: (70) +35 Spell Power, +20 Stamina
Brilliant Spellthread: (70) +50 Spell Power, +20 Spirit
Sapphire Spellthread: (70) +50 Spell Power, +30 Stamina
Enchanted Spellthread: (80) +55 Intellect, +65 Stamina
Ghostly Spellthread: (80) +55 Intellect, +45 Spirit

There are quite a few caster leg enchants available to you, though some of them require various reputation grinds to get their patterns (if you don’t already have them). There are also some Tailor-specific spellthreads that I have listed down below in case you’d like to consider those. If you like your casters to be tailors, then I’d definitely consider at least looking at them. Otherwise you’ve got plenty of options here.

Much like the melee enchants above, I would lean towards the level 50 versions myself for the sake of getting 35 levels worth of benefit from the enchant. In order of preference, I’d go Mystic/Silver, Golden/Runic, and then Brilliant. The one benefit of Brilliant over the others is that it gives Spirit rather than Stamina which is more appealing in my opinion (even for casters that get no benefit from Spirit beyond passive mana regen).

—Tailor-Only Bonuses— Number in parenthesis is the Skill Level required to activate
Master’s Spellthread (Rank 1): (405) +50 Spell Power, +30 Stamina
Sanctified Spellthread (Rank 1): (405) +50 Spell Power, +20 Spirit
Master’s Spellthread (Rank 2): (475) +95 Intellect, +80 Stamina
Sanctified Spellthread (Rank 2): (475) +95 Intellect, +55 Spirit

The tailor’s special spellthreads are quite good. While the Rank 2 versions are significantly more powerful than the Rank 1′s, I would still lean towards the Rank 1′s myself because of how much Frostweave it takes you to level from the 405 mark for Rank 1 to the 475 mark for the Rank 2. That’s a lot of cloth to farm for an upgraded enchant that you can only use for 11 levels. Especially for someone like me who rolls a lot of alts, as I’d have to level tailoring on every one of them if I wanted to benefit from these. If you’re an altoholic, these enchants probably aren’t the best option for you.

So my preference, if I was going to use any of these, would be Sanctified 1, Master’s 1, Sanctified 2. Personally, I roll too many alts to seriously consider any of these when other options exist that don’t force me into a specific profession to use them. Rings don’t have any non-Enchanter options so it’s either those or bust, but there are way too many leg enchants available for me to really consider these worth it.

Heirlooms Guide
If these heirlooms do end up confirmed for patch 4.3, then I will update my Guide to Heirlooms to include which rings, legs, and respective enchants that I would suggest for each class and spec just as I’ve done with all of the other heirlooms to date.

I would also like to take a moment to thank all of those who have sent me emails or who have left comments regarding how useful they’ve found the various guides that I’ve written here. The Guide to Heirlooms post has consistently been my most frequently visited post since just a few days after I wrote it, and I’ve gotten more emails from readers about that post than any other. So thank you, one and all.

 
25 Comments

Posted by on September 1, 2011 in Caster, Death Knight, Guide, Hunter, Leveling, Mage, Melee, Patch Notes, Rogue, Warlock, Warrior

 

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Critter Killer Squad

13 Jan

After a few conversations back and forth on Twitter, it was decided that I should be the one to do a post about tips for farming the Critter Killer Squad achievement for your guild by killing 50,000 critters collectively. Completing this achievement gives your guild members access to the Armadillo Pup companion pet, though you do have one heck of a rep grind to do with your guild before you can actually purchase and summon him. The current PTR patch mentions he’s purchasable at Revered once the patch goes live, but currently it’s Exalted.

This isn’t really a guide to show you how to do it, it’s merely a list of tips to help you along the way. I’m going to point out the primary locations for where I did most of my grinding as well as things you can do to help you out in your own.

General Tips

Classy Killers
The first thing to consider if you’re going to go on a critter farming spree is your class. If you don’t have good AoE spells, or you’re not able to “spam” your AoE spells, then you aren’t really an ideal farmer. That doesn’t mean you can’t do it of course, only that you could do better if you were a different class. Which class is the best Critter farmer in the game? Mages followed by Priests.

Mages are the best critter farmers because they have a cheap AoE spell that you can spam (no cooldown) and several ways of getting their mana back quickly and easily. By taking the Arcane spec they can reduce the cooldown of their best mana return, Evocation, to every two minutes. By taking the Fire spec they gain access to two more AoE spells that can be cast instantly on a targeted location. And they can always conjure their own food for free if mana returns get stuck on cooldown.

Priests have a similarly useful AoE, but mana can become an issue after sustained periods without as many ways of generating it back.

You can also do a fair job with a Death Knight if you take the Frost Spec, allowing you to cast two Blood Boils, and two Howling Blasts to clear large numbers of critters. The drawback is that Howling Blast does require you to select a target which can be hard if you’re having to click on some of these tiny critters. You can get around that either with a macro or by trying to click on other, larger targets to center it on. You can also use your “ice cubes” cooldown when it’s up, allowing Frost Fever to kill them.

Critter Killer “SQUAD”
The next thing to consider is whether or not other people in your guild are willing to help you. Why is that important? Because just like loot in dungeons or raids, you get credit for the kills as long as you’re in the area when they die. Credit in the case of critters is the kill count. What that means is that if you’re in a group then everyone who is there and within “reward range” of the critters when they die all get credit for it.

So if you’re in a group with another person for your guild then every critter killed counts as two critters because both of you are rewarded with a kill. If you’re in a group of five, then every critter counts as five. And if you’re in a 40 man raid, then every critter counts as 40 instead.

Remember, guild achievements aren’t meant to be accomplished by a single individual, they’re meant to be a group effort; that’s why they’re guild achievements. Get a group together for the areas you want to farm in and then go do them together. You can either send a large group, like the 40 man raid, to a single location, or you can do smaller parties or raids to several locations at once.

Uldum
Uldum: the land of sheep, moths, lizards and scarabs.

This is where most of the people who got this achievement first did their thing. There are two locations on the map where two groups of sheep spawn which make it an excellent zone to grab a few, quick kills from. When the expansion was first released killing these sheep forced more sheep to instantly respawn, making it the single-best location in the game to farm the achievement. Once Blizzard caught on though, they took away the respawn rate and now they respawn about the same as any other critter, though maybe a tad slower.

Those little packs of sheep are still a great source of kills though, so I still enjoyed farming them even after the respawn nerf.

Anywhere that you find green growth in the zone can also be home to moths which count for the achievement as well. If you happen to be an herbalist or a skinner then you’ll likely be farming these areas for your professions as well, and killing critters while you’re in the middle of farming something else anyway is a great way to contribute to the guild without going out of your way. The sheep don’t quite have enough time to respawn after a single path along the highest spawn points of Whiptail unless you manage to find several of the nodes and stop for moths along the way, but a double-path should have the big sheep packs back up for you.

If you’re a miner then you’ll often find along your mining paths here that there will be several groups of critters that spawn in groups of three and then spread out and “flee” when you get close to them. Drop down in the middle and fire off an AoE spell to grab your three kills and then return to your ore farming. Many of the ore nodes themselves are spawn points for these critters which you can use to some extent as a reference for a place to keep your eyes open for a node you’re not aware of.

I start my mining path just south of where the sheep spawn, at a point where I often find Pyrite nodes and then I run a path that takes me through both sheep spawn locations, up around where the Armadillo rare spawn is located, up into the western mountain ranges looping around the north side of the map all the way to the east where I also find several Pyrite nodes, and then I go back to the sheep spot. My mining path is significantly larger than my herb path, and the sheep have always respawned by the time I get back around.

You can also make a macro to “/target Strange Camel Statue” to search for the statue that gives you a chance at a camel mount. I haven’t had any luck with that one myself yet, but I’ve been told that’s the best way to find it since the statue can be targeted.

Zul’Gurub
Zul’Gurub: The raid that once was, land of the eternal snakes.

In Zul’Gurub you’re going to be killing snakes. Lots, and lots, and lots of snakes. Now, there aren’t all that many snakes that are actually there, probably only 25-30 in this particular area, but killing them forces more to spawn and they also have a fast respawn rate on their own. The key to getting them to spawn a lot is to make sure that you kill all of them, and doing that requires you to know where all of them are.

Go to the area marked on the map. You’ll find the section where the snake boss used to be located when ZG was still a raid instance. Now, back out of his room onto the main pathway that runs around the instance. There are 4 snakes that spawn right outside there; 2 are in line with the doorway and there is one slightly to both the left and right of the door. The doorway itself also has up to 3 snakes that can spawn inside it.

Now your objective is clear a ring around the entire area inside the snake bosses “room”. So go in the door and start making a circle around the edge, spamming your AoE the whole time. I prefer to turn right and go around counter-clockwise, but that’s just me. When you come around opposite the doorway to where the stairs are go on up and do the same thing there, spamming your AoE as you circle around the upper floor. Then go back down the stairs and finish your ring of the lower level by following it around and going back out the door.

From there it’s just a simple matter of repeating everything you just did. If you don’t kill all of the snakes then not all of them will respawn, that’s why I have you kill the ones outside the door. You can’t kill just the lower floor and outside the door, or the snakes will follow normal respawn rules. If you do take the time to get snake down in there then you’ll have a constant supply of snakes to kill.

As you path around here you’ll pick up on where all of the snakes are and get a feel for where you need to stand when you fire your AoE to kill the most snakes per cast, and you’ll find just how close you need to get to the edges of the room. Once you’ve got a feel for it you’ll be able to clear the place in no time and can probably develop a rhythm like I did where I didn’t even have to look at the screen anymore because I knew how far to turn in each direction in sequence to get to where I was going.

ZG farming gets old pretty fast, but it is effective and it’s your best source if you don’t want to deal with respawn rates. If you’re grinding the achievement with your guild you probably don’t want to bring more than 2-3 other people with you to this place. While killing does force respawns, there’s still a little bit of an actual respawn on the forced spawn as well which ends up giving you a slight delay followed by bursts of snakes in random places and it gets a little screwy.

Eastern Plaguelands
Eastern Plaguelands: Enough creepy crawlies to feed the entire goblin race for a decade.

Eastern Plaguelands is overall the best place for you to farm. It has more critters than any other location in the game now, and they all have a reasonable respawn rate of 3-5 minutes. The respawn timer kind of sucks, but the cave is large enough and there are enough critters in there to make up for it.

EPL comes with another side benefit though which helps with that respawn timer, and that’s farming for the Mr. Grubbs companion pet. The whole point of killing these critters is to open up another pet, so don’t try to tell me you’re not in it for pets. ;)

If you don’t already have Mr. Grubbs then go ahead and clear out the cave full of critters and then fly east and farm some mobs for a chance to get Mr. Grubbs. After a few minutes of grinding those, head back to the cave and kill some more, then grind Grubbs while you wait, and so on and so forth.

If you’re going to grind this achievement with your guild then this is the best place to do it in groups.

Psynister’s Psystem
I did a large portion of my guild’s critter farming solo, mostly because I had no idea at the time that doing it in groups could multiply your kill count. If I had known that then we would have gotten it way sooner than we did.

I started off farming the sheep in Uldum, pre-nerf, and not expecting a nerf to come for a while I mostly took my time with them and only did a few thousand at a time before going off to do something else. I don’t remember what our count was when the nerf hit, but I think it was around 10-12k at that point.

The nerf wasn’t a big setback though because I had found a location that was even better. I was leveling a Worgen Fury Warrior to become PvP twink when I suddenly found myself in a tunnel/hallway absolutely full of critters. I remembered it from the Beta but I had completely forgotten that the area existed. The great thing about this place was that the critters actually attacked you which mean that my Warrior had a never ending supply of Rage along with a never ending supply of critters, and a wonderful spell to dump that Rage into that just happened to be an AoE.

I farmed the crap out of that hall until all of my non-BoA gear was broken. Once it broke I set off to find myself a repair vendor so I could make use of my enchanted Hand-Me-Downs again, but none of them existed in the phase I was in. Sadly, neither did a mailbox so I couldn’t send the BoA’s to a new Warrior. The grinding was still great, but slower after all of my gear was busted so I took a break there for a while as well. The following week this place was nerfed as well so that the critters don’t count. Still, I’d managed over 20,000 kills there.

That left me with only a few options so I searched for other good places to go and stumbled onto the snakes in ZG. The good thing about them is that they do have an excellent respawn rate. The bad thing is, farming them kind of sucks with how spread out they are so you don’t get as many kills in as short of a time. And because of the layout I actually got bored with it easier than I did the others. I only did maybe 500-1,000 there before I got bored and left.

I then went to try my luck in EPL which is where I decided to spend most of my remaining time farming it. The respawn rate isn’t great, but the number of critters inside was fantastic. The respawn timer did make it boring pretty easily though, so again I only ended up with a little over 1,000 kills here at the time.

From there I left the achievement alone for a while at around 36,000 critters. From there I left it up to the rest of the guild for a while and we made decent progress from there. When I saw that we were within 5,000 of the achievement I went back to farming a bit more seriously and decided to beat the respawn timers by setting up a different toon in each of my three best farming locations and just relog each time I finished off an area. That worked for all of two cycles before I was killing them all too fast to really make it efficient. The DK in Uldum was doing good slaying sheep with Blood Boil and Howling Blast, but the Balance Druid kind of sucked in ZG with how much they were spread out and how much mana my non-cooldown AoE spells required to cast. The Mage was still slaying like crazy in EPL though, and eventually I just gave up on the rotation and stuck with Mage/EPL.

Quite a few members jumped in there at the end trying to finish off the achievement. At the very end, I saw two other people farming critters and only one of which was in a good spot (Uldum) for getting big numbers in a short amount of time. I’d worked so hard on the achievement though that I wasn’t about to let someone else finish what I’d started so I jumped back on the Mage for one final push through that EPL tunnel. I went in with 200 critters left on the countdown and started in.

I saw the numbers drop quickly, and just as we hit 13 I saw someone else in my tunnel doing the same thing. If he had been flagged, and on the opposite faction, I’d have killed him with AoE spells a’blazing, but that was not the case. Luckily I’d been through that stinking cave so many times that I knew all of the twists and turns and I knew there was a side passage to his right…and apparently so did he.

But, he wasn’t a mage.

/cast Blink
/cast Arcane Explosion (critter count: 3)
/cast Arcane Explosion (critter count: -7)

Now all I have to do is stop being such a friggin altoholic and focus on a single character long enough to get my rep high enough to buy the Armadillo. I’m not real big on companion pets, but still – I am a Texan, after all.

 
11 Comments

Posted by on January 13, 2011 in Death Knight, Mage, Priest, World of Warcraft

 

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Guide to Heirloom Purchases

30 Jul

Today we’re going to look at which heirlooms you should purchase for your leveling alts. A couple of weeks ago I covered Enchanting Your Heirlooms, so I’ll refer you back to that post if you have already purchased heirlooms and would like to look into the various ways that you can enhance their performance via enchants and item enhancements.

Equipment Lists
I’m going to make a list of heirlooms for each class individually, and I will mention certain items that would work better for certain specs as well. I will tell you right now though, that while I have leveled most classes to a significant leveling milestone, I have not played every class and every spec. So if you see me suggest an item for your class because I know you’re looking for Spell Power, but you feel it would be better for you to go with another because it has Spirit as well as Spell Power, then go with your gut as you may very well know that particular class better than I do.

What I am going to have is a list of weapons, chests, and shoulders for you to use in each of your different specs, and a (hopefully) short explanation of why. In some cases there may be multiple suggestions made for a particular slot, particularly when it comes to weapons. The reason for this will generally be because there are multiple builds that people use for that class, or because certain equipment options aren’t available until a higher level. A good example of this is the Enhancement Shaman who benefits more from a large two-hand weapon until level 40 when they can dual wield one-handers, or the Warrior who may dual wield one-handers until level 60 and then dual wield two-handers from there on.

Under each class header you’ll find the list of gear that I suggest and prefer. There will also be a Substitutions list which are items that I consider to be reasonable replacements for the items I suggest in case you already have some of those and would rather not purchase others, or in case you have more of one currency than another and can’t afford all of the recommended pieces.

If you would like to jump down to a specific class, you can click on one of the following links: Death Knight, Druid, Hunter, Mage, Paladin, Priest, Rogue, Shaman, Warlock, Warrior

Heirlooms for Heir’veryone
There are a few heirlooms that I’m going to list here instead of repeating them over and over on every single class: trinkets and rings. There is only one ring, and it’s not easy to get, so it’s obviously that ring or none as far as heirlooms go. Similarly, there are only three types of trinkets, one of which is strictly used for PvP due to limited usefulness in PvE, and the other two are pretty straight forward.

Rings
Dread Pirate Ring: Stam, Hit, Crit, +5% Exp

At this point in time there is only one heirloom ring, and this is it. Lucky for us every class can benefit from the bonuses it gives. Some classes benefit more than others, of course, but everyone can make use of at least something that it has to offer. The more attributes your class uses, the better off you’ll be of course, so Tanks and DPS will get more benefit than some Healers since the Hit is wasted on them, but otherwise it’s still a great addition for any of your alts.

Trinkets
Discerning Eye of the Beast: SP, 2% mana restore
Swift Hand of Justice: Haste, 2% health restore
Inherited Insignia of [Faction]: Resil, PvP Trinket

While there are three heirloom trinkets, only two of them would I really suggest you purchase if your goal is leveling. The Inherited Insignia is a decent purchase if you plan on doing a fair amount of PvP while you level, and it does have at least some use in PvE, but generally speaking it’s at the bottom of your priority list as even in PvP you’re better off spending the honor for a 2 minute cooldown trinket instead of this 5 minute one.

If your class uses Spell Power and/or Mana, then it’s a good idea to pick up at least one Discerning Eye, but if you never use mana or are playing a class that doesn’t have mana in the first place, then you’ll want to use dual Swift Hand trinkets instead. For some caster classes, such as Warlocks, it’s not a bad idea to run with dual Swift Hands on them as well since they have other means of restoring their mana and can get a lot of benefit from the SH’s Haste value and healing.

Classes that break the general rule of Swift Hand for melee and Discerning Eye for casters will have have that noted in their individual class sections.

Both the Swift Hand and Discerning Eye restoration abilities stack both with each other and with multiple copies of themselves. So if you wear one of each and kill a target that gives honor or experience, then you restore 2% of both health and experience. If you wear two of the same one then when you kill a target that gives honor or experience, then you will restore 4% of your health or mana, respectively.

Death Knight
Chest: Polished Breastplate of Valor
Shoulder: Polished Spaulders of Valor
2H Weapon: Bloodied Arcanite Reaper
1H Weapons: Venerable Mass of McGowan x2

I have personally rocked this combination with my Death Knight and found it to be an excellent setup. I didn’t have access to the dual Venerable Mass setup, but I really wish I would have. I did level up as a tank rather than DPS (for the most part), and I did a lot of switching back and forth between two-hand and dual wield while I did it. In the end I preferred dual wielding for trash tanking and two-hand for boss tanking, so if you’re planning on being a tank then you may want to look into purchasing all three.

Note: DK Runeforge enchants cannot be used on heirloom weapons at all.

Since Death Knights have no access to mana, don’t bother using a Discerning Eye for one of your trinkets. In fact, you may consider ignoring the heirloom trinkets all together and just sticking with the ones that the DK starts with and any upgrades you find while you level.

For substitutions I’m going to throw in the PvP Shoulders instead since they’re a bit “easier” to get because of their cost, and I have a couple of swords thrown in if you’re not a fan of the maces. The Repurposed Lava Dredger is your optional two-hand replacement if you’re looking to level up as DPS.

Substitutions: Strengthened Stockade Pauldrons, Venerable Dal’Rend’s Sacred Charge, Battleworn Thrash Blade, Repurposed Lava Dredger

Druid
—Balance—
Chest: Preened Ironfeather Breastplate
Shoulder: Preened Ironfeather Shoulders
Weapon: Dignified Headmaster’s Charge

I didn’t have the leather caster heirlooms yet when I leveled my druid, so she was leveled with cloth heirlooms instead. But, the stats on them are exactly the same except for the Armor value which is only different because of the types of armor. I also did not, and still do not, have a Headmaster’s Charge so I used the PvP staff instead. The stats on the two are very similar, but the DHC is more balanced for PvE leveling.

Balance Druids are very well known for having big mana problems during the leveling process, so I suggest you go with dual Discerning Eyes and skip the Swift Hands if you plan to stay Balance. I also strongly suggest that if you’re going to level Balance, that you go with the +22 Intellect enchant on your staff rather than the +30 Spell Power, because you will have mana issues while you’re leveling.

For substitutions I list the cloth caster pieces, the leather PvP caster shoulders, as well as the other staff. Any combination of these will work, the ones listed above just happen to be more optimized for leveling than the substitutes.

Substitutions: Tattered Dreadmist Robe, Lasting Feralheart Spaulders, Grand Staff of Jordan

—Feral—
Chest: Stained Shadowcraft Tunic
Shoulder: Stained Shadowcraft Spaulders
Weapon: Repurposed Lava Dredger

Feral gear is all about Agility, Attack Power, and Armor Penetration and this is the set you’re going to get that from. Your armor choices are really limited since there’s only one leather-wearing class after level 40, so these are basically what you’re left with.

For Feral you’re definitely going to want dual Swift Hands if you have them rather than bothering with any Discerning Eyes, the haste and health restoration will be far more beneficial to you.

The subs include the other leather heirlooms so that you’re getting leather armor values at the very least, and various one-hand weapons that can serve you well too. Using a one-hand over two- does give you the option of using off hand items. While there are not heirloom off hands right now, there are several that you can find, purchase, or have crafted during the leveling process. If you do use a one-hand weapon, you should probably seek some of these out, preferably ones with either bonus stats or ones that have abilities that can proc during combat.

Substitutions: Preened Ironfeather Breastplate, Lasting Feralheart Spaulders , Preened Ironfeather Shoulders, Venerable Mass of McGowan, Balanced Heartseeker, Sharpened Scarlet Kris

—Restoration—
Chest: Preened Ironfeather Breastplate
Shoulder: Preened Ironfeather Shoulders
Weapon: Dignified Headmaster’s Charge

The Restoration set is exactly like the Balance, as are the substitutions.

As far as trinkets go, you’ll probably never really need the healing from the Swift Hand, but the Haste stat that it provides is excellent and works very well with your HoT’s. Resto is well known for not having mana problems very often, but Spell Power is your primary stat. Because of all of this, I suggest that Resto Druids either run with one of each of the restorative heirloom trinkets, or double up on the Discerning Eyes.

Substitutions: Tattered Dreadmist Robe, Lasting Feralheart Spaulders, Grand Staff of Jordan

Hunter
Chest: Champion’s Deathdealer Breastplate
Shoulder: Champion Herod’s Shoulder
Ranged: Charmed Ancient Bone Bow
Weapon: Balanced Heartseeker x2

This is your optimal setup for the hunter. If you decide to roll a Hunter prior to Cataclysm, then you’ll also want to run with two Discerning Eyes rather than Swift Hands, because a Hunter typically takes very little damage while using a great deal of mana. It’s not hard at all for them to get that mana back once certain spells become available, but it’s better to have reduced downtime in my opinion. The haste from Swift Hands does have it’s benefit as well, the heal just happens to be wasted in most cases. After Cataclysm, you’re no longer going to use mana in the first place, so the Swift Hands would be the clear choice.

If you’re deciding to go Marksman in your build, then you may also consider using a Dignified Headmaster’s Charge with the +22 Intellect enchant on it as the Int is converted to Attack Power for you. It won’t be too long after level 20 though that the dual Heartseeker’s with +15 Agi becomes a more powerful setup.

Subs include the leather-only versions of your armor or the PvP version of the leather/mail shoulders, the PvP ranged weapon, and the second best melee weapon for hunters in general.

Substitutions: Stained Shadowcraft Tunic, Prized Beastmaster’s Mantle, Stained Shadowcraft Spaulders, Upgraded Dwarven Hand Cannon, Venerable Dal’Rend’s Sacred Charge

Mage
Chest: Tattered Dreadmist Robe
Shoulder: Tattered Dreadmist Mantle
Weapon: Dignified Headmaster’s Charge

There’s not a whole lot of wiggle room for cloth casters right now.

As far as trinkets go, use whichever setup works for your playstyle. I’m an AoE grinding fool while I level so I’d run with dual Swift Hands for the Haste. Discerning Eyes would provide a great benefit both in spell power and mana restoration, but I’m not bothered nearly so much by downtime taken for drinking as most other people are. Not when I’m on a mage that can conjure his own water at will, anyway.

Substitutions include basically the only two other choices you have available to you. None of the other weapon types we have access to are for casters, so what you see is what you get.

Substitutions: Exquisite Sunderseer Mantle, Grand Staff of Jordan

Paladin
—Holy—
Chest: Mystical Vest of Elements
Shoulder: Mystical Pauldrons of Elements
Weapon: Devout Aurastone Hammer

I’m going to suggest a Leather/Mail chest and shoulder pieces, even though I don’t like doing that. The reason for that is that the plate heirloom pieces really don’t give you the stats you’re looking for. The PvP Plate shoulders aren’t too bad, but they don’t offer any Intellect where the mail ones do. Paladin’s don’t get the chance to wield a staff, so you’ll have to accept the maces as your caster weapons of choice. The list of decent caster shields while leveling kind of sucks, and sadly they haven’t given us access to an heirloom shield yet.

While I have leveled a paladin, I have not leveled one as a healer, so I would suggest doubling up on Discerning Eyes for your leveling purposes. One of each trinket would probably be a decent idea as well, though I’d probably stay away from dual Swift Hands.

Substitutes include the leather caster pieces as well as the plate pieces in case you just want to stick to your primary armor type. The PvP caster mace is also acceptable as a substitute since it’s the only other weapon you’d really benefit from.

Substitutions: Preened Ironfeather Breastplate, Polished Breastplate of Valor, Pristine Lightforge Spaulders, The Blessed Hammer of Grace

—Protection—
Chest: Polished Breastplate of Valor
Shoulder: Strengthened Stockade Pauldrons
Weapon: Venerable Mass of McGowan

As Crit is not a huge stat for a Prot Pally, I’m going to suggest you go with the PvP shoulders instead, which trade Crit for Resilience. Resilience is a PvP stat, but it does have some impact on damage taken in PvE as well, so I consider them to be a bit better overall. Weapon choices are very open here. I’m going to suggest the Venerable Mass based purely on the stats that it gives. Stamina and Agility are both useful for a tank, even though the Crit is kind of wasted.

Trinkets can go both ways. I would probably take one of each for a Prot build, though possibly dual Discerning Eyes below level 40 and then maybe switching to dual Swift Hands afterward. Playing it safe, I’d say one of each.

Subs include other pieces of plate that are also decent choices for a Prot Pally as well as the Thrash Blade in case you’re really into AoE grinding like I am. The Thrash Blade’s extra attack procs will trigger your Judgement abilities which make it a great choice for grinding. The proc rate isn’t super high, but it does become more common as you get higher in level. I also list other weapons that I would consider decent for Prot.

Substitutions: Pristine Lightforge Spaulders, Polished Spaulders of Valor, Battleworn Thrash Blade, Venerable Dal’Rend’s Sacred Charge, The Blessed Hammer of Grace

—Retribution—
Chest: Polished Breastplate of Valor
Shoulder: Polished Spaulders of Valor
Weapon: Bloodied Arcanite Reaper

Ret is all about laying the smack down, so we’re going for melee stats with this setup, and here you have the best of those options. I’ve done some Ret leveling with this setup myself, but I’m waiting to level a Pally until Cat, so I didn’t take him very far into his 20′s. However, I have played high level Ret, so I’m familiar with the style and the desired stats.

For trinkets I would probably go for one of each, though in some cases I could see the benefit of doubling up with either one. Personally, I’d got for one of each.

Subs include the PvP shoulders and a couple of alternative weapons. For melee classes that use two-handed weapons that rely on straight damage dealt, the Arcanite Reaper is the best BoA weapon for you, where classes that rely on melee to deliver bleed or disease type damage need Armor Penetration to increase that secondary damage. The Truesilver Champion is acceptable, but of all the BoA weapons it’s the one I care about the least and have no intention of purchasing.

Substitutions: Strengthened Stockade Pauldrons, Repurposed Lava Dredger, Reforged Truesilver Champion

Priest
Chest: Tattered Dreadmist Robe
Shoulder: Tattered Dreadmist Mantle
Weapon: Dignified Headmaster’s Charge

Default cloth caster setup once again. Being a big fan of leveling clothies, I’m really flipping tired of seeing that purple robe.

If you have access to the Inscription profession, or don’t mind making a few purchases from the Auction House, you may want to consider switching the staff out for one of the maces. You can find a list of all of the Inscription-made off hand items in this list.

For trinkets I would run dual Discerning Eyes on a Priest. But, I’ll tell you right now that my priest leveling experience only goes up to level 40.

Subs include a couple of extra one-hand weapons since priests can use maces. Both of these provide decent caster bonuses and also include MP5 in case you’re looking for some extra. If off-hand items were a bit more common, and had a bit better stats, I’d probably be more excited about using the maces over a staff, but since that’s not the case I’ll take a staff first.

Substitutions: Exquisite Sunderseer Mantle, Grand Staff of Jordan, Devout Aurastone Hammer, The Blessed Hammer of Grace

Rogue
Chest: Stained Shadowcraft Tunic
Shoulder: Stained Shadowcraft Spaulders
MH Weapon: Venerable Mass of McGowan
MH Dagger: Balanced Heartseeker
Off Hand: Sharpened Scarlet Kris
Ranged: Charmed Ancient Bone Bow

If you’re not going to use a build that focuses on using a dagger in your main hand, then you want the Venerable Mass in your main hand for max damage. If you do want to use abilities like Backstab and Ambush often, then you’ll want to roll with the Balanced Heartseeker instead with it’s high damage and stats. Regardless of which style of main hand you go for, you’ll get the most damage overall from having the Sharpened Scarlet Kris as your off hand weapon. As far as armor goes, you don’t have a whole lot of choice and these are your best options either way. As a Rogue you’ll rarely use your ranged weapon, but the stats on the bow outweigh the stats on the gun.

Note: As temporary “enchants” a Rogue can use their poisons on BoA weapons in addition to having them permanently enchanted with actual enchants.

Since you don’t have any use for mana or spell power as a Rogue, your trinkets are clearly dual Swift Hands.

Substitutes are other weapons that have some amount of value to them. If you see a weapon listed here that’s also listed in the main suggestions up above, it’s because I’m listing it as an alternative to a different slot, such as off hand vs. main hand, and so on. Weapons suggested for that reason will have the slot I suggest them for in parenthesis.

Substitutions: (MH) Venerable Dal’Rend’s Sacred Charge, (MH) Battleworn Thrash Blade, (D) Sharpened Scarlet Kris, (OH) Balanced Heartseeker, (OH) Battleworn Thrash Blade, Upgraded Dwarven Hand Cannon

Shaman
—Elemental—
Chest: Mystical Vest of Elements
Shoulder: Mystical Pauldrons of Elements
Weapon: Dignified Headmaster’s Charge

With the poor choice of off hand items while leveling, I consider this to be your optimal Elemental setup. If you can find good caster shields or off hand items, then it may be worth your time to switch to one of the maces I have listed as a substitute, but for the most part you’ll get better stats overall from the DHC.

Note: A Shaman’s temporary weapon enchants (default Flametongue for Elemental) do stack with permanent enchants, and can be used on BoA weapons.

If you have access to the Inscription profession, or don’t mind making a few purchases from the Auction House, you may want to consider switching the staff out for one of the maces. You can find a list of all of the Inscription-made off hand items in this list.

Trinket recommendations are going to be dual Discerning Eyes first, followed by one of each. I haven’t leveled very far yet as Elemental, but I’m going to say that I don’t think you’re going to be so addicted to Haste that you would need to have dual Swift Hands, but that could be my lack of high level Ele’xperience talking there.

Subs include leather armor pieces, and cloth pieces as well though I don’t have them listed. If you do manage to get your hands on some solid off hand items or shields for Elemental, then switching to one of the maces might be an option for you, but you’ll probably have higher stats overall going with a staff.

Substitutions: Preened Ironfeather Breastplate, Tattered Dreadmist Robe, Aged Pauldrons of the Five Thunders, Grand Staff of Jordan, Devout Aurastone Hammer, The Blessed Hammer of Grace

—Enhancement—
Chest: Champion’s Deathdealer Breastplate
Shoulder: Champion Herod’s Shoulder
Two-Hand: Bloodied Arcanite Reaper
Dual Wield: Venerable Mass of McGowan

Enhancement is all about melee, and yet…not, at the same time. You end up being an odd hybrid that in some ways is similar to a Death Knight. About half of your damage in later levels is going to be melee and the other half spell casting, so you want to keep a nice balance in your stats. Starting out you want to use a big, slow two-handed weapon so the Arcanite Reaper is your weapon of choice prior to dual wielding. Once you can dual wield it’s Venerable Masses all the way.

Note: A Shaman’s temporary weapon enchants (default Windfury for Enhancement) do stack with actual weapon enchants, so you can use both at the same time.

Trinket selection for Enhancement can vary a lot in different level ranges. You probably won’t have too much problem with mana until you get to your 30′s or 40′s, but you’re not too big on haste until high levels either. Personally, I’d probably go with one of each during the whole leveling process, but it’s hard to say really. I know I’ve had times that dual Discerning Eyes would have been amazing, while at others if I’d had just a little bit of healing I could have done some crazy pulls. Overall, I’m going to suggest one of each.

The Subs list is large for the shaman. For the most part, I’m looking at leather melee gear and a few other weapon options. Before you can dual wield staves are actually very strong melee weapons. They have slow speeds and high attack powers which make them very effective in the hands of a Shaman. I also noted the Scarlet Kris because some people prefer to use a fast off hand with Flametongue on it instead of dual Windfury enchants. I’m a Windfury man, myself, so I’ll roll with the dual Venerable Mass, dual Windfury setup.

Substitutions: Stained Shadowcraft Tunic, Stained Shadowcraft Spaulders, Prized Beastmaster’s Mantle, Exceptional Stormshroud Shoulders, Repurposed Lava Dredger, Dignified Headmaster’s Charge, Sharpened Scarlet Kris

—Restoration—
Chest: Mystical Vest of Elements
Shoulder: Mystical Pauldrons of Elements
Weapon: Dignified Headmaster’s Charge

Restoration, for the most part, is going to look for the same stats and Elemental, so we’re going with basically the same setup here. As with so many of the other classes, I’m recommending you use a staff instead of a mace because of the poor selection of shields and off hand items.

Note: A Shaman’s temporary weapon enchants (default Earthliving for Restoration) do stack with permanent enchants, and can be used on BoA weapons.

If you have access to the Inscription profession, or don’t mind making a few purchases from the Auction House, you may want to consider switching the staff out for one of the maces. You can find a list of all of the Inscription-made off hand items in this list.

While I have never leveled Restoration, I have played as high level Resto and would suggest that for leveling you stick with dual Discerning Eyes. By the time that Haste is necessary for you you’ll most likely already be looking at permanent replacements for your heirlooms anyway.

Subs include leather armor pieces, and cloth pieces as well though I don’t have them listed.

Substitutions: Preened Ironfeather Breastplate, Aged Pauldrons of the Five Thunders,
Grand Staff of Jordan, Devout Aurastone Hammer, The Blessed Hammer of Grace

Warlock
Chest: Tattered Dreadmist Robe
Shoulder: Tattered Dreadmist Mantle
Weapon: Dignified Headmaster’s Charge

Again, we have the generic cloth caster setup. Really nothing new here at all.

Note: A Warlock’s temporary weapon enchants (spellstones and such) do stack with permanent enchants, and can be used on BoA weapons.

Trinkets can go however you want them to for a Warlock. Affliction would probably benefit the most from dual Swift Hands because haste and health regen are very important to them, Demo is kind of half and half, so I’d probably go one of each for that build, and Destro is all about burning things down before it matters so I’d run with dual Discerning Eyes as Destro. Regardless of your build, Warlocks benefit well from either of them, so go with whichever setup you feel benefits you the most for your style of play.

Subs include the PvP armor and weapon options.

Substitutions: Exquisite Sunderseer Mantle, Grand Staff of Jordan

Warrior
Chest: Polished Breastplate of Valor
Shoulder: Polished Spaulders of Valor
2H Weapon: Bloodied Arcanite Reaper
DW Weapons: Venerable Mass of McGowan
Ranged: Charmed Ancient Bone Bow

Basic Plate wearing melee DPS setup here. If you’re going to stick to two-handed DPS then the Reaper is the weapon for you. Arms may get more benefit from the Lava Drudger’s Armor Penetration, which is why it’s listed as a Sub. If you’re going to be Protection or going to dual wield, then you’ll want to use the Venerable Mass for the best overall damage. If you are Fury then you’ll want to dual wield Venerable Mass while leveling, and then switch to dual wielding Arcanite Reapers once you have Titan’s Grip and can use dual two-handed weapons. The ranged weapon is not crucial for Warriors, but the bow gives better overall stats than the gun.

As another non-mana using class, it’s dual Swift Hands or nothing.

Subs are mostly leather and mail armor pieces that would be suitable for non-Protection warriors. Prot Warriors will want to stay in the best armor they can find, and so should not use Leather beyond their mid 20′s if possible.

Substitutions: Stained Shadowcraft Tunic, Champion’s Deathdealer Breastplate, Strengthened Stockade Pauldrons, Prized Beastmaster’s Mantle, Stained Shadowcraft Spaulders, Venerable Dal’Rend’s Sacred Charge, Repurposed Lava Dredger, Reforged Truesilver Champion, Upgraded Dwarven Hand Cannon

 
19 Comments

Posted by on July 30, 2010 in Caster, Class, Death Knight, Druid, Guide, Hunter, Leveling, Mage, Melee, Paladin, Play Styles, Priest, Rogue, Shaman, Warlock, Warrior

 

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How To: Deleting Level 80 Toons

02 Jun

A subject that I get endless laughter out of on Twitter or in Vent is the deletion of level 80 toons. I’ve deleted two level 80 characters so far, and I have no doubt that there will be others in my future as well. Deleting characters has never bothered me because, as I’ve stated several times before, I play to level. Once a character hits the level cap the game doesn’t “start” for me, it ends. I don’t care about gearing them up, doing dailies for gold, building my rep, collecting mounts and tabards, or anything else that people do at level 80.

One way you can look at it is that the Experience bar on my toons is a representation of my personal Enjoyment bar. The more it moves, the more fun I have. Once I ding and that bar resets I’ve got a whole new bar full of fun to go play around with. But once that bar stops moving, so too does my enjoyment with that character. Now, I do have an exception to that which is raiding with my guild, but I only do that on one of my toons. Right now that one toon happens to be my Mage, but he may very well get replaced with a healer before too long.

So now that you’ve got the backstory that nobody asked for let’s get down to business; shall we?

Deleting max leveled toons is something that makes most players cringe. They just can’t stand the thought of throwing away all that time and effort that it took. For me of course, it’s just another day and another toon.

Steps For Deletion
When you delete a high level toon for the sake of deleting them rather than for something like closing your account and rage quitting or whatever.

Check the Auction House: A lot of players do all of their AH business on a single toon, which is my preferred method. If that’s the case with you then you can skip this step unless (obviously) this is the toon that you do it on. The first thing you want to check is whether or not you have any gold coming in from sells. If so then you know you need to wait to delete until after you get the gold for those items. If a bid was placed then you’ll need to wait for one hour after the auction time, where a buy out will come in approximately one hour after it was purchased. For all other items you have on there you want to just cancel the auctions so that you can get the items back and then send them to another toon to sell or just vendor them.

Clear Out Your Bank: First thing’s first, you need to send all your valuable goods to another toon, preferably your bank alt or your main character, or something along those lines. If you send items in the mail then you can immediately delete the toon and still get the items in the mail, but if you put something on the AH with them then you lose any items or gold from selling them. If there are Soulbound items in there then you should vendor them all or delete them if they cannot be sold.

Everything else should be sent to another character. If you have crafting mats for that toon then you may want to take one last run through your profession to make whatever might be more profitable crafted than as raw mats. If you have any items in your bags or bank that are for quests that you can’t immediately turn in, then delete them.

Spending Currency: The first thing you want to do is take advantage of all your currency. That means raid/heroic emblems, stonekeeper shards, honor points, etc – basically everything except for your gold. Spend it either on things that you can sell or things that can benefit your other characters. In my case I spent my emblems of Frost/Triumph on Crusader Orbs that I sent to my bank alt to sell on the AH. My Stonekeeper’s Shards and Wintergrasp Marks were turned into Wintergrasp Commendations which bind to your account and grant 2,000 Honor when used.

I used the honor tokens to bump Psynister’s honor to get close to a multiple of 10,000 and then ran one quick battleground for enough honor kills to get the last 250′some honor to bump me over the 10k mark (50k in his case) rather than spend one of the commendations for 2k and then not use 1,750 of it. The honor points were then used to purchase epic gems from the vendor in Stormwind which I sent as raw gems rather than cutting them myself before I deleted him.

Also, since Psynister was a 450 Jewelcrafter I did his daily JC quest and turned the token in for a Dragon’s Eye that I also sent to have auctioned since the gems you cut from it all bind on pickup. The final currency he had available to him was the gold itself which I did not spend since it can be spent by any toon.

Selling Your Gear: Deleting a character with all their gear on is like throwing away gold, so be sure to find yourself a vendor and sell everything you’re wearing that’s not transferable to another toon (such as BoA Heirlooms). The whole point here is to not waste resources. You might be deleting the character and thus “wasting” the time and effort put into the character, but for me I got paid back for that with entertainment and the rest is just icing.

Mail Your Spoils: Finally you need to send everything you’ve got left to another character. I personally use my main character as my AH character and have my bank alt simply hold things for me so that I’m not bothered with logging into them all the time. Send everything that you kept from your bank/bags and everything that you got from cancelling auctions and so on, but don’t send your gold just yet.

Sell Your Bags: We’re here to milk it for everything it’s worth so be sure to sell your bags after you’ve gotten rid of all of your other items. If your bags aren’t soulbound then you can send them in the mail as well, otherwise you’ll need to just vendor them.

Send Your Gold: And finally you need to send all of the gold that you have to your other character as well.

Walkthrough
Now that all of your resources have been spent and all your goods have been sent off to other characters to hold or dispose of, it’s time to get down to business and delete the toon. All it takes is a quick log out, click the delete button, type in the word “delete” to confirm, and then click on “Ok”. It’s as simple as that.

To give you a better idea of how it’s done I went ahead and put it into a video for you. I realize that the audio in the video is insanely low compared to what it was when I uploaded it, so something apparently went a little off during the upload or something. I might fix it, might not. Anyway, my apologies for the crappy sound.

 
15 Comments

Posted by on June 2, 2010 in Death Knight, Guide, World of Warcraft

 
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