Leatherworking

[Stabface]

Thats a bunch of gold and your forgetting the time and cost to get LW to 375 on the entire group. Grinding 75k honor doesnt take that long. You kill 2 birds with one stone.. Pvp gear and heroic gear all in one package. Plus you get to save your gold for xpac. Spend less time getting geared up and more time doing heroics and such with your shiney new gear. I have watched guys take their team and farm honor then shortly turn around and blow through every instance heroic on mag. It's the most effecient way to do it. There are 3 guys in The Zerg that walk through heroics after they pvp geared their shaman. Lawl, Azq and Res. Azq geared up so fast it wasnt even funny. I see him one day and the next he has all pvp gear and dragons. He is crazy. I made the mistake of only making 3 shaman. Well my other two are 69 now so I plan on joining the fellas in The Zerg with their uber pvp/heroic gear and bank accounts.

/facepalm
So how much gold do you get from PvPing? Rather, after grinding out PvP epics vs grinding out LW epics, how much more gold is the PvPer going to have?

Again, if you are going to mostly focus on PvP then yes it makes sense to go PvP for gear as the PvE LW gear is not good for it.
Otherwise LW is better in the long run as you get more benefits (drums are awesome, armor kits make $$, etc) and have something to build from once WotLK hits and obsoletes all our gear.

[Stealthy]

Again, if you are going to mostly focus on PvP then yes it makes sense to go PvP for gear as the PvE LW gear is not good for it.

Until Wrath hits and you start all over again... wasting that 1 - 2 month grind for S2 gear.

Ya, good plan.

The only "plan" that would make sense if you were REALLY into PvP would be to grind max honor points and marks and then bank them until you hit 80... then you could just right into the game when you reach level cap....

Because leatherworkers receive free upgrades to all their crafted gear in WotLK AMIRITE? The fact is, regardless of whether you get your gear through crafting or PvP, you will still have to grind it out to get it in WotLK.

While PvP might be the more boring of the two grinds, at least the gear is updated more often (how many new LW recipes added in since BC introduced?). There is also an opportunity cost with LW, since it requires giving up one of only two profession slots (2 on one toon at least, since you'll need skinning).

Just my 2c worth. :P



Cheers,

S.

[Ken]

I think most people are completely overlooking a major aspect here.

Grinding PvP Honor for S2 gear = 100% wasted time when WotLK hits in a couple of months. Seriously, it all goes to waste.You can't even disenchant or sell the shit

Grinding LWing (without even making the epic set) = Maxed tradeskills and ready to keep on going when WotLK hits. NOT WASTED TIME.

I pointed this out on my very first post, but I think everyone failed to read it. (seriously, its in the 2nd post in this thread... go back and read it)

The disenchant/sales value of these epics will be worthless compared to what you paid for getting those items(or what you missed by not selling the primals etc.).
Grinding LW without getting the set is indeed not wasted time.

[Memn]

The gear grind is a grind, no matter your route. Here's my route for my 2nd team:

• Do the daily BG everyday, the bonus honor makes it a decent honor per hour, and its good PvP practice. Even if your not interested in PvP, it will make you a stronger player.
• Do an hour or so of money dailies, its over quick, and its bearable.
• Scan the AH for primals each day / crafting matts everyday, my server never has enough.
• If I still have more time, I raid with my guild, or box a heroic (if I can... my dps still lack heroic quality gear).

Take the daily efficiency bonuses to each path, and avoid the grind.

[Stabface]

Because leatherworkers receive free upgrades to all their crafted gear in WotLK AMIRITE? The fact is, regardless of whether you get your gear through crafting or PvP, you will still have to grind it out to get it in WotLK.

While PvP might be the more boring of the two grinds, at least the gear is updated more often (how many new LW recipes added in since BC introduced?). There is also an opportunity cost with LW, since it requires giving up one of only two profession slots (2 on one toon at least, since you'll need skinning).

Damn straight the PvP gear got updated. Allow me to remind you of the PvP honor gear that was available when TBC was released :

http://www.wowwiki.com/Grand_Marshal%27s_Thunderfist

So lets see... PvP honor gear, 5 slots stats are : +186 Sta, +74 Int, +112 spell damage, +81 resil, +82 spell crit, +13 mp5, 3 red 3 yellow 1 meta sockets.

Netherstrike is only 3 slots, so lets add in some blue crafted Netherfury Boots and Netherfury Leggings to bring it up to 5 slots?
Total stats are: +177 Sta, +53 Int, +160 spell damage, +65 spell crit, +17 mp5, 3 yellow 6 blue sockets 2 red sockets.

You tell me which one you'd rather have for running Heroics.


I'm going to leave this thread with one comment from Blizz: its likely in WotLK that you won't need to max out LW to get the BoP epic set. So think about how cheap 300-350 was to skill up, if you already had 300 pre-TBC.

Drysc: Sound very cool. Ok, let�s move on to Leatherworking. We added some cool stuff in 2.3, obviously, drums and such. But same question as all the previous, how did it go in Burning Crusade and where�s it going for Lich King.

Jon LeCraft: Leatherworking was off to a rough start, because the drums were in a place where we were probably too conservative. You know, they were on very difficult reps, they had Primals in the reagents, and you know didn�t really match up with the power that you got from them. And once we brought them to where we wanted to in 2.3, I think it helped a lot. It helped with the leveling definitely, where you�re making something that you can consume and that you�re using a lot rather than these just esoteric items that somebody may or may not want. So I think that worked out pretty well. Another thing that was a little weird about Leatherworking, and this is the same thing with Tailoring, is that they required you to max out the skill to get your bind on pickup item. Like the Primalstrike and whatnot. And that just felt a little too punishing. We�ll probably� like 350 is around, you know to give it in terms of Burning Crusade, is where we�re more comfortable with that. Kind of like we did with the Engineering goggles and things like that.

http://eu.blizzard.com/blizzcast/archive/episode4.xml

[Jaese]

Again, if you are going to mostly focus on PvP then yes it makes sense to go PvP for gear as the PvE LW gear is not good for it.

Until Wrath hits and you start all over again... wasting that 1 - 2 month grind for S2 gear.

Ya, good plan.

So what? The money you spent on all the mats for the LW stuff is wasted too. However, while the LWers were hemorrhaging money for their gear, the PvPers were banking it because their gear doesn't cost anything except patience, so who cares if it doesn't DE or vendor. Plus the vendor/DE values of the LW stuff will be insignificant when Wrath hits anyway.

It comes down to people who want to spend thousands of gold or people who are patient enough to do BGs. Either has pros and cons and both will be equally worthless when Wrath hits (the gear; training LW and PvPing aren't mutually exclusive so that is a moot point).

Time or money: choose.

[Stabface]

No way Fursphere! I pvp'd for a couple hours just the other night and made like negative 15 gold in repairs, food, water, bandages, potions, etc!

lolcat says : Time iz monies freind, om nom nom

[Skrimshaw]

your all idiots. This whole game is a grind. Whether its honor for your purples, professions for your purples, arena for your purples, instances for your purples. Argueing on which way is better is like argueing whats hotter blondes or redheads. My choice was to go the pvp method, I had a surgery planned, so I hit 70 right before it. During my two week recovery I got all my pvp gear minus my cloak. I could easily see going with leatherworking and the instance or rep GRIND to get the patterns, but that just wasn't what I prefered. Either way, this game is a time sink, its meant to be a time sink. Enjoy wasting your time as you see fit, and I will waste mine as I see fit.

[pinotnoir]

Again, if you are going to mostly focus on PvP then yes it makes sense to go PvP for gear as the PvE LW gear is not good for it.

Until Wrath hits and you start all over again... wasting that 1 - 2 month grind for S2 gear.

Ya, good plan.

The only "plan" that would make sense if you were REALLY into PvP would be to grind max honor points and marks and then bank them until you hit 80... then you could just right into the game when you reach level cap....

They are not going to let people bank honor and arena points for the xpac. Do what makes you happy.

[Xar]

Jaese, did I read you correctly in suggestion people psuedo-afk in AV by hanging in a tower? Sad... As a 5 shammy team I usually lead the HK list, only time I don't is when I rush RH when I "mix it up" instead of defending Balinda first then go offense. Please don't give us a bad name (if that's what you meant).

I've geared up in BG's after hitting 70 and had a lot of fun but really I'm pretty sick of PVP. I'll still go into AV because it's still somewhat fun. I was able to hit 1575 with 4 + healer in Arena's and got my Brutal pants and Guardian bracers on 4 but it's really not my thing and my healer partner is an arena junkie so I cut him loose because I personally can't stomach the time in arena to get where he wants to get to. I wish him much success, he's multiboxing a group of 4 now himself.

I went LW on all 5 of my shaman partially so I could get drums for use in BG's. So far 2 are high enough to use drums and my main will be 375 today and make her Hurricane boots. I had bought 5x patterns before my shaman were 70 when they were cheap on the AH. Yeah I know drums are planned to be somewhat nerfed in the xpac but still, I'm looking forward to what will be craftable down the line in wrath.