While gearing up my Feral Druid, there was something peculiar that caught my attention. Keep in mind that other than that Kara run (which I was basically carried through, since my heals were insignificant at the time), I had yet to do a single instance. If I was a new player to the game, I would have zero experience with group dynamics, or working with a group at this point. I wouldn’t know the basics about waiting for the tank to get aggro, waiting for casters to get mana after a pull, or even what “marking” is. The idea of a “boss” would be something new for me, especially a boss with unique moves that I had never seen before.
This game almost forces you into groups if you want to get gear, so you don’t end up in a Kara group without knowing anything about running with a group. I remember grinding instances on my Mage to get minor upgrades, which affected my DPS and survivability so significantly. And gear that I couldn’t get in instances, I’d have to spend a lot of time working towards. I can’t even remember how many hours it took me to farm for just the [Frozen Shadoweave Shoulders], let alone the other two items in the set. And don’t even get me started on the primals needed for [Spellstrike Hood] and it’s companion. Not to mention the ridiculous amount of time and gold that went into powerleveling my tailoring up to 375 so I could make and use the full set. Now compare it to my druid.
I bought [Heavy Clefthoof Leggings], [Heavy Clefthoof Vest], and [Heavy Clefthoof Boots] from a LWer in Orgrimmar for 150g. I bought the gems ([Enduring Talasite] and [Solid Star of Elune]) uncut from the AH and had the guild jewelcrafter cut them for me. I spent a day doing AV for [Gladiator's Dragonhide Spaulders], and gemmed that up as well. Paid the guild LWer 10g for a [Stylin' Purple Hat], and he gave me 4 Heavy Knothide Armor Kits free. I hit him up a little later and paid him 100g for [Nethercleft Leg Armor] which I attached to the leggings. I bought [Braxxis' Staff of Slumber] from the AH for 30g, and I had [Dabiri's Enigma] from a Netherstorm quest that I stashed in case I needed a defense rating boost. I also grabbed [Strength of the Untamed] from the CE quartermaster. The rest of my gear was made up of random odds and ends that I had picked up while leveling or during my first Kara run (like [Bracers of Maliciousness]).
Without stepping into any instance, and without paying that much gold (<500g), I was already set with crit immunity, 14k life, and 20k armor self-buffed. I was basically ready for Kara. If you read my post from a few days ago where I talk about gearing up a new Druid, you saw that I could get a Druid to almost 17k health and 23k armor without even running a single normal instance!
It becomes increasingly interesting once you look into the respective play style of each class, and what’s required of them. I found that most of the time on my Mage I was spamming a single hotkey over and over, occasionally hitting another one to put it on cooldown, all while watching the DPS charts. Depending on the fight, I may switch target or move around a bit, but it all came down to spamming a button or two. On the other hand, my Druid required full situational awareness, and the ability to instantly react to a change in situation, whether that be a CC breaking that I need to pick up, losing aggro on a target, or even having to reposition or move around, based on the fight. I need to have my “oh shit” buttons ready, and need to be able to react to anything at anytime.
It’s an interesting juxtaposition, if you really take the time to think about it. The class that is simpler to play requires a lot more when it comes to gearing up, while the one that is harder to play and requires more attention (and, may I say, requires more skill?) and focus and reaction time, is significantly easier to gear in comparison. Hm… perhaps this is another way that Blizzard balances the game?
What do you think? Anyone else play any classes that they had an easy time gearing? Or the opposite, any of you found yourselves having to invest a lot of time towards gearing up your class? And how hard (or easy) would you say it was to gear yourself up? Share your thoughts in the comments, or in your own blog post (link back so I see it)!
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The only character I had any trouble gearing up was the druid I decided to spec Moonkin. This character is not a leatherworker and most of the cool upgrades seem to come from Badges.
I think you’re seeing much more of an alt-itus issue than a true gearing comparison. My main is a feral druid, and my first alt to 70 was a warlock that leveled from scratch just to take a look at the ghostlands.
I found gearing up my druid to be quite a chore:
*horrid itemization for bear gear. It was crazy bad at the beginning before badge gear, best chest and wrists in the game before 25 mans came from low level quests where I had no idea I was going to be a tank at the time. Old world quests even for some trinkets, etc. You didn’t keep them, or you used to be a healer like all druids, sorry, out of luck.
*Leveling up LW is not so easy when you have to do the skinning yourself, since everyone else is leveling their own LW too. Scrounging for primals when everyone else is.
*To be a real feral druid you have to work on a bear set and a cat set at the same time, not just one.
Now compare to my warlock alt:
*Just one set to worry about
*I decided that after hitting 70 that the tailor spec gear was really nice, so I dropped herbalism and in a week I had a full set. Cloth is easy to come by and if you do need to farm it, there are so many places that you can synergistically farm cloth and something you need at the same time.
*Now lets do talk about those spec tailor pieces, talk about the easiest gearing in the game, those pieces are so amazing, that many in our raids are only just dropping them now and we’re on a one shot farm of mount hyjal and half way through black temple. Bear gear your only upgrades (outside recent badge gear) were tier pieces that you had to fight tooth and nail with warriors and priests. Warrior/Priest/Druid tier group, talk about the worst combination of classes one can think of.
I huge part of the ease that you saw with your druid and I’m seeing with my warlock is the huge drop in demand, large increase in supply, and huge gains in buying power you see one year out from when you were doing the same thing with your main. I really don’t see think its because one class is significantly easier to gear than another.
wewhoet, you raise an excellent point. I didn’t even think about it like that. You are definitely right when you say that it’s possible that the reason I had such an easy time gearing my Druid as opposed to my Mage was because my Druid is my alt while the Mage was my main (and my first character). Thanks for the analogy to your own druid/warlock, it’s always great to see it from another perspective.
You know just this evening I’ve respecced my Boomkin to feral and have set her up pretty nicely without any instance runs and a couple of pieces from kara that I’d bid on as off spec. It’s amazing how easy it can be to gear up a druid from scratch these days… maybe that’s Bliz’s way of apologising for how bad we were in the dark days ;)
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There could be another reason that your mage seemed so expensive. The crafted gear you have made is often considered tier 5 equivalent, and your druids gear is not. Just a thought.
CaptSlow, while the above example does seem to demonstrate this, I’ve managed to gear my Druid so he can reliably tank through SSC and TK (T5 raids) with all of my gear being crafted/bought (<1000g total), other than my Wildfury Greatstaff. Items that I’ve bought/crafted that weren’t mentioned above include Badge of Tenacity and Belt of Natural Power.
@ wewhoet - I definately think you’re on to something with the main/alt thing, I can tell you that for a while my husband was trying very hard to gear his druid (his main) and he found it to be very difficult, he’s since been focusing more on his shadow priest.
I also had a lot of trouble gearing my shadow priest (in fact she still has one blue) Then after leveling my alt warrior and making her my main, I’ve outgeared the priest within a month and a half.
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