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Mailbag: Leatherworking vs. Tailoring in WotLK
Published on December 9, 2008 by Phaelia 
Featured, Items and Equipment, Lunar Guidance, Mailbag 
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Kehnomar of Nordrassil (EU) wrote in with this great question:
Come WotLK, would Leatherworking or Tailoring be the better profession for healing, in your opinion? I’m currently a tailor because the Primal Mooncloth set was pretty nice for healing before getting some good raiding gear, but I’m considering changing to Leatherworking if it will be more useful in the expansion.
He actually sent me this question at the beginning of November. At the time, I wasn’t sure how to respond because I was under the belief that all of the items for Leatherworking/Tailoring hadn’t been released. Unfortunately, I was wrong. Blizzard has opted to change their policy on armor crafting so that these skills no longer produce skill-defining Bind-on-Pickup epic items like the Primal Mooncloth and Frozen Shadoweave sets of the Burning Crusade. Practically all of the armor that can be crafted with these skills is now Bind on Equip and can be bought and sold. What does this mean and, if there aren’t self-crafted sets any longer, what benefits do each tradeskill now provide to the healing Druid?
Crafted Armor
Assuming you’re choosing the skill for the reduced cost of items it produces, let’s compare the items each can create. Because you’re likely to graduate out of them fairly quickly, I’m going to ignore green items.
Leatherworking
Leatherworking can currently craft a total of 23 items with spell power.
The Iceborne Blues: [Dark Iceborne Leggings] [Dark Iceborne Chestguard]
These two items are itemized perfectly for the raiding Druid with plenty of Spirit and not points wasted on superfluous stats. Note that wearing these two pieces plus one other green from the [Iceborne Embrace] set will net you an additional 26 spell power. With the number of slots available (waist, feet, hands, shoulders, wrist, or helm), it will give you a lot of flexibility when it comes to upgrading your gear.
The Overcast Set: [Overcast Spaulders] [Overcast Leggings] [Overcast Headguard] [Overcast Handwraps] [Overcast Chestguard] [Overcast Bracers] [Overcast Boots] [Overcast Belt]
This all-blue set of items has a great balance of stats for the healing Druid with lots of Spirit and no wasted points spell crit, spell haste, or spell hit. The excess of Resilience, however, makes this clearly intended for use in PvP. Tailoring can produce a similar set called Frostsavage, but a conscientious Druid knows to shy away from cloth in PvP.
SQUISH! [Bugsquashers]
These boots are easily on par with the two blue items from the Iceborne set mentioned above but are likely separated from them to avoid having three easily acquired blues that provide the set bonus (you have to sacrifice one slot to a green item).
The Earthgiving Set: [Earthgiving Legguards] [Earthgiving Boots]
These two items are currently the only two crafted leather epic items with spell power, appear to be itemized with the Tree in mind, and are certain to give you a leg up in heroics or Naxxramas. The recipes for both of these items must be purchased for 2 [Artic Fur] from Braeg Stoutbeard in Dalaran and each requires a [Frozen Orb] to make (the WotLK equivalent of a [Primal Nether]).
Non-Ideal Items: [Wildscale Breastplate] [Purehorn Spaulders]
These two items aren’t itemized perfectly for the raiding Druid with itemization points on the breastplate wasted on spell crit and on haste rating on the shoulders. I’d guess these two items are intended more for our Balance brethren.
Tailoring
Tailoring can currently craft a total of 46 items with spell power. Note, however, that a number of these are geared more toward DPS casters and Holy Priests with spell crit, spell hit, and spell haste.
The Mystic Frostwoven Set: [Mystic Frostwoven Wristwraps] [Mystic Frostwoven Shoulders] [Mystic Frostwoven Robe]
This set is similar to the Leatherworking Iceborne set with three blue items instead of two (but both a 2-piece and 4-piece set bonus, the latter of which can be achieved by wearing one of the green items from the [Frostwoven Power] set). This set is heavy on the Spirit but has no Intellect. It also includes a lot of crit rating, which is not an especially useful stat to the Restoration Druid. Overall, this set seems poorly itemized and is likely to be avoided.
The Frostsavage Set
This is the Tailored equivalent to the Overcast Set from Leatherworking. It has no Spirit, a lot of critical strike rating and Resilience, and – as it’s made out of cloth – is best avoided by the PvPing Druid. PTUI!
Spiritual Blues: [Light Blessed Mittens] [Aurora Slippers] [Cloak of the Moon] [Frostmoon Pants]
These are easily craftable blues that have a nice balance of stats, including Intellect, Stamina, spell power and Spirit (or, in the case of the cloak, MP5). I’ve crafted a couple of these for myself so far, consuming Moonshroud cloth that I would otherwise be saving. I’ve already replaced one of the items with an item from a Heroic dungeon, though, so you might instead consider saving your cloth for the Moonshroud set further on.
The Moonshroud Set: [Moonshroud Robe] [Moonshroud Gloves]
These are the big cahuna items of Tailoring for healers, the equivalent of the [Primal Mooncloth] set in TBC. Like the Earthgiving pieces from Leatherworking, they are perfectly itemized for us. You will note, however, that there are only two pieces to the set and there is no set bonus like that of PMC. This will make these items less painful to replace.
The [Wispcloak]
While not perfectly itemized for a Restoration Druid (having MP5 instead of the more desirable Spirit), it is an epic item with good spell power and Intellect.
Non-Ideal items: [Silky Iceshard Boots] [Hat of Wintry Doom] [Deep Frozen Cord] [Cloak of Frozen Spirits] [Black Duskweave Wristwraps] [Black Duskweave Leggings] [Black Duskweave Robe] [Spellweave Robe] [Spellweave Gloves] [Ebonweave Robe] [Ebonweave Gloves] [Deathchill Cloak]
Given the allotment of stats on these items, they’re better for other casters than the Restoration Druid.
Monetary Benefits
By choosing a crafting skill, you’ve chosen to give up one of the potentially lucrative gathering skills. However, there are still a number of items that can be produced for profit (in addition to the BoE armor listed above).
Leatherworking
Leatherworking can craft a number of useful BoE armor kits, including the [Frosthide Leg Armor], [Icescale Leg Armor], and [Jormungar Leg Armor]. The [Heavy Borean Armor Kit] isn’t spectacular, but it’s nice for alts while they’re leveling.
Tailoring
As with TBC, Tailors can create spellthreads to enchant players’ legs, including [Azure Spellthread] and [Shining Spellthread]. In addition, Tailors can train the Northern Cloth Scavenging ability that gives them an additional chance to find extra cloth on humanoids (and Undead humanoids). This ability means Tailors will continue to acquire more cloth than non-Tailors, making it easier to level first aid or sell the unneeded excess.
Tailors can also make bags, though the introductory level [Frostweave Bag] is a popular choice for skillups and is therefore harder to sell at a profit (or break even point). The 24-slot [Glacial Bag] requires 4 pieces of Ebonweave and 4 pieces of Moonshroud, making it a valuable (but time-consuming) item to produce.
Additional Self-Only Benefits
Leatherworking and Tailoring both provide nice self-only enchants as well as items that can be used to “enchant” the equipment of other players. Let’s look at the healing-oriented options for each.
Leatherworking
Leatherworkers can apply several fur linings to their bracers (these are self-only enchants). Restoration Druids will prefer the [Fur Lining – Spell Power]. There are also versions for every resist type. It’s assumed that Blizzard will also be adding Drums like in TBC, but the recipes haven’t been released, yet.
Tailoring
Tailors can embroider their cloaks with one of three caster-oriented embroideries. Restoration Druids will likely prefer the [Darkglow Embroidery]. They can also craft a self-only [Sanctified Spellthread] to apply to their pants, a significantly more potent version of the [Shining Spellthread] and cheaper self-only alternative to the BoE [Brilliant Spellthread].
Perhaps the most iconic self-only benefit of being a Master Seamstress is the [Magnificent Flying Carpet]. It can be crafted at 425 tailoring, and the materials are surprisingly affordable. There are more prestigious, specialization-specific versions of this mount including one sewn from Moonshroud.
Summary and Comparison
- Both Leatherworking and Tailoring have a good number of similar options for a healing Druid.
- Tailoring is a self-sufficient gathering tradeskill. Northern Cloth Scavenging will help you acquire the cloth you need to level your skill, especially if you run a lot of instances with humanoids. A leatherworker has to pick up Skinning on her main character or an alt or be willing to place herself at the mercy of the auction house. /cower
- Tailoring currently has slightly more self-only Druid-friendly benefits (one of the self-only benefits for Leatherworkers only benefits melee characters), though the addition of Drums should even the score.
- Leatherworking includes the Overcast PvP set, and the Improved Tree of Life talents make all leather armor more valuable than it would have been otherwise.
- Tailored items are typically more attractive (and more visible since Leatherworking doesn’t include an epic chestpiece), but this doesn’t matter to everyone and is only relevant outside of Tree of Life. Tailoring also comes with a sweet-looking magic carpet (beautiful Persian princess not included).
Honestly, the differences between the two professions aren’t that pronounced. I’d be inclined to recommend Leatherworking to a Restoration Druid that intends to PvP and Tailoring to a Restoration Druid who intends to have Balance as her off spec (sadly, there appear to be fewer few Balance-friendly rewards from Leatherworking). Of course, you could be a masochist like me and level both! /wildtreecackling
A Note on Leveling Your Tradeskill
To raise your skill to the level required to make a desired item, you’ll have to invest a considerable sum of money to craft items that aren’t necessarily useful to you (or an alt). In the realm of Tailoring and Leatherworking, the sooner you can raise your skill and place your excess merchandise up for sale, the better off you will be. As time passes, more players enter the market, flooding the auction house with the most easily crafted items, often selling them at a loss in order to sell them at all (I’ve found this to be the case of Imbued Frostweave Bags). At the same time, players are graduating out of this “tier” of items as they find replacements through Heroic drops, badge gear, and demand eventually trails off. This temporary increase in supply and ever decreasing demand can lead to a glut in the crafting market that will leave you “holding the bag” on raising your skill. In short, raise your skill as quickly as you can and try to craft items that are not only economical to produce but seem like they would sell. (Don’t produce 10 pairs of cloth bracers if there are already 8 of them on the auction house.)
Production vs. Gathering
In the comments below, reader Faradhim inquires:
Given that there are no longer large number of BoP items for either profession do you think there is a good reason to even pick up one of this crafting professions? Like you have observed leveling up tailoring/leather crafting is very expensive and seems like you will be able to buy just about every items you need on AH from other tailors/leather workers save spell threads and Fur lining. And there will be stiff competition from other crafters which means items is likely to sell at a deep discount.
This is such a good question that I wanted to append my response here. Since discovering that Blizzard wouldn’t be providing tradeskill-defining BoP epics, I’ve wrestled with this question myself. Am I not doing myself a disservice by choosing a production tradeskill over a gathering tradeskill? While it’s true that each gathering tradeskill provides some form of self-buff or self-benefit in addition to their obvious monetary potential, how do these benefits stack up against the ones provided by production tradeskills?
- Herbalism
Lifeblood (Rank 6): This ability does not scale with spell power and for a class that uses HoTs, its effect is pretty negligible.
[Fire Seed]: Makes you vulnerable to magic, but increases your spell power by 200 for 10 sec. Assuming you could chain the use of these, the benefit works out to be 33.3 spell power. - Leatherworking
[Fur Lining – Spell Power] replaces [Enchant Bracers - Superior Spellpower] (or the much more affordable [Enchant Bracers - Greater Spellpower]) and [Enchant Bracers - Major Spirit]. It’s 44 more spell power than the greater enchant and 37 more spell power than the superior one, not to mention considerably more affordable.
Assuming that drums recipes are eventually added for Wrath, we can likely expect the WotLK equivalent of [Drums of Restoration] to be 30 MP5 or greater. - Mining
Toughness: All your hard work spent mining has made you exceptionally tough, increasing your maximum health by 500. Obviously, more health is always welcome even if it’s generally more useful for Feral tanks. - Skinning
Master of Anatomy (Rank 6): Skinning all those dead animals has broadened your anatomical knowledge, increasing your critical strike rating by 25. As a Resto Druid, I /spit on 25 crit rating. PTUI! - Tailoring
[Darkglow Embroidery] replaces [Enchant Cloak - Wisdom]. With a 35% proc rate and 75 second internal cooldown, the embroidery works out to be 0.79 PPM or 20 MP5. Honestly, the enchant seems better to me, not to mention substantially easier to acquire. I think adjustment to the embroidery is needed to clearly make it superior to what could be acquired otherwise.
While significantly cheaper, the [Sanctified Spellthread] is equivalent to the [Brilliant Spellthread] available to non-Tailors.
To me, none of the gathering profession benefits seem to match up with the strength of the production tradeskill benefits (which, in my mind, is as it should be). Therefore, the most ideal situation is to keep two production tradeskills on your main character and keep an alt for gathering to supplement them. For instance, my Warlock is a Skinner and Herbalist helping Phaelia raise her Leatherworking skill and keep her stocked with potions. This has the additional benefit of doubling your return from any reputation gains that afford you new recipes.
Kaliope actually recently addressed this issue on her post To Keep or Not to Keep, THAT is the question. She seems to present the opposite point of view, so it’s definitely worth a read.
Thank you to Kehnomar for the wonderful question and for all of the information he later sent to me that assisted with writing this article!
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I am excited that BRK is back, though!
/cry I love you, ty for everything.
Just a quick correction: the Wispcloak doesn’t require Ebonweave, it just requires Imbued Netherweave. I had mine made last night.
Charlotta @ US Scarlet Crusade
As i find armor more and more appealing with improved tree of life, I’ll stick to leather working. I level with my own DPS slave, my wife, casting aoe after me pulling big packs of mobs with moonfire, and tanking the lot. It’s really fun!
Excellent article. Thank you for posting this!
I have a few observations:
Given that there are no longer large number of BoP items for either profession do you think there is a good reason to even pick up one of this crafting professions? Like you have observed leveling up tailoring/leather crafting is very expensive and seems like you will be able to buy just about every items you need on AH from other tailors/leather workers save spell threads and Fur lining. And there will be stiff competition from other crafters which means items is likely to sell at a deep discount.
On my realm I currently loss between 25-60GP for each point of tailor point I gain. Since there is minimal return at the end I start to wonder if I shouldn’t just drop tailoring and pickup another profession. Frankly if you just have tailoring at 350 and pick up northrend cloth gathering you probably be better off financially.
faradhims last blog post..17 easy to get horde pets for achievement
Faradhim raises a good question. I’m level 77, about to hit 78 where I can make a nice set of blues for my feral druid with LW. I have over 700 borean leathers saved up, and know I need about 900 more to get the skill ups to get to 340. If most of these are BOE, am I ahead of the game to just sell the leather and buy the items from others?
I am an alchemist/herbalist on my druid, so I was very excited to see the great BoE epic items. I purchased the two Earthgiving epics and the Moonshroud Robe and Wispcloak at a cost of about 5k gold–which is probably way less than it would have been to level either profession up to 450 (I know from experience–I have a rogue leatherworker). The items are fantastic, and though I do wish I could use all leather items, the Moonshroud Robe is a lot easier to get than any of the level 200 epic leather chest pieces (and is just as good as the T7 item that costs 80 Emblems of Heroism to attain).
@Charlotta: I believe that you may be mistaken. The Wispcloak is a recipe that’s acquired by completing an extensive dungeon-running achievement. It’s materials are Frostweave Cloth x75, Infinite Dust x10, Eternal Water x4 (Crystallized Water x40), Eternal Life x6 (Crystallized Life x60), Siren’s Tear x1 (Winterfin Clams x100), and Frozen Orb x1 (according to comments at WoWWiki). But really if I can get this crafted for some simple Imbued Netherweave, please hook me up!
@Wiz: Sounds like a plan and a sound reason for making the decision!
@Faradhim: Great, great question. I’ve added an additional section to the bottom of the post that hopefully addresses it to your sastisfaction.
@Copey: Please see the addendum to this article.
@Riverrun: I think you might be surprised how economical it can be to level a production tradeskill if you start in on it quickly enough and make sure to craft items that you’re sure you can sell. I’ve actually made a bit of money leveling up to 430, but we’ll see how those last 20 points go.
Not Ebonweave, not Imbued Netherweave, but Imbued Frostweave (thus the cloth and dust in your list of mats, Phae). Wowhead has the pattern at http://www.wowhead.com/?spell=56016 , for confirmation.
To finish off that list, alchemy does provide a lasting self-only benefit in the form of Mixology (http://www.wowhead.com/?spell=53042). The increased effect is approximately 25% for elixirs, 50% for flasks.
@Adremma: Well color me corrected. I have no idea where I got the idea that it required Ebonweave! Fixed, thank you Adremma!
First off – awesome blog, thanks for writing! =) Now, some notes about a few of the items, if I may:
Note about the [Wispcloak] – it might be a good idea to point out that the mats cost about 800g. For my druid, I got the [Reanimator's Cloak] instead – a lot cheaper and customizable to boot.
Note about the [Glacial Bag] – at the moment it’s a lot cheaper to buy Paris Hilton’s bags than to acquire the mats for this, so as a tailor (my lock is a tailor from the FSW days), I’m not really exited about this item.
Note about the [Sanctified Spellthread] – there is an equally potent BOE augment available, the [Brilliant Spellthread] (although that is a lot more expensive).
My personal thoughts from a min/max point of view:
The only BOP benefit a resto druid gets from LW is the bracer enchant (it’s +37 SP compared to the normal ‘chant – typo in your article claiming 7) and the only BOP benefit from Tailoring are the cloak enchants, which many consider inferior to the normal BOE ‘chants available for everybody. I heartily recommend all you tree druids skip Tailoring and pick up JC, Enchanting or even BS (I’m not kidding) instead.
That is, if you are a munchkin like me and are fussy about 30-40 Spellpower. Tailoring is an awesome moneymaker though, so you might not want to drop it, if you already have it. =)
Well said, Phae!
I have both Leatherworking AND Tailoring as well. Works out smartly for me
@Minttunator: Great point about the Glacial bags. What a stupidly high cost to make them. *Sigh*
I’ve corrected the miscalculation for the Fur Lining (I used the required item level rather than the spell power value – oops) as well as adding mention of the Brilliant Spellthread that I missed.
@Inwe: Right on.
Something I noticed that might be worth taking note of when comparing the professions is that Tailoring gives access to an epic chestpiece and an epic set of gloves. Leatherworking, as you showed, has a set of legs and a pair of boots.
Well, with badges you can get your T7 chest and gloves. In my mind, makes the cloth pieces look like they’d be easier to replace. It’s not a big difference, but it might give leatherworking the upper hand if you’re just looking at those few pieces. When it comes to the self only benefits with spellthreads and possibly drums, well, I’m not sure what’ll end up on the winning edge, but they look similar enough for it not to really matter in the long run.
Also, it should be noted that Lifeblood is affected by the ToL aura (Affected by something, at least) and that it’s off the GCD (I think you can pop it while silenced, too). Makes it a tiny bit more useful than I figured it was. Still not a big fan of it, but I try to pop it every now and then just cause I can.
I would like to point out, that since all the items mentioned (except fur lining and embroidery) are BoE, they are NOT reasons in deciding the tailoring/LW question.
I’m neither tailor nor LW still I got Earthgiving Legguards and pants, Moonshroud robes and gloves and the wispcloak. And I’m also not blacksmith, yet I got a Titansteel Guardian and not a JC, still I got Titanium Spellshock Ring.
It’s much easier to find a crafter for these items, than leveling a crafting skill for them.
LW has a problem. You can’t really make much money with it. We have yet to see new recipes, but leg enchants aren’t that great for two reasons: they’re cheap (so there’s little business margin) and they’re needed for leveling.
What does being needed for leveling do? Lots of them at the AH! People are so desperate to sell them that sell prices go below mats, so you actually lose money. I’ve only seen three realms, but this seems like the general trend.
Last time a friend asked me if I could make leg enchants with his mats I said: sell the mats, buy the enchant at the AH
You’re forgetting the best reason to be a tailor: Pretty dresses! *twirl*
Last night I got my Valorous Dreamwalker Robe, and my first thought was, “yay, best in slot” followed very quickly by, “awww, now I can’t wear my Moonshroud Robe anymore
”
Heh
I wrote about this topic shortly before the expansion. I have a few friends who really frown on druids wearing cloth because they’re “not supposed to”, but historically the tailored gear was just so much better, and even the drops were – our pre-raid Moonglade set for example had hybrid stats – agi, crit etc. Why on earth? So I became a tailor and haven’t looked back. Of course, since all of the epics so far are BoE, it prompted me to drop tailoring on my mage because if he ever needs gear, Keeva can just make it for him! Hooray for freeing up tradeskills!
While there were no BoP epics so far to sway me one way or the other, I took a stab and guessed that later in the game there will be epic patterns dropping from raids, and that they will be desirable for druid tailors. It’s a gamble, because all of the SSC/TK/BT tailoring patterns were bad for me, and the “good stuff” only started dropping again in Sunwell – for a while there I questioned the longevity of my trade, but stuck with it and I’m glad. This time around, it seems that they finally worked out that they should make some LW epics that are actually good for resto druids, instead of sets geared more towards balance or hybrids. That’s great. Until they come out with something vastly superior to the cloth versions though, I won’t be swapping.
I get great items for healing (and fully expect more excellent items), spellthreads for myself/to sell, cheap spellthreads for me (already saved me a lot of money), cloak embroidery, flying carpets (the dismount animation will never get old), pretty dresses (very important), extra cloth from farming (absolutely INSANE in places like Icecrown) which makes my craft a gathering and crafting profession in one (much like enchanting), and bags for a fairly steady income (well, if cloth drops in price, at the moment people are selling bags at a massive loss.. /boggle).
If you’re a raider I guess you can just skip all the cool stuff, vanity items and convenience of being able to craft particular items. Assume both crafts will give you good epics, and focus on the BoP, crafter-only stuff to weigh up your options. LW gives you an extra 20 spellpower on your bracers, plus drums. Tailoring gives you cloak enchants (something that was always very lacking for healers).
But I can make lumberjack shirts.
Keevas last blog post..Brain dump on smart heals and why I hate them already
Lifeblood can be used in moonkin form, sigh I’m herbalism/alchemy.
Dear Phaelia,
If spell haste is wasted points, why does all the epic leather spell gear have it?
Nice post. I have always been an avid instance runner and always took pride in being able to ‘craft’ or provide my own gear. Badges are a great source for epics for me, even though I love to combine it with crafting. This is where I got disappointed in tailoring. It offers only 2 epics:
[Moonshroud Robe] [Moonshroud Gloves]
They are nice, but unless I’m mistaken those are also the two tier 7 pieces available through badges. I don’t know about you… but I would favor the tier 7
So the value of these pieces has really diminished and I can see myself farming those badges just as easily (with more fun) as I can see myself farm those mats. You could dent your wallet them, but gold farming only kicks in at lvl 80 where you might as well farm the mats or badges.
So, for raiding, the cloak is the only item I see in cooperation with mid level raid gear. The biggest gain, or so it seems, is the cheap embroideries. Being able to enchant your gear with top notch stuff for a small cost is indeed a welcome gift.
Compared to Leatherworking which gives epic legs and boots, I’d say Leatherworking is very recommendable for druid healers over tailoring. The legs may get their T7 replacement, once you hit a decent raiding schedule, but the boots are a keeper.
So in terms of raid value I would promote Leatherworking.
Keeva, that’s 37 spellpower.
Anadia, Blizz has screwed up T7 Resto itemisation. For some strange reason all the items pack haste/crit, which, while nice, still aren’t healer stats, no matter which way you look at it.
Zusterke, I actually prefer the Tailor-crafted 2 items to T7 – the stats are VERY similar and I can spend my badges somewhere else (the badge belt, for example).
@Nilianil: That’s a really helpful observation. I actually snagged the [Ymirjar Physician's Robe] last night before our raid so that I’d have time to work up my Tailoring for a Primal Moonshroud Robe, but maybe I’d be better off just saving my badges (and my money).
@Ghostboci: You’re correct that all of the items listed are BoE. I tried to make that clear. Some people really like crafting upgrades for themselves, though, and I don’t necessarily agree that it’s always going to be cheaper to buy them on the Auction House (though it certainly is the case sometimes).
@Ermengol: Ugh … yeah, Leatherworking has ALWAYS been far more difficult for me to skill up than Tailoring. For a while, I assumed that was because Phaelia isn’t a Skinner, but now I have a Warlock who is and it’s still no easier.
@Keeva: I really, really enjoyed your article on this very subject and wish I’d remembered it before now. I nodded my head at every reason for choosing Tailoring over Leatherworking you enumerated, but I happen to have both and am more or less committed to them.
P.S. Tree of Life in a Lumberjack Shirt = win
@Wynn: That’s a fairly nice benefit.
@Anadia: Because Blizzard doesn’t want to itemize properly for one spec of one class.
@Zusterke: The cheaper embroideries have made a difference for me. Ordinarily, I’d be a cheapskate and avoid enchanting any of the gear I expected to replace, but I’ve been sewing the cheaper spell threads onto every pair of pants I’ve worn!
@Minttunator: On the bright side, all the unnecessary spell crit and spell haste will make swapping to a Boomkin spec pretty darn viable. We’ll only need to keep a few items with +spell hit on hand and will be good to go! >.<
I would recommend my profession combo, enchant/alchemy, to serious raiders with money to burn or a guild bank to support their crafting needs.
Enchanting will give you +19 spellpower to each ring, which is pretty nice and roughly equivalent to the extra benefit of leatherworking or jewelcrafting.
Alchemy is, in my mind, the star of this expansion. My flasks and elixirs have a greater effect on me than on others, and they have double the duration. 4 hour flasks are simply amazing. It’s expensive to level, but I will be so happy with my 4 hour flasks over a year and more of raiding. It’s the ultimate scaling benefit. The harder the content, the more I appreciate my extra-potent, extra-longlasting elixirs and flasks. Couple that with elixir mastery and you’re sitting pretty.
@Phaelia: Of course auction house is expensive. However spamming /trade for a minute “LF tailor crafting Moonshroud Robes, have mats, pay 50G” is much cheaper.
Minttunator – no idea where I got that number from, perhaps old enchants or something. At any rate, I don’t see it as a huge deal. There are people out there who like to squeeze every little bit of stats out that they can (eg enchanting for ring enchants) but I don’t worry about it so much.
Oh my goodness Phae, I never even thought about the fact that I would be a *tree* in a lumberjack shirt. That’s just.. wrong!
(they’re still cute though)
Keevas last blog post..Brain dump on smart heals and why I hate them already
Hi Phae
i must say I read your blog with greatest interest – loving all the nice thoughts on resto druids.
I needed to comment on this fine outline of the crafting skills.
I refuse to believe that we have seen the full strength of any crafting skills yet – It simply cant be that there is no epic recipies dropping in raid instances along with this both JC and alc are missing their lvl80 epic trinkets which I believe will come with uldaar keep.
Besides that I think we will see the nether vortex equivalent in uldaar keep along with some recipies as well.
Keeping this in mind – maybe levelling those crafting skills arent that bad a deal
I was wondering if you maybe could do another blog on mana regen and the new correlation between spirit, int and mp5 as I see a lot of different opinions on the matter on various other forums.
yet again, thanks for a great blog
@Tiroq: I hope you’re right — that we will see better recipes dropping (hopefully with regularity) in higher-level raid instances. The major difficulties I can see with this would be that they don’t want crafters to have exclusive access to these items. But at the same time, they likely wouldn’t want to give access to these items outside of the group that raided the instance (which means they couldn’t make them simply BoE). Maybe a solution that involves a BoP item that could be used by the non-tailor to “complete” an item before it could be worn would solve this problem.