You Be The Judge: Pure Stam > Mixed Stats?

So I recently ran VoA and got a nice Tier 7 chest piece. As you all know, I recently hit 80 so this is a welcome addition. The problem is, I'm not sure that putting gems into it and wearing it is better than the crafted item I currently have on my chest.

Now check this out. I currently have...
Polar Vest with
Solid Sky Saphire for my Blue Slot
Shifting Twilight Opal for my Red Slot
Vivid Forest Emerald for my Yellow Slot

That is a total of +229 Stamina (Roughly 2.2k HP), +8 Agility, +8 Hit Rating and +115 Frost Resistance.

The Tier 7 chest that I got is Heroes' Dreamwalker Raiment. If I fill it with Shifting Twilight Opal for my Red Slot and Vivid Forest Emerald for my Yellow Slot, that will give me +114 Stamina (Roughly 1.1k HP), +82 Agility, +8 Hit Rating, +54 Critical Strike Rating, +35 Expertise Rating, +132 Attack Power.

As you can see, that stamina is huge for the Polar Vest but there isn't much to it. With the Tier 7 chest there is a drop off in stam but a huge boost to a lot of other stats. So which would you chose? I could use an opinion. I am new to the whole feral tanking scene so if this seems obvious to you, please share your thoughts.

And for those that are wondering, I was able to purchase my Malfurion's Handgrips of Conquest this week. Now the only gear I have that needs to become "epik lewtz" are my neck, head, wrist and one trinket. So moving right along...

Bear Gear: Update

Well, the last post I made about gear was my wish list. A lot has happened since then. So here is a little update to what I have gotten since then, and where it came from.

So the day after I posted my wishlist I had three craftable items on my list that I immediatly went home and bought the mats to to bolster my gear level and get things moving a little faster. They were as follows.

Polar Vest
Durable Nerubhide Cape
Titanium Earthguard Ring

I wasn't able to get the Ring crafted by anyone in Band of Misfits because no one was online at the time with the recipe. But a big thanks to Asarune for crafting me the Chest and Cloak. I appreciate it a lot.

So the runs then began to get gear from the instances and to collect emblems along the way. After six runs, one in which the trinket in question dropped but I lost the roll to my buddy Kochanski, I finally was able to pick up The Black Heart. The leather hands that I want from there never dropped but I got tired of it after six straight runs and decided to move on.

So after those normal runs, and their lack of emblems, I headed over to the new ICC 5 mans. With all the gear I had acquired up to the start of Forge of Souls, it wasn't too hard to tank them on normal. Me and some of the guys from Band of Misfits made our way through Forge of Souls and unlocked Pit of Saron for me. I then proceeded to run Pit of Saron about 5 or 6 times and the ring I was trying to get from Garfrost never dropped. I was able to pick up Garfrost's Two-Ton Hammer which was an upgrade from the staff I had from leveling in Gundrak.

Yesterday was also a very good day for my bear tanking gear status. I was able to get into a guild run of the weekly raid. We downed the first two bosses and I was able to pick up a Signet of the Earthshaker from XT-002 Deconstructor. After I turned in the weekly raid quest and got all my emblems, I then jumped into a 25-man ToC group with the guild and was able to pick up Drape of the Untamed Predator. So a pretty good haul for the day right?

Well, before I logged I decide to look at some emblem gear since I had a good chunk of emblems built up. So I decided to turn some Emblems of Triumph into Emblems of Conquest and drop them on Idol of the Corruptor which then earned me the achievement Superior. So all in all, yesterday was a very good day.

Next up on the list, earning Malfurion's Handgrips of Conquest from emblems while trying to find a good leather wrist item.

Til the next installment... you stay classy.

What if: Landro Longshot's Casino and Strip Club

I'm big on making weekly blog posts, cause it makes me actually write something even when I don't know what I want to write about. For example, I'm going to start a new weekly article called "What if". I think you can just take a wild guess and know what it is. These are the "What ifs" I think of in the world of warcraft and decide to share with everyone else.

So let's just drop the "and strip club" part of the title of this post, because let's be honest, that will never happen. Don't get me wrong either, I don't want to see that on my screen anyways, I just thought it made for a good name to this facility. If you don't know Landro, he is the vendor that gives you all the free stuff from the wowtcg loot cards. He is a very sleezy looking dude, and thus I picked him to be the one opening this casino I am proposing.

So why would we open a casino in-game. Well the first reason I'll give is... why not? Think about it. The RPG "Fable" and "Fable 2" has a few pub games in it that are so popular they have become their own separate game sold on XBOX Live. In the actual game "Fable" you can bet your in-game money on the games and make a profit or take a huge loss. It's a risk system with rewards and devastating let-downs. I'm sure it would take some working to come up with a way to do it, but I don't think it's entirely impossible.

Second reason I would give to make this is a reality is that some WoW players (like myself) are not that adept at making money in the wow economy. Now on the flip side, I can play a mean poker or blackjack game. So if I can use my skills in that in game to 'risk' the money I've earned in game to make more money it would be very helpful. That way I would not have to use my lack of economic knowledge to earn ALL my money but there would be a good secondary option for me to try.

What do you guys think? I think it would be alot of fun. If I don't have time to do dungeons, dailies, or raids, I would be able to get a few games of lets say blackjack for the twenty minutes I have before the baby wakes up and all hell breaks loose. And if it did happen, this would be the perfect way to add an iphone app that integrates into World of Warcraft. You could play the wow casino games on your phone by logging into your account and playing with your toons money. Now I dont' have an iphone anymore but I'm sure everyone that owns one would definitely not be opposed to this.

So yeah, anyways, what do you guys think of the idea?

Fresh Bear Tank Wish List

So now that I'm at lvl 80, I thought I should set some goals in terms of gear that I would like to try and get pretty fast to be ready to do anything the guild might ask me to do, or more likely me ask the guild if I can do. :)

Here is a list of items that I have already secured to start off.
Duskstalker Shoulderpads
Polar Boots with Eternal Belt Buckle
Trollwoven Girdle

Thanks to Matheo for crafting me the Polar Belt and Trollwoven Girdle. And thank you to Blackbear for crafting me an Eternal Belt Buckle.

And here is the list of items I'd like to shore up for all my other slots along with how you get them.

Head
Mask of Distant Memory (Drops from The Black Night in Heroic Trial of the Champion)
Arcanum of the Stalwart Protector (Argent Crusade: Revered with Nashette)

Shoulders
Greater Inscription of the Pinnacle (Sons of Hodir: Exalted)

Cloak
Durable Nerubhide Cape (Leatherworking crafted BoE)
or
Eerie Runeblade Polisher (Drops from Falric in Normal Halls of Reflection)

Chest
Knightbane Carapace (Leatherworking crafted BoE from a recipe drop in Trials raid)
or
Polar Vest (Leatherworking crafted BoE)

Wrist
Gloves of the Argent Fanatic (Drops from either 2nd boss in Regular Trial of the Champion)

Leggings
Gored Hide Legguards (Drops from Gal’darah in Heroic Gundrak)

Rings
Titanium Earthguard Ring (BoE crafted, Jewelcrafting)
Ring of Carnelian and Bone (Drops from Forgemaster Garfrost in Regular Pit of Saron)

Necklace
Chained Military Gorget (25 Emblems of Heroism)

Trinkets
The Black Heart (Drops from The Black Knight in Regular Trial of the Champion)
Essence of Gossamer (Drops from Hadronox in Heroic Azjol-Nerub)

Weapon
Staff of Trickery (Drops from Cyanigosa in Heroic Violet Hold)

Idol
Idol of the Corruptor (Bought with Emblems of Conquest)

What I need to do it (Runs & Emblems):
Normal:
Trial of the Champion (2nd Bosses & the Black Knight)
Pit of Saron (Forgemaster Garfrost)
Halls of Reflection (Falric)
Heroic:
Violet Hold (Cyanigosa)
Anjol-Nerub (Hadronox)
Gundrak (Gal'darah)
Trial of the Champion (The Black Knight)
Emblems:
25 Emblems of Heroism
19 Emblems of Conquest

Introductions

So after a year or so off from playing my druid, I finally got some good news while I was on deployment. You see, I had been wishing and hoping that someday they would allow faction changes because I leveled Nashamire to 70 and raided with him as a Horde Tauren Druid. Well after all my friends I joined WoW to play with stopped playing I decided to roll an Alliance Draenei Pally (Nashette) to play with another of my real life friends Elocine leaving Nashamire in the dust. I always hoped there would be a way that Nashamire was not "thrown by the wayside" but I didn't plan and go back and play with him on the Horde side when none of my friends were around.

Well much to my surprise and excitement, I read while I was on deployment that they started offering faction changes. So I went online while in the middle of the ocean and tranferred servers with Nash, then after that went through faction changed him to the Alliance side. So there he was waiting for me to faction change him on the Azuremyst server when I got home.

So after a few months of messing around with alts, like I always seem to do, I leveled Nashamire to 80 slowly by learning to bear tank from 70-80. I almost strictly leveled from 70-80 in dungeons.What made this interesting was the fact that I was a Boomkin the whole time I was raiding at level 70. So the prospect of something new really renewed my interest in WoW in general. So yesterday, 01.23.2010, I finally got my first level 70 to be my second level 80 and my new main. What a journey it's been for Nashamire and I'm really excited for the things to come as I bear tank my way through Northrend.

I'll be keeping you updated on my thoughts of what I like and don't like about it, and general WoW thoughts as I go along. Hopefully you enjoy it, but if you don't then I guess it's all just for my amusement.

Regardless, here we go...