I have this going over on the official beta forum too. http://beta.worldofwarcraft.com/thre...340665&sid=1#0


The buzz is really going now... and folks in "llve" are increasingly sorta waking up to the reality that an expansion is on the way. There is a lot of tension, frustration, confusion, delight and exaggeration about TBC and it's reality in terms of existing gear. Guilds are making tough decisions. Folks are negotiating priorities.

Let's carefully share notes on this, ok? No exaggerations allowed. Let's come up with some honest guidelines on what we're seeing in terms of gear/items and how fast people replace them.

So, beta testers, go ahead and answer these questions as directly as you can:

1. What range of gear did you have at lvl 60?

2. What lvl have you achieved within beta and how much of your active equipment did you replace thus far?

3. Have you kept using any weaker pieces (in light of new pieces from Outlands) in order to maintain set bonuses or perhaps for other reasons?

4. Have you "nerfed" what you actively wear in order to negotiate repair costs?

5. Have you spent any effort trying to (re)run specific quests or dungeons in order to obtain new, replacement items?

6. Would you agree to the following basic guidelines?

a) Leveling 61-64 greens/blues will transplant some Tier1ish pieces (yes or no)
b) Leveling 64-67 greens/blues will transplant some Tier2ish pieces (yes or no)
c) Leveling 67-70 greens/blues will transplant some Tier3ish pieces (yes or no)
d) By level 70 you will replace most of your current gear (yes or no)

e) You may not replace all of your lvl 60 items on the way to 70, esp if you level quickly (yes or no)
f) You may be able to hit level 70 with 120 hours of effort (yes or no)

If you said no to any of those, please explain why and what you think is a more accurate statement.

1. What range of gear did you have at lvl 60?

http://ctprofiles.net/77784 for details.
In summary, mostly blues. AV Exalted epics, one or two things from MC, couple from ZG, one from BWL, some Rank 8 PVP gear, AB belt, Black Grasp and Darkmoon neck. Nothing stellar, but about as good as I could get given my ability (or lack thereof) to really raid.

2. What lvl have you achieved within beta and how much of your active equipment did you replace thus far?

65, almost 66. Replaced almost everything. Kept a few things like trinkets, Don Julio, Black Grasp, a couple elem/healer items. One important thing to note is someone at my level of gear probably could replace even more; I found myself having to choose between quest rewards (like a DPS ring versus a healer cape) and dungeon drops often, otherwise I would have replaced even more. Another thing to note is that I'm wearing a couple pieces of leather gear that were too juicy stats-wise to pass up for my older, weaker mail gear, and some cloth for my Elemental/Healing set. If I hadn't quit, I probably would have been close to level cap and 95% gear replaced.

3. Have you kept using any weaker pieces (in light of new pieces from Outlands) in order to maintain set bonuses or perhaps for other reasons?

Things like the Zulian cape for the +hit despite getting much nicer overall capes.

4. Have you "nerfed" what you actively wear in order to negotiate repair costs?

Nope, monetary influx exceeds expenditures including about 70g in respecs.

5. Have you spent any effort trying to (re)run specific quests or dungeons in order to obtain new, replacement items?

Of course. Did Underbog and Slave Pens repeatedly to get a couple pieces (still missing the chest from Underbog). Ran Mana Tombs a half dozen times for gear in there. Several Ramparts runs as well.

6. Would you agree to the following basic guidelines?

a) Leveling 61-64 greens/blues will transplant some Tier1ish pieces (yes or no)
Yes

b) Leveling 64-67 greens/blues will transplant some Tier2ish pieces (yes or no)
Yes

c) Leveling 67-70 greens/blues will transplant some Tier3ish pieces (yes or no)
No experience with either 67-70 gear or Tier 3

d) By level 70 you will replace most of your current gear (yes or no)
Me? Yes. Decked out Tier 3 people? Some, depends on the class. Some classes will replace most, others some-much.

e) You may not replace all of your lvl 60 items on the way to 70, esp if you level quickly (yes or no)
Without rerunning instances, probably.

f) You may be able to hit level 70 with 120 hours of effort (yes or no)
No clue. I was levelling on the speedy curve from a few weeks back.

I think your class makes a huge difference in how fast your gear gets replaced. The addition of Agility and Attack Power on the same item is very attractive to rogues. On the otherhand, a warrior may gain signifigant amounts of stamina replacing say dreadnaught with greens, but in doing that he will shitcan his AC and so tank signifigantly worse.

Also there are the classes that have been historically underitemized, healing plate, melee chain etc. I imagine they will quickly replace all/most of thier items. Healers picking up more damage gear is pretty likely too.

http://ctprofiles.net/4540735
Is what I was wearing when I transferred over several months back, mix of T2/2.5/3.

70.

So far, I've replaced my:
Neck (http://www.thottbot.com/beta?i=646)
Cloak (http://www.thottbot.com/beta?i=14)
Gloves (some stupidly overpowered green quest reward with random stats)
Belt (http://www.thottbot.com/beta?i=15247)
Legs (http://www.thottbot.com/beta?i=14936)
Trinket 1 (http://www.thottbot.com/beta?i=2814 or http://www.thottbot.com/beta?i=14845)
Ranged weapon (http://www.thottbot.com/beta?i=11725)

Kind of. It's more of a combination of set bonuses and enchants, replacing head and leg slot items was especially difficult because of ZG enchants, and I also didn't know anyone who could enchant a lot of my gear for a long time. The BF 3 piece set bonus did factor in when I got some upgrades, especially when I was trying out some mutilate builds and envenom.

no

For a couple of things, yes. I wanted to get a good thrown item to test out deadly throw for example.

C and D are questionable, D moreso, the rest sound about right. I don't feel I've replaced most of my gear by 70, I'm sure I will in time.

Yes. (agreeing with this statement)
Yes.

1. What range of gear did you have at lvl 60?

Healing:
8/8 Stormrage, Ring of Blackrock, Revered BoN Ring, Aurastone, Lei of the Lifegiver, blue trinkets, wavefront necklace, hide of the wild.
Feral:
Furor's Eyepatch, Mantle of Wicked Revenge, Malfurion's Blessed Bulwark, Blue bracers, zg 5 heads quest belt, gloves of the hidden temple, blue zg pants, hive tunneler's boots, don julio's band, band of the ogre king, counterattack lodestone, av exalted trinket, hammer of bestial fury, darkmoon neck, windshear cape, elementium threaded cloak.

2. What lvl have you achieved within beta and how much of your active equipment did you replace thus far?

1 bar into 67. Finished all of the quests in Hellfire Penninsula, Zangar Marsh, Terokkar Forrest, and Nagrand. Instanced only to complete quests, roughly 1 run on each, a few 2.

Healing Set:
Replaced Aurastone Hammer and Briarwood Reed. I've seen upgrades for rings and my neck as well, but chose the feral reward instead. I've also replaced my Hide of the Wild with an instance drop.

Feral:
Cat: Replaced nearly everything. I'm using Mantle of Wicked Revenge, and Gloves of the Hidden temple still, but every other piece listed has been replaced in favor of higher dps items. One of the trinkets I have was a pvp reward for 30 marks of honor hold, which can be obtained in just a few hours of world pvp.
Bear: Still using Malfurion's Blessed Bulwark, Elementium Threaded Cloak and Hive Tunneler's Boots in addition to the cat gear I kept. I'm also using the AV exalted trinket in favor of a dps trinket for extra mitigation. I also have my unyielding maul on hand since I haven't seen any weapons with armor yet, but I haven't been in a situation where it was more favorable than the dps boost, and with http://www.thottbot.com/beta?i=3267 the stam seems to be more valuable anyway.

All of the feral replacements with the exception of the 1 trinket have been quest rewards.

3. Have you kept using any weaker pieces (in light of new pieces from Outlands) in order to maintain set bonuses or perhaps for other reasons?

The belt of preserved heads I used for a really long time. I'm currently using http://www.thottbot.com/beta?i=1710 which I see as more of a side grade than a real upgrade. With either piece, I'm pretty much capped on +hit.

4. Have you "nerfed" what you actively wear in order to negotiate repair costs?

Not at all. In fact, I transfered over with 800g, and I'm above 2100g now. Any greens that I AHed had buyouts of double the listed initial value, so that's with 0 price gouging.

5. Have you spent any effort trying to (re)run specific quests or dungeons in order to obtain new, replacement items?

Nope. I'm still amazed at how well I can solo dps as a feral cat, and have found quest rewards to be more than adequate.

6. Would you agree to the following basic guidelines?

a) Leveling 61-64 greens/blues will transplant some Tier1ish pieces (yes or no)
Yes

b) Leveling 64-67 greens/blues will transplant some Tier2ish pieces (yes or no)
Yes

c) Leveling 67-70 greens/blues will transplant some Tier3ish pieces (yes or no)
No experience with either 67-70 gear or Tier 3

d) By level 70 you will replace most of your current gear (yes or no)
Me? Since I'm not really concentrating on healing gear, I don't think so, but it'll be just like the game was when people were first hitting 60. The first few 60s on my server were still running maraudon and getting upgrades, and there was only 1 or 2 UBRS keys on the server. Now people can hit 60 with 1/2 if not most of their tier 0 set or equivalent much faster. The more time that passes, the easier it will be to get upgrades from the higher level areas, so it's not a static number.

e) You may not replace all of your lvl 60 items on the way to 70, esp if you level quickly (yes or no)
I doubt it. The quest rewards will take care of places where you were weak, and most likely all of your MC gear. To replace BWL gear, it seems you have to run instances, although not necessarily the level 70 ones.

f) You may be able to hit level 70 with 120 hours of effort (yes or no)
It might be possible for people who have already done all the quests on the test server, and can prioritize doing multiple quests in one place at a time instead of doing one, then another and finding out it was a prereq for another quest to go back where you just were...

For the person who doesn't have beta experience, I'd lean more towards 150-200 hours, and even more if you like to read quest text, figure things out on your own, and explore each area.

1.) Mostly tier 2.5/3, though my necklace right now is Eye of Hakkar(terrible drop luck on aq40/naxx necks), offhand is Dragonfang Blade(lacking Maexxna's mainhand), and one of my trinkets is Blackhand's Breadth.

2.) At level 67 I've replaced my Deathdealer's Helm with a blue from Auchenai Crypts(req level 65ish), my Deathdealer Leggings with Leggings of Unending Assault(30agi, 45sta, 62ap - hard to pass up that hp), my Eye of Hakkar with a blue neck from a Nagrand quest(14agi, 21sta, 14hit, 28ap), and I also have two blue cloaks - one from the Windrock Matriarch quest(14agi, 19 sta, 14hit, 28ap) and the other from CoT: Durnholde(18agi, 19sta, 40ap) that I might use over Cloak of the Fallen God due to the ap/hp on them. I've also replaced Blackhand's Breadth several times over, once with Bladefist's Breadth and recently with a trinket from Nagrand that's 48 worn ap and 185ish activated. Oh and DFB has been replaced with Ceremonial Warmaul Blood-blade(thanks Gurgthock!), and is my mainhand Mutilate dagger atm.

3.) Nope, so far it's either a clear yes or no. Though I probably will keep my Bonescythe pieces for the 2/4 piece bonuses.

4.) Not at all, I've made far more gold than I spend repairing - I don't really die all that much other than when I get the crazy idea of trying to solo elite quests.

5.) I actually did run Underbog a few times trying to get The Stalker's Fang to replace DFB, but then decided to just hit 65 and do the Ring of Blood quests.

6. Would you agree to the following basic guidelines?

a) Yes.
b) Yes.
c) Yes.
d) Yes.

e) Yes.
f) No.

Hunter

1. What range of gear did you have at lvl 60?
Full giantstalker, zg rings, blackhand/dm quest trinkets, onyxia necklace, ragnaros agi cloak, rhokdelar, brutality+fang of the faceless

2. What lvl have you achieved within beta and how much of your active equipment did you replace thus far?
I hit 70. I replaced 6pieces of giantstalker, the bow, both trinkets, the necklace and the cloak.

3. Have you kept using any weaker pieces (in light of new pieces from Outlands) in order to maintain set bonuses or perhaps for other reasons?
Sadly when I leveled to 65, there was no new talent/mechanics on hunters, so I kept giantstalker even tho I could have switched some pieces, since multishot was my basic dps shot for leveling. I broke the set at 67 tho, to replace leggings with the Haala legs and Thrallmar gem, Haala belt and Leather shoulders from Blood Furnace(hellfire 2nd instance)

4. Have you "nerfed" what you actively wear in order to negotiate repair costs?
No, repair costs were never an issue, and I started the beta with 45g(selling my beaststalker set that was in bank, and other various stuff, I had 34silvers when I copied my char)

5. Have you spent any effort trying to (re)run specific quests or dungeons in order to obtain new, replacement items?

I've completed every quest in the game, sadly due to population issues on euro servers, haven't got to run many instances. Didn't look for anything specific really, just took what I got questing.

6. Would you agree to the following basic guidelines?

a) Leveling 61-64 greens/blues will transplant some Tier1ish pieces (yes or no)
No, not for a hunter
b) Leveling 64-67 greens/blues will transplant some Tier2ish pieces (yes or no)
Maybe some pieces would
c) Leveling 67-70 greens/blues will transplant some Tier3ish pieces (yes or no)
No
d) By level 70 you will replace most of your current gear (yes or no)
Depends on what gear you start with really, if you're in full naxx gear, I doubt you'll change more than your trinkets, and maybe some stuff like cloak/neck/rings, but I doubt you'd break cryptstalker

e) You may not replace all of your lvl 60 items on the way to 70, esp if you level quickly (yes or no)
Depends on how you level, if you quest, you won't replace all of it, mainly because there's slots lacking any upgrades(bracers for hunters for example). If you level in dungeons like a lot of people will tho, you'll probably switch most of your gear if you're geared before AQ, and half of it at AQ level.
f) You may be able to hit level 70 with 120 hours of effort (yes or no)
Less than that.

If you said no to any of those, please explain why and what you think is a more accurate statement.
As a not so well geared hunter, I ended up replacing a lot of my gear. However, it was mainly dps upgrades, I lost stamina in the process because there's not that many good hunter rewards from quests(they're either +dmg +str enhannce stuff, or straight +heal/+dmg elem/resto shaman gear) and the ones that do exist are full agi+ap with no stam on it. However, I only replaced most of it at 67+, from the elite quests in Nagrand(good cloak, good neck) and up. Before that, there was not really a lot of stuff worth breaking set bonus, especially since you have to consider that your current gear is most likely enchanted, while getting green stuff you're lvling enchanted feels like a waste of time. So in the end, due to enchants, you don't replace items that easily. The exceptions are trinkets, since you get awesome trinkets in the first 3-4levels that pretty much beat anything in the game besides kiss of the spider and saph trinkets. But enchants are really the big thing, I didn't replace my melee weapons because they both had 15agi, and replacing them with slightly better stats(but almost 20more dps on each) would have ruined my crit%, which was already taking quite a hit from the crit rating system.

As a conclusion, I'd say, if you're only questing, you'll replace tier1 by 70, you probably won't bother on tier2+ because of enchants, and you might end up switching only a few pieces. If you're dungeon farming for xp tho, you might end up replacing tier2 by 68, and tier2.5 on the way to 70. Tier3 will stay good until 70 easily, and some pieces, again because of enchants might stay the best pieces you can get for some time, until you can get new enchants and stuff(thinking of zg shoulder/head/legs enchants mainly). If you're a leatherworker or know one willing to give those ap/crit kits while leveling, you'll replace stuff more easily.

1. What range of gear did you have at lvl 60?
T3/T2 Mix -- http://ctprofiles.net/16667

2. What lvl have you achieved within beta and how much of your active equipment did you replace thus far?
L70, I've replaced my cloak, shoulders, ranged, brood-ring, and trinkets. I have 3 or 4 items banked that would replace my other gear if I enchanted it.

3. Have you kept using any weaker pieces (in light of new pieces from Outlands) in order to maintain set bonuses or perhaps for other reasons?
Not necessarily weaker, however, I've been hesitant to lose either the 3pc DragonStalker bonus, or the 4pc CryptStalker bonus

4. Have you "nerfed" what you actively wear in order to negotiate repair costs?
No, between being beta, and the lack of real 'die over & over again' progression content, and the significant cash gains (I'm about +2k from leveling to 70), repairs haven't been an issue.

5. Have you spent any effort trying to (re)run specific quests or dungeons in order to obtain new, replacement items?
The sporegarr quests for Coilfang - the cloak was an upgrade since shrouded mists hadn't been changed, and the mushroom is real nice for leveling up. Shattered Halls ring from killing Kargath. Also the Nessinger 2.0 quests for the new rifle. Currently running CoT:Dark Portal for a new bow, although there's a couple others better. I haven't seen a ton out of the current instances I'd consider upgrades yet though.

6. Would you agree to the following basic guidelines?
a) Leveling 61-64 greens/blues will transplant some Tier1ish pieces (yes or no)
- Yes
b) Leveling 64-67 greens/blues will transplant some Tier2ish pieces (yes or no)
- Not so much
c) Leveling 67-70 greens/blues will transplant some Tier3ish pieces (yes or no)
- Not so much
d) By level 70 you will replace most of your current gear (yes or no)
- Not been my experience for my hunter
e) You may not replace all of your lvl 60 items on the way to 70, esp if you level quickly (yes or no)
- I've seen a lot more upgrades on my mage, who was geared mostly in AQ20/ZG epics, and she's only 64. My hunter hasn't gotten very many upgrades at all.
f) You may be able to hit level 70 with 120 hours of effort (yes or no)
- I hit 67 during the cap in a hardcore 4 day weekend's time, I got to 70 in basically the same time it took me to get 60-67.

Note I am using my Warlock for this
1. What range of gear did you have at lvl 60?
Blues Tier 1, I basically did not own rings (character was deleted/restored).
2. What lvl have you achieved within beta and how much of your active equipment did you replace thus far?
63, 8 pieces.
3. Have you kept using any weaker pieces (in light of new pieces from Outlands) in order to maintain set bonuses or perhaps for other reasons?
Yes, but only until I had two clear upgrades from Felheart.
4. Have you "nerfed" what you actively wear in order to negotiate repair costs?
No.
5. Have you spent any effort trying to (re)run specific quests or dungeons in order to obtain new, replacement items?
No
6. Would you agree to the following basic guidelines?

a) Leveling 61-64 greens/blues will transplant some Tier1ish pieces (yes or no)
Absolutely
b) Leveling 64-67 greens/blues will transplant some Tier2ish pieces (yes or no)
Cannot say for sure, but a wishy-washy yes.
c) Leveling 67-70 greens/blues will transplant some Tier3ish pieces (yes or no)
Have yet to experience any level 67 range content
d) By level 70 you will replace most of your current gear (yes or no)
No
e) You may not replace all of your lvl 60 items on the way to 70, esp if you level quickly (yes or no)
I will most likely not replace all gear, but a large majority of it.
f) You may be able to hit level 70 with 120 hours of effort (yes or no)
Looks to be correct.

Paladin: 6/8 Lawbringer, Judgement Helm/bracers. Aurastone Hammer/ZG shield. ~60 spell dmg.

Lvl 69 currently. Holy Build (45/8/7) I am still wearing my 2 Judgement Pieces (bracers/helm). Comprable items have dropped from questing, but stats have not been exactly what i'm looking for, enchant has been upgraded on the bracers. All lawbringer is replaced. Shield replaced practically instantly with a green quest reward at 60. Currently running 7500 HP/8200 MP unbuffed with ~450 spell dmg. I think its worth it to note that all my items have been replaced with solo Quest gear, not instance drops, as I haven't done anything past The Blood Furnace as far as instances go.

No, but as I mentioned, I have found comprable drops to a few things but haven't replaced the judgement yet because the enchants already on them make it moot.

No. Gold flows like water.

No, but I will when the expansion goes live. There are replacements for many of the pieces I'm wearing if I were to actually run instances.

Yes to all, but that is for ME personally. Many people will not replace much gear at all, especially raiders doing Naxx, until they hit 70 or close to it.

To me this seems to be the time where the casuals have the opportunity to close the gap with the raiders.