It's not an easy journey to transition from cloth gear to leather. There is simply more and better cloth out there than there is leather. This applies not only to damage and healing gear for moonkins, but also for plain old healing gear (for our Resto brethren). I don't blame Blizzard for the lack of leather. After all, moonkins don't make up a terribly large part of the population. It wouldn't really be fair if bosses continually dropped leather dmg/heal gear to groups who couldn't use it.
I recently was able to obtain some new shoulders, Grand Marshal's Wyrmhide Spaulders. Previously I was using Archmage Mantle of the Sorcerer. The green shoulders have 108 armor on them, while the GM ones have 249. While this doesn't seem like a lot (only 141 armor in Night Elf), I underestimated it's significance in Moonkin form.
Archmage Mantle
108 + 108 * 4 = 540 armor in Moonkin
Grand Marshal'sNever underestimate leather armor. Moving from a piece with 108 armor to a piece with 249 armor granted a 705 armor increase in Moonkin! It's also worth noting that, after gemming the GM shoulders, I only lost 1 point of damage and healing.
249 + 249 * 4 = 1245 armor in Moonkin
I can understand how raiding moonkins might go with cloth over leather. If all is going well (the tank keeps aggro), the extra 705 armor is negligible. However, if you like to PvP and you are still wearing cloth, trade it in! The GM shoulders are suprisingly easy to get. 10K honor and 20AB marks can be gained in about a week of moderate PvPing, and you won't replace them for quite some time.
I'm down to three cloth pieces! How many are you still wearing?
4 comments:
How do you determine when to no longer keep a piece of cloth spell damage gear around? A lot of the leather for Boomkins is inferior to the cloth that's available. I could easily see having full sets of both, cluttering my bags, just to perform optimally in raids and PvP.
As a healer my tunic, belt, and shoulders are Primal Mooncloth for PvE. But I would never dream of wearing this into a BG or Arena. Consequently I carry separate PvE and PvP healing sets at all times. The built-in gear storage they mentioned at Blizzcon can't come soon enough!
Yep, unfortunately keeping separate sets for PvE and PvP is the best bet currently. In case you are wondering my set count is 6! (Moonkin PvP, Moonkin PvE, Resto PvE, Resto PvP, Cat, Bear) There is some overlap in those sets but it's not as much as I'd like. It's kind of frustrating to never have inventory space, but this is the price we pay if we want to be able to switch roles and be successful.
Indeed the built-in gear storage is going to be a big help, however we are also getting nerfed in arena at least by the fact that we won't be able to switch gear anymore. Changing to a more potent cloth set against a caster team was a nice advantage, but unfortunately people abused the privilege (switching to 350 shadow resist against priest/lock) and druids got the brunt of the nerf.
As far as when I swap out leather for cloth, I can't really say I have a definitive method. I look at overall whether it gets me closer to my long term goals (of 15K armor, 10K health, 8K mana, and 800 spell damage) than the cloth piece already has me. As far as the shoulder piece went, it was pretty much a no brainer as it was nearly a pure upgrade to all stats.
When it comes to keeping cloth gear for PvE, I'll almost always keep something with higher spell damage over something with higher armor/stamina/resilience. However, it is important to watch for spell damage vs mp5 (for longevity) and intellect (which through talents gives bonuses to spell damage and to mana regen)
Thanks for stopping by, and thanks for the post on Resto4Life! My heart skipped a beat when I saw my blog on your most recent post!
Let me see....
Balance gear: 0 cloth.
Resto PvP gear: 0 cloth. Though, 3 balance items. (PvP epics from my balance days).
Resto PvE gear: 1 cloth.
Hunter alt: 1 cloth. (Healing shoulders from BRD).
Would recommend to not take any more GM pieces, and go for Veteran stuff instead. And fill up with Gladiator where it is needed the most.
-Muda (Europe)
You're very welcome, Delos. =) Loving your blog so far. Still working on a description that does it justice for my blogroll.
Are you excited about the Moonkin gear promised with the Zul'Aman patch? =) I am, and I don't even play a Laser Chicken!
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