As the WoW Cataclysm Classic pre-patch is set to launch on April 30th, I've put together a brief guide on swiftly acquiring gear for returning players on freshly boosted characters or those starting anew. It's surprisingly simple to reach an average item level of 260, more than sufficient to expedite your leveling journey when WoW Cataclysm launches.
Prepare Honor Points
Before the pre-patches launch, it's important to prepare the currency that you need to get this gear, and that's honor points. Make sure you cap on honor points before the pre-patch launches. In the WoW Cataclysm, the currency is totally revamped. The cap on honor is now 4K.
Which is why the best strategy right now is to prepare the Stone Keeper's Shards to turn them into Wintergrasp Marks of Honor. Wintergrasp Marks of Honor can be used after the pre-patch to grant you a lot more honor. Remember, these are actually account-wide, so if you have Stone Keeper's Shards lying around on your alt, get a load of these marks and get them hoarded up.
We're going to be purchasing the Wrathful PvP gear with Wintergrasp Marks of Honor. Although PvP gear isn't ideal for PvE, it's the biggest power creep you can achieve from this little time and this can leapfrog you into Gamma Dungeons and raids.
Although it's not confirmed yet that this gear will be purchasable with honor, it's how it did work at the end of WoW Classic and how it did in the WoW Cataclysm Classic. If for whatever reason it doesn't work, you can still get the Relentless gear. There might be an arena rating restriction on the weapon, but there's a simple solution to that. There might be an arena rating restriction on the weapon, but there's a simple solution to that.
Dungeon Raids
So, now you're decked out in PvP gear, then you're going to obtain is the weapon. The item level of the gear is so bad on the boosted gear that you may actually struggle to get yourself into Gamma Dungeons as it does now have an item level requirement.
So, you want to queue yourself into Forge of Souls, Pit of Saron, and Halls of Reflection to get yourself a weapon. These reward 232 gear. If you don't get anything from those dungeons, queue Trial of the Crusader.
We will just be able to purchase the Wrathful weapons with honor and therefore the best thing to do is just mindlessly grind Battlegrounds and Wintergrasp, making sure to do all of the quests in Wintergrasp. These reward honors but also reward you Wintergrasp Marks of Honor, which can be turned into commendations, which obviously can also be turned into even more honor.
For returning players, you can queue Gamma Dungeons now in the Dungeon Finder, which are more difficult versions of the original Heroic dungeons. However, we want to farm the Scourgestones, particularly for the trinkets, because that will be the best trinket that you can get.
A currency vendor for these is where all the others are in Dalaran. You'll be able to get excellent weapons and trinket upgrades, and the trinkets will be even better than the PvP ones. You can also downgrade the Scourgestones into Celestial Essences if there's something better on that vendor.
Final Thought
You can do raids to get Heroic gear, but your time would be better making WoW Cataclysm Classic Gold and leveling up your professions. Particularly for a returning player, professions provide a big DPS boost, and you can easily do gold flips on the Auction House in order to afford all of your weekly raid consumes.
Feel free to do some raids. You don't need to deck a character out in full 25-man Heroic gear unless you're going to be doing the World First race to Level 85. Bear in mind that by the time you hit Uldum and the Stonecore, the quests will start rewarding item Level 312 gear.
