Project Lore

With a fresh build of 3.3 on the test realms, that means some brand spanking new information is coming down the pipe. First off, perhaps in an effort to stave off would-be data-miners, Blizzard is starting to show off all the near Tier 10 armor pieces on their very own preview site. So far, you can only see gear for Death Knights, Druids, Hunters, and Warriors. Though I appreciated some of the Tier 9 designs, I'm really enjoy what I'm seeing here. Every set looks like it fits the theme of the class and, don't worry, you won't see the cut-and-paste jobs we got the last time. But a little info-spelunking can go a long way. MMO-Champion has discovered some details concerning the next tier of raiding gear in the files, and the set bonuses that will go along with them: EDIT: It seems as though these set bonuses will be tweaked or changed throughout the testing period! In other words, these are not final. We will bring you the end result when it's solidified, but until then, you should keep tabs on blue posts in this thread.

Death Knight

• T10 Tank 2P Bonus - Increases the damage done by your Death and Decay ability by 20%.
• T10 Tank 4P Bonus - When you activate Blood Tap, you gain 12% damage reduction from all attacks for 10 sec.
• T10 Melee 2P Bonus - Your Obliterate, Scourge Strike, and Death Strike abilities deal 10% increased damage.
• T10 Melee 4P Bonus - Whenever all your runes are on cooldown, you gain 3% increased damage done with weapons, spells, and abilities for the next 15 sec.

This how Death Knights will look in their full Tier 10. Druid

• T10 Restoration 2P Bonus - The healing granted by your Wild Growth spell reduces 0% less over time.
• T10 Restoration 4P Bonus (Rejuvenation) - Each time your Rejuvenation spell heals a target, it has a 2% chance to jump to a new target at full duration.
• T10 Balance 2P Bonus - When you gain Clearcasting from your Omen of Clarity talent, you deal 10% additional Nature and Arcane damage for 6 sec.
• T10 Balance 4P Bonus - Reduces the cooldown on your Eclipse talent by 6000.
• T10 Feral 2P Bonus - Your Swipe (Bear) and Lacerate abilities deal 20% additional damage and the cost of your Rip ability is reduced by 10 energy.
• T10 Feral 4P Bonus - Your Enrage ability no longer decreases your armor and instead decreases all damage taken by 12%, and the periodic damage done by your Rake ability can now be a critical strike.

Hunter

• T10 2P Bonus - Your Auto Shots have a 5% chance to cause you and your pet to deal 15% additional damage for until cancelled.
• T10 4P Bonus - Your Shot abilities deal 4% increased damage to targets afflicted with Viper Sting, Serpent Sting, or Wyvern Sting.

Mage

• T10 2P Bonus - Your Mirror Image ability also causes you to deal 15% additional damage for 10 sec.
• T10 4P Bonus - Your Hot Streak, Missile Barrage, and Brain Freeze talents also grant you 12% haste for 3 sec when the effect of the talent is consumed.

Paladin

• T10 Holy 2P Bonus - The cooldown on your Divine Favor talent is reduced by 60 sec.
• T10 Holy 4P Bonus - Your Holy Shock spell causes the next Holy Light you cast within 10 sec to have 0.3 sec reduced cast time.
• T10 Protection 2P Bonus - Your Hammer of the Righteous ability deals 20% increased damage.
• T10 Protection 4P Bonus - When you activate Divine Plea, you gain 12% dodge for 10 sec.
• T10 Retribution 2P Bonus - Your Seals and Judgements deal 10% additional damage.
• T10 Retribution 4P Bonus - Your melee attacks have a 4% chance to reset the cooldown on your Divine Storm ability.

Priest

• T10 Healer 2P Bonus - After your Pain Suppression and Guardian Spirit talents expire on your target, they grant your target 10% increased healing received for 10 sec.
• T10 Healer 4P Bonus - Your Flash Heal spell has a 15% chance to reset the cooldown on your Circle of Healing and Penance Spells.
• T10 Shadow 2P Bonus - The critical strike chance of your Shadow Word: Pain, Devouring Plague, and Vampiric Touch spells is increased by 5%.
• T10 Shadow 4P Bonus - Reduces the channel duration and period of your Mind Flay spell by 51%.

Rogue

• T10 2P Bonus - Gives your melee finishing moves a 13% chance to add 3 combo points to your target.
• T10 4P Bonus - Your Tricks of the Trade ability now grants you 15 energy instead of costing energy.

Shaman

• T10 Restoration 2P Bonus - Your Riptide spell grants 20% spell haste for your next spellcast.
• T10 Restoration 4P Bonus - Your Chain Heal critical strikes cause the target to heal for 25% of the healed amount over until cancelled.
• T10 Elemental 2P Bonus - Your Lightning Bolt spell reduces the remaining cooldown on your Elemental Mastery talent by 1 sec.
• T10 Elemental 4P Bonus - The cooldown on your Lava Burst ability is reduced by 15 sec.
• T10 Enhancement 2P Bonus - When you activate your Shamanistic Rage ability you also deal 12% additional damage for 15 sec.
• T10 Enhancement 4P Bonus - Each time the beneficial effect of your Maelstrom Weapon talent reaches 5 charges, you have a 15% chance to gain 20% attack power for 10 sec.

Warlock

• T10 2P Bonus - The critical strike chance of your Shadowbolt, Incinerate, and Corruption spells is increased by 5%.
• T10 4P Bonus - Each time your Immolate and Unstable Affliction spells deal periodic damage, you have a 15% chance to gain 12% spell haste for 10 sec.

Warrior

• T10 Protection 2P Bonus - Your Shield Slam and Shockwave abilities deal 20% increased damage.
• T10 Protection 4P Bonus - Your Bloodrage ability no longer costs health to use, and now causes you to absorb damage equal to 20% of your maximum health. Lasts until cancelled.
• T10 Melee 2P Bonus - When your Rend and Deep Wounds abilities deal damage you have a 2% chance to gain 20% attack power for until cancelled.
• T10 Melee 4P Bonus - You have a 20% chance for your Blood Surge and Sudden Death talents to grant 2 charges of their effect instead of 1 and for the duration of the effect to be increased by 100%.

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Choosing gear used to be so simple. When you roll a new character, you start out with the crappiest of the crap. At first, it’s just a matter of picking whatever has the highest armor rating. Couldn’t be easier. Then you add in stats to consider. Would you rather have agility or intelligence? Is your character more suited to armor of the bear or of the tiger? Are you mainly PvE or PvP? The choice becomes slightly more difficult, but usually is still pretty clear-cut as long as you have a certain spec in mind. My main character is a rogue, so I almost always went for the agility, with stamina as my second-favored stat (<3 “of the monkey” armor). Then come item enhancements. Being a leatherworker, for me the choice was between using an armor kit or getting a guildmate to enchant my gear with increased stats. Again, I usually went for the agility whenever possible. But then I hit the high-50s, and things got more complicated. Blue armor was no longer always better than green armor. The stat bonuses started getting better. Many items offer bonuses to more than just one or two stats. And now there are sockets to consider, along with bonuses for actually filling the sockets. Or, bonuses for having multiple items in a set. And in addition to just stat bonuses, there also are pluses to attack power, crit rating, resilience rating, dodge rating, resistances etc. Too many choices! Of course, one helpful trick is to equip back and forth between the gear you’re choosing from, and see how the stats that matter to you change. Or, if it’s a bind on equip item, you can use an add-on specific to your spec (I use GearDPS) to see how the gear will work for you. Sometimes you have to choose between one great stat and another great stat. A straight-up plus to agility isn’t always my best choice anymore, not when so many other enhancements may increase both agility and a combo of other needed stats. How does one cope, especially when making the shift to questing in Outland, then Northrend, where much, much better equipment is given as quest rewards (and it drops pretty frequently, too)? In the early 60s, I often found myself carrying around gear that, as it was, wasn’t quite as good as what I had equipped. But if I was able to get it enchanted, it would be a little bit better. Then I would find an even better item before I had the chance to enchant the second one. Or I would hold on to gear that I thought was awesome, but that I wasn't high enough level to equip yet. But once I reached the right level to equip it, my gear already had surpassed that mark. Now that I'm in Northrend, it’s getting even more complicated. So, I became more stingy with my gear. For BoP gear that's a quest reward and already obsolete, I'll just choose whichever item sells for the highest amount (yay, Auctioneer addon). For me, I can't justify equipping BoE gear if I’m going to find something better in a half-level anyways. Instead, auction it! Or give it to a guildy to disenchant.  Do those few extra tenths-of-a-chance to crit really make a difference when I can level quickly without it? Is it even worth keeping spare sets of gear for different uses when you’re leveling up so quickly that it becomes obsolete before you can use it? At least until I hit 80, my guess is no. So how do you go about choosing whether to use gear that may be replaced quickly? Do you go ahead and equip it and make use of it while you can? Do you just go for the money? Or is there a happy medium?

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