New Professions Review and Stockpiling for Patch 5.2

New Professions Review and Stockpiling for Patch 5.2

In my previous post Patch 5.2 New Profession Recipes I showed all the new profession recipes in the upcoming patch. In this post I will discuss them along with my opinions on all the profession changes.

Overview

Most of the new recipes we will see will be for Blacksmithing, Tailoring, and Leatherworking. The new PvE recipes will be for feet and head armor. New PvP armor is also introduced with some nice changes. Engineering and Jewelcrafting will see a little bit of love as well. An important thing to note is that none of these recipes require Blood Spirits. They have been replaced with a new item Haunting Spirit. We know Blood Spirits are obtained from disenchanting 5.1 raid gear it appears that Haunting Spirits are obtained from disenchanting 5.2 raid gear.

Leatherworking

Leatherworkers will receive 8 new PvE armor patterns along with 77 new PvP armor patterns. Leatherworkers will also receive one new bag pattern and two new Magnificent Hide crafting patterns.

Along with Haunting Spirits the main crafting reagent for PvE ilvl 522 leather gear will be Magnificent Hide. It will require 7 hides for the feet armor and 14 hides for the head armor. Leatherworkers will receive two new recipes for crafting Magnificent Hide. They are Pattern: Magnificence of Scales. and Pattern: Magnificence of Leather both of these are found from random world drops from all mobs in Mists of Panderia. The drop rates of these are pretty common on the PTR and should be easily obtainable once the patch hits. Our current recipe for creating Magnificent Hide will stay in the game costing 50 Exotic Leathers to craft. The new recipes will only cost 20 Exotic Leather or 20 Prismatic Sale to craft, however both recipes are on a shared cooldown of once per day. The important thing to note is that the new PvP and PvE recipes are discovered from crafting the hide once per day using the new recipes. Thus learning the new recipes will be gated at one new recipe per day. The discoveries are random and there is no way to choose if the discovery will be for a PvP or PvE recipe. The new bag recipe Magnificent Hide Pack will be a new 36 slot leatherworking bag replacing the old Trapper's Traveling Pack a 28 slot leatherworking bag. The new ilvl 458 PvP armor will require Magnificent Hide to craft.

Tailoring

Tailors will receive 4 new PvE ilvl 522 armor patterns along with 34 new PvP ilvl 458 armor patterns. Along with Haunting Spirits the new PvE head armor will require 6 Imperial Silk while the new Feet armor will require 4 Imperial Silk. As with leatherworking, the tailor patterns are discovered once per day while using the Imperial Silk crafting. PvP armor will require Bolts of Windwool Cloth to craft.

Blacksmithing

Blacksmiths will receive 6 new PvE ilvl 522 armor patterns, 6 new ilvl 463 weapon patterns, and 33 new ilvl 458 PvP patterns. They will also learn a new reagent recipe Living Steel Ingot. Along with Haunting Spirits the new PvE Head armor will require 8 Living Steel and 3 Spirits of Harmony while the new Feet armor will require 6 Living Steel and 2 Spirits of Harmony. The new weapons will require Lightning Steel Ingots, Living Steel, and Spirits of Harmony. The PvP armor will require Ghost Iron Bars to craft. As with the other professions recipe discoveries are gated behind a daily Lightning Steel crafting.

Conclusion

The PvE patterns show promise but with the reagent requirement of Haunting Spirits these items will not be realistically craftable for 6-8 weeks from patch release. My plan is to make gold from the new PvP items. With leatherworking I plan on stockpiling large amounts of Magnificent Hide. This will allow me to make all the PvP items and the new Leatherworking bags. For tailoring I plan on stockpiling Windwool cloth and bolts. I also plan on hoarding my Imperial Silk until I can make the PvE cloth items, however I will watch the leg enchant market closely and may use a few to make leg enchants if the prices rise dramatically. With Blacksmithing I will stockpile Ghost Iron Ore/Bars, Living Steel, Trillium, and Spirits of Harmony. I will craft PvP gear for all professions as soon as I learn the recipes.

While stockpiling all the mats is wise I feel that the hidden gold mine is in leatherworking. Blacksmithing has a large number of suppliers for the market. Players farm ore and botting helps provide a large supply to market. While questing, dungeons and raids provide a continued supply of cloth. The truly limited supply item is from skinning. The supply is the most limited of all the professions. Many people have alts to farm herbs and ore but few have skinners. Due to the large demand there will be for leather and scales I do not believe the supply will be able to come close to meeting the demand. While I expect ore and cloth prices to rise in this patch I expect the highest price spike to be with leather. Not only will leather prices rise the highest but I expect the leather market will have a longer time to stabilize compared to the cloth and ore markets.

One important thing to remember about ore and bar prices is that there will be two separate price spikes. The first will occur immediately after the patch release. This will be due to players needing more bars to craft the PvP gear and those using the new method to level up their lower level blacksmiths. The second, and larger, price spike will come after the server unlocks the Thunder Forge. The exact amount of time for a server to unlock the Thunder Forge will vary by server but estimate it will take approximately 30-40 days for an average server to complete it. Once the Thunder Forge is open up to blacksmiths you can expect the second price spike to hit so be prepared for it.

I also advise stockpiling all items necessary to make item enhancements. This includes all enchants for Enchanters for the new supply of gear players will be replacing from the new raids. Also leg enchants made by tailors and leatherworkers, shoulder enchants made by Inscriptionists, and gems made by Jewelcrafters. Alchemists can also expect an increased demand for potions and flasks. Don’t forget there will be an increased demand for specialty foods if you have leveled your cooking. Thus expect an increased demand, and price, for key cooking mats.

A special note for Jewelcrafters: in the past PvP crafting gear never had gem slots. Thus PvP gems were reserved to armor bought with honor and conquest points. However as of this patch the new crafted PvP gear will have gems slots available in them. This might be a good time to take a new look at the PvP gem market. Now would be a good time for all players to check their auction house for cheap PvP gems and for Jewelcrafters to collect mats to meet the demand for this increasing market.

Hopefully this will help you for the upcoming patch.

Thanks,

Jafo