Petrus' Brief Guide to 540

[Petrus]

This is a short guide designed to get you to 540 Defense (689 Defense Rating) using only quest and rep rewards with a couple of enchants thrown in. Anything listed as "Optional" is not part of the initial 689 rating. The number in parentheses after each item's source is the amount of Defense Rating on the item. The only faction required to get these items is Wyrmrest Accord up to Revered status.

The big thing is that there are NO dungeon drops on this list! You don't have to grind for that one thing that never drops.

Helm:
The Crusader's Resolution - Quest Reward: The Crusaders' Pinnacle, Icecrown (60)

Optional Enchant:
Arcanum of the Stalwart Defender, Requires Argent Crusade - Revered (20)

Neck:
Betrayer's Choker - Quest Reward: Betrayal, Zul'Drak (17)

Gem: Thick Sun Crystal (12)

Shoulders:
Tundra Pauldrons - Quest Reward: Have They No Shame?, Borean Tundra/The Nexus (24)

Cloak:
Cloak of Peaceful Resolution - Requires Wyrmrest Accord - Honored (43)

Optional Enchant: Titanweave (16)

Chest:
Breastplate of the Solemn Council - Requires Wyrmrest Accord - Revered (76)

Enchant: Greater Defense, Requires 10 Infinite Dust and 1 Eternal Earth (22)

Wrist:
Tempered Saronite Bracers - Blacksmithing BoE Crafted, 13 Saronite Bars (48 )

Glove:
Daunting Handguards - Blacksmithing BoE Crafted, 12 Saronite Bars and 1 Eternal Earth (71)

Waist:
Tempered Saronite Belt - Blacksmithing BoE Crafted, 6 Cobalt Bars and 5 Saronite Bars (57)

Legs:
Daunting Legplates - Blacksmithing BoE Crafted, 14 Saronite Bars and 1 Eternal Earth (88 )

Feet:
Sabatons of Draconic Vigor - Requires Wyrmrest Accord - Revered (58 )

Rings:
Solid Platinum Band - Quest Reward: For Posterity, Zul'Drak/Gundrak (25)
Kurzel's Warband - Quest Reward: Search and Rescue, Grizzly Hills/Drak'Tharon Keep (19)

Weapon:
Crescent of Brooding Fury - Quest Reward: Wanted: Ragemane's Flipper, Zul'Drak (26)

Shield:
Saronite Bulwark - Blacksmithing BoE Crafted, 14 Saronite Bars (31)

Enchant: Defense, Requires 3 Infinite Dust and 3 Lesser Cosmic Essence (20)

60+17+12+24+43+76+22+48+71+57+88+58+25+19+26+31+20 = 697

All that should put you at 697 Rating and uncrittable at over 540 Defense. Be sure to replace pieces and get upgrades once you're able to head into the heroics and Naxx with this stuff! Notice also that I left out trinkets - those are harder to get your hands on and will be more customizable with this model.

[Barathorn]

Good work Petrus.

I'll be incorperating this into the Main Tanking Sticky once I have more feedback about how we are going to construct it.

Barathorn

[Petrus]

I figured this would be the exact kind of thing needed for your mastersticky since so many people are asking about it lately

[verthis]

Great piece of work there thanks.

I am wearing most of what is on your list save a few items I have not yet gotten and a few upgrades I have picked up but otherwise my gear is identical.

[Bregor]

Very nice list!
May I add an alternative legging: Special Issue Legplates easily obtainable if you do some AC quests. Slightly less def and str but a sweet chunk of hit.

[Barathorn]

This is exactly the sort of information we need to compile, the more people who get involved with ideas and suggestions, the better the guides we can produce for the community

Barathorn

[ulushnar]

Very nice list!
May I add an alternative legging: Special Issue Legplates easily obtainable if you do some AC quests. Slightly less def and str but a sweet chunk of hit.

I don't think you can. There's a 19 Defense rating difference between the two legs and the OP's guide only puts you at 3 rating over the 689 minimum. even if you put a +14 Def rating gem in the slot you'd still be 2 def rating shy of the goal.

[lythac]

As from my list here (very similar, with same gearing rules) it was suggested that getting Revered Wyrmrest Accord may take some time (not much)

Staunch Signet > Kurzel's Warband

Daunting Handguards > Tempered Saronite Gauntlets

[ulushnar]

Daunting Handguards > Tempered Saronite Gauntlets

I should have picked up on this one myself. Just today I was telling a BS buddy of mine to not bother making me the Tempered Saronite gloves and wait for the Daunting ones.

[Mortehl]

Gearing is much less cut and dry than it used to be. Keep in mind that maintaining the right amount of crit avoidance is going to be -far- more fluid this time around. You will find yourself having to balance the value of a massive upgrade on one set of stats against the loss of too much defense.

[lythac]

Remember this was the case in the beginning of TBC, except it was crushability and mainly surrounding BV/avoidance and sta.

[Ayka]

Am I right, or does the quick (napkin) math on this add up to under 800 Stamina gained over the set?, If I'm not mistaken, that's gonna be under 20k Unbuffed Health.

Uncrittable or not...

Can someone see if this is really the case? Maybe I missed a piece, or I'm not adding up correctly?

[Petrus]

It may be, I haven't checked. I simply put Tempered Saronite Gauntlets on there because of the (slightly) cheaper cost; I'll update it with Daunting. I also wanted to make the list such that you only really needed to grind one faction - Wyrmrest - rather than two for the Argent stuff, though it really isn't hard to get Honored with them (I'm 78 and already wearing Special Issue pants).

I also left those trinket slots open for things like Essence of Gossamer (111 stam) and Noise Booster for the engineers (81 stam). It's also rather intended as a guide for those of us who had no or few TBC epics going in and are simply trying to reach it for the first time. For some of us, myself included, there are a few pieces here and there that are swappable, changeable, and net you plenty of stamina in between. Note that I also didn't list a boot enchant (22), leg enchant (45 or 55), wrist enchant (12 or maybe 16), shoulder enchant (a heavy borean kit is 18 here), or glove enchant (Armsman is best but 18 stam works again here too), bringing you another bunch of stamina.

[lythac]

The current gearset has 949 sta, doesn't have any trinkets and remember it doesn't have many enchants on it.

Edit: BTW you can now sandbox on Warcrafter.net, Although it doesn't have the correct base hp at 80 (still has level 70 values). Still useful for playing around for def values.

[Petrus]

One more thing: I tried not to pick anything that WoWHead said was Alliance-only or Horde-Only. It may not actually be the case, but I wanted to avoid it on the off-chance that it is actually the case.


May I also suggest we move Lythac's post here from the WotLK forum? I didn't know it existed until it was linked here, and I think it belongs here with the other good gearing-up-type threads.