gearing up pre-Kara for warrior

once the warrior reaches level 70, the question becomes: "what gear do we need before we start Kara?" i expect this topic to evolve over the next week or so as i confirm how i have set up for Kara. the target, of course, is to have 490 defense, 12K health and 12K armor - while preserving 25% avoidance (parry+dodge) and racking up as much +hit as you can. if you are still a bit fuzzy on why we need 490 defense, 25% avoidance, etc etc yatta yatta - you can do one of two things: i) just trust us!; or, ii) go read about it at places like wowwiki.com, elitistjerks.com and tankspot.com.

i have found several solid guidances online on different approaches to gearing up for Kara. tankspot.com shows you how to gather good gear without rinsing and repeating dungeons over and over again looking for those oh-so-critical drops that seem to always be afk and instead ' yet another cloth piece' drops! Polar's approach is a fantastic one and i highly recommend reading it at level 60. what?! come again?! yes - start reading it often and start at level 60. it shows you how to gather a great tanking set mainly from quests and rep rewards where your rep is no higher than revered. this is great news because it means you won't miss quests as you level that you really need the rewards from. (or more importantly, you won't sell the rewards thinking there is something better coming later - e.g. the boots from the escort quest out of Mana Tombs at level 64.) if you missed it until now, like me, just pick up where you are and chase down what you need from his list!

if you have a penchant for crafting, follow Lootables's approach to quick-leveling your blacksmithing and forge some felsteel pieces. by and large, it will cost less to just buy the pieces from someone that knows how to make them already rather than try to get the patterns and to level up BS enough to make the pieces.

and of course, you can rinse and repeat instances if you have the time and especially if you need the practice.

i'm taking a combined path. both using quest rewards, rep rewards, rinsing and repeating instances, and /1 to ask for anyone that can make the felsteel pieces! i might even go farm some honor and buy some welfare epics to patch any holes as we get closer to night.

having said that, i am already sitting at 27% avoidance, 487 defense, 10.5K armor and 10.5K health - so i am relatively in good shape. the problem now is that as i pick up new pieces to replace old, invariably, they jolt the balance and while you add a lot of one thing, you lose something else that prompts you to need to go get something else updated and the chain continues.

by and large, once i have my baseline gear lined up, *then* i will go get the enchants and leg armor kits to boost as necessary to clear 490, 25% and the 12K twins.

interestingly, in shad labs we got the Adamantine Figurine and the Platinum Shield of the Valorous with almost no hassle at all. they dropped very quickly for us. even dropped the Breastplate of Many Graces our paladin wanted!

Heinkel saw and picked out Helm of the Stalwart Defender for me (you rock!) which has helped a lot. He was hilarious and even showed up at the instance to drop it off - gemmed! Most likely, depending on how everything shakes out, I'll end up gemming it with Solid Star of Elune x3. I'd sacrifice the +4 STR, but really - compared to +36 STA, yeah - exactly!

earlier, i had picked up Cloak of Eternity and many greens that stacked defense or stamina.

24 hrs into it and already very close. of course, it pays to have not really bought very much gear at all through the levels and lived off of drops and rewards so that now you can afford to buy shtuff.