• 169 Strength
• 185 Stamina
• One red socket and one blue socket
• Improves hit rating by 95
• Increases your armor penetration rating by 100

Heroic Attributes:

• 185 Strength
• 209 Stamina
• One red socket, one yellow socket, and one blue socket
• Improves hit rating by 99
• Increases your armor penetration rating by 115.

The Cryptmaker is a pretty solid choice for any class able to wield it, but it truly shines in the hands of a feral (cat) druid. The other classes can certainly make use of it (some more than others) but Cryptmaker has worked its way onto some druid Best in Slot lists.Depending on where you've decided to get your needed +hit from, Distant Land is Cryptmaker's biggest competition currently. The possibility remains that the Lich King himself has a weapon on his loot table that will blow them both out of the water, but that's a mystery that Blizzard has kept guarded for now. We won't know for sure until that portion of Icecrown Citadel has opened.

Cryptmaker's hit rating makes it a great death knight tanking weapon, though many still prefer the expertise of Ramaladni's Blade of Culling.

Edit: The viking warrior Matthew Rossi also informs me Cryptmaker is one of the best offhand weapons available to fury warriors. There ya go!

How to Get It: Take down the Blood Princes in the Crimson Halls and pray to the lords of loot that it appears on Prince Valanar's corpse. The official Armory sets the drop rate for this item to Medium, which is a 25-50% chance.

Getting Rid of It: As mentioned, it's on some feral druid best in slot lists. If you're a cat druid with this, you might not be getting rid of it at all if you end up with the heroic version, it'll be staying with you until Cataclysm. Warriors, paladins and death knights can use this but would be better off with Bryntroll, Shadow's Edge, or the legendary Shadowmourne.

Additional Information: As is always the case with high end items like this, you'll find plenty of discussion and theorycrafting about it over on Elitist Jerks. Register, do a search, and get reading. Remember to read and follow their rules before posting. If Elitist Jerks isn't your sort of place, the comments section on Wowhead has some active discussion as well.

Tags: best-in-slot, blood-princes, cat-druid, crimson-halls, cryptmaker, distant-land, feral-druid, icecrown, icecrown-citadel

Filed under: Druid, Analysis / Opinion, Phat Loot Phriday