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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsThe lack of wands in Cataclysm
by Alex Ziebart 
Jan 5th 2011 at 3:00PM
There are no level 85, pre-heroic wands for classes that do not use spirit. There is only one ilevel 333 wand in the game, and it drops in Grim Batol. All other ranged slots have ilevel 333 (or ilevel 346) bind on equip items available. This puts casters at an obvious (though admittedly minor) disadvantage when trying to gear for heroics.
For classes that use relics, scribes are able to craft the following: Each of these items is ilevel 346 -- they're not cheap, but you can acquire them with a chunk of gold or a little time spent solo farming. Picking up one of these relics on the auction house (or having a friend craft one for you) will kick-start you on your way into heroics. They're legitimately good items on par with heroic gear, and they will help your average ilevel along.
For classes able to equip guns and crossbows, engineers can provide the following:
These items are ilevel 333. There is the ilevel 346 Kickback 5000, but that requires a Chaos Orb to craft and isn't nearly as accessible as the 333 items. Still, it is a bind on equip, heroic-quality gun that you could get off of the auction house if you wish to do so. There is no bow option -- but personal preferences aside, if you can use a bow, you can use a gun or a crossbow, so a bow option isn't necessary.
Update: There actually is an ilevel 346 bow crafted by engineers that I managed to miss, despite being a 525 engineer. The Overpowered Chicken Splitter is your friend!
The only ilevel 333 option for wands is the Wand of Untainted Power, a spirit wand that drops from Forgemaster Throngus in Grim Batol. Not only can casters not acquire a BoE wand like every other ranged item, there is only one pre-heroic wand, and it isn't particularly desirable to classes that don't utilize spirit heavily. At least you can reforge spirit -- despite being listed among the primary stats, it is considered a secondary stat. You can dump half of it if you'd like.
Why is there only one wand option prior to heroics? The lack of BoEs aside, the wand drops are just unfortunately placed. The ilevel 346 wands that become accessible in heroics are:
- Corla's Baton This wand drops from Corla, Herald of Twilight in Blackrock Caverns. The normal version of this wand is not a 333 item. Blackrock Caverns is likely the very first instance you will run stepping into Cataclysm content, so the non-heroic version of the wand is ilevel 308.
- Cookie's Stirring Rod The normal version of this wand doesn't even drop in post-80 content. The normal version of Deadmines is still for level 15+ players, so the normal version of this wand is a mere ilevel 20.
Also, there really is the possibility that the developers believe enchanting is too profitable as it is, and I might even agree with that. Many enchanters have built castles made of gold at the release of this expansion and the last just via disenchanting items and selling dusts and essences at ludicrous prices. Making one trade skill too profitable is a real concern. Would crafted wands have pushed it over the edge? Maybe.
Still, it's an imbalance in gearing/itemization, and one that's easily fixed via crafted wands. Do other instances of itemization gaps exist in Cataclysm? Yes, but this is the most obvious and probably the easiest to fix.
Sorry Jasper, I don't have an answer to your question. I don't know why enchanters don't craft wands anymore -- but they should.
World of Warcraft: Cataclysm has destroyed Azeroth as we know it; nothing is the same! In WoW Insider's Guide to Cataclysm, you can find out everything you need to know about WoW's third expansion, from leveling up a new goblin or worgen to breaking news and strategies on endgame play.Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Cataclysm
Reader Comments (Page 5 of 6)
Fierna Jan 5th 2011 5:09PM
Castles of gold eh? No not quite. Everyone can sell enchanting materials. The quest reward materials pretty much all go to leveling to 500 so everyone in heroics can disenchant.
Kylenne Jan 5th 2011 9:24PM
...but not everyone can buy cheap greens off the AH and flip them for a profit.
Seriously, it's the easiest profession in the damn world to make money off of, take five minutes to think outside the obvious. I've made close to 10k without even really trying, and not being on every day.
conundrum Jan 5th 2011 5:14PM
I think ppl who need thrown weapons are in a similar situation. There's a lvl318 quest reward in TH, but after that there's just a drop off Annuaea in HoO
Taus Jan 5th 2011 5:33PM
I'm not sure if it's been said, but I just want to point out that it's not just enchanters making the money. With the majority of mats coming from heroic runs, these are spread all around. Granted, dust from greens is still largely from enchanters.
Also, with the essence/dust screwup (again!) at the beginning of the xpac as well as the fact that anyone can "gather" our mats made leveling enchanting extremely expensive. With a daily system in place for JC, I'd argue that the tailor/chanter combo has it the hardest costwise nowadays.
Xaklo Jan 5th 2011 5:33PM
What if they made the craftable lvl 85 wand something that needed materials accross many professions to learn? Similar to the Goblin Rocket Fuel recipe. Say, the rod for the wand needs to be crafted by a blacksmith, a gem focus made by a jewelcrafter, the enchanting recipe itself by a scribe, the ink for the inscription recipe made by an alchemist, who gets the ink recipe from an engineer or something. Professions across the board would then benefit from such an item instead of only profiting enchanters. (except leatherworkers I guess...)
Xaklo Jan 5th 2011 5:35PM
Ooh ooh, I know! the scribe must use a scroll made of a certain hide prepared by a leatherworker. See? Everyone wins!
Xot Jan 5th 2011 5:44PM
lol I like it.
unvme331 Jan 5th 2011 5:41PM
I want to bring up the fact that you didn't list pvp options. I understand most pve player wouldn't use pvp in raids, etc. If you look at the options other classes have for relics, etc they also have very cheap options to buy with honor( which is very easy to obtain). The could bridge this gap easy by adding 2 wands, one spirit with resil, the other with mastery and resil. This would help fill the gap pre-raid and would be an easy fix to not offer more money to that profession that is making to much money or imbalance any other professions.
Most players want a wand for two reasons. One: to hit the achievement of having everything ilvl333 and above. (which most casters i know are stuck with wand being that last item). Two: in order to get the ilvl high enough to hit heroics.
I think this should be quite the issue and it was an issue in WotLK until the brought out the icecrown heroics. This seems to be an issue that has been plaguing casters for a long time. This has always been an easy buy or obtain for other classes through honor, boe's, craftables, etc. I think blizzard needs to have a look at this as class balance in this expansion seems to be the most important issue.
In closing, Will we get a fix? I would say that most will have to just look to running for the one wand in heroics, or use something low ilvl and pick one up in a raid. I doubt they will add a bloodthirsty wand as they are available for higher currency. Professions right now are in a very odd spot, due to some not making money from too many players leveling, or the lack of players needing certain items at this point. Fill every other slot with ilvl 346 and reforge the wand to fit you. Wait until the RNG helps you or you get lucky and are the only one who can use a wand in your group (hope for shaman/druid heal, and alot of melee)
TL;DR - Be Lucky, RNG, wait until a raid to obtain. Nothing shows a change coming.
xenothaulus Jan 5th 2011 6:15PM
Let mages use relics. Problem solved.
Phatty Jan 5th 2011 6:16PM
I still don't get why the engineering crafted guns\bows have such ridiculous mat requirements. The orb I can live with. The 2 truegold and 12 hardened elementium (OP Chicken) are ridiculous. In no realm will it ever be worth it to craft those items. The BS crafted 346 items are even worse.
The lack of a strength gun is a glaring omission, however a bigger suprise is why they didn't eliminate the gun altogether. Why not just make warriors use relics? When was the last time a Fury\Arms warrior actually used his "shoot" button? For that matter when was the last time a clothie used their wand? Remove from game, they aren't necessary. I can already hear War tanks screaming, but you do have heroic throw for ranged pulls.
Herman Jan 5th 2011 6:19PM
actually, on my server the mats for the gun are about 5000 gold, and they sell for around 8-9k so far i'm the only one making them
Jason Ralph Jan 5th 2011 6:25PM
This is almost as bad as it was getting a healer shield. Aside from the lvl 200 that you can get froma vendor, the next was lvl 219 in a Wrath heroic. I raided all through Wrath and never saw the upgrade drop in ToC 10 or 25 and in ICC 10 or 25. Still have that low level shield equipped to my Holy Paladin as I haven't started on him yet.
Blayze Jan 5th 2011 6:38PM
Damn it, Thundercall. Why couldn't you exist?!
Avan Jan 5th 2011 7:16PM
Well, it's about time other casters are screwed on gear. In Wrath, the only offhands that would drop in 10-man content all had hit rating on them. That meant that priest and druid healers needed to do 25-man content if they wanted non-wasteful stats. It was stupid.
Luckily, I got the Wand of Untainted Power on my first trip through Grim Batol. It kind of sucks that I won't be able to find anything better until heroic, though.
Xaklo Jan 5th 2011 7:56PM
There were plenty of spell shields in wrath, the problem (and I assume you mean for ele shammy since you said 'damage") was that, in my experience, they usually went to holy pallies and resto shaman. -.- even thought there were seperate 'healing' versions of said shields. These were some of the spell damage shield you could have gotten throughout wrath:
Aegis of Damnation ilvl 200 (naxx 10 reg)
Pulsing Spellshield ilvl 219 (uld 10 reg)
Voice of Reason ilvl 226 (naxx 25 reg)
Bastion of Purity/Resolve ilvl 245/258 (ToC 25 reg and heroic)
Plenty of shields to choose from prior to ICC, and those are only the ones that don't have spirit (mp5 at the time) nor the PvP shields
marauder Jan 5th 2011 8:04PM
"personal preferences aside, if you can use a bow, you can use a gun or a crossbow, so a bow option isn't necessary."
Unless you're a troll, in which case gun or crossbow doesn't utilize your full dps potential.
elstor Jan 5th 2011 8:27PM
*points out a lack of BoE tanking relic- the highest is a 325 and costs thousands of gold to buy on most realms currently*
prot pally ;)
Sl0th Jan 5th 2011 8:36PM
I was thinking about this very issue the other night as I stared at the green wand my Mage is still carrying around despite now being mostly kitted out in 346 gear. And I think there's another option that would work quite well were Blizzard to implement it.
Why not put a couple of wands on the Justice Point vendor? That would be the perfect place if you don't want us enchanters to build ourselves another money bin to swim around in Scrooge McDuck style. It would be accessible with a small amount of farming and they could make the stats on it different from the heroic wands and give players another option as to what stats they want in that slot.
Possum Jan 5th 2011 8:52PM
I have been thinking about this very thing as I'm gearing up this week. I still have that 318 wand.. On the other hand trinkets seems a little more accessible than they have been in the past.
Redielin Jan 5th 2011 9:36PM
@Kylenne
I can make money selling enchanting mats. Not much - it takes so long to list all those mats, and there's a cap on how many you can sell at once before you're just likely to get undercut or waste your deposit - and I could make just as much selling those mats even if I weren't an enchanter thanks to the dungeon finder.
I make WAY more money as a tailor than I ever did selling enchants or selling enchanting mats though.