What should you do Upgrade or Purchase Malevolent

[OmniRaden]

I would think that one should upgrade weapon first, then purchase new malevolent gear. Malev gear costs less per item level than the upgrades, however, weapons directly give DPS or spell power. Also, I may be wrong, but don't weapons have more stats allocated to them than any other slot, which means more stats per point? With that, you should always upgrade the higher cost items first (2250) before lower cost items (1250) because they have a bigger stat budget. Anyone have numbers to prove or disprove this? Also assume Dreadful is already upgraded.

[Tyrean]

The jump from dreadful to mal will be more than any single upgrade. Assume you are thinking of upgrading your weapon versus buying mal pants. Judging from your posts you play a shadow priest so I will look at those pieces.

Upgraded Dread Pants
1386 Stam
751 Int
616 Haste
443 Mast
424 Power
424 Res

Mal Pants (not upgraded)
1626 Stam
924 Int
723 Haste
563 Mast
433 Power
433 Res


Staff Not Upgraded
1440 Stam
960 Int
640 Crit
5497 Spell Power
4770 Power
640 Res

Staff Upgrade 1
1494 Stam
996 Int
664 Crit
5705 Spell Power
4950 Power
664 Res

Pants Gain:
240 Stam
173 Int
107 Haste
120 Mast
9 Power
9 res

Staff Gain:
54 Stam
36 Int
24 Crit
208 Spell Power
180 Power
24 Res

Seems if you are living okay but having a hard time killing stuff you should spend on the weapon, but other wise the pants. I would just be wary of wasting my conquest on a T1 weapon unless I already had my gear upgraded.

[OmniRaden]

I thought I saw a Blue Post which said that upgrades would carry over when upgrading tiers. Bashiok, said so. I looked it up, but cannot post the link. "They remain. If a piece of gear is used as currency for a new piece of gear, upgrades are preserved."
It does seem that the cost is higher for the weapon. However, it does carry Spell Power and PVP Power, which are the most valuable stats for a shadow priest.

Staff Upgrade:
750/54=13 conquest points per stat point stam
750/36=20 conquest points per stat point int

Pants Upgrade:
2250/240=9.37 conquest points per stat point stam
2250/173=13 conquest points per stat point int

---------- Post added 2012-12-03 at 01:33 PM ----------

I will have to look to see if 1750 and 1250 conquest point cost items are the same.

[Snuggli]

Buy weapon

Upgrade your weapon

Buy everything else

Upgrade gear

(Weapon has PvP power so you want that maxed out first).

[Yanwu]

I am having this same debate with myself.
Buy new pants or upgrade my weapons.

But since PvP Power is the #1 stat, I may now go with weapon.

[OmniRaden]

Well, regardless of what class or spec you are, spell power or weapon damage are higher priority still. And since weapons are the only thing to carry those stats, I would think (and my boss agreed with me) that it would be best to Upgrade Weapon first.