question about gearing up

[lilbandit]

I just recently rerolled on a new (established) server, so don't have access to a top-end guild yet or many high level friends (still only level 68 ), and on my server, as is common amongst all servers, there are loads of pugs going all day for anything from Ulduar to ICC 25, but they all require achievements and gear score, or just gear score if it's high enough. Obviously we know gearscore =/= skill, but it's what they look for

So, as a newbie to this server (not to the game), my options are pretty limited. I don't want to spend 2 months gearing up enough to be able to run a few pugs! especially now with heroics vote-kicking you if you are in blues :S, so I figured my best option is to farm gold and buy run throughs of some instances, but my question is, which one should I go for?

I'll be going arms by the way (I know it's <fury, but I love the spec and dislike fury).

My options are roughly:
Ulduar 10 hard modes + algalon = 15-17k (get all the drops)
Ulduar 25 hard modes (maybe + algalon) = 25-30k (depending on numbers buying, may be more :S) (get all drops)
ToC 10 = estimated 10k (get all drops)
ToGC 10 = estimated 20k (maybe get some drops, depends on guild doing it)
ToC 25 = estimated 25k (get all drops including tokens)
ToGC 25 = estimated 25-50k (maybe get some drops)

atm I'm leaning toward ulduar 10 hard modes + algalon. I'd love the title and the mount (310% ftw), but also available from there is the Mjolnir Runestone which is obviously very good for arms, and also Aesir's Edge, plus some basic Tier 8 wouldn't hurt anything gear-score wise. It's also the cheapest run through, and 15k for a guaranteed algalon kill and 310% mount is pretty sweet :P Hopefully get some really nice drops too.

Alternatively, should I just go buy battered hilt (about 8k) and get the 264 weapon from that?

Any help would be appreciated.

[CyCloneNL]

Just farm the hell out of FoS/HoS/HoR/ToC?
Get complete tier9 by badges only, then start doing some ToC10.

*Edit
Also, while gearing my warrior, i found wowhead to be a really great tool to search for gear. I got this page bookmarked, it shows the best gear from Heroics/normals/badges.

[Madhoof]

Rnd Hero, Rnd Hero, Rnd Hero,....... buy T9 and start raiding ToC and ICC 10men

Or start your own PUG ...

[Kirri]

It might be different on your server, ofc, but as a basic you will not get kicked from a dungeon group for having bad gear -they might moan, but it's 15 minutes before they can kick you and by then you should have proven that you're not just there to be pulled through :P Have decent dps and gear that looks like you've made some effort and people shouldn't give you a too hard time.

Some hints, take them or leave them depending on how much time/gold you have.

Battered hilt: In my opinion one of the most worthwhile investments out there for anyone not in a 25 man guild. As a warrior I believe you are very weapon dependent (yeye I'm a shammy posting on the warrior board, shoot me) and you're unlikely to get into a tenman icc pug anytime soon. Get it enchanted.

Other BoEs/buying runs: See what you get out of instances first. Ulduar won't be giving you much gear that's better than what you'll get simply pugging. TotGC is better, ofc, but as you say, it's expensive. For the same you can probably buy some ICC loot. If you're impatient it's possibly more worthwhile looking for someone to pull you through the new instances (get a tank and healer and you will get groups for it quickly, but you'll ofc have to compete with the other dps'ers for loot)

Pug while leveling. You'll get emblems of triumph for you random dungeon daily from 70+ -if you make sure to pug on the way up you'll probably be close to buying some tier nine when you ding, and also probably have some epic gear from totc (since quite a few lvl 80s queue in this one for a trinket you'll probably find a few runs where you can sweep up everything else you'd like without competition. It's only lvl 200, but it's epix)

Be polite -yes, sometimes people do kick other people from group, but it's general because they act like morons (which includes both rudeness and below-1000 dps.) Have semi-proper enchants and gems. We don't expect epic gems and BiS enchants in greens, but completely ungemmed is unimpressive.

Learn your skills -seeing my rankwatch complaining about someone using downranked spells in lvl 80 heroics and being informed that "lol, I haven't trained since dinging" makes me cry, and will get you booted from any group I control, including if it means me and my guildies have to slow down a bit so we can boot you right before the last boss.

[lilbandit]

It might be different on your server, ofc, but as a basic you will not get kicked from a dungeon group for having bad gear -they might moan, but it's 15 minutes before they can kick you and by then you should have proven that you're not just there to be pulled through :P Have decent dps and gear that looks like you've made some effort and people shouldn't give you a too hard time.

Some hints, take them or leave them depending on how much time/gold you have.

Battered hilt: In my opinion one of the most worthwhile investments out there for anyone not in a 25 man guild. As a warrior I believe you are very weapon dependent (yeye I'm a shammy posting on the warrior board, shoot me) and you're unlikely to get into a tenman icc pug anytime soon. Get it enchanted.

Other BoEs/buying runs: See what you get out of instances first. Ulduar won't be giving you much gear that's better than what you'll get simply pugging. TotGC is better, ofc, but as you say, it's expensive. For the same you can probably buy some ICC loot. If you're impatient it's possibly more worthwhile looking for someone to pull you through the new instances (get a tank and healer and you will get groups for it quickly, but you'll ofc have to compete with the other dps'ers for loot)

Pug while leveling. You'll get emblems of triumph for you random dungeon daily from 70+ -if you make sure to pug on the way up you'll probably be close to buying some tier nine when you ding, and also probably have some epic gear from totc (since quite a few lvl 80s queue in this one for a trinket you'll probably find a few runs where you can sweep up everything else you'd like without competition. It's only lvl 200, but it's epix)

Be polite -yes, sometimes people do kick other people from group, but it's general because they act like morons (which includes both rudeness and below-1000 dps.) Have semi-proper enchants and gems. We don't expect epic gems and BiS enchants in greens, but completely ungemmed is unimpressive.

Learn your skills -seeing my rankwatch complaining about someone using downranked spells in lvl 80 heroics and being informed that "lol, I haven't trained since dinging" makes me cry, and will get you booted from any group I control, including if it means me and my guildies have to slow down a bit so we can boot you right before the last boss.

i'm a veteran wow player of 4+ years, so most of that goes without saying

didn't know you get EoT from daily dungeon quest from 70+ though, so that's damn nice (took a break for about 6 months). I'll probably go buy the battered hilt 1st then, as yes Warriors are extremely weapon dependent.
Thanks for the help.

[Aliadra]

Regarding the hilt reward, the item level of the weapons isn't 264, it's 251.
Gearing up is pretty much faceroll, if you run HC PoS you should be able to get a decent 232 axe along with some other pieces. (Never did check the plate drops in PoS)
Also, normal FoS/PoS/HoR reward you with an emblem of triumph every boss kill.

[kassy]

if you're going arms you deffo do not want a battered hilt. swords are the weakest weapon for arms due to specs, and you're likely to be needing hte crit from poleaxe spec early on anyhow. get the axe from heroic pos and just farm emblem tier and items like normal people did

[iddqd]

Just farm the hell out of FoS/HoS/HoR/ToC?
Get complete tier9 by badges only, then start doing some ToC10.

*Edit
Also, while gearing my warrior, i found wowhead to be a really great tool to search for gear. I got this page bookmarked, it shows the best gear from Heroics/normals/badges.

I have to say that the weight scales used by wowhead.com for ANY class suck so BAD, dont EVER use em! Either you dont really care about your items and you take the one with better ilvl or you do it the right way and use programs like toskk/rawr or landsouls spreadsheet from EJ.

[lilbandit]

is the 5% crit on axes really that much better than the 5% sword spec, when you factor in the battered hilt sword has a much higher top end damge and a lot of bonus crit on it anyway? I know you want 50% crit as arms, so your OPs always crit to keep up deep wounds, but... just wondering.

Probably should've said, I'll be using this weapon to start out in arenas too until I can work up to 1800 rating and the points to get the weapon.

[Pokemaster]

Random heroics and doing quests/farming is good start, you can have over 5000 GS in a week.