miss elf

So you’re a fresh 80 Mage, you’re following my Wrath pre-raid mage gear guide, and now you have a collection of un-enchanted, un-gemmed gear. There are a lot of options in Wrath - ranging from the surprisingly expensive to the pleasantly affordable. But what’s the best option to max your stats in PvE?

Here is a rundown of the best choices for each item slot, each gem socket, and links to some handy reference guides.

Please note for the time being, I have left out any enchants or gems limited to certain professions - I will add these in a later edit.

Let’s start by looking at equipment enchants:

Helm
Top Enchant: As mentioned in the gear guide, the Kirin Tor is an excellent first choice faction to champion for. At Revered, you will be able to purchase [Arcanum of Burning Mysteries] for 127g 50s.
Budget Enchant (AKA Help I’m desperate!): [Arcanum of Blissful Mending] - from Wyrmrest Accord, Revered. Same spell power, but it has mp5 instead of crit - eww! Another option is the [Arcanum of Power] from the Sha’tar (revered - BC faction) - it has less spellpower, but does have a dose of hit.

Shoulders
Top Enchant: [Greater Inscription of the Storm ] - from Sons of Hodir, exalted. Top enchant! It may take you a little while to get however, so…
Budget Enchant: [Arcanum of Dominance] - purchased for 30 [Stone Keeper's Shard] when your faction holds Wintergrasp. If you have neither, but are exalted with The Scryer’s (BC faction) - [Greater Inscription of the Orb] is okay-ish to tide you over. But get on those Hodir dailies for a nice upgrade!

Chest
Top Enchant: Powerful Stats - +10 to all stats. Fairly pricey enchant, but definitely a top choice. Until you have a great chestpiece, though, the budget enchant is probably a better option:
Budget Enchant: Super Stats - +8 to all stats. Much, much cheaper and you only lose +2 stats. A good enchant to have until you get a nice robe raiding :).

Wrists
Top Enchant: [Formula: Enchant Bracer - Superior Spellpower] - +30 spellpower.
Budget Enchant: Greater Spellpower - +23 spellpower.

Gloves
Top Enchant: If you aren’t hit capped, Precision is the way to go for +20 hit rating. If you are hit capped, Exceptional Spellpower (+28 spellpower) is your top choice.
Budget Enchant: I don’t see any reason to not get one of the above enchants - both are fairly affordable and common to any maxed Enchanters.

Belt
Top Enchant: [Eternal Belt Buckle] with your choice of gem.
Budget Enchant: The belt buckle is your only option here, and with luck you can pick one up for 60-80g off the AH.

Legs
Top Enchant: [Brilliant Spellthread] - With the upcoming changes to Spirit for Mages, I prefer the +20 spirit version to the +20 stamina.
Budget Enchant: [Runic Spellthread] or [Sapphire Spellthread] - not bad to tide you over, but an obvious downgrade to [Brilliant Spellthread].

Feet
Top Enchant: Icewalker - +12 hit and crit rating.
Budget Enchant: Icewalker is cheap and pretty unbeatable - I suggest grabbing it and not looking back ;).

Weapon
Top Enchant: [Formula: Enchant Weapon - Mighty Spellpower] - a great enchant. Unfortunately, the price is pretty massive if you’re gear’s not topnotch (six abyss crystals!) Depending on your coin, grab this or hold out for a better weapon.
Budget Enchant: Exceptional Spellpower - +50 spellpower, at a much cheaper price than +63. A great enchant to keep you going until you can upgrade your entry level weapon.

Now that you’re ready to go with Enchants, what about your gems?

There’s a few things to remember when you’re gemming your gear. In no particular order:

1. Don’t forget your meta gem! It is way too easy to forget your meta gem requirements when re-gemming, or gemming new gear.
2. You can ignore socket bonuses. You don’t have to match socket colours. Most bonuses are only a small benefit and often not worth skipping out on your favourite gem for. It’s also amazing how many people, even at level 80, who I have astounded by saying, “You don’t need to match that colour if you don’t want to, you know.” If the bonus is a good stat (haste is a nice one), and you can match it by using a Crit gem instead of a Spellpower gem, I consider this worth it. Your gemming preferences are up to you, though, and whether or not you think the socket bonus is worth chasing.
3. Be prepared to re-gem. A lot. Even after you reach hit cap, be prepared that you’re going to be forking out a fair chunk of gold as you get more upgrades. Maybe your new item has more (or less) hit, and you need to add (or replace) some hit gems in other gear. It can get expensive, so choose carefully! Re-gemming brings us back to point #1 - don’t forget your meta gem!

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Without further ado, onto the gems:

Meta Gems
[Chaotic Skyflare Diamond] is our best meta gem. Elitist Jerks states this works out to be worth around 150-200DPS. It requires two blue gems to be activated.

Red Gems, Orange Gems, Yellow Gems!
Red is a good gem colour for us. Not only can we get [Runed Scarlet Ruby], but we can use the orange gem [Veiled Monarch Topaz] to give us both hit and spellpower, as well as fitting in neatly with all those red sockets our gear has.
For yellow gems, [Rigid Autumn's Glow] is your best choice if you’re running low on hit. If you’re at hit cap and still need a yellow gem, [Smooth Autumn's Glow] offers +16 crit rating.

A note about red, yellow and orange gems: Red and yellow gems are single colour - they will only unlock socket bonuses for their own colour. Orange, however, is considered a red or yellow gem, and will activate bonuses for either.

Blue Gems, Green Gems, Purple Gems!
These gems are important to us because we need two blue gems to activate our meta gem - [Chaotic Skyflare Diamond]. That said, it’s a good idea to check your gear over for any blue sockets and use your two blue gems in these items to try and nab some bonuses.
[Vivid Forest Emerald] is your most solid choice. It offers hit rating and stamina, and while stamina isn’t ideal, it beats mp5 which is fairly useless. When the new patch comes out (providing I’m hit capped), I will most likely be switching this for [Purified Twilight Opal] - the Spirit will be a (tiny) boost to Crit with the upcoming changes, and if the boss comes to munch on me, +12 stamina isn’t going to save the day!
If you still need hit come the patch, [Shining Forest Emerald] will be a solid choice.

A note about purple gems: Purple gems match both blue and red sockets.

A note about green gems: Green gems match both yellow and blue sockets.

WoWWiki features some great reference tables for Northrend gems:
Northrend gems by colour
Northrend gems by quality
Northrend gems reference table

My next Mage guide will be about managing cooldowns, trinkets and macros :).

Edit: I know the gem section may be a little overwhelming or confusing - I will go back over it and tidy it up, but for the time being here is the rough draft of the guide! Hope it helps!

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 8th, 2009 at 01:43 and is filed under Mage, Raiding, guides. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.