Choosing The Right Gear To Power Level From 1 To 85 In Cataclysm

Have you received links from another World of Warcraft (WoW) player asking you which gear is better for their character or situation? Or, have you linked your gear asking someone for help on which one is better at level 55, or as a frost pvp mage? I have linked my gear to guild members countless times asking them which is the right gear for different situations. More commonly, I have done this on my level 85 characters because equipping the right gear is crucial for my rotations.

Interestingly, I found myself not caring too much about what gear I’m wearing when leveling a new character from level 1. I used to think that gear didn’t matter until you reach the maximum level, in this case in WoW Cataclysm would be level 85. After talking to various guild members and reading online WoW forums, I realized how much time I have wasted leveling a character while not wearing the right gear. Every bit matters and choosing the right gear could have saved me significant amount of leveling time.

So, choosing the right gear, meaning gear with the right stats for your character, can really help you get to level 85 a lot faster than wearing the wrong gear. To start off, stamina is the easiest stat to remember because it is the most important stat for all classes when you are leveling. More stamina means more hit points (hp); hence, less downtime. After stamina, the stat priorities are class specific. For example, the stat priority for a leveling mage would be stamina followed by intellect, since intellect gives you more spell power and some regen; hence more dps and less downtime.

Choosing the right gear is essential in leveling because it gives you an edge in the game. Not only for power leveling, but for endgame content that applies to both pvp and pve. The right set of gear corresponds to the best leveling spec; together, can significantly increase how fast you can breeze through a zone while leveling. It can mean spending a couple hours completing a long quest chain as opposed to a whole evening.

Don’t forget about the heirloom gear if you are not leveling a new character for the first time. Heirloom gear was introduced in the Wrath of the Lich King and gives players an increased percentage of experience gained while leveling. The gear is bind-on-account, so it can be purchased from a main character and mailed to the new leveling character. In all, choosing the right gear that has the best stat priorities for your class while taking advantage of items like heirlooms, can help you zoom through the leveling process and reach level 85 to enjoy the endgame contents.