Gearing up for MV - ilvl 470

Now that we've had a few weeks to test how Mogu'Shan Vaults is tuned, it seems that the whole raid should be in 470 gear at least.

Of course, it was cleared in 463-ish gear by the world top guilds. But they all play perfectly. We make a lot of mistakes (myself included), so having that extra gear buffer means we can recover from a bit of standing in fire, slow chains meeting etc, instead of having one mistake mean a wipe.

See if you can aim for a minimum of 463 in every slot,  plus a few 476 or 489 items to bring your average up to 470.

Here is an excellent gear list.

The people who currently have 470 ilvl are (according to armory -- of course, some people might have logged out in pvp/offspec gear, send me a message if so):

• Meelo (483)
• Whimpie (476)
• Savik (474)
• Autumni (474)
• Vorpel (473)
• Argoth (470)

A number of people are on 466 and 467.  If you are lower on gear then we may have to sit you out if another player is available.  We have been approached for a joint guild run by another guild in a similar situation to us, so this is a realistic possibility.

A few pro tips:

• Run LFR every week, it goes pretty smoothly now that people know the fights. You can try to optimize your DPS at the same time. 15% chance of 476 item from each boss (or 483 items from Heart of Fear and MV end boss). T14 available from second half of Heart of Fear.
• 489 necks and rings only require Honored rep with Klaxxi (which you get just from clearing Dread Wastes normal quests) and Golden Lotus (a few boring dailies).
• 476 boots guaranteed for your first kill of Sha of Anger; plus you can kill it once each week for a shot at another 476 item.
• 483 items can be obtained from Arena. You don't have to be good, it matches you with people of a similar skill level to yourself. Winning 10 games 2 weeks in a row will get you a bit of gear - maybe allow 2 hours a week for this.
• Keep an eye out on the auction house for BOE 476 items.

Challenge Mode videos

5-man challenge modes are a good test of your raiding skills, and will highlight areas where you can improve.  They are like the 5man heroic version but everything hits a lot harder, and in a few spots there are more mobs, so you have to respect the fight mechanics.

Our goal is not necessarily a fast time, but a clean run -- minimizing unavoidable damage taken, while maximizing DPS and healing output.

We have done a mostly guild run of Gate of the Setting Sun (with Cloud healing - thanks!), it wasn't too painful apart from the noob tank taking a while to sort out the adds on the last boss.

There is a wide difficulty spread amongst the different dungeons - we also tried Shado-Pan Monastery, it was brutal compared to GSS (here is one guy's ordering of difficulty).

Video links: Gate of the Setting Sun  Scarlet Halls

Note that they will skip some trash with Invisibility - we probably won't do that at this stage until we have perfected our play on the later bosses. If you skip it and then wipe, you have to clear it on the runback :)

General tips:

• You must travel to the instance - there's no auto zone in feature.
• When you set your UI to 'challenge mode' and zone in, the timer doesn't start until you click an orb.
• Allow a couple of hours while you learn the fights.
• Flasks are essential.
• Having a Time Warp, and at least 2 ranged DPS, makes things considerably easier in most spots.
• There is a daily quest that gives 80 VP for a particular dungeon -- however you can of course do any one at any time.
• There is no loot, but there are special rewards for achievement sets.
• Each of your gear items is scaled down to 463 (but lower items are not scaled up). So, ideally you should have a 463 item or higher in every slot, else you are putting yourself on the back foot.