Up first is some discussion of the upcoming ‘Myth’ upgrade track, which will apply to items that drop at item level 441 and 444. https://www.wowhead.com/news/upgrade-441-gear-to-new-cap-of-447-item-level-on-new-myth-track-in-patch-10-1-5-333383 While this isn’t relevant to our new characters, it’s an important change worth discussing and it will change the demand for different key levels too!
The first order of business for a new character is getting up into the 380-400 item level range, which can be accomplished through 376 or 379 items from the Auction House, 385 BoA Forbidden Reach gear (which you may be farming anyway if you’re building an Onyx Annulet on your new character), and Spark of Ingenuity crafted gear, which you can still pick up even on a new character, you’re just limited to 5 of the old sparks.
A full runthrough of the campaign will also equip you with some flightstones, crests, and upgradeable gear, as well as granting you a quest to kill Sarkareth for an Enchanted Wyrm’s Shadowflame Crest. Once LFR Sarkareth comes out, this will be very easy to obtain, but for now the other LFR wings are a very good use of time, as the gear they drop goes all the way up to 424 and uses the crests you can already acquire to do so!
The next steps are tough to break into without friends, but being the party or raid leader can help. Normal raid and +11 keys can equip you with gear all the way up to 437, and Heroic raid and +16-17 keys can be the next thing to push for. This can take a while to reach, but especially with the Catalyst activating next week, you should be able to make big strides towards good gear any time you want to log in and play.
What tricks do you have to gear up new characters? Let us know in the comments!
