Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Quickly getting a good 2 hander in WotLK

So far in Wrath of the Lich King I'm not having a lot of luck upgrading my 2-handed weapon. With Titan's Grasp you would think that Blizzard would ramp up the number of big 2-handers in the game, but it still seems hard to find a decent weapon. I remember this was also a problem when people first started raiding in the Burning Crusade. There was such a lack of weapons that a lot of raiders participated in the arenas just so they could save up points for one. Blizzard didn't like this and eventually added arena ratings to all the PvP weapons. I know a decent weapon can make a big performance difference on a character so I really can't fault Blizzard for wanting to make them a bit harder to acquire.

Dungeon crawling is the primary way I've been looking for upgrades and four of the twelve single group dungeons do offer a 2-handed weapon. Utgarde Keep offers a good entry level axe off Ingvar the Plunderer that is about equal in dps to the arena season two weapon. After that it dries up a bit until a midlevel dungeon called Drak'tharon. Here you can get a nice 2-handed sword called the Troll Butcherer off the first boss. Its a very easy fight though the first couple pulls in the dungeon can be a pain. The other two 2-handed weapons from the non-heroic dungeons are found on the high level 80 dungeons. Both the Occulus and the Culling of Strathholm offer decent upgrades. However, if you're like me you probably want an weapon upgrade before getting to level 80, especially if you need to defend yourself on a PvP server.

Thankfully, there are a couple other ways that you quickly earn a decent a 2-handed weapon in Wrath of the Lich King. There are at least two quest chains that aren't that hard and provide decent upgrades. The first one is called Last Rites/Hellscream's Champion and can be found in the Borean Tundra. It may require the help of one or two people on the last part, but it can be done in the low 70's. If you're using something worse then the first arena season weapon then you probably want to do the quest. At 75 if you have a decent group, you can visit the Ring of Anguish in Zul'drak for another upgrade. This questline works just like the Ring of Blood did in Nagrand and there's even an achievement for doing both.

The Ring of Anguish 2-handers are probably the best available to you until the level 80 dungeons or some of the low end heroics. However, if you don't mind leveling by grinding reputation then you have some very nice options open to you. A couple factions like the Knights of the Ebon Blade, Argent Crusade, and the Kalu'ak offer nice weapons at revered and exalted standings. The easiest one to level up is the Kalu'ak faction since you can get quickly get to Honored by doing thier quests. The Kulu'ak have quest hubs in the Borean Tundra, Howling Fjord, and the Dragonblight. What makes it even better is that they have a system of giant sea turtles that link each quest hub together so its easy to do their daily quests. At revered you can land a level 78 polearm which is better then the Ring of Anguish reward. And if you are a master fisherman you can get a pretty sweet level 70 fishing pole with great dps, though it can't be used for special attacks.

4 comments:

Green Armadillo said...

Note that, unless they've changed Titan's Grip recently, it only works on 2H Swords, Maces, and Axes.

slux said...

And also that the fishing pole will not work for anything other than autoattack so it's not a real choice :P

Relmstein said...

Yes, unfortunately that's true. It still looks cool. I'll probably get revered myself for the Kalu'ak polearm then stop grinding faction.

Marty Runyon said...

You might be stopping, but I want me a fishing pole. That thing looks so nice. And I'm not going to win the fishing tourney on all my alts just to get that pole. It took me two months to get the one!