Now that you have and understanding of some of the basics of Frost Mage PvP, and know what stats to aim for, you need to gear yourself for PvP. But where to start?

In Wrath of the Lich King, Blizzard has given players many ways to obtain PvP gear. The obvious way is to PvP. Participate in Battlegrounds, Wintergrasp, or Arena. You can also get them with badges obtain from dailies!

This is written during Arena Season 8: April 22, 2010.

Honor Points

The basic currency for PvP is Honor Points. You receive them by killing a player of the opposing faction. The best way to get honor is by going into Battlegrounds: Warsong Gulch, Arathi Basin, Eye of the Storm, and Alterac Valley.

Queue into any of these Battlegrounds from your Character’s Honor tab (press H), and start farming those Honor Points. Make sure you win at least one Random Battleground a day for that extra bonus honor! Not only do you get extra Honor Points, you get Arena Points as well!

You can also get Honor Points by completing the Weekly Wintergrasp Quests that are available in this PvP zone. So make sure you do them every week also!

Remember: The max honor your character can hold is 75,000 Honor Points. If you are getting close to the cap, make sure you spend some of it before continuing to PvP so more.

Furious Gladiator Set

• Furious Gladiator’s Silk Amice – 34,700 Honor
• Furious Gladiator’s Silk Cowl – 54,500 Honor
• Furious Gladiator’s Silk Handguards – 43,300 Honor
• Furious Gladiator’s Silk Raiment – 54,500 Honor
• Furious Gladiator’s Silk Trousers – 34,700 Honor

Non-Set Wrathful Gear

• Wrathful Gladiator’s Band of Dominance – 52,200 Honor
• Wrathful Gladiator’s Cloak of Subjugation – 52,200 Honor
• Wrathful Gladiator’s Cuffs of Alacrity – 43,400 Honor
• Wrathful Gladiator’s Cord of Alacrity – 68,200 Honor, 1300 Personal Rating
• Wrathful Gladiator’s Pendant of Subjugation – 52,200 Honor
• Wrathful Gladiator’s Treads of Alacrity – 68,200 Honor, 1400 PR

Non-set Other Gear

• Medallion of the Alliance – 68,200 Honor
• Battlemaster’s Ruination – 34,100 Honor
• Battlemaster’s Vivacity – 34,100 Honor

The Personal Rating is the rating you have in your 2v2, 3v3, and 5v5 teams. This is different than your Team Rating, especially if you have many different players in your Arena Teams.

Wintergrasp Mark of Honor

These mark of honor you get from… GASP- Wintergrasp! You receive 3 Marks for winning a WG battle, 1 for losing. You have to actually reach at least Rank 2 during the battle to receive full credit for winning the match however. If you don’t, you may only receive 2 or even 1 for a winning match.

Wintergrasp isn’t a Battleground that you can queue from your Honor Tab. You have to queue directly from a Battlemaster at any of your capitals, or actually fly into the zone in Northrend.

Also, there is a 2hr 30min timer in which the faction which wins the match, will have control over the zone. At then end of that timer, the battle will begin again. So there may be a chance that your faction won’t have control of Wintergrasp for many many hours.

Wintergrasp Gear

• Flow of Knowledge – 25 Marks
• Platinum Disks of Swiftness – 25 Marks
• Platinum Disks of Sorcery – 25 Marks
• Titan-Forged Band of Ascendancy – 15 Marks
• Titan-Forged Cloak of Ascendancy – 25 Marks
• Titan-Forged Cloth Leggings of Salvation – 40 Marks
• Titan-Forged Cord of Salvation – 15 Marks
• Titan-Forged Cuffs of Salvation – 15 Marks
• Titan-Forged Hood of Salvation – 40 Marks
• Titan-Forged Pendant of Ascendancy – 25 Marks
• Titan-Forged Raiment of Salvation – 40 Marks
• Titan-Forged Rune of Alacrity – 25 Marks
• Titan-Forged Rune of Audacity – 25 Marks
• Titan-Forged Slippers of Salvation – 25 Marks
• Titan-Forged Shoulderpads of Salvation – 40 Marks

Stone Keeper’s Shard

These shards you can obtain by killing any bosses in any Northrend Heroics Dungeons while your faction has control over Wintergrasp. You can also obtain them by completing the Weekly quests that are available in Wintergrasp.

Chances are you have a ton of these shards just sitting on your character begging to be used. Now that you are PvPing, you will have many uses for them now!

Stone Keeper’s Shard Items

• Wintergrasp Commendation – 30 Shards
• Arcanum of Dominance – 40 Shards
• Inscription of Dominance – 30 Shards

Relentless Tuna!

Emblem of Triumph

An optional way to purchase Furious Gladiator gear is by doing Heroic Dungeons. So yes, you can PvE to get PvP gear this way! You have to start somewhere right? If you mainly PvE and want a way to start getting PvP gear, this is the way to go.

This way is much better than jumping straight into Battlegrounds with just whatever gear you happen to have.

Furious Gladiator Set

• Furious Gladiator’s Silk Amice – 50 Emblems
• Furious Gladiator’s Silk Cowl – 75 Emblems
• Furious Gladiator’s Silk Handguards – 50 Emblems
• Furious Gladiator’s Silk Raiment – 75 Emblems
• Furious Gladiator’s Silk Trousers – 75 Emblems

Emblem of Frost

Just like the Emblem of Truimph, the Emblem of Frost can also be used to purchase PvP gear. The PvP gear that is available with this emblem is also a step up in tier as well. You will be able to purchase Relentless Gladiator Gear!

Relentless Gladiator Set

• Relentless Gladiator’s Silk Amice – 60 Emblems
• Relentless Gladiator’s Silk Cowl – 95 Emblems
• Relentless Gladiator’s Silk Handguards – 60 Emblems
• Relentless Gladiator’s Silk Raiment – 95 Emblems
• Relentless Gladiator’s Silk Trousers – 95 Emblems

Arena Points

Arena Points are… well points you get from participating in Arena Matches. You can get 25 Arena Points by winning a Random Battleground, but you only get in once per day. So that’s more reason for you to win at least once a day.

The points you get is determined by your Arena Rating for your Arena Teams. If you are part of multiple teams, the points you receive will be based off the team rating which will give you more points. You only receive Arena Points for being on a team at the beginning of the WoW week (after server resets), based on how well you did the week before.

“1337″ Ratings!

You can calculate how much Arena Points you will get based on your Team Ratings on WoW’s armory page HERE.

If RATING = 1500 -> POINTS = [.22 x RATING + 14]
If RATING > 1500 -> POINTS = [ 1511.26 / ( 1 + 1639.28 x 2.71828 ^ -0.00412 x RATING ) ]

Penalties:
2v2 teams earn 76% of the points of a 5v5 team with the same rating.
3v3 teams earn 88% of the points of a 5v5 team with the same rating.

If your team rating is under 1500, you will receive at minimum, the amount of points you would if you were 1500 Rating. So the best practices to farm Arena Points is to be in a 5v5 team, and play at least the minimum required.

All the big boy PvP gear are purchased with Arena Points, and almost all of them will require a Personal Rating of some sort in order to purchase them. The Personal Rating required will vary between each item.

Remember: You are only eligible to receive Arena Points for a team if you participated in at LEAST 10 matches AND 30% of the total team’s matches for the week.

Relentless Gladiator Set

• Relentless Gladiator’s Silk Amice – 10,550 Honor, 600 Arena
• Relentless Gladiator’s Silk Cowl – 13,200 Honor, 770 Arena
• Relentless Gladiator’s Silk Handguards – 8,000 Honor, 440 Arena
• Relentless Gladiator’s Silk Raiment – 13,200 Honor, 770 Arena
• Relentless Gladiator’s Silk Trousers – 13,200 Honor, 770 Arena

Wrathful Gladiator Set

• Wrathful Gladiator’s Silk Amice – 1,930 Arena, 2000 Rating
• Wrathful Gladiator’s Silk Cowl – 2,370 Arena, 1950 Rating
• Wrathful Gladiator’s Silk Handguards – 1,430 Arena, 1400 Rating
• Wrathful Gladiator’s Silk Raiment – 2,370 Arena, 1600 Rating
• Wrathful Gladiator’s Silk Trousers – 2,370 Arena, 1500 Rating

Wrathful Weapons

• Wrathful Gladiator’s Piercing Touch – 1,260 Arena, 1700 Rating
• Wrathful Gladiator’s Wand of Alacrity – 1,260 Arena, 1700 Rating
• Wrathful Gladiator’s War Staff – 55,000 Honor, 1,540 Arena, 1800 Rating
• Wrathful Gladiator’s Compendium – 350 Arena, 1800 Rating
• Wrathful Gladiator’s Grimoire – 350 Arena, 1800 Rating
• Wrathful Gladiator’s Blade of Alacrity – 38,500 Honor, 1,300 Arena, 1800 Rating
• Wrathful Gladiator’s Blade of Celerity – 3,950 Arena, 2200 Rating
• Wrathful Gladiator’s Combat Staff – 4,670 Arena, 2200 Rating

Any extra or left over Arena Points (like on last day of the season) you can purchase [Commendation of Bravery] for 100 Arena Points each.

Next I will cover Gemming and Enchanting for PvP.

For players who have been 80 for awhile now, and are now enjoying the new dungeons and raids, will still have a reason to use the Random Dungeon Finder tool. Once a day, you can get 2 x [Emblem of Frost] from completing a Random Dungeon.

It is also a perfect chance for you to attempt some of those Heroic Dungeon Achievements you haven’t gotten around to getting yet. I know I just got the achievement for piloting the three different drakes in The Oculus. Funny how before this patch was released, I’ve only done that dungeon ONCE!

Ohh… I know why, I hate this place! Even with the recent nerf to this place, I still hate it. To make matters worst, this instance has popped up so many times, that I’ve stopped using the Random Dungeon tool after I’ve gotten my two Frost Emblems. In fact, I think I’m starting to hate The Nexus and The Old Kingdom too!

The increase amount of these instance groups are most likely due to players specifically queuing to get their Red and Green Winter Hats for the Winter Veil achievement. Damn you Winter Veil!!

I know I could just pick the specific Heroics I want to run, but really, I’m only in it for the 20g from doing it the Random way. The two extra emblems are just a little bonus. Plus I was getting my title and pet pug. He’s pretty damn cute!

So anyways, I was playing Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne recently. Playing a few one on one ladder matches, or doing a few 2v2s with my cousin when I realized that Blizzard should implement this random map selection system, to the random dungeon system too.

In WCIII, you are given 5 “thumbs down” you can use on some maps you don’t like. So out of around twenty maps, you pick 5 that you don’t like, your opponent selects 5 that he/she doesn’t like, and the system selects a mutual map for you to play on.

For the Random Dungeon Finder, Blizzard should give us maybe 2 “thumbs down” we can use (heck I’ll even take just 1) to pick dungeons that we do not want to run. Yes, I know this is “Random Dungeon” Finder, and not “Dungeons I Only Like” Finder, but it is only to eliminate one or two that I just dread going to.

For too many times already, I’ve been queued into The Oculus, ported in, only to find that the Tank, Healer, and a DPS has left the group. I then get auto queue for the instance again, and 3 new players pop in, only to also leave the group. Then I wait for the same thing to happen again and again.

Then it is just me and one other guy. That guy be queued in here to get the stupid hat, and I’m refusing to leave because I don’t want to have to wait 15 minutes before being able to queue again.

Don’t lie, you guys have had similar situations. This was just a random solution that popped in my head while playing WCIII, but I hope Blizzard does add something like this. Maybe set it up so that if so many players have left your group, you are given the option to opt out of the instance without suffering the 15 minute penalty. I don’t know… I’m just ranting.

Blah, I hate Oculus!