The Swtich

“Do you realize in the entire history of western civilization no one has successfully accomplished the roommate switch. In the middle ages you could get locked up for even suggesting it.”

– Jerry Seinfeld, The Switch

Alright, so I’m not talking about any roommate switch, but what I am going to talk about is the dreaded profession switch. You know how it goes. You’re standing around Dalran when all of the sudden you have one of those “I could’ve had a V-8” moments. You realize that your chosen professions are not getting the job done.

Currently I have Engineering and Leatherworking. Neither are bad, but I’m getting the same benefit from these professions as those who do not have them. So I’m considering dropping both and picking up Jewelcrafting and Blacksmithing.

Blacksmithing for Socket Bracers and Socket Gloves, and Jewelcrafting for Delicate Dragon’s Eye as well as cutting all my other gems. I did some very rough math and concluded that with my current gear I can add +89 agility (that’s net) if I had these two professions.

Now that I’ve mentally decided to do this, the next step is to figure out how to make it happen. Here’s what I recommend.

  • Don’t get impatient. Wait until you have the materials to power level before you drop your current professions.
  • Do some research. Check out sites like WoW Professions.com. Get a list of materials, and determine your quickest path from one to 450.
  • Figure out how high you need to go in each profession. You probably don’t need to get to 450 for the benefits you seek ( I think 400 for both Jewelcrafting and Blacksmithing is all I need).
  • Identify the speed bumps. Most professions have one or two recipes that have hard to obtain materials. Identify these ahead of time so you can plan accordingly.
  • Make a plan for gathering you materials. Do you have the funds to buy everything from the AH? Do you have a high level alt that can gather? I sort of do, but I’m working on another Hunter (duh) to handle this task.
  • Have a plan to store all of the materials that you are going to gather.

Switching professions is never easy, however, with patience and planning you can avoid many of the obstacles. Gather like crazy, look for bargains on the AH, and don’t feel like you have to do this in one or two days. Give yourself some time. Oh and hope Blizzard doesn’t decide to change up professions so that you find yourself needing to switch again. /fingers crossed.