Emblems of Confusion: Triumph

I have emblems and there's so much to spend them on! I don't know where to start!

Well, start by clicking this little read more link down here.

There's a lot of stuff on the Triumph vendors, and it can be pretty daunting, but it's pretty easy to narrow things down really fast. The biggest complication is that alliance and horde have different gear, so I'll be referring to gear primarily by it's defining stats and any shared words in their name.


The first thing I'll say: If you're in a position to get Trophies of the Crusade, I'll simplify things for you greatly: Don't buy any armor. You'll want 4 pieces of tier 9, one way or another. Your 5th set slot can come from a few places, but the best options include Merlin's Robe and the robes from Beasts of Northrend and Twin Val'kyrs, or take the tier robe and the Nemesis Skullcap from Onyxia if ToGC25 gear isn't an option. Nemesis has a huge amount of spellpower for itemlevel 245. Because of the cost of trophy gear, budgeting is important, so don't bother with itemlevel 232 set pieces unless you absolutely must have a set bonus now.

In this case, the wand and the Band of the Invoker are still both solid options. There's not many alternatives for itemlevel 245 wands, only from Imprisoned Souls (haste/crit) from ToGC10, ToC25 has no wands at all. These two items are two of the most solid options regardless of your armor situation.

Now, if you aren't in a position to get trophies, you're probably also not in a position to get a huge flow of triumph emblems, but remember that set bonuses are big - our tier 8 and 9 set bonuses are big enough that the only thing more important than accommodating them in gear is the hit cap. So one of your goals should be 4 piece t9, or at lest 2pt9/2pt8. This is quite expensive, as tier 9 pieces cost 30 or 50 emblems, and the four piece bonus will cost you minimum 160 emblems. However, these items are cheaper than the non-set pieces, and because of the set bonuses, are much better gear overall.

If you're not getting trophies, I'm assuming that any TOC25 drops are basically out, so you do have three options for your non-set piece. Merlin's Robe is the strongest, or the Nemesis Skullcap for the immense spellpower if Onyxia's open to you, but there are two good warlock items on the general triumph vendor: The hit/haste helm (Aftermath), and the haste/spirit shoulders (Revered Mortality).

Another consideration is tier 8.5 2 piece, which is easily attainable from the helm and robe through conquest emblems. T9.232 is very side-gradey from t8.5. In this case, the best combination you can get prior to replacing 2pt8 with 4pt9 is getting 2pt9 through the gloves and pants, and taking Aftermath for your shoulder off-set slot.

The other two cloth items, Clouded Sight (spirit/crit helm) and Catastrophic Emanation (hit/crit shoulders) are inferior for most specs, but are both options for Affliction in 3.2.2, where the gap between haste and crit is very small. With 3.3 looming and haste becoming a much stronger stat for affliction, I wouldn't consider either.


Merlin's Robes came up several times in this thread, they're a solid, if expensive, investment at 8 crusader orbs. There's a second slot with Crusader Orb crafted gear, and that's bracers. The selection isn't cut and dry here, either, and it's a situation where it helps to know your scale factors.

The options are Bejeweled Wizard's Bracers (50 haste/42 crit) and Royal Moonshroud Bracers (42 crit/50 spirit). The pick is haste vs. spirit. Bejeweled is generally the safe bet, but at high gear levels, spirit CAN outweigh haste at high gear levels, making Moonshroud the preferred pick - demonic pact builds might also favor the higher spellpower for raid support. However, at these gear levels, itemlevel 258 options from ToGC25 are probably on the table anyway, making the point moot.

Now... You'll notice I never mentioned trinkets in here. That's because quite simply, both caster trinkets suck. Shard of the Crystal Heart has a huge amount of hit on it, and it does make a good hit "crutch" similar to Dying Curse. On one hand it shouldn't really be necessary to use a big hit crutch at this gear level, but on the other, it does simplify things. However, the spellpower effect is significantly inferior to Dying Curse, which is still a pretty immense hit crutch, and is even still one of our better trinket options.

Talisman of Resurgence actually gets an honorable mention. The immense amount of intellect generally isn't the warlock flavor, but just like Pandora's Plea from Ulduar, there is an argument for picking it up. 25 man heroic Anub'arak has a very mana restrictive phase 3, similar to hard mode Vezax. Rather than mana regen being turned off, life tapping is quite difficult and may actually prove impossible. An extra 2000+ mana does give a lot of wiggle room to play with while learning the encounter, but I wouldn't want to depend on it long term. At least this trinket you can pick up on your own if you feel the need - you're stuck fighting healers for Pandora's Plea (and generally losing - it's an awful trinket for us except on one fight, but good for them on all fights).