Gear Uprades for Hunters

I've accumulated over 100 Badges of Justice on my hunter. And the time has come to make a decision about what gear I want to get next. Since I can only choose one piece, I've got to pick between a new chest piece or new leggings.

The new chest piece I'd pick up would be the Scaled Drakeskin Chestguard. This would replace my Gladiator's Chain Armor from battlegrounds.

I've done a little analysis, to make sure what I'm going to be losing. The badge piece is clearly superior in nearly every way. It has 122 more armor, 20 more agility, 9 more intellect, 12 less stamina, 2 fewer red sockets (which I've socked with 32 attack power), 4 less critical strike rating (from the socket bonus), 10 less critical strike rating(equip), 20 less resilience, and 76 more attack power, and finally 25 more haste rating.

Since 20 agility for hunters is equivalent to 20 attack power, 11.04 crit rating and 20 armor, I've factored all this together determine that if I switch I get:

• 68 AP
• -2.96 critical strike rating (I have 88 crit rating right now)
• 142 Armor
• 135 Mana
• -120 health
• -20 resilence
• 2.38% haste (at 10.51 haste rating = 1% haste)

My choices in leggings are the Leggings of the Pursuit which would replace my Leggings of Beast Mastery. The badge pieces are better in every way except that I'm afraid I'd miss the pet buffs with my current pants. If pressed, I'd choose the badge legs.

However, happily (???) I only have enough badges to buy one. Thus, I'm intending to visit my band and pick up my badges and happily trot out to the island and get a new chest piece. And now, I'll have to get it enchanted....

Badges of Justice... OR Conspiracy Theory???

This is another fun meta post. I was thinking about this a little last night. Bremagorn accumulated enough badges to have over 100 and visit the badge vendor on the island. I purposefully left his badges in his bank and avoid an impulse purchase.

After annoying my guildmates way too much about which to choose -- pants or chest, I think I've finally decided on the chest piece. I would save for the crossbow, but it doesn't seem that much better than mine, I have a skill of 1, AND I thin the crossbow is ugly.

So, then I actually got thinking about why we're using badges now. There seems a very simple answer. Blizzard has introduced a hard to acquire, soulbound object as currency to combat gold farming and account hacking. Gold is a very liquid currency. It can be moved easily, transferred by trade or mail, and is used for a great many things in game. Liquid currencies are easy to move and hide. And it's very easy to hack accounts to get at it.

Soulbound items can't be traded or sold (on the AH). Instead of charging 10,000 G for the new gear, the price was set instead at a number of badges.

However, what would be happening in game? Why on earth would vendors like the new smith WANT all these badges of justice? Is she hording them for some purpose. And if they're truly soul bound how can she even accept them (yes, I know she's an NPC. It's just a thought experiment). Or perhaps she is working both sides. Perhaps, she's SELLING the Badges that we turn in to bosses in raids and heroic dungeons. Perhaps the raid bosses are also doing their dailies to open a new vendor so they can gear up! Sort of makes ME wonder...