With WotLK coming...

[Ballendor]

Here's my Armory:
The World of Warcraft Armory

Based upon my current gear level and the time to expansion, how much do i stand to gain by grinding out current content?

In other words, should I focus on making gold, leveling my professions, and other objectives with the thought that I will get better gear earlier in the new content than others?

I have not participated in the Beta, but have read somewhere that T5/T6 would not find replacements until well into the expansion content.

[Tatt]

Honestly unless you got some raid to pull you through content, you are not going to get enough gear in what time you have remaining to make much of a difference. Personally I would start saving up honor for new pvp gear, do dailies to stockpile some gold, maybe finish upgrading your Breastplate of kings in case they make a tier 4/5/6 of it so that you are ready to move on quickly.

[Arrivan]

Even T4 level stuff won't be replaced for a few levels. The gear jump is not going to be anywhere near as drastic as it was going into TBC. I'd actually wait to finish leveling up your blacksmithing because new plans will be available from 350 that will use a lot less mats than the current plans. The craftable Cobalt plate set will be an upgrade in quite a few slots for you so you may want to focus on making some gold in preparation for leveling up blacksmithing.

That said, keep doing as many runs as you can for fun and experience if nothing else, and some of the gear you get may last a little longer. Trinkets in particular are very few and far between and so far level 80 trinkets aren't even itemised last I heard (may have changed now though).

[NmEnforcer]

Does honor carry over? I knew arena points got wiped at 71.

After looking at your gear, I would say going through Kara some more wouldn't hurt. Practice, etc. Some of the badge gear will still shine for a bit at 80.

Overall, the previous posters are correct. Just farm gold. That's what I am doing.

I am gonna heal some more on my paladin so I have a decent set of healing gear to do instances as I level. And I'm gonna do some more as prot pally, to see how I like it compared to warrior.

[Ballendor]

Thank you for the responses everyone.

Just a day or two before this thread I made the decision to purchase the cloak as my first badge piece. I had 49 badges and got impatient: I hadn't gotten a drop in a while and couldn't bear the thought of waiting until 75... or 100 until getting another upgrade.

The cloak replaced a blue and allowed more flexability in my gearing as i can now choose between 515 def with higher avoidance or 482 (with Merciless Shield) with higher EH.

It was the thought of grinding for 75 to 100 badges from my new lower cache that inspired the thread... I'd appreciate any other random comments anyone would have on my gearing / where to roam.

BTW you might be wondering why i'm wearing the green ring and not the Kara one.. that's because like an idiot i fast fingered the quest to give the ring and got the Caster one... so i'm stuck with the green until i reach exalted with Violet.