Mists of Panderia - Where Shall I Start?

Mists of Panderia - Where Shall I Start?

So I finally got home after my travels & one of the first things I did (besides collapse into bed & sleep for 5 hours!) was upgrade my EU account to Mists of Panderia. I've been following various tweets over the last week about all the different things people are doing & I have to try to decide where the heck to start my Pandaren adventure!

I don't really want to rush any alts to 90 although I do want to get them all there in the next month or so and I also want to max my professions. From Twitter, I'm getting the impression that a farm is a must have for all my 85's but as yet, I have no idea how to get the the Farmer NPC guy!

I have had a little play with pet battles on my US account and also raised a baby Pandaren Monk to level 10 but gold making on that account is unimportant to me so I'm going to leave that out of my musings. I will probably poodle my US Hunter along very late at night when my US friends are around though.

So what do I have in my stable of alts & which order should I tackle stuff?

1. Paladin - Retribution, Leatherworker & Skinner. also my Achievement Queen but that's not so important now. Gear wise she's kind of middling. I never got to grips with the Holy Power system so she's just been gathering dust although she is my first love & I feel the irrational urge to level her first & fast too.
2. Death Knight - Frost, Jewelcrafting & Inscription - my main melee DPS girlie, she's also been my main gold maker with her professions. I know there are kobolds in the Glyph market now though so I'm not sure if I want to keep fighting that battle.
3. Priest - shadow/holy, Enchanting & Tailoring. I'm honestly not very good on my priest - I didn't start healing until the very end of Wrath & never had the confidence to face many Cataclysm dungeons with her. Her gear is ok but I think she will struggle a bit in Panderia.
4. Rogue - Combat, Herbing & Alchemy - geared to mid Cata PvP level, she will definitely struggle in Panderia. I love my lil gnome rogue but I'm really really bad at all the moving around & jumping type stuff so she's never really had a chance!
5. Hunter - Marksman, 2nd Alchemist & 2nd Tailor, this girlie is my favourite for a bit of PvP & some dungeons too. I seem to be able to pull some ok DPS numbers out of her although still not spectacular. If I do dungeons in Mists, I'm pretty sure she will be my 1st choice but her professions are only basic - no extra plans/recipes etc, just the basics to get at the additional cooldowns in Cataclysm.
6. Warrior - Arms, Mining & Blacksmithing - my newest level 85, she just dinged the week before Mists of Panderia arrived so her gear is still end leveling greens & a few blues. She will probably struggle in Panderia too but although it took me over a year to finally get her maxed, I did quite enjoy it in the end.

My initial thoughts were to take my gatherers out first - get those farmed items onto the Auction House & capitalise on the early rush but I'm already seeing prices dropping dramatically & stabilising at fairly reasonable prices too so that blows that idea out of the water.

Next thought was to take my Paladin out first - (instinctive really, she is my fav!) her Leatherworking would be ideal with all the new monks that suddenly sprung into existance! But then I remembered I dropped skinning last summer & am only half levelled on that now - do I spend an afternoon getting that to Pandaren level?

I'm hearing that professions are fairly easy to level now so I'm also wondering, shall I just throw some gold at it & get all my professions leveled via the Auction House & just play which alt I want to? My old friend Khalior is writing again - 2 great posts to get me thinking this week - a Grab Bag of Random Tips & More Random Tips for Panderia

But then there's the whole Spirit of Harmony being Bind on Pickup thing! Most of my girls will need them at some point. Faid literally just posted about SoH & determining their value whilst I'm writing this & that's given me a whole new lot of stuff to think about!

Phat over at Phat Lewt's Gold Blog has also been analysing this kind of stuff too - his post Top 5 professions to Level ASAP makes some really good points & based on his thoughts, I could happily level my hunter first (Alchemist/Tailor). Even though she doesn't have extra stuff from earlier expansions, I'm not sure that matters too much right now - my other Alchemist & Tailor will get leveled soon enough to fill any gaps there.

And lastly, just now, Jim from Power Word:Gold has just published a new post 'How To Eat An Elephant' - apart from making me smile at the title, he also makes some very good points that are perfectly timed for me as I write this post! It's good to know that as I sit here, frantically trying to work out how to catch up for missing the first week & worrying that I'm falling behind, there are others out there feeling exactly the same sense of being overwhelmed by all the possibilities Mists of Pandaria & Blizzard have brought to us. I don't think I'll be complaining about boredom anytime soon, that's for sure!

Image © Alex Bellink under Creative Commons License