I have two toons at 70, and while my Hunter was the first to 70 and the first to get a cool ride, she languished since September in the gear I had used to solo her through Outlands to 70.

I remember doing my Netherwing quests and seeing a fellow Hunter mow down three Dragonmaw Transporter guys in the time it took me to finish one, and I had to drink after every second fight and let Dragonmaws fly by.

Then, joining a Gruul’s Lair-geared party that was nailing down the Ogri’la reputation quest chain (I had no idea it opened that reputation line at the time, but it sure was fun!) and looking for one more DPS - and seeing how completely pathetic my gearing and damage capability was in comparison to the group.

I had already decided by the time my Hunter hit 70 that it was my then mid-50s Mage I wanted to advance thoughtfully through Outland, now that I was familiar with it and ready to take on the new Instances with PUGs again (not having enough guildmates to pull together). So, I’ve spent most of my time levelling up, rep’ing up and gearing up my Mage over the past few months.

My Mage is now sitting at +750 frost damage, with a hit rating of over 100 and 7.2k health unbuffed, and has been doing Heroics since mid-December when I had +450 damage and a complete lack of understanding of spell hit-vs-spell penetration. I’ve been invited to multiple 10 and 25-man raids that have been a lot of fun, but raiding is not where my interest lies.

So, my attention has turned to improving the gearing on my Hunter, getting her ready for Heroics.

Where I Am Now - PUGs and Gear

Over the past two weeks I’ve gotten into PUGs with my Hunter after a long, long time of soloing or just using her as a farmer or guild/friend helper, and I’ve seen my “fears” lessen quite a bit about my ability to trap well, keep up to a swift-moving group and not pull aggro all the time during fights.

I’ve gotten a few gear upgrades from the 67+ dungeons as I’ve worked on improving my reputation well enough to get Heroics keys, but when I hit 70 I hadn’t done a single Outland instance, and therefore the only Heroics reputation line I had at Honored was Cenarion Expedition, since quests alone can get you there. I’ve since done enough PUGs and guild runs (we actually had a few of those, amazing) that I have four of five heroics keys, missing the Keepers of Time one for now.

My gear consists of mostly dungeon blues 67+ and the crafted Felstalker set, with a little bit of Season 1 PvP gear which I bought from the PvP vendor for battleground tokens and general honor

Spec?

I didn’t do enough reading before I went and spec’d myself Marksman/Survival after levelling to 70 as Beast Master. Once I did some reading, I realized that a Beastmaster/Marksman spec would be quite acceptable for Heroics. Right now, however, I’ve gone BM/SV to get improved traps, hoping that’ll make my CC job easier in exchange for some DPS output.

I will probably re-spec a billion times over the next month as I continue to gear up and PUG and compare myself to others around me for learning purposes.

Stats?

Unbuffed and without any Aspects up, I’m at 8.2k health, 5.9k mana, 1k ranged attack power, and a 12.73% chance to crit. Not quite Heroics Geared yet, and certainly nowhere near a respectable resume for Karazhan, but it’s getting there.

Keying Progress

After getting Kara keyed on my Mage, it was another month before I finally got the key to Shadow Labyrinth and Shattered Halls, which seems kind of backwards as I was able to do Heroics versions of them before I even had the key…

So, I’m trying to key up those other ones on my Hunter more quickly this time. Shattered Halls key quest chain was easy enough to do solo (with the assistance of the guards outside Thrallmar to help down the Fel Reaver), but Sethekk Halls doesn’t seem to be a dungeon I get asked to join parties for, and therefore the Shadow Labyrinth key still eludes me.

My Hunter was able to pick up the first fragment of the Kara key in Shadow Labs last night in a partial-PUG, but since I’m not Heroics geared yet nor itching to get into Karazhan on my Hunter, I’m not in a rush to secure the second and third key fragments and will get them as I PUG my way through rep-grinds and gear-ups.

Reputation Grinds

I have yet to decide where to spend time grinding reputation, other than the ones required to get Heroics keys.

I think I’ll probably focus on Cenarion Expedition reputation afterwards, however, as they have “the good arrows” from my understanding.

I’ll let you know how it goes!

Tags: beast master, cenarion expedition, Dungeons, felstalker set, gearing up for heroics, gruul's lair, heroics dungeons, hunter, hunter gear, hunter spec, instances, karazhan, karazhan keying, level 70 hunter gear, LFG tool, LFM Tool, mage, pick up group, pugging, pugging strategy, PUGs, reputation grind, respeccing my hunter, season 1 gear, survival, thrallmar rep

Life has been busy and I’ve been quietly puttering along on my spare time, advancing my Mage to be the next to 70.

After reading for months on the Official Forums about the trek from 60 to 70 for someone who wishes to get Heroics keys “in the most efficient way”, I knew that the path to the greatest amount of Reputation was kind of backwards compared to the way a player would initially take on the Outland - especially as a solo, casual player.

Thrallmar - Neutral to Honored

Thrallmar rep was the first I spent time working on.

I did a few quests to get me from 59 to 60 in Outland and then from 60 to 61 and a bit, all I did was log in to this toon to head into another dungeon, or to clean up from the last one and get prepared and repaired for another run of Ramparts or Blood Furnace.

As a Mage, I haven’t had difficulties finding parties for these dungeons, and in general the parties have been pretty decent quality for being a PUG full of strangers. I’m super impressed that many people do actually seem to be able to “not break the sheep” by this level, and most often the sheep is the last to fall.

The dungeon parties I’ve been in have also been very good at handling unexpected emergency situations (extra mobs attacking us before we had a chance to prepare from the last fight, generally) and except for one I can recall, there were no ‘dead on the floor coaches’ who felt the need to offer advice (or to whine) since they died and everyone else is still fighting.

After some 6 or so runs of Ramparts and 3 or 4 in Blood Furnace, I was capped at 5999/6000 Friendly, which is the point where no more honor is gained from killing the mobs in a regular Ramparts or Blood Furnace dungeon, and Thrallmar quests should be tackled to continue the gain of Thrallmar Rep.

Thrallmar - Honored and Onward

Until level 70, Thrallmar rep isn’t really all that easy to “grind” out. If I were a PvP sort I could do the Hellfire Fortifications for 250 rep a day, but I’m not, so I’ve just opted to do as many quests in Thrallmar as possible.

If you’re already level 70, there’s a quest line to get the key to Shattered Halls, and the level 70 non-heroic version of the dungeon continues to give reputation right through to Exalted, from what I have read.

Theoretically, by the time I get there my “grind” will have been reduced since I maxed out on mob-kill reputation before doing most of the quests in Thrallmar that also give reputation, but give reputation past where the mob-kill rep leaves off.

Cenarion Expedition Rep - Neutral to Honored

This reputation grind from Neutral to Honored was incredibly easy since I’ve got a level 70 who has been through all the same areas and over-collected on the Unidentified Plant Parts and thus has a collection of them for my Mage to use.

The very quickest way (although it’s tedious) to get from Neutral to Honored with Cenarion Expedition is to turn in 360 Unidentified Plant Parts - that is, 36 turn-ins of 10 Unidentified Plant Parts each. After the 36th turn-in, you advance to Honored and the Plant parts are no longer turn-in-able to improve your reputation.

Another way to get from Neutral to Honored is to treat it like Thrallmar rep worked, and run Slave Pens and Underbog over and over until you reach 5999/6000 Friendly, and then start on the quests in the Cenarion Refuge in Zangarmarsh.

However, by doing it the plant-turn-in way, you also get a chance of finding an Unidentified Species which can be turned in once you’ve reached Honored and it will help boost the path a little bit towards Revered and Exalted. I got 4 of these Unidentified Species to help boost me up before I started on the Cenarion Refuge quests in Zangarmarsh and the Cenarion Expedition ones drizzled around the zones.

Cenarion Expedition Reputation - Honored to Revered and Exalted

Like the Thrallmar rep, right now my best bet as a non-70 is to do Cenarion Expedition quests from the various places they exist in the Outland - Hellfire Peninsula, Zangarmarsh, Terrokar Forest and beyond.

At level 70 there’s a dungeon called Steamvaults that has both a non-heroic and a heroic version to it, and in the non-heroic mode the mobs give Cenarion Expedition rep right through to Exalted.

How Many Runs To Get A Heroic Key?

Dunno! When I hit 70 I’ll give a reputation overview and when I get each heroic key (over time), I’ll let you know how many of those lvl 70 dungeon runs it took me after this attempt at efficiency when grinding reputation in Outland!

Stay tuned ;)

Tags: blood furnace, cenarion expedition, cenarion expedition reputation guide, cenarion refuge, cenarion rep guide, hellfire fortifications, hellfire ramparts, heroics reputation guide, outland reputation guide, slave pens, steamvaults, thrallmar reputation guide, underbog, unidentified plant parts, zangarmarsh