A brief look at the crafted PvP blues in WOTLK

BRK recently made a post displaying his awesome new blue PvP gear, which has replaced a large chunk of his 70 epics (although he still has his 2-piece Tier-5 bonus, /jealous).

Listed below are the item sets, plus the stats specific to each set (resilience and stamina are ubiquitous):
NB: set name links to the set on wowhead, the helms are linked for mouseover goodness and comparisons.
Eviscerator's Leather (agi, crit, AP) - Rogues, Feral Druids (Eviscerator's Facemask)

Overcast Leather (int, spirit, spellpower) - Resto/Balance Druids (Overcast Headguard)

Stormhide Mail (int, stam, MP5, spellpower) - Resto/Elemental Shamans (Stormhide Crown)

Swiftarrow Mail (agi, int, crit, AP) - Hunters, Enhancement Shamans (Swiftarrow Helm)

Frostsavage Cloth (crit, int, spellpower) - All clothies (note that wowhead lists this set as requiring level 80, while the others require 78) (Frostsavage Cowl)

Ornate Saronite Plate (spellpower, MP5) - Holy Paladins (Ornate Saronite Skullshield)

Savage Saronite Plate (str, crit) - Warriors, Retribution Paladins (Savage Saronite Skullshield)

Since they're made through tailoring/leatherworking/blacksmithing, these items seem really accessible, requiring basic ingredients for each (frostweave cloth, borean leather, or saronite bars respectively) plus one eternal (apparently the new motes). Since the items are BOE they'll really boost profit margins from crafting professions and also provide solid entry-level gear for 80 PvP (and probably represent a few PvE upgrades during questing).

Sadly the gear seems extremely streamlined. While Moonkin now benefit from spirit, I'm not sure that DoT-based Warlocks scale all that well with crit, and there's probably other sub-par itemisation offered by the new gear for other classes/specs I'm less familiar with.

One thing you might notice is the complete lack of sockets on this gear, and the complete lack of hit rating. While the lack of hit on shared healer/dps gear makes sense, not being able to socket for it will mean quite a few resists/misses especially given things like the nerf to the Hunter talent Surefooted (from the BC Surefooted).

Overall though, I very much approve of these items, and will probably be leveling the hunter for the Leatherworking love.

Also, turns out Ghostcrawler is male, and I have no idea why the forums kept refering to him as a "she". Lots of blogs did it too. Man, my world just got turned upside down. That being said, does it really matter?