Grimmtooth's Troops

It’s probable that there will be some changes between now and the 28th, but we’re close enough that we can consider the numbers we have now to be fairly stable. So let’s consider the stats and what they mean for you.

Note: I am not linking to any of the items on WoWHead because after a very short time, those links will be invalid when the MoP database becomes the real database.  Obviously I can’t link to the real database for items are going to change. Sorry.

First and foremost: Blackfallow Ink is not your friend. On the 28th, it will not be usable to buy other inks. It will only be good to make glyphs. And there is only one glyph that you can make with it.  So, before the turn of 5.0.4, you need to convert Blackfallow Ink into anything that’s useful.

Topic the First: what’s useful.

First of all, at the end of this article will be a chart showing all glyphs that are active in MoP. In case you want to skip the brilliant analysis.

So what inks are useful? This chart shows the distribution of ink utilization in MoP.  Obviously, you can’t buy Ink of Dreams, but everything else is fair game.

As you can see, Ink of the Sea is by far the most useful.  Basically, 30% of your ink-exchanging should be for this glyph, followed by Ethereal¹ at roughly half that. Blackfallow is that little sliver.

This chart confirms Blackfallow as officially the most useless ink in the game.  You can make one glyph with it, the market is going to be flooded by people skilling up, and you can’t buy anything else with it. Useless. Unless you directly need to use Blackfallow ink for some sort of skilling up activity, don’t bother grinding Cata herbs. Sell them to alkys.

One thing to take into account: all this chart does is show the utilization of inks. It does not show how well the glyphs that are made will sell.  We won’t know that until we start rolling those glyphs out on the 28th.

Surprisingly, utilization of Ink of the Sea increases in MoP. This is despite moving several glyphs to different inks from what they used in Cata. It bewilders me that they didn’t bring Blackfallow up even with at least Ink of Dreams. This has always been a thing that confuses me. It seems that a glyph’s ink should be on par with the glyph’s level, and the glyph’s level should be on par with the level of the skill that it is modifying. But none of the glyphs learned between 80 and 85 use Blackfallow Ink except for Colossus Smash.

Within a few percentage points, glyph distribution in MoP is pretty even. DK seems to be hurting the most.  Compared to Cataclysm’s distro, it looks like this:

First of all, note that there were close to fifty (50) glyphs added between Cata and MoP. Of those, Monk accounts for around 35.

Big winners were Warrior, Priest, and Paladin.  Hunter did well, while everyone else held even or lost one or two spots.  Which is bad news for mages, as roughly 1/2 of their glyphs are now variations on Polymorph².

Following is a full list (as of today, 8/17/2012) those glyphs³ that will be supported as of 8/28/2012. Enjoy!

Note: this table defaults to 25 entries, but has over 400. Please use the drop-down at the top of the table for navigation.  There are little pagination buttons at the bottom, too.

1. Yes, I realize it’s mis-spelled in the chart. [↩]
2. Just kidding! [↩]
3. Plus Certificate of Ownership [↩]

This entry was posted on Friday, August 17th, 2012 at 9:35 pm and is filed under Beta, Crafting, Expansions, Relevant to my Interests. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.