Would you stop it with the gear already!!!

I tell you...the end-game gearing choices become infuriating.

You simply never get to be happy and just go play. There's always something just out of reach. F- Blizzard for that :-)

Badges of Justice. Patch 2.4.

F- them for the new Badge loot that's coming out.

But luckily, I've got a little switch in my head. Its my "i dont give a h00t" switch.

Loot that costs 100 badges or more? Yeah, I'll get right on that with my 10-badge per week trickle.

So I don't give a h00t.

In the three months since I earned my first badge, I've collected about 90 badges and, as of sunday night, have gotten 3 pieces of gear.

But here's where things get interesting.

You might recall (since I posted it yesterday) my blog about fiddling with foodstuffs and gems to play with the hit rating and hit cap'edness.

Well it gets better.

When browsing G'eras for Badge dumping opportunities, I took a look at my gear. With 25 badges, I bought a Blood Knight War Cloak, replacing a level 68 blue cloak that's been on my back since November. Whoot! Really only buys me 2 more agi, 2 more stamina, and 10 more AP, so its a minimal upgrade, but its shiny and purple, so I'm a satisfied customer.

But what's next?

The worst item that remains on my toon right now is my belt. (A) it looks stupid and out of place with my other gear, and (B) its only real redeeming quality is the +24 hit rating it offers.

From either badges or pvp there's a cool belt upgrade I could get, but because of that damn hit rating, I'd have to make other sacrifices elsewhere.

BUT....after my regemming, I'm at 144 hit.

Hmmmm, if I were to flip flop back to my old Spicy Hot Talbuk, I could throw away the belt and replace it with something that has zero hit rating and still only be 2 hit points below the hit cap (when well fed).

That's sorta reasonable, I suppose, but surely leaves me feeling like its an endless loop of messing around with gear.

One belt is the War-Feathered Loop for 60 Badges of Justice. This puppy would be outstanding to equip, but its going to take me 4-6 weeks to save the badges, unless by some miracle we start really clearing out the upper part of Kara, but Shade of Aran is pretty much telling me that aint gonna happen none too soon.

The other belt is the Vindicator's Chain Girdle. I could get this guy much sooner via BG, as I've nearly got the honor and marks saved up already.

If I go ahead and replace the belt, I'll be left with only 3 non-purplez.

One is the Hourglass of the Unraveller which is a nice little puppy. I think I'd like to replace it with that hasty trinket, Abacus of Violent Odds, but the odds are pretty violently against that ever dropping for me.

The other two are both Beast Lord set items (gloves and shoulders), giving me decent-but-not-quite-stellar base stats, but a hugely valuable 4 second reduction to trap cooldowns, so I'm really hesistant to break that set. I wonder???

And those new, inattainable Badge rewards...I just don't give a h00t!