Siege of Orgrimmar Raid Planning

Lok’tar Ogar, grunt. So you want to fight corruption and tyranny by freeing Orgrimmar from its corrupt dictator, Garrosh Hellscream? May you just want a chance to get payback for your people by beating on some Kor’kron Heads? Well, you’ve come to the right place, grunt! With us, you can be part of a special team assigned by Vol’jin and Baine Bloodhoof to take back the Horde capital!

It won’t be an easy, nor quick process, but if you have the guts and the grit you can make it. We’ve prepared a special guide to assist you in getting ready to take back Orgrimmar. For the Horde!

About the new raids
Normal mode – drops ilvl 553 (probably tuned for ilvl 522)
Flex mode – ilvl 540 (probably tuned for ilvl 515)
SoO LFR – ilvl 528 (probably requires ilvl 500)

Expectations for raiding with The Crazy Waiguorens
We run two 10-man raid groups on a regular basis. If you're just joining us, then you can expect to start with our 2nd raid group which currently raids on Tuesday and Sunday nights. For more information on raid times, check here.
We expect you to be reliable (always inform us in advance if you're going to be away), tolerant (with our international guild, you need to treat others with respect) and willing to learn (learning strategies, fights, and your class).

Who to talk with if you want to raid
The following Officers/Champions of the Crazy Waiguorens are the main raid organisers. Please mention your interest to one of us in game.

Blackhorn
Pandamental
Katryn
Tim (礼君)
Jacqie

Getting geared (updated to include 5.4 changes)

With a new raid tier, the most convenient gearing options have changed.

Raiding for Gear
Obviously, this is the best and most convenient option. At present, The Crazy Waiguorens are planning to hold Flex raids (ilvl 540, anywhere from 10-25 players) and normal mode (ilvl 553, 40VP per boss) raids on a weekly basis. For gearing, you should also run Siege of Orgrimmar’s LFR (ilvl 528 gear, 90VP per wing) which offers better gear than all but heroic gear from Throne of Thunder.

Timeless Isle
iLvl 535: Trinkets can be purchased directly for 50,000 Timeless coins. In addition, you can farm (or buy with 50,000 Timeless coins) Burden of Eternity (found rarely in chests on the Timeless Isle) to upgrade “unopened” timeless ilvl 496 epics to timeless ilvl 535.

Buying/crafting gear
Ilvl 553, 522 or 496 – The new 5.4 raiding quality Belts and Legs will be ilvl 553, but will require a huge amount of Hardened Magnificent Hide,  Celestial Cloth, or Balanced Trillium Ingot, all of which are restricted to a daily cooldown. Therefore, expect enormous costs for these. For 5.2 and 5.0 crafted gear, the prices of materials should be more reasonable, so crafting them should be feasible. Don’t forget that you can use your farm to get most of materials over time.

Legs	ilvl 553 requires 28 Hardened Magnificent Hide/Celestial Cloth/ Balanced Trillium Ingot (all of which are restricted to 1 per day)
Belt	ilvl 553 requires 21 Hardened Magnificent Hide/Celestial Cloth/ Balanced Trillium Ingot (all of which are restricted to 1 per day)
Helm	iLvl 522 requires 8x Haunting Spirit and one of the following: 14x Magnificent Hide, 6x Imperial Silk, 8x Living Steel & 3x Spirits of Harmony
Boots	iLvl 522 requires 6x Haunting Spirit and one of the following: 7x Magnificent Hide, 4x Imperial Silk, 6x Living Steel & 2x Spirits of Harmony
Chestpiece	iLvl 496 requires 8x Blood Spirit and one of the following: 3x Magnificent Hide & 4x Spirits of Harmony, 6x Imperial Silk, 8x Living Steel & 3x Spirits of Harmony
Gloves	iLvl 496 requires 5-6x Blood Spirit (approx 100-130 gold) and one of the following: 2x Magnificent Hide & 3x Spirits of Harmony, 4x Imperial Silk, 6x Living Steel & 2x Spirits of Harmony

How to get the materials
Hardened Magnificent Hide = 2 x Magnificent Hide (Once per day)
Magnificent Hide (Once per day) = 50 Exotic Leather (20 Exotic Leather once per day)

Balanced Trillium Ingot = 1 Trillium Bar (Once per day)
Living Steel = 6 Trillium Bars  (Alchemy, once per day)
Trillium Bar =  2 Black Trillium Ore + 2 White Trillium Ore or 10 Ghost Iron Bars (Alchemy)

Celestial Cloth = 10 Bolt of Windwool Cloth (Once per day)
Imperial Silk = 8 Bolt of Windwool Cloth (Once per day)


World bosses
Ilvl 553 gear – Ordos and 4 celestials (Yu’lon, Chi’ji, Xuen, Niuzao) will provide ilvl 553 gear (and some Tier 14 PVP gear)
Ilvl 522 gear - Oondasta (Isle of Giants) & Nalak (Isle of Thunder) will provide ilvl 522 gear (and some ilvl 493/496 PVP gear)
Ilvl 496 gear – Sha of Anger (Kunlai Summit) and Galleon (Valle of the Four Winds) will provide ilvl 496 gear (and some ilvl 483 PVP gear)

Valor Points
The best option for using Valor Points lies in gear upgrades. For 250 VP, you can upgrade any piece of gear by 4 ilvls. This is able to be done twice per purple epic piece. In addition, you can purchase iLvl 522 gear from Shado-pan Assault Quartermaster.

Heroic Scenarios (120-150 VP for completion)
ilvl 516 gear - requires ilvl 480, needs a pre-formed group of 3 players, not always easy (try to complete every day)

Gold Raid
This will likely be unavailable for several months until enough guilds have the raid on farm. Details regarding costs are unavailable, but each piece of gear will likely cost 5-10k minimum (prices can get up to 150k on some items). Although not strictly permitted in the game, if you have the gold, this is the fastest option for gearing once available.

Heroic Dungeons  for Justice Points
Quick and easy with 80JP per boss and 80VP for first dg per day. All vendors from 5.0 and 5.1 will now be selling their gear through Justice Points rather than Valor Points. Therefore, it is now a good idea to gear yourself up to ilvl 496 simply through Heroic dungeons for JP.  Also gives iLvl 463 gear.

Honor Gear
Ilvl 476 gear – No longer viable with 496 gear being available through JP.

1.       Kill Dominance Offensive PVP rares in the Krasarang Wilds for 250HP (275 with guild bonus) per kill (Check out Jason Leung’s awesome post on gearing for PVP)

2.       Queue for Heroic dungeons and convert your Justice Points to Honor points at the JP vendor in Orgrimmar (bonus to this method is acquisition of Valor Points and ilvl 463 gear as well) Note that this method will be slightly nerfed for patch 5.4



Wrathion’s Legendary Quest
If you’re not already started on this, it is highly recommended that you start pushing for the meta gem and cloak that is given through this quest chain. It is a long undertaking, but well worth it once you get the items. Just the gem is a ~10% dps gain for many classes.

A guide to the legendary questline can be found here on wowhead.com

Know your class and spec
Knowing how to play your class at its best can make a huge difference to your raiding success. Therefore, please check out class guides and forums to learn how to make the most out of your chosen class. Some good resources include:

Icy Veins class guides
MMO Champion Class Forums
Elitist Jerks

It’s also often worth installing addons such as WeakAuras or TellMeWhen to assist you in managing cooldowns and procs.

Study the fights
You got to know when to move, when to stand still, when to stack and when to kill. So learn about the fights before you join the raid and make sure you have the addons Deadly Boss Mods or Bigwigs installed.

Some resources for learning the fights are:
Icy Veins Raid Guides
MMO Champion Raids & Dungeons Forums
Elitist Jerks

Hope you can join us soon
Warmaster Blackhorn

awesome post. looking forward to the update.

Updated to include 5.4 PTR gearing strategies