[Cata] Will mail (e.g., Legguards of the Vault) still be good for plate wearers?

[zrt]

Is it still the case that in Cataclysm "[a]gility [will] provide the necessary Attack Power for leather and mail wearers" and that "trength will provide the appropriate amount of Attack Power for plate wearers", meaning that "leather and mail items will no longer be desirable for plate wearers"? (World of Warcraft (en) Forums -> [BlizzCon 09] Classes, Items, and Professions).



If so, how does this apply to characters <= level 39 who cannot yet wear plate? Will mail items with +agility on them (e.g., Legguards of the Vault) be significantly less useful for warriors and ret paladins, or will warriors and ret paladins count as mail wearers for the purposes of determining whether or not they get attack power from +agility or +strength prior to level 40? Will plate wearing classes still get +dodge and +crit from agility, or will strength cover that as well?



My intuition is that a warrior would always count as a plate wearer and that mail items (edit: with agility) will become significantly less useful for plate wearing classes in Cataclysm, but I wanted to make sure that I'm not missing something.



Finally, my apologies if this topic has already been covered; I was unable to locate any threads on it.



(edited for clarification)

 

[Ihateurmom]

I'll try and tackle this one to the best of my sleep deprived abilities

For the first point, yes. Leather will absolutely be off the list (due to the item specialization bonus). It's also worthy to point out A lot of mail gear is going to be junkariffic. From the position of Warriors and Paladins, we have always counted as a Plate class.

For the second point, I'm sure there will still be tons of 'transitional' mail pieces that will provide Strength, Crit, and all the lovely stats we crave

In terms for point number three (on agility bonuses) I'm sure we're going to still recieve dodge and crit. However, much of those agility pieces are going to be unfavorable, due to the fact that our intended pieces will provide similar levels of crit and/or dodge, while also providing static Attack power to round things out. In other words, your intuition sounds about right

All in all, it's going to look like just a simple adjustment over anything else. I'm sure further evaluations will be done for new gear pieces when Cata comes out, but this is no where near a serious issue yet in my mind.

 

[Luhar]

will healadins not want to wear cloth in cata?

 

[builtokill]

i doubt it; no. they're adding lots of new items which will enable classes to have correct stats on correct proficient armor types.

 

[Dorigon]

Leather won't be off-limits - the armor specialization bonus doesn't even apply until level 50, last I saw, and even then it's only 5%. Leather is fair play.