Level 85 Pre-Raid Gear Recommendations for Moonkins

Last night, I hit the halfway point in my goal of becoming Justice Points capped prior to Cataclysm.  Just a few more LFG dungeons and I will at least be close to my goal.  However, when I do get capped, I have to start thinking about what my purchases will be.

 I started off by looking at some gear list of what you can get with Justice Points and I started to build my list of what I wanted.  Unfortunately, considering the choices available for us, our decisions are relatively straightforward for Justice Points.  Also, there are a lot of slots that are not covered by Justice Points.  To fill those slots, I looked at the heroic dungeons to find what gear would be the best to fill in those slots.

In terms of what I was looking for in gear, my priorities changed slightly from my level 80 stats.  Here are my current level 85 priorities in gear.

Spirit > Hit > Intellect = Spellpower > Haste > Mastery = Critical Strike

A little explanation.  The reason I chose spirit over hit is for one major reason.  Spirit is automatically converted to hit so it is at the very least equal to hit.  However, given the issues that may occur with mana in Cataclysm, we will need to have better mana regeneration out of combat.  In this vein, I chose spirit over hit.  This also shows the initial priority should be our hit cap, which at level 85 will be *prepare to catch your breath* 1742 to have 17% spell hit.  Also, I chose haste over mastery/crit due to the way haste effects the speed our spells are cast and DoTs tick.  Mastery and Critical Strike are relatively close in importance.  We will want to get plenty of both, but haste is our major stat.  What I tended to find with our gear is that haste and mastery were together or crit and mastery were together.  When there was a question, I took the haste/mastery.  Also, remember that reforging can  help to get the gear to where we want it.  Finally, and it should go without saying, but leather only to get the leather specialization bonus.

So with all that in mind, here is my ideal level 85 pre-raid gear.  I tried to only use Justice Points or gear from heroic 5-mans.  Also, I got all this information from Wowpedia, since it is the only one I can access from my job.  It doesn't have all the heroic 5-mans bosses' loot, so some heroic 5-man loot may be better than this, however, it has enough info to at least make a starter list.

    Head: Cluster of Stars - 2200 Justice Points

Neck: Celadon Pendant - 1650 Justice Points

Shoulder: Somber Shawl - 1650 Justice Points

Back: Solar Wind Cloak (Heroic) - Halls of Origination (H) - Rajh

Chest: Robes of Forgetfullness - 2200 Justice Points

Wrist: Armbands of Change (Heroic) - Blackrock Caverns (H) - Corla

Hands: Blessed Hands of Elune - 1650 Justice Points

Waist: Thatch Eave Vines - 1650 Justice Points

Legs: Leggings of Late Blooms - 2200 Justice Points

Feet: Awakening Footfalls (Heroic) - Halls of Origination (H) - Temple Guardian

Ring 1: Lavishly Jeweled Ring (Heroic) - Deadmines (H) - Admiral Ripsnarl

Ring 2: Rose Quartz Band (Heroic) - Stonecore (H) - Slabhide

Trinket 1: Witching Hourglass (Heroic) - Blackrock Caverns (H) - Ascendant Lord Obsidius

Trinket 2: Tendrils of Burrowing Dark (Heroic) - Stonecore (H) - Ozruk

Main Hand: Scepter of Power (Heroic) - Halls of Origination (H) - Setesh

Off Hand: Apple Bent Bough - Justice Points 950

Idol: Book of Dark Prophecies (Heroic) - Stonecore (H) - High Priestess Azil

So, for only 13,750 Justice Points (Don't worry, this won't be that hard when we are getting 75 justice points for downing heroic 5-man bosses) and a few instance runs,  here are the stats that you get.

Spirit/Hit: 1436

Intellect: 3068

Haste: 1158

Mastery: 1001

Critical Strike: 533

Since you are not at the hit cap, you will need to reforge slightly and maybe even gem for a little hit until you get some raiding gear under your belt.  If you are going to reforge for your hit, I would work backwards on the list of stats.  40% of the mastery and critical strike numbers come up to 613, so you should be able to find your hit in just those two stats to get to 1742 and still have a good amount of mastery and critical strike. 

Finally, if you want to save some Justice Points and go for a sweet staff instead, I would recommend getting Staff of Isolation (Heroic) from Lord Godfrey in Heroic Shadowfang Keep.  However, I think the stats would be overall better going with an offhand and main hand due to the increased spellpower of using a main hand/off hand combo.

Of course, when you start raiding,  you will want to go for your tier sets and then get the next level gear from there.  And you don't need all these pieces to start raiding.  From what I have heard, an average iLevel of 340 would be enough to get into starting raids.