iLvL is king they say. This is true in many aspects. You should be able to tell if an item is a upgrade to you. This is how I gear my druid for the Balance spec. With the Balance of Power talent we turn Spirit into Hit. This allows us to have more items to use as gear. The main stat we want is Intel which increases our Spell Power, Mana & Spell Crit! The best 2ndary stat would be Haste. To a point. I gear for at least 18% in Moonkin. There are more breakpoints after this but I believe I'm giving up power through Crit and Mastery by stacking Haste. To a point. I favor Mastery over Crit because I feel it is a more static over-all damage boost rather then a random chance type of boost. This is because if you play right you should always be getting an Eclipse at a constant rate.
I try to Reforge/Gem to maximize my DPS. I do aim for socket bonus, if possible. I don’t believe in going out of your way to stack. You can always tweak things a tad because this is an ever shifting game and you must change with it.
Intel > Spirit/Hit > Haste > Mastery/Crit
Hit Cap - 17% - 1742 (Magic Number)
Crit Rating - 17.45% - 798 (4.45%) I assume a base of 13%?
Mastery Rating - 12.07 - 792
18.30% Haste Break Point 1622 (Semi Magic Number)
This Semi Magic Number is my haste pre Moonkin aura.
Note* I did not have MotW buff when taking my numbers.
I use Graymatter & Elitist Jerks as my references. And gave my reasoning behind what I gear for.
