Badge gear vs. Tier gear

So tonight, my guild got Fathom-Lord Karathress down for the second time. And, for the second time, no “of the Champion” tokens dropped. (You’d think out of six tokens dropping, at least one would be “of the Champion”, but no. You’d be wrong.)

I am fast-approaching 100 badges. I’m not a holy paladin who enjoys healing 5-mans or heroics. Karazhan and I have essentially parted ways. I get my badges by raiding, now, which I quite enjoy doing. I picked up 9 badges tonight, then added another two through dailies and I’m up to 69 (quit chuckling!) badges.

So because I’m at the point where, when our badge vendor on Eldre’Thalas eventually opens, I should have enough badges to replace Jade Ring of the Everliving with Anveena’s Touch. A clear upgrade, since it’s almost identical to the Jade Ring, but with actual stats.

I could save my badges for the Gavel of Naaru Blessings if I really wanted, but Vashj going down is just a matter of time, and she has a pretty sweet Lightfathom Scepter. So, assuming I don’t want to save up for the mace… should I drop 100 badges on Greaves of Pacification?

I want my T5 set bonus. Quite badly.

(4) Set: Your critical heals from Flash of Light and Holy Light reduce the cast time of your next Holy Light spell by 0.5 sec for 10 sec. This effect cannot occur more than once per minute.

Seriously? A 1.5 second Holy Light for 10 seconds? Once per minute? That’s just disgustingly great.

However, not getting my pants yet again made me look at the numbers. Obviously, with 4 pieces of Tier 5, the Crystalforge Leggings are superior. But otherwise, properly gemmed and threaded, the badge pants are kind of frickin’ awesome.

Total of 176 healing, 12 mp5, 34 spell crit and 36 int on the T5 pants, compared to 181 healing, 17mp5 and 47 int on the badge pants.

More healing, a substantial amount of mp5 and 11 more int, which is 165 more mana, not to mention more healing due to my talents.

But what about that pesky 34 spell crit? That’s 1.45% at level 70, which would boost me from 20.95% holy crit (unbuffed) to 22.4% holy crit (unbuffed). Which is 28.4% Holy Light crit. Which is frickin’ awesome with that T5 4-piece set bonus.

But on their own? I think they kind of fail to match up with the solid regen off the badge pants.

Coriel, at Blessing of Kings, talks about this briefly, but the article pre-dates 2.4 badge stuff.

Alternatively, I could hold out for the T5 pants and get Libram of Mending for 20 badges to aid with my regen, and still upgrade my ring as soon as the vendor opens, like I planned to.

I’ll keep you folks updated on my decision, but you’re free to leave a comment with any advice. :)