Pre-raid gear

Blizzard rewrote the level-60 gearing problem. “Every dungeon drop has been re-examined, memorable items remain memorable,” and quest rewards were upgraded too. verified That means the Classic Era pre-raid BiS list you remember is wrong for Forever, and no correct one exists yet because beta stops at level 30. This page gives the circuit, the method, and the traps.

Why the old list is dead

Three Forever changes break every Classic Era spreadsheet:

Dungeon drops were re-examined item by item. verified
Quest rewards were upgraded. verified
Stats were unified: a single hit stat and a single crit stat across melee, ranged and spell, and +healing grants one third of its value as +damage. verified Old “spell crit” versus “melee crit” comparisons no longer apply, and a healer piece is a small DPS piece for casters.

Beta is capped at 30, so nobody has tested any level-60 dungeon. Every published “Forever pre-raid BiS” is either a Classic Era list with the name changed or invented.

The level-60 dungeon circuit

Dungeon	Level	Status	Notes
Blackrock Depths	52-60	Vanilla	Huge, many quests, Shadowforge Key vanilla baseline
Lower Blackrock Spire	55-60	Vanilla
Blackmaw Hold	55-60	New	North Azshara, “behind the Furbolg Gates”, a great furbolg city with “unsettling corruption stirring in the depths”. Reportedly awards Timbermaw tokens. verified location tokens unverified
Dire Maul (East / West / North)	58-60	Vanilla	Crescent Key. The tribute run buff is a world buff, so likely useless in raids if the world-buff report holds. vanilla baseline
Scholomance	58-60	Vanilla	Argent Dawn rep. Skeleton Key vanilla baseline
Stratholme (Main / Service)	58-60	Vanilla	Argent Dawn rep. Key to the City for the back door vanilla baseline
Upper Blackrock Spire	58-60	Vanilla	10-player in 1.12; Forever size unconfirmed. Seal of Ascension, one per group vanilla baseline
Shaper’s Terrace	58-60	New	Un’Goro Crater, Titan facility verified

Level ranges are from foreverchanges.pro and Wowhead’s dungeons overview. verified

Blackmaw Hold and Shaper’s Terrace bosses and loot are not testable in beta and nothing credible is published. The boostroom and coachcarry “loot focus” lists for these dungeons are invented. verified absence

Camping Blueprints (profession campfire objects) drop from dungeon bosses, which is a second reason to keep running the circuit after your slots are filled. verified See Professions.

The leveling-side dungeon list, including Alcaz Prison (48-53) and the other new instances, is on Dungeons.

How to approach BiS per role

There is no list. There is a method.

Everyone

Finish the 55-60 questlines first, especially the Mount Hyjal chains. Quest rewards were buffed and several will beat blue drops. verified direction, specifics unknown Hyjal quests also build Guardians of Hyjal rep and familiarity with the raid entrances.
Run every 60 dungeon once with the guild, then repeat the ones whose loot tables turn out to matter for your slot. Nobody knows which those are until December.
Check every tooltip in Forever, not on a Classic database. Single hit and crit, the 1/3 healing-to-damage rule, and reworked drops make old item pages wrong.

Tanks

Defense, stamina and armor still matter; whether the vanilla “crit immunity at 440 defense” threshold exists in Forever’s unified stat system is unknown.
Protection Paladins and Feral Druids are real tanks now (Seal of Fury taunt, Templar’s Bulwark, Mangle and Lacerate). verified Plate and leather tank pieces are both worth chasing. See Classes.
Fire resistance: only the Onyxia main tank needs any. Do not farm a set. See Onyxia’s Lair.

Healers

+healing pieces are still your main-spec pieces; the 1/3 conversion is a bonus, not a reason for a caster to claim them.
Priest gained Penance and Prayer of Mending; Holy Paladin, Resto Shaman and Resto Druid are all viable, and both factions have both Paladins and Shamans. verified
Mana regeneration items matter more than in retail because there is no gear-scaled regen; treat spirit and mp5 items as contested among all healers.

Melee and Hunters

Single hit and crit stats mean a “spell crit” item is never yours, but a generic “crit” item is contested with casters. Loot rules need to name a priority. See Loot systems.
Melee Survival Hunter exists. verified Hunters may now want melee weapons for real, not for stats; expect that in loot discussions.
Weapons from BRD, LBRS, UBRS and Scholomance were the vanilla pre-raid staples; assume their Forever versions were re-examined and check.

Casters

One spell damage stat; the shared crit stat is contested with melee.
Healer pieces grant 1/3 of their +healing as damage. A +100 healing piece is a +33 damage piece. That is usually not competitive with a real caster piece, and loot rules should say a healer piece is main-spec for healers. See Loot rules.

Dungeon Set 2 (Tier 0.5)

The Valthalak upgrade questlines reportedly exist in Forever and the sets are being tested with revised 2/3/4/5/6-piece bonuses. unverified Evaluate per spec; do not assume the full set is good, and do not assume the questline is the same as 1.10’s. Nothing about it is testable at beta cap 30.

World-drop epics

Blizzard is “updating and expanding” world-drop epics per fan summaries. unverified Guild rule: post BoE drops in the guild channel before the auction house. Whether the guild bank buys them, rolls them or lets the finder sell is a Loot rules decision to make before launch.

Crafted gear

Forever adds 600+ new recipes. verified Relevant at 60:

Item	Profession	Status
Belt Buckles, four tiers	Blacksmithing	verified
Ring and neck enchants (new)	Enchanting	verified
Hyjal crafted epics (Conviction, Demonheart, Grimstitch, Spiritcaller, Grovekeeper, Justice, Glory)	Tailoring, Leatherworking, Blacksmithing	datamined. Need Malleable Essence of Nature from disenchanting Barrow Deeps or Hyjal Summit drops. Early-raid, not pre-raid.
Vanilla crafted pre-raid pieces	Various	vanilla baseline. Re-examined; check tooltips.

Which professions to prioritize for the raid team is on Professions. The short version: one Enchanter per raid, one Alchemist, First Aid on everyone.

Reputation gear

Faction	Why at 60	Status
Guardians of Hyjal (new)	Level-60 zone rep; Revered gives Rousing Seed Pod, Exalted the tabard; likely gateway to Hyjal quest gear	datamined
Argent Dawn	Accrues naturally in Scholomance and Stratholme; epic quest rewards and recipes in vanilla	vanilla baseline
Timbermaw Hold	Enchants and LW patterns in vanilla; Blackmaw Hold reportedly awards tokens	vanilla baseline tokens unverified
Theramore Expeditionary Force / Darkspear Raiders (new)	Darkspear Islands BG reps; gear at every standing, weapons at Revered and Exalted	datamined

Full faction list and advice on World bosses and reputations.

PvP gear as a pre-raid path

The rare-quality PvP set needs no rank, only Honor currency. datamined For a casual player who likes battlegrounds, that is a legitimate way to fill slots before December 9 without running Stratholme nine times. Epic “elite” upgrades are rank-gated. See PvP.

What is vapor

wowforever.be and woweternity “BiS” pages: vapor. Nothing at 60 is testable; these are relabeled Classic lists.
boostroom and coachcarry “loot focus” lists for Blackmaw Hold and Shaper’s Terrace: invented.
coachcarry’s Shaper’s Terrace “attunement chain”: contradicts the Blizzard dev interview.
Wowhead’s Forever gear planner: real, but empty of Forever raid data as of this writing.
Resistance-set guides: nothing indicates fire resistance is needed beyond the Onyxia main tank.

Unknown as of 2026-09-24

Bosses and loot for Blackmaw Hold and Shaper’s Terrace.
Whether Dungeon Set 2 and the Valthalak questline exist and what the bonuses are.
Whether the vanilla dungeon keys still gate anything.
UBRS size and the instance-per-hour cap.
Which world-drop epics changed.
Whether a defense or crit-immunity threshold exists for tanks in the unified stat system.
Riding cost at 60, which competes with gear for gold. See Transmog and mounts.