Leathercrafting / Skinning Guide (part 1)
While at the lower levels leatherworking may look like a less useful tradeskill, at the higher levels it becomes more valuable. However, I would say that leatherworking isn’t necessarily a money making powerhouse of a tradeskill, it does allow you to make armor kits and obtain leather used for making bags.
How useful is leatherworking?
Leatherworking has arguable use. For Alliance there are plenty of quests that give out nice leather armor up until level 40, then it gets pretty desolate till 60. The Stranglethorn Vale Tiger/Panther/Raptor Masteries really give some awesome leather gear that is rather hard to beat at level 32-34. However when you hit level 40, you’ll wanna upgrade, and aside from Tremours of the Earth at lvl 50 and a nice Felwood quest that gives you some shoulders, you’ll be crafting and wearing most of your gear.
Once you get near level 50, you can pick a grandmastery and then begin making some impressive quality items. Depending on what path you take, you’ll see different bonuses, but most of them will sell well on the Auction House.
Uniqueness of Skinning
The thing I particularly enjoy about Skinning/leatherworking is; unlike other professions, you can control the pace that you gain resources. You know your skins come off beasts, you know there is an endless supply of beasts and all you have to do is kill them to gain resources. If you know the drop rate and your character’s limitations (how fast he can kill and where he can hunt) you can deduce how many skins you’ll rack up in an hour. With mining/smithing there’s always competition and the veins have to respawn to get resources, with tailoring you can only gain resources off monster drops (which is not 100% drop rate) and with Enchanting… well we know that’s a bitch.
Being able to calculate the intake of skins per hour gives you an upper hand and allows this profession a very stress free approach.
Armor Kits
Everyone wants em, you can make em! This is the leathercrafter’s claim to fame. They add up to 40 armor to any head, foot, leg or chest piece of armor that any class can wear. You can sell them, use them or pass them out to guildmates but they are the most useful class-spanning item a leathercrafter can produce.
