Engineering Guide for Dragonflight

Last updated on Sep 04, 2023 at 13:00 by Seksixeny 1 comment

This page covers the most important aspects of Engineering in Dragonflight, including talent builds and suggestions on how to make gold with the profession.

1.

Engineering in Dragonflight

Engineering makes profession tools and guns, as well as helmets and wrists with special Tinker Sockets. They can also make bombs and various gadgets.

Engineering in Dragonflight

An important gadget for personal benefit is the Wyrmhole Generator Icon Wyrmhole Generator. While the place you are teleported to is random, you can specialize into Novelties in order to be able to teleport to a Dragon Isles place of your choosing.

Engineering Novelties

While you will eventually be able to unlock all talents, doing so will require a long time as the sources of knowledge are very limited, especially once one-time treasures and first-crafts are exhausted.

2.

Best Race for Engineering in Dragonflight

There are no Horde races with Engineering bonuses, but Alliance players can be Gnomes for +5 skill points or Kul'Tiran for +2 skill points.

3.

Crafting UI in Dragonflight

Dragonflight introduces a few new concepts to professions, which can be seen in the annotated Crafting UI screenshot below:

Crafting UI
  • Most crafting reagents will now have detailed descriptions on how they can be obtained, such as their profession source;
  • Quality, depicted by the number of diamonds on the top left corner of most profession items, is a measure of how proficiently the item was made, and how powerful it is. On crafted gear, this translates to extra item levels, while crafting reagents with higher quality contribute some skill towards any craft they are used on;
  • Doing the First Craft of an item (as indicated in the UI) grants some Artisan's Mettle Icon Artisan's Mettle and one profession knowledge point, as well as significant experience, making it worthwhile to craft every item at least once;
  • Crafting Specializations, the second option in the bottom tabs, are a new system which allows you to spend profession knowledge points for various talent-like bonuses to your crafting abilities;
  • Crafting Orders, the last option in the bottom tabs, allows you to manage your orders, a new system which allows you to craft gear which requires bind on pickup materials for other players, as long as they provide these materials. You can also recraft equipment, in order to change its optional reagents and quality.
First Craft Bonus
4.

Crafting Stats for Engineering in Dragonflight

Recipe Difficulty represents the profession skill level needed to craft the selected recipe at its highest quality potential. It starts from your baseline profession skill, but can be improved with profession gear, specialization bonuses, the quality of the materials used to craft and other special items.

Crafting UI

The Expected Quality bar under the recipe stats give an idea of the quality outcome of crafting the item under current conditions.

There are four new stats for crafting professions, which can show up on your crafting gear:

  • Multicraft provides a baseline (increasable by talents) chance to craft 1 to 2.5 times more items than the usual items a craft produces. A Multicraft proc on a craft that produces 2 items will grant between 1 and 5 extra items, for example;
  • Resourcefulness provides a chance to use fewer tradeable crafting reagents when crafting;
  • Inspiration provides a baseline (increasable by talents) chance to craft a recipe with bonus skill (33% of Recipe Difficulty for crafts with 3 levels of quality, 16.7% for crafts with 5 levels of quality) added on;
  • Crafting Speed increases your craft speed, allowing you to finish your crafts faster.

These stats, when activated, will show up on your Crafting Results panel, as displayed below:

Crafting Stats Procs

All stats have their uses, but for Engineering we recommend focusing on Inspiration and Resourcefulness for most crafts, as recipe difficulties tend to be on the high side for the best crafts.

If you are focused on crafting parts, explosives and other similar items where quantity is also very important, swap out your Resourcefulness gear for Multicraft, instead.

5.

Leveling Engineering in Dragonflight

Increasing your skill in Dragonflight is done by crafting items that grant skill points as usual, but the endgame of the profession is in the search for Engineering Knowledge and using it to unlock Engineering Specializations.

Some crafts require special bind on pickup reagents, such as Artisan's Mettle Icon Artisan's Mettle or Spark of Ingenuity Icon Spark of Ingenuity. These reagents are heavily time gated in how they can be obtained, and thus caution should be used on what you use them for, especially early on.

Spark and Artisan's Mettle

In order to be efficient, we recommend trying to get as many first-craft bonuses while leveling Engineering as possible, but the specific items to aim for while leveling depend on your server's material costs and current sale price for whatever you are crafting.

6.

Best Engineering Gear

Engineers, like most other professions, can use three pieces of gear:

  • Protective Gloves Icon Protective Gloves and Shockproof Gloves Icon Shockproof Gloves, made by Leatherworkers;
  • Draconium Brainwave Amplifier Icon Draconium Brainwave Amplifier and Khaz'gorite Brainwave Amplifier Icon Khaz'gorite Brainwave Amplifier, made by Engineers;
  • Draconium Encased Samophlange Icon Draconium Encased Samophlange and Khaz'gorite Encased Samophlange Icon Khaz'gorite Encased Samophlange, made by Engineers.
Profession Gear

As shown in the image above, quality is a big factor in the stats you can get from the gear. Green versions are bind on equip and from trainer recipes, but blue versions require faction / renown grinding for their recipe and are bind on pickup, requiring you to submit a Crafting Order for them.

Also, remember to enchant your primary tool with Enchant Tool - Draconic Inspiration Icon Enchant Tool - Draconic Inspiration or Enchant Tool - Draconic Resourcefulness Icon Enchant Tool - Draconic Resourcefulness.

7.

Crafting Orders

Speaking of crafting orders, all you need to do create one is to go to the NPC responsible for them in the capital city and open the auction-house like interface. Type a part of the name of the item you are looking to get crafted in the search box and pick the exact item from the list that shows up, resulting in the following interface:

Crafting Orders Sender PoV

Here you can pick between a Public Order, which requires you to supply all materials but should result in a very fast craft (as long as the gold Commission for the crafter is decent enough) as the whole server will be able to do your order, or a Personal Order, which requires you to specify a character that will then receive this order in their profession crafting log:

Crafting Orders Receiver PoV

In public orders you cannot specify the quality of the crafted item. This means that, no matter your commission, there is a very high probability that an unskilled crafter will pick up the order and produce a low quality item, as that will still grant skill points without requiring materials from the crafter, making it useful even at a 1s commission.

Private orders do allow you to specify a minimum quality for the item, and you can always send them to your own alts or trusted players, who will then be able to contribute some, or even all of the crafting materials required themselves. This should be the favored method for anything but the most basic of crafts, but absolutely make sure to talk to the crafter first and / or put in a very large commission, as otherwise you are likely to have your order ignored, rather than finished.

7.1.

Recrafting

All professions which craft gear can perform Recrafting, which takes an existing item and crafts it all over again in the hopes of a higher quality result, using a fraction of the original materials:

Recrafting UI

Recrafting's purpose is to allow you to craft gear upgrades as soon as you can, with the knowledge that you can upgrade the item for much cheaper later. Take note that, if you use low quality materials to craft the original item, future recrafts of the item will not gain as much quality from having maximum quality materials used in the recrafting as would be expected!

While the exact math behind it is not well understood yet, you can think of it as having the recraft use all previously used materials instead of only the newly submitted materials.

You can also use the work order system to submit a recrafting request, allowing you to recraft items you do not have the profession to make:

Recrafting Work Order UI
8.

Zapthrottle Soul Inhaler and Empty Soul Cages

Engineers can create the Zapthrottle Soul Inhaler Icon Zapthrottle Soul Inhaler, which is used alongside Jewelcrafting's Empty Soul Cage Icon Empty Soul Cages to capture the soul of powerful Elementals. These souls are used in some rare powerful crafts, such as the Jewelcrafting trinkets (Idol of the Dreamer Icon Idol of the Dreamer).

Zapthrottle Soul Inhaler
9.

Best Engineering Specializations and Talents in Dragonflight

Engineering Specializations UI

Engineering Specializations are divided into four disciplines, each with multiple sub-specializations within which can be unlocked as you put points into their pre-requisite disciplines, akin to talent trees.

The best specialization for you depends on what your goals are: do you want to be an explosive master who can also teleport around at will, an efficient part producer for yourself and other Engineers, to mass-produce explosives that anyone can use efficiently, to focus on end game armor or guns, or to create profession tools, optional reagents, and ammunition efficiently? We will give suggestions on how to accomplish each of these goals below.

Certain specializations, such as Function Over Form's Gears for Gear sub-specialization activate a discovery system where crafting Greased-Up Gears Icon Greased-Up Gears gains a chance to teach you how to craft Cogwheel optional reagents:

Cogwheel Discoveries
9.1.

Best Engineering Talents for Raiding and Mythic+

  1. 10 points into Mechanical Mind for pathing;
  2. 30 points into Novelties to gain control over where Wyrmhole Generator Icon Wyrmhole Generator teleports you;
  3. 30 points into Mechanical Mind for 50% reduced cooldown on Wyrmhole Generator Icon Wyrmhole Generator, pathing, and S.A.V.I.O.R. Icon S.A.V.I.O.R.;
  4. 35 points into Inventions for reduced tinker malfunction rate and extra skill for tinker crafts.

Bombs have their own shared 5-minute cooldown, separate from Combat Potions, but unfortunately do not work inside instances, thus we will be focusing on tinker malfunction improvements and ways to teleport around faster with Wyrmhole Generator Icon Wyrmhole Generator.

While not directly helpful inside instances, Wyrmhole Generator Icon Wyrmhole Generator helps with quickly getting around the Dragon Isles and making your WoW gameplay more efficient, and S.A.V.I.O.R. Icon S.A.V.I.O.R. helps with wipe recovery.

9.2.

Best Engineering Talents for Part Mass-Production

  1. 5 points into Optimized Efficiency for pathing;
  2. 30 points into Pieces Parts for added efficiency when creating parts and occasional free Rousing elements;
  3. 10 points into Optimized Efficiency for further pathing;
  4. 40 points into Generalist for added efficiency when creating parts;
  5. 25 points into Optimized Efficiency for added efficiency.

There are many types of Engineering parts requiring many different reagents, which makes creating them yourself quite a pain. Thus, by specializing yourself into part-crafting you can potentially save (or make) a lot of gold by mass-crafting and selling the parts required for the other Engineering crafts.

9.3.

Best Engineering Talents for Bombs and Explosives Mass-Production

  1. 5 points into Explosives for pathing;
  2. 30 points into Short Fuse for added efficiency when crafting Engineering bombs;
  3. 10 points into Explosives for further pathing;
  4. 20 points into Creation for added efficiency when crafting Engineering bombs;
  5. 5 points into Optimized Efficiency for pathing;
  6. 40 points into Generalist for added efficiency when creating Engineering bombs;
  7. 15 points into Explosives for further pathing;
  8. Learn EZ-Thro (no knowledge point investment required) to start learning its recipes;
  9. 5 points into Creation to enable occasional creation of EZ-Thro explosives when crafting regular ones.

Primal Deconstruction Charge Icon Primal Deconstruction Charge and EZ-Thro Primal Deconstruction Charge Icon EZ-Thro Primal Deconstruction Charge for non-Engineers are fun devices to use in world content.

While non-Engineers can use EZ-Thro Primal Deconstruction Charge Icon EZ-Thro Primal Deconstruction Charge, these are not cheap due to requiring Assorted Safety Fuses Icon Assorted Safety Fuses on top of the regular bomb materials, thus it is questionable whether there will be much of a market for these types of bombs. It is still good from a gold-making perspective to get at least one point into EZ-Thro because it enables you to get free EZ-Thro bombs from the 25-pointer of Creation.

9.4.

Best Engineering Talents for Gear and Profession Tool Crafting

  1. 5 points into Function Over Form for pathing;
  2. 5 points into Gear to enable the discovery of Bracer recipes and added skill;
  3. 10 points into Function Over Form for further pathing;
  4. 30 points into Gears for Gear to enable the discovery of Safety Components and to enable the use of Cogwheels;
  5. 25 points into Function Over Form for added efficiency when crafting;
  6. 30 points into Gear to enable the use of optional reagents with Gun crafts;
  7. 40 points into Optimized Efficiency for added skill and Inspiration benefits.

While typically neglected, Engineering gear is actually likely to be meta this time around because of its unique Tinker Sockets, which do not count towards the 2 Embellished item limit, thus being free perks which include a straightforward damage gain in Tinker: Breath of Neltharion Icon Tinker: Breath of Neltharion. Unfortunately the crafted Head pieces require Engineering to be worn, but the Bracers can be used by everyone!

Tinkers can be safely extracted from items with the Tinker Removal Kit Icon Tinker Removal Kit, which makes them a one-time purchase and generally low selling potential over time. All tinkers have a chance to malfunction, potentially critically, but you can apply Safety Components such as Calibrated Safety Switch Icon Calibrated Safety Switch and Critical Failure Prevention Unit Icon Critical Failure Prevention Unit during the crafting of the gear item to minimize such risks.

9.5.

Best Engineering Talents for Ammunition Crafting

  1. 5 points into Function Over Form for pathing;
  2. 30 points into Utility to unlock Ammunition and Scope recipes;
  3. 35 points into Function Over Form for added crafting efficiency;
  4. 5 points into Optimized Efficiency for pathing;
  5. 40 points into Generalist for added efficiency when creating parts;
  6. 35 points into Optimized Efficiency for added crafting efficiency.

Hunters are the only class that can use the Ammunition items Completely Safe Rockets Icon Completely Safe Rockets (AoE) and Endless Stack of Needles Icon Endless Stack of Needles (ST), serving the role of temporary weapon enchants for Hunters like sharpening stones for melee and Fauna runes for casters.

Scopes are Hunter's specific enchants for ranged weapons. By taking this path you will be able to craft these types of items very efficiently, but your market is Hunter players only.

10.

Making Gold with Engineering in Dragonflight

From a gold-making perspective, Engineering should allow you to convert cheap ore and other materials into expensive Gear, Bombs, Parts, Scopes and Ammunition.

For bind on pickup gear, making gold with Crafting Orders is very dependent on your server, how many (and how generous) clients you can get for your wares, and on timing the public Crafting Order market. Theoretically the best gold from orders should be found in the middle-to-late part of the week as many crafters will have exhausted their weekly public crafting order quota already but the panic to use what is left of the quota before the weekly reset has not set in yet, either.

Doing orders just before popular raid hours could also be a great goldmaking opportunity, as slackers will want to get their shiny new gear crafted quickly at any cost and thus increase their commission to ensure speed in completion.

For bombs, parts, scopes, and ammunition most of your profits will come from timing the market in two steps:

  1. Figure out your server's raid days. Wednesday, Sunday, and Tuesday are the typical candidates. On these days it will be easier to sell commodities for higher prices. To make sure, track the worth of your crafts over time in your server with The Oribos Exchange website, and sell during high price periods.
  2. Before leaving the website, search for the materials used in the crafts. Take note of when they are cheapest, and aim to buy during these periods.

Although it sounds simple, most players do not have the patience or knowledge to take advantage of timing the market, and doing so correctly is where your profit will come from in the long term. Buying materials to craft and selling the crafts randomly could actually lead to losing money if you buy high and sell low, so take a little bit of time to understand the market before you dive in!

11.

Changelog

  • 04 Sep. 2022: Reviewed for Patch 10.1.7.
  • 15 Dec. 2022: Clarified that bombs do not work inside Dragonflight instances.
  • 27 Nov. 2022: Updated for Dragonflight.
  • 17 Feb. 2022: Updated for Patch 9.2.
  • 26 Jun. 2021: Updated for Patch 9.1.
  • 09 Mar. 2021: Removed journal mention.
  • 01 Jan. 2020: Added information on the Engineering Battle Resurrection item, leveling tools and more gold making strategies based on live testing.
  • 30 Nov. 2020: Added a small clip showcasing the usefulness of the Wormhole Generator.
  • 28 Nov. 2020: Added a note on how Engineering is one of the few professions that can make a lot of gold with old world content.
  • 25 Nov. 2020: Guide added.
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