The Lowdown on Professions in World of Warcraft

Professions are crafting skills, used to create various items, which are able to be used by player characters. Sometimes referred to as tradeskills, they are done a variety of different ways in different games, but tend to follow a few guidelines. You learn different recipes from trainers, or from recipes dropped by monsters. You then collect the supplies needed, and combine them using the correct tools. Some of these supplies and tools can be bought from merchants, found as treasure from monsters and chests, or collected from natural resources.

World of Warcraft follows these guidelines, in regards to professions. There are thirteen professions. In Everquest 2 and Everquest, professions are called "tradeskills", although they serve the same purpose. Three of these professions, everyone can learn (First Aid, Fishing, and Cooking). Of the other ten you may choose only two. Three of these are called "gathering skills", because although they take up one of the two available profession slots, you do very little actual crafting. Instead, you gain the ability to get supplies from the natural resources scattered around the world.

Warcraft's three gathering skills are Mining, Herbalism, and Skinning. Skinning gives you the ability to get the skin off of dead animals, which can be used for many types of armor. Mining helps you find and mine ore and gems from the various metal veins around the world, with rarer and more valuable types of metal being found in higher level areas. Herbalism lets you find and pick the many types of plants and herbs, for potions and enchantments.

After the gathering skills, World of Warcraft has seven crafting skills. These are Leatherworking, Blacksmithing, Tailoring, Enchanting, Alchemy, Engineering, and the new Jewelcrafting.

Leatherworking uses the leather from Skinners to create leather armor and items to increase the armor rating of your armor. Blacksmithing uses metal and gems from Miners to create plate and chain armor, weapons of all types, and various other tools, such as skeleton keys. Tailors use cloth from humanoid monsters to create robes, shirts, bags, and bandages to assist healing. Enchanting uses magic components, gained from "disenchanting" magic armor, which destroys the armor and turns it into magic dusts, essences, and magical shards. They use this to imbue armor and weapons with many different effects, such as increasing abilities and giving special attacks to your weapons.

Alchemists use the herbs from Herbalists to make a great variety of potions, which have many effects, such as healing, increasing stats, and giving special abilities to the imbiber. These effects are temporary, compared to the permanent effects of Enchanting, but tend to be more powerful. Engineers use metal, gems, and leather to create a multitude of different devices, which can do anything from turning you invisible, mind controlling your opponent, creating mechanical pets, or blowing up. Sometimes, whether or not that was your intention, the devices will blow up anyway. Jewelcrafting, a new profession from the Burning Crusade expansion, uses metal and gems to create powerful rings, necklaces, totems, and other jewelry.

All these professions are useful to several classes, so whether you're an Undead Mage, a Dwarf Warrior, or a Human Rogue, World of Warcraft has provided at least one profession that is of use to you, whether it supplies you with good armor, devices and potions to assist battle, or tradable items to help you make money. All it takes is a little bit of experimentation to find your trade.