New SHam On Blue Gear Help?

[loramin]

Honestly I kind of disagree with all the responses to the OP. EQ has a (general) rule:

level up, then earn plat > earn plat, then level up

This rule is especially true for Shaman, who don't really need gear at low levels ... and I say this as a 56 Barbarian Shaman who used only looted gear until my late 20's (when I was given some gear; I didn't spend a copper until much later).

The difference between wearing cheap armor you looted off gnolls in BB (or wherever) and the best armor you can afford after spending hours earning/saving plat at low levels is almost not noticeable. On top of that, at low levels a shaman "root/rots", ie. you DoT the monster, root it, and wait for it to die. When you barely ever get hit (ie. only when the mob breaks root) that difference really is meaningless. Similarly, for Shaman weapon damage is so small (relative to DoT/pet damage) that the difference in damage between the best weapon you could possibly afford and a simple club that you loot off a BB gnoll will be very small.

However, it will take you awhile to run over to EC, hang out until someone selling banded appears, buy it, and run back. And if you find out you don't have enough plat, and start spending time killing spiders, skeletons, and other newbie cash critters that's going to eat up more time. If you spend all that time on leveling instead you'll get to higher levels much faster. Then, when you reach your 30s (or better yet 40s) you can finally start thinking about buying gear. You'll have all the plat you've saved up until that point, and you'll be able to kill monsters (eg. Hill Giants) that drop MUCH MUCH more plat than anything you could have killed in your teens or 20s.

At the end of the day, if you don't worry about gear now, spend all your time leveling, an then earn plat/buy gear in your 30s/40s, you will have better gear and be higher level than the guy who wastes time trying to make money and buy gear early on.

P.S. Of course, everyone should do what's fun and play however they want ... I'm just arguing that the more efficient route is to level without buying gear.