The Spirit Realm

So I'm almost at the magical 70 and I have a couple questions. Last night I replaced my belt with Druzzil's Distance for one with Spell Haste V and I'm not sure I made the right choice. My old belt is in a bag in my magelo if you care to see. This leads me to ask:

1. What focus effects are must haves, what ones are desirable, and what ones aren't worth even bothering with?

2. Are DoN crystals my best bet in getting these? I am in a very small guild who are basically just a bunch of friends, I play very odd hours becasue of my job, and have only about 50K to spend on upgrades.

3. I'm thinking about replacing my weaker wrist slot with the Dawn Forged once I ding. Any suggestions for my next piece?

4. How far in to level 70 should I go as a safety buffer before I change to 100% AA exp?

Thank you guys

Took a shot at 2 of the questions!

1. What focus effects are must haves, what ones are desirable, and what ones aren't worth even bothering with?

Must haves:

Mana preservation
Spell haste
Heal focus

4. How far in to level 70 should I go as a safety buffer before I change to 100% AA exp?

I keep a 20% buffer. As soon as I drop to 17 or so, I switch to regular exp to get it back to 20%

I'll asnwer a couple of those questions for ya that I know i can answer form personal experience.

I have almost all the V foci stuff whether it be from drops or via DoN crystals (check my magelo if ya like) I'm still missing a few and ahhave taken a break from the Gather Crystals grind in favor of playing the confused hydra who likes to insult himself in /guild with 3 to 5 different characters (makes for some great fun when new members to the guild don't check the guild management tool to see who is a main or an alt )

For myself once i was at least 50% into lvl 70 I set my aa to the setting just before 100% (think its 80%) this way if I die and I wind up eating a death then i'll not have to worry aobut not regaining the xp in short order (with the year 1 Vet aa this is an immense help in that regards especially in places like RSS or the Nest) However most peeps tend to go the 20% route then go 100% aa. I chose my method cause I made the mistake of setting my aa to 100% the day before level caps were raised to 70 and died like 40 billion times and had no one avaialbe to rezz me and wound up being 90% away from lvl 66 the day that cap was raised (then again I was being stupi d and tried soloing a couple of zones that should have been great for me for xp)

In regards to what you want for "Must Have" Foci as the top choices I'm sure some will agree with me its all based on your play style and what you are emphasizing on do you solo a lot, are you trying to focus on yer healing ability. Basically its all "Taster's Choice" in what you are looking to improve on. I would most definately recommend the extended range , extended ehnhance (For yer buffs), and Spell Haste and any mana saving foci that you can get yer hands on (I forget what that particular Focus is called)

DoN is a good way to go if yer not in an all out raiding guild. The Gods know that my guild is one of the most casual guilds on the Saryrn server and most of the raiding we see lately is the pick up raids we happen to catch on the flags channel introduced when the good peeps from Mith Marr merged with us (Thanks guys I couldn't have gotten fully Ep flagged sooner hated being flagged for every ep zone except for Fire)

As for equipment I'm pretty dumb when it comes to stuff like that I tend to concentrate on stuff that will gain me more hp/mana/wis with better AC than what I currently wear. I'll let the gear savvi peeps answer that for ya

I priortize my foci as such

1. Mana Preservation
2. Buff Extension
2b. Heal Foci
3. Extended Range
4. Debuff Extension
5. Spell Haste
6. Dot Damage
7. Nuke damage

I have different foci for different types of mana pres, (30% dot mana pres ear, Bloodlink for the all around etc,) but really, just a good all around is good enough for it. I generally try and get generic foci over specific ones unless the specifics (i.e. ice foci) are significantly (10% or better) better than the generic ones, and usually they aren't.

For the most part, the DoN foci will do you just fine, get a few foci from MPG trials and the like and you will be decked out pretty well, then if you take up raiding, fill in the blanks.

I use to worry alot about focus effects but not so much anymore.

By far the most important focus effect to me is improved healing.
Second is spell haste. I am currently trying to find a decent item for that.
Third is extented buff. Mainly because I am lazy, but really only useful for champion IMO. I also lack this focus atm.
Next is dot damage. I have excelent poison and magic damage foci and love em.
Last would be a mana preservation.

But I love the speciality focus of the GoD bp - slow duration extention.

As far as leveling into 70. I got to 70 two days after oow came out. Since then I left my aaxp at 90%. Two weeks ago I filled the xp bar.