Which weapons each class can use

Every weapon, by class

16 kinds of weapon, and which of the nine classes may ever hold one. This is read from the game's own skill table rather than from a class description, which matters at the edges: a mage can hold a one-handed sword and a priest cannot, and both of those surprise people.

The Warrior can use 15 of them and the Warlock just 5. A weapon your class cannot use is not merely bad — it cannot be equipped at all, so the item is dead weight in the bag whatever its stats say.

Two more skills sit in the same category and are not weapons. Defense is the mitigation skill every class carries, and Dual Wield is permission rather than a weapon — in Classic only three classes have it, which is why an enhancement shaman holding two axes is a Burning Crusade memory and not a vanilla one.

Armour, and the jump at 40

Armour works the same way: a class can wear a type or it cannot. The row that needs a footnote is the one every class guide gets wrong by stating a single answer.

Two of these are not available from level 1. Mail is taught at level 40 and Plate at level 40, by a class trainer, for nothing. So a warrior wears mail until 40 and plate after; a hunter and a shaman wear leather until 40 and mail after. “Plate” as a flat answer for a warrior is wrong for the first thirty-nine levels of the class.

Read from the trainer table's own required level, which is why it can be stated as a number rather than as a recollection.

What you start with

A new character knows some of its weapons already and has to be taught the rest. This is the list from character creation — everything else in your class's row above costs a trip to a weapon master.

Where the weapon masters stand

8 NPCs teach weapon skills, and between them they cover everything a class is allowed to hold. Each teaches a fixed set for a few silver, so adding a weapon is a short errand rather than a cost — the difficulty is only ever knowing which city has yours. Coordinates come from the 1.12 spawn table.

One skill has a level requirement, and it is also the dearest: Polearms at level 20 for 1g, against 10s for everything else.

The rest of the basics

• Elite, rare, rare elite and bossWhat the dragon around a mob's portrait means, and how much harder each rank actually is.
• Creature typesThe ten types a creature can be, what can be tamed or skinned, and which spells only work on one of them.
• Schools of magic, and resistanceThe six schools plus physical, what resistance does to a spell, and which creatures are immune.
• Attributes, and what a point is worthStrength, Agility, Stamina, Intellect and Spirit, with the per-class numbers the server itself uses.