Professions are an essential part of developing your World of Warcraft character, especially once you’ve finished leveling up. While leveling up is often a new character’s first concern, once you hit level 60 (or 70 with the expansion), the choice of profession often comes back to haunt a character who didn’t think hard enough. This is because once leveling is out of the way, professions provide an excellent opportunity for gold accumulation.
The main professions are alchemy, blacksmithing, enchanting, engineering, herbalism, jewelry making, leatherworking, mining, tailoring, and skinning. Secondary professions are Cooking, First Aid, and Fishing. It is possible to choose all three secondary professions, but only two main professions can be chosen.
The best method of using your primary professions to their full potential is to pair a gathering and crafting profession that complement each other. Thus, the first profession allows the character to gather the necessary resources to exercise the secondary profession. Examples of good career matches include:
Mining and blacksmithing, which leads to a character who can stock up on quality armor and weapons.
Mining and engineering, engineers also need a type of things to make their works of art, and mining provides most of them.
Skinning and working leather, allowing for the creation of highly specialized equipment as well as more mundane leather armor.
Herbalism and Alchemy is ideal for any character class, as the potion options to create are wide and varied.
In each case, the gathering profession allows for rapid advancement from the craft-type profession. Items created by the crafting profession can be used to upgrade the character or sold for profit.