Calculating Item Average

[mortnoct]

What makes the calculation of the average Item Level difficult? I have BonusScanner and GearScore, which give different averages, and both differ from the average provided by WoW itself.

The value from WoW is the highest.

[Werderx]

It's because the math and numbers behind GearScore is different from a piece of gear's item level. I am also baffled as to why Gearscore didn't initially use the itemlevel that was already in-game. /shrug

What the in-game Average Item Level feature does, is takes all of the items that you have access to (meaning what you are wearing and what is in your bags) and averages the highest item level you have for each slot.

That being said, in my guild/server, we refer to that feature as "Bag Score" instead of the gear score since it averages what is in your bags. What people do is keep items in their bags that aren't for their spec but have a larger item level. This boosts their gear score, and makes it to where they can enter dungeons before their gear is really up to par.

Note that the gear in your bags has to be equipable.

On another note, there is an addon that uses the average item level and takes into account if their gemming/enchanting is fit for their spec. It's called Elitist Group. I used this back in Wrath, but haven't tried it since Cata so i'm not sure if it still works.

Hope this helps.

[mortnoct]

GearScore is, in my opinion, goofy in what you say it does. I do have a lot of stuff in my bags and in the bank, a lot of it because I'm lazy and over cautious about some things in the game. I will try going through everything and pitching or selling what I will never use and see if that changes anything.

Thanks for your time!

[chaos5061]

The item level is also caculated from your bank also. That is the number that the Random Dungeon Finder uses to find Dungeons for your item level.