How to get tier 0.5 items

Stratics has a nice report from some player on the Test Realm on how the quests for getting the tier 0.5 items will work. The first part is pretty standard, you do some quests, farm some quest drop items, hand in some cash and looted/crafted items and you get your tier 0.5 bracers first, then the belt and the gloves.

Next step involves going to Stratholme in a 5-man group and killing the Baron in less than 45 minutes.

I think that is the step at which the majority of people will get stuck. My last Stratholme raid took 90 minutes to the Baron, with 10 players. Even if they remove half of the trash mobs on the way, I don't see how you could do it in under 45 minutes. Except of course if you have a top-notch team in epic gear, but then why would you want to go questing for tier 0.5 items?

Fortunately both Raslebol and Kyroc have the tier 0 bracers and belt (Valor and Devout), so I can do at least the first part. I think the general idea of Blizzard is that people will have to go several times in a 5-man group to Stratholme to find their tier 0 items, so by the time they need to do the 45-minutes Baron run, they are well trained in handling the place. But still I think 45 minutes is extremely challenging, many people on the test realms say that it is impossible to do. And I generally dislike quests with a time limit, I'd rather do things methodically than rush them. The tier 0.5 quests being a series, you can't even skip that part, if you don't succeed in the timed run you won't be able to get more than 3 tier 0.5 items. If you have all 8 tier 0 items, you even need to consider that you could end up with two half sets, thus much diminished set bonuses.

Basically the tier 0.5 quest series addresses only half of the problem. It was advertised as being for the casual player, who doesn't have the time to spend 4+ hours in a row in Molten Core. Doing Stratholme in 45 minutes is good for players with little time, provided they have hardcore skills and organization. For a casual player in a pickup group that is way too hard.