Gearing for the battlegrounds at 80

With 3.5 levels to go before I hit 80, I figured it was time to start looking at options for world and battleground PVP. Unlike the previous expansion, where you could buy the basic blue resilience set from various factions upon hitting 70, there are, as far as I have been able to tell, no faction-sold PVP sets for 80. So where do you get gear?

Well, there are a few options.

Option 1: Become an Arena Junkie
If you are into arena, then you are pretty well set — all you need for the blue Savage Gladiator set is arena points and honor, and if you manage to top a 1550 rating, you can get the mid-rate Hateful Gladiator epic set. [Note: I linked to the plate chestpiece for each set, since the links for the full sets seem to be sort of busted. Just search for "Savage Gladiator" or "Hateful Gladiator" to find the appropriate set pieces for your class.]

According to WoWHead, the blue set will also be available with Emblems of Heroism, gained from heroic 5-mans and 10-man raids; you can purchase the purple set with Emblems of Valor, gained from 25-man raids. That's all I know about arena gear, though, since I really don't intend to do it.

Option 2: That PVE Thing
As mentioned above, you can earn Emblems of Heroism and Emblems of Valor from completing PVE objectives, and use these to purchase arena gear. Why you would do that rather than purchase PVE gear, I don't know, at least right now. I could see this happening later when you are overgeared for everything and have 82 of the things, but now? That's kind of shafting your guild, if you are all working on the content, but you're not working on gearing for it. Unless you are just PUGing heroics to get them, but why would you do that to yourself?

Anyway, this is not the only way to get geared. See, in very general and oversimplified terms, PVP gear is itemized around survival first and burst damage output second, whereas PVE gear is itemized more around doing continuous damage/mana regen and efficiency/lasting power/etc. (Or so it seems to me, based on the stats for comparable pieces of both.)

If you were really dead-set against arena and enjoy that PVE thing, you could probably build a "glass cannon" PVP set around PVE gear. Use PVE gear, gem and enchant with resilience in mind, or supplement with the off-set pieces (which can be purchased with honor points; cannot find if they require an arena rating to purchase, but I'm pretty sure at least the blues will not). Basically, try to mitigate the loss of stamina and resilience with a significant increase in MQoSDPS, ranged or otherwise, or lots of healing power and staying power. (If you're a good healer and you're not in a battleground with a bunch of schmucks, the only way you're going to die is if you get zerged or some sneaky warlock DoTs the crap out of you before anyone can figure out where they are, and you'd probably die anyway in that case, after you've finished the battleground returned to Dalaran, and wandered off to fish in the sewers or something.)

If you do this, of course, be sure you aren't gimping yourself in PVE — that's unfair to the groups you run with. Use off-set pieces, pieces for slots you've upgraded, vendor gear, etc.

Option 3: Wintergrasp PVP and that Wintergrasp PVE thing
Stone Keeper's Shards. You can get them in a couple of ways: By completing the daily quests in Wintergrasp, or as boss drops when your faction controls Wintergrasp only. Stone Keeper's Shards can be used to buy some VERY nice gear, like the Prized Beastmaster's Mantle (extra nice because it binds to the account and scales with level). Or enchants or gems like the Inscription of Dominance or Trenchant Earthshatter Diamond. Or you can just blow them on fun stuff, like the Reins of the Black War Mammoth, and then ride around Dragonblight yelling, "MAAAAAAAMMOOOOOOTTTTTHHHH!"

Ahami and Ideale will be spending quite a lot of time in Wintergrasp, I can tell.

Plus, if you do the PVE dungeon in Wintergrasp (available only when your faction controls it), the bosses drop arena gear of various levels. And the season hasn't even started yet!

Option 4: Craft Craft Revolution
Blizz included crafting recipes in the expansion that can be used to create a full set of basic arena gear. This gear is not great — in fact, if you have S4, S3, and maybe even S2, you might want to very carefully weigh which pieces you replace — which stats are you shaky on? Will a few pieces of the Stormhide set fix that?

If you had a fresh 70 who you chose to level to 80, then the set is a very good starter set, to be supplemented with gear obtained in other ways. But if you had a 70 who was already decently geared for PVP, then weigh your choices. The nice (well, sort of) part about these sets is that they don't have a set bonus, so you can replace pieces as you go without worrying about maintaining a certain number.

Certain specs of certain classes (holy paladins and enhancement shamans, for example) might be better off looking elsewhere for PVP gear.

That said, here are the sets you can get:
Blacksmithing: Blacksmithing sets seem to be taught by trainers. Blacksmiths can make the Ornate Saronite and Savage Saronite sets.
Leatherworking: Leatherworking patterns can be purchased in exchange for pieces of Heavy Borean Leather. If you have a skinner, you might offer to supply your leatherworker if they purchase the patterns for the pieces you need. Leatherworkers can make the Stormhide, Swiftarrow, Eviscerator's, and Overcast sets.
Tailoring: Like blacksmithing, the tailoring set seem to be simply taught by the trainers. Tailors can make the Frostsavage set. As far as I can tell, this is the only tailoring set available.

Are there better ways to gear up for WotLK PVP? Probably. But with avoiding arena as much as possible in mind, this is what I've come up with to gear my peeps. (Though I might give arena a go for a couple of rounds — the new arena maps and the rebalancing is supposed to have made it somewhat closer to fun. Don't really want to commit to something I don't have a schedule for and would just be half-assing, though.)