Okay, I haven't been able to play Iron Banner in ages, so I'm a bit behind on the bounty strategy these days. They apply the "Tempered" buff automatically, right? (I know there isn't an actual buff on the character, but the rep rewards scale up over the course of the week, IIRC). And there are now two types of IB bounties - green (daily) and bronze (weekly).

Therefore, should I hold off "turning-in" the bronze-colored bounties until later in the week for maximum points? Or do those not scale with the new Tempered buff?

Hope to get some clarification. The system isn't very transparent anymore.

Edit: Also, how do we get the Iron Banner class items now? Are they only from random drops? Do they still stack with the Shader and Emblem to grant extra rep gains?

I got my class item as a drop last time, but saladin was selling them.

I turned my weekly bounties in, plus 2 more on Saturday last time and jumped from rank 2.75 to rank 4.5. I'm pretty sure they give you rep based on when you turn them in, but my evidence is anecdotal.

Hold the weeklies till the end of the week for max bonus.

Unfortunately you'll have to get lucky with the class item this month. It was for sale last month and I sharded mine thinking I could get another. (Not sure why I did). I'm pretty sure you still get the bonus from equipping all the IB stuff.

Keep in mind that the random drops you get are partially determined by your IB rank. So cashing your weekly bounties near the end of the week will get you more XP, but it means you spend most of the week playing at a lower rank, therefore you're excluding yourself from better drops.

It depends on what your goal is. If you want to reach rank 5 with as little playtime as possible, cash the weeklies in late. If you plan on playing regularly throughout the week, cash them in earlier so you spend more time playing through ranks 3-5 to get a better chance at decent drops.

It scales, but the sooner you get to a rank, the more drops you can get ( by getting play more often at a higher rank). Plus with the 2nd character buff, it doesn't hurt to get one character up as quickly as you can.

I think the sweet spot is hitting rank 3 then playing for drops/fun the rest of the week.