I have a personal guild for my Banker Alt that sports a Guild Tabard that proudly recalls the gold earned by selling cookies for the You'll Feel Right as Rain achievement. It's a cute, happy cookie! What could possibly go wrong?
Aldonza was not afraid in the kitchen
Well, do you know what happens when you change your bank alt to a Worgen that crouches over, obscuring part of the Guild Symbol?
How dirty is your mind?
Gee. What craft makes those? Maybe there's a market for that...
My renewed enjoyment with Kallixta led me to review what I might enjoy doing with some of my alts. In particular, Aldonza, the Coward, had managed to get to Draenor and build a Garrison, but I wasn't enjoying PvE content as a mage. I'm not sure why, but I did know I enjoyed leveling her using alternate means, especially Pet Battles. Therefore I made certain she ran through the Pandaren Trainer dailies and at least Ashlei. Following this path, she dinged 94 this weekend and has her garrison at level 2 and is careful to work on her profession cool downs. I expect to add other Draenor Pet Tamers as soon as she can get her courage going.
Between reviewing my pet collection and questioning why my Mage wasn't more fun, I considered poor Kallifornia, my neglected shaman. I had carried her into Pandaria as a low level, battling wild pets in the western part of the Valley of Four Winds. She's managed a few levels and does things like leveling up the lowest level pets so they won't be one-shot when being carried in a trainer battle. I really think I'd enjoy taking her back into PvE exploration. In preparation, I freshened her heirlooms.
This spoiled her old Bronze Fenclaw transmog. She has sat so long, it's strange to see her in anything else. I absolutely need to change her shirt.
If the only K-pop you've ever seen has been synchronized dancing, you have never seen a "Dramatized" Music Video. Here the boy band Super Junior put together one that I think folks might enjoy.
The stars aligned and I had nothing prevent me from joining the planned OLRG run on Saturday. I think the last time I was in ANY dungeon or raid was when OLRG got me to join a Molten Core during the Anniversary and earning a Crown of Desolation.
To start, I discovered I didn't have a quick method of travel to the Caverns of Time. Without quick access to Dalaran, I might have been faster to port to Ironforge and sail to Theramore!
Setting up on Mumble was easy for me. I just asked my new son-in-law for help. Five minutes later, I was GTG. I'm not sure what he uses as a serious StarCraft player, but he had a spare microphone for me.
The computer location is not optimal for a raid. It's in the family room and next to the kitchen, which is great when all I'm doing is Pet Battles or Dailies or whatever, but in future there are better locations in the house that would be less disturbing for me and for my family.
It was great to talk to Matty and Helke. I'm sorry Tome was silenced. In retrospect, I'm surprised our conversations didn't have more digressions.
As far as raiding, Dragon Soul was easy until he got to the Spine. At that point, nothing we did seemed to work. I think we've all revisited strategy guides since and should be better informed next time, but as it was, we spent too much time on it.
I did manage a selfie while there! I know someone wanted to try the PhotoBomb toy, but I don't think we coordinated properly. I was aiming to include the others in this snapshot!
I was happy to continue with Matty after Tome and Helke ran out of time. We decided to do Firelands. I say "we", but I had very little opinion. Matty could have talked me into anything. At least with Firelands, I'd been inside before. Our only problems came from things like staying "In Combat" after a boss went down. It mostly was a problem because we couldn't mount up for a time. The only things I'm short on for the Glory of the Firelands Raider now are "Bucket List" and "Only the Penitent". Both of these are a pain and our purpose was fun instead. And we had a good time.
All of this activity made me feel more welcome than I had in ages, more so than the WoD activities in my guild. I had "Come Back Home".
In general on runs like these, I only bother to pick up loot no one else wants. I ended up with one Tier 13 Plate item from Dragon Soul and another Tier 12 Plate piece while in Firelands.
I thought my Guildies had be encouraging when we split up loot, but when Spaulders of Recurring Flame dropped, things went in a new direction. It's not like I avoided Transmog nor do I dislike it. Instead I was starting from a single piece that unexpectedly dropped. It has a really cool animation. It deserved solid treatment.
Now "I gotta Do what I gotta do". So I spent almost all my time on Sunday researching the Molten Giant Lookalike set. I loaded more Addons with better see what I already owned in my Banks and Void Storage. I then needed to change my default ground and flying mounts to match my new outfit, choosing the Black Drake and the Fossilised Raptor for now.
I'm using a Trident with good animation, but I'm not thrilled with it. I also am not happy with my navel showing. Did y'all know the Scarlet Filigree Shirt, while the correct color, is too short? Thankfully with my cloak, there's no chance of showing the T-back of a thong. That'd just be embarrassing to all.
The music stuck in my head today is the Korean group 2NE1 and their song "Come Back Home". Instead of the usual M/V of this song, I'm linking their Unplugged version.
While the rest of my family love 2NE1, I'm not thrilled with most of their stuff, but if you want the English translation (using the "plugged" music)
Even while showing my old Dalaran Transmog yesterday, I had been working on a new outfit. I had tried out different outfits, but nothing attracted me as much as the simple wizard robes style. And then my Guild Mistress asked for help doing some Classic Dungeons for Guild Achievements.
That's how I rediscovered Robe of the Moccasin and Anacondra's Robe, both found in Wailing Caverns and both simple recolors of my purple Lesser Wizard's Robe. That led me to the various Apothecary's Regalia and its recolors. The Black and Purple is much too Warlocky for my tastes, but I like the teals in the blue outfit. I haven't bothered with a different belt. My current cloak works while my weapon is a fine match.
The headband underscored how little I cared for long blone hair. I'm sorry, but I've never liked blonde. I have no idea how Aldonza ended up blond anyway, but I wasn't about to have a radical change. Simple greying works fine for me and a shorter style just looked better to me.
Aldonza took a deep breath as she dropped the gray outfit back into the clothes chest. She shifted uncomfortably and twitched the colorful robe about her hips again. She needed another breath before resolutely striding out into public, wearing her new outfit. It was more colorful than anything she'd worn before, but after her excitement with unearthing the scrap of cloth and the subsequent efforts to craft her new robes. The robe wasn't the only recent change. Her new cowl and shoulders were provided by her tailoring friends. Between those three items, the rest of her clothes wouldn't be noticed.
Now it was time to start a new adventure and maybe the wardrobe change would boost her confidence.
Honestly, I was writing this before Kamalia posted about making a Brightly Coloured Transmog for Noblegarden. I was even writing this before Navimie was trying to find an outfit to match her Direhorn.
Aldonza dinged level 82 a while back and was shopping for deals with Brassbolt Mechawrench and the Auction House in Dalaran when she happened to notice a Sodden Cloth Hat posted for less than the vendor price. Aldonza has long enjoyed grabbing these items and quickly selling to an adjacent vendor for the quick profit. However, this item had Aldonza delaying before selling. She could realize the profit whenever she wanted, so there was no hurry. And something about a gray item that required level 82 was intriguing.
Then she had the idea of building an outfit to match. She couldn't transmog her helm with it, but not being an adventuring, she's worn gray items before. So Aldonza has spent a little time glancing at various gray outfits before making a decision. By the Power of Gray(skull)
Most people wouldn't notice that last item, but think about Aldonza's history as a coward...
Her experience with torturing critters has allowed her to discover her contempt for things that can't hurt her. So a few weeks ago Aldonza followed in Kallixta's footsteps (and carefully drawn map and detailed instructions) into the Depths of Blackrock Mountain. Her primary goal was actually to craft a Smoking Heart of the Mountain to celebrate her completion of Enchanting and Working for a Living. Aldonza also has More Skills to Pay the Bills. Archeaology provided her with the means to accelerate her leveling without risk, earning level 84 last week!
So now she can wear her colourless outfit to match any Direhorn or World Event! One more level and Aldonza can visit Pandaria!
I knew it would happen. I'd fiddle with my Pink Transmog and not update my results. I was pleased with her outfit and have been wearing it all over Azeroth, but because my screenshots are on one machine while I blog on another... You're only getting to see it now!
Hm, can't see the Cape or Shoulders in this picture.
Sages of Tabasco is Aldonza's personal guild, so I changed her tabard to pink! At first it was because I had so little pink otherwise, but I'm planning on keeping it far beyond Breast Cancer Awareness month.
Something interesting about this outfit. There's only TWO TRANSMOGs! The only things mogged are the hat and cape. EVERYTHING else Aldonza wears undisguisedly every day. (Undisguisedly?)
I debated finding something better for things like the belt and shoes, but concluded they went well enough. Feel free to point me to something better. I wasn't a fan of the skulls on her heirloom shoulders, but their colour seems to go, doesn't it?
The shoulders show now!
Sometime after starting this outfit, I noticed the Fishing Pole actually went well with my outfit. I realised since Aldonza was a coward that didn't need a better weapon, she could merge her fishing outfit and heirlooms into a single outfit. See the tiny details on the pole?
Jeweled Fishing Pole is Jeweled!
Before, I would have a fishing outfit that I'd switch to instead of my heirlooms (that allow her to squeek out a few extra XP.) With this change, all she's giving up is the hat's fishing bonus, but she's continuing with the fashion statement. The gloves and pole continue to provided bonuses, but were not originally chosen to match pink. The gloves with their open fingers were originally chosen for the fishingwomen's look, but they provide the casual touch now and I like their look. Maybe I should switch to brown?
Yes, that was Arille in Dalaran in that close up above. Aldonza is now doing the cooking dailies in Dalaran! Her recent increase in XP shall be the topic of another post.
As others can attest, there is a small pool of pink available. Aldonza has the luxury of being able to wear white and grey items, since fishing and cooking don't actually matter. She got her friend Martuska, the tailor, to send her a pink shirt, but after that, things got non-pink. She decided that alone was better than nothing and ran around with that for a day.
Eventually Aldonza decided that her Darkmist Cape was a bit pink. Being the Guildmaster of her Banking Guild (Sages of Tabasco!) she'll change the colors for the month, but here is her current outfit:
