#FFW Persuasion to Pet Battle

When Mists of Pandaria was first announced, the Pet Battles feature didn’t particularly excite me. I barely remembered to summon the companion pets I already had, and I didn’t long for the pets I didn’t have enough to expend much energy in trying to acquire them. Later, as I watched my friends succumbing to Pet Battle Fever and (like Effy) observed that Pet Battles + OCD Tendencies = Bad Combination, I determined to not tumble down that rabbit hole.

Then my Furtive Father Winter 2012 donor, the lovely Kialesse, sent me an in-game mail to let me know that Real Life had crit her rather sorrowfully over the holidays. Attached to the message was a Pandaren Air Spirit.

I was awed by this generous gift. What Kia didn’t realize, though, was that she’d really given me two pets — the Pandaren Air Spirit became my 125th pet, granting me in addition the Brilliant Kaliri!

After receiving Kia’s magnificent gift, I felt like it would be a churlish response indeed to let such a treasure of a pet lie sleeping in my Pet Journal.

And so, off to the Battle Pet Trainer I went. I chose the Brilliant Kaliri as my first Battle Pet, naming it Kiamore in honor of Kialesse. As I unlocked the other two slots on my team, I brought in the Pandaren Air Spirit and my Pandaren Monk — another generous Winter Veil gift from a dear blogging friend.

I’ll spare you the blitz of newbie Pet Battle achievements, except for a couple –

– that, with alts already stationed in most of the capital cities, were a cinch to accomplish.

In the long run, I’d like to complete the Tamer achievements, so I also made sure to visit the two faction-specific tamers.

I’m not, however, going to go after the Safari achievements. I’m already feeling like my Altoholic credentials are slipping because I haven’t yet got a second character — let alone a third or a fourth or more! — to 90.

Many thanks again to Kia for a sweet FFW gift!

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Prize for Most Creative Use of Shapeshifting

I figured I ought to get this posted while the Faire was still going

For Navimie and Akabeko.

4… 3… 2… 1… shift. In unison, the two druids shifted from stealthed cat form to bear form and pushed with all their might. With their heads partially underneath Dubenko, shifting into their more powerful bear avatars was just enough to get them the leverage to try and force Akabeko’s nemesis into a vulnerable and humiliating position…. Time seemed to pass slowly, almost comically, as Dubenko was tipped onto his back and he rocked in the dirt helplessly, his limbs, head and tail pinioning wildly as he bellowed his outrage.

Navimie-kitty and Navimie-bear are kind of hard to see behind Akabeko-kitty and Akabeko-bear, so I’ve made some supplementary images with the layers pulled apart.

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Furtive Father Winter returns!

Who cares what Greatfather Winter (or Great-father Winter) gives us in-game this year! The gifts from the Furtive Father Winter blogging event last year were so much more fun to see — and do! If you’d like to participate, leave a comment on Akabeko’s announcement post or on the FFW2012 Blog Azeroth Shared Topic thread.

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What to Wear with your Cloak of the Darkmoon Faire

As I was poking around the Darkmoon Faire looking for the crazy hats previewed on Wowhead, I discovered something wonderful: the Cloak of the Darkmoon Faire and the Darkmoon MalletHammer are now Transmogrification-friendly!

And that meant, naturally, that I had to figure out some Transmogrification template kits to go with them. Because I tried to use as many items as I already had on hand or could quickly find at the AH as possible, these perhaps aren’t the “best” or “optimal” sets for each armor type — and, of course, personal aesthetics vary widely, too! So these are meant more to encourage you to experiment and come up with your own ideas — which I would love to see!

Darkmoon Magician



Elder’s hat vest belt & pants, Silk Mantle of Gamn*, Shimmering gloves & boots, Aurora bracers, Cloak of the Darkmoon Faire, Green Holiday Shirt, Greater Magic Wand, Spellbinder Orb
The Cloak not previously being Transmogrification-friendly had been the only thing stopping Kelilla from transmogrifying her questing gear into a Darkmoon Faire set, so she hurried to the Three Winds as fast as she could go!
Use the Gossamer shoulderpads to retain the white look of the Silk Mantle of Gamn, or use the Elder’s or Hibernal shoulders or the Slavehandler Amice to match the greens and purples.

Darkmoon Acrobat


Headhunter’s shoulders belt & gloves, Darkmoon Vest, Dervish leggings, Cutthroat boots, Cloak of the Darkmoon Faire
This set would look a little more polished with the Headhunter’s boots, but until those show up on my AH, the brown version of the same style will suffice. The Gypsy pants would also be attractive, particularly on elves.

Darkmoon Sharpshooter

Bog Epaulets, Turtle Scale chestpiece & leggings, Netherstalker belt gloves & boots, Cloak of the Darkmoon Faire, Taut Driftwood Bow, Bright Yellow Shirt
The Green Dragonscale chestpiece and leggings would also work nicely in this set.

Darkmoon Brawler


Valorous Pauldrons, Fel Iron Plate breastplate & pants, Chromite belt, Revenant gloves & boots, Cloak of the Darkmoon Faire, Darkmoon Hammer
Mola is wearing the Symbolic gloves & boots, Enchanted Adamantite Belt (why isn’t she wearing the teal Warleader’s belt, I wonder? It’s the same style, and would match better), and cloth Highborne tunic & pants. Kerri Hicks is wearing a custom coloration of the mail Pillager’s set. Neither set is Transmogrification-friendly for any class that can wield 2H Maces, but I think what I’ve come up with fits the spirit of the Faire pretty well.

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Theramore Arcanist & Hero of Stormwind

After 42 runs of Theramore’s Fall, 4 Squallshaper’s Hats, 2 Rok’nah Hag’s Hats, 4 Archmage’s Staffs, 3 Staffs of the Faithful, 2 Everlasting Alliance Fireworks, and 135 regular Alliance Fireworks, Kinevra finally obtained the Theramore Arcanist’s Hat.

I have coveted this white wizard hat, which is worn by several NPCs (mostly Inscription trainers), for a long time. Now, it takes on a more poignant meaning.

Theramore Arcanist’s Hat*, Vicious Embersilk shoulders & belt, Astral Knot Robe*, Gandling’s Gloves, Shimmering/Ivycloth Boots, Cloak of the Faith*, Archmage’s Staff*, Theramore Tabard*

The Astral Knot Robe was awarded from a pre-Cataclysm Mage Class quest. The Aurora, Gossamer, Spiritmend, and Vicious Embersilk robes would all be adequate substitutes. There are many good white capes, such as the Silky Spider Cape.

I have added some further thoughts on Theramore’s Fall to my previous post on the subject.

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When Kinevra received a summons to Stormwind Keep requesting “a trustworthy and proven hero for a mission of the utmost importance”, she knew she had to look her best! Thanks to the Alliance controlling Wintergrasp for most of her time in Northrend, she’d accumulated enough Honor Points while in the dungeons there to purchase a Knight-Captain’s Silk Tunic.

She was very disappointed to discover that “the appearance of that item cannot be used” for Transmogrification. So she had come up with something different, but she tried to make it as similar as possible. She was glad that she’d made the effort to look good when the “mission of utmost importance” turned out to be assisting the Prince!

Feline Mantle, Whispering Tunic, Bridenbrad’s Sash, Simple Kilt, Gandling’s Gloves, Slippers of the Twilight Prophet, Stormwind doublet & cloak

She’s only 3 or 4 years older than he is — close enough in age to have had the sort of daydreaming crush on him that all young girls tend to have on princes… Poor Kinevra, she really fell hard for Anduin during that one short day — he was so kind, and so smart, and so good looking! sigh…

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Tides of War, Theramore’s Fall, and the integration of in-game and novel lore events: more questions than answers

The pretentious-sounding title of this post is exactly that — pretending. Rather than a true literary/scholarly critical analysis of the sort you might find at Ironyca Stood in the Fire or Flavor Text, this is a list, more or less, of my thoughts, opinions, and lingering questions regarding the events of Tides of War and the Theramore’s Fall scenario.

In the weeks and months following the destruction of Theramore, it became the fashion among Gnomish women to wear pink pigtails

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some quick thoughts upon finishing Tides of War

I finally finished Tides of War last night, and the very first thing I did in the game after finishing the book was move all my Tauren who had been in Orgrimmar back to Thunder Bluff. Although there’s no pre-launch events (other than the Theramore’s Fall scenario) that might allow Orgrimmar in the game to temporarily assume the grim, oppressive atmosphere that it has at the end of the book, I still couldn’t bear to leave my Tauren there knowing what was “really going on” in that city.

WTPlay the Siege of Orgrimmar raid nao! I can’t wait to punch Garrosh in the face!

When is that Vol’jin book supposed to be coming out, again? I’m really looking forward to reading it and seeing if/how it follows up on Vol’jin’s actions (and Baine’s, too) in Tides of War.

After finishing the book, I definitely want to play through the Alliance version of the Theramore’s Fall scenario before I play through the Horde version. Although I’ve been leveling pretty hard (for me) with Kinevra over the past few weeks, she’s only level 82 — and then after she gets to level 85, she has to get to ilevel 353 before she can do the scenario. I did find five pieces of ilevel 377 crafted PvP gear on the AH for reasonable prices, so hopefully it won’t be too much more difficult to meet the gear check.

Thus, I’ll post the rest of my thoughts on the book later in the week, so that I can include my thoughts about the Theramore’s Fall scenario, too. I’ll be on a bit of a blogging blackout until then, because I want to get my own thoughts posted before I go read other people’s reviews.

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At the Mogolympics with K, et al., week three

The third and final week of the Mogolympics featured Fencing, the Freestyle competition, the Equestrian event, and Closing Ceremonies.

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Fencing — Time for some swordplay. Build your best outfit around the 1H Sword of your choice.
I wanted to avoid the easy, obvious Dread Pirate Roberts reference and go for a more real-world sport look, but I couldn’t make a white or near-white set that I really liked, so it ended up being black anyway.

Helm of the Vast Legions, Puncture-Binding Spaulder, Cadaverous Armor, Dusky Belt, Dark Leather Pants, Cadaverous Gloves, Rapscallion Boots, Dazzling Mithril Rapier

Although I wasn’t able to make a real-world mimic outfit that truly satisfied me from leather, the gold medalist in this event made a perfect outfit from cloth. And I guess my effort wasn’t so far off-the-mark, after all, because out of yet another outstanding array of competitors, I won the bronze!

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Freestyle — Build your own NPC.
There are so many beautiful animals to tame in Stranglethorn that Nesingwary’s Expedition really ought to have its own Stable Master. You’d think a camp full of Hunters would have one, so it always vexes me terribly that they don’t!

Stylin’ Jungle Hat, Cloaked Shoulderpads, Righteous Armor, Sash of Musing, Righteous Leggings, Morra’s Gloves + Quelling Bracers, Rocket Boots Xtreme

This event produced so many intriguing characters whom I’d love to meet! I just wish I knew what all of them do….

~*~*~

Equestrian — Build an outfit to complement one of the horse mounts in the game. The mount chosen must be available in-game to the race modelling the outfit.
With this brighly coloured jacket, this ensemble is appropriate for the Cross-Country or Showjumping events, but not for Dressage; a true Dressage outfit would also require a Transmogrifiable Top Hat; there was no really good riding hat, so I went for the Napoleon Crossing the Alps look.

Admiral’s Hat, Oracle Mantle, Sorcerer Drape, Mystic’s Belt, Astralaan Pants, Oracle Gloves + Sorcerer Bracelets, Saltarello Shoes, Tuxedo Shirt

I was really looking forward to this event, and the competitors did not disappoint! I wondered if there would be any outfits similar to mine, and I was very much delighted and amused when my entry and a strikingly similar riding costume shared the gold.

~*~*~

Don’t forget to check out the Closing Ceremonies for the Judges’ Choice awards, the overall outstanding performance awards, and a special surprise!

Thank you so much to JD, Tome, Matty, and Khizzara for all their hard and very, very difficult work in judging so many amazing outfits and in preparing such entertaining presentations for each event!

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At the Mogolympics with K, et al., week two

The second week of the Mogolympics featured the Discus throw, Wrestling, Archery, and the Javelin toss.
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Discus — Build an outfit around one of these relatively small, circular shields.
I chose just about the plainest shield of the whole assortment, so my outfit had to be relatively plain, too. I chose a sleeveless breastplate to accentuate my model’s buff throwing arms. The toss off the back of the hand is a very advanced technique.

Helm of the Siltwater Slayer, Wyrmhunter Spaulders, Warbringer’s Chestguard, Studded Girdle of Virtue, Chitinous Plate Legguards, Reiver Claws, Warbringer’s Sabatons, Northern Shortsword, Ceremonial Buckler

Another impressive field in this event!

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Wrestling — We’re going to deviate from olympic wrestling and go to the sports entertainment aspect instead. Using one of the “championship”/oversized belt styles first introduced with T9, design your own Azerothian pro wrestler.
Abandoned as an infant, raised by murlocs, now he’s the fearsome MURLORC!

Arion’s Crown (Normal), Spaulders of the Scarred Lady (Normal), Brackwater Vest, Coil of Ten-Thousand Screams (Normal), Brackwater Leggings, Unyielding Fists, Unyielding Footwraps, Reclaimed Thunderstrike

What a fight! What a fight! You gotta see this mob to believe it!

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Archery — Build an outfit around your favorite bow.
Okay, so, for this event I actually built the outfit first and chose the weapon last. I suppose the outfit is just a little too fancy to make my inspiration immediately obvious — she’s a Brave lass.

Pauldrons of the Promise, Hateful Gladiator’s Chain Armor, Veteran’s Linked Girdle, Kilt of Spiritual Reconstruction, Bountiful Gauntlets, Brunnhildar Snowkickers, Formal White Shirt, Stout Oak Longbow

I used a simple bow for my outfit a) because it matched my inspiration and b) because I like that bow model a lot anyway. I was also happy, though, to see my favorite more complex bows represented, with correspondingly elaborate outfits.

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Javelin — Build an outfit around the polearm of your choice.
My current favorite polearm is this beauty from the Lost City of the Tol’vir, so I tried to make an outfit that would fit right in at Ramkahen.

Phantasmal Headdress, Passive Resistor Spaulders (Heroic), Peerless Armor, Peerless Belt, Rugged Leather Pants, Inscribed Leather Gloves + Manacles of the Sleeping Beast (Heroic), Gold-Leaf Wildboots, Seliza’s Spear

This was a very tight competition at the top, with 16 competitors landing their throws within ten feet of each other!

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At the Mogolympics with K, et al., week one

The first week of the Mogolympics featured the Flagbearers, Cycling, and the Hammer Throw.

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Flagbearer — Build an outfit around the tabard of your randomly assigned faction. This is the only outfit that is required to coordinate with the tabard. This event did not award a medal.
My randomly assigned faction was Silvermoon City, so of course my flagbearer had to be a Blood Elf!

Praetorian Coif, Bonechewer Shoulderguards, Silvermoon Tunic, Hyena Hide Belt, Ghostclaw Leggings, Mighty Gauntlets, Expedition Boots, Silvermoon City Tabard, Mistyreed Torch

See all the Flagbearers at the Mogolympics Opening Ceremonies!

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Cycling — Design a leather or mail biker outfit to complement the Chopper/Mechanohog.
I knew right away that I wanted to use this combination of chestpiece, belt, and leggings. Then, it was just a matter of finding some good shoulders, gloves, and boots. The Phytoresistant Helm looks so much like an RL motorcycle helmet that it was the perfect thing to top off the outfit.

Phytoresistant Helm, Pauldrons of the Abandoned, Dark Iron Mail, Heavy Scorpid Belt, Bloodmail Legguards, Hulking Gauntlets, Felscale Boots

All of the Cycling entries made one bad to the bone biker gang!

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Hammer Throw — Build an outfit to complement your favorite 2H Mace.
Although the Conk Hammer is a relatively simple design, it is, indeed, one of my favorite 2H Maces in the game. That’ll leave a mark!

Helm of the Illidari Shatterer, Pauldrons of Zul’Farrak, Grimscale Armor, Heroic Girdle, Talonguard Legplates, Truesilver Gauntlets, Grimscale Sabatons, Conk Hammer

This event saw an awesome array of amazing maces and some equally impressive outfits to go with them!

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