Quest text? Who needs that, anyway?

My oldest has been doing well in kindergarten. He’s gotten good at figuring out a word by putting together the letter sounds, and he knows most of the “high frequency” words in the caterpillar that’s been growing on our living room wall. He can read words in simple stories.
He is by no means literate enough yet to read quest text*…
He discovered Transmogrification, but his lowbie toons didn’t have any money. I told him he needed to do quests to get money. I taught him the elementary skills of questing: talk to the person who is sparkling**, pick up things on the ground that are sparkling, loot your kills, the silver arrowhead on the minimap is you and the yellow arrow is pointing where you need to go and when you get to the right place the arrow turns into a yellow dot. I’ve given him occasional help with specific quests that have trickier requirements (such as the one to /wave at the ogre chef in Exile’s Reach).
I’ve been amazed by what he’s managed to figure out how to do on his own.
He can get all the way through Exile’s Reach, the Demon Hunter starting zone, the Dracthyr starting zone, the Warlords of Draenor Dark Portal to Garrison introductory scenario, the Legion Broken Shore introductory scenario, the Battle for Azeroth rescue of Talanji from Stormwind introductory scenario, and the Shadowlands escape from the Maw introductory scenario.
Without reading***.
I’ve shown him how to take the skips for the expansion introduction scenarios, but he likes to play through them. He plays through them over and over, deleting a character he already has# to roll up yet another new Zandalari Troll or Nightborne to do it again. He peppers me with questions about the characters and the storylines (I am so tired of answering questions about Sylvanas…) and I tell him, “kid, you know that better than I do by now.”

~*~*~

*Or, thankfully, city chat channels. I ought to teach him to leave city chat channels whenever he comes into a capital city for the first time with a new alt now, so that he’s already in the habit of automatically getting out of them by the time he’s literate enough to know what they’re saying….
**I don’t use Outline mode because I’m too lazy to turn it off and then back on again when I want to take Sunday Mog Show screenshots. I still have to contend with sparkles in my screenshots, but I think they’re less distracting.
***He doesn’t go out and do any regular zone questing, though, so perhaps it might be better to say that one doesn’t need reading to do an on-rails scenario questing experience.
#My account only has about 8 slots that aren’t filled with my own toons, so I had to teach him how to type “delete” soon after he started wanting to make his own characters instead of just playing with my Night Elf Druid and the Orc Hunter I’d created for him when I first began allowing him to play WoW.

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gratuitous art post: The Kiss of Awakening

Sometime during the latter part of the Suramar campaign*, one of the Suramar citizens whom Kaelinda had helped to rescue from the City and bring to refuge at Shal’aran took a fancy to her and began to court her. His name was Burgaux; he was an artisan — a glassblower who had created many of the beautiful vessels that held arcwine, some of the lovely beaded curtains found around the City, and a multitude of wondrous objects d’arte**. Kaelinda was charmed and flattered by his attention.

When Burgaux kissed her, however, she instantly realized two very important things.

One, she did not want this relationship to proceed all the way to the bedroom.
Two, she would really much rather be being kissed by Ianestin, who had been her best male friend, and indeed one of the closest of all her friends, for decades.

She broke off the relationship with the hapless Nightborne immediately.

~*~*~

Kaelinda’s “Pretty Posies” outfit (#47) was designed as as “date” outfit — though I didn’t know at the time just whom she was on a date with. When this story started developing in my mind, then I knew.

~*~*~
*specifically, the 7.1 “Insurrection” stage of the Suramar storyline
**think Chihuly, only enhanced with arcane magic, and you’ll be imagining the right sorts of artisan glasswork

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I Am All The Elves

Kaelyla is a Void Elf.

With the Orb of the Sin’dorei, she can become a Blood Elf.

With the Orb of Deception, she can become a Nightborne.

And by entering the Well of Eternity, she can become a Night Elf.

So if you want to be All The Elves and side with the Alliance, roll a Void Elf.
If you want to be All The Elves and side with the Horde, roll a Nightborne.

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a scattering of idle musings on alt leveling in Shadowlands

One thing I’ve really appreciated about the “banding” paradigm for content from previous expansions that was introduced in Patch 7.3.5 is that it extended to Transmogrification — that one can now wear anything, including “endgame” items, from the highest level band that one has reached. That has made Mogging with the Minor Mages so much more enjoyable, even though most of them are still limited to Vanilla items.

I wonder how Transmogrification will be affected by the new leveling paradigm? Will characters in the 1-50 range now be able to wear anything from Vanilla through BfA? If so, then I might not need to do any leveling with the Minor Mages at all! Or will one only be able to wear stuff from expansions that one has actually visited? That would be okay, too — though it would become tedious, by the third or fourth alt, to have to cycle through all the expansions with Chromie just to unlock all the folios of the Wardrobe.

~*~*~

One of the first things I thought of in connection with the description of the new leveling paradigm for content from previous expansions in Shadowlands was “Now I can level my Pandaren just in Pandaria!”

What other race-expansion combinations might be good thematic fits?
Night Elf or Nightborne in Legion? Yes, but if I’d ever really do it is perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.
Orc or Draenei in Warlords? Well, I’ve already got a Draenei stalled out at level 92 in Draenor, and I actually think it might be better to try to finish getting her through that content before the level squish.
Dwarf in Howling Fjord, Grizzly Hills, Storm Peaks, and Twilight Highlands? Hmm, hmm…
Troll in Stranglethorn Vale, Hinterlands, Zul Drak, and Kun Lai Summit? Yeah, yeah, I rather like that idea.
Undead in Lordaeron & Northrend? Well, yes, thematically it fits, but my Undead is not a supporter of Sylvanas’ agenda.
Worgen, Gnome, Goblin? *shrug*

So maybe in the end-of-Shadowlands lull — after I’ve completed the four Covenant Campaigns — I’ll level Kaoling. And maybe I’ll level Kikimaia, too — though a current feeling of interest in leveling a Troll could just be the influence of having been surrounded by Trolls for all of BfA, or it could be the influence of Classic because I’d rather be Troll than Undead to play a Horde Mage in Classic.

~*~*~

Night Elves have such an elegance to them. Does having a high-level Night Elf Balance Druid — who uses Glyph of Stars — fulfil the desire to have a caster Night Elf, so I don’t need to level a Night Elf Mage?

Nightborne have the elegance of movement of Night Elves, and they have such a pretty tabard and I rather like their Heritage Armor… but I just don’t like their resting stance. It bugs me enough that I’m not sure that I could get into playing my Nightborne alt. The stance of Zandalari Trolls has the same relationship to the stance of Darkspear Trolls as the stance of Nightborne does to that of Night Elves, but the Zandalari Troll stance doesn’t bug me quite as much as the Nightborne stance. Somehow the placement of the feet of the Nightborne seems a little too awkwardly, uncomfortably wide to me. I had the oddest thought the other day — the stance of Nightborne men doesn’t bug me the way the stance of Nightborne women does, so what if I were to reroll my Nightborne Mage as a man — likely an Occuleth clone, ha! — to level for the Heritage Armor? (There isn’t any other race I’d preferentially play as a man rather than a woman…)

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elves she was and is and might have been

Way back in 2011, Millya of Manalicious* was doing 5-minute sketch portraits (batch 1, batch 2) for her friends, and I requested a portrait of Kaelinda**, thinking that I might use it for digital coloring practice…

Eight and a half years later, I’ve finally gotten around to doing that.

drawing by Stacey Landry; colors by me

~*~*~

* I miss Manalicious and still regret that I didn’t ever commission a watercolor portrait of one of my characters, even though I wouldn’t actually be going to BlizzCon…

** because I’d already gotten a Millya portrait of Kamalia, which has been my Gravatar ever since

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supporters of Shal’Aran

Some suggestions for non-Shaldorei who wish to show their friendship for First Arcanist Thalyssra and her people. The “of the Nightfall” title is the perfect finishing touch for all of these outfits.

Magic of the Night

Mantle of Closed Doors (H), Felfume Robes, Belt of False Dignity, Silkweave Gloves, Suspicious Slippers, Nightfallen Tabard

Nightstorm

Boughs of Archdruid Van-Yali, Breastplate of the Incendiary Soul (H), Shifting Sash of Midnight, Cinderweb Leggings (H), Earthguard Grips, Sandals of the Insurgent, Shocking Claws, Nightfallen Tabard

Suramar Nightingale

Conqueror’s Nightsong Cover, Boughs of Archdruid Van-Yali, Songbird Blouse, Strap of the Chosen Dead (LFR), Cinderweb Leggings (H), Twisted Wraithtalon Gloves, Rapscallion Boots, Fandral’s Flamescythe (H), Nightfallen Tabard

Night Seer

Hateful Gladiator’s Linked Spaulders, Darkmoon Breastplate, Netherfury Belt, Bloodmail Legguards*, Ebonhold Gauntlets & Boots, Purple Martial Shirt, Element-Infused Knuckles, Shadowbark’s Shin, Nightfallen Tabard

Night Seer II

Hateful Gladiator’s Linked Spaulders, Steadfast Breastplate, Stillwater Girdle, Scaled Greaves of Patience, Bloodbinder’s Gauntlets, Hydra Scale Sabatons, Streamtalker Slicers, Titansteel Shield Wall, Nightfallen Tabard

Nightwell Liberator

Doomplate Shoulderguards, Darkrune Breastplate, Bogslayer Belt, Weaponmaster’s Legplates, Lucidity Handwraps, Thunderpeak Greatboots, Edge of the Cosmos/Black Ice, Rich Purple Silk Shirt, Nightfallen Tabard

Night Knight

Booty Bay Helm, Replica Soulforge Pauldrons & Legplates, Breastplate of Many Graces, Uktar’s Belt of Chiming Rings (N), Sunstrider’s Gauntlets, Fen Strider’s Footguards, Pilfered Ethereal Blade, Revenant Deflector, Nightfallen Tabard

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come with me to Tir na nOg

Having had the good fortune to obtain a Lovely Black Dress, I made an outfit with it for my Void Elf.

Little Black Dress

Forever-Lovely Rose, Lovely Black Dress, Stonecloth Britches, Silver-Thread Gloves, Sorcerer Slippers, Clear Crystal Rod*/Diamond Tipped Cane

Then I got to thinking about how there are three other colors of the Lovely Dress, and three other Elf races, and these outfits practically made themselves:

Lady in Red

Forever-Lovely Rose, Ferocious Gladiator’s Silk Amice, Lovely Red Dress, Stonecloth Britches, Night Dreamer Handwraps + Nightvale Wristwraps, Boots of the Tempest, The Sunbreaker, Penelope’s Rose*
Meet Kaelydia, a new alter-ego whose story I might get around to telling one of these days.

Arcwine

Ternary Mantle, Lovely Blue Dress, Royal Trousers, Gloves of the Infernal Nocturnal, Shimmering Geta, Staff of Haunted Memory
Koralythria is too young and not of a high enough social class in Suramar City to have the glowing tattoos permanently, but she went and got a temporary set for this special occasion.

Moonshimmer

Orchid Amice*, Lovely Purple Dress, Stonecloth Britches, Replica Virtuous Gloves + Dryad’s Wrist Bindings, Kurkenstoks, Mok’Morokk’s Beat Stick
Imagine the original Ashenvale music playing…

~*~*~

As of Lunar Festival in 2020, the flower crowns can now be Mogged year-round, making these Love is in the Air outfits possible!

Infinite Loveliness

Crown of Infinite Prosperity, Lovely Red Dress, Bloodscale Belt, Greaves of the Martyr, Red Crane Sword

Everlasting Loveliness

Crown of Everlasting Fortune, Lovely Blue Dress, Iceguard Leggings, Boots of the Fallen Hero, Decalcified Elven Spear

Boundless Loveliness

Crown of Boundless Courage, Lovely Purple Dress, Murkblood Avenger’s Legplates, Fen Strider’s Footguards, Inkgill Blade, Sunsoul Bulwark

Eternal Loveliness

Crown of Eternal Memorial, Lovely Black Dress, Inkling’s Leggings, Noble’s Fancy Boots, Ashkandi

~*~*~

Mugambala Mystique

Fen Spirit Headdress, Fen Spirit Mantle, Flowing Sapphiron Drape, Lovely Blue Dress/Windchanneller’s Tunic, Celestial Kilt, Celestial Observer’s Astral Walkers, Warmongering Combatant’s Energy Staff

Shadra Silk Headband, Shadra Silk Mantle, Butcher’s Wrap, Lovely Red Dress/Simple Blouse, Colorful Kilt, Infernoweave Boots, Wild Combatant’s Battle Staff

Cobra Priest’s Headdress, Sandspinner Mantle, Finely Woven Cloak, Lovely Black Dress/Lovely Purple Dress/Willow Vest, Elunarian Sarong, Kafa Silk Treads, Warmongering Combatant’s Battle Staff
A Lovely Green Dress would be totes hawt — but then, for just about every monochrome item in the wardrobe that is available in two or three or four colors, I wish that I could have it in All The Colours.

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in which the Nightborne have been saved from themselves

This week being my Spring Break, I finally managed to sit down and power through the rest of Suramar.

It was indeed some very well done storytelling, and I enjoyed it — though it helped quite a bit that I’m at ilevel 900 from the slow ratchet of WQ rewards and already have flying. Although I still think she’s a conceited snob, I grew to like Arcanist Valtrois a bit more when I got to see her in her element, as it were, working with the ley lines — and the quest where she butts heads with Stellagosa in Zharkhenar cracked me up. I still like Occuleth the best, though.

I am not entirely “done” with Suramar, however, as I still haven’t gotten the Leywoven Flying Carpet. Kaelinda has Paragoned for the Nightfallen at least twelve times by now, and it’s getting rather discouraging to keep getting nothing but gold and Wakening Essences and other random junk when I open the caches. sigh…

I’d been making myself wait to purchase Battle for Azeroth at least until I’d completed Suramar and would be able to do both of the Horde-side Allied Race recruitment scenarios. I’d read that the Highmountain scenario is the longest and most involved, and that the Nightborne scenario has a scene that dovetails with the Void Elf scenario.

I spent the extra $20 to get the Collector’s Edition because fancy raptor for my Hunter who loves raptors —

— and fancy horse for my Human Mage who loves horses.

Although I could recruit the Highmountain Tauren and roll up the Highmountain Tauren alts I want to create now, I’m going to try to save that until after I’ve gotten all the classes leveled to 110 and experienced their Order Hall campaigns (through getting the last champion from the Broken Shore).

Because I only needed my Nightborne Mage to exist, however, there wasn’t any problem with sending Kaelinda off right away to help Lady Liadrin convince Thalyssra to join the Horde.

She was rather surprised and shocked by how harshly the Regent Lord treated Alleria Windrunner, though she herself was sufficiently well-mannered not to show it.

Kaelinda now has a “prettykitty” mount macro that includes the Mystic Runesaber, Arcanists’s Manasaber, Nightborne Manasaber, Luminous Starseeker, and Winged Guardian.

Thanks to a comment on Wowhead, I learned that I could create an Allied Races character on a realm where I didn’t yet have a level 110, so I was immediately able to create a Nightborne Mage on my Minor Mages realm (I’ll still have to get Kaylynda to 110 to do the Void Elf recruitment scenario, though).

Minor Mages, please welcome Koralythria!


She has pale pink hair (the color is very subtle) and no glowy tattoos (because she’s a commoner).

Koralythria is very young, as Nightborne go — only a hundred or so years old (about the same age as Kaelinda). Before — well, before Gul’dan, really — she was a junior assistant gardener at one of the smallest gardens in Suramar City, dreaming of someday becoming skilled enough to work on the Grand Promenade.

In her free time, she associated with a group of other young (less than a millenium old) people who were curious about the world outside the shield and wondered if there were things their leaders weren’t telling them. After the Legion arrived, she joined the cause of the Dusk Lily and became part of Vanthir’s network as soon as she became aware of them. Though her horticulture work had given her some proficiency with certain types of bladed implements, during the Insurrection, she discovered that she was more talented with magic than she had thought. When she came to Shal’Aran, she was overawed by Thalyssra. She was also rather disturbed and concerned by the Withered… especially by how many of them there seemed to be (so she’s even more of a conspiracy theorist now than she was before). She very quickly began to idolize Valtrois and Occuleth, though.

So… now that I’ve finally finished Suramar, what next?

Xe’ra’s Revisionist History of Illidan, then Argus, with my Demon Hunter — because the more Void Elves I see running around, the more I want to play one.

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in which Kaelinda is a Good Suramaritan

Over the past few weekends, I set myself to completing the 7.0 half of the Suramar campaign. With both Kamalia and Kaelinda, the point I’d stopped at was just before Ly’leth Lunastre’s instructions to meet with Vanthir. When I finally went to meet with Vanthir, and did the Waning Crescent chapter of the campaign, then I began to understand why Anne Stickney has been praising the storytelling in Suramar all expansion long. I hadn’t really felt like I could relate to Thalyssra and Valtrois — or even Occuleth, though I liked him better than the other two. But when I started to meet common folk Nightborne like Vanthir and Deline, then I started to be able to think of what a Nightborne character that I might create could be like.

Meanwhile, BTH recently decided to re-sub up to WoW and has been busily plowing through the Broken Shore and Argus campaigns. After having spent a lot of time corpse-running in the Midnight Court area of Suramar yesterday evening while working on the Statecraft chapter of the Suramar campaign, this evening, I enlisted BTH to help me with the quests in the first part of the Change of Seasons chapter that required me to return to that neighborhood. That made it much easier!

Now that I’ve finally completed Broken Isles Pathfinder, Part One, I think it’s time to go to the Broken Shore and do Broken Isles Pathfinder, Part Two before I continue on to the 7.1 half of the Suramar campaign.

As for Koralythria, my future Nightborne Mage… Not all Nightborne are over 10,000 years old, like Elisande, Thalyssra, Valtrois, and Occuleth. We know this because Nightborne have children — I love that there are so many Nightborne children in Suramar City (and that there are child models for the Zandalari Trolls in the datamining from the first Battle for Azeroth build) — which means that there are Nightborne of all ages. So she is relatively young, probably about the same age as Kaelinda — who is a young adult, as Blood Elves go, at a little over 100 years old. She lived in the southwestern half of the city and recieved help from Vanthir at the Waning Crescent, then joined Thalyssra at Shal’Aran. As a commoner, she does not have any glowy tattoos. I observed that only the elitest of the elites have those — not even nobles such as Ly’leth Lunastre or her friend Lady Aurore have the glowy tattoos. She’s probably an artisan of some kind — perhaps an apprentice or assistant to one of the merchants in the Evermoon Bazaar, or maybe one of the horticulturalists who tended the Glitterpools along the Grand Promenade. She’s a Mage, so she’s done some scholarship of magic, but that won’t become her main career until after the Insurrection.

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preparing for Battle for Azeroth: consolidating the Minor Mages

For many years, I kept my Horde Minor Mages and my Alliance Minor Mages segregated onto two different realms. Over the past year or so since Legion raised the character limit per realm to twelve (to accommodate a One-of-each-Class roster, which I have on Kamalia’s realm), I’ve occasionally contemplated moving them all onto the same realm.
Earlier this week, I finally did it.

Amazingly, I didn’t even have to change any of my names!

The key factor in my decision to spend the real money for the character transfers was the knowledge that while the unlock for a particular Allied Race will be account-wide and apparently not faction-restricted*, creating an Allied Race alt will require a level 110 character on the desired realm. Whether or not I end up creating alts of the Lightforged Draenei, Zandalari Trolls, Dark Iron Dwarves, or any future Allied Races, I will definitely be creating new Mages of the Void Elves and Nightborne**. I looked at my Horde Minor Mages and realized that I didn’t want to have to level a third additional character*** to 110 just to be able to create my Nightborne Mage on that realm — that would be yet another distraction from getting the Twelve Classes leveled and through their Order Hall Campaigns and various other Legion end-game goals. It would be so much easier, I thought, to put all the Minor Mages on Kaylynda’s realm — leveling Kaylynda to 110 would then allow me to create both my Void Elf and my Nightborne on that realm. Of course, that would then be thirteen characters on that realm — but Battle for Azeroth will also be giving us six new character slots per realm (to accommodate all the really serious altoholics who will want to put alts of each of the Allied Races on their already full realms), so no problem.

So now I have my characters on four realms: Kamalia’s realm with the One-of-each-Class collection, Kaylynda’s realm with all the Minor Mages, the Underpowered Death Knight’s realm with my minor Tauren characters, and a non-Mage Alliance characters realm that just has my Dwarf Paladin and Shaman on it. Nice and tidy!

~*~*~

* So I can go do Argus with my Blood Elf Demon Hunter and still unlock the Void Elves — yay!

** Although I’m not particularly wildly enamored of the Nightborne in and of themselves, I need to have the Elf Family Reunion 😛

*** The two “extra” characters I’m already working on leveling to 110 are Kaylynda, to be able to create a Void Elf on her realm, and mini-Kam, to be able to create Highmountain Tauren characters (and a Zandalari Troll Elemental Shaman) on her realm

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