Ok Wrathion, we’re good now

During Battle for Azeroth, I pushed the Shroud of Resolve to rank 6 to get the first appearance upgrade, but once that was accomplished, I just didn’t want to keep going. I spent all of Shadowlands feeling envious every time I saw someone wearing the second appearance upgrade for the Shroud of Resolve, which occurs at rank 12. So after finishing the 9.0 Night Fae Campaign, I took my Druid back to Battle for Azeroth to raise her Shroud of Resolve from rank 6 to rank 12. It only took a few weeks. Doing Black Empire Assaults and Horrific Visions at level 60 as a Druid was a good choice; Boomkin AOE is my favorite AOE of all the Classes (though Elemental Shaman is pretty fun, too), and when I’m in the Horrific Vision, Stealth gets me through the trash in the entrance area without needing to spend excessive time or Sanity.
But once again, now that I’ve got the Shroud of Resolve appearance upgrade, I just don’t want to keep going for the Black Dragonscale Backpack. The grind for Corrupted Mementos is too much and too slow. sigh If the devs made a recolor of that item — perhaps in a less-exciting brown color scheme? — and made it not too terribly difficult to get — such as putting it on the new Trading Post or even in the Store for $5 or $10 — I would go for it.
~*~*~
Meanwhile, Kamalia dinged 70 (again) on the 18th at halfway through the Azure Span main storyline. We’ve finished the Azure Span by now, but we haven’t gotten started on Thaldraszus quite yet.
With the Titan constellations appearance of the Shroud of Resolve now in my Appearances collection for real, Kamalia no longer feels any need for Wrathion’s Armoire of Endless Cloaks — and thus no need to choose between Wrathion and Sabellian or pursue Friendship with them at all. The Cobalt Assembly, on the other hand — it has the fun part of Torghast — stacking up OP power-ups — without the tedious parts. BTH and I had a blast one evening running around there. When we feel like just smashing stuff, that’s where we’ll go. And Kamalia wants the Cobalt Dracthyr Battlegear, of course.

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Done, and not so Done, in the Shadowlands

I finished the 9.0 Night Fae Campaign with my Druid last night, at last! Now she is Done with the Shadowlands!

The second time through, the Night Fae Campaign still felt awkward and disjointed. The NPC losses were still downers, but I guess I “got” a little better how they raised the stakes this time. The things that made playing through it a LOT better the second time through were 1) Prowl is awesome for not having to fight through everything, 2) flying is awesome for not having to fight through everything, 3) being able to ride and not having to worry about the Eye of the Jailer made the Maw sections so much easier, and 4) having OP gear made the necessary fighting so much easier (iLevel 252 Primal Storms stuff, which I didn’t begin replacing with Kamalia until she was about level 65).

Except for Prowl, those things will also make replaying all the Campaigns easier for my Mages. As I’ve mentioned before, Kaelinda, who originally did the Venthyr and Kyrian Campaigns, decided that she needed to do the Night Fae and Necrolords Campaigns so she can do each Covenant-story-advancing chapter of Korthia (which has been on hold since the Primal Storms phase of the pre-patch went live) as a member of the appropriate Covenant. But then Kaelyla, who originally did the Night Fae and Necrolords Campaigns, decided that she needed to do the Kyrian and Venthyr Campaigns. Kyrian, because Kaelinda chose the sword and I decided that, actually, I do want to have the staff as well. Venthyr, because Venthyr was my favorite the first time through, so how can I replay all the others and not replay that one? Also, I want to see if Kael’thas says anything special to Void Elves once he’s installed in the lower level of Sinfall (if you know, don’t spoil me please!).

I do still want to finish the story Campaign for Korthia, get Exalted with Death’s Advance, and grind the necessary Stygia to acquire the Night Fae set as well as both Venthyr sets. Seeking to minimize the time I still have to spend in Shadowlands, however, I looked up how far I’ll need to get in the Zereth Mortis Campaign to begin using the Creation Catalyst to make Sepulcher of the First Ones raid items. Upon finding out that that occurs in Chapter 4, I decided that that is as much of ZM as I’m going to do. I looked up and spoiled myself on the rest of the ZM Campaign story. After I’ve finished Chapter 3 of ZM with Kaelinda and unlocked the skip for alts, I’ll probably bring Kaelyla, Kamalia, and Kaurinka out there for a brief look around so that they have it as an available location for Mog photoshoots, just in case.

But all of those things will have to happen when I’m not busy doing stuff with Kamalia in the Dragon Isles!

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in which we do not want to have to be the ones to decide between the black dragon brothers

BTH and I finally finished up The Waking Shores last night, dinging 64 in the process.
Every time we have to fight elementals, BTH teases me about how as a Shaman, Kamalia should be upset about having to put down these elementals instead of trying to save them by solving the problem that is making them be all riled up.
When we went through the quests involving the return of Sabellian, BTH groaned aloud, “Don’t make ME choose who gets to be the new Aspect!”
Kamalia doesn’t want to choose, either. Although she knows Wrathion better, Sabellian and his followers do have some good points — and it was Sabellian’s actions that allowed the Ruby Oathstone to be restored.
I am starting to get itchy to bring Kaelyla out to the Dragon Isles. At the same time, I don’t want to rush her ahead of Kamalia, because I want to save the delights of first discovery of all the things in the Dragon Isles for Kamalia and playing with BTH.
When they eventually get there, Kaelinda will choose Wrathion, because of greater familarity, and Kaelyla will choose Sabellian, because she feels a wisp of kinship between his experiences in Outland and her experiences with the Void.
Meanwhile, Kaurinka is still considering going back to Uldum & the Vale of Eternal Blossoms after she finishes the Night Fae Campaign to work on getting the second upgraded appearance of the Shroud of Resolve and the Black Dragonscale Backpack (but do I really want to grind that? really and truly?).

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The Official WoW Timeline and My Characters’ Ages

Officially, Shadowlands began in Year 35 from the Opening of the Dark Portal, and Dragonflight begins in Year 40; with World of Warcraft having begun in Year 25, there are 15 years between the beginning of Classic and the beginning of Dragonflight. What does this mean for my characters?

Way back in 2018, Gnomecore asked, “How Old Are Your Toons?” At the time, I began a rundown of the ages of my characters that then sat in draft for a few years until I eventually deleted it. Now seems like a good time to revisit that storybuilding prompt.

Although I have previously headcanoned the first several expansions of WoW as being two years in duration, the Official Timeline has one year for most of them. I’ll use the Official Timeline for these age calculations.

A couple more assumptions, which may or may not be Canon: Tauren become adults in their culture at age 16 and generally live to 90-110. Eversong Elves become adults in their culture at age 100 and generally live 300-500 years, though rare individuals may live for 1000 – 3000 years.

~*~*~

The ages of my major Tauren characters can be determined from my Tauren Paladin and Priest, the twins Karaelia (Paladin) and Kaohana (Priest), who came of age at the beginning of Cataclysm. Thus, they are 16 years old in Year 28 and were born in Year 12. The twins were a surprise late pregnancy for their mother. Keija (Warrior) was 10, Ketura (Hunter) was 13, Kerisa (Druid) was 15, and Kamalia (Shaman) was 18 at the time.
In Year 25 when World of Warcraft begins, they were: Kamalia 31, Kerisa 28, Ketura 26, Keija 23, Karaelia & Kaohana 13.
Kerisa married in Year 28 at the end of Wrath of the Lich King and her daughter Kessina was born about a year later during Cataclysm; either late Year 29 or early Year 30. Her son was born during Legion, probably Year 33.
Keija didn’t begin actively adventuring herself until after the twins came of age. She married at age 25 (Year 27), but she and her husband chose to remain childless until around the end of Legion (Year 33); they had a son in late Year 34.
Kamalia finally got married in Year 33 at the age of 39*. She may or may not have succeeded in having a child by the time Dragonflight begins in Year 40, at which time she will be 46.
When Dragonflight begins, Kerisa will be 43, Ketura 41, Keija 38, and Karaelia & Kaohana 28.
My Tauren Death Knight, Kregga, came of age approximately during the events of Warcraft III, which puts her at about 18 or 19 in Year 25 and 33 or 34 at the beginning of Dragonflight.
Kaumaleia, the Underpowered Death Knight, was about 25 in Year 27 at the beginning of Wrath of the Lich King, so she is 38 at the beginning of Dragonflight.
My Tauren Monk, Katewatha, was a young adult, perhaps 21 or 22, when the Pandaren came in Year 30; she will be 31 or 32 at the beginning of Dragonflight.
Kasheena, my Highmountain Tauren Druid, was a young adult of 19 or 20 when the Highmountain Tauren joined the Horde at the end of Legion (Year 33), so she will be 26 or 27 at the beginning of Dragonflight.
Kaurinka, the identity of my Tauren Druid during Shadowlands, is in her mid-30s.
My Tauren Rogue will borrow the name Kazithra from Kregga’s mother, and she will be young, reckless, and insolent; perhaps only 17 or 18 at the end of Shadowlands and 20 or 21 at the beginning of Dragonflight.
My Tauren Mage, whose name I haven’t quite decided upon yet, wants to be middle-aged, I think, even older than Kamalia, maybe in her 50s or 60s at the beginning of Dragonflight.
Update: When I actually created my new Tauren Mage and Rogue, this is what happened…
My Tauren Rogue, Kaiuna, has appeared previously as a Feral Druid who always enjoyed dressing up Rogueishly. Now that Tauren can become Rogues for real, she cheerfully switched classes. She is about the same age as Karaelia and Kaohana, with whom she was a childhood friend.
My Tauren Mage, Kazithra, is Kregga’s niece; she was named for her grandmother. Kregga is one of the younger children in her family and Kazithra is her eldest sibling’s eldest child. Kazithra has just come of age; she is 16 at the beginning of Dragonflight.

~*~*~

I’ve always thought of Kaelinda as a young adult, approximately equivalent in societal function to a 21 – 25 year-old Human. In a story I wrote about a decade ago, she is raised from journeyman to Magistrix shortly before she goes to Outland — but the story is about her crafting a Sparkle Pony, which the story describes as being a construct pattern found in Ulduar — which places the story in mid-to-late Wrath of the Lich King or about Year 28. In a story I currently have in Draft, she is an apprentice at an Eversong Woods academy of magic at the time of Arthas’s rampage in Warcraft III, or about Year 24. So she would have been about 105 in Year 25 at the beginning of World of Warcraft and is about 120 at the beginning of Dragonflight.

Kaelinda’s best female friend, Kaelyla, is a few years older, perhaps 110 at the beginning of World of Warcraft and 125 at the beginning of Dragonflight.
Kaelinda’s best male friend, Ianestin, is also in the 120 – 130 age range as of the beginning of Dragonflight.

Of the various Mage Alter-Ego characters, Kaelydia is around 175, and I don’t know any of the others — Khrysanthemina, Kaelyra, Kateleina — well enough yet to estimate their ages.

Kalaneia and Keliora are both significantly older than Kaelinda, having had their own young adult children at the the time of the destruction of Eversong Woods. Thus, they are somewhere in their mid-to-late 200s.

~*~*~

* Coincidentally, this makes Kamalia about the same age as me — I am 42 this year.

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Current Shadowlands alt priorities

Meanwhile, in Shadowlands…

For awhile, I had all four of my mains in the Night Fae doing the Queen’s Conservatory. Kaurinka recently got hers upgraded to Tier 4. The others waited until they’d gotten their Conservatories upgraded to Tier 2 before beginning to nurture Spirits so that they could use 2x Wildseed Root Grain for every Spirit. Collectively, we’ve gotten the pets multiple times and a few of the other things, but we’re still trying for the Spirit Tender’s Bulb. Kaurinka has restored all of the Spirits she collected before she began actively doing the Conservatory and is only getting new ones from Fair Exchange for a Soul and an occasional Return Lost Souls, so she doesn’t have any active wildseeds right now. Kaelyla and Kamalia both have collections of Spirits that they are actively nurturing, but they’ll run out in another week or two. Kaelinda hadn’t even done the Conservatory Tier 1 activation yet when she was in the Night Fae before, so after she got it going, she only had a few Spirits to nurture. I only really need one Mage to upgrade the Conservatory to Tier 5; while Kaelyla is working on that (recently upgraded to Tier 3), Kaelinda began using the Anima she collected to buy the Renown version of the Faewoven set. Kamalia also began using her Anima to buy the Renown version of the Runewarden’s set; she decided the autumn/fire orange of the Renown version of the set was more interesting to her than the green of the Conservatory version of the set. But having four active characters was exhausting, and having all of them in the same Covenant was, quite honestly, boring. Kaurinka and Kamalia are therefore currently resting; I’m only checking in with Kamalia to turn over wildseeds.

After Kaelinda had restored all of the Spirits she’d gathered (she had only gotten 4/9 of the Night Fae Renown pieces, but she can come back for the rest later — or Kaelyla can get them), she went back to the Venthyr and began doing the Ember Court. And my goodness, the Ember Court is a lot of work!

Kaelinda and Kaelyla are in what I have been thinking of as “Anima Vacuum” mode — trying to get as much Anima each night as I can with both characters — though I don’t do all the available Anima WQs, just the ones I feel the most like doing.

I’m also attempting to get ready for Fall Semester, which will be beginning all too soon. It didn’t take long to get my GE courses ready to go for Fall semester. It’s taken me awhile to get mental traction on reworking my Organic Chemistry course, for which I am doing a substantial overhaul, though. OChem will continue to occupy a lot of time and attention as the semester progresses because I’ll be working on updating my day-to-day course materials as I go along.

With all of this, I’ve been routinely staying up until about 2 am — which isn’t good for my physical or mental health…

~*~*~

I sorely need a new computer to play WoW. My current laptop has a 256 GB harddrive which is somehow almost completely full, to the point that every night it complains about being out of memory and sometimes I can’t take screenshots or the game crashes. I’ve also been getting an annoying lua error which keeps resetting all the UI tutorial banners on some of my characters. I’m getting tired of turning them off every time I log in. I definitely need a new computer before Dragonflight — and before I do Korthia, Zereth Mortis, or the 9.2.5 Blood Elf questline, so that I can take lots of story screenshots that I will probably never look at again! 😛

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Tentative Dragonflight alt priorities

Thankfully, the Dragonflight Quest armor and Dungeon armor sets are not the same as the PvP armor. I like the both of the Cloth sets, the Dungeon Leather set, and the Quest Mail set, but I don’t find either of the Plate sets particularly inspiring.

Even better, that Dracthyr Battlegear is just the kind of awesome-looking new Mail armor that I was hoping we’d get with a new Mail-wearing class joining the game! Kamalia is really looking forward to wearing it… if it’s not ridiculously exclusive to Dracthyr Evokers, that is.

With that in mind, and keeping in mind that any alt management plan I concoct during the beta phase of a new expansion never ends up being exactly what I actually do with my characters — at the moment, I’m thinking that for Dragonflight, I’ll lead out with Kaelinda. Mages have unparallelled world mobility with their capital city teleport, and Invisibility is a pretty good aggro drop and run away ability. It’s okay for reconnaissance sneaking around, too, on occasion. Kamalia will go next; I missed her too much in early Shadowlands, and I’m excited about the new Mail armor. Then either Kerisa or Kasheena; I love being a Balance Druid AOE Goddess and a sneaky kitty to get from one place to another, but although I like the Leather armor, I want to get the Mail first. Then Kaelyla, to keep my Alliance Main caught up. And then… maybe Kamalisaura the Dracthyr Evoker, just to see how the new Class plays? She will be Alliance, so that I can put her in the “Blue Team” category on my Characters page instead of having to make a new category just for her.

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Stuff I’m doing in Shadowlands that’s NOT advancing the Kyrian Campaign…

My Horde Mage is supposed to be working on the Kyrian Campaign. She’s done Chapter 3 — and is horrified by the implications of Scourge presence in Lakeshire. I keep thinking “tonight I’m going to do Chapter 4”, and then I keep doing other things instead.

As soon as she’d finished up the Necrolords Campaign, my Alliance Mage went back to the Venthyr. When she was in the Venthyr earlier, she’d hardly touched Sanctum upgrades, only doing the Stage 1 Anima Conductor and reinforcing the Greater Greedstone. Upon returning to Sinfall, her first objective was to upgrade the Anima Conductor to Stage 2 and reinforce Darkwing Drills. When that was done, she recruited Laurent and got to work on activating and upgrading the Mirror Network all the way to Stage 3. After I’ve been to Korthia and gotten flying, I want to put both Mages in Venthyr and get working on doing Venthyr Travel Network Broken Mirrors with them until I’ve obtained the Soulbreaker’s Burnished Mantle & Sash. She’s just gotten the Mirror Network up to Stage 2.

Meanwhile, Kaurinka and Kamalia decided that they didn’t want to wait until they’d done the Night Fae Campaign to start working on the Queen’s Conservatory. After doing the introductory quests and reading the Wowhead Guide, I decided to backburner it with Kamalia until she gets her Mushroom Network — recently advanced to Stage 2 — fully upgraded. Kaurika, however, has now upgraded her Queen’s Conservatory to Stage 2 and is farming catalyst seeds while she gathers Anima for further upgrades. The main reward I want from the Queen’s Conservatory which has to be farmed — to my relief, the recolor of the armor set is not RNG-dependent, but can simply be bought for 12.5K Anima after fully upgrading the place — is the Spirit Tender’s Bulb, which is one of the possible rewards from Untamed Spirits with two Wildseed Root Grain catalysts active.

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considering Covenant hopping

Like my four year-old who is so excited for Halloween, I “can’t wait” for Patch 9.1.5 because I’m so excited to be able to bring Kamalia to the Shadowlands without having to go through that introductory Maw experience one more time. As I’ve played with my Mages, Druid, Priest, and Warlock, I’ve found myself missing slinging Flame Shocks and Lava Bursts and Chain Lightnings and Earthquakes as an Elemental Shaman. I also just miss being Kamalia because she’s my oldest and “flagship” character.

With Kamalia in the Shadowlands, I’ll have three of the four armor classes there. That makes it tempting to also bring out my Paladin, Karelia. Then I’d want to bring my Tauren Priest, Kaohana, so that I’ll have all four armor classes as Tauren, and because the twins don’t like to be separated. But I know that that’s more alts than I can really manage, so I am telling myself quite firmly that I am only going to advance Kamalia.

I plan to matriculate Kamalia with the Night Fae and then slowly level her with my favorite no or minimal combat World Quests. After Kamalia has acquired all of the Night Fae stuff I’d like her to have, I’ll covenant swap her to the Kyrian to get their gorgeous set — at least the Campaign coloration; I may or may not also go for the Renown coloration — then swap back to the Night Fae.

In thinking about what kind of Covenant hopping I might want to do with my other characters, I began to think about which characters I might want to bring ahead to 10.0. Which characters will need to cycle through all the Covenants so that they’ll have access to all the things to Mog with in the future? Over the past few expansions (Shadowlands included), I’ve figured out that I can handle about four active characters at a time. The four characters I want to keep actively playing for as long as I keep playing WoW are Kamalia, Kerisa, Kaelinda, and Kaelyla. Kamalia only wants Night Fae and Kyrian stuff, and Kerisa only wants Night Fae stuff. It’s just the Mages who really want stuff from all four of the Covenants. So, after Kaelinda has reached 80 Renown and unlocked unlimited Covenant hopping, and after I’ve completed all of the 9.0 Covenant Campaigns with the designated characters, I’ll want Kaelinda and Kaelyla to each take turns with all of the Covenants. I’m imagining having them work together to collect the sets from the Korthia daily quests…

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must… have… moar… Anima…

Kaelinda finished acquiring the Renown recolor of her Covenant armor set this week. She doesn’t want any more of the Venthyr Anima collectibles, so she’s Done. She doesn’t need to clear the map of all the Anima WQs she’s willing to do anymore. She can rest and relax and be satisfied with 1000 Anima per week — half of it just from rescuing 20 souls from the Maw — until I’ve finished the other three Covenant campaigns and am ready to start playing the Ember Court.
I’ve been farming Anima so intensively with her for the past however many weeks that it’s being a bit hard to resist wanting to take her out to clear those Anima WQs, though…

Meanwhile, I’d given Kaurinka the task of acquiring all of the Night Fae backpieces that are available from various vendors. There are seven in all: one from the Wild Hunt, two from Marasmius, two from Renown, and two from the Court of Night. I’ve been slowly ramping up her Anima farming, and she’s now got five of the seven; she just needs the two from the Court of Night. When she’s got those, she’ll start saving up the 25K Anima to get the Winterborn recolor of her Covenant armor set from the Court of Night; the Renown recolor is my least favorite version of that set, whereas the Winterborn recolor might be my most favorite. I’d also eventually like to get the Renown recolors of the staff and harp, but perhaps Kaelyla can work on acquiring those. Anyhow, now that Kaelinda is Done, Kaurinka will have first dibs on going out to do WQs each day, and her Anima farming will go faster.

Well, I guess Kaelinda can’t completely take a break. She’ll want to keep running the Blood From Stone wing of Castle Nathria LFR until either the Stone Generals themselves or the Great Vault cough up the robe version of the chestpiece. And she does still have to go to Torghast a few more times to get through the questchains that will be required to unlock the Patch 9.1 content. At least once she’s done that, the rest of the crew will be able to skip that stuff!

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sklonklish in the Shadowlands

I first heard the word “sklonklish” in a movie starring teenage Shirley Temple that my family watched when my sisters and I were teenagers. It became part of my family’s lexicon immediately because it perfectly describes that feeling of being vaguely irritated and out-of-sorts with the world. It’s sort of like ennui, only with a bit more of a disgruntled edge.

~*~*~

Kaelinda and Kaurinka have each finally finished reinforcing the fourth stream for their Anima Conductor; since I don’t intend to upgrade the Anima Conductor to stage 3, I am now Done with it, which is something of a relief. With my remaining three characters, I’m thinking that I’ll just do stage 1 of the Anima Conductor and just reinforce the stream to the Treasure, since that’s the activity that I have done the most consistently with the first two.
The Travel Network is likely to be the only Sanctum feature that all five characters will fully upgrade.

Kaelinda reached Exalted with Bastion last week. She kept grinding away at Maldraxxus, trying to do one or two WQs in Maldraxxus each day. This week’s WQ rep buff, plus a string of Maldraxxus Callings, allowed me to finally finish that off, too. Phew! I intensely dislike Maldraxxus as an environment, so now I can mostly ignore Maldraxxus with everyone except Kalaneia (my designated Necrolords character)*.

I have also been actively farming Anima with Kaelinda. I don’t try to clear the map of Anima-rewarding WQs, but I’ll often do as many of the available ones as I find tolerable to do. She has gotten both of the Venthyr Renown backpieces and has been spending Anima as fast as she gets enough of it on acquiring the rest of the Renown recolor of the Venthyr Covenant armor set, after which she will be Done with Covenant collectibles (at least until Patch 9.1). She needs 11000 more Anima to accomplish this goal.

I’ve been pushing hard to finish these reputation and collection goals because I’m wanting to just be Done with Kaelinda — to be able to put her/the Venthyr on the bench for awhile** and move on to the campaigns of the other three Covenants. I intend to do Night Fae first, then Kyrian, then Necrolords.

Since the news from the Patch 9.1 PTR is that the Korthia extension of the Covenant campaigns brings them all together right from the beginning, making them all essentially the same except with variations in the window dressing, I’m thinking that I want to get all of the 9.0 Covenant campaigns completed before I jump into the new Patch 9.1 content — even if that means that Patch 9.1 will have been out for quite some time before I finally get there.

Anyhow, the result of pushing rep and Anima with Kaelinda so hard recently is that I am feeling a bit burned out and can barely bring myself to do much of anything with Kaurinka (even though there is a lot more Night Fae stuff that I want than Venthyr stuff). As I’ve mentioned before, though, part of that feeling of burnout is spillover from RL right now. It’s the penultimate week of the semester, and I am feeling greater than usual end-of-semester weariness.

~*~*~

* Well, Keliora has to complete the House of Constructs storyline in Maldraxxus before she turns on Threads of Fate because saving Kyrians. But after that, Kalaneia will be the only person who has to be in Maldraxxus.

** I do want to play the Ember Court (and the Queen’s Conservatory) before Shadowlands ends, though. I’ve learned that if I don’t do an activity while the expansion it debuted in is current, I’m not going to come back to do it later (e.g., Deaths of Chromie). I can worry about gathering Anima for those upgrades, however, when I’m ready to actually do that content.

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