May is here!

It’s nice this month that Children’s Week is early enough in the month that doing Holiday activities will actually be a significant contributor to collecting my Trading Post currency for the month, rather than being things I do after I’ve finished it off just for the fun of it.

I’ve already picked up the Wanderer’s Snowy Trappings and the pretty High Priestess’s Ceremonial Drape. The Lost Crown of the Arcane was an immediate must-have, too, seeing as how it is a recolor of one of my all-time favorite Mail Tier helms, the Crown of Flame from Firelands. I have the Magenta Cloud Serpent frozen from last month. I could get it this month if I choose not to get the Trial of Valor cloth set recolor or the Stormheim Vrykul leather set recolor. Knowing that stuff I’ve passed on will eventually come around again makes me feel less fretful about that decision.

As far as Children’s Week goes — I think I’ve done both the Classic and Cataclysm versions for both factions (because I seem to remember noticing the differences the first time I did the new versions); I’ve done the Burning Crusade quests for both factions; I’ve done both of the Wrath of the Lich King neutral options; but I was feeling burned out on Holidays during Battle for Azeroth and haven’t done the newest Children’s Week quests yet. So to do Children’s Week activities for the Trading Post, I guess I’ll start with the Zandalari and Kul Tiran orphans; to get the most out of that, I should go do them with characters who need XP, maybe my Druid and Human Mage. Then I think Kaelinda ought to go take Salandria to see her future self, and I haven’t quite decided which orphan to choose to round out the four for the Trading Post activity. My six characters who are doing the Wrath Dalaran fishing dailies in hopes of getting a Battered Jungle Hat have all chosen orphans to accompany them, to make the Trading Post activity for turning in dailies while accompanied by an orphan very easy to complete.

Here are my plans for Patch 10.1 tomorrow: BTH has an obligation on Tuesday nights, so while he’s out, I’ll log onto his account with his alt who is in my me-myself-and-I guild and invite my Void Elf Mage and my Dracthyr (who is Alliance to keep my Characters page more neatly organized :P) into the guild. I managed to finish up the lore questline in the Forbidden Reach (which I always want to call the Forgotten Reach, a name which is equally appropriate) in the past couple of weeks. I’ll probably do the first quests to go into Zaralek Cavern and fly around picking up all the new Dragonriding glyphs — and then I’ll set it aside for awhile. I’m still working on Dragonscale Expedition and Valdrakken Accord Renown and haven’t unlocked all of their 10.0 story content, and I think I’d like to complete that before I do the Zaralek Cavern lore questline.

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Fishing for a Hat

I was rather excited about the new quiver & ammo pouch set for Hunters on the Trading Post this month. It was the first thing I purchased — or maybe the second, after the evening gloves 😛
Then I went to put together a new outfit for my Hunter, and the Stylin’ Adventure Hat just wasn’t quite what I wanted. The hat I wanted was the Battered Jungle Hat.
I thought for sure I’d already acquired a Battered Jungle Hat at some point with all the various times I’ve done Marcia Chase’s Fishing dailies for one purpose or another. I looked in my Guild bank, and I looked in the banks of all the characters I thought were most likely to have it, and I just couldn’t find the darn thing.
So now I have six characters — Tauren Hunter, Warrior, Paladin, Priest, Monk, and Death Knight — hearthed to the Ledgerdemain Lounge in Wrath Dalaran, diligently doing Northrend Fishing dailies as my first priority activity in Azeroth each day.

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Sunday on the Promenade 180: Things my characters are wearing with the Darkmoon Harlequin’s Bells

Based on how quickly I finished up the Traveler’s Log last month, I was going to let the Traveler’s Log points accrue as they would this month, until it occurred to me that I’d want to take pictures with this months’ Ultimate item at the Darkmoon Faire while it was still in session. So I pushed a little bit to get it done this week.

Kamalia et alia passed its 13th blogiversary this week. After I reached the 10th one, I stopped paying attention to when my blogiversary would be coming up and have been a bit surprised each year when I get the “happy anniversary!” notification from WordPress.

The Titans’ Fool





Darkmoon Harlequin’s Bells with Pink Party Hat, Cloak of the Darkmoon Faire, Aluneth (hidden, tint 1)/Staff of Dominance/Blade of Savagery + Omega Orb*/Depraved Ritualist’s Kris + Dreamseeker Dandelion/Groady Goblin Wand + Night Courtier’s Lyre/Torch of Austen + Mistyreed Torch
As I don’t like masks in general, I’ve chosen the most utterly obvious — and fortunately also at least somewhat coordinating — alternate hat. If there was a version of the Fae Revel Masque in some kind of gold tone, it would be a brilliant choice to wear with the Harlequin’s Bells, but alas, the purplish-silver just doesn’t quite work.

I’ve shown here weapon suggestions for all the weapon types a Mage can use; there are of course other great options for each weapon type. I’ve also shown my favorite option for a staff that one not fortunate enough to be a Mage could use.

If you simply must wear the set hat, the Felsoul Staff complements the style and has Darkmoon Faire-appropriate colors.

Harlequin’s Hoard



Darkmoon Harlequin’s Bells with Demonic Gladiator’s Leather Helm, Trusty Treasure Trove, Demonic Gladiator’s Leather Slippers, Surgeon’s Needle and Rolfsen’s Ripper
I couldn’t decide which of these fancy daggers I liked better with this ensemble, so I used them both!

Darkmoon Trickshot




Darkmoon Harlequin’s Bells with Bronze-Tinted Sunglasses, Gauntlets of the Dragonslayer, Dragonstalker’s Greaves, and Thas’dorah (upgraded, tint 1)
Getting most of these screenshots was more like “lucky” shots than “trick” shots — I don’t think I could capture any of those exact frames of the animation again if I was trying for them.

Darkmoon Chuckler


Darkmoon Harlequin’s Bells with The Horseman’s Horrific Hood, Cloak of the Darkmoon Faire, and Darkmoon Hammer
This was just too good of a combo to pass up. Keija probably won’t wear it long before insisting on something else, though.

And of course I couldn’t resist playing mix-and-match with Harlequin x Sprite Darter and Harlequin x Fireplume, though as you’ll notice, these are all Dressing Room pictures — I didn’t actually commit to Mogging any of these combinations.
Which one is your favorite?

Meanwhile, Kaelinda dinged 70 without having done more than a few regular storyline quests. She got XP from gathering, First Crafts, profession quests, and the occasional World Quest. She’ll still do the main storyline quests anyway, for the Mog appearances and so that she’ll have the restored Oathstones available as Mog photoshoot locations. Anyway, now she can wear the full Tailored Surveyor’s set,

augmented with the Crimson Combatant’s Wildercloth Tunic, Starfire Tiara*, and Neltharian Channeler’s Rod.

~*~*~
This series of posts began because I set myself a goal to document new Transmogrification outfits in a more timely fashion. As soon as I create a new outfit, I write it up in a draft post. As the weekend approaches, I start working on taking fashion screenshots, processing them, and updating “Things my [Class] Wears” posts. On Sunday — though not every Sunday — I publish the collection of my recent efforts. Then I begin the next “Sunday on the Promenade” draft post.

Occasionally, I have ideas for themed Transmogrification collections that take several months to completely assemble. Thus, some of these outfits might get re-posted at a later date as part of such a themed Transmogrification collection.

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A Romantic Ohn’ahran Picnic

Crown of Boundless Courage, White Traditional Hanbok, Rosy Corsage, Mindsear Shanker, Aegis of the Vindicator
Even though I can’t get Trader’s Tender for doing this anymore, it was too charming of an idea to not do anyway.

Happy celebrations, however you choose to observe the day!

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Gliding through the Dragon Isles

Well, that was easy.
Even with spending a couple of days away from Azeroth while I attended an academic conference last weekend, I still got the Trading Post all done in the first week.

I did go a little out of my way to /love the Dragon Aspects in Valdrakken and /love things at the Trading Post itself — but even if I hadn’t done those things, I’d have picked up the final reward for the month in another week-ish just from going about the activities that I ordinarily do in the game. I think it’s probably tuned about right. I like that there’s such a good variety of things to do that can contribute to getting Trading Post points; that really helps it feel like a reward for just doing whatever you’d be doing anyway — with nudges to do one or two things that are off-routine, just for fun. Having all four of my mains in Valdrakken doing this and that definitely helped the Trading Post go fairly quickly; they all contributed something to it. I approve of the extent to which it is, in fact, an account-wide progression system. I’ve delegated one of my alts who is chilling in Orgrimmar anyway to hang out at the Trading Post and be in charge of picking up currency from the chest and buying things with it.

I’d put the Swashbuckling Buccaneer’s Slops, which are 650, on layaway. I kept being tempted by the Shattered Voidspire seeing it being carried by casters all over Valdrakken. Thinking that it was 750, I thought that maybe I would put it on layaway and just buy the pirate clothes. Then when I went to look again, the Shattered Voidspire was actually just 500, so I decided to just get it. I still have a little over 1100 to carry over to next month.

A downside of the Trading Post being account-wide, however, is that I did have to tell my 5-year-old quite sternly that he is NOT allowed to buy things from the Trading Post. I don’t want him spending all my Trader’s Tender on stuff I don’t want, so that I end up being unable to afford something that I want very much!*

~*~*~

Kamalia is at 12/11/14/13 with the Major Factions and 5/6 with Wrathion.
I am really liking how Reputation-Renown — and Reputation in general — is working in Dragonflight. I am so glad that it is linear — the same increment from one rank to the next — rather than exponential — twice as much work to get to the next rank as it was to get to the previous one.
My other three co-mains have been leveling from gathering, first crafts, and the occasional World Quest with surprising speed; I do want to do at least the Main Storylines again with each of them (I liked them that much!), but I’m getting a bit concerned that I might ding 70 before I manage to set aside the time for serious questing! Kaelinda is level 65** and 2/2/3/2; Kaelyla is level 65 and 1/1/1/3; and Kaurinka is level 64 and 3/1/3/2.

~*~*~

*He plays on my account and has filled up all the remaining character slots with a revolving door of Zandalari Trolls, Darkspear Trolls, Nightborne, Vulpera, Allied Race Death Knights, Demon Hunters, and Dracthyr (I went to un-delete a toon the other day and was astonished at the number of deleted Dracthyr on that realm). Several times, I’ve considered the idea of RAFing an account for my son so that I can get the Renowned Explorer’s transmog set, but I haven’t quite yet been able to bring myself to do what would essentially be paying $180 for a Mog, and so he plays on my account.

**Well, actually, they’d all gotten to level 61 or 62 already doing stuff in Shadowlands by the time I got them out to the Dragon Isles. And yes, though I’d been saying that I was afraid that if I moved on to Dragonflight, I’d never go back and finish my unfinished business in Shadowlands, a couple of things happened. One, Kaelinda completed her Kyrian Cosmetics shopping list, so she wasn’t feeling tied to doing Shadowlands WQs and dailies for Anima anymore. Two, Kaelyla started working on the Kyrian Campaign and almost immediately got stuck on the Spires of Ascension dungeon quest. She was already too high level to LFG queue for it, so she was going to have to level to 70, then come back and see if she could solo it on Normal.

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first Trading Post purchases

The Trading Post is here! Hooray for new Cosmetics! Hooray for new pink stuff just in time for Love is in the Air!
So here’s what I got:

I like the scarf and intact cloak of the Wanderer’s Trappings better than the hood and tattered cloak of the Vagabond’s Threads. I look forward to picking up more colors of these items as the year rolls along.
I dithered for some time over the Swashbuckling Buccaneer’s Slops. I like the shirt-chestpiece as a not-quite-as-cool alternative to the shirt-chestpiece of the Recruit-A-Friend reward Renowned Explorer’s Attire; I’m not as excited about the rest of the set *shrug*. Although I have enough of the currency to purchase it now, I decided to freeze it so that if there’s something that costs a tremendous amount available next month that I want more (such as a recolor of the Black Dragonscale Backpack), I’ll have enough currency to get that, and if there’s not, I can still get this.

I am pleased to see that the acquisition of the currency does seem to be truly account-wide. I meandered into a Centaur Grand Hunt while I was out herbing with Kaurinka, and then when I looked at the Trading Post list of things to do with Kamalia at little later in the evening, she saw 1/2 Grand Hunts completed.

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