This Is How I Mog (April, '12 edition)

I played with the idea of making some very specific mog-sets in the past, and have had the luck of getting a few drops that let me finish my sets. These might not look incredibly creative but I like complete sets and I think a good way to set the look of a full-set apart is, as my friend Maara said, to accent it with a couple of off-set items that compliment the themes. It's a very good way to distinguish the uniqueness of your character, I think.

Given that, here are my sets that I'm using now, and will likely use until either I get bored of them (unlikely) or Pandaria (very likely).

ARMOR OF RADIANT GLORY
This to me is the best paladin tanking set in game right now. The white and gray accents are lovely, they match well, the feathered shoulders are delicate but evocative, and with a good tabard, you can hide the hideous plate-belly-shirt. Of course, snagging Holy feet and belt to complete the look is important and you can luckily buy both of them from Valor vendors along with almost all the other pieces. So, if you can win the Shoulders the rest of the set can be purchased with Valor making this an easy 'mog to put together and yet I almost never see people in it.

The accents here are the weapons. The sword is Honor's Call which comes from being Exalted with Honor Hold in Hellfire Penninsula (many thanks to Maara for suggesting the sword.) The shield is the current Season Conquest PvP shield (which I splurged on despite the fact that I don't play Holy-PvP). Here are all the pieces I'm using. Oh, and no helm, no cloak.

Slot	Item
Shoulder	Shoulderguards of Radiant Glory
Chest	Chestguard of Radiant Glory
Tabard	Argent Crusader's Tabard
Hands	Handguards of Radiant Glory
Belt	Dragonfracture Belt
Pants	Legguards of Radiant Glory
Boots	Pillarfoot Greaves
Sword	Honor's Call
Shield	Cataclysmic Gladiator's Redoubt

ARMOR OF VINDICATION

If the objective of PvP armor is to make you feel like a bad-ass while giving your class as aggressive a look a look without descending into farce and brutality, then this set manages the look hands down. Even the helm is awesome! However, the belt is a bit under-whelming so I'm using an off-set belt which matches it quite nicely. Also, I don't have the feet quite yet as I can't splurge on Transmog gear just yet, but I will have the matching feet by the time the set is finished.

However - the sword is what takes this set over the top. Ashkandi has always looked good but it seems to just match this set in a way I can't describe - the colors accent well, the scale and size of it just brilliantly reflects the kind of sheer power and burst Paladins can bring to bear, while being majestic and graceful - it never seems brutal. If it could reflect a subtle, smoking enchantment of some sort, it could be perfect. No cloak, no helm. Pure awesome.

Slot	Item
Shoulder	Cataclysmic Gladiator's Scaled Shoulders
Chest	Cataclysmic Gladiator's Scaled Chestpiece
Hands	Cataclysmic Gladiator's Scaled Gauntlets
Belt	Cataclysmic Gladiator's Girdle of Prowess
Pants	Cataclysmic Gladiator's Scaled Legguards
Boots	Cataclysmic Gladiator's Greaves of Alacrity (Shown: Cataclysmic Gladiator's Warboots of Cruelty)
Sword	Ashkandi, Greatsword of the Brotherhood

Various and Sundry

Bah-humbug.

Deathwing, after six-odd weeks of kills, has dropped two rogue axes, not once, not twice, but multiple times.  In addition to the agility polearm and the bow for a raid with no main-spec ferals or any hunters, Deathwing can go DIAF. I'm tired of disenchanting the same goddamned things while pining for a Souldrinker and the rest of the raid is still using crappy 397 gear week after week.

In fact, the loot-tables have been just miserable. I don't think we've seen more than one or two healer trinkets drop and other than Resolve of the Undying (which drops every week like clockwork) we have seen no Tanking trinkets. I could also complain about the fact that this week we saw 4/5 tier token drop for the Hunter/Warrior/Shaman set which we have none of, but that would be just the icing on the cake.

Bah. Normal mode Dragon Soul has gotten super-boring at this point, as we're mostly finished with all of the achievements as well, except for the Gunship and Madness ones. At least we started working on Heroic bosses finally, which has been incredibly gratifying. We're also nearly finished with the Firelands meta achievement, which I'm eager to put behind us, and we're maybe three weeks from finishing the legendary. And then I never have to do Firelands again!


You know what would actually be kind of fun? Going back to T11 and doing the hard Heroics there. These Heroics are still a hold-over of the super-hard T11 tuning and they didn't really nerf this content so I'm kind of hungry to go see it. Heroic Yor'sahj kicked our ass for a while this week though, so working on the current tier isn't a bad thing either, for me.

Other than that, and some mid-level Arena, and occasionally playing my Death Knight, I really haven't had a whole lot to do in game. I wound up almost emptying my bank last night to buy a relatively cheap Deathcharger (60k) and immediately liquidated some assets on the AH overnight to get back up to 35k, so maybe I'll play the AH for a few weeks.

Mostly, I'm working on some off-line writing and programming projects, and I'm excited for MoP to start so we can leave Cataclysm behind for good. I did pay for the year-long subscription, but I likely won't be logging into Beta as I hate spoiling myself, or having to do all that work twice on the same character. I might log in to test the class changes and talent tree stuff and so forth, but I won't do any leveling or dig into the new zones at all.

As far as when to expect the game, my crystal-ball gazing has revealed the following to me:

Alpha: This month
Beta: Mid-April
Release: Mid-August

Unless I'm very wrong and my Insider Source(tm) has been misinformed.

And finally, have you guys seen the new Paladin tree? It's pretty interesting and I want to chew it over and write a full post about it. And for those of you freaking out about Ardent Defender missing from the talents, it has been made a base-line ability under protection. Relax.

New Season Shenanigans

I swapped back to Innana to PvP with for this season and it is a massive culture shock.

Warlock PvP is all about control, very strict oversight of the field, making sure at least one of the opponents is being juggled and dotting everything up. While being focused so you're continuously self-healing and kiting as much as you can.

Palading PvP especially in 2's with a Rogue melee-cleave is all about burst. The longest fight we had was maybe 45 seconds last night. The number of stuns and interrupts the rogue has, plus my interrupt and stun, and the amount of burst I can dump within the first 20 or 30 seconds of a fight is just absolutely crushing at very low levels. I'm sure it'll even out very quickly as we get another week or two of gear in, but still, it was very shocking to go from such a nuanced play-style to essentially a burst-fest with occasional Stun/Hammer/Repentance/Blind chains on the healer.

Cleared an 8/0 win streak in less than an hour.

I do still want to PvP on my warlock, but I'll probably do more Battlegrounds and maybe see if I can sneak into a 3's team. Like a dummy I completely failed to realize I could have been gathering Conquest last week so I'm short, essentially, an item. Ah, well. It'll even out in the long run.

I also managed to find someone last week in Trade who had the tanking wrists pattern and had them crafted, and my Warlock bought the boots for Innana, while she picked up the Relic and Cloak as I can't get either of those upgrades from the raid. With the tier legs and shoulders I picked up two weeks ago, my gear is looking pretty good and I'm seriously starting to get into a situation where my gems are starting to slowly shift into the blue spectrum.

I'm considering actually re-gemming for full-out mastery just so I can swap out one of my mastery trinkets for a stamina trinket, but I kind of like having a sort-of DPS trinket on hand to get a bit of extra damage in (and a minute bit of parry as well) on demand. I don't know.

I'm excited for a 3-day raid week. I want a new title already, damn-it.

Paladin Transmog Sets - Part 2

Right now I'm sporting a mixture of the first set I made, with a different shield than the one I showed there. Mostly because Human Female model covers her entire face with the shield and it's not a lot of fun. Also, I quite like the model's face so I'm actually not using the helm right now.

Anyway, once I do start to build up some Tier 13 gear, I'll be switching to a more contemporary look. However, there are some issues I have with the full Paladin set. Mostly with the fact that it brings back the bare midriff. Ugh.

Thankfully, we also happen to have an amazing PvP set this season, and with Conquest available through daily Random BGs at a reasonable pace, we can build what I think is a truly unique and inspirational, Paladin-y set.

I really like this set and I think this is what I'm going to be wearing till MoP comes out. The added benefit is that you can get a LOT of this gear without ever having to set foot into the raid. The only thing you'll need from the raid are the shoulders. Almost everything else is purchasable with Conquest or Valor.

The Shoulders, Hands and Legs are all Paladin Tier 13 gear, but, you can also buy the off-set pieces from the Valor vendor, or get the off-set healer pieces from the raid. I'll have to wind up buying or getting the healer Belt and Boots somehow myself. The Conquest sword and shield are absolutely amazing. Some of the best art that has come into the game in a long time. They're beautiful, but functional, and they are absolutely on-mark for Paladins.

The chest, sword and shield are all from Conquest gear. I'll be doing Arenas on Innana this season, so I expect to be able to get the weapon and shield fairly easily, however, I won't be doing it as Protection so it'll be a bit of a point-sink just for aesthetics. But oh, so worth it. Look at those gear - just absolutely lovely and perfect for a Light-wielding warrior. The cloak is actually a throw-back to ICC, and is purchasable with Justice for cheap. I like the colors as they synchronize well with the blue in the shield.

If you're a fan of helmets, I would recommend you forgo the winged Tier helm and actually grab the PvP conquest helm as well - it fits in quite nicely with the rest of the set and actually makes you look a bit like an avenging and wrathful angel of some sort straight out of the Old Testament.

Here are the individual items in detail and a link to the base set for you to start messing with.

Gloves: Handguards of Radiant Glory (Valor alternative: )
Leges: Legguards of Radiant Glory (Valor alternative: )
Shoulders: Shoulderguards of Radiant Glory
Chest: Cataclysmic Gladiator's Ornamented Chestguard (Conquest)
Belt: Blinding Girdle of Truth (Valor)
Boots: Silver Sabatons of Fury (Valor)
Sword: Cataclysmic Gladiator's Slicer (Conquest)
Shield: Cataclysmic Gladiator's Barrier (Conquest)
Cloak: Sentinel's Winter Cloak (Justice)

Helm: Cataclysmic Gladiator's Ornamented Headcover (Conquest)

If you are still dedicated to using the Tier chest, you can always sport it with an undershirt to eliminate the midriff. It doesn't fit perfectly, but the result isn't terrible either. Lastly, you always have the option of using a good looking Tabard to cloak yourself - but if you do this, I'd recommend ditching the cloak. You have some pretty good options here, and the set is just lovely. I've linked alternate set pictures below so you can decide what works best for you.

With a Formal White Shirt.

With the Argent Crusader's Tabard, sans cloak.

I realize this set is expensive to make in terms of the time commitment required to get all the items, but I think it's worth it in the long run. It's one of the best looks I can imagine for a Paladin that's in the game right now. Enjoy!

Paladin Transmog Sets - Part 1

In case you weren't sure, I'm really, really, really excited for Transmogrify. I'm a stickler for the way gear looks, I want my character to look powerful, regal and heroic. I want her to be dressed as a sword-wielding shield-bashing name-taking blood-spilling holy warrior of the Light would dress. That is to say, not wearing plate bikinis and exposing a flat mid-riff in the hopes of distracting her enemies.

So I'm going to make a catalog of various sets I'm planning to use - I'm sure I'll swap between these as the mood and whim strikes. I'll start with my hands-down absolutely favorite, best remembered set from the last two years that I actually gained and used actively while playing that I haven't worn in close to a year - the Sanctified Lightsworn Plate. This is the set in it's unadulterated glory:

It certainly isn't bad on it's own,and it might be fine for healing, or even DPS but I think tanking sets just look better without a skirt. I adore paladin sets with with plate skirts, but I think functionally they work as ceremonial or for healing at best. And besides, can you imagine her being able to kite mobs in that skirt? I don't think so. The set itself is dramatic and striking, the visor is unique, the glow and effects and the details of the ribbon are lovely and I like the way it works even when you color shift it for some glamour shots.

So, taking the head and shoulders as a base, and relying exclusively on Icecrown gear, I build into this.

Paladin Transmogrify Set: Modified Sanctified Lightsworn Plate
(link to full set)

The set uses a lot of stuff you can easily purchase from Vendors or get crafted:

• Head: Lightsworn Faceguard (1100 JP)
• Shoulders: Lightsworn Shoulderguards (695 JP)
• Chest: Lightsworn Chestguard (1100 JP)
• Legs: Pillars of Might (crafted)
• Hands: Gauntlets of the Kraken (695 JP)
• Boots: Boots of Kingly Upheaval (crafted)
• Belt: Lich Killer's Lanyard (695 JP)
• Shield: Icecrown Glacial Wall. Drops from Blood Queen Lana'thel in 25s - alternately, you can buy an almost-look-alike from the legacy PvP gear vendor in SW/Org called Wrathful Gladiator's Redoubt for 190 Honor. It comes in 3 colors so you can find the one you like best. It's not as nice as the Glacial Wall but for being so easy to obtain it's absolutely a good substitute.

The only thing you might actually have to go hunting for is this:

• Weapon: The Facelifter. Drops from Professor Putricide in 10s - alternately, you can use the Soul Blade, a BoE sword from Bastion of Twilight that's fairly easily found and looks quite good.

Of course, I would have much rather used the purchased off-set Tanking chest piece, but it suffers from bare-midriff-itis. You can mitigate it with a black undershirt somewhat, but the colors and patterns don't quite match up. The caster belt helps transition between the warrior tier legs and the Paladin tier chest piece quite nicely. I don't use a cloak with it because it just looks much better without it.

UPDATE POST PATCH 4.3!!
It's one thing to plan an outfit and another to wear it. I found the shield and sword to just not be up to my standards in game, in terms of look and feel, and while it might work for you, the shield in particular was just too big and disguised my character's face far too much. I wound up using the Soul Blade and a vintage shield called Brutal Gladiator's Barrier that you can buy from the retro PvP vendor in Stormwind/Orgrimmar the same as the PvP shield I linked above for a small amount of Honor. Here's how I look in game right now:

Pretty snazzy, if I may say so myself!

Next time, I'll look at modifying Tier 13 to be even more bad-ass than it already is, by eliminating the bare-mid-riff and tweaking the look slightly with different weapons and cloaks.

Xariona? I hardly knew her.

Late Saturday night, I was farming on my warrior, my friend Thistle was committing mass genocide against Crocolisks to fill her Money Bin with gold, our resident Resto druid was leveling her fishing and our Shadow Priest was leveling his Death Knight in Deepholm.

It was a sleepy night, not much chatter going on, everyone was doing their own thing, as it was close to 2 AM. Suddenly the green chat lights up, "Rare in DH," says the Death Knight, "Get down here now!"