Cassandri in level 70 gear, current gear and future transmogrification set

I must be the last player to catch the news that Blizzard intend to bring transmogrification to World of Warcraft.

While I’ve not really been playing much (cough – not at all – cough) I have kept on top of my feed reader. I’ve been reading about World of Warcraft. I’m sure I’ve skim read at least 10 posts that mention “transmogrification”. And I just kept thinking that:

I’m going to transmorg my latest pair of gloves!

actually meant

I’m going to crudely turn the blue polygons on my latest pair of gloves into a greenish snot colour instead

Hardly inspiring stuff! But that’s not what Lathere promised me at all. I popped over for some tea, cake and baby cuddles (not necessarily in that order) last Friday.

“I’m surprised you’re not mad keen on the whole transmorg thing… I thought you would be jumping at the chance to wear your Frozen Shadoweave set again. But, technically, still have your latest gear on.”

I was outraged. You can do that?! Nobody told me you could change the armor model to something else entirely!

I didn’t even wait to go home. I logged in from Lath’s place. Unfortunately I then remembered why I’ve accomplished so little in the game since reaching level 85. I don’t really know anything about the game anymore. I don’t understand what people are talking about in General chat (although I’m fairly sure that BOT doesn’t stand for Botanica anymore). And I don’t know the people in my guild.

I guess I should be grateful that I’m still in a guild! This continually surprises me – whenever I do log in the first thing I do is hit “j” to check that I am in a guild. Ok, that’s a lie. The first thing I do is hit “o” and then after a bit of confusion I hit “c” and then I remember that the Guild stuff is its own window and has its own shortcut now. That’s when I hit “j”.

I have weird stuff in my bags. I don’t know if Dragon Flank is worth keeping, selling or auctioning. And it’s a million little uncertainties like this that paralyze me. I have to think hard to determine if Eternal Earth are from Cataclysm or Wrath of the Lich King (Wrath, I determined). Frankly all my game knowledge, one expansion to the next, has kind of muddled together into a great big grey cloud that’s almost impossible to get really, useful, data out of.

I wandered around Stormwind for a little bit. I tried to seek help from a city guard but they didn’t seem to be able to point me in the right direction. I walked up to The Cathedral to say “hello” to my priestly trainers. They were very keen to scrub my mind clean but they didn’t seem to know anything about transmogrification.

Like a noob I did those Stormwind call ins on horseback… because I keep forgetting that you can fly inside a city these says. /sigh.

I didn’t really want to ask strangers (guild members or otherwise) where to go to begin the magic of transmogrification so I just skipped straight over and headed to the bank – AKA Cassandri’s Wardrobe – to try on a few outfits.

If I can wear anything, what do I want to wear?

The single most stupid decision that I have ever made in game, and I’ve made some doozies, was disenchanting my Shadow’s Embrace set in favour of extra bag space when I was level 71.

Thought process at the time: I’ll never need this again.

Stupid Cass! After finishing off The Insane at level 80 I planned to recraft the set for sentimental reasons.

But did I just think about doing it or did I actually do it? Well it turns out that I did a bit of both. Nearly all the materials were there in my bank bag – including 20 shadowcloth and 20 primal waters.

I spent Saturday night grinding some extra Primal Shadow on Void Ridge in Hellfire Pennisula. This was a job that I could comfortably do. I knew where to go. I even remembered the approximate drop rate of Mote of Shadow.

It didn’t pass my notice that I was, essentially, trying to live in the virtual past. I’m not proud of that. I should be jumping head first into Cataclysm content. At the very least I should have queued for a Cataclysm heroic while I grinded BC materials in a BC zone. Why didn’t I try and get a group to check out the Zul’Aman heroics? A part of me is interested to see if Harrison Jones still comes to open the doors and how else ZA has changed.

I didn’t even take my guild mate’s offer (since some people I knew had logged in as I was heading out of  Shattrath - and on that point I cannot remember which characters are Scryer and which are Aldor supporters – argh) to be summoned in to meet Ragnaros the New Raid Boss.

While I was grinding BC style I was confronted with the fact that I no longer know how to play Cassandri. I dithered over whether or not to Mind Sear. I remember reading something about it channeling off friendly targets. Did I also read something about it killing the mob you cast off?

My Shadowy Apparitions were bugging the hell out of me. I don’t want to think of the number of times I thought “what’s is that th?- oh that’s right”. My action keys were lighting up like a shopping center at Christmas time. Since when does a Shadow Priest proc so many other spells?! It’s quite Mage-like. Although, to be fair, perhaps it’s very Wrath Mage-like and Mages are something else altogether now.

To make a very long story short: I got my mats. I flew out to Shadowmoon Valley and crafted the last pieces of Shadowcloth (no cooldown on Shadowcloth creation now) and was soon enough in possession of all 3 pieces of Shadows Embrace. Bound to me on Equip.

Only to find out that the Transmogrification feature has only been announced by Blizzard. It’s not going to be implemented in game until some future, oh god let it be soon, patch.

Not to worry! Now I’ve got a bit of time to track down the matching belt and helm. And then I need to pick out, or find, some awesome looking staff. Because even though I’ve always preferred the dagger/mace+offhand combination, a staff certainly looks more impressive.

Would it be wrong to mix generations? Benediction (60) with Shadow’s Embrace (70)? Probably.

So… anyone for Magtheridon’s Lair? Epic cloth gloves LOCKED.

Shadow's Embrace AKA Frozen Shadoweave armor

Tier 7 is the first tier set that I have collected in World of Warcraft… and I’m getting hooked on the whole matching set thing.

The other day a Paladin in Stormwind was walking around (yes walking, not running) wearing one of the classic armor sets. At first I thought a strange NPC had somehow broken loose from the throne room to visit the Trade District. I’m sorry I can’t be specific about which armor set they had equipped as I saw them on my brother’s screen while he was playing.

It made me miss my first armor set: the Frozen Shadoweave tailoring set. To this day I think it’s one of the most beautiful armor sets in the game (followed closely by the Tier 5 Priest set) and it’s doesn’t even require you to raid to acquire it.

The Frozen Shadoweave set lasted me all the way through the Burning Crusade and I never took a piece of Tier 4 or 5 gear as a result. Unfortunately I wasn’t raiding far enough into Mount Hyjal or Black Temple to collect the Tier 6 set.

With the release of Wrath I took a couple of screen captures of Cassandri’s gear and disenchanted my items as I replaced them in Northrend. Oh how I regret that now. Bag space be damned!

Here is a brief gallery/history of the Priest Armor sets, mostly Tier raiding sets, in World of Warcraft for your reference (and mine). I love them all.

Priest Armor Sets (Tiers 1-8, Dungeons 1 & 2, Frozen Shadoweave)

Please note that the links below are to the damage (Shadow) versions of the armor sets from Tier 4-Tier 8. Healing equivalents exist and you can find them all listed here on the one page.

Classic
Dungeon Set 1: Devout (Scholomance, Stratholm, Blackrock instances)
Dungeon Set 2: Virtuous (upgrade from set 1)
Tier 1: Prophecy (Molten Core)
Tier 2: Transcendence (Blackwing Lair/Onyxia/Molten Core)
Tier 3: Faith (Naxxramas in Classic)

Burning Crusade
Frozen Shadoweave (tailoring)
Tier 4: Incarnate (Karazhan/Gruuls/Magtheridon)
Tier 5: Avatar (Serpentshrine/Tempest Keep)
Tier 6: Absolution (Black Temple/Mount Hyjal/Sunwell)

Wrath of the Lich King
Tier 7: Faith (Naxxramas in Wrath/Obsidian Sanctum)
Tier 8: Santification (Ulduar)

I’m contemplating crafting the Frozen Shadoweave Robe, Shoulders, Boots and the Battlecast Hood all over again. The Primal Mights and Ebonweave cooldowns might dissuade me though.