The Miracle Worker

This week I'm working on opening my 50th paragon box from the Nightborne, and I'm not holding my breath expecting it to contain a flying carpet. Instead, I was thinking about the first time I saw my Withered troops do this ^. I thought I was doing such a great job of teaching them that they had learned chain lightning like proper Shamans-in-training. I was so proud! Then I unlocked Withered training with my Warlock and got to the point that they were using spells, and, lo and behold, they still cast chain lightning. Oops.

Although maybe I can take credit for this? I have no idea where they learned to line up like this, I've never seen it before.

The best recent event, though, marks the end of visiting Argus for any reason ever again. I finally got Blistermaw's mount! The "Found after 6 attempts!" is adorable, I just love losing my addons and starting all over again fresh. Of course, it would be better if it could erase the memories of the first 40-50 attempts in my mind so I could be surprised and delighted, too. Although delight is a bit much, this mount is ugly as sin and really only worth having for the count.

Cozy Camprire

 

Rares in Darkshore pop up so quickly the corpses don't even fade out before they reappear. I thought I'd sit and pose for pictures while I waited, but when I checked my screenshots I saw that I'd caught Gren Tornfur mid-respawn, and apparently his eyes are first to arrive. So ominous!

I only have one mount left to get in Darkshore, all the toys, and multiples of the pets. I'm still farming the tokens, through, and probably will be for a long time. I've bought the toy, pet, and cheaper mount, but 750 medals for the bat will take quite a while. 

I've also been taking advantage of the 100% rep buff to grind paragon boxes with the Nightfallen. During the last Darkmoon Faire I opened two paragon boxes in a day and one the next day. No carpet. I'm up to 45 attempts but I keep reminding myself that at least I don't have to wait for a holiday to have a shot at the mount. Eventurally I will have the mount and I will never, ever, ever, ever, EVER return to Suramar again.

Small Wins

 I like farming rares and Honorbound Service Medals now that I can solo them for the most part. I am always happy when someone jumps in on the ones with million+ health, though. It's nice to get little drops (pets, toys, the occasional mount) fairly often and breaks up the more tedious grinds. I was happy to get the bear in Darkshore this week! Although I'm a bit disappointed his mount special isn't a little dance. At least I'll always have my Darkmoon Faire bear.

 I got the donkey in Arathi last week, and I was pretty pleased with that, too, although I still prefer my bouncy alpaca for ground travel. 

But the biggest surprise this week happened while I was working the Kirin Tor emissary for my Nightborne rep token. I always do whatever Kirin Tor quests are in Suramar so that I get Nightborne rep as well, and this time the only quest was the Arcway dungeon quest. I've run it dozens of times any time it comes up during Nightborne/Kirin Tor emissary weeks and I'm pretty used to clearing it and vendoring all the drops at the end (or dropping Jeeves if my bag management was poor that week). 

But this time, I was surprised to get a Tome of Hex: Spider. Even though I didn't anticipate using it instead of the Compy one I already have, I was still amazed to actually get something new in an expansion-old dungeon during the endless slog for the Nightborne flying carpet. And I will never get tired of hexxed mobs-now-critters wielding tiny spears menacingly.

 

 

Toys on Parade

I've been farming the toys/pets/mounts each week in Arathi Highlands/Darkshore, but this is my favorite so far. I was bored waiting on a rare in Mechagon and discovered that the ogre head stacks with other costumes while going through the toy box. The green tint is from the irradiated shirt Rocksy's wearing. There's a pet to collect from it, but the shirt goes away and I'm kind of fond of the green so I haven't done it yet.

And it was also fun to use on my Druid while I waited for the Uldum alpaca.

Ivory Cloud Serpent Pink Pain-in-the-Neck

I mean, I like that it's pink. But, holy shit, is this mount ever not worth the trouble. I should have kept better track of the amount of time I wasted on it, but at least after the last mogu invasion ended, followed by several days of Black Empire assaults and Mantid invasions, I thankfully was able to get it this cycle instead of waiting days just to sit around and wait for hours.

This is a screenshot from a group I was in last night. No, it doesn't get that dark in Pandaria at night, but I used an Inky Black Potion to see if the Ivory Cloud Serpent would show up better against this background. "Does it?" I don't know! I waited below the worm's range, planning to join the others when the serpent spawned, but I saw them yelling in chat during one of my breaks from spamming the macro, and I never even saw it! Haha, so fun. By the time I joined them (within seconds, as I didn't have any worm debuff) it was already gone and they were congratulating each other on their new mount.
Today I had a different strategy: stay in the group gathering worm stench, keep spamming the macro, and just hope the spawn point is within range of someone in the party.

Incidentally, I never did see the worm this time, either. My addon announced it, I clicked the macro and waited for it to channel, noticed it wasn't channeling and panicked, then saw the mount was already in my bags. I'm guessing someone else lassoed it and everyone in the party got it? I don't know. I'm still kind of mystified by the whole thing. This guide linked on Wowhead was useful, but I do definitely recommend joining a group. I've been in groups twice now where most* people got the mount.

*Wah, wah, wah.

Hey, Ivory Cloud Serpent*

 Spawn right here for me,

Worm stench is stacked, there's no way I'll catch up to you,

 Hey, Ivory Cloud Serpent, won't you spawn for me,

When the Mogu are invading, I'll be waiting for you

Just let me get close to you, within the lasso's range,

Don't let your spawn point change,

My patience soon will wane,

It's driving me insane,

I don't know why I want this mount I'll never use.

I wish the lasso hadn't dropped, 

this chore's not a "reward".

But I'll do it 'cause I'm bored,

And it frees one bag space more, 

I want this to be over with.

Hey, Ivory Cloud Serpent, c'mon and spawn for me,

When the Mogu are invading, I'll be waiting for you.

*Not pictured. Obviously. But isn't this Great Worm From Beyond with a freaking ivory stripe down the side just a punch in the gut?

If you need the tune: Mr. Tambourine Man, Bob Dylan

Da Ba Dee Da Ba Daa

I got the Void-Touched Souvenir Totem in a chest from running a Horrific Vision of Orgrimmar. I'm a fan of any critter-related toy, and the first place I thought of to try it out was the patch of hillside in Thunder Bluff with oddly violent critters running around.

Pros:

1.  Works anywhere. So many Pandaria toys were nerfed to be usable only in Pandaria, so I was really glad that I didn't have to use this only in the Heart Chamber, or something stupid like that. I'll have to try this in Pandaria, though, so I can use the Panflute and see if the void-blue critter becomes my minion for ten minutes.
2. Makes regular sized critters larger and combative. 

Cons:

1.  30-minute cooldown is a bummer, particularly for setting up screenshots. The cooldown wait could be mitigated by making the totem effect last longer and/or increasing the area affected, especially given the critter's pathing swath can be large and difficult to predict for totem placement. 
2. The large violent critters in Thunder Bluff don't seem to increase in size from the totem (beyond their enraged growth, that is), as far as I can tell.