Fashion First

OK, since I can’t raid in a Naxx 10 until the reset I don’t have any new whining to do about my fire spec.

Time for a frivolous post!

As I have mentioned a few posts ago, Tier 7 is the first tier set I have collected. When I hit level 70 I was able to make my own Spellfire set and purchase the Spellstrike set. That was it. I was watching trade chat roll by with alluring invites to Karazhan and Sunwell and all these other mystical, magical places – but they were all badge runs. Meaning my lack of tier gear and my lack of experience with the fights would have quickly landed me back in Silvermoon City after being forcibly ejected from the raid.

Now I’m in a position where I am earning my tier pieces and so have been paying attention to news about upcoming sets.

I’ve been collecting my T7 pieces and have gone through almost a complete set of T7 and replaced it with T7.5. I still have a T7 chest in the bank, but have an off-set piece that is better. I’m not keen on the helm, but I like the rest of the set. Mixing and matching T7 (browns/reds/yellows) with T7.5 (blues/purples) was awkward, but now I’m rocking all the same pieces and I like it. Even if I can’t see my PANTS!!!

I’ve upgraded my belt since this shot, but it shows off my shoulders and gloves. Click here to see it with the helm.

The T7/T7.5 shoulders for a mage are awesome. They’re like crystalized power being extruded from the shoulders with little puffs of smoke wafting off of them. They glow without being too obnoxious. And the whole purple set is slick. It’s sort of a compromise between blue for frost, red for fire and matches the purple of arcane.

But one of the hazards of playing a caster class is all the jealous types razzing you for wearing a pretty “dress.” It’s a robe, mother fuckers, get it right.

So when T8/T8.5 was revealed, my heart was all a-twitter with the prospect of wearing PANTS!!!

Alas, I am not yet in a position to be regularly seeing T8 drop. Close… but I’m basically filler DPS for a progression guild since my guild hasn’t progressed past getting 7 people on at the same time.

Off to Threads of Fate to preview T8 and T8.5.

Oh, goodness.

Um. I can un-twitter my heart now.

I’ve seen a fellow mage in full T8. I only knew he was a mage because he blinked. I had at first mistaken him for a troll rogue in leather. Drab, boring, fugly, leather.

They kept the same color scheme, which is OK. But they made the parts in between the bits of color so… blech.

The helm is horrendous. I really have no interest in parading about town with the mark of the Kirin Tor emblazoned across my whole face. I don’t care if they are the Valorous/Conqueror’s Kirin Tor garbs. It’s still stupid.

The helm does have one plus:

Unimpeded view of the ponytail!

However, the shoulders are a massive joke. I feel like some sort of giant robot with little viewing ports on my shoulders for the little people inside to look out on the world as I blast off into space to do battle with other giant robots… with spikes. The T7 shoulders have spiky bits, nothing wrong with spiky bits. But the spikes on the T7 shoulders are crystals – that just “feels” mage-like. These are more like poison dart spiky bits protruding at an awkward angle. If I were to reach up and brush my raven locks back from my face, I might stick my own arm with the spiky bits.

Surely they will fix this travesty in 3.2 with T9!

Well… today I saw the finalized(?) shots. (Shamelessly taken from MMO Champion.)

Not too shabby!

I’m really digging the inclusion of the Horde insignia and I think it’s very cool that the Horde and Alliance get different sets (the Horde version – way better, FYI). It has sort of the gritty feel that they’ve been emphasizing in Northrend and the inclusion of the bits of metal and feathering/fur just adds more to the tribal feel of the Horde. The T7 set was very pretty, but this looks like something a battle mage would wear in the field, less fuss, less muss, more kick ass. I also appreciate the lack of voluminous sleeves on the chest piece – I like to see the gloves.

The use of orange is a little odd, as I normally associate that with warlocks, but it’s still a bitchin’ design. The shoulders are back to being appropriately pointy with raw power just wafting off.

I’m a little worried that the back of the helm will cut off the hair display. But I’m not thinking I’ll be displaying this helm. It’s sort of a cross between Silence of the Lambs and Shredder. If the ponytail shows, I *might* display helm. Maybe.

Overall though, a VAST improvement to the T8.

But what is this?

These are the priest and warlock designs…

They stole my tier gear! And the warlock is in my colors!

If the price I have to pay for looking different from the Alliance is looking the same as every other cloth caster in my faction, I want a refund!

Blizzard has stated time and time again that they are trying to avoid class homogenization. Well, Blizz, ya failed right here.

I was looking forward to my priest getting some cool shoulders with little wing-type additions or something else cool. Maybe a halo-looking helm… but now my priest and my mage are going to be twinsies to the color blind. One holds life and death in his hands, the other slings the raw forces of the elements about (or makes nummy strudel) and they are both going to look the same.

So I give the overall design an A-, but the implementation of having it shared across all the cloth-wearing characters an F.

I haven’t looked much at the other classes, how do you feel yours fared with the new designs?