Breakfast Topic: Transmogrification means revenge
by Weston Arrowsmith 
Oct 9th 2011 at 8:00AM
We've all had this problem: that one piece of gear that never dropped when it was relevant, only to drop the first time you went back, and you were left going "Really? ... Really?!" Sure, you laugh it off, but you can't help but give the RNG gods the finger, can you?
When I started thinking about what gear I'd want to gather from transmogrification, the very first idea that came to me seemed so ... perfect. Back in The Burning Crusade, I had a huge bone to pick with the Beast Lord Armor. I had the legs, chest, and gloves, but the helm and shoulders refused to ever drop for me. I had to get the look-alike PVP shoulders just so I wasn't wearing greens anymore. I went back at level 80 to get some reputations to exalted, only for both pieces to drop on my first try. My friends on voice chat could hear the steam coming out of my ears!
Transmogrification has given me the will to go and collect that whole set all over again (with the matching belt and boots), and I am going to wear it with pride. I am going to show Blizzard that it doesn't roll the dice -- I do. I also think the armor set looks pretty badass, but that's a different matter.
Has transmogrification driven you to go and get that one piece (or more) of gear that never dropped back in the day? And why are you getting it? For looks? Closure? To beat that one boss down over and over for the hell it caused you back in the day?
Filed under: Breakfast Topics, Guest Posts
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Ad134 Oct 9th 2011 8:06AM
The Sonic Spear from Shadow Labs never dropped for my hunter... Ever. 2 years after BC was obsolete, it finally dropped while I was boosting someone... On my druid.
FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU
Knob Oct 9th 2011 8:24AM
I'm going to use a set that I haven't used ever, because I wasn't Alliance till a few weeks ago. So I'm going to go with the ridiculously awful looking green-coloured Lieutenant Commander's Pursuance level 60 PvP set (http://www.wowhead.com/itemset=550). Using this with the Rhok'delar level 60 hunter epic quest bow, which is also green-coloured. The hunter class colour is in any case green, so I'll be the greenest hunter ever! Everyone else will be green with envy! Right guys?......guys? :(
Mortenebra Oct 9th 2011 8:48AM
Apparently, the gear is greener on the other side!
Average Joe Oct 9th 2011 2:04PM
Be sure to tame Winna's Kitten too!
http://www.wowhead.com/npc=47687
TheDoomcookie Oct 9th 2011 2:47PM
Hey, someone else who is going to be a green hunter! Yay! I'm using T11 with Rhok'delar, Recovered Cloak of Frostheim, and the vanilla PvP polearm. It looks awesome while on my green razzashi raptor, with my green devilsaur and green raptor hatchling by my side. Oh how I love the color green!
Busta Oct 10th 2011 11:22AM
You 'green' hunters should go farm this as well:
http://www.wowhead.com/item=27877
I recently farmed one to go with my Rhok'delar as graphically they are an awesome combo!
valadarium Oct 9th 2011 8:25AM
Hehe.Yeah, I had that type of problem as well. Zul'aman, and the Hex Shrunken head. I don't know how many times we killed Hex Lord (we did ZA runs every reset when ZA came out, and I was always either on my mage, or very rarely my druid) while my mage was in the group, all I know is that that thing never dropped. But my resto druid, who only healed our runs maybe 10 times, saw 3. I was so annoyed with that boss.
Achtungg Oct 9th 2011 8:38AM
The only set I've kept intact all these years on shaman is the Tier 1 Earthfury set. I wish I still had the upgraded epic dungeon set Rolling Thunder, I think it was called.
Now I've been running BC dungeons and have all the pieces for the recolored D1 set (teal in color) & the recolored Tier 2 set:
Bellajtok Oct 9th 2011 8:46AM
Actually, no. All the items I have a history with are staves, and I'm using a mace and off-hand these days.
Funkysocks Oct 9th 2011 8:47AM
I was tanking on my DK back in wrath. I remember using bracers from ulduar all through Lich king patch. I had noted where the good tanking bracers dropped, and me and my guild have cleared icc weekly for months or something. Sure i was replacing slots constantly for better and better items. When I found myself with very decent gear fom 25-man and heroic 10-man, i looked at my bracers and wondered... ilevel 213?
We cleared out ICC when we were 85 for kicks long before transmogrification came about.
I looked in my bags after all the loot had randomly been greeded and stuff. And found tanking bracers, good ones. I muttered in anger:
"Really? REALLY?!?! Entire expansion with rubbish and now it drops when i have no need for it EVER? SERIOUSLY? "
guildmate asked with a smirk on his face: "u mad bro". I replied in a manner not suited for this comment that i was in fact very mad
Revnah Oct 9th 2011 8:50AM
Maybe this isn't a good time to mention that my hunter has full Beast Lord from "back in the day", hehe. Shame really that I don't play her anymore because that might be one character I'd like to use transmogrification with! :-)
Mortenebra Oct 9th 2011 8:54AM
It's funny because I think the situation is opposite now. We're going back and doing all of these raids on our alts-- who, otherwise, probably would just be collecting dust on a shelf-- and stuff that we would have liked to drop for our characters in one run will drop on the next run when we're on different characters!!
But it IS a lot of fun going back to stomp on bosses who used to give us proverbial Hell back in the day. I'm looking at you, Nightbane, with your insane summoning quest.
HappyTreeDance Oct 9th 2011 9:25AM
The loot that I've mostly had issues with dropping are things like necks or trinkets, so sadly there will be no transmog revenge for me.
What I WILL get revenge on is the fact that ret pallies never have matching belts and boots. No more will only holy pallies get to have the full look!
....now if I only had the boots that match t9...
Kelanar Oct 9th 2011 9:34AM
Back in BC my guild ran kara every week and I only saw the light's justice drop one time. Lost the roll to my fellow healer hearing "Next drop is yours" and "It will drop again!". It never did. We did a nostalgia run one day, during wrath, the hammer finally decided to drop. I took it and put it in my bank as a trophy. So I am super stoked to finally be "using" it.:)
Amanda A. Oct 9th 2011 9:41AM
I'm having the opposite problem.
I have two versions of a holy paladin engineer, one on a PvE server and one on a RP server. The first time I healed a succesful ToC on the PvE 'copy' I won an awesome gear mace off Anub'arak. Perfect for an engineeradin, and the only place you can get that model is in ToC raids.
Nearly two years later, it refuses to drop for my RP paladin. And half the time I can't even get a group together because no one likes ToC. (And getting plate from ToC5, some that my DK owned and vendored once he started running the ICC 5s because I didn't realize it was a set? When it's not really soloable without jousting flawlessly for over an hour and no one likes jousting? /cry)
Artificial Oct 9th 2011 9:52AM
No doubt anything I really want will never drop, too. I really wish it was possible to earn rewards in WoW through work and skill, but for the most part, the best rewards are unavailable that way. The only thing you actually earn is a lottery ticket, and it's entirely up to luck whether you ever get the things you want most.
LynMars Oct 9th 2011 10:20AM
I await the day the system is robust enough to note who's in the party and what specs they have (active and possibly inactive) in order to distribute loot based on who was there when a boss went down. Still a bit of RNG, but more based on requiring the teamwork and skills of the players working on it.
DarkWalker Oct 9th 2011 9:57AM
Nope. I don't fight the RNG, not even to look the way I want. I only go after anything in the game if there is close to no RNG element involved at all. I want gameplay that challenges my skill, not my luck and patience.
I would look for either a discreet set of PvP gear (i.e., no loot drop RNG involved at all), a set of crafted gear (again, no RNG), or a set of low level BOE gear that is so plentiful that I can get it on the cheap by just stalking the AH for a week or so (very minimum RNG involved).
One thing is certain: until Blizzard drastically changes how they do their tier gear, I will never again sport a non-transmogrified version of them. I have disliked every single set of tier gear, for all classes, since, at least, BC.
(Warning: rant ahead)
Besides, I'm really considering definitely jumping ship to a MMO that limits how much the RNG can hamper the player (I'm looking at an upcoming one with individual, per-player loot, so there is no loot rolls at all; and where every piece of gear that can drop from "raids" seems to be available for the same currency that drop from boss kills, so there's a limit to how many times I need to run a piece of content in order to get every loot piece).
In the end, for gear drops, I'm almost RNG phobic. Contrary to most players, I don't feel excitement when a new piece of gear drops; I feel only relief that I won't have to farm for it. Plus, I tend to remember the big dry spells in gear drops way more intently than the moment I finally get the gear. I don't remember how I got the tanking neck from Marrowgar, I don't even remember if it was a PUG or a guild run; I just remember that the blasted thing took a few months to drop, and this memory came to the front every time I noticed the blasted thing on my character sheet. This went to the point I started refusing to read or discuss loot tables (the Marrowgar neck reference was me actually breaking my own rule, unfortunately, since it made me hate that thing).
If I actually enjoyed WoW's PvP, I would have dropped out of raiding a long time ago, exclusively due to the random drops. This is how much I dislike RNG in my gearing.
tiwuno Oct 9th 2011 10:10AM
Back in TBC days I led a Karazhan raid group every weak on my nelf rogue. We had that place on farm eventually, yet in the 30+ times that we cleared it, I never once saw Drape of the Dark Reavers drop from Shade of Aran. I'm going back to get my cloak and get some sweet, sweet revenge.
LynMars Oct 9th 2011 10:27AM
Just before I joined my current raid group at the end of BC, they were at the point in Kara where the raid lead would get someone to trigger (and potentially die given how it worked then) the Opera event to see if it was the Big Bad Wolf. If so, no matter what alt or role he was playing, he'd swap out to his hunter for a chance at the rifle. It never dropped in the many, many runs they did (they were a mostly 10 man group even then, so Kara and original-flavor ZA were it except for occasional Mag'theridon and Gruul runs with friends).
We rolled through Kara for some new players and transmog stuff a few weeks ago, and his joy over the rifle FINALLY dropping was shared by everyone else (we all made fake rolls for the rifle and joked about giving it to the actual high roller, of course).