Screenshot Saturday February 7, 2026

Welcome to another edition of Screenshot Saturday.  I've been trying to get more screenies but, some of my play time is spent on a shiny new laptop that won't play nice with screenshots, and it's a bit cumbersome to get them.  Even so!

 

Endeavors

Imagine my surprise when my Horde BE got a series of weekly Endeavor quests in her neighborhood!  I've only ever seen the Architect Riddles in the Alliance neighborhood.  I can find only the smallest mention of these, saying that they go with having the Valdrakken Accord as your monthly assigned Endeavor theme.   In case they make these available more widely (as they should), here are the Weeklies in Razorwind.

 

Alternative Skinning 

 

Farm To Table

 

Reverse Herb Farming

 

Magical Touch

 

Smelting For Two 

 

On the Alliance side, I filled my Endeavor bar for the month completely.  This is supposed to open up more options from the vendor.  I didn't see anything new.  I do believe on the right you should be able to see who contributed to the neighborhood Endeavors, but it's all Atherne and her Warband.  Go team warband!

 

 I got a community endeavors chest reward that had coupons and something else I didn't pay attention to.  Zzzzzzz.

 Also, I think we earned some lights adorning the town center for our efforts (me and me and me).

 

Mechagon is the assigned Endeavor theme for my public Alliance neighborhood.  I swapped my Gnome Warrior Engineer in to finish up the questing there, and I just can't get her to leave.  I hated Mechagon so much when it was originally offered I only sent one character there.  It should have been my Engineer, clearly.  I'm going to let her try to complete everything before Midnight arrives.

 

 

Hunter Love

With my BE Hunter, I saw this adorable toad-like beast  called a Fussy Swoglet and wanted it.

 

 

 

It turns out, you need to get a special book in Valdrakken city from the Stablemaster to train a dragon pet (he doesn't look like a dragon to me).

 

No problems! The flight to Valdrakken is short, and with book in hand, I got my Swoglet. 

 

Despite my Transmog whine, I have been buying from the Trading Post anyway.  I have a thing for the guns for Hunters, which are often elaborately steampunk-ish in design.  How about this BAG?

 

  

Atheren's Gaming Goals for February 2026

 Here are my main goals for the month:

Prep for Midnight 

 

It's crunch time! March 2 the WoW world descends into darkness with the coming of Midnight.  Or so it would seem.  Can our heroes, with the supposed help of the Army of Light overcome Miss Twinkle Toes?

Level up!   

My Rapscallion Blood Elf.  I've got the Mysterious Winds buff plus the ongoing 25% xp for having 8 max level characters.  Eek will that go away in Midnight once there's a new level cap?  Yikes. Just thought of that.   My Blood Elf also wants to do Endeavors in her neighborhood but they haven't been available to her.  Maybe now she's out of the Burning Crusade Time Loop the neighborhood will be kind. There's a watering can   (10 coupons each) available on the Endeavors Vendor and a little garden trowel (5 coupons each) that I need for both of my houses.  I mean REALLY NEED.

 

 

I have replaced my squishy main Tailor/Enchanter who is a Mage in the Midnight Runners with a currently level 77 Warlock.  Need to get her to 80 in a trice.  Warlocks never really get nerfed, in my opinion, so she should be viable in the new expansion.

 

 

Gear Up!  

I have to get all the Midnight Runners through the new pre-patch gear up area of the Twilight Highlands.  My main is a druid and before the Squish she could easily handle five mobs at a time.  Now two or three have got her on the ropes.  I've only done one session with her in the Highlands though and zero gear dropped, plus two of the world quests seemed buggy.  I think these problems were addressed  in last weeks patch?

 

 

Continue hunting down tradeskill recipes and ingredients for decor with all of my crafters.  Hot tips:  Dark Runes drop from Corrin's Crossing Dark Casters and Vile Tutors while I got none in two Scholomance runs.  The Firelands Raid in Hyjal is, in fact, a simple place to get your Living Embers, and the only place you will find them.

In Before The Lock

 I always loved that phrase, from way back in my Forum Rat days.  Here is post ten for January, putting me on course for squeaking out ten posts a month this year.  Yay me.

I chose The Dragon Isles for my Blood Elf Paladin.  I felt a little guilty leaving the Ghostlands unfinished, but these feet were made for flying through the air.

 

 

Beloved Raptor Plushie and The Dark Portal Decor I Didn't Know I Needed

 My Tailor made a new Plushie for the House.  I had to gather and mill a fair few Dreamleafs to get Roseate Pigment with my Inscriptionist, and Prospect also quite a bit of Leystone Ore and Felslate Ore with my Jeweler, but ta da!

 

Here's the Raptor in his original size, next to the embiggened Elekk Plushie.
 

And here I set both plushies to their maximum size, which I think I will keep.

 

Free for owning Midnight and logging into the game, your own personal Dark Portal.  After sneering at my neighbor who had an ugly green round portal in his yard (of course I didn't actually sneer), I am going to rearrange my furniture and find a spot for this bad boy.  I didn't realize I was fond of the Dark Portal, but it pleases me to no end to have it.

 

World of Warcraft The State of Azeroth

 Thursday, a video feature was posted with Holly Longdale and Ion Hazzikostas  talking about where Wow has and where it's going. 

 

 

 

 

In addition to the usual roadmap layout, they talked about many new features coming to the game.   

Though I don't PvP, I think it's interesting they're introducing an AI powered PvP mode so you can learn the basics without being camped at the graveyard by real people. 

There's a new Delve type coming that's called Labyrinth (for now) that is huge and sprawling, as if it's numerous delves joined together.  You can do the various parts as suits you.

Also I don't raid, but there are a few Single Boss Raids in the works, which seems less torturous than the normal raids.   Noice.

They did also cover upcoming Mists of Pandaria and Anniversary realm events.  Something for everyone.

Housing of course slipped into the presentation a fair few times.  It's a fantastic feature and some players are truly doing incredible things already.  Give them more tools, and what will they imagine?

I liked the presentation, but, then I like the game and play most days.  Holly and Ion seemed genuinely happy and enthusiastic, which is a good thing. 

The Bloody Elf On The Shelf

 Half the battle of writing a post is getting just the right title.  I pondered quite a bit before that gem came up.

 You will recall I made this character to snare some of the new Blood Elf themed furnishings now available.  I haven't any at all, I don't think.

My plan to level her using dungeons on high pop Horde server Area 52 has not been a grand success.  She's level 28, which is perhaps a little higher than she would be if I had just quested with her.

The Blood Elf starter area is Sunstrider Isle, Eversong Woods and The Ghostlands.  It may be somewhat akin to Ammen Vale and Azuremyst Isle for the Draenai in size. It feels like it goes on forever.  I'm in the Ghostlands portion, and you can see how much more there is to do.

 

There's no flight here.  Also, it turns out, the whole area is in the Burning Crusade Time Period, not the Midnight era of the game.  The big gate you see on the map leads to the current era.   Additional timey wimey twistiness is that in order to get Classic Dungeons for my runs, I went to Orgrimmar and chose the Cataclysm timeline.   I don't believe I have gotten a single low level Classic era dungeon in my queues, as they time out and try for another era.   A trip to the Big Bad O for nothing.

I did travel there yet another time to get my house at level 11.  I went with the traditional Blood Elf style home. I've not done much with it because I have no money (though I took 2000 gold out of the warband bank to get her started), and also, I want to use this house to experiment with changing the structure of the inner house, trying to add stairwell rooms and such.  Simple is good, I can just stuff all my things away and then move walls and ceilings and doors around, constructing staircases from beams like the big boys and girls do.

 

I got a really nice plot looking out to sea again in the neighborhood. There aren't any close neighbors here either.  It's a good escape on a day when my girl may have gotten pounded into the ground by bad guys.

I'm unsure where I'll go once I finish the Ghostlands.  I was trying to think of an era of the game where there's a neutral hub so I can be in a city I'm familiar with. The three possibilities I came up with are Draenor, Legion, or Dragon Isles.   Dunno.

Wow Transmog: Back To Clown Town

 It's only been a recent thing for me to do much transmog.  Now that I like it, I'd send my character to the Transmogrifier after any session where they got new armor.

I knew changes were coming, and I initially had thought transmog would be free in Midnight.  So funny!

What they did instead, on the 27th of January, was remove the transmog you had on every single character.   No toon left unturned.

 Because Atherne has plenty of money, I fixed her appearances and took the shot.  The others, particularly my Mage....eeekkk.   For other characters as I've played them, I just went with the hidden helm appearance, and let the clowns flow.  Horrible. No fun.

 Here is a character who has no money to speak of.  34 Gold.  I had her upgrade a bunch of Dreanor Buildings so poof went her money.

How she looks now:

 

Using the Transmog interface, I put her outfit back the way it was before the transmogapocalypse  as best as I could. 

This would cost 492 g 55 s 90 c, unless I'm mistaken.   Additionally, she does not come with an outfit slot  though it looks as if she has two.  Nope, 200 gold for a slot.  Yup 34 gold...nearly 700 gold to get to where she was...

 

My hope is they back track from the system as it is now.   At some point soonish, they are planning to give every character one free transmog.   After that, I will do little transmog. Surely I won't buy anything more from the trading post, and any reward that is a transmog reward is as dust.

The Post Count Cheater

 

I’m back in fine post form with a goal of 100 posts for the year (this blog had 11 total in 2025).  My monthly goal is 10 posts each month, to slide into that 100 posts for the year with ease.  This is just for me, to keep my brain going, sort of.

If you’ve been reading this blog for awhile, you know I can be ruthless getting my post count goals in.  My “a post is a post” mantra gets me a long way when I’m crunching.  As always, I can philosophically fall back on two things:

I write this for myself and my imaginary audience (also me).

Nobody reads this %h*t, so it doesn’t matter at all.

To those of you who are definitely not nobodies, big hugs as always for stopping by.

This counts as one of the six I need for January.  Five more to come before day’s end on Saturday the 31^st.  Go go go!

Fan Out!

 

Housing has completely changed my strategies for playing the game.  Everything centers around how I can get all of the decor treasures available and upcoming everywhere.

 

No More Wow Classic For Me 

This was already in the cards. I started playing the Classic version of the game when it was offered because I was not in the game at the beginning.  The Classic "progression" servers are now up to Pandaria.  I had already largely slid back to the modern version of the game by the time this came out.  Pandaria is the first of the expansions where I actually had already done everything I was going to do in the expansion.  I did not need to re-play the Classic version.   Besides...

 

Fan Out! Cover Each of the Expansions with 7 Crafting Characters 

My new plan, my even better plan (Start the Revolution Without Me), is to play through every expansion with a set of seven characters who cover every tradeskill.  Note: I only need seven characters because I always combine Tailoring and Enchanting in one character. I've been going through my character lists and am assigning them to a particular time period.  Just as my "Midnight Runners" will move ahead into the Midnight Expansion, I have Draenor and Shadowlands (so far) characters who will do everything, and get every bit of reputation in those eras.  No possible decor source left unturned!  Well developed characters.  If you're going to relive former eras, get all the resources and rewards offered.  Share it with Warbandies.

Because I'm old school as well as new, I have four by six index cards for each expansion and the characters covering them.  For Example:

Shadowlands 

Alchemy L62 Monk

Inscription L33 Priest

Leatherworking  L28 Rogue

Engineering L28 Hunter

Jewelcraft  L 30 Shaman

Tailor/Enchant  L28 Warlock

Blacksmith  L49 Warrior

In this case, I tried to keep everyone near the same level. They aren't all on the same server, but again, via the magical Warband Bank, they can operate together.  I like that some characters who haven't gotten played for a long time will have a purpose.  

 For the Horde? 

Here's where you see just how far down the decor rabbit hole I've gone.  I created a Horde Blood Elf Death Knight  specifically for the upcoming really lovely Blood Elf furnishings that are on the way.

My plan for her was that I'd power level her via dungeons to level up. I gave her Herbalism and Mining.  She could go everywhere and grab any Horde specific things I might want.  Also lumber! (sidenote bizarrely the Horde Starter area lumber is Olembra Lumber which belongs to the Outlands expansion.)

I must briefly complain that as an Alliance player, I spent an inordinate amount of time lost in Orgrimmar (worst city layout ever), Lordaeron, and the vaunted Silvermoon City.  They don't want you to get in, they don't want you to get out.

I got her to level 21!  My highest Horde character ever.  Then I noticed I had stuck her on Scarlet Crusade where I have a set of characters I call my "Draenor girls".  They are all low level, so I actually briefly considered poofing them but they were too cute. 

Sadly, the DK died.  In her place, I created a Blood Elf Paladin.  I put her on Area 52 after looking up servers with large Horde populations as I wasn't getting any bites on dungeon finder on Scarlet Crusade most times.  She landed in the Blood Elf starter area, yay, which I have played through some of, a few times.  No tormenting Orgrimmar for her, until I have to go to find Chromie there to pick Catalcysm as a timeline for Classic era dungeons.  So much complication for a few tables and chairs!

 

House Poor

 

I've been in decor acquisition mode for about a month.  I stopped adding rooms.  All I do is hunt vendors, look for recipes, use my Draenor Herb gardens for Dyes (which I've made no dyes from yet, I'm just stockpiling), and I go all over to get needed Reputation to buy stuff.   All of a sudden, I noticed my main character had a rather alarmingly low (for her) amount of money.  I might have spent 25k with her alone buying decor and related items.  

So, I decided I needed to clear my quest log anyway, and I sent her to the Undermine, an area where I'd finished the main quest line and scooted, because the music made me buggy and the cartel blah blah annoyed me.   I've done every quest now (except the golf course one), did the delve, which I liked a lot, and have been World Questing for money, and you guessed it, decor!  Much of the decor is awarded from completing quests, some requires Reputation (working on it), and the price is in Resonance Crystals generally rather than gold.  Filling my pockets with all the things. 

I'm charmed by these flamingoes.

 

I don't know why, but I spent a great deal of time trying to catch enough Gold Fish to buy this insanely adorable bathtub.

There are three fishing bobbers I'm fishing my way to getting as well.  So. Cute.

 

I've been on a rather fiendish hunt lately for foods that I can place on my table.   I hate fish in real life but spent an inordinate amount of time getting the reputation, cooking skills and ingredients for the Boralus Style Lobster Platter.

 

This is my Mage, who had the highest Battle For Azeroth Cooking skill to begin with, so I could level her to get that recipe.   I spend quite a bit of time digging around in various character's banks for ingredients for old recipes.  Here's where being a sort of pack rat pays off, because almost always, someone somewhere has the goods.

 

I like my kitchen. It's cozy. After having had characters in various time periods and expansions starving for food, I just like for any of them to walk into the house and voila!  Food, food and more food.  Welcome home, babies.

 

 

Outside, I'm just getting screening between myself and my neighbors.  To my surprise, when I was taking screenshots, I saw my closest neighbor was gone!  Poof!  Sorry guy, but all that green glowy ugly stuff was an eyesore anyway.

 

I'm waiting for the housing upgrade coming soonish that will show you the border of your property so you can place and plan the space better.  In the meantime...

 

And per my spouse's request, here's the view out across the bay from my plot.

 

Beloved Elekk Plushie

 I have never collected toys in World of Warcraft, but love them in the real world. Now that I can have them in my virtual house, gimme the toys!  I enlarged the Plushie so it would show up better on my bed.

 

 

Midnight Runners

 

Welcome to the New Year!  Thanks to World of Warcraft's Housing Early Access, my plans for sitting out the Midnight Expansion altogether, or only sending my main through have changed. Everything has changed.  I completely see the game through the lens of my cozy house and what decor I can get for it.

 My all new plan, my even better plan, is to send one crafter of each tradeskill through so I can get any recipes and decor available in any way.  Except PvP and Raids, lol. Nope nope.

I have two Blacksmiths going, because one specializes in weapons and one in armor.   I'm replacing my highest level Tailor who is a Mage with a Warlock, and my Priest Jeweler with my shiny new Druid from Legion Remix.

The Jeweler and Tailor have some catching up to do, but they'll be fine. 

All the Midnight Runners are going through the Prologue.  I read today you can complete it in 30 minutes to an hour.  I'm still rolling on the floor laughing and it's so hard to type.

I've mentioned I struggle with Ka'resh.  The Prologue softens you up by giving you a painting almost right away near Dornogol, then they send you to Ka'resh!  Agghhh!  Even worse, there's a second part of the prologue that sends you the (insert bad word) Maw to find Sylvanas.

I have to say, compared to Xal'atath, Sylvanas is a purring smoothie who doesn't seem so bad.

My third character is doing the Prologue.  She's about to enter the Maw, which I can only take for small sessions.  Smaller than half an hour! 

Head down. We got this.