You know you're cool when your clothes match...

From the beginning of the game, we get various 'sets' of clothing - some that don't have similar names, but were designed in such a way that they match. Undoubtedly this was done on purpose because no one likes looking like a hobo.

Except hobos.

However, at various times, in our quest to get better gear and upgrade ourselves, we wind up looking like we're either 1: seriously fashion deficient, 2: color blind or 3: both.

When Blizzard introduced the dressing room, we suddenly had a takeoff of a small subset of people who wouldn't wear things if they didn't make them look cool, despite any upgrades to stats they may get, unless they were actively in a dungeon or some other 'need the stats' activity.

People had always carried around (or had available) a 'town' outfit, probably a practice far more prevalent in RP servers than in nonRP servers. I myself did this, and fostered this for my guild, as a tailor who could make the Black Mageweave set (hello, sexy/slut!) for guild members, I was in high demand! I personally usually had my characters dressed in a robe of some sort, since to my eyes, they look better than slutwear! Which is not to say that I didn't enjoy slutwear myself, but at the same time... I'm trying to look respectable here! Or there. I was the co-guild leader and it was beneath me to look anything less than respectable!

Boon, the paladin, had a full set of something that made him look like a knight in shining armor. Everyone in the guild had a 'guild meeting' outfit that they wore specifically for any guild meeting, no matter what for. If you recall, I mentioned that my guild had its guild meetings RP style, in the world, at a set location, and with everything typed out.

It was a load of fun. People would farm for hours (or days!) for the mats to make their 'formal' gear. They had to look GOOD.

There were some outfits that weren't BoP that I would loan out to people who didn't have time to farm their own outfit, like the wedding dresses that are sold in Moonglade, I don't recall the actual name, hanbok? something like that. And of course, now there are the specific holiday related outfits and there's just so much fun clothing!

In my mind though, nothing looks so good as when you have REAL clothes that match. A full set of Hallowed Gear, or Voidheart, or whatever. 1: you match! Yay! 2: you kick ass! 3: c'mon, you get a thrill out of seeing yourself on your character select screen all matchy and kickassy. Admit it. You can't hide it from yourself!

We're a visual people. We like things that LOOK pretty to our eyes, be it a girl toon for a male player (the oft heard excuse: If I'm going to be staring at this thing for hours, it can at least look pretty!) or a matching set of gear, it says something immediately to us.

For those gear pieces that are obvious, where you can just look and not have to inspect to KNOW what they're wearing -- or at least (in the case of lookalike gear) the QUALITY of gear, everyone wearing the gear gets a big burst of pride. (C'mon, admit it. You take pride in being kickass and pretty.)

Anyway, last night I went and practically beggared myself by buying the primals to make 1: 4 bolts of primal mooncloth (2 tailors, 1 mooncloth tailor) and 2: 1 primal mooncloth belt.

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(Okay, I'm not really beggared. I'm just not as rich as I normally am. I have 6 level 70's that are constantly questing, instancing and doing stuff. While I don't have enough to just buy myself an epic flying mount, neither do I usually have problems buying the Earthwarden off the cuff or loaning a guildy enough gold to get their regular flying mount.)

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My priest, Kiljara, had a level 68 green healing belt on previously. So this is, obviously, a big upgrade for her. Yay for tailoring!

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Kathe finally went and did Arc. It was cake. I'm working slowly on those SMV quest lines -- namely because I am doing them with two slackers! -- to get some more tanky gear for her.

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Kikidas is still merely awesome. (I haven't talked about my 'main' for a while. So here I go.)

Now, everyone obviously picks their spec particulars because they think either 1: it's the best or 2: their guild says 'change or we kill you.'. However, IMNSHO, there are a few things that every warlock SHOULD have and SHOULD do if they raid.

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A warlock in a raid serves a few very particular purposes.

1: soulstone

2: healthstone

3: banish duty/charm duty

4: improved imp bloodpact

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1: A soulstone is for use at the discretion of either your raid leader or your class leader. Who it gets put on. The person who has it put on also isn't at their discretion to use USUALLY. It's always polite to ask 'Should I use it?' before you go and do that, with some few exceptions. When it isn't a wipe saver (ie: Maiden) or when something is almost dead and just a few more heals is the difference between living/downing the mob and everyone dying for no reason. Sometimes a SS is put not on a wipe-saver but with multiple warlocks, on the person most likely to die and by dying have a big negative impact on the group. (#1 DPSer, tank, healer)

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2: Healthstones are important. I don't think I need to say too much about this. Don't forget to prompt your raid members for more, because they'll forget to ask.

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3: If you don't have a focus macro for banish and/or charm, GET ONE. If you're a warlock in a raid, then your primary function is DPS WHILE CCing. Not CC then DPS. Not DPS then CC. Both. At the same time. You're a warlock. Multi-task. A focus macro allows you to not have to switch targets back and forth between your CC target and your DPS target. (This applies to mages and druids, too!)

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(On a side note, any repeat-CC class can do this (unsure about hunters, but I'm sure there's something.), sheep, shackle, charm, banish, cyclone, hibernate...)

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I don't know the numbers, but your DPS is going to drop like a rock if you have to anticipate your target breaking, turn to find it, click it, then recast (or wait for banish to cool down before you recast). Alternatively, your CC target will run amok if you try to eke out the last few DPS you can before you re-CC.

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With a focus macro and a timer, you keep DPSing on your main target, you notice to yourself 'Seduce is ending in 3 seconds.', you finish your shadowbolt cast, you click your seduce focus macro, and then you go back to DPSing. No fuss. No muss. No more than a millisecond of time spent CCing.

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With banish, you do lose a little bit of time, but that's unavoidable. To avoid any break in your banish, let your timer click to 2, THEN macro. Banish is a 1.5s cast. It SHOULD hit just as your previous banish wears off. But still no fuss, no muss. No target running over and one-shotting the healer while you try to re-target it. The banish focus macro that is on WoWWiki has a modifier that lets you switch between rank 1 and rank 2 banishes, which is useful so you don't waste time waiting for the rank 2 banish to wear off when you know they're getting ready to switch to your mob. Incidentally, you do have to try to switch between rank 1 and rank 2 banishes during a certain boss fight in ZA, so it's useful to get used to how to switch between the two.

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4: This is an EXTRA 70 stamina your tanks can have. Not doing that is like a priest saying 'Sorry, I don't do fort buffs.'. Unless there are multiple warlocks in the group that can keep this buff on the tank group, you as the warlock don't get another option unless you need your succubus for CC or some other vitally important minion job. If you have another warlock keeping bloodpact on the tank, then go ahead and sacrifice if you're demon-spec, or DPS with it or whatever else you want to do with it. But if you're the one and only warlock in the raid group, then you keep that imp out. You keep him phased out, and if you're going to be positioned away from the main tank, you park him where the tanks will be standing.

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(In Gruul's lair, a warlock will be asked to park their minion by the mage-tank for the extra hit points.)

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The raid leader SHOULD say to any warlock that doesn't have their imp out 'Hey, will you get out your imp, please.', even if it doesn't have improved bloodpact, it's still more hit points for the tanks.

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IMNSHO.