Things I didn't notice in Draenor until flying

This is going to be an image heavy post.

The spires of light in Talador:

Crowds (relatively) at pet battles:

This elevator is not the Aldor Rise:

It's not actually that far from Frostfire to Nagrand:

I didn't have my view distance set on Ultra.  The clarity:

Alliance towns:

Seriously, these zones seem to be set up to route you completely away from the other faction's towns.  I couldn't tell you where most of them are.

The extent of the ogres in Nagrand:

(I think I quested there and I didn't realize just how big it was.)

The volcanic? peak over Hallvalor:

Holy crap, why did you give us Warspear, Bladespire looks frickin' awesome:

Hot damn, this place feels underused now.  Sorry, Bladespire.

Seriously, Bladespire:

Drov the Ruiner.  Sorry, Drov:

Oh, my God, the Foundry:

This is what it felt like to fly into Storm Peaks the first time and see all that Titan architecture.  This place is amazing, and we've been stuck down there not able to see the forest for the trees.

Trees in a steam vent:

Gorgrond isn't that much less confusing from the air, but at least the plants aren't trying to kill you up here:

Huh, I apparently had the music off and oh my God I know that music but why is it in flutes and not brass??


Well, this looks particularly uninviting from the air:

Huh, there's mountains up there:

Oh, they fel-broke the roof?

Huh, symbols inside the portal:

Okay, enough sight-seeing; time to level the druid:

Pet Battles of Tanaan

Over the past week or so, since I finished Draenor Pathfinder and don't feel compelled to do grindy stuff for reputation, I started working on the new boss battle pets in Tanaan.  These are all boss pets with a kind of nasty surprise - they all come with two additional pets.

Direflame

Many of these pet battles wouldn't be nearly as troublesome if you didn't have to deal with two buffed extra pets after knocking them out; the boss pet will cast Fel Corruption throughout the fight while they're up, and in addition to being a fairly hard hitting AOE (and making it hazardous to have mechanical pets in your lineup), it turns the backline pets on their side into minibosses for up to 10 rounds.

Most of these battles I was able to get through with some experimentation, though for a few I had to hit the WoWhead comments for ideas on pets to try.  It should be obvious from the chart that, although some of the commenters frequently push the Anklerender and the Emerald Proto-Whelp, I don't have the former leveled, and I only found the latter helpful once.  I also tried out suggested strategies involving forced pet swaps (to minimize the Fel Corruption), but those gave me no success.

Due to the back line pets, setting up a traditional "Howl Bomb" (Unborn Val'kyer/Pandaren Water Spirit/Chrominius) frequently meant that the Fel Corrupted pets would finish off the AOE-damaged remaining pets even if the boss pet was dropped.  Using 1.5-2 pets to get the boss pet down and cleaning up the remnants with the Anubisath Idol was ultimately more reliable.

Teams 

The numbers after the pet name are the ability slot choices - particularly with Chrominius and the Anubisath Idol, who saw heavy use, there are some fights where not swapping out an ability really hurt.

Pet	Slot 1	Slot 2	Slot 3
Bleakclaw	Chrominius 2 1 2	Disgusting Oozeling 1 1 1	Crimson Geode 1 2 2
Chaos Pup	Iron Starlette 1 2 1	Pandaren Water Spirit 1 2 2	Chrominius 1 1 2
Corrupted Thundertail	Pandaren Water Spirit 1 2 2	Chrominius 1 1 2	Emerald Proto-Whelp 2 2 2
Cursed Spirit	Tolai Hare 2 2 2	Mr. Wiggles 1 2 2	Anubisath Idol 1 2 2
Dark Gazer	Lil' Deathwing 1 2 2	Infinite Whelpling 1 1 1	Anubisath Idol 2 2 2
Defiled Earth	Dancing Water Skimmer 1 2 2	Magical Crawdad 2 2 2	Anubisath Idol 1 2 2
Direflame	Garden Frog 1 2 1	Dark Phoenix Hatchling 2 1 2	Crimson Geode 1 2 2
Dreadwalker	Fel Flame 1 1 1	Infinite Whelpling 1 1 1	Anubisath Idol 1 2 2
Felfly	Chrominius 2 1 2	Disgusting Oozeling 1 1 1	Crimson Geode 1 2 2
Felsworn Sentry	Pandaren Water Spirit 1 2 2	Chrominius 1 1 2	Anubisath Idol 1 2 2
Mirecroak	Crow 2 2 2	Chrominius 1 1 2	Anubisath Idol 1 2 2
Netherfist	Unborn Val'kyr 2 2 2	Ghostly Skull 1 1 1	Anubisath Idol 1 2 2
Skrillix	Pandaren Water Spirit 1 2 2	Chrominius 1 1 2	Anubisath Idol 2 2 1
Tainted Maulclaw	Sprite Darter Hatchling 1 2 2	Darkmoon Hatchling 1 2 2	Anubisath Idol 1 2 1
Vile Blood of Draenor	Infinite Whelpling 1 1 1	Anubisath Idol 2 2 2	Crimson Geode 1 2 2

Pet List

Anubisath Idol: The Anubisath Idol saw heavy use in Tanaan, making it into the lineup for 10 of the 15 battles.  Sandstorm is the big boon here - the damage reduction and its humanoid healing allow it to survive the Fel Corruption-buffed backline pets.

Chrominius: Chrominius makes it into 7 of the teams in Tanaan, although in one he was a barely-used third pet.  He is frequently paired with the Pandaren Water Spirit for the "Howl Bomb," buffing the Whirlpool/Geyser combination, but for the two flying pets, he can simply Howl + Surge of Power to one-shot them.

Crimson Geode: The Crimson Geode makes it into four of these fights, not so much for the boss pets but because it's a strong candidate for cleaning up flying pet adds.

Crow: Crow makes one appearance in Tanaan, using the Call Darkness/Nocturnal Strike combo on Mirecroak.

Dancing Water Skimmer: The Dancing Water Skimmer was brought in to handle the Defiled Earth.

Dark Phoenix Hatchling: The Rebirth ability helped make the Direflame fight doable for the team I was using.

Darkmoon Hatchling: There are other pets with the Predatory Strike ability, but the Darkmoon Hatchling is a Critter, which is less susceptible to Fel Corruption, so it survived on the backline to be brought in as a finisher on the Tainted Maulclaw.

Disgusting Oozeling: The Disgusting Oozeling was put into two lineups in case Chrominius couldn't for some reason handle the flying boss pets, but it turned out to be handy for cleaning up the back lines for them, since Fel-Corruption-empowered pets make fast work of a recharging Chrominius.

Emerald Proto-Whelp: The Emerald Proto-Whelp only turned out to be useful for me for cleaning up the Corrupted Thundertail's back line pets.

Fel Flame: Fel Flame was a trial pet in a lot of battles, but it only ended up on the final team for Dreadwalker - albeit as a starter, not on the bench.

Garden Frog: Garden Frog softened up Direflame enough for the phoenix to finish off - and the crowd control from the Frog Kiss didn't hurt to keep down the Fel Corruption casts.

Ghostly Skull: Bob was brought in for Netherfist; Ghostly Bite is lovely for how hard it hits, even with the boss damage reduction.

Infinite Whelpling: The Infinite Whelpling made it onto three teams; with its mixed bag of abilities, it's useful both on magic and mechanical pet bosses.  The heal doesn't hurt, either.

Iron Starlette: Iron Starlette was one of the suggestions I got from the WoWhead comments; the Chaos Pup was giving me fits, and it turned out to be the mechanical for the job.

Lil' Deathwing: Dark Gazer was Lil' Deathwing's first appearance on a pet team for me.  He is the hardest hitting dragon I've got, and many team combinations went down to this fight before he joined the team.

Magical Crawdad: Magical Crawdad is another pet you see touted a lot, and it can be quite good in some lineups, but for me it only helped with Defiled Earth.

Mr. Wiggles:  Mr. Wiggles was brought in, as he not infrequently is, for an undead fight, the Cursed Spirit.  Being a critter, he could take the Fel Corruption on the back line better, and he hit especially hard following up the rabbit.

Pandaren Water Spirit:  The Pandaren Water Spirit made it onto 4 teams, most often as a truncated version of the "Howl Bomb," i.e., with no leading Val'kyr.

Sprite Darter Hatchling: The Sprite Darter Hatchling was brought in for Life Exchange versus the Tainted Maul Claw; it helped set up for Predatory Strike from the Darkmoon Hatchling.

Tolai Hare: The hare, like almost all the rabbits, can be wicked against undead pets, and it made the team for the Cursed Spirit as an armor break before Mr. Wiggles.  Dodge and critter resistance to elemental damage didn't hurt.

Unborn Val'kyr: The Unborn Val'kyr made it onto only one team, versus Netherfist.

Alternate Teams

I'll update as I find additional combinations that work.

Direflame: Jungle Darter, Pebble, Crimson Geode
 

Spires of Arak

I love Spires of Arak.  It is far and away my favorite thing zone-wise of all of Draenor: the ambiance, the story lines, the puzzles.

You get introduced to the stories in Spires through two routes: aiding the Arakkoa, and helping out at Pinchwhistle Gearworks, where attempts to start an outpost have gone awry.  Along the way you meet various members of the Arakkoa Outcasts, find out what Wrathion has been up to in Draenor up to this point (not-spoiler spoiler: no good), and fight more plant zombies like you ran into in Gorgrond.

Into the woods to help my bird buddies...

I like the Arakkoa story here the best, but the two kind of side-plots with Pinchwhistle and Admiral Taylor's garrison are both engaging as well (and the former will land you the Salvage Yard plans).  Ultimately this is where my alts have been hitting 100, working towards getting Talonpriest Ishaal, their Salvage Yards, and Admiral Taylor's sword (where applicable).

The Arakkoa Outcasts have had a difficult time, basically on the losing side of an Arakkoa civil war.  They've fled from the spires in the sun down into the shadows, and you both help them against the Laughing Skull, who are hunting them, and against the Arakkoa who still live in the glory of the sun above, following Terokk's story as you do.  Depending on how well this Draenor's Arakkoa parallel our own, this story line helps flesh out the bits we got in Terokkar Forest in our broken Draenor.

Spires in the sun...

... banished to the shadows.

I vastly prefer getting around this zone grounded compared to Nagrand, and despite the rope puzzles making my palms sweat, I also appreciate most of the puzzle rewards here more - the archaeology fragments, the various items at Terokk's shrines.

Bear-okay puzzles

Bear-not-okay puzzles

Arakkoa are interesting; those following Rukhmar have sun and air magic, and they also make much use of wing-blades.  The Arakkoa Outcasts make heavy use of shadow and illusion magic - sort of the flipside of Rukhmar's followers.  They are closer to Anzu, the raven god, and Terokk, their former king.  Prior to Spires I didn't understand why people wanted to play Arakkoa, but now that I've got Ishaal and Kurekk hanging out in my garrison, and Reshad and Percy visiting?

I don't know that I want to play one myself, but I wish they were a bigger faction back in our home timeline.

In the meantime, I've retired Bloodsail Admiral for awhile.

Post-Blackrock Foundry

Yeah, yeah, 6.2 hasn't dropped yet.  But Blackhand's dead, and my guild is taking an unofficial raiding break.

So what am I doing in WoW right now?

Leveling alts.  I had done my warrior and priest with the intention of having tank and heal alts available for fives, alt raids, LFR, etc., but realized that with treasure hunters I might be able to get the yak.  So my death knight got bumped up when it got slow, and my rogue is a fresh 100.  The weird thing is that I'm doing the melee first.  They aggravate the arthritis in my hand with their keybind-heavy set-ups, but the DK just kind of mowed through stuff, and my rogue, with stealth, can skip a lot of stuff (I've been doing this with her since Vanilla, really).  I really like Spires of Arak and have been basically heirloom and potioning my way to it and then more or less doing the quest achievement for the zone.  You get your salvage yards done like that.  I've hardly touched Nagrand other than on Duskhawk and some barn farming.

Missions.  I love the missions, although I kind of wish our mission table were in Warspear, so I spent more time around people I'm not in charge of.  I also wish Nazgrim were running it.  Siege of Orgrimmar left some holes in our NPC ranks. :(  But yeah, the  missions are edging me closer to a yak.

Crafting.  I realized I had over a thousand hexweave bolts; I upgraded my main's bags and kind of have some space again.  I feel bad when I load up my barn on my priest because I always feel kind of useless in a group farming wolves, but she's disc/holy.

Occasionally - apexis dailies when they align with the two reputations I still need to finish.  I'm nowhere near done with the Frostwolf and Laughing Skull reputations, so when those dailies come up, I buy the extra apexis dailies from my sergeant and hit them up with my bird-buddy Ishaal.

Even more occasionally - hitting up old dungeons or raids where I need mounts.  I still need the mount off Deathwing to finish out the drake achievement.

All in all I'm still playing, and enjoying, the game, but I'm not doing some of the things I did previously; I haven't farmed out the archaeology items yet, and I haven't been regularly hitting up the pet tamers.  Both of those feel too time consuming on ground mounts.  We'll see how Tanaan is for non-raid content once 6.2 drops.

Favorite Garrison Followers

I have 73 followers on Duskhawk.  Every week I go to the inn and get a new one, currently favoring Treasure Hunter followers because I'm still working towards that yak.  Having as many as I do, I definitely have some favorites.  Here's my top seven:

Talonpriest Ishaal:  Ishaal is my best bird buddy, currently assigned to the barracks.  I really wish he could go everywhere with me, not just in Draenor.  I loved the Spires of Arak storyline for the Arakkoa, and I'm really glad I've got a couple of them hanging out with me now.

Lin Tenderpaw:  Lin was the first follower I got that was a pre-existing NPC back in our timeline.  I was so excited when she showed up!  I think I have rerolled her stats, since I don't recall her having come with mining.

Matoclaw:  I was even more excited to get Matoclaw than I was when Lin showed up.  Matoclaw is the druid who coordinated all the Azerothian side of the Molten Front!  She's pretty awesome, and I wish I could get her Warmaster Zog's job.

Aila Dourblade:  You're probably thinking, "Who is Aila Dourblade?"  I don't know, but she's a blood elf rogue with death knight hair, which is entirely the reason I picked her at the inn that week.  And she's subtlety, the best rogue spec!  Aila has helped bring in a crazy amount of resources for me with Scavenger.

Bim'ini:  Bim'ini is another Inn follower you've probably never heard of, but she's got an awesome transmog, Emerald Plate.  This transmog and Epic Mount have kept her in my active lineup of followers.

Soulbinder Tuulani:  I like having Tuulani around since she's a draenei and I'm playing Horde.  She's one of my active healers, ironically, since she's a shadow priest.  I'm still trying to get Treasure Hunter or Scavenger on her.

Talon Guard Kurekk:  Kurekk hangs out with me since I'm, you know, the Talon Queen.  Also he's an engineer, likes fast horses, and works well with orcs.  I think I probably rerolled him trying for Treasure Hunter, but Epic Mount was good enough.

Warlords of Draenor Shot Rotation

Okay, we're a bit into Warlords now, and I haven't been entirely satisfied with the numbers my rotation was putting out.  Since I absolutely love the concept of Exotic Munitions (specifically, of fire arrows, which I've wanted since Vanilla), and I'm frequently the raid's battle rez with my crane, I'd been using this cast sequence still:

/castsequence Chimaera Shot, Steady Shot, Steady Shot, Aimed Shot, Steady Shot, Steady Shot, Aimed Shot

But I've been drowning in focus.  Just drowning in it.  So I put together this cast sequence to work with:

/castsequence Chimaera Shot, Steady Shot, Steady Shot, Aimed Shot

The difference on the target dummies, using Murder of Crows, Glaive Toss, and Poisoned Ammo, was a bump from ~15k to ~16k.  Moving in a positive direction!

But then I decided to try Focusing Shot, since I was frequently getting Glaive Toss or Crows in between my Steady Shots when I wasn't paying attention.  The first attempt went badly - I just shoved Chimaera, Focusing, and Aimed into a cast sequence, and I was again drowning in focus and clipping cooldowns.  Based on those observations, I put together this:

/castsequence Aimed Shot, Aimed Shot, Focusing Shot, Chimaera Shot

The results were markedly better than either of the Exotic Munitions tests: around 18.5k.  That's an improvement of about 3k on my average dps right now; with raid buffs that will likely be even better.

What I'm not sure about is movement:  Focusing requires not moving, and there are some fights where movement is important.  I won't get to test this in our raids again until Thursday due to work, but I might hit up LFR before then to see how it shakes out.

Either way, with or without Focusing Shot, this is the first major revision to the cast sequence in what, four years?

Times change!

Elekk Plushie - Draenor Tamers

Now that my Elekk Plushie is overstuffed, I decided to take it around to all the tamers on Draenor and start working on [An Awfully Big Adventure].  Some of them took more work to figure out than others.

Here's what worked for me:

Gargra, Frostfire Ridge:  I used a Fluxfire Feline (S/S) and Mechanical Squirrel (S/B) for this since her set up is three wolf pups.  The Fluxfire is set up with Pounce, Flux, and Supercharge; I started with it for some backline damage.  Once it dies, the Mechanical Squirrel (Metal Fist, Overtune, and Wind-Up) can take out the other one/two left.

Cymre Brightblade, Gorgrond:  Cymre took some work to figure out; she's got magic, undead, and mechanical pets.  Ultimately I ended up using the Anubisath Idol (H/H) with Crush, Stoneskin, and Deflection, paired with the Infinite Whelpling (P/P) with Tail Sweep, Healing Flame, and Early Advantage.  These two are actually one of my go-to pairs for working with carry pets, but I hadn't used them in a while.  Deflection has to be paired up opposite the Idol of Decay's Rot for this to work.

Tarr the Terrible, Nagrand:  Okay, so I hadn't actually beaten Tarr before I tried this, and doing it straight up with the Elekk Plushie took some work.  He's got three humanoids (murlocs), so I went with double undead pets:  a Ghostly Skull (H/P) with Shadow Slash, Ghostly Bite, and Siphon Life, and a Scourged Whelpling (P/S) with Shadowflame, Death and Decay, and Plagued Blood.  I opened with the whelpling, made sure to keep Death and Decay up (including refreshing it before he died), and finished them off with the skull.  There's some RNG involved in this combination, but it will be really close even when it fails.  (If I bump my whelpling from uncommon up to rare, it might be more consistent.)

Ashlei, Shadowmoon Valley:  She's got an Elekk Plushie slotted - how hard can she be?!  Anywho, her other pets are magic and beast, so I used the Emerald Proto-Whelp (P/P) with Emerald Bite, Ancient Blessing, and Proto-Strike and the Mechanical Squirrel (same set-up as for Gargra).  The Emerald Proto-Whelp will almost solo this.

Vesharr, Spires of Arak:  Vesharr has two flying pets and a mechanical that will briefly masquerade as a flyer.  I went with a Sprite Darter Hatchling (S/S) with Arcane Blast, Life Exchange, and Moonfire and a Crimson Geode (H/S) with Feedback, Amplify Magic, and Stone Rush.  I originally decided to level the geode because I've always found the Deepholm tamer annoying to beat, and it paid off for this.

Taralune, Talador:  Taralune has the standard Draenei pets, three moths.  I had good luck with a Disgusting Oozeling (H/B) with Ooze Touch, Corrosion, and Expunge opening for the Sprite Darter Hatchling.  The sprite darter's Moonfire will negate the Call Lightning, which can be really bad with Moth Balls.

Bonus:  Darkmoon Faire

I did both Darkmoon Faire tamers with the Elekk this week, too.  For Jeremy, with his magic/mechanical/beast team, I just used my regular Infinite Whelpling (same set-up as for Cymre) and Water Waveling (B/B - Ice Lance, Frost Nova, Geyser) set up and substituted the Elekk in for the Mechanical Squirrel, which is normally my third.  When the RNG is in your favor, the Infinite Whelpling will solo the first two pets, and eat the monkey's initial stun, and then the waveling can finish him off.  One of the keys is hitting the tonk with Early Advantage with the dragon buff, so you might need to pass a round (or heal or something) on the eye to get it active for the tonk.

Christoph took some experimentation to figure out.  He's got that initial fast magic pet with both a hard-hitting geyser and an attack-blocking bubble, and the obvious counter is a dragon - but which one?  It turns out the Silver Dragonhawk Hatchling (S/S) with Quills, Conflagrate, and Flame Breath can survive it.  Open with the Flame Breath to set Syd on fire; since it's a 100% speed breed, it's going to go before Syd's second-round bubble, so you can go ahead and Conflagrate on turn two, then basically Flame Breath or Quills till Syd's dead.  The tri-horn is going to kill the dragon, but a Mechanical Squirrel (Metal Fist, Overtune, Wind-Up) can take out both it and the cow.  Wind-Up will pretty much take out the tri-horn right away, but with the cow you may want to Metal Fist when you've got reduced damage to avoid wasting Wind-Up's big damage.

Garrison Choices

Now that we're a couple weeks into the expansion, I've had time to unlock Level 2 garrisons on several alts, and Level 3 on my main.  After playing around with it thus far, I think I know which way I want to go with the rest of them, as well.

Some observations:

• Having an Enchanting Hut on anyone but an enchanter can be... frustrating.  Not everything disenchants via the cauldron.  Work orders are quite expensive when you're not able to disenchant everything.  All in all, if you have an enchanting toon already... Let's just say I replaced my blacksmith's.
•  The Storehouse is awesome!  I have Jeeves and the guild bank button on my main, but I am so not regretting bank and guild bank access (and eventually transmog), and I am liking the extra work order capacity for the potential days I won't be able to check on them.  This is, in fact, what I replaced my blacksmith's Enchanting Hut with.
• I haven't figured out which, if any, toon will get a Mage Tower (whatever the Horde name for that is).  War Mill, sure.  Stables, yes.  Barracks everyone starts with, and I like followers enough to keep it.  I think I'm giving my other engineer a Goblin Workshop to see what the inventions are.  But I don't know what I'd do with the Mage Tower, really.
• Leatherworkers are still getting kind of screwed compared to professions that use ore or herbs, given that the Barn requires tying up a medium plot.  That said, the Barn isn't actually that bad for a medium plot, especially on a toon that doesn't have a tank or healer queue (for the Inn quests) or one that doesn't collect a lot of other raw materials (to do work orders at the Trading Post).
• The Gladiator's Sanctum is... well, I don't PVP.  I kind of want to give it to a toon for account completionism, but I really don't know which one I'd even try it on.  The rogue, maybe?  One of the other hunters?  I don't know.

I really like followers and follower missions.  Once I have all 13 max level toons' garrisons open, I could easily just cycle through them doing their missions every hour or two and actually not mind.  They're going out fetching 630 ilvl gear for me right now!  (They had better be.  There's a 99% success chance for those boots with the group I sent out this afternoon.)

All in all, I think the way my toons' garrisons are going to shake out are:

• Small Plot 1:  Crafting profession building
• Small Plot 2:  Storehouse or crafting profession 2 building
• Small Plot 3:  Salvage Yard or Storehouse, based on Small Plot 2
• Medium Plot 1:  Inn or Trading Post (based on gathering profession and dungeon queue roles)
• Medium Plot 2:  Lumber Mill or Barn (based on whether they need leather)
• Large Plot 1:  Barracks
• Large Plot 2:  War Mill (raiders) or Stables (gatherers); Goblin Workshop on Engineer 2

Have I mentioned that I really like followers?

What I'm Riding

And by I, of course, I mean they, my 12 13 characters that are 90+.  I've got a lot of mounts, so I try not to use the same one on two different characters.  I'll do these in the order I opened their garrisons (or plan to).

Duskhawk: Swift Shorestrider - It was a birthday present, and I still love it.

Priest: I use different mounts for different specs on the priest.  For Disc, I'm using the Imperial Quilen.  For Shadow I'm using the Spectral Wind Rider - because it's practically invisible in shadow form, and I find that amusing.

There's a wind rider there, I promise.

Death Knight: My death knight was the first toon I started using the Sky Golem on, since I was leveling her with herbalism.  I didn't realize just how much I would love its flight animation, or how much I miss it.

Warrior:  I'm still using the Sapphire Panther on my warrior; when I first made all the gem cats, I was like, dammit, they're expensive, I'm using them.  She got the blue one.  (Also I was a huge Voltron fan when I was like, 8.)

Hunter 2:  Expensive cats?  This is the jewelcrafter, so she got the black one.

Shaman:  My shaman had the yellow cat for a long time, but I switched her back to a wolf for Warlords.  I tend to prefer unarmored mounts when I have the option, so I went with the Old Cliff Jumper model, the Dire Wolf.

Warlock:  My warlock is still using the yellow cat.  I might switch her up if I find something else I like her on, but the cat turns more golden when she's got full embers, so...

Hunter 3:  This is what happens when I can't decide what mount to use: a boring old Swift Green Wind Rider.

Rogue:  I've been using the Sandstone Drake on her, because 21 canopic jars, but I'm not sure I want to keep using big giant dragon on the ground. 

Druid:  This is where I sigh about flight form and stuff.  At least the updated Astral form makes the Forest Strider look even cooler.

Mage:  This is another character using a drake mount, this time the Azure Drake from Malygos; it seemed appropriate for a mage.  I may just go back to her Burgundy Wolf due to huge drakeness on the ground.  (It matches her hair.  Ahem.)

Paladin:  My pally used to be my bank toon, so I gave her Tyrael's Charger for running back and forth between the auction house and the mailbox.  It was paladin-y, and it wasn't a huge kodo that I couldn't find the mailbox under.  It's also one of the mounts that goes seamlessly between flight and no-flight, which is a plus as you level.

Mabs:  When I first made a character, part of the reason she ended up like she did was because her hair could be green.  So she's got the green cat (after years of default nightsaber that matched her Kitty).