Toy lovers in World of Warcraft, it’s time to collect ’em all.
When WOW patch 6.0.2 releases in the next couple of weeks in preparation for Nov. 13’s Warlords of Draenor expansion, the Toy Box feature will launch with it.
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Above: The first page of the World of Warcraft Toy Box in Warlords of Draenor. Toys in your bags become clickable items. When you click them, they are learned and added to these pages, where you can use them like spells.
It will also be the first time that players can see almost all the toys available in the game. (Some that are no longer available will be hidden, unless the player happens to own them already.) But which toys are the best? I’m so glad you asked.
The rules: I’m only including items that are actually toys, not food or clothing or other non-toy items with actions attached (though I may mention them in passing). All toys, by definition, have actions attached — their sole purpose is to make something fun happen. Non-toy items typically add other benefits, such as increasing your character’s statistics.
Above: This combination of two toys — Rasha’s Sacrificial Dagger, which allows players to kill themselves, and Mourning Glory, which makes a flower grow over their corpse when they die — are totally fair game.
The list of which toys are in the Toy Box in the Draenor expansion changes constantly, but I’ll include a note if a toy I’ve picked as the top selection in a particular category isn’t stored in the Toy Box … yet. Blizzard has been going back through all the items in the game to add toys to the Toy Box, but it’s definitely a work-in-progress given the tens of thousands of items available in WOW.
I’m usually not including items that have charges that run out or that “poof” on use or toys you can’t get anymore. For example, the Haunted Memento has a spot in my inventory forever because of the shade it continually creates to follow me around. But the only way to get one today is via the Auction House from other players that hung onto theirs from years ago, too. That’s not fair.
I’m also not including items that, despite that they should be in the Toy Box, aren’t likely to make it because they also have character-boosting statistics on them. I’m looking at you, Rainbow Generator.
Above: The Rainbow Generator in mid-strike. Care Bear stare!
I’ve picked my favorite and a whole raft of runners-up in each of five different categories. The links take you to WOW’s item pages; further links on those pages lead you to sites that have instructions for how to earn each toy.
Toys to transform you
A whole horde of items — not just toys — in Warcraft transform your character into other races, classes, or species.
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You can shapeshift into a leper gnome, ghost pirate, blood elf, or a ninja, for example.
Prefer something inanimate? Change into a giant coffin or encase yourself in a chunk of amber. Take the form of a huge stone statue. You can even plunk yourself nearly naked in a giant clamshell in an ode to Botticelli’s “The Birth of Venus” painting (no, really).
Above: You can never un-see a naked orc.
Ai-Li’s Skymirror will transform you into a slightly watery-looking replica of whatever you have targeted.
Or you can even — with one my favorite toys — take the form of the giant bull-like tauren Mr. Smite from the Deadmines dungeon, causing your character to shout at anyone who’ll listen, “You there! Check out that noise!”
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But the best transformational toy is clearly the Super Simian Sphere. This gadget turns you into an ape inside a giant pink bubble of light, which you take with you wherever you go. It’s one of WOW’s frequent pop culture references — in this case, to Sega’s Super Monkey Ball series — but it has a uniquely Warcraft look, and it lasts for five minutes.
Above: The Super Simian Sphere: smashing.
Sadly, the Super Simian Sphere is spectacularly seldom seen, dropping randomly from elite-difficulty enemies in the Wrath of the Lich King expansion (character level 70-80) dungeons and larger raid instances. It’s bind-on-pickup, so it can’t be sold to other players, adding to its rarity. But it’s still out there. Go farm it, my friends.
Toys to mutate other players
Above: The Super Soaker turns players blue and leaves them in a puddle.
Our next honoree is the best item for messing with other players: the Shado-Pan Geyser Gun, otherwise known as Warcraft’s Super Soaker.
You can use plenty of doodads to transform your friends. Make them orange, turn them into a bunny, put a voodoo mask on them, stick starfish to their faces, shoot fireworks at them — why, the possibilities are legion.
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The Brazier of Dancing Flames even gets your friends in on the action. Use the item, and it drops a brazier on the ground with a tiny flame dancer on top. If other players target it and use the /dance emote, they’re turned into fiery dancing draenei themselves.
Above: The only good draenei: a burning draenei.
But the best toy for transforming other players is clearly the Geyser Gun, an item you earn by jumping on water spouts in the Throne of Thunder raid dungeon until your eyes bleed. (I kid, of course. I mean until you reach 250 stacks of the debuff you get from jumping on water spouts, which you may reach long after your eyes start bleeding. In apparent sympathy, an NPC will then mail you the gun.)
The effort is worth it. The gun is visible to other players and looks something like a crude metal Super Soaker constructed by bored goblins. When you use it, an extra action icon pops up in the middle of your screen. Punch it, and you send a huge gout of water at the person you have targeted, turning them blue, making them drip, and putting a large puddle at their feet. It’s glorious.
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Toys to infuriate the masses
Above: The Piccolo of Flaming Fire: Minding your own business? Trying to eat or shop or role-play? Pfft. It’s dancin’ time!
But I don’t want to just transform my friends and enemies, you say. I want to annoy the crap out of them!
This is the category for you. Warcraft has a long and illustrious history of giving players items that annoy other players, and the selection after 10 years is so broad that it makes this category a tough one to judge.
Want a beam of light that stacks until it’s impossible to see? An item that makes you flinch or unable to attack anything, that knocks you down, or fills your inventory? Something to knock a player off their mount? You’re covered.
Players abused some toys so often Blizzard actually nerfed them. Snowballs used to knock anyone down — now they only affect people in your party and only if you’re not in a battleground.
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The Toy Train Set, which places a model train on the ground that makes everyone in the vicinity do the /train emote (Choo! Choo!) with a loud whistle, was so reviled that there were stories of raid leaders who left 40-man dungeons because they couldn’t stand it.
Above: Players using transformation toys — Leyara’s Locket, the Celestial Defender’s Medallion, and the Magic Ogre Idol — are caught in the /train madness. (The cow-like tauren there is just photobombing, naked.)
Eventually, Blizzard put in the Wind-Up Train Wrecker so other players could do battle and added train-wrecking to the skill sets of battle pets that players could summon, such as Lil’ XT.
One of the most annoying toys in the Toy Box — in the current build, at least — is definitely the Train.
But my choice for overall most annoying toy is a classic: the Piccolo of the Flaming Fire. One of the very first toys in the game, it’s also one of the most irritating: When you use it, it plays one frequently repeating harp glissando and causes all other players in the area to drop what they’re doing and dance. Get yours by killing Hearthsinger Forresten in the Stratholme level-45 five-man dungeon.
Yes, players can cancel the Piccolo’s effects by moving. But with its relatively short one-minute cooldown, you can hit them again after just a few moments. Bonus points for using it on role-playing servers, where people are attempting to carry on conversations — that’s some seriously annoying stuff.
(One similar alternative is the Party G.R.E.N.A.D.E., which also makes NPCs dance. But sadly, it poofs on use, making it ineligible for the Overall Most Annoying title.)
The Piccolo isn’t in the current Toy Box lineup. Perhaps Blizzard knows just how annoying that thing would be if you didn’t even have to equip it before using it. But I’m waiting.
Toys that move you
Above: This screenshot of the kafa-crazed goat and the rampaging yak was only capturable by mashing on the screenshot key with wild abandon. Those are a couple of fast mounts.
Most toys change the way things look. There are only a few that actually move you to a different spot, and while this category has fewer items, they add a ton of fun.
On a small scale, this division includes toys like the Survivor’s Bag of Coins, which is only available to rogues. Pickpocket coins from humanoid creatures and then use the item on a spot on the ground, and you’ll jump in the opposite direction. You can chain the jumps to keep moving.
On a larger scale, some toys act like temporary mounts, making you look silly or move quickly or uncontrollably across the landscape. The Tuft of Yak Fur, which is sadly consumable, summons a giant yak with you on its back for 18 seconds. It moves fast — about 400 percent of your base run speed — but there’s one catch: no brakes. The only way to stop is to click off the buff that gives you the mount.
Don’t care for yaks? Try the coffee-crazed goat or the giant, lizard-like mushan.
Above: A mere screenshot cannot capture the awesomeness that is the Falling Flame.
The best toy for transportation is a doozy: Falling Flame. This item, which drops from the Cinderfall elite mob on the Timeless Isle, turns you into a meteor and throws you “far into the distance.” Really, really, really far. Trigger this little fella in the middle of one zone, and you’ll roll up into a spinning, fiery ball and hurtle all the way to the middle of another.
Yes, I know I’m breaking my own rules: This toy has 50 charges before it’s consumed … for now. Fifty charges is a lot of fun in one little toy. It’s not yet in the Toy Box, likely as a result of that consumable status.
Toys to change the world
Above: The Salyin Battle Banner: And they’re off!
Most toys give players the opportunity to change themselves or others. But a select few give us the chance to change the world. One lovely item, the Battle Horn, calls everything within 40 yards of your character to come attack you. (It’s also a contender for the “most annoying” title since you can use it in dungeons while you’re with other people.)
Less irritating, the Panflute of Pandaria will call any nearby cute little critters to follow you around in a crowd for 15 minutes.
If you’re trying to get rid of creatures instead of drawing them to you, there’s always the Salyin Battle Banner. It summons a Saurok lizard-man who calls your foes to chase him and then runs off.
Above: It’s not easy being green … unless you have Mylune’s Call.
One of the most dramatic area effects is from Mylune’s Call, which summons woodland creatures, grows flowers and grass under your feet, and creates pretty, swirly lights.
There are a ton of toys that enable you to drop items into the world that others can see. Some are cute but ephemeral: The Puntable Marmot, for instance, drops a little gopher that anyone can boot into the distance. The Golden Banana throws a big, heavy metal fruit with a thunk on the ground. Ruthers’ Harness summons Ruthers, the bad yak, which will chase you around for a few seconds before head-butting you and running away.
Above: Warning: Your friends can use the Gin-ji Knife Set on you after you die.
The Gin-ji Knife Set is another wonderful example: It takes any humanoid or beast corpse (including a giant raid dungeon boss) and slices and dices it into a small pile of flesh. It’s a nice way to get a big body out of the way if you have to fight something else in the same area. Personally, I enjoy watching raid dungeon bad guy Garrosh turned into lunchmeat.
My favorite toy that affects the game world, however, is an easy-to-get quest item: the Hozen Idol. Target a critter — one of the non-aggressive, typically cute and cuddly creatures that wander around WOW — and trigger the idol. Your eyes glow, sending a laser beam at the critter until finally it explodes. Mwahahahaha.
Above: The Hozen Idol: Bye bye, bug. Explosion incoming.
It’s the reward from a quest series that starts with “Traffic Issues” in the Kun-Lai Summit zone in Pandaria. Look for Smokey Sootassle near the Yaungol Advance to start the quests.
Did I miss your favorite toy? Which ones are you collecting first? The comments are right down there, folks.