Err, I Dunno!

Don't believe him! This guy knows everything about the economics of the game. This shrewd market genius revels in ripping of noobs (especially those five star noobs) and ruling the Auction House. He is one of the game's arms dealers extraodinaire, and he didn't get this rich by wasting his crowns on a bunch of faddish foolery, you fashion fops! Like that eccentric old guy down the street who you'd never know had a million bucks in his basement, Erridunno, normally hangs out in pretty casual duds. At the Dragon Princess's request, he slipped on a few of his, err, I dunno, more, ummm, "fashionable" outfits (slight wince).

Uh, yes, so this first one is quite an orginal look. In fact, I doubt any other player would have the, err, "creativity" to come up with this outfit. Um, yeah, so, Erridunno has taken his proto helm, in this case a spiral sallet, and has put on it, uhhh, some accessories, of, err, a wide variety. Yes, uhh, we can see a regal spike mohawk on top, and um, some fancy mecha wings on the side. And that appears to be a military binocular visor, umm, yeah. Not visible is the, hmmm, military long feather on the back. Ahem, yes, moving on to the spiral scale mail ( no sense springing for any pricier armor, eh? heh-heh) there is a (really?) heavy barrel belly on front, and in a bit of surprising color matching, heavy dragon wings on the back. This is, ahhh, a swell look.

The Dragon Princess was planning to show you a few more of his, ooooh, "novel" appearances, but, umm, perhaps dressing up is not his forte'. However, if you want any advice about how to accrue wealth in the game, this is definitely the player to ask! (Although, he, err, may charge you for the, ehhh, wealth of his knowledge.)

Ahhh, that explains it. That second one is much nicer. good job!

Critical Hit!!! Ding!

Critical hit? Ding? What's all that about, you ask?

Wha'da'ya' mean you ain't never played Team Fortress 2 !?!
What kinda free gamer are ya' anyways?

You've probably noticed that a lot of our knights dabble in the TF2 world.
Vescrit (V's Critical Hit) is one of those players. Critical hits, or Crits, are attacks that do extra damage and have distinctive sounds both when fired and when hitting a target. When you hit a player with one, the words "CRITICAL HIT!!!" appear over the target's head in green letters, accompanied by a loud "ding." Vescrit is something of a play on those words, or a pun if you will.

What caught the eyes of the Dragon Princess was the well-matched color coordination of Vescrit's outfit. It begins with his personal color, blue, which shows up in his cute pill eyes. He chose to don a Chapeau of the Blue Rose, and then carefully chose two accessories that fit the color scheme - a dusky pipe and cool vertical vents. Next he matched his Chap with Spiral Plate Mail, which has the same cool blue colors, cool valkyrie wings, and a cool parrying blade.

As an example of how the Spiral Plate Mail looks with a diferent color, Mawashimono was caught heading out to the rice field wearing a Cool Stranger Hat.

It's always nice when a player chooses gear that matches well with one another and the player's personal color to produce a tasteful appearance. Well done! And here's another nice example of his fine fashion sense.

No Pun Intended

Cleverpun - A lot of players choose a name that have a double entendre (a figure of speech in which a spoken phrase is devised to be understood in either of two ways), a hidden meaning, or are a play on words often as a pun. Cleverpun chose his name as an ironic poke at this practice. Looking like something of a sun-tanned samurai, Cleverpun has equipped his Spiral Demo Helm with a regal maedate, a regal plume, and regal helm guards. He then combined his proto helm with one of the games rarest armors - Ancient Plate Mail, with a regal canteen. The Dragon Princess appreciated his unique combination as well as another fine example of coordinating personal color and gear colors. The result is an understated, refined look befitting his samurai theme.

Soigné Uncle Sung

Uncosung - Harken back to those early childhood years when you had trouble pronouncing adult people's name and titles. Shortly after you learned words like "Mama" and "Papa", you realized that there were other people in the world with some hazy connection to yourself. You called these beings things "Bwuhda", "Gumpa", "Dog", and other approximations as best your little mouth could manage. You may have even had an 'Uncosung", or Uncle Sung, that kind old Korean man in your family tree. And what a Soigné uncle he was! (If you're pronouncing it as "Soyg-nee" please stop immediately, and try to shape your little mouth into the sound of "swan-yay". France thanks you.)

How did Uncosung achieve this dapper look? He began with a Rock Jelly Helm and then added a combination that the Dragon Princess is pretty sure she's never seen before - dusky vertical vents sticking out from a cool toupee. Add on prismatic round shades and a dusky scarf, and voilà, Uncle Sung is born. (France called again. Apparently some of you are saying "voy-lah" in your heads. France is not pleased, and hopes you could better approximate the true, though sadly unpronouncable sound, as "wha-lah". Yes, that'll have to do.) Uncosung has used a Vitasuit Deluxe as a place to hang his divine parrying blade and a divine wolver tail. Apparently dear old Uncle Sung is part fox spirit, a not so uncommon event in South Korea, we assume. Farewell or
"Annyeonghee gaseyo", dear uncle, or as they say in France, au revoir!
(Uh, yeah, France is on the line again, and . . . Oh, never mind!)

Koopa the Incapable King

The life of a princess is at times far from luxurious or leisurely. A Princess's life can be full of roles and responsibilties and even risks. Some may seek to do her harm, or to steal her hand in marriage, by force if necessary. The Dragon Princess is not unacquainted with such dangers and learned to defend herself at an early age. Sadly, however, there are semi-members of the dragon clan, odd and sometimes awful offspring of ill-fated unions, who would fashion themselves as rulers of magical realms beyond ours.

Once such creature, produced from the mating of a turtle with a dragon, and born in the year of the ox, was Bowser Koopa, aka King Koopa, archnemesis of Super Mario. Altough Bowser is physically powerful, can breathe fire, and is said to have skills in black magic, most dragons would have nothing to do with him; however, he found powerful allies in the anthropomorphic turtles that inhabit the Mushroom Kingdom. Koopa's ultimate goals are to marry Princess Peach Toadstool, defeat Mario, and conquer the Mushroom Kingdom.

Which is why you may have seen our own Kingbowser lurking about Townsquare. The Dragon Princess was understandably leary of this suspicious character, but has since learned he is much more affable than his Nintendo counterpart. Kingbowser achieved his tribute look by the use of a full Dread Skelly suit, with its natural glow eyes effect and ox-like horns, and with a heavy mohawk on top to simulate Koopa's own shock of red hair.

When he's not cos-playing King Koopa (and wouldn't Mawashimono enjoy dressing up as Princess Peach!), you can see him like this in his full Almirian Crusader suit with a toasty long feather, toasty mohawk, toasty mecha wings, heavy parrying blade, and toasty dragon wings, and, of course, those crazy orange spiral eyes.

Look for Kingbowser next time you are in Townsquare. He can be a bit gruff sometimes as he continuously becomes infuriated with the incompetence of his minions, but he's not such a bad guy and can even be a bit fun to be around (as long as you're not a princess, that is).

You Red My Mind

Pula - Guess what color his name means in Tagalog in the Philippines. That's right! It's "red", and the Dragon Princess doesn't think you could get any redder than this! Pula is a loooong time player in Spiral Knights, and you won't see many players in a full Red Rose Chapeau and Tabard. Pula is not taking any fashion risks as all his accessories are the same heavy red color, but he has done at least one innovative thing - putting a game face on a Chap, the first I can recall seeing. That, combined with his squinty eyes, adds a playful appeal to his outfit (and I hear he's quite playful). His complete red outfit includes a Chapeau of the Red Rose with heavy vertical vents and a heavy game face. His Tabard of the Red Rose has a Heavy bomb bandolier, heavy dragon wings, and a Love aura. Posh playful Pula's preferences are perfectly presented.

Prismatic Maedate!!!!

Homuhome - The Dragon Princess just had to show you this lovely find. Homuhome had a prismatic maedate!!!! (You probably guessed that from the title.) The Valkyrie Helm also has a prismatic plume as a natural feature, so Mawa wanted to show you both front and back views of this character. The military wolver tail is also a perfect match for her color, and the Nameless Poncho perhaps has more prismatic fabric than any other gear armor in the game. An Unclean aura completes this ultra-prismatic masterpiece.

A Salamander Salute

Moshmonster - This post is to not only recognize the cool look of Moshmonster, but to show my awestruck appreciation for the artistic team that made these suits into a virtual reality. Mawashimono loves the Arcane Salamander and Volcanic Salamander sets as well, and perhaps will start featuring some spiffy-looking sets in the future, but today she is honoring the Deadly Virulisk suit. The Dragon Princess just loves the combination of toxic green and light purple in this outift. Look how the claws taper in color. Look at those cute little toesies on its feet. Check out that prismatic stripe on the shoulder guards. Look at all the scalish details in the helm and armor, and the noxious fumes it emits. Then when a player with a suitable personal color puts on this suit, adds some purplish spike mohawk and wings, picks up a scaly purple shield and purple, pink, or green weapon, and as an added touch, puts on that adorable proto crest, you end up with a visual delight unparalleled in games I've seen. So thank you Spiral Knights for your artistic designs, and thank you Moshmonster for showing us such a great way to wear it.

Usagi Small Lady Serenity

You are perhaps familiar with the pretty soldier Sailor Moon. More familiar than you'd care to admit? Come on, sing along with me now! (Don't pretend you don't know how it goes, but if you really don't, you can check it out here. ) ~

Fighting evil by moonlight,
Winning love by daylight,
Never running from a real fight,
She is the one named Sailor Moon.

Ah, the magical-girl genre of Japan. Mawashimono completely denies ever owning a Sailor Moon costume at any time in her life. Well, not one she bought for herself, anyway. But what girl knight couldn't enjoy the thought of being a Sailor Soldier, named for their school girl sailor-style outfits. (And, Oh My, don't the stores in Japan have fun with these costumes!) The girls of the team are actually the reborn defenders of a kingdom that once spanned the Solar System, and Sailor moon is the reborn Princess Moon (ya gotta luv it!). And I think we've got a fan of the show here in Magical-Master. Dressed in a full Valkyrie suit with a fancy flower, prismatic valkyrie wings, and a love aura, she resembles Chibiusa, or Rini in the English versions, the youngest of the Sailor Soldiers or Guardians. Is there a mysterious Tuxedo Mask knight waiting for her in the game? Romantic hearts can only hope so!

The Tengu Poet Warrior

One of the newest additions to the helm class in Spiral Knights is the Mask of Seerus. Three versions of the mask exist - one for each tier level of the Operation Crimson Hammer exapansion portion of our game. Upon successful complete of the the tier, each player is awarded a fragment of the mask. After obtaining three fragments, the mask can be crafted.

The mask itself is based on the Japanese Tengu mask. Tengu (heavenly dogs) are a class of monster-spirits found in Japanese folklore. Although they take their name from a dog-like Chinese demon (Tiangou), the tengu were originally thought to take the forms of birds, and they are traditionally depicted with both human and avian characteristics. The earliest tengu were pictured with beaks, but this feature has often been humanized as an unnaturally long nose, which today is practically the tengu's defining characteristic in the popular imagination.

Ah-Bard's Perfect Mask of Seerus has a flashy grandness to it due to his volcanic halo, which perfectly suits the reddish volcanic colors of both the mask and the Volcanic Salamander Suit he's wearing. The suit's accessories include a coordinating toasty bomb bandolier and volcanic dragon wings, made even more reddish by a love aura. Both his name and appearance mark him as from the line of warrior poets famous in history and fiction, while his lithe red form adheres nicely to the traditional depictions of Tengu demons in Japanese literature. Although the Tengu Perfect Mask of Seerus can be worn well with many different armors, Ah-Bard's character gave us a nice chance to appreciate the beastly beauty and background of this new helm.

Syntactically Stylish

Xyntax - Have you ever been using your calculator and your calculator gives you this message? It means you've typed in an equation wrong, like a mis-matched parentheses, or double plus signs ,++, or something similar that doesn't make sense. The Spiral Knight gear version of this might be matching a 5* helm with a 0* armor, which is exactly what Xyntax has done. However, rather than resulting in an error, it's produced more of the grammatical meaning of syntax, which is "a harmonious arrangement of parts or elements". Strangely, Xyntax's counter-intuitive set results in quite a harmonius arrangement of colors and style. A toasty pipe and cool maedate are attached to his Heavenly Iron Helm, whose colors match perfectly with his Fencing Jacket, cool canteen, cool valkyrie wings, and ghostly aura. Even his sword blends in well. As a final cherry on top of this sweet setup is his guild name - T A O - a symbol of balance and harmony , and whose letters mean "Together As One." Some players just have such a sophisticated sharpness to their name and look that they are a joy to encounter!

Chime to Charm

Life (or the latest update) got you a little stressed? In need of some music to help you relax. Let's try this. Open another window using the tab at the upper top left. Copy and paste the link below. Jump ahead about 1 minute in the video and then let the sound of the music flow over you for a few minutes as you read the post.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h15XTI2Zhy0

Mmmmmmm, the sound of gentle chimes blowing in the Autumn breeze, with birds singing in the background. Laying on a blanket in the grass while the sun warms your face and body. Beautiful colors all around, in the trees and on the ground. Feel yourself relaxing, becoming harmonious in mind, body, and spirit.

Leafchime has chosen a name that conjurs up positive karmic energy as nature plays a tune on her wind chimes. Her appearance has an Autumny feel to it as well, with its red and oranges and browns like the leaves falling from the trees. Her head is comprised of a Quicksilver Helm with a heavy scarf, a lovely volcanic flower, and toasty vertical vents. Her body armor is a Vog Cub Coat with a Halloween-time pumpkin bomb bandolier and volcanic dragon wings. It's both a fresh and refreshing fashion fete.

[edit- guessed at gender]

I Hadn' Noticed That Hadn Had One!

One of the great accessory mysteries of the game is the almost complete lack of existing prismatic plumes and prismatic mohawks. Although the prismatic mohawk exists on the Mad Bomber Helm and the prismatic plume exists on a Valkyrie Helm, these popular costume features are almost nonexistent ingame. My somewhat uneducated guess is that they are about a 1 in 100,000 accessory. So it's always exciting to see a player with one.

In this case, that player was Hadn. Hadn's personal red color shows up not only in the prismatic plume (shown here from the back) on his cobalt helm, which also features heavy helm guards and a heavy mustache, but also in the prismatic elements of his Heavy Plate Mail and prismatic wings with a ghostly aura. His Hammer also has the same heavy red color. Prismatic Wings currently sell for around 3 million crowns in featured auctions, and the value of the prismatic plume is nearly incalculable, making this one of the most expensive and distinct outfits you'll ever see. Congratulations, Hadn, on your exclusive look.

Hadn's divine plume and divine wolver tail also look very nice.

Lost Child Alert!

The adorable Michaelb has become seaparated from his mommy and is hopelessly lost ingame. He was last seen in the Townsquare region of Haven 12 wearing a blue chap and icebreaker armor. If anyone should happen to spot little Mikey, please lead him by the hand to the nearest Training Hall. Mawashimono hears that he despearately needs the practice. Thank you for your cooperation, and enjoy your day in Spiral Knights Land!

A Decidedly Dashing Dish

Dishly is the founder and Guild Master of the guild Fruition, whose goal is to bring all players to their full potential, much like his Pokemon Trainer ("gotta catch 'em all") upon which he based his character, who wants the pocket monster to evolve to its full potential as well.

Dishly's costume efforts have born fruit, seen here from the front, with this chichi blue appearance achieved with a modish Sniped Stranger hat and a fancy ribbon. He is also wearing Boosted Plate Mail with a dusky parrying blade, prismatic valkyrie wings, and a ghostly aura, seen here from the rear. You can't miss him in this outfit, nor would you want to.

This outift also looks nice this way with a Heavenly Iron Helm that has a cool game face and fancy wide vee.
Dishly has a few other nice looks as well.

Dishly 1 looks ready for the hunt in a Skolver Cap with dusky mecha wings and a dusky scarf; and a Tabard of the Green Rose with a military canteen and a dusky side blade.

Dishly 2 seems to be in a foul mood with his Mercurial Demo Helm with regal game face, regal mecha wings, heavy scarf; and Volcanic Demo Suit with a regal barrel belly.

Dishly 3 dangerously mixes wolves with dragons for a stately golden outfit that makes use of a Wolver cap on Radiant Silvermail with a predator crest and regal valkyrie wings.

The Dragon Princess very much enjoyed meeting this thoughtful gentleman of the game and is looking forward to dishing out some serious damage with Dishly sometime soon.

Hottie Alert!

Okay, so you didn't choose a spiral tailed helm when you created your character, and now you're bummed that you don't have double prismatic pony tails to make you look irresistably cute! Well, cheer up, you regretful knight, for there exists another option - a Blazebreak Helm - and no one has made better use of it than the crimson commando of cuteness herself - Natashavolkova!

Hmmm, that name sounds distinctly Russian and vaguely familiar. Who is she really, you might be asking yourself. Well, for starters, our Natasha ain't really Russian! But then again, neither is Gina Carrano, who played this Red Alert 3 character in the movie, and I don't hear any of you guys complaining about that bit of casting, do I !?!
[Netflix is gonna wonder why 10,000 subscribers just added this movie to their queue!]

Natashavolkova chose this name because she used to play a lot of Red Alert 3, and I liked this character more than the others for various reasons. In order to also approximate the character's appearance, she is wearing the full Blazebreak set. Her Blazebreak Helm has heavy vertical vents, a heavy flower, and dot eyes behind fancy glasses, while the Blazebreak Armor is equipped with a heavy canteen. It's a sizzling and saucy homage to the sniper assassin, and best of all, it doesn't cost too much to achieve this killer look!

On an unrelated note, the alt. of the Dragon Princess, Ryuu-No-Hime, one day hopes to grow up to be even half as cute as Meixmei!

Hi, Windsickle. Thank you for your enlightenment in regards to the full Blazebreak set. However, Mawashimono feels your literary inquiry in regards to my alleged proliferation of alliteration is of no consonantal consequence.

Windsickle rightly noted that I might be over-using the repetition of consonant ... you know, not "a, e, i, o," or "u" ... sounds in the initial, ahhh, beginning of words as a literary...er, writing device...um, tool. (Boy, translating is hard work!)

A Conflated Conflagaration

Gingermace (aka Warmaster-Vanaduke) - It's appropriate that a player who chose his name by amalgamating his two dogs' names into one character name would choose a look that is also quite an amalgamation of different costume elements. Ginger, a hot, fragrant kitchen spice particularly popular in Asia, is combined with mace, an aromatic spice of a nutmeg, although the Dragon Princess suspects he chose "mace" for its other meaning - a heavy club - to create a unique but aptly symbolic name for a fiery Warmaster Rocket Hammer-weilding Warmaster-Vanaduke.

Mawashimono particularly appreciates the very Sci-Fi alienness of this costume. Looking like he just stepped off the set of some kind of Predators sequel, Gingermace has taken a Volcanic Stranger hat and added to it a toasty helm-mounted-display, a military com unit, and a fancy scarf. His body is armored in Azure Guardian Armor with a regal bomb bandolier and prismatic dragon wings. Five accessores and not a single one matching. In fact, nothing really matches on this outfit which is what makes it so wonderfully, bizarrely fresh and funky.

The Wall Has Been Infiltrated!

How the men in the guild of The Nights Watch could let a woman this pretty slip into their ranks undiscovered is beyond comprehension. Then again, maybe they knew exactly what they were doing! [FYI, this is a Game of Thrones reference.] Danicka has quite the pretty costume, using a Crown of the Fallen with a fancy helm-mounted display and military headband. The Crown's greys and purples match so well with the Drake Scale mail she's wearing, and her personal color shows up beautifully in the military canteen. Looks like the Nights Watch guild picked a pretty player, and the Dragon Princess is glad to see that women are finally gaining entrance to the Wall, even if they have to cut their hair and dress a like a boy to do it!

Whew! I've been so busy the past two days taking advantage of SK's genreous 2 days of free elevators that I haven't had time to post anything! Let's get to it.

Sonic the Hedgehog

You can open another tab and listen to one of the theme songs - His World - while you are reading, if you care to - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cqniw8-plS8

How has the Dragon Princess so grievously overlooked Sonic the Hedgehog costumes? Sonic, as many of you well know, is Spiral Knights' (new) parent company Sega's mascot and one of the key reasons for the company's success during the 16-bit era of video game consoles. Sonic is actually a blue 15-year-old anthropomorphic hedgehog, who has the ability to run at supersonic speeds and the ability to curl into a ball, primarily to attack enemies. He is without a doubt one of the most famous video game characters in the world. Spiral Knights released a costume version of Sonic the Hedgehog along with the tails tails accessory to celebrate Sonic's 20th birthday.

The Dragon Princess thanks Natsahavolkova, who appeared a bit earlier in this thread, for showcasing how well this costume set can be accessorized. "Sonic Natasha" has chosen to use cool grey colors to create something of a Russian General look. Her Metal Sonic Helm has a cool mustache, cool mohawk, and heavy gray plume, while the Metal Sonic suit has a cool parrying blade in front and a cool side blade in back.

Although the costume set was wildly popular when it was first released, players are not wearing them nearly as often these days, so it's nice to see Sonic characters visiting our world from time to time.

Mr. Wacky

Another player who deseves honorable mention for making fine use of a mohawk is Mwacky. He displays a fine sense of color-coordination as well as a sharp sense of humor by matching his personal orange color with heavy-colored accessories. On his full Skolver set, Mwacky has a heavy mohawk, heavy mecha wings, heavy dragon wings and a heavy canteen. It's a quiky looking costume that lives up to his name with sensational style.

The Wolver-Tailed Bomber Babe of Slovenia

Iekeliene is actually half Slovenian and half Austalian, but she's 100% swish, which means fashionable and is a popular clothing brand in Australia. She's also a member of the guild "pseudoparenchymatous", which was formed by old "Risen" members after Gwen left. Mawashimono looked up the definition online. Unfortunately, Mawa is, to borrow the name of one of her new player friends, a "Big-Baka" in science. Here is the definition if you can make heads or tails of it: "compactly interwoven short-celled filaments especially in fungi that resemble parenchyma" which are "a tissue of higher plants that consists of thin-walled living photosynthetic or storage cells capable of division even when mature and that makes up much of the substance of leaves and roots, the pulp of fruits, and parts of stems and supporting structures - of higher plants". Got that? Yeah, me neither . . .

The Dragon Princess was euphoric upon discovering this amazingly costumed player. It was like discovering a Silver Age comic book collection in your grandfather's attic, or getting a complete collection of your favorite figurines from your aunt who's grown tired of them. The giddiness can take your breath away.

Iekeliene 1 - Her delicate eyes peek shyly out from a Brute Jelly Helm with a a cool flower, dusky mecha wings, and a cool scarf. The blue of the helm looks sensational on the Metal Sonic Suit with a love puppy monster pocket, heavy wolver tail and a love aura.

Iekeliene 2 - A Chapeau of the Coral Rose with fancy vertical vents and prismatic glow-eyes sits atop a Spiral Brigandine with a fancy bomb bandolier, fancy wolver tail, and ghostly aura.

Iekeliene 3 - Her bomber is showing in this outfit, which makes use of a Heavy Demo Helm with heavy mecha wings, prismatic round shades, and a cool scarf. She also has on the rarely accessorized Cobalt Armor with a toasty bomb bandolier, cool wolver tail, and ghostly aura.

or ubelieveably, here is this same helm on a Vitasuit Plus with toasty wings!!! and a heavy bomb bandolier. (There are probably only 2-4 sets of toasty wings in the game, so this is a special outfit indeed! The Dragon Princess personally knows one of the other owners - Hi, Dreamy!)

And here's that same coblat armor matched with a Fractured Mask of Seerus with dusky vertical vents

Iekeliene 4 - A Flawed Mask of Seerus on a Vitasuit with a toasty wolver tail.

Iekeliene 5 - A Skelly Mask with military vertical vents on Boosted Plate Mail with a military bomb bandolier and a military wolver tail.

Iekeliene 6 - A Firebreak Helm with a heavy ribbon, regal maidheadband, and regal helm guards on Radiant Silvermail with a regal parrying blade and regal dragon wings.

Iekeliene 7 - A Dread Skelly Mask on Angelic Raiment with dusky dragon wings.

(Iekeliene 8 is the third post of Iekeliene 3)

Iekeliene 9 - A Love Puppy Disguise on a Vitasuit Deluxe with a heavy vitakit, love puppy pocket monster, and a love aura

Iekeliene 10 - A Heavenly Iron Helm on Angelic Raiment with prismatic dragon wings.

Whew! That's quite collection. It seems some players have been filling their time waiting for "New Content" (the magical mantra of Spiral Knights) by creating a wonderful treasure trove of dressy delights!