This comes into my head every time timewalking shows up and its all about the legendary weapons/cloaks from past expansions.
We have probably a few hundred unused spell animations now (past expansion skills/trinkets/legendary item effects). These animations are mostly fantastic looking with a few needing updates (Sulfuras/Thunderfury to name a few), so why can we not use these spell effects/animations on Trinkets.
Example: Balefire trinket is a on use trinket that grants a large Int bonus to the user for 20seconds (reducing over time). Its animation is a small blue burning light on your hand, barely noticeable at times. Why can we not Transmog the trinket to have the same use but change the effect to a legendary caster cloak wings for example.
This can also be expanded upon with items like Fangs of the Father and Shadowmourne. Fangs provides wings effects and Shadowmourne grants the souls of the dead swirling around you the more you proc. You could change a Duration buff from a Trinket to be either of these effects. AND you could make it so it is not restricted to a certain class allowing every class to use the effect aslong as some one on the account has the achivement.
NOW Sulfuras is a whole different kettle of fish regarding effect as you cant really allow a transmog to fire off a special spell animation as that could be deemed as “OP” “BiS” and so on. What i would do how ever is attach it to a proc , and for lets say 20seconds of your proc your melee attacks replace your weapon with Sulfuras skin and animation for abilities (i’d limit this one to melee sorry casters). This would make all those Enhancement shamans happy about those two handed beefy animations (if there are no plans in the future to bring back 2handed enhancement).
You could also do the same with Thunder Fury but limit it to 1handed users only.
By allowing us to Transmog Trinkets you can bring back Legion Artifact Ability animations and effects like Lights Wrath, Warrior Dragon shield (name eludes me sorry) Eagle talons aoe animation aswell as Talents removed in previous Culling of skills/talents.
Maybe disable them for PvP so people dont have to learn a whole new set of animations to avoid and not avoid. I know some of the pvp community is very upset with transmog as a whole but at the same time all use it.
Regarding the Illidan Warglaives, they are pretty specifically attached to DH for weapon skins (i completely understand why). And they also already have a reason for getting them on an alt or main even if its not a DH. So these should not be included. If you want Warglaives play a DH or ask blizz to allow your class to use them.
Now what i would say is it should be broken up into certain groups so as to not use an offensive ability animation with a Defensive ability (trying to keep lore here). Some of these would clearly fall into multiple groups but you should see why.
-
Defensive– This could contain Items like Shadowmourne, Quin-Le, Courage of Niuzao. Fangs of the Fathers. Thunder Fury
-
Offensive Trinket - Shadowmourne, Fangs of the Fathers, Sulfuras Weapon Change for duration or the single use animations (kimbels claw trinket comes to mind with that one). Deathbringers WIll Proc. Legendary Melee Cloak spell effect aswell as its clawing animation for a seperate choice (gotta help those kitties out)
-
Ranged Offensive - Sunwell Bow Arrows for Hunter or Equip the bow for proc duration. Dragonswrath, Tarecgosa’s Rest (Procs could turn you into a whelp or give you some Blue Wings (kinda like the fangs but more magical) Aluneth Circle under target or on ground. Legendary Dps caster cloak spell effect and jadefire animation as seperate aoe choice.
-
Healing - Velens Sight, Jina-Kang, kindness of Chi-ji, Single Proc animation of Lightwell for cleave healing procs.
-
Absorb - Clarity of Will, New Void absorb animations from Uu’nat.
These are all examples and can be changed to anything that the community would deem fit.
The last thing i want to add to this is the unique old Set bonuses that have been removed from the game animation wise.
I have been playing a mistweaver for the past 3-4 expansions so for example:
Allow set bonus to be attached to a healing effect trinket and instead of effects not having an animation the trinket now makes you explode with mini chi waves like almost 2 maybe even 3 of the sets. Its a clear theme and i know other classes have their own unique theme happening with old sets.
This could also be attached to spells like essense font turning bolts from white to green. But that isnt part of this topic so i wont touch on that.