Scorch Spam

I wrote this up in the final article of "Care and Feeding of Warriors" on WoW Insider today, thought i'd share it here too. 

My first toon was a Warrior. I started him in late vanilla. I was an Undead. I had gotten into the game because a bunch of my roommates in college were getting into it. I had played blizzard games before and enjoyed myself. It was suggested to me to play a warrior because "Our group could use a tank, you could tank for us." I really didn't know what that meant, I just wanted to be a thing that hits things with a giant sword. I did not understand the role from the very beginning. 

Since we had all rolled different races, we all had to make some kind of journey to group up. The guy who had played before ended up being our leader. He had rolled a Tauren. He made the decision for all of us to meet up in Thunder Bluff and quest through Mulgore and The Barrens. Being new to the game, I had no idea where that was or how to get there. I looked it up on the old map on the community site. At this point, I had gotten to level 6-7ish and was all "I'm ready to go on an Adventure." Back then getting on a zeppelin and flying to a whole nother continent was amazing. It might have took an hour to find it, with having maybe 30 feet of visibility in front of me, but it was still a big thing. 

I met up in Orgrimmar with our Troll buddie and an Orc, and the 3 of us believing that together the three of us level 6-7s could take on any of the wild beasts crossing the Barrens. I still remember the dread I felt as we crossed the bridge over the Sunfury river into the Barrens. I could click on mobs that were numbered red or even skulls. We stuck to the road. I would attempt to tank anything that we aggroed, but they would eat through my armor like it was cheese. 

It was this day that I was introduced to the corpse walk. I think wiped a good 4 times before the roommate that played before brought out his 40-something hunter to keep us alive. We died a few more times as the beasts got stronger to the south. Eventually we got into Mulgore for a short amount of questing to 10 and into the Barrens.

There were other memorable moments including entering the Deadmines for the first time, or forming Sul'Thraze the lasher for my first epic. As I said, I really didn't understand the role of tank. Somehow I had made my way to my 50's tanking in an Arms spec taking 2-hander specialization talents and taking no points boosting my defenses from the defencive tree. I know that warriors had some 36-4-20 tree or something back then for tanking, but I took my talents based on my solo play and using a two hander. I was both foolish and stubborn. It all culminated in a showdown in Blackrock Depths. 

The run was going as usual, mobs from everywhere running around everywhere and I having a complete inability to control them. By this point everything tore through me like paper. I had not yet replaced all of my Mail gear and my shield was still from Scarlet Monastery. Thinking I should just try to tear through them faster using my two hander I pop my Ice-Barbed-spear in my hands and quickly things go downhill. 

I think we get though 4-5 more pulls and this dps starts freaking out. He takes a look at my gear and my spec and just about everything about me and just rips it all to shreds. I knew I wasn't handling the tank role well by this point, but I was just trying to do what I could with what I had. Some of it I deserved, but that lashing sticks with me to this day and that particular room in BRD still brings the memories. 

Within the next couple days, I had retired that warrior to stand guard in the Lordaeron Throne room just waiting for the day that he could finally die for the last time. 

I stopped play for over a year after that. I came back in late BC and leveled a mage to max level. I gained at least 1 max level toon every expansion. I'd say I played a lot since then, but only about 3 times have I logged into that warrior. This warrior to me carried such a stigma. It was this column that inspired me to take up a new Warrior in Wrath and eventually get it to max during ICC lulls. 

I'm not subscribed right now, but I will again to clean up challenge modes before they are gone and play the pre-expansion event. But while I'm working on that, on the side I am going to make my old Undead take up his sword again. I am going to level him to max just to do some kind of tribute to this column. I don't even play anything on Zul'jin, but I will have one max level there. I might even halt progress at 80 for a min to get a Herald of the Titan's run in. But I swear, he will be 90 before we head back through the Dark Portal. In a weird sort of parallel, the goal will be to hit max level to travel through the Dark Portal in the next expansion. He didn't make the journey the first time over, I am going to make sure I change that for the second time around. 

So, my raid team finally broke apart last night. It's kinda heartbreaking. I feel so odd. I just can't describe it. This might be the oldest screenshot of my raid team that I have. I started raiding with them in ICC. We just finally disbanded this week. I am no longer the longest standing member of a raid team. It's such a weird thing. As far as I am aware, there are only 3 people in this screenshot I still talk to. Sigh. I don't know what to do. 

God it's frustrating when it's been about 5-6 weeks since a progression kill. It's all Vacations, back to school, I'm building a Photo Album and I've got Cancer. 

It's kinda a joke, I mean that is our exact situation in our raid team. And I laugh at it, but I also cry. I want my Wand from HM Horridon Damn. 

It's cool though. The girl on our Raid team with Breast Cancer is getting it removed on Patch day. So we'll be down our Disc Priest and Holy Paladin for the first whole week. So hopefully, everything goes well for them and her cancer is gone and in remission or whatever the term is. 

Warcraft has never been very clear on some things in its universe, namely magic. Dalaran Magi study it for years in old tomes and spellbooks enchanted to not collect dust. Surely our characters get to understand this magic much more than the players ever get to. Some people are comfortable that 1 casts Fireball. Other people know that Magi pull from the energies of the Runic Lay Lines to manifest into an orb of molten fire. I on the other hand like to question “How?” Certainly “It’s Magic” is an acceptable answer to any common Warrior, but it’s unsatisfying to me because I just want to question things. Follow along and I’ll question with you.

This 4th of July I finally completed the Transmog set I've wanted for my Warrior. It's a really simple set. It's just the Exalted Plate set with the Pauldrons of Abyssal Fury and the Lionheart Executioner, Reborn for my Weapons. I have the Doomed Crown of Lei Shen so I've been toying with it for the Helm. I do think it works with the set, I just wish you could see the back of your hair through the back of the helm. I always hate how many helms turn your hair into just a discoloration on the back of your head. Regardless, this is one of my favorite transmog sets. I've also come up with some exchangeable pieces for it too.