And then there was orc.

I’m a hunter at heart.

This may come as a surprise to a good number of you, but I really am. From my late high school days of secretly statting out Dungeons and Dragons Rangers in Journalism class to my first excursion as a fatty cowman trying to figure out why I couldn’t shoot a gun while running to the next plainstrider, I’ve played bow-toting foresterers whose best friends are animals. Prior to Elam’s creation, I had three hunters: Minotauren, my first cowman who reached level 7 before my trial expired, Lethreyn the blood elf male, who was deleted out of frustration with my inability to solo the level 30 hippogryff in Ashenvale at level 27, and another Tauren whose name escapes me.

Even after Elam began his massive trek from Mulgore to Mount Hyjal, I stalled his leveling at level 61 to start a Draenei Hunter. I had literally no interest in ever playing Beast Mastery, which was a vogue (read: most viable dps spec by a long shot) spec at the time, and I had read that Survival was beast CC- something Shaman were (and are!) notoriously lacking- while offering a unique raid buff in the form of Expose Weakness. Darwinism the Survival hunter (proudly SV from 10-80!) and his pet’s  <Charles> (I’m on <Charles> the sixth atm) were born, Alliance on Uldum, a rl friend’s server.

I’m not quite sure what happened, but shortly after Darwinism hit 62 (a level above Elam), I for some strange reason saw an appeal in leveling Elam. As Resto. Wtf. (I blame a certain British Protection-turned-Retribution Paladin, who IMed me one day with her glorious stories of tanking regular Mechanar and how she needed a good healer because all of her friends were terrible and wanted to dps.) A million lightning bolt casts, 11 mana tombs runs, and a particularly nasty attempt at regular shadow labs later, I was 70 on Elam and Darwinism was a distant memory, abandoned on a backwater server in the services of the lesser-faction. This was May, 2008. Darwinism sat at 63 for the rest of Burning Crusade, and the Wrath of the Lich King saw Elam, my Shaman who is very rarely on Ramen, and Grazeless, my Femcow DW Tankard O’ Terror DPS DK hit 80.

Finally, a little frustrated with being sat on the bench with nothing to do (I was a Surreality initiate in the Spring, and I had  terrible computer: I was the last person invited. ), I headed back over to Uldum one night as an escape. And, I fell back in love (part of it was my leaving Zangarmarsh and leveling elsewhere- I really hate that zone.) I felt the same way I have everytime I’ve played a hunter in the past, some sort of strange idea of returning to my roots. I got passionately into leveling Darwinism, ignoring the fact that it was my third time through northrend, I had no heirlooms to make life not suck, and Survival is -so- not optimal leveling. June of 2009, close to the anniversary of Elam’s level 70, and nearly 16 months after his creation, Darwinism hit level cap.

Like celebrities, our love affair was passionate and brief. Try as I might, I couldn’t make playing alliance on another server from my home guild and friends work, especially when the Alliance guild I was in on Uldum was full of turds who wiped on Ignis for an hour and 30 minutes,(No lie- I was there.) and my only friend on the server is the biggest introvert I know, who I’ll go out to dinner with and hold entirely one-sided conversations with myself while he sips beer and doesn’t talk. (Whispers are even more painful. >.<) I left Uldum behind for another two months, and actually grew to disdain my hunter as a representative of all that was bad on that server. I did end up trying to level a THIRD tauren hunter during this time, but she reached 13 and I got bored. :S

When news of having level 80s of both factions on one realm hit, I didn’t consider transferring Darwinism, because I still was feeling the aforementioned disdain. Rather, I cleared out his 1500g bank account, spent all of his emblems on heirloom gear, and loaded up my unfortunately named Paladin alt “Idrawaggro” with everything he needed to make the leveling process not suck. Idrawaggro spent levels 55-73ish on Uldum, before one night changed his identity changed forever, making the move from Idrawaggro, the male human paladin from Uldum to Notelam, the Female Blood elf on Black Dragonflight. A week or two of question and Notelam hit 80 in Early September, gearing herself up as a Holy Light bot. Darwinism still lay neglected.

And then, about two weeks ago, Frost PVE changes were announced on the PTR that made Frost Specced Mages look like they might be close to viable dps in 3.3. Excited as heck, I took my level 32 Frost Mage out of retirement, gave ger some nice heirlooms, and started the grind towards 80, because I am the quintessential alt-oholic. This grind was different, however, as my guild leader accompained me on it- queuing us for BGs on her hunter  (Btw, Warsong Gulch is horrid for leveling.) and pewpewdpsing Uldaman with me.

Somewhere in the midst of watching Villanie (and her pets- Elam the Raptor and Buttercup the Scorpid-) ENJOY her hunter play (srsly, she loves it),  and getting mercilessly owned by them in 40-49 BGs, my interest in Darwinism was renewed. I had been planning on transferring him Horde side for a while, but the cost dissuaded me. (Really, my boyfriend’s opinion on the cost dissuaded me. ) I struck a deal with him four nights ago- I’d realm transfer him this paycheck, and then NEXT paycheck I’d faction change him. It was great…until I gave into temptation upon deciding I wanted to play him that very night and blew the extra 30 bucks on a faction change, too. And Darwinism, the female orc with pig tails, was born.

Now that the history is all done, here is the crux of what this post is about: Darwinism is an orc now. As I might have mentioned in this post, other than one blood elf male who was deleted for being useless, all my attempts at Horde hunters were tauren. Why? Because Tauren are the single coolest race in the game, bar none. On sheer awesome factor, from 1-Elam, Tauren come in somewhere around 32 million.

However, when I was actually PAYING to make Darwinism an orc, I had to put more thought into it than “what looks best.” Tauren racials are piss poor for Hunters- while war stromp may situatinally be useful, you don’t want to be in melee range. 5% base health increase is negligible, the herbalism bonus is not something I worry about very often, and I don’t pvp enough to care that Balance Druids are hitting me 2% less often. On the other hand, Orcs offer Blood Fury, a 2minute cooldown DPS trinket, and command- a racial that is equivalent to the 2pc t7 bonus. (5% pet damage.) I didn’t want to deal with the “lol why tauren hunter” comments; not did I want to fake naivety and not knowing when I made the character that the racials were subpar. And, I wanted to maximize my dps- and that meant orc.

I think this is really important, as it is a question a lot of us are going to be asking ourselves within the next month or so, once race changes become viable: At what point does min/maxing take priority over personal pleasure? I never want Elam to be an orc- I don’t like the race very much, but 5% feral spirit damage, an AP trinket, and 5 expertise for each axe I equip seems a hefty tradeoff for the please of looking awesome. However, when race changes become available, would I be willing to face the critique of “why didn’t you go orc?” Because, in effect, it becomes the same as not getting epic gems in your gear or enchanting it properly- I would have to willingly forego a proven DPS increase for no visible gain. Is that a choice that I would be willing to make? I’m not sure yet, and I’d love to hear others feelings on the matter.

(I’m going to try to comment on comments as much as I can, but I doubt I’ll be posting much this week. Besides a side-project I’m planning, Ciderhelm from Tankspot gave me the go ahead to develop a text-based guide to playing an Enh Shaman, so I’m planning on using a lot of my free time this week working on that. )

Tags: Altaholic, Enhance