Alpha Starts the Clock

This was originally going to be Sunday’s post before my computer problems started up. Let me start by giving a big shout out to commenter JK who gave me a clue about PIO and DMA. After a Google search I had found a solution and my computer is running great once more. Plus all the other scans I did, it’s actually running faster now than before. Thanks, JK!)

Friends and Family Alpha has started. The countdown has begun before the ‘Expansion blahs’ kick in and people decide it’s just not worth doing much of anything anymore as they wait for the next expansion.

Naturally, at this time, people start to think about what they want to play in Cataclysm. An expansion is the ideal time to change your class or role. Like most of my guild mates, I have multiple level 80s, and each of us will have to decide which one we will level and gear first. The reality for me is that Devolve has to start raiding long before I’m ready. The guys in my guild simply level at a much faster pace than I do. I don’t know if they just have more playing time than me or if they are better at leveling. It’s probably a little of both.

I know there are certain classes I won’t play, but those are limited to Warlock and Death Knight. I’ve actually decided to not concentrate on what Class I want to play in the Expansion, but rather I’m concentrating on something even more defining for what toon I’ll play. In an ideal world, it should be as simple as playing what I have fun playing. The problem is I enjoy several toons. I ran all four of my eighties through Heroics and I had a blast on all 4. It’s basically impossible to know from the play experience of the Wrath Class whether or not I’ll enjoy the Cataclysm class. Can you imagine deciding on being a Paladin Tank in the waning days of Burning Crusade. The Wrath Tankadin plays completely different from the Burning Crusade one.

Basically, I have two decisions that will heavily influence what character I make my main in Cataclysm. The first is deciding on what role I want to pursue. As I started earlier, I don’t want to pursue a Tanking role, so that leaves: Healing, Melee DPS, and Ranged DPS. The second decision is whether or not to pursue a Hybrid class, or go with a Pure. Despite what my guild mates would tell me, I should also consider what everyone else is going to be leveling. While we have raided with as many as 4 Druids before, it would probably be better to have a good balance of classes , or at least armor classes (Cloth, Leather, Mail, Plate).

Comments

Ellevis said…
Most people in our raid group are still up in the air in regards to what they wanna play for cataclysm. I'm sure that alot of decisions will start being made as more info comes trickling out.

As of right now I think there are only 3 of us who know for sure what they will be playing: Myself - DK Tank, Blue - Feral Tank, Lakini - moonkin. Everyone else has an idea but nothing solidified yet.

Like we did for wrath I will do my best to accommodate everyone in terms of what they want to play, but in some cases it's just hard ( like if everyone wants to be a tank ). In the end I want everyone to enjoy their character.
Ken Bowen said…
I currently have 3 level 80 characters and may have 4 or even 5 by the time Cataclysm releases. I'm in the same boat on deciding. In the end, I'll probably stick with my paladin just because I can fill any role with him, and I like being versatile.

There are some people in my guild who are not versatile and always insist on playing dps, so I try to fill in where needed. Luckily, I enjoy playing a lot of different things so it fits for me.

In the end, we always need healers and tanks, and since I'm comfortable doing both as a paladin, I'm sure I'll keep playing him as my main. However, I do hope to get to play DPS a bit more than I've been able to in Wrath, and I might make the decision to drop my holy spec for Ret and just tell the guild more people need to play healers.
Anonymous said…
I took a break on my pally tank and came back as a resto druid several months later. I leveled from 12-80 by predominately healing instances.

I still hate healing. I hate not being in control. I hate spamming heals on avoidable damage. I hate squishy tanks who cop attitude when you have to drink.

No, certainly not going to be my main in cataclysm.

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