Flux

One of the more popular debates that surfaces on WoW forums like an unkillable multi-headed troll is, are hybrids better?

What’s a hybrid?  Blizzard designed the game with specialists and hybrids. The specialty classes are supposed to be the best at something, like ranged damage, while the hybrids do more than one thing like healing and melee damage, but not as well. In the first stage of the game this works very much as advertised. However in the last stage of the game, raiding or arena, it’s murkier because changing between roles requires a talent respec which is hardly something you can do quickly while off killing trolls.

During the first stage of the game there isn’t much debate which is better.  This is because it doesn’t matter.  You spend most of your time soloing.  And leveling up is not difficult, only time consuming.  But the debate burns with feverish passion in the end game when players start discussing nerfs, class balance, and raiding.

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Most of you have been in this situation.  Someone in your group goes afk, brb, bio, gets a drink, has a computer problem, phone call, spouse aggro, inc kids, didn’t show up on time, forgot a quest item, forgot the daily quest, didn’t bring food, flasks, elixirs, needs to repair, is pvp flagged, or gets everyone killed when they didn’t pay attention before or during a fight.  They just wasted everyone’s time.

This is especially a problem in pugs when you aren’t there to socialize or in raids when the goal is to get to a certain point. How much of a problem is this really?  Let’s take a look.  A typical brb lasts around 2 mins, an afk can go on for 5 mins, a computer reboot can take 3 mins, on pve servers deciding to flag up or down or dealing with the split buffs can take 2 mins, running back to the bank for what you forget is 5 mins, and so on.  If you multiple that by how many people are in the group (minus the person who did it) you get a feel for how much total time was wasted for everyone.  Players tend to think, “Hey I was only gone for a couple minutes”.  But when there are many people waiting, this is more time than they think.  In a 5 player group you only wasted about 8 mins.  But in a 25 player raid you just wasted 48 minutes of other peoples time.  If you have a five minute bio or repair in a 25 player raid, you just wasted a whoping two hours.
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It’s a debate that has been around since the beginning. Is someone a casual or hardcore player? What does that mean?

Confusingly some players use this to compare how much time they play instead of how they play. This leads to phrases like ‘Hardcore Casual Player’ or ‘Casual Hardcore Player’. Some players even use it as an insult or compliment, depending on if they want to point out how good someone is or how little real life they have.

I am going to use Casual and Hardcore to describe how you play. And I’ll use Daily, Regular, or Occasional for how often you play. For example, someone who plays everyday but isn’t playing to ‘win’ is a casual daily player. Someone who plays to win but does not play often would be a hardcore occasional player.

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The World of Warcraft is several different games in one. But there always seem to be three stages to the game. Leveling, gearing, and achievement. Let’s take a look at them so we can refer to them later.

The first time you played WoW, when it hooked you, was the Leveling stage. There were many new things to see and do. The world was wide open. And there was virtually no grinding. You would spent most of your time adventuring solo and probably played casually. Of course, if you had already been through the leveling stage once and went to make another character the second or third time probably seemed like a grind. Eventually you hit the maximum level and things changed.

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Often there is a choice of which item to upgrade first. For example, do you get the most out of updating your head slot item or your shoulder item? At first, this will be fairly easy to answer. You just upgrade the one that is the worst quality. For example, get rid of your greens for blues and then purples. And secondly upgrade your item level.

We have talked about gearing up, quality and item levels previously.

But as all your items start to become the same quality and roughly the same level this becomes harder to decide. A third way to help you decide is to know how Blizzard spends points on itemization.

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Generally in WoW one person pulls a creature mob over to where everyone fights it. But who does the pull? The puller is usually the tank, crowd controllers, or a hunter. But which is the best?

The Tank

There are currently three tanks in the game, each with their own way of pulling. Druids will usually start a pull with damage spell or Faerie Fire. Paladin’s usually pull with Avenger’s Shield. And Warriors use their ranged weapon, either a bow or a gun. Crowd controllers control their targets after the pull starts, except with Sap. The tank builds up aggro on the loose creatures. And the party proceeds to blast the creatures in the kill order. The tank is the simplest puller to have, and it’s the most often used.

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