Sticking to your guns, do you do it? What I mean is do you play the class/spec that's the flavor of the patch or do you play whatever class/spec combo that you like the best? If you are a Survival Hunter, do you stick to it no matter what your guild leader says? What if you're a Shaman, like me, and want to stay Enhancement even when everyone around you is saying "You should go ranged DPS or switch to Resto. As Resto you can get into any raid, it's awesome".
But what if you don't like healing? Should you allow yourself to be forced to heal for the good of the group? Or should you say to your guild leader "Maybe you should recruit more healers, but I would like to stay DPS".
I haven't done the math, but there are, let's see, 1...2...3...4...oh I give up. There are a lot of different race/class/spec combinations. Enough to go around, that's for sure. Now I hear it often, we need more tanks and healers in the game, DPS is a dime a dozen, can people please roll more tanks and heals?
Why?
So your LFD queue time is instant, just like tanks? Why should you or I give up the class/spec that we enjoy most for the good of the group?
Disclaimer: I'm an American, an individual from a very individualistic society. What's good for the whole isn't our first instinct. That said, I still wonder if we should easily capitulate to outside forces, demanding that our Mage be Arcane in order to top the Recount meters.
Gronthe is my Warlock, but I also have a Shaman at lvl 80. He's Enhance, and will always be. I will heal every now and then, but if I ever have a choice I play my Enhance because that's what I love to play.
If you continue reading I'll tell another story of my childhood, it's pretty good and has a lot to do with what I'm talking about.
This is embarassing, but as a kid I had some "speech impediments", according to experts. Actually, moving from the New England to the Rocky Mountains (for only a few forgetful years) my Maine accent was considered to be a disability. My elementary school forced me into speach therapy to fix my habit of rarely pronouncing my "R's", which most of the time came out sounding like the word "awe".
Heck, even at my high school football games when I moved back to New Hampshire we joked about our team's/city's name, Dover, by chanting:
Gimme a D...O...V...A...H. What's that spell? DOVAH!
One day I was at my friends house in the crisp, clean air of the Rockies, when I looked at a Tonka truck in his driveway, I noticed that there was a hole in the top of the truck that wasn't supposed to be there. Wanting to be a good friend, I tried to point this out by saying that I saw a hole in his truck, and maybe I could help him repair it. But it didn't come out right.
"I sawed a hole in yuh twuck".
He, being quick witted and a bit sarcastic, understood what I was saying but decided it be more fun to play with me.
"What, you sawed a hole into my truck? Why would you do that? Are you going to saw it in half when I'm asleep? Why? Why?"
Then he started to fake a cry. Oh great, he completely misunderstood me, or so I thought. After a couple minutes of teasing me he told me that he understood. We laughed about it and them played the day away.
But back at school I was forced spend the next year in speech therapy learning to forget the "true me" and speak like all the other robots in my shcool. In other words, I learned to pronounce my "R's". Now I can't stop, and to this day I hate my school for thinking there was something wrong with me.
For me this is the same as somebody telling me I need to change my spec because it's not the right fit. Well what if I don't freakin' want to pronounce my "R's" anymore, what if I want to stay Enhancement and not switch to ranged DPS or full time healer. I like who I am, and if you don't well then I'll find somebody who will!!!!!
I wish I could have said that to my speech therapist, but I had a hard time pronouncing his name:
Roger Frankwriter (a.k.a. Wodgah Fwankwightah). He probably thought I was swearing at him all the time.
I know it's not that big of a deal, as many smart guild/raid leaders appreciate and seek for a balance in their raiding teams, but I just had to get this off my chest.
2 comments:
Well... it all boils down to what's most important to you - to play exactly the spec of your heart or to raid. Of course you can stick to your choice, but on the other hand - this may cause the raid not to happen at all since what the team really needed was a resto. Maybe you think it's worth it. Maybe not.
I would personally be perfectly happy to even switch class if necessarily, however I would probably point out that it might be a trade-off for the raid as such since I've got a ridiculously long and slow learning curve...
The point I'm trying to get to is that wow can be played in different ways - indivudually or as a team sport. If you're into raiding, it's definitely the team way of doing it and to make it smoother and more successful you'd do wise to show some flexibility.
@ Larisa: I know you're right, but it's hard to come to terms sometimes with it. It took me about 6 or 7 months to take my first character to 80, that's a lot of time invested in one class/spec.
I think because of that it's hard to let go. But you're right, raiding is a team event, and to think of the team first may be the way to go.
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