One thing I’ve noticed lately is that I usually get confused and curious comments or Twitter messages when I mention that guns are by far my favorite type of ranged weapon, or that I am obsessed with Mechanostriders, or that I like gnomes and goblins. And because curiosity is typically a good thing, I am here to reward that curiosity with answers! *nods*
Okay, first, let’s go back to the basics. I believe I’ve mentioned this before, but I’ll mention it again because it’s relevant: I’ve always been more of a sci-fi person than a fantasy person. When I was a kid, I found aliens and spaceships and androids to be much more interesting than more abstract concepts like elves and dwarves. I shoved various fantasy films and cartoons aside in favor of Star Trek or Star Wars, which never bored me, despite the fact that I’d seen the various movies enough times that I could quote entire scenes verbatim.
As I grew older, I finally started to sort of grasp and appreciate fantasy much more than I had in the past, but that longstanding love for sci-fi has really stuck with me.
As such, I really REALLY like anything involving robots, steampunk, rube goldberg devices, mechas, crazy machines, airships, flashing lights, and any sort of otherwise otherworldly and machiney contraptions.
One of the awesome things about WoW and the Warcraft world is that Blizzard isn’t afraid to occasionally toss all those awesome things into their games. Sure, I was always the girl who preferred StarCraft to WarCraft back when they were strictly RTS games (go figure), but even the WarCraft games had glaive throwers and flying machines and all sorts of fun stuff. So I’m naturally drawn to all that stuff (and by extension, to gnomes and goblins).
Anyways, this fangirlishness of mine has manifest itself today in the form of showering my characters with all sorts of fun contraptions:
I’m not sure if it’s quite possible for me to express the awesomeness of having a mechanical mount and a mechanical minipet. I have actually started collecting Mechanostriders in various colors and while I love all minipets, the robotic ones (such as Clockwork Rocket Bot) are my favorites. The particular set you see here; the Gnomeregan Mechanostrider and the Mechanopeep, cost 140 Champion’s Seals all told. That’s a lot of dailies. And you know what? It was totally worth it.
I love the way Mechanostriders appear to have so much personality for being a machine (I am a sucker for that sort of thing), but recently I discovered that they have tail-lights, and my Fangirly Squee reached new heights:
Tail-lights. On my mount. Tell me that’s not awesome.
Now let’s move along to guns. Truthfully, there are sort of a myriad of reasons why my various hunters tend to gravitate towards guns instead of bows/crossbows, the major ones among them being a.) roleplaying (Tawyn has close ties with the Dwarven District of Stormwind, for example), and b.) Me being shallow (Male blood elf + gun = drool)
Largely, though, it all goes back to phasers and light-pistols and tricorders and things that go PEWPEWPEW very loudly and with lots of flashy lights. It reminds me of Trek and Star Wars and those warm, cozy, and oh-so-fun childhood memories of watching the good guys triumph with their little laser guns in hand. (Well, and lightsabers, but that’s what glowy stat-sticks are for.) I want my made-up hero to be like that too. So gimme guns, baby.
Now I know what you might be thinking. You might be thinking, “Pike, are you seriously going to pass up a ranged weapon upgrade just because it isn’t a gun?”
The correct answer is: no, of course not. I only saw Arrowsong drop once, ever. But I rolled on it so fast your head woulda spun. I lost, but you know. Back in Burning Crusade I replaced the sexiest ranged weapon of all time, Wolfslayer Sniper Rifle, with The Choco-Bow as soon as I had the badges. I am, afterall, a hunter. I’ll take any good ranged weapon.
…but that doesn’t mean having a gun gives me a little thrill and makes me happy in a dorky way.
I used Nesingwary 4000 for a very very long time. I love that weapon. It looks absolutely gorgeous. I think it’ll stay in my bank for time and all eternity (alongside Wolfslayer). The other day, the new gun from Trial of the Champion dropped. I waffled on taking it for a bit because the stats alone weren’t super hot, but in the end, it’s enough of a white damage increase that I’m pretty sure it is an overall upgrade. It’s not quite as pretty as Nesingwary, but I like it; it’s a very handsome weapon in its own right.
…and it’s a gun. *squee*
I’m loving Ulduar so far. Guys, it’s full of robots and vehicles that chuck bombs at people. HOW IS THIS NOT AWESOME? (Hint: It is, in fact, extremely awesome.)
Okay, I’m done fangirling. Just figured I’d explain some possibly odd little obsessions of mine. Carry on now…
Sonic Spear was the first item on pretty much any fresh 70 hunter’s list, and for good reason: it was just about the best thing you could get until you were halfway through Karazhan. Having one of these suckers meant you were serious about getting into heroics and raiding, and it just looked super cool to boot – especially when enchanted.
The “alternate” Sonic Spear, Terokk’s Quill was especially great for Survival hunters with all of its agility. This is because back then Survival hunters had a raid buff called Expose Weakness which scaled based off of the hunter’s agility, so you wanted to stack it. Oh, and like Sonic Spear, it looks super awesome.
A true Rite of Passage for any hunter beginning raiding, Legacy was one heckuva weapon. It was tough to even see it, because it only dropped from one Opera event (picked at random every week) and then only 22% of the time. But once it did, you’d be wearing this thing for a long time to come and with its distinctive design you could show off in town that hey, you were doing raids and stuff!
A drop from the first boss of Black Temple, Halberd of Desolation was a true sign that you were playing with the Big Kids. The fact that you had to be in a BT-ready guild to get it, combined with its appearance and super cool glowy affects, meant that having one would earn you the envy of all the little baby hunters in Stormwind and Orgrimmar.
Shivering Felspine is dropped very rarely by Sunwell trash, which made it another highly coveted high-level item. Its design matched many of the Sunwell gear drops quite nicely, and back in those pre-transmog days it was neat to have a weapon that matched your set.
