I’ve got a lot of thoughts running around in my head right now regarding my first visit to Ulduar and some of the things I’ve come to realize, but I’m not sure how well I’ll be able to sort and present them. I can always try, though!
Last week, I wrote a piece on “the soullessness of badge epics“. A post I threw together in twenty minutes and tossed up before running out the door has rather unintentionally become one of my most viewed posts ever and generated several good comments. I’m not entirely happy with that post, though. I kind of wish I’d let it simmer in drafts for a while before publishing it. Mainly because I think it gave off a different vibe than I wanted it to.
Now, I am rather emotionally invested in WoW, as I’m sure most of us who have been playing for a while are to some degree, whether or not we like to admit it. Thinking back to all the stories behind the gear I’d acquired through the years got my in an emotional mind-set while writing the post and as such it came off as a bit over-the-top, and I think it possibly confused some people into thinking that I was either a.) stubbornly refusing to ever buy badge epics even if they were an upgrade, or b.) anti-badge-system… neither of which are at all true.
Here is Attempt Two at trying to put my feelings into words:
In a big way, I don’t play WoW for the loot. If you put some instance in the game that had super awesome loot but which was simply a boring instance to me, you’d be hard-pressed to get me in there. On the other hand, I’ll totally do an instance I’ve done a million times that has no gear for me, just because I like it. Naxx10 is an example. I’ve done this more times than I can count and it has like… two things out of there that are side-grades and/or arguably slight upgrades (KT’s gun is one of them), and that’s it. But gosh if I wouldn’t love to go back there sometime soon. That place was awesome. Visually stunning, awesome sound design, fun encounters, etc. I don’t understand the people that are bored with it, but hey, maybe I’m just “special”.
I love when a great story happens behind gear… see my “Karma and the Naxx PuG” post for an example. Those shoulders are in my bank ’cause they have such a good story behind them.
This was sort of my mindset when I wrote that badge epics post, although the timing for my publishing of it was admittedly bad– the time when I was really feeling sort of “meh” about the new epics was when I figured I wouldn’t be doing any more progression in WotLK and thus acquiring epics beyond what Naxx had to offer seemed utterly pointless to me. I would rather have my epics that told a story, thankyouverymuch.
But now let’s move on. Because in another big way, especially now, I do play WoW for the loot, and this is why:
When I went to Ulduar-25 on Saturday, it wasn’t just “going to a raid”, no, it was an entirely different creature that I haven’t encountered very often in my WoW experience. It was a “Progression Raid”.
“Progression Raid” means everybody is bringing their mains (unless their alt is pretty much a main itself).
“Progression Raid” means everybody has to perform at their peak.
“Progression Raid” means wiping when the boss is at 2% if somebody messes up.
“Progression Raid” means yours truly went in there wearing three blues and a Heroics-level ranged weapon, and was pretty much demolished on Recount. It was embarrassing. I was all proud of myself for scraping up 4000 DPS and then I realized pretty much everybody else was doing closer to 5000.
Thus, “Progression Raid” means suddenly, gear is important. Because I don’t want to be a hindrance to the team. I don’t want to be the reason we wipe at 2%.
And I have absolutely, 100% no qualms about replacing “gear with a story behind it” with “gear without a story behind it” if the end result is going to be “helping out the guild so we can collectively have more awesome stories”. No, I don’t have an issue with it at all. I am super glad the badge gear is there right now, otherwise it would take even longer for me to catch up.
Ultimately, that means I have an issue with getting pointless gear for the sake of getting pointless gear. If I wasn’t in Ulduar right now, I’d have a hard time convincing myself to get the badge gear, because I wouldn’t need it. Now that I am raiding, I do need it, and thus most of the initial misgivings I had with the idea have melted away.
…does that make sense? o.O If it doesn’t, no worries, this post was kind of rambly anyway.
I really hope I never lose my mindset of enjoying older content though. I like that mindset. Gosh I wanna do Naxx10 right now. I also want to go back in time to level 70 and do Karazhan. Having this video open in a Firefox tab doesn’t help. /nostalgic~
P.S. Because I know people are going to go look at my Armory and give me gear upgrading hints: most of the gear that I’m wearing right now that is sub-par, I’m wearing because of hit rating issues. I am well aware of upgrades to my cloak and ring. =P
P.P.S. Super-grats to my guild for “of the Nightfall”! =D