Wednesday, August 15, 2007

I'm holding out for a Hero

With the buzz surrounding the Death Knight Hero Class, I'm reminded of the old pre-BC Hero Class rumors. Anybody else remember those? At the time I was terribly excited by the possibilities. My priest, a Demon Hunter? My druid, a more powerful caster?

Of the predictions made in the Hero Classes rumor, some did find their way into The Burning Crusade. For example, Druids can now summon Treants, and they do have a Crow Form. And mages can summon Water Elementals. In fact, the WoWWiki entry itself remarks:

It may be interesting to note that Summon Water Elemental is now a 41 point Frost Mage talent, released with The Burning Crusade expansion. Considering this article was created prior to the public release of information about Burning Crusade content, this particular part of the rumor leads one to believe there may have been some accuracy behind it.

With whatever accuracy may lie in the Hero Class rumor, let's have a look at this entry for Dwarven hunters:

Mountaineer
The Mountaineer is similar to the ranger (no pet, energy bar), but without the stealth aspects. The Mountaineer is hardier in melee combat than the hunter and also has more extensive tracking and detection abilities.

lol wut? Melee, you say? An energy bar, à la rogues -- implying a Mountaineer is meant to melee? In that sense, Gweryc is potentially a forebearer of Mountaineers-to-come rather than a mere modern-day sideshow attraction. Is there some future World of Warcraft where melee hunters are desirable?

1 comment:

Gauntlet said...

Of course a melee/ranged hybrid is a desirable class to play!

Just think of all those cool heroes from movies who fire off a whole bunch of shots before the enemy hordes get close, and then WHAM! They pull out a dagger or stab them in the face with arrows.

Super fantastic. And I would throw down with a pet-less ranger if they built a class around it, hero or non.