The Jargon File, the online version of The New Hacker's Dictionary, offers several definitions of what a hacker is, including this one:
7. One who enjoys the intellectual challenge of creatively overcoming or circumventing limitations.I realized something about Gweryc, or rather, the reason I've enjoyed him more than any other character. He's a hack. A living, axe-wielding hack. (Funny enough, the Jargon File claims that the etymological origin of the word "hacker" was someone who made furniture with an axe.) I took something that wasn't supposed to work, and made it relatively successful. That was the challenge, and the fun.
The sad thing is, I'm running out of hacks. I don't believe I can coax much more dps out of Gweryc without better gear, and it seems unlikely I'll regularly see content beyond Karazhan at this point. As my guild progresses into more exclusive endgame content, leaving Kara behind, my feelings toward the game echo the ennui I felt at level 37. I'm a member of a guild full of great people that I have limited opportunities to play with. How frustrating.
What novelties are left to me? Taming Ghost Wolves, where once officially endorsed, is no longer possible. My Ravenholdt rep grind is slowly progressing. I guess I could work on my fishing skill, or "go corporate" and try manipulating Auction House prices. Maybe I could shoot for the Baron's skeletal mount, while my guild works on their ZA bears. If all else fails, I am on a roleplaying server...
Dorothy Parker had kinder words on boredom than Samuel Butler, who incised, "The man who lets himself be bored is even more contemptible than the bore." Am I contemptible in my languor? That seems an extreme position to take over a video game. Maybe the right thing to do is to step back from the game itself for a while. Or I could try ERP.
On the subject of hacks, Little Gamer Girl is wrong. The Deeprun Tram isn't the place to level up your weapon skill. It's the Blasted Lands. Attack the unkillable Servants of Allistarj, and afk your way to victory.
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3 comments:
Gweryc,
I've really enjoyed popping into your blog from time to time. I've often considered making a melee hunter (Ahab is currently a lvl 70 41/20/0). I made a second hunter, a draenei, but my daughter took that one over before I could melee. I'm fascinated by some people's approach to this game, where they scold and deride people for doing something different. I hope you keep going as a melee, especially with WotLC coming up, with the changes to the talent trees. I bet you find something beyond the 10 new levels to inspire you to keep going forth as a melee hunter.
My philosophy about WoW is this: if someone is valuable in a group or in instances, even if they're not performing at "top levels" in DPS or healing or whatnot, then that's great. Someone who pays attention to detail, works as a team, communicates and uses the skills their toon has to their own/their team's benefit - well, that person is someone I want to hang with all the time. We have a small guild on Khaz Modan that runs 5-mans because we only have eight active members. We're working towards heroics because that's a reasonable goal. The great thing about our guild is that we're all friends (in real life, too, not just the game), we talk, we strategize, and we laugh when we wipe in an instance, even though we try not to and go back until we get it. Some of us dream of Kara, but we also know what goes with that – stress from other players we don't know if we don't perform at those peak levels all the time, long times in front of the computer, etc.
Anyway, I hope to keep reading about the great Gweryc for a long time. Keep on keepin' on, my friend, and don't let a little pause in your excitement get you down too much. Soon you'll find the next goal and actively hack your way towards it.
Sorry to ramble. I've lurked without posting for over a year now, so it was time to speak up a little.
Ahab (publishing anonymously because I forgot my blogger password)
Something a raidmate of mine said spurred a question for you, sir:
Should survival actually become the hunter tanking build, how would you feel about that? I ask, because I know Gweryc was designed originally to push the envelope of hunter play; would Blizzard expanding that envelope be, in your mind, a good thing? Or would it be irritating to be the guy who "did it before it was cool" surrounded by all the scrubs who only jumped on the bandwagon due to Elitist Jerks endorsement?
This is meant as pure curiosity, mind. XD I'm afraid I might come off as hostile or irritating, which I don't intend at all; I'm mostly just curious.
(My thought is that survivalists-become-tanks would go something like this: the 45-point survival talent will be an "active parry" talent equivalent to a warrior's shield block/paladin's holy shield [separate from Deflection--when I say "active parry" I mean short cooldown, limited duration, limited charges that needs to be refreshed], while the 51-point talent that follows from it is "Aspect of the Bear"--200% armor and 30-60% increased threat. Ta-da, tanking hunter!)
@Ahab - Thank you very much. I agree about WotLK -- I check the wiki pretty much every day, hoping to see what's coming for Engineering, Inscription, and the Hunter trees in general. I may be in a funk right now, but I'm still very excited about the possibilities the future holds.
@C. - Very good question. How would I feel, if survival did become a melee tree, whether dps or tanking? Vindicated, maybe proud to a certain extent, in that my idea for what the class could do was adopted and made official. But it would be a sad day, too, in that what I've enjoyed about playing the class this way was making sustained melee work, when it's not really meant to. I've grown very attached to Gweryc, so as long as I'm playing the game, I don't see myself giving up on him, even if his schtick does end up being approved by Elitist Jerks. But playing different for its own sake... maybe it's time to level up my tanking shaman, or my lollersmite priest. ;)
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