What If Your Class Was Removed?

After talking about blizzard removing things yesterday I started to think what wouldn't they remove.  Almost anything is fair game.  They can remove or redesign zones, remove raids, dungeons, gear, titles, achievements, mounts, pets, mobs, you name it.  They could even remove entire races if they choose to and just leave your race as the "last survivors" if they wanted to because that is what some races are to begin with.  But what about your class?

What if tomorrow you woke up and logged on to your favorite warcraft news source or random internet blog to hear about the recent hub bub going on with the game to see announcements about your class being removed?

Lets say for some reason blizzard did not like the idea of 11 classes and wanted to move backwards to a nice even number like ten and it was your class that they decided to put on the chopping block.  Outside of the clear outrage you would see on the forums, and many blogs like mine, over the removal of your favorite class with no warning, it very well might be the first time that anyone would agree rage quitting the game is actually the right answer.

While some of us have many alts and might even like to play them most people consider themselves a particular class.  I am a hunter, that is what I am.  There are no ifs, ands or buts about it.  I like the play style, I like having a pet, I like being the loner sort of class that is capable of doing many things on its own. So even if I have all classes at max level and multiples of many of them at max level I am a hunter first and foremost.  So this post, for me at least, is about the hunter class being removed from the game.  For you, make it about whatever class is your true love in the game, the one you like to play best and the one that you most closely identify yourself with.

This is a what if in all scenes of the words because when you think of things they could remove this would be as far as possible of anything that could happen because it never will.  But to continue with the what if, what if you do not rage quit.  Which would be, quite honestly, the result most people that play that class as a main would do. So no rage quitting allowed.  Now to the question posed to me, change the class to the one that best suits you for your answer.

What if the hunter class was removed?

I first started playing a hunter when I tested it out in BC mainly because it was what was highlighted on my screen.  I wish there were some sort of deeper thought put into it but it was highlighted and when I read the desorption I liked it, really that was all that was involved in choosing the play a hunter.  It was a ranged class, which if you have ever played any fantasy game ever in the history of gaming you would know is the best class to be, and it had a pet that could take the hits for you while you beat down a mob.  So hunter it was for me.  It sounded good.

As the years went by I made a lot of other classes, even had a few more classes to play around with before my hunter was max level.  Mostly support characters made with the intention of helping my hunter.  Like someone to make gear for me, someone to make bags for me, you get the idea.

So I was an alt-a-holic before I ever actually became one.  With that I learned to play with many different styles and it became clear in no time at all that hunter was the only class I ever waned to be.  So if I could not be a hunter, while I could still find some joy in the game otherwise, I really would not get that into it.  But being I am not allowed to quit in this what if now that the hunter class is being removed I have to consider other options.

For me it is not as hard as you might think.  I have always had my main, a hunter, and two additional mains, for a few expansions now.  I've worked with the three main system and I am used to it.  One main for tanking and one main for healing along with my over all main, the hunter of course.  Those other mains usually ended up being a druid for tanking and a priest for healing.  For a short time in cataclysm I was mostly healing on my shaman and mostly tanking on my warrior, but in time I went back to my druid and priest combo for my tank and healer mains as it was.

I have dabbled in the other damage dealers and all their specs.  I do not like any of the other ranged classes.  I could sink my teeth into a warlock, or one might assume, as it does have a pet to tank and it does (or very soon did) have some ability to do damage while moving but I just never felt comfortable with a lock.  I could play a mage because they can do what I love to do with my hunter better than any of the other classes I have played and that is kite.  Mages are quite good at that.  But no, they did not feel right either and always feel way to squishy.

Nearly all the damage dealers have something I like about them, but they just are not for me.  I am sure everyone that has a main can sympathize with me there.  No matter how we try, no matter what we like, an alt will always be an alt.

And that is where my problem would lie.  I am an average at absolute best healer.  Sure I am healing heroic, sure I can heal most things, but when it comes to cutting edge stuff I will never touch that with a ten foot pole.  As far as tanking goes I do that a slight bit better than I do with healing.  I am a very serviceable tank.  Given a little time playing with it to into a grove with it I believe I could meet my potential as a tank, at least a hell of a lot easier than I can as a healer.

Over all however, I am a damage dealer, that is what I like to do.  When I am on my hunter and I pug I usually just tell the raid leader.  I know the fights, just point at what you want me to kill and I will kill it.  I do not need any explanation.  And that is the truth.  It is how I play.  I study the fights and what is relevant to me first to do my job to the best of my ability.  I rarely if ever go into a fight not knowing what I want to do and how I want to do it.  I plan out my cooldowns before the first pull.  I plan out my movements before the first pull.  I take pride in being the best bringer of death that I could possibly be.  My job is the be the best killer I am capable of being and I try my best.  It is the fun of the class for me.

So that means while I would still have a main tank and a main healer neither of those would be my new main.  I would need a new damage dealer.  Not a main as a tank or not a main as a healer, my main will need to be just as my hunter is, a dealer of death.  So which damage dealer would I choose?

The obvious choice would be to choose one where I can double dip.  One I can tank and DPS on, or one I can heal and DPS on.  Or even better yet, one and I can tank, heal and DPS on like a druid, monk or a paladin.

I'll rule out the monk because although I did have a short stint as a main tank on my monk this expansion, which included tanking for some of our earliest clears of ToT I abandoned it shortly after SoO came out because I was just not feeling it any longer.  I've never tested monk healing so that would be worth a shot at some point maybe and I can say that I like monk DPS even if it is melee but not enough to main it.

Now on to the druid.  No thank you.  I am not fond of the kitty toolkit.  I played around with it once this expansion and gave it a true effort to play it and I did manage to get it working.  Even the advanced rotation.  However, while fighting I oft times found myself losing track, not because of lack of skill on my part, but because I was not enjoying it and started to zone out.  There is too much to keep track of as a cat and if I am going to get bored at doing it that quickly it will only hurt my game play because a bored player is a bad player that makes mistakes.  And I was starting to make mistakes.  Balance just never floated my boat, all 2.3 seconds I tried playing it for on the various occasions I did attempt to play one.  No thank you.  At least being a druid healer I could get into but that would not solve the issue where I need a damage dealer.

For the paladin the answer is a lot easier.  I do not like paladin healing and I do not like the peaks and valley feeling to the DPS rotation.  So paladin is not even an option I would consider.  It is tank or nothing.

Now for the ones that can heal and DPS only which would be shaman and priest.  Although I have used both as my main healer over the years and I really love both shaman and priest healing I am not keen on the damage dealer part of if.  I can not stand shadow.  Talk about boring, that one is up there.  For elemental it is better than shadow at least but still takes place in the category of lacking buttons and waiting on procs does not make for compelling game play when you only have a couple of buttons to begin with.  Enhancement is what my shaman always was.  It was not a healer to start oddly enough, it was melee DPS.  I hate melee DPS but I really like the enhancement rotation.  It has always had some issues with gaps in the rotation and that bugs me, but I could deal with it.  I would give it a try, but I do not see me considering this as my main DPS spec to start with, just something I could try.

Now for the tank and damage dealer category.  I could consider a death knight but I am not overly fond of either unholy or frost.  I have played them, I have played them okay as well.  So I am sure if I put my mind into it I could even get good with them but I do not want to.  They suffer from the number one thing I hate about damage dealers, being in melee range.  Unless you are the tank I do not believe there is any reason anyone should ever be in striking distance of the mob.  Simple as that.  Now I do understand my choices are getting quite limited.  I've already ruled out both pure ranged classes and all ranged specs from classes that can do damage and something else, so I am getting short on options here.  But DKs are not it.  I would give the enhancement another try way before even considering a DK.

Warrior, ah the warrior.  I have had a warrior as my main tank before and gladiator stance does really seem promising.    I love the idea of being a sword and board damage dealer.  Just the idea alone is enough to get me to test it out.  From all I have read, have not tried it yet, it seems like gladiator is also a very fun style of combat.  So it is quite possible I might find myself being a warrior tank and damage dealer, basically while still a tank.  That is an interesting idea.  This would most likely be the first alt I would bring up just to try it.  At least as it stands now, it is the most promising alt.

So were are we now.  There is only one class left and I saved it for last for multiple reasons.  It is the class I like the least.  It is a pure class which means it can not do anything else.  It has a history of being a great PvP class but I am not a PvPer.  And last but not least it is a melee class, which as I mentioned, I really dislike.  But when all is said and done, and I do not believe I am about to type these words, if hunters were removed from the game I would main a rogue.

Yes.  I said it.  I feel dirty now.  It is my arch nemesis the rogue.  Not only as the exact counter to hunters in PvP but many I like about hunters, rogues don't have.  However, with that said, many things I do like about hunters, rogues do have. 

They have a misdirect of sorts, they have a better stealth, they have a way to drop aggro, they have lots of control, they have more defensive cooldowns and they are kind of sucking in the self heals department just like hunters plus they can get around pretty nice with things like sprint and shadowstep.  They are a lot like hunters and a lot not like them at the same time.  As I like to joke sometimes rogues are hunters that were not smart enough to stay at ranged and got hit in the head one to many times.

When all is said and done, if I were forced to pick a new main it would end up being a rogue.  I might not be good at one now but they are one of, if not the, easiest classes in the game, so I am sure if I tried getting the most out of one it would not be too hard when compared to other classes.  I can pull around 200K-240K at a 544 item level with a lovely 502 weapon but I can not tell you if that is good or not.  But one thing I do know is that if I played it more than once every few months I would be doing better. 

Also one thing that is in the rogues favor, sort of like how gladiator is in the warriors favor, is that they changed one of things about rogues I had hated to the most, outside of the fact they are melee of course.  Combo points.  Now that they are on me and not on my target which means I will not feel as useless as I always did when there was a time I had to switch targets.  I always felt bad that I wanted to land a finisher on the target I was on before switching.  Now that I no longer need to worry about that, and with rogues excellent movement abilities, target switching should no longer be an issue that holds me back from enjoying the class. 

As an added bonus a rogue brings some decent raid utility, does fair numbers, is one of the least played classes and is a beast even for a complete noob like me to play in PvP.  So maybe I might actually enjoy PvPing when I am not running around with the free kill sign around my neck that I usually feel like I am wearing when I am on a hunter because everyone always comes after me first, even before healers.  And if someone puts that sign on me as a rogue, cloak, vanish, reset.  Yeah, I think I can really dig that.

So what if your class was removed and you were not allowed to quit, you had to pick something, what would you pick?