Tanking questionFollow

My guild is in bad need of tanks. My main is a mage and since DPS is a dime a dozen I figured I'd try to help out. Would a DK be the way to go? Starting at a higher level and the easier leveling to 70 would get me up faster. The only problem would be that I havn't ran with that many good DK tanks. Is it that hard to tank with?

You just described the scenario that Blizzard wanted. They made DKs to help the tank population, and they made them start at 55 to get them to max level quicker so they could have more tanks quicker. So yeah, make a DK.

Haven't taunted since.. Nexus, I think. Haven't come up against many aggro wipes I couldn't handle. Usually I'm 100k threat ahead of everyone else.

Is it really any different than a leveling NE Druid. I mean, they have likely been alive for hundreds of years, at the very least (that is to say they are relatively a teenager in NE time) and yet all they can do is a small heal and wrath.

Or how Mages can just randomly conjure fire with no training, but need to spend time learning how to work with ice. But, in a short amount of time, master the art of transfiguration?

Or how Warlocks manage to learn the immensely difficult (and dangerous) art of summoning in little time (not to mention the random magical arts they know before that)?

And, what if you make your toon old, with white hair and a wrinkled face? All this just gets weirder.

Though, Warriors and Hunters (and MAYBE Priests) all make sense...

I'm not following you, idiggory. You seem to confuse life experience with combat prowess.

When a level 80 Warrior wipes the floor with a level 1 Mage, it supposedly has nothing to do with age, but rather skill in combat. You can make your toon look old and it still won't matter, because it's combat prowess we're talking about here. Whether you start your combat training at age 19 or 69, it really makes little difference (other than certain physical abilities that most likely require a healthy heart to do).

A level 1 Night Elf Druid might be a gazillion years old, but his combat prowess is that of level 1. Before you begin your adventure in World of Warcraft, your character has been a civilian. You decide to take an active part in fighting the enemies, so you begin your combat training - usually with a quest.

It's also why you get experience from killing stuff. Combat experience. Not life experience. Once enough combat experience has been gained, you increase your combat prowess by one level.

Mages in this game are most likely sorcerers as they seem to not require incantations to cast their spells, but rather pull the power from within, so to speak. Which is probably why Mages start with some pyrokinetic abilities. One might refer to fire being the violent magic school and the strong emotions in Mages (isn't the plural form Magi, btw?) is what fuels the fire magic. Later on the Mage learns how to control his emotions and thus gains control over frost as well. As for polymorph being learnable at a relatively low level, I'm assuming all Mages possess some kind of magical gift, enabling them to manipulate magic unlike others. Learning how to polymorph something probably requires training, which is why it's not available at level 1. You need seven more combat prowess level-ups to get it.

Are you following me here, or have I lost you? Your level is just an indicator of your experience in combat. How well you are with a sword, or magic and your overall mental/physical health. When you gain two stamina and thus 20 health, it's not like you have a pool of health next to you and adding 20 increases the amount of blood you can bleed before you die. Health is really just another for of mitigation. The more health you have, the more beating you can take before you die. Just like defense, dodge rating, parry rating and other avoidance/mitigation stats.

So a level 1 Mage and a level 80 Mage might both be 25 years old, but the level 80 Mage has a vastly larger knowledge of combat and manipulating magic. Which is why the level 1 Mage would be helpless against him.



Usually I'm the drug-addled moran in the group.

Edited, Jun 18th 2009 5:21pm by Mazra

Edited, Jun 18th 2009 7:04pm by Mazra

But that's my point. Culture-wise, NE males were Druids and females were Priestesses (though this does not mean they had to belong to the church in a strictly priest-like manner). It makes NO sense for the combat prowess of any NE druid older than his teens to be a level 1. Ever. He should have:

-Spent time in the Emerald Dream.
-Experienced at least one form, bear or bird.
-Gained significant knowledge of the workings of nature (far more than that of a simple heal or damage spell--thorns is a little better, but you don't get that until level 6 or so).



Yes, but using this idea, I find it to make MORE sense for a Druid to start at 55 (if NE) than a DK to. Because, while a Druid WILL have practiced for hundreds of years, both in and out of combat, a DK is just being introduced to their craft. Why does having skill with a blade (say if they were a Rogue before) lend anything to their skill with spellcraft?

A DK has MORE reason to start at level 1 than other classes. While any person on Azeroth could have trained for years in the art of their specific class before making a specific dedication to it (for instance, Vareesa Windrunner, while a Ranger, learned a few different spells over time due to her culture). DKs, on the other hand, are introduced to a brand new art, and somehow have more combat mastery with it than druids that have been training for thousands of years.

And, remember, just because you were a Hero doesn't mean you were skilled in battle. You could have been a simple footman that died to save 20 other people. Nothing demands you to have been a fierce, hardened warrior.



This is actually refuted in lore. The "cast time" is supposed to represent the hand movements and words required for the spell. This is why "silence" functions against them. And instant casts are also easily explained in the novels, where they talk of mages sending "bolts" at enemies, that are difficult to conjure and take a lot of energy (explaining the long cooldown most have, and their higher mana cost).



I get you here. But I don't agree with your overall conclusion. While two different 25 year olds could have different levels, the 50 year old mage is MUCH more likely to be a fiercer foe in battle, assuming he has actually trained in the magical arts from an equal age (say both started at 7).

This is why I made the points about Druids. They have spent, at least, hundreds of years fighting against the Satyrs, the residual demons, the wildlife that turns feral, the fluctuations in the Emerald Dream, etc. But, they still start at level 1. Where someone who may have had decent skill with a blade, no magical training and only some combat experience becomes a Death Knight and now randomly has "more" combat experience.

The level has far more to do with gameplay mechanics than anything else.

And, remember, level is ACTUALLY IRRELEVENT to your character. In lore, the level 1 mage and level 5 mage aren't necessarily different.

Take, for example, an Ulduar Keeper and Illidan. Do you really think he couldn't take the General down solo? I'd be surprised as hell if he couldn't. But his level is 10 or so below.

Your level is a gameplay mechanic. That's all. Using it to describe battle prowess doesn't work if people aren't starting on equal footing.