The Dwarf Moves South….and Retires?

Not quite, but close.  In short, I’m not too comfortable with all of the Hunter changes.  The class is also, finally, starting to feel slightly stale to me.  4.0.1 brought a lot of changes, but also showed some glaring weaknesses in the class redesign.  Most notably for me: we weren’t scaling nearly as well as some other classes (Warlock, Mage, Warr to name some).  As such, we were barely beating tanks in Heroic ICC and therefore were arguably liabilities to a raid.

Now, not to completely harp on Hunters.  4.0.1 brought some much needed utility to the class, with pets bringing any of the various buffs/debuffs provided by other classes.  This means that Hunters can bring a missing raid buff/debuff in a pinch.  It’s vital to 10-mans; especially those that are pushing content.

However, Hunters are first and foremost a DPS class.  While utility is nice, it takes a bit away from what should be our main focus: killing things to death!  The fact we went from top-5 on non-add fights to barely above tanks, though, is just too far of a fall.  I’m hoping once I arrive at 85 that most of these issues will have diminished or disappeared altogether.  While I can understand that Blizzard was designing for the future, the fact that they hobbled Hunters for a month beforehand just hurts.  I’m a tweaker at heart, and when I know that no amount of perfect gameplay, gearset, or experience can make me competitive, then it’s time for me to look elsewhere.

Which brings me to my Elemental Shaman!  She just hit 75 last night and is sporting 4 somewhat tarnished Heirlooms.  I’m still learning the nuances of the spec and class, but it really feels like a whole new play space for me.  This is the first ranged I’ve played since my Hunter and I can tell you that it looks like I really am a ranged player at heart.  Where my Rogue and DK got the job done, I hated that I would get hit in the face pretty much no matter what.  With the Shaman, most mobs are half dead before they reach the character.  I’ve also become comfortable enough with the cooldowns that I can handle adds or even dropping right on top of a particular boss/quest mob and not immediately fear for my character’s life.  I’m very intrigued to see where this class leads.

I also want to dabble in healing, which I have yet to start doing.  I’m trying to decide if I should jump into randoms as a healer and just deal with it, or if I should wait until 85 and run with guildies.

Oh, by the way, CATACLYSM JUST DROPPED BITCHES!!  THE WORLD BLOWED UP!

I’m very curious to see how things play out for both my proposed mains, and I still have to decide if I should push my Shaman to 85 or take the Hunter there first.  If I had to decide right now, the Shaman would take precedent, but with at least 3 levels to get through, it could be tough to get her there in a timely fashion.  More to come!

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