Gladiator Stance is a GO

Gladiators!

I am happy to announce that through some crafty keyword trapping on twitter, I managed to get myself a WoD Beta Key. I've probably entered 40 contests so I'm pretty happy with myself. This guy on twitter asked if anyone wanted a key, and I happened to be on twitter at 10am on a Sunday morning. I responded immediately, opened up my code redemption page in case he responded with the key out loud, and he sure did. I had the fasted copy/paste that day.

My experiences on Beta as Gladiator have so far been pretty much amazing. Here is why:

1. Gladiator Stance does good damage. We compete extremely well in single target, and right now with current AOE tuning I can say we're slightly behind. The lack of Ravager at level 100 hurts but there has been mention that current AOE Damage tuning is still being worked on.

2. Gladiator Stance is extremely fun to play. We have next to NO downtime in our rotation because we have a filler ability that doesn't cost us anything ( devastate ). We also have Heroic Strike, so I expect we hit more buttons than a lot of our DPS comrades.

3. Some of our concerns have been addressed! While the Blues haven't done a lot of tweeting about us lately, the biggest bug on the Beta was that Heavy Repercussions wasn't actually giving our shield slams that sweet 50% bonus after a shield charge.

4. Unyielding Strikes is actually good! Sudden Death not so much. Right now Execute hits like a wet noodle (we're missing the execute perk), so you won't want to use Sudden Death. But the damage output between US and Heavy Repercussions is pretty close, so you're able to play an even MORE spammy playstyle if you are missing that burn in your wrist =P.

5. Survivability. With Shield Barrier, you can very much help the healer out a ton. There have been a few boss situations where it was just me, the tank, and the healer left, and I was having to do my damndest to stay alive. Barrier will put a bubble on you to allow your Blood Craze healing to catch up. Between this and the levels of Resolve you can get with your defensives ( shield wall and demo shout ), you can do a very nice amount of healing.

Current Issues that still stick out for Glad on Beta:

- We can't shield charge a Boss that we can't walk up to. Think of Ultraxion. The Shield Charge thankfully doesn't just run you off the cliff haha. It just doesn't work. There is a new Boss in UBRS like this. You fight it on a Bridge.

I actually recorded a stream of the Beta I played last night. I tanked a dungeon with a Blue! And then I went and killed Bashiok in PVP. To be fair, both Bashiok and myself are PVE Allstars, so that probably helped :).

Then I also ran the new UBRS as Gladiator! This one is a pretty good example of some bad play at times.. but I had a ton of fun. The only person I was really competing with on the meters was the Tank!
http://www.twitch.tv/cyclonus_wow/b/560678452

10 Years of Warcraft

Alternative Blog has Asked us to answer these questions in an effort to try to get a handle on the WoW collective consciousness, I think it's a great opportunity as we're at the 10 year Anniversary of Warcraft. 
http://www.alternative-blog.net/2014/08/10-years-10-questions-official-launch.html

While this is a new Blog, I'm definitely not a new player. Just new to contributing back to this amazing community. 

1. Why did you start playing Warcraft? Having Raided a bit ( as Warrior ) in Everquest, and spending the majority of my teenage years tinkering with an learning computers, so that I could play EQ @ Home.. I was excited for the genre. I saw WoW as the natural next step in MMO Progression. At the time of WOW Launch, I had quit playing EQ in Favour of competitive Counter-Strike and it wasn't until a friend of mine declared WoW a success that I purchased the game and we then LAN'd that entire weekend. He was an Undead Holy Priest, and I was a Tauren Warrior. We cleared Blackfathom Deeps and I can still remember him yelling "HOW ARE WE SUPPOSED TO DO THIS" as he got cornered and ruined by about 10 Elementals I spawned when I lit all of the candles. 

2. What was the first ever character you rolled?
A Tauren Warrior named Kaerthon. This used to be my handle in Counter-Strike and EQ. I levelled him to about 45 before taking a break due to some RL Mixup, and then creating the Tauren Warrior Cyclonus I play today on Mannoroth US. I chose the Tauren because I'm a Taurus, Year of the Ox, and it's a freaking Minotaur.

3. Which factors determined your faction choice in game? I didn't even question this one as Minotaurs were an option for Horde. And I always played Orcs in Warcraft II. Since then I've played Horde right up until they made it easy to boost characters with the Refer-A-Friend System, and I think I've got a few 60-80 Alliance all over the place now. I have recently payed to Boost a second Warrior ( with the same name ) on Alliance, and have been having a blast challenging Flex runs in Timeless Gear, and pulling it off as Prot. Good knowledge of when to shield barrier goes a loooong way.

4. What has been your most memorable moment in Warcraft and why? Definitely this one right here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0Z7TPlFHII So Proud!. Moofur is my girlfriend and this is just one of those moments. She had started out as a clicker and very frustrated player. She'd had a rough time with Trolls and once we met, and decided to play again, it didn't take long to get her into shape. We now run a 3 year old guild that's nearly done the current tier in Heroics playing only with people we like and we only run 2 nights a week.

5. What is your favourite aspect of the game and has this always been the case? By far the social aspect of the game. Whenever I play, I can make friends, some of which have resulted in decade long lasting friendships. In 40man Raiding I think I spent most of my time chatting with all the people I liked in the raid, and now days I run my own raids, and find myself getting extremely attached :).

6. Do you have an area in game that you always return to? 
Blackrock Depths. I always make sure to do this dungeon on my way up when levelling. It's a better dungeon than it used to be, and we're definitely a lot more powerful than we used to be, but it's hard to not be reminded of that candle scenario I mentioned earlier.

7. How long have you /played and has that been continuous? 
 I've played off and on since October the year of release. I missed out on most of BC Raiding, and End of Wrath Raiding. Just ICC and Everything after Karazhan.

Total Time Played Across All Toons is > 440 Days. Cyclonus being my only major character until Wrath @ 340 Days played.

8. Admit it: do you read quest text or not? I do now. It wasn't until MoP that I really got into the quests. Before that I'd click through them as fast as they would let me.

9. Are there any regrets from your time in game? Well, I didn't get a Beta invite for WoD. So definitely that I unsubbed... ever. And delete/vendoring all of my gear after Vanilla. I WISH I could have recovered some of that Dreadnaught I had.

10. What effect has Warcraft had on your life outside gaming? It's definitely helped in becoming confident as a leader. I'm a Manager at work and have become very comfortable leading the team. I've also made a few friends that have lasted the entirety of the game. I'm in a 3 year long relationship where my first message to her was Taunt ( not joking ). I've been to Blizzcon and am going this year as well, with a lot of friends meeting me there. The way that is going, I think we'll be one of those guilds renting a house soon :).