Win A Free Month of WOW Via The New 31 Assassination Talent Contest, Jamaican Heat

I couldn't sleep on Friday as I knew the destiny of the rogue class in WOTLK is imminent.  With the tremendous improvements other classes received, our class really needed help against the likes of death knight, retribution paladin, deep freeze mage and our arch rival, warrior.  The latest patch made mutilate no longer positional, but none of the other promised changes went in and we continue to be one of the worst classes in WOTLK beta. 

And that is why September 5th, 2008, will be one of the most important dates in rogue class history.  Not only the hokage is going to China for the fourth time in last 12 months, and hoping at last, he won't be back alone, but he also expects the full rogue patch to come out on that day.  Like I have said many times before, the strongest classes always had one dominant, definitive spec.  And I am really hoping the new 31st assassination ability is the one ability that makes mutilate the clear winner over shadow dance.  I still believe shadow dance is stronger at the moment, but a free 31 talent changes everything.  I will be satisfied if it is equal in power to any of mage's 31 talents.

I am already assuming opportunity won't affect mutilate in the final patch, but something like 51/20 should still be extremely strong.  Assuming the promised dualwield specialization to tier 1 does happen, you get 50% offhand damage, 2% hit, 6% parry plus the amazing new riposte that reduces enemy melee attack speed by 20% for 30 seconds (PVP duration?), 2 minute improved sprint + evasion (or dagger specialization which is getting moved to tier 3), and whatever lightning reflex will turn into (I expect a huge improvement in that talent, perhaps "you gain 1/2/3/4/5 energy every time you dodge an attack on top of 5% dodge?").  Suddenly the first 20 points of combat tree is every bit as good as first 20 points in assassination.

So the question remains, what will be the new 31 assassination talent that is going to replace vigor?  Here is your chance to win one month subscription of WOW (I will drop $15 cash into your paypal account!)!  Leave your comment here on what you think the new 31 assassination talent will be BEFORE any official announcements, and the closest match will be notified via Gameriot PM as the winner!  If two people put in the exact same answer, the person who posted the idea first will win.  The cut off time is 8 hours before any blue comments or patch notes.

This will be the first of many WOM contests to come.  It is the hokage's way of giving back to Konoha.  I may even make it a weekly/bi-weekly thing if I can come up with interesting enough contests.  I have a few crazy ideas coming . . . 

Jamaican Heat

For the first time ever I visited the third world I meant beautiful country of Jamaica, and I felt like a gnome in Thunder Bluff.  Ya mon the trolls are meant to be Jamaicans in Blizzard lore, but I find taurens to fit brothers better in term of size, stats and color.  Heck even the latest Naruto manga featured a tauren ninja who also likes to rap . . . 

Long story short, I did enjoy the slowly cooked Carribean meat (for some reason Ox's Tail tasted exactly like the way my mother cooked it), and I was VERY fortunate to get out of the area 12 hours before the tropical storm.  But even living in one of the better hotels in the area, I felt out of place by the second day.  My guildmate who also happens to be tauren had a much better time than I did.

It seemed like taurens only trusted each other and they definitely don't trust gnomes.  I was picking up the raid from where another tauren guildie left it off, and they clearly doubted the hokage's capabilities.  Every change I suggested, they made international calls to check with the other tauren first, and any wipes they automatically assumed the gnome pulled aggro, when I was spamming feint and still topping the DPS meters with ease.  It is one thing if they questioned my business decisions, but it is downright insulting when a tauren questioned my technical expertise when I have +5 to engineering!

The democratic convention came up during the trip, and needless to say, they all supported the tauren candidate, Barack Obama.  When questioned of my own preference, my pre-canned response was "I hope to god Obama wins, because he would open the door for all of us in Azeroth."  It wasn't a lie as I  always wanted to see changes, and before the trip I probably would have voted for him too, but after the Jamaican heat?

Let's face it, America is about as white as Stormwind, and humans aka whities will always, always dominate the upper spectrum of corporate ladders and political worlds.  One exception does absolutely nothing in breaking the trend.  However, it is going to have a huge impact in the second place race.  After reviewing Jet Li's best movie "Romeo Must Die", I realized that gnomes and taurens were never at peace.  While humans know and act like they are the master race, I believe they are much more comfortable around gnomes than taurens.  Which is why I worked well under human class leaders, and struggled under tauren ones (thank god they aren't common).

Gnomes generally work harder/smarter and have less complaints than taurens, and we have the edge in education/income.  But taurens did produce class heroes who made huge impacts like MLK and more recently, Obama, and I don't think I can vote for him.  I don't think he will put any real dent into white Azeroth, but he sure as hell will give taurens the clear advantage at second place as he repays these who supported him during the campaign. 

Tags:

World of Warcraft

Report Post