Full on Melee

The Damai Method

Last night I spent most of the evening working on my Deathknight, who is at this point level 98.  I am doing what I am lovingly referring to as the “Damai” method for leveling him, but in truth I know Kylana and several others did it as well.  The idea is that you spend exactly as much time as you need in a zone to jump to the next zone.  Basically if you are leveling your way through Draenor you are given a quest to jump to Gorgrond when you ding 92, Talador when you ding 94, Spires of Arak when you ding 96 and finally Nagrand when you hit 98.  The idea is to keep moving for maximum leveling speed, but unfortunately minimum content completion.  You do however want to stick around in Spires of Arak just long enough to get your outpost and save some goblin friends so you can unlock the Salvage Yard.

This method goes against every instinct I have, but I probably will be doing quite a bit of it to push up my army of 90s…  hopefully before the MC LFR helmet grab is finished.  My plan is to stick around Nagrand and cross my fingers hoping I get enough upgrades from my Dwarven Bunker to be able to hit 615 without much issue.  Mostly I am doing this to see if I can in theory completely skip Heroics jumping straight into LFR.  I am honestly not sure if this is even viable.  I might be screwed and have not gotten enough faction with the birdmen or the draenei to buy those two 615 trinkets.  If I am stuck in the same place I was last time, with needing to PVP to get into heroics…  then basically this is not a viable method and there is really no point in skipping content.  I will of course let you know as the weekend goes how well this worked because I fully expect to be 100 during that time.

Full on Melee

One of my frustrations with MMO design in its current state, and all state for the foreseeable future is that having too many melee in your party is a massive liability.  During the entire time I have played MMOs there has never been a time when having a bunch of melee was favorable for any encounter.  More often it was spending time as a raid leader trying to convince players that preferred melee to switch over to their ranged characters for the sake of “balance”.  Balance generally means that if more than 30% of your damage is coming from melee you are pretty well fucked.  It frustrates me to no end because I really do not care for playing ranged characters.  I find them boring with their incessant finger wiggling and standing in one spot to cast a spell only to move again to cast another spell.  Nothing is enjoyable about that, and a large chunk of my problems with Deathknights at the moment is that they FEEL like a caster, not a melee.

While I know there are definitely players who prefer to play ranged casters, I have feel like we would not have this constant “full on melee” problem were it not that casters on average are less enjoyable to play?  This has been a constant problem the entire time I have played MMOs that the melee players always outnumber the ranged…  so maybe just maybe that means it is time to readdress the way ranged feel to play.  There is two games that I have been able to stomach playing ranged characters, and in both of them it was because you could cast while moving.  Granted in the case of Final Fantasy XIV this is exactly ONE class that  can do this…  but still the ability to move around freely while attacking is a big part of why I enjoy playing melee in the first place.

Brief Periods of Fun

Granted folks are going to write in with comments telling me that in World of Warcraft most of the ranged classes have abilities that allow them to cast and move at the same time.  Here is the problem… so you are telling me for brief moments when I use a cooldown the class won’t feel like crap to play.  Apologies but that does not convince me that playing a ranged class is a good idea.  I would far rather stick to playing something that feels awesome all the time, rather than having to rely on cooldowns to bring me brief moments of happiness.  Ultimately I don’t have any good answers here.  Ultimately even removing the requirement to stand still to cast doesn’t go all the way into fixing my hatred of casters.  I really really dislike the concept of a cast time on abilities as well.  I like mashing buttons and seeing an effect when I mash it… and there is something primal and visceral about being up close with a mob rather than kiting it around like I am scared for it to touch me.

At the end of the day…  I accept the fact that I am melee and can only really ever be happy playing melee.  I just wish that I did not constantly feel like I was a detriment to my friends for choosing to play one.  Every game reinforces that by playing melee dps I am making a poor lifestyle choice, but I keep thinking that surely game designers can come up with a way that does not punish your raid for having an abundance of players standing toe to toe with the mobs.  Until that day however… as leaders we are going to have to continue furious horse trading to convince players to keep picking ranged casters so that we can have our balance.  But I can’t help feeling like we would not have this problem were ranged a more enjoyable choice in the first place.  Every time a bell rings, a melee loses its wings…  and becomes a ranged.