There’s no doubt about it. World of Warcraft is one of the most influential video games ever to hit the market. As a massively multiplayer online role playing game, it let you create a fantasized version of yourself and seamlessly wove you into a living world, filled with quests and ongoing wars.
Warcraft isn’t just some “click attack, smash your 1 key” kind of game, either. Every little detail — from gear choices to talent selections to which race you selected back at the start — matters when perfecting your unique character. Though the game has changed dramatically over its 15-year lifetime, if you wanted to get anywhere back in the early days, you needed to think through all the details, down to ensuring that everyone in the raid was wearing the right cloak; that took an insane amount of time.
Over the years, these minute (some would say “tedious”) intricacies devolved to appease the more casual audience, but with Monday’s re-release of the Classic World of Warcraft servers, everyone has a chance to experience the basics anew. And now that we’re looking at the game through a more mature perspective rather than our awkward teenage years eyeballs, it’s worth it to reevaluate how we setup our raids…
…Or, more accurately, how the military gave us that tiny little edge in thinking about how to best kill a world-threatening fire lord with our buddies this Tuesday night. Sadly, there’s no coordinating with air support — after all, Blizzard didn’t add flying mounts until The Burning Crusade.
“The more you sweat in training, the less you bleed in battle.” – Richard Marchenko, First Commanding Officer of SEAL Team Six
(Blizzard Entertainment)
Train in low-stress environments
This should be drilled into everyone’s head the moment they step off that bus in Basic/Boot Camp. For the next several weeks, you will practice fighting during every waking moment of your life. Not only is it important to get time on the range, but MOUT training, where you enter a simulated environment made to mimic the conditions that await you on deployment. It’s a good way to give troops an easy training scenario where it’s actually crucial to let them fail — so they can learn what not to do when the real thing comes.
In World of Warcraft, this same concept applies. If you want to learn how to most efficiently use your abilities, do so by running dungeons that are a little on the easier side relative to your level. That way, when it’s time for the big bad, you’re not sending your friends to the graveyard.
Remember, practice dummies weren’t added until the second expansion.
Not just any chump off the street could get a shot at wielding Thunderfury, Blessed Blade of the Windseeker.
(Blizzard Entertainment)
Physical proof you’re ready to undertake a certain mission
No one will let you jump out of a perfectly good aircraft unless you’ve proven you’re capable at the Airborne school. No one will let you join the SPECOPS unless you’ve proven you’re capable of fighting at their level. It’s nothing personal — it’s just that watching over the dead weight isn’t a high-level operator’s duty. Prove you’re ready and they’ll welcome you in with open arms.
Classic World of Warcraft ran the same way. Before you’re ready to step into the higher-end dungeons and raids, you’ll need to do lengthy attunement quests. Don’t get mad at your guild when raid night rolls around and you can’t get in — show up prepared.
If it looks cool, great. If it doesn’t, at least your DPS should be high enough.
(Blizzard Entertainment)
Double-checking everyone to see if they have the right gear
One of the best things about leaving the Army is that no one will ever make me unload every last bit of TA-50 I was issued onto the motor pool parking lot just so some butterbar can take a quick glance at it hours later for all of five seconds. But there’s a method to the madness; it ensures that every troop has everything they need — even if it’s something mundane, like an extra red filter for their L-bend flashlight, before the deployment.
When planning a raid, you should make sure everyone has every last potion they need, every last reagent required for their spells, and above all, the right armor and weapons to get them through the intense fights about to happen.
Just leave the fire doggo alone.
(Blizzard Entertainment)
Timing the infiltration perfectly to cause the least amount of conflict
The military isn’t running missions like the Wild West. You don’t go kicking down every single door. That’s just dumb. What you really want to do is find where you’re going and take the path of least resistance.
For the most difficult encounters in Classic WoW, you’ll need 40 people to coordinate amongst themselves. If that sounds difficult to manage, that’s because it is. Only kill the monsters that are absolutely essential, and let everyone focus on what’s important: the loot, the boss.
If you’re a hunter, your role is to turn on the wrong aspect, set your pet to tank, wipe the raid several times, and still claim that any weapon that drops is for you.
(Blizzard Entertainment)
Coordinating everyone’s strategy down to the letter
If you enlisted as a radio operator, be the best damn radio operator you can be. If you’re a medic, you keep an eye on everyone in case someone goes down. The team leaders and commanders should have their battle plans and stick to them perfectly. Even if you’re just a rifleman given just a single window to provide overwatch on, you keep your barrel on that window. There’s a greater mission at play, and everyone is counting on you to do your one task.
WoW gives kind of a double meaning to the term “roleplaying game.” There’s the disassociation with reality aspect that lets you pretend you’re a sexy elf girl when you’re really a 300lb bum sitting in your momma’s basement, but it also implies that everyone is given a mechanical role and that you’re expected to adhere to it.
If you’re a priest, heal or cast attack spells (depending on your specialization choices). If you’re a warrior, tank or stab (depending on your specialization choices). If you’re a rogue, stab or… well, you have no choice but to stab, but you get my point. Focus on what you’re best at and let that be what you bring to the table.
I don’t care what anyone says…. Stand in fire, you DPS higher.
(Blizzard Entertainment)
Debrief to improve next time
There’s nothing better than rolling back in from a successful mission, dropping your gear, and hitting the chow hall. But there’s always that pesky debrief the commander wants everyone to attend first. It seems boring to the private in the back of the tent, but it’s crucial information for next time. Let everything out — what worked, what didn’t, what needs to be brought next time, what can stay back. There’s no such thing as a perfect mission, but you can tweak it ever so slightly each time.
We get it. Ragnaros didn’t drop your Perdition’s Blade and you just want to Hearthstone back to Orgrimmar. That’s fine, as long as you’re still on voice chat with your raid leaders. When everything’s said and done, it’s nearly impossible to keep tabs on 40 people at once — everyone’s input is valuable.
Don’t worry, your purpz will drop next week.