WOW (World Of Warcraft)

[Wolf Rider2]

Awesome, thanks. I'm thinking a warrior or paladin. I've always preferred close combat as opposed to spellcasting. I'll probably end up tanking, though, because most people love close combat.

So, if I was to go into the herbalism profession early on, would that be a good idea? I'm just thinking that it will allow me to heal myself if I don't have a character who is capable of spellcasting. Seems like a really interesting profession, too, with so many plants in the game and different concoctions to create.

[Wolf Rider2]

Human Paladin, uses swords, herbalist profession.

Or

Draenei Warrior, also uses swords, no idea what profession, but as it can heal already, I could do something else with it.



It is most likely that I would be tanking.

[Memnoch]

Originally Posted by Wolf Rider2 Awesome, thanks. I'm thinking a warrior or paladin. I've always preferred close combat as opposed to spellcasting. I'll probably end up tanking, though, because most people love close combat. So, if I was to go into the herbalism profession early on, would that be a good idea? I'm just thinking that it will allow me to heal myself if I don't have a character who is capable of spellcasting. Seems like a really interesting profession, too, with so many plants in the game and different concoctions to create.

Put it this way - if you're going to be tanking you're not going to run an instance (do a dungeon) without a healer. Unlike most RPGs like BG2, NWN, Dragon Age etc there will always have to be a dedicated healer (holy pally, disc/holy priest, resto druid or shaman) healing you and the group - you'll be taking pretty major damage as you should have aggro on all the mobs that you're fighting so that the dps can do their job. That's if you want to be a prot pally - otherwise you can be a retribution pally which is a hybrid dps class that can buff and offheal (in dire circumstances only).

I note you said you enjoy close combat. You don't have to be a tank to get in close combat, you can also play a melee dps role. Not sure how much you know about the various roles, so I'll list them out:

• Tank - role is to soak damage on behalf of everyone else in the group. They do this by various abilities that make sure they hold aggro on ALL mobs currently being fought, and especially bosses. They will have the most health and the best armour. You will also do damage of course which is one of the ways you hold aggro on mobs, but your role is not so much to kill the mobs via damage. You will effectively be a meatshield and while everyone's attention is on you, the DPS (damage dealers) in your group will be working on killing said mobs/boss. You want to make sure aggro is on you at all times because if one of your dps or your healer draws aggro they will likely die very quickly. Tanks can be: Warrior (prot), Paladin (prot), Death Knight (any), Feral druid (bear form). All have pros and cons, no one is better than the other overall, some are easier to play than others.
• Healer - healer's role is to heal, basically. They don't do any damage generally, their role is to keep a ) the tank and b ) the dps alive. Some roles specialise in single target (tank) healing while others are better raid (group) healers, but you won't worry about that until level 80. Healers can be: Holy Paladin (best single target healers); Disc Priest (better single target and have lots of damage mitigation abilities); Holy Priest (raid healer); resto shaman (raid healer but can also single target heal adequately, totems provide flexibility); resto druid (great raid healers and have a lot of HOT - heal-over-time - abilities). If the healer dies your group is basically farked.
• DPS (damage dealers] - the role of the DPS (technically means damage per second) is to damage the enemy and burn him down as quickly as possible. They generally are unable to withstand a number of direct hits from enemies and so they rely on the tank to "hold" the enemy's attention while they do their business. They do this by making sure they do not generate more threat than the tank (the person with highest threat will be the one that has aggro from the enemies). You could also say that the tank needs to make sure that he generates more threat than the dps, but in reality this is a combined effort. DPS come in both melee and ranged forms. Melee dps will be: Rogues (like me yay!), Druids (Feral Cats), Ret Paladins, Fury and Arms Warriors, Enhancement Shamans, Death Knights. Ranged dps will be: mages (all kinds), shadow priests, elemental shamans, hunters, warlocks.

At early levels the Lifeblood ability from herbs is inconsequential, don't use that as a major factor in your decisionmaking. At high levels it's a great panic button when you have a shit healer. Where herbing is REALLY useful is that it will give you a decent source of income in terms of selling herbs in the Auction House. Along with mining it's the most profitable profession. You won't be making stuff with herbalism though - that's Alchemy. That's also a good pair to choose - Herbs/Alch is kind of like Blacksmithing/Mining or Skinning/Leatherworking. If you have Alch though expect to be using most the herbs you gather to level up your Alch skill, rather than selling them. But at the upper levels Alchemy becomes really profitable - everyone uses consumables.

Also - it won't matter as much in the early stages what weapon you use as you will find what is available. (Unless you're roleplaying.) If you're levelling as retribution you will be using a 2H weapon, either a sword, axe or mace. Humans get racial bonuses for swords and maces, dwarves get racial bonuses for axes. The draenei self heal is useful when levelling, but the real benefit of a draenei is the fact that they have Heroic Presence which gives a 1% bonus to hit (may not seem much but it's a lot!). If you want to check out PvP then humans have a great racial called Every Man For Himself, which breaks you out of stuns, snares, fear and other forms of crowd control. BTW, you won't be dual wielding as a paladin - it's either 2H wep as dps or wep + shield as tank or healer. As warrior you can dual wield particularly if you take the Fury tree - eventually you will be able to dual wield 2H weps (one in each hand). Dual wielding as an Arms warrior will be gimping yourself, and if you do so as a Prot warrior nobody will want you to tank for them.

Let us know if you need more help/advice. God knows I needed heaps when I started playing. I'm sure you will find the threads below useful! (Esp. the first one).


Mem's journey from noob to less of a noob in WoW
Mem's first ever 25-man raid ever (this will be a while away for you Wolf, but you will be doing instances/dungeons which are 5man)
Tips on battlegrounds from a noob's perspective

[Wolf Rider2]

I think I'll be tanking because everybody else loves close combat too, and as I'm the noob, I won't get much choice...

Threads very useful, thanks

No problem with healing, one of the guys I'll be playing with always gets stuck with healing (level 80 healer, but he didn't mind, because he has a Death Knight now, too).

[Memnoch]

Well if you have high level friends, ask them for a loan of 10g or so when levelling. It will make life so much easier for you.

Yea, from being a noob I've now got 6 80s (rogue, ret pally, fury warrior, feral druid, mage, death knight).

[Wolf Rider2]

Hehe, will do.

Nice work on all the level 80's, by the way. Very impressive.

They will use the recruit-a-friend program on me as it will take soooooo much less time to level. I like triple experience .

[SpiritWarrior]

Originally Posted by Wolf Rider2 Hehe, will do. Nice work on all the level 80's, by the way. Very impressive. They will use the recruit-a-friend program on me as it will take soooooo much less time to level. I like triple experience .

Yes it is, it's gold. Plus they will get the rocket mount which is fun. The Xp in instances from RAF bonus is amazing. You will rocket up in level like a rocket....mount.

[Memnoch]

Got Lich King down to 19%!!

[Memnoch]

Woot we killed Lich King!!!!

[Wolf Rider2]

Nice work!!!!!!!! Glad that Lich King finally went down