The SHAMMY POST

You lucked out! Its time fer the shammy post!

See, back in the day, during the beta... I played horde. A forsaken rogue. I was so happy with her, back in the day before anyone knew how to play... and then the game came out for real, and I made the mistake of joining friends on a pve server.

Lets face it... only kindly, delicate creatures should play on PVE servers... and Ima asshat.

A note on my relationship with Arms&Fury.... Hesa lazy slacker that needs a serious kick in the butt to get him moving every so often. I provide that kick. Otherwise, he tends to just coast on talent. Which he's got a lot of. However he has yet to learn, despite the vicious beatings I administer, that age and treachery will overcome youth and beauty everytime... I mean, really, he updates his blog so rarely, the page doesn't even bother loading anymore...

Back to shammy-ville!

So after my first, and last, trip with guild drama, I decided to move to pvp, and go back to the horde.

I was crashing with a bud while looking for a damn job... (took almost a year...) and we would both play our chars together, and smack things around.

We both went shammy. And for a reason. What says horde (pre-b.c.) more than Shammy? TAUREN SHAMMY. Cuz warstomp is to horde what gnome rustling is to alliance. (Get along, little gnomes!)

This was back in the day. Back when shammies were FEARED! When the class concept was... have big ass mace/axe, will travel!

See, before Blizz decided to return to teh ghey, Shammies were the lord masters of the burst damage concept. Windfury would proc, and something would evaporate. Nuttin came close. Everyone feared the shammy... didn't matter what, 4 outta 5 times you might be able to kill one, but that fifth time, oh mama.

We call this deterrence. Think about the psychology of the gank. I can kill you, and laugh at yuir attempts to defend yuirself... but that tauren shammy... with the wild crazy look in her eyes... /MOO!

Witha old skool shammy, ya never know. Doya feel lucky, dwarf? WELL, DO YOU? Shammies WERE the horde. One shammy, one big ass pile of bodies. Ya know, cuz THRALL is the main orc! And he aint no wuss baby warrior. Hesa shammy wielder of DOOMHAMMER. And nuttin puts the doom back in DOOMHAMMER like the triple crit with +a bazillion AP.

Unbound was my love. The only allies that would mess with me were pallies, and I'd hurt them like... oh lord. It was so funny. Unbound was also an engineer, see. And back then, the dominant build was resto to nature swift, and rest in enhance. So you'd have an insta cast heal up yuir sleeve... and a bomb, anda robot dragon pet... this one time, in hinterlands, I got jumped bya pally two levels higher, while I had half health and no mana... and beat him down like the alliance coward he was...

It was great. Shammys reward quick thinking and improvision. So many classes, itsa just button one or button two... but shammies can do so much, via totems... and each shammy really can play differently, some relying more on totems than shocks, others more on kiting than straight combat... play style is everything...

Then came burning crusade, and blizzard's war on insta kill specs. Yeah, hunters lost that one aimed shot, one kill thing... but shammies lost the thing that defined their class... the big honking weapon laying low the proud, and bringing justice to azeroth.

Friggin dual wield? SHAMMYS? /weep

I was broken. I went resto, and had a blast... and plan to go back to resto when unbound hits 70... cuz I seriously think resto shammies are the most evil pvp spec on earth right now... next to MM hunters :) Unbound, as resto, got jumped bya rogue in hellfire...

/Stun
/Stun
/stun
... 15 secs later...

INSTA HEAL, SHOCK, WINDFURY... DEAD ROGUE

Enhance, OTOH... rogue/warrior meat. :(

But I gotta level... and while Sun Tzu's dictum that, ifya wait long enough by a river, yuir enemy's bodies will come floating by... that doan get ya to 70 fast enough... So there I was, playing a class that does better with cheap green weapons than shiny blue ones due to design issues. A rogue wanna be without stealth or stun. A fury warrior without the damage or protection.

I wanted to cry. I think I did. The new concept of the enhance shammy is just... crappy. What gets to use big ass 2h weapons? Warriors and pallies, i.e. ALLIANCE TRASH. The horde without its "smite on behalf of the ancestors" spiritual leaders? LOOKIT ME, GRANDMA, I'M GOIN DUAL, LIKA BACKSTABBING GNOME!

Enhance is no longer a true melee dps class. Itsa mockery. Itsa travesty. Itsa tragedy. Not since the first starbucks opened in the Valley of Wisdom have I felt so... ashamed.

Or wait... there are other builds... that use SHIELDS! What kinda self respecting hordie uses a damn shield? Its cowardice, thats what it is! Elemental, resto? WITHA SHIELD? Bugger this to hell! Horde isn't afraid of damage! Horde isn't scared to mix it up!

Well, we are now. Thanks a lot, blood elves... and space goats. Yeah, I know pallies have been bitching for the same general reasons, but they're like... pallies... they'd bitch even if they got to wear plate. (BTW... ever multi shot a pally, see the crit, and then think... hey... he's wearing WAY TOO MUCH CLOTH? /evillaugh)

Unbound got put on a shelf while I leveled Maj from 1 to 70. Every so often, I'd pull unbound, and run around, and realize how much it hurt, and go back to the mage....

Truth be told, shammies are now, more than ever, a support class. In pvp AND pve. Shammies are a harder target than anything but a holy pal, and even then, we aren't neutered healers in plate. We can dish. After 2.3, the new damage mitigation gives a great deal of survivabilty. So, yeah, time to dust off unbound and get her happy hooved ass to 70. But still... this dual wielding crap HURTS. And the worst thing... ya can't go anywhere alone... cuz yuir support...

Oh bugger.