Breakfast Topic: What was your turning point in WoW?
by Chris Clow 
Nov 27th 2011 at 8:00AM
Everyone took a path to get where they are in the today, both in life and in Azeroth. Whether you're a heroic raider, an Auction House kingpin, a rabid collector, or even an ex-WoW player, at some point you stood at the crossroads and chose the path that got you where you are. Likewise, there is often a moment that crystallizes your desires and sends you decisively down the road. That moment is the turning point.
I spent a good amount of my time in WoW raiding. I eventually wound up as the GM of a raiding guild during patch 3.1. We were previously a fairly casual guild, but a few of us wanted to try our hands at hard modes. I found the prospect intriguing, so we went into Ulduar and began knocking down four-tower Flame Leviathan, Heartbreaker, and I Choose You Steelbreaker and pushed into the Keepers of Ulduar. This was fairly late in the Ulduar cycle, so we had the best gear we could get from normal mode content. We tore through the content at a rapid pace, with none of the encounters taking more than a raid night to knock down.
Then came Firefighter; for those who never had the privilege of attempting this encounter at level, Mimiron hard mode takes what was already the most difficult of the keepers and cranks it up beyond 11. It had massive tank damage, obscene raid damage, hunter tanking, and DPS coordination. Oh, and the floor is covered in fire that chases you the whole time. It was our first real challenge in progression raiding. We wiped to it for a month, and over 220 attempts later, we got our last sigil to unlock Algalon. We rose to the occasion, and from that point on, we were heroic progression raiders.
What was your turning point?
Filed under: Breakfast Topics, Guest Posts
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
nymrohd Nov 27th 2011 8:09AM
The exact same:)
blastermyer Nov 27th 2011 8:32AM
I started having chest pains when the going got tough, so i bowed out of the group and about 5 days later had a heart attack. Just play causal now.
I try to play no stress now.
Pyromelter Nov 28th 2011 12:11AM
Mimiron is fucking epic.
And yes, this is one of those times where I am glad wowinsider allows cursing, because there are no other words to describe it.
Rmschoir Nov 27th 2011 8:45AM
News of the impending birth of my daughter took me from raider to someone who almost never plays anymore. Don't get me wrong--I still love the game, but I just can't fit it into my schedule anymore.
caldai Nov 27th 2011 5:11PM
Same thing for me. Business, young family. Just struggle for time now. But still love the game.
Khirsah Nov 28th 2011 7:17AM
Same here, except I had a son. It was February of 2010, so the rest of my guild was about to go knocking on Arthas' door, and I had to bow out.
No regrets, though. If you want a really epic hard-mode challenge, raising a kid has 'em all beat!
Cata has been a disaster for me. No time for anything but PvP in the beginning of the xpac, and now I'm too far behind to catch up to my guild's raiders. Just biding my time til MoP comes out and we can all start over again at level 90!
Grats to Rmschoir and Caldai on your kids! Maybe in a few years we can all team up and have our own little Raid group! :-)
Shoikler Nov 27th 2011 8:47AM
My turning point was in Albuquerque, but I should've taken the left.
Zune Nov 27th 2011 8:52AM
That just made me smile =)
Lokanaya Nov 27th 2011 8:48AM
When I stopped trying to level hunters and started leveling a feral Druid. I realized I HATED ranged classes, and that was why none of my hunters got above 30 after months of playing. :P
razion Nov 27th 2011 8:49AM
I had to make this decision in Wrath--which was a long time, considering I had been with the game from mid to late Vanilla. I will, in advance, apologize profusely for the undeniable wall of text that is about to ensue.
Here's the thing: up until Wrath, I had never been in a guild that didn't have less than a 150 people. All the guilds I had been in were large, and they were all leveling guilds. People came and went all the time in every guild I had been in. As a result of the size of these guilds, I never really knew anyone, and no one really knew me. Guilds had a tendency at that size not to do much together, except house characters who could help each other level.
But then Wrath happened. Again I was in a leveling guild, but unlike all the times before I was actually leveling further on a character than I ever had before. The desire to hit the level cap and raid was strong for me at the time. But for the life of me, I don't remember why.
This was the beginning of my turning point: a lone, AFK, night elf hunter at a meeting stone. At this time, I was just entering Dragonblight after going through Borean Tundra on my night elf druid, who was scraping along, looking for quests. I had dropped into a nerubian pit to pick up a few when I saw the night elf hunter begin to get assaulted by an undead warlock. I was a feral druid, spec'd for tanking, but I had been stealthed at the time, and it was a PvE realm. At that second, I had to make a decision--to help that AFK hunter, or ignore the situation.
Tanking instinct roared to life and I chose vengeance. The fight ended almost as quickly as it had began. I stood triumphant. The warlock used his soulstone and made for the exit. I didn't pursue--I chose to stay and defend the hunter, but no one else came for him. Just as I was about to leave with my quests I saw the AFK flag move from his head, and he thanked me for the save. He then inquired if I was, by chance, a tank, and if I would be interested in doing Azjol'Nerub. I had just picked up the dungeon quests so I agreed.
Everything from that point changed. My game time in WoW was forever altered. From that moment on, I did dungeons with that hunter. Soon I did them with him and his wife, and then his guild-mates. When we finally reached the harder level 80 heroics and began running Utgarde Pinnacle did I get invited to vent. It took me a while, but eventually I got Ventrillo (my first time) and surprised them by jumping into their server and saying hello.
Later that dungeon run, my turning point came.
We killed Skadi, and the drake dropped. Everyone rolled for it, and miraculously, I obtained the drake (despite, at the time, any of us being able to use it). Vent had lit up something magical--the cheers and the gasps and the exclamations of congratulations for me were some of the most joy-filled sounds I had ever heard in my life. It was at that point I realized I had actually made friends, for perhaps the first time--and not just in-game. These were real people who cared about me and valued the time they spent with me.
I then got an invitation that at the time took no thought or effort to digest. It was the single easiest decision of my living life--if I would be willing to part ways with my leveling guild and join their ranks as casual dungeon runners. Of course, I accepted--in a heart-beat. I cannot describe the joy I had on that day, but I will say that it was a grand day, and possibly some of the best fun I have ever had.
From there our adventures grew--the little dungeon guild evolved, and over time we got into raiding during ToC's emergence. We partnered with another guild, and even went on to ICC, becoming the second on the realm to kill Sindragossa and reach the Lich King.
The guild had a falling out then, but the bottom line I'm trying to get across is that I was able to break my mold of leveling guilds into raiding and beyond, and it had all started... with a hunter at a meeting stone. And wherever he is now, I would like to call out to him and thank him. Thank him for everything he did for me.
Thorie Nov 27th 2011 9:29AM
World of Warcraft at it's a absolute finest.
Shyster Nov 27th 2011 3:30PM
I don't mean to be a negative nancy and that was great to read, however I can't help but think it's been a good while since this game has had that kind of an affect on me. It might be cata, it might be the dungeon finder, it might be badge epics, it might be all the reasons people whine about the game not being the same for them, but in truth I think for me it's finding the people you've enjoyed the game with for so long quickly getting bored of it since the launch of cataclysm, myself included. Seems a shame really considering how much time a lot of us have spent since vanilla and such, only to end up disappointed with this most recent stretch of the game. Nevertheless I plan on trying MoP and then and only then will I come to my turning point, I just hope whichever turn I take I find some solid enjoyment =)
Madison Nov 27th 2011 8:51AM
I no longer play, but I enjoyed it when i did. I raided in classic Wow and BC, I raised alts, did lots of exploration, questing and rep farming, maxed out - or nearly maxed out 6 trade skills, exalted all bg factions and spent the entire WotLK pvp'ing (never could find a tolerable arena partner) then re-rolled and took a paladin to 85 and did lots of Cataclysm stuff.
The expansions always lure me back, new questing and adventures are always awesome. I love reading the books and blogs, but come max level I lose interest really quickly now, I suppose due to having experienced endgame...that's where the community really starts to matter (not excluding 5 mans here, but they're not lasting relationships) so that's where I like to end it.
Rhev Nov 27th 2011 8:52AM
When we finally learned to switch to lava spawns on the firelords, and quickly became the first guild to down a raid boss in WoW. Go go molten core. After that my life became about prepping for weekly raids, not just chooching around.
Rhev Nov 27th 2011 8:53AM
first guild on my server* Sorry.
Greg Nov 27th 2011 8:56AM
My turning point was about 5 months of raiding 25 hours a week, plus the additional time I spent preparing to raid. We did heroic everything in Wrath- and were the server first, or darn near, every time.
But once we made it into Ice Crown Citadel, and hit the long pause between Xpacs, I'd decided enough was enough. Wow just doesn't have that appeal for me any more. I still love the game, but I'll never play like that again.
Now I'm just waiting for my one year break to end- looking forward to returning to casual play in January.
doncroyle Nov 27th 2011 9:01AM
About three months after Cataclysm came out I was doing dailies while waiting on a heroic group. I realized I wasn't doing this because it was fun; it was just to get my daily quota of Valor Points and guild rep. I never ran another heroic or did another daily. I had another month of prepaid time, and I spent it grinding archaeology achievements.
I still keep an eye on what's going on with the game and I've accepted the free weeks Blizzard has offered me a couple of times. Never made it more than three days though.
goldeneye Nov 30th 2011 3:05AM
After a while in any game, you either start playing metagames or you bow out.
Muru Nov 27th 2011 9:20AM
For me, it was Ulduar. I wasn't a normal raider by any stretch, only having done Karazahn with my very casual 10-man guild a few times back in BC. I got into a PUG with this group and we were on hardmode leviathan. As an elemental shaman, it was my job to be on the "tank" blowing up turrets. The other DPS'er went down, and I solo'ed the rest of the turrets to this PUG groups amazement.
...That was my personal turning point. From then on, I wanted to be a full-time raider in 10-man content. With Cataclysm being more 10 man friendly - that's exactly what I did.
Jay Nov 27th 2011 9:21AM
I've had a bunch of turning points, after leveling up my first character I was for some time a die hard wpvper (when there still was such a thing). Through that I came to heal. That led me to raids, late BC and the entire WotLK I was a progression raid healer. Then real life demanded much more and that led me to play the auction house for a few minutes a day and chat with some friends. Now I have a bit more time again and now I'm leveling alts and doing som BGs.
I go wherever the combination of real life and WoW takes me.