A Moo-ving Tale...

Ok, for this post I'm not going to talk about our titular hero and his adventures in Huntardom. Mainly because I've really scaled back my time playing Wulf recently. I'm recharging my enthusiasm for raiding before I launch myself back into it with hopefully renewed Gusto.

So instead, I've been taking the time to level Stormpaw, my Tauren Druid:



Since moving him to Moonglade, where I've had the pleasure of playing with some of my old friends from CD. I've also managed to get him up from a rather humble level 19 to his current level 38, which is a hitherto unprecedented feat for an alt of mine. Having friends to play with regularly helps, as I quickly tire of the solo game and normally give up on alts by their mid-20s at the latest.

The Druid playing style is pleasingly varied as well compared to the rather dull "send in your pet and hit autoshot" play of the Hunter. In his normal form, Storm can cast spells to damage opponents or heal himself and his friends. He can then shapechange into a Bear where he's able to absorb a lot of damage, and has abilities that allow him to hold off a large group of opponents for a while (assuming there's someone there to heal him). He can also change into a cat where he is able to sneak around and deal a lot of damage at close range, but he lacks some basic survivability. Most of the time when he's soloing, Stormpaw stays in Cat, sneaking up to his target, doing a lot of damage and then repeating. If he get's too badly hurt, he can quickly switch to caster form, heal himself and then move onto the next target.

When grouped with my friends (Shaman, Priest and Mage normally), I'm usually able to stay in Cat Form and help the group take down targets quickly. However, sometimes we get extra enemies adding and our priest's healing isn't sufficent to keep everyone alive. At that point, it's normally a good idea for Storm to switch to caster and help out. It normally works fine, but given that Storm's normal gear is focussed around his physical damage stats (Strength and Agility), it tends to leave him without much mana. To this end (and with the help of a couple of nice quest rewards), I've started putting together a hybrid set of gear. This sacrifices some of his damage-dealing ability for more Stamina (for Health), Intellect (for Mana) and Spirit (for faster Mana recovery). This second set of gear will probably be what I'll wear for most of Storm's group playing, since it gives him more versatility. The downside is that he has to wear what the game refers to as a "kilt":



Now I'm Scottish, and I know kilts, if only because I make a point of refusing to wear one. That, my friends, is a skirt, not a kilt!