So... I play World of Warcraft. I started in Vanilla, during patch 1.8, and have played on and off until the present. This might not sound that odd to some of you, which is fine, because it's not really that odd to play WoW anymore. Normally I only play on PvP servers, as I enjoy world PvP much more than not. My first level 60 was a Human Paladin. I played him for a few months, and then decided to reroll with some friends on a fresh new server. I, *again*, rolled a Paladin (this time out of necessity, as we were going to raid as soon as possible and since I was extremely familiar with the class and was also very fast at leveling we thought I would be able to power level my friends), who was soon level 60. We started raiding and after a few months, the server died, as most of the alliance population transferred off to other servers. This second Paladin was known as Siegfried. He was soon transferred to an RP realm with the remnants of his guild, where he experienced all sorts of end game PvE content, however his desire for PvP was too great and eventually he couldn't take it on the RP realm any longer.
This is when Burning Crusade launched. I hadn't played for 2-3 months and I thought I had finally had enough of WoW. One day, my friend tells me he is rolling horde on a server with his brother and some of their friends. I think about it for a day or two and I give in. I bought Burning Crusade, logged in and went to character creation. Before the launch of Burning Crusade, I had been anticipating the release of Blood Elves, and was hoping to make a Warrior (this was before it was announced that Blood Elves would not be able to be Warriors). As I was creating my Blood Elf, fully sold on playing a Warrior, I noticed that Warrior was not a selectable class. I had a bit of a conniption over this for a few minutes, and then I looked at what classes they COULD play as because the best class was not available (ie. Warrior). I wanted to play a class that used a large weapon and brought the pain. Looking through all of the classes available, there was nothing.... But the next closest thing was... that's right a Paladin. So, as I double check to make sure warrior is not actually hiding from me in some way, I finalize my character creation. That's right, my third Paladin. This was the one to be known as Deran (and quite possibly the most important reason as to why people think I'm special, having 3 Paladins that were all max level during the time they were active).
Now, I don't know where my friends started getting the idea that I was a badass, or that I could do anything, or that if I got into a staring contest with a rock, it would run away while peeing it's pants... All I know is that being my third Paladin, I had played on the PTR constantly (literally whenever it was available), researching in-depth about class mechanics and PvP strategy. I wasn't a "god" at PvP, I was just better than average. I practiced many long hours against the people I knew were good, preferably the best, but the best weren't always available. I lived through the age of the Reckoning Bomb, and dropped a few on my enemies. I saw the emergence of Crusader Strike and saw everyone QQ about how powerful Retribution Paladins were. I saw Blizzard swing the nerf bat with mighty vengeance at an ability that had been proven to be balanced at level 70, just because the player base complained that it wasn't balanced at level 60 (that's right it was a Burning Crusade talent that was created to be balanced at level 70, not 60). Of course the other classes that had abilities that seemed over powered weren't touched, but Crusader Strike got what I liked to call 'pwnt.' Now, imagine an ability that would be considered balanced. Now double it's cooldown. That is essentially what happened to Crusader Strike. It took until Arena Season 3 for Blizzard to get off their high horse and admit they made an atrocious mistake, finally rebalancing Crusader Strike to the way it had been during the Burning Crusade prelaunch, beta, and PTR. Blizzard finally started showing the Retribution Paladin a little favor. I can't tell you how many times the Retribution Paladin has seen the short end of the stick, but I can honestly say it has been far too many.
Now, don't get me wrong, Retribution Paladins weren't useless lumps of coal sitting on the side of the road taking up space. They were worse than that. Honestly, until late in Burning Crusade, most people would scoff at the mere mention of the Retribution talent tree, not to mention someone who actually decided to spec deep in to the tree (horde was actually more accepting of Retribution Paladins, as Paladins were new to the horde and much was unknown by the player base and seemed to play things more by ear with the new expansion rather than letting old stigmas get in the way). I have played holy, prot and ret since vanilla, and I can honestly say that until the prelaunch of Burning Crusade (patch 2.0), Retribution Paladins were a sad lot (although prot might have been much sadder, with no way to regain their mana besides drinking and potions). Now, I didn't mean to get sidetracked from my tale, but this just is here to give you a feel that I did indeed experience what I described above. Anyways, I ended up joining a PvP guild on my server, with the recommendation of my friend. That guild was Martha Stewart. During the application process they liked what they saw in battlegrounds and I was officially the first Retribution Paladin in Martha Stewart (main spec at 70 anyways). I ended up with a great 2v2s partner by the name of Savarok, who pushed me to learn more and more, and build better reactions and muscle memory. I will never forget the arenas with Savarok, the glory of winning against an impossible match up, and the horrible sinking feeling in your stomach when you lost against that impossible matchup and there was nothing you could since it was the same as rock paper scissors. I'm not sure where I started becoming a legend in the eyes of those around me, but stories started spreading, posts started appearing, and local defense started buzzing. My adventures in Stranglethorn Vale during the fishing tournament brought me some attention on the forums, and a friend of mine who was dual-boxing was monitoring Local Defense and General chat, and apparently I was all everyone was talking about on the Alliance that day. The badass Paladin with the s3 greatsword wrecking everyone he came across.
I will stop that tangent right now, as I didn't save the posts from the old forums, and I didn't save the screenshots my friend took of the Alliance chats, but honestly it doesn't matter if you believe me or not. My friends remember those times, and to me that is enough. The point of this isn't to tell you how cool I am or anything of the sort, it is just there to give you a little idea of my background in this game. And at this point I would like to clarify something. I am not here trying to say I know more about this game than others, or debate the merits of one spec over another. What I am trying to do is tell you how awesome Warriors are.
Now, I know you might have started to see this coming from the beginning, but then forgot due to the large rant, but now I'm back on track. Deran, the freaking awesome Paladin that did a little pwning of faces has considered putting down the mantle of "Paladin only" and picking up the mantle of "Unstoppable killing machine." By unstoppable killing machine, I was referring to how most people who started to read this are probably dead from boredom at my unstoppable ranting and run-on sentences. Anyways, I just wanted to say that although Paladins are awesome, you've got another thing coming if you think Warriors are washed up (it's what my friends keep on saying for some reason). Geared up and ready for Cataclysm, my Warrior will be ready to start rocking faces in arena, regardless of how over/underpowered they might be. I'm bringing back what Siegfried (my second paladin) stood for, which is that just because someone says nobody has every done something before, doesn't mean you can't do it, it literally just means no one has ever done it before and you'll just be the first! (this is referring to my tanking adventures in Vanilla WoW when I was told Paladins can't tank raids, which they most certainly could if geared and played properly).
Anyways, I guess I'll just end my rant here and say this: "Get ready to Eltwopee"
Afterthoughts: After looking over this post, I think I've started to understand why my friends think I'm so "epic" and it might have more to do with how long winded I am instead of how good I was/am at playing a Paladin...
More Afterthoughts: My cousin felt left out because I didn't specifically mention her, so I'll add right now that I coordinated rolling on the horde server with her, after my hiatus from Vanilla WoW.
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