Intro
My Main Character (and my favourite Character) is my level 20 Rogue ‘Domunique’ (formerly known as ‘Domisunique’), this was my baby, it was the first Account I ever made. I know the Birthday of my Main Character because it was the first day that ‘Starter Edition Trial Accounts’ were released on ‘28/6/2011’. I have been playing WoW for a long time, here is my story.
Cataclysm Expansion
Back in 2011 (during Cataclysm), My good friend (neighbour) told me about how WoW was going to introduce these 'Starter Edition Trial Accounts', So I made sure to download WoW beforehand (It took me 1.5 days to download on my old shitty computer), and to make a Trial Account the day it was released. I was a big time F2P player at the time (due to being poor), and I was mainly playing F2P Runescape.
I was a first time WoW player, and I had no prior experience of WoW whatsoever, I used to watch my neighbour play the game and partake in raids, but I truthfully had no idea what was going on, he was not much of a PvPer, I always told him to join me and play Runescape, but he never did.
This first mistake I made was that I joined an Australian server called 'Khaz'Goroth' (the advice of my neighbour), even though I am from Australia, it wasn't ideal, I would of made my Account on a US/Twinking server if I had more knowledge beforehand. Even so, I would see other Trial Accounts playing on my server, so I would play alongside them, It wasn't about being pro, Achievement Hunting or Twinking (yet), it was just all about questing, doing dungeons and getting blue items. These were the times I enjoyed the most, I was also taken aback by the entire game and its vast world, and the scenery, since I was used to the bad graphics of Runescape, it was a pleasant change for me.
My main friend was a guy named Paul, he was a level 20 Rogue just like me, we used to quest and Achievement Hunt together, we were always together, I have memories of fishing up old Crafty/Ironjaw with him, trying to get the Gurubashi trinkets with him, and many other things. As we were both first timers, we used to read alot and exchange WoW tips and knowledge with eachother. His Rogue was never as good as my Rogue though, because I used to play much more then him. He got much busier with life, it got to the point where he would only log in once a week, by this time, I was fully geared, with twin AGM trinkets etc, I was so ahead of him that I didn't want to play with him as much anymore because I was way too ahead of him. I sort of regret these actions, instead of trying to be super efficient, I should of took the time to play with him, even though I had further progressed, this was one of my main regrets, not enjoying the game with him, however we were still friends, whenever he would log on, I would talk to him instead of play alongside him. Eventually he told me that he was going to quit and get on with his life, I respected his decision, I told him I would always have him added, to this day I still do, he hasn't logged in, not even once. Even though Paul was my best friend, I had other friends on my server too.
I remember at the time, there were alot of Trial Accounts running around, I think Cataclysm was the peak of the Trial Account Era (population wise). During Cataclysm there was so many Trial Accounts, but they were genuine first timers like myself, so they didn't have the knowledge or skill to all group up on the one server. At the time I think there was around 40-50 Trial Accounts on every server (minimum). This is why Cataclysm was a great time for actual P2P Twinks to take advantage of, because in the 20-24 PvP Bracket, these 'level 24 P2P Twinks' were up against alot of 'level 20 F2P players' who were under geared and inexperienced. I remember I bumped into a level 20 F2P Warrior in a Battleground, we started talking, and we both found out that we lived a couple of blocks away from eachother, we never met, but my good friend ended up meeting him at the local kebab shop, this is how popular Trial Accounts were (at the time).
I stopped being as social on the game, and I would instead spend most of my time Achievement Hunting and efficiently playing the game (without higher level assistance). I got to around 2500 Achievement points (at a time when that was considered really good) I did this without higher level assistance too (which I didn't even know was a thing that F2P players were doing). I found out that I was one of the top 10 ranking players on the 'F2P player Achievement Points' ladder on the site 'twinkinfo.com'.
So I discovered this site called 'twinkinfo.com', it had just opened up a F2P sub-section, and it tended to all my questions and needs, I also used to do my part and post alot of useful and knowledgeable comments/threads on the forum to help other F2P players out. The F2P subsection quickly became the most popular section of the forum, with many daily posts, and informative posts about the limits of F2P gameplay. Even though I was feeling lonely on some no-name Australian server, I felt somehow connected to the F2P community through Battlegrounds and through the website 'twinkinfo.com', this inspired me to play the game more competitively. I was still social but in a different way, not as social as before, but I was now 'competitive social' (yes, I made that term up just now). I looked up to players like 'Kale', 'Lil' and 'solvegero', who were not only on the top of the 'F2p Achievement Points' ladder, but would also post up very informative and useful threads on the forum. At the time, there were only a small handful of pro F2P players that always pushed the boundaries of the F2P limitations, and discovered they could get amazing achievements/goals that were never done before on an F2P Account (or were unconfirmed), and then they would tell the rest of the community about their newfound Achievements and discoveries. This is what made the F2P community creative, interesting and mysterious. It was like being sent into space and seeing what you could find. This is the main reason why I think the WoW F2P community was so great at the time.
My Account got to a point where I got all the Achievements that I could possibly get by playing on my own (around 2750 AP during Cataclysm). I didn't want to make a P2P maxed level Account just to assist myself with for the higher level assist Achievements (as I thought it would ruin the spirit of the Account and how it was being played independently). So to keep myself busy, I decided to focus on some miscellaneous goals like collecting certain rare gear (Shadowfang, Assasin's blade, Axe Of The Enforcer, Ring Of Precision, Scouting Tunic Of Agility, etc) and collecting rare companion pets. I now had time for PvP achievements and collecting honourable kills. I used to be so busy with Achievement Hunting that I didn't really queue for Battlegrounds much, but since I had nothing else to do, I got really into PvP, and I enjoyed it alot. I ended up getting around 50-60k Honourable kills on my Rogue during that expansion. Out of pure boredom, I ended up also collecting these sets on my F2P Rogue: Max Agility Set, Max Critical Strike Set, Max Haste Set, Max Dodge Set, Max Stamina Set. These sets were fun to acquire, only a couple weeks later, the new expansion released, rendering all the sets quiet useless, what a waste of time. As you can tell, my bank and bags were all full at the time, I was holding so much gear, this made it super hard to play the game, I had literally no storage space. I was happy with the Achievements that I had accomplished, and I took a break from playing as I wasn't inspired to play anymore (the only thing I wanted to get which I didn't, was the 100k Honourable Kills Achievement and the and Name Title, which I still don't have till this day).
Mists Of Pandaria Expansion
During the next expansion 'MoP' (Mists Of Pandaria), I didn't play the game as much and I went back to playing Runescape more. I feel like with each expansion, came more Achievements to get, but I wasn't bothered to get them anymore as I was less inspired as before. Also with each expansion, came a new BiS gear set that I had to attain, I usually had most of the gear so it wasn't so hard to adapt to the new expansion, especially as a Rogue, it was just a minor pain in the neck to re-gear every expansion. Also with each expansion, comes a new set of abilities I have to get used to. When I started as a level 20 Rogue in 'Cataclysm', I had cool abilities like Sprint and Shadowstep, these privileges would soon leave me forever.
During ‘MoP’ all I did was re-gear my Character, re-organize my Action Bars with the new updated Abilities, and then queue for PvP, I just PvPed, no more Achievement Hunting. This was actually a very PvP intense sweet spot in my life, whilst I was waiting for WoW queue pops, I would PK on Runescape, and then when I heard my queue pop, I would do PvP Battlegrounds on WoW. It was like 24 hours a day non-stop PvPing, non-stop action, not a boring moment, I actually enjoyed this time a alot, unfortunately it only lasted for around 2 weeks. This non-stop PvP lifestyle was very fun, but it was also very draining, I remember my wrists and brain hurting by the end of it. For some reason PvE'ing isn't as tiring.
Around this time I heard of the F2P Death Knight glitch, even though I had no interest in doing it at the time, I decided to atleast make the Death Knight for potential future use. I ended up doing some minor F2P Death Knight Achievements, nothing major, and I got bored very quickly, then stopped. The Annoying thing about Death Knight glitching, is that there is so much Achievement potential, so it never ends, also the fact that I have to remake a new Death Knight and re-do the whole starter area every time I log in (or disconnect), which was very annoying.
I also, out of pure boredom, ended up making over 38 Characters, and got them all to level 20, using every ‘Class/Specialization’ combination that an F2P could possibly make (around 35/42 Accounts all level 20). I ended up deleting the Characters anyway, what a waste of time.
Warlords Of Draenor Expansion
During the next expansion 'WoD' (Warlords Of Draenor), the 'Veteran Account Status' was released, also Account-Wide Collections were released, further diminishing the Achievements of all true F2P Accounts (like every expansion does), so I decided to go Vet. I decided to finally change my name from 'Domisunique' to 'Domunique', and I decided to finally change my Server from 'Khaz'Goroth' to 'Bleeding Hollow' (a more Twink based PvP Server). These are 2 things that I wanted to do for a long time, but I never could do it with the limitations of F2P gameplay. PvP now was alot more balanced which I can't complain about, but everyone was given a HP buff, everyone's HP was so high, that my burst potential as a Rogue had been made obsolete. I feel like ever since Cataclysm, Rogues got weaker with every expansion, but I stuck with my Account because it was my baby. I joined an official Twinking PvP Guild, they used to queue together alot and were very active, it was quite fun, at the time, I never had that experience before.
During 'WoD', The PvP queue times were so insufferably long, so to be efficient, I decided to make a new Twink instead, I decided to make a level 29 Tauren Warrior, I ended up questing it up on both Factions, got it geared for all specs, I got it so much gear that its storage was full, but it is more than prepared to adapt to any new expansions.
I Also ended up purchasing a level 29 GF’ed Shaman Twink, with many GF’ed items, including the rare ‘Deadman’s Hand’ Ring, I don’t play the Account much, but It’s very nice and I like to just have it. I also quested this Character on both Factions.
Also since the Account-Wide collection box was in existence, I tried to collect some Toys for a little while, I shortly stopped at around 100 Toys.
During this time I was PvPing a lot on my 29 Warrior Twink, I was obsessed with Stamina stacking as a Protection Warrior, I would have around 9.2k HP pre buffs, I maxed out at around 12.8k health using consumables, buffs and cooldowns, I could of got a lot higher if I was a Druid or a Monk. I was the ultimate Tank, a damage sponge, the thing was, both my Armor and DPS were incredibly low so I was quiet useless unless I was Tanking and AoE’ing.
Legion Expansion
In preparation for the Legion Expansion, there was an event beforehand, where you could collect Legion Gear (now it’s GF’ed, and BiS too) during a Legion Invasion Attack, the enemies levels would scale, so all players were welcome to do the event. I made sure to get the full Legion set on all 3 of my Twinks, however I didn’t get many forged pieces (nor did I have the patience to attain all of them).
When the Legion Expansion came out, there was an Account-Wide Transmog collection system that was released. For some reason, all the quest reward Transmogs from lvl 1-60 (in Azeroth/Kalimdor) were applicable to all levels, so I decided to do all the quests in Azeroth/Kalimdor to collect all these applicable Transmogs to my Twinks. I am still in the middle of that process because I took a break from WoW, I haven’t completed this task yet, but so far I am 1/3 of the way finished and I have already unlocked so many Transmogs for my Twinks, it’s amazing, so much fashion possibilities, this was the only update I liked about Legion.
PvP doesn’t require gear anymore, your ‘Class/Specialization’ will determine what your base stats are, and now your item level can give you a small boost (not a significant difference), which I can’t complain about, I can’t believe I collected gear for all these years so I could do PvE instead of PvP, Oh the irony. Also Battlegrounds seem to be balanced, but they added another HP buff again, further rendering the burst potential of my Rogue as useless, everyone’s HP is quiet high at this point.
Conclusion
Right now I am taking a break from WoW and I am playing Oldschool Runesacape. Runescape has always been my main game (since 2005), but WoW will always have a special place in my heart. I do feel like the good times have long passed me by, and the longer the game goes on, the more I don’t enjoy it as much. I also feel that the F2P/Twinking community is shrinking, which is a shame. However I am looking forward to the future of WoW, I am excited to see what it will become. I feel like whenever I play an MMORPG I learn a lot of life lessons, one of the lessons I have learnt whilst playing WoW is to just enjoy yourself in the moment and to not worry so much about getting to and from your destination, but to enjoy the journey that happens in-between it.
. PvE wise, I thought with stealth I can get around almost anywhere, which was totally wrong lol. But one day a Blingtron 6000 teleported her to Jaded Forest and opened a whole new world for me. It wasn't months later that I figured out how to bring my monk off Kun-Lai Summit and a Blingtron to take my 6 ally toons to Pandaria. She made her way throughout Pandaria and Dreanor wearing a lovely black dress.