20 Questions with BigRedKitty

Recently I had the honor of Interviewing BRK. Don’t know who BRK is? Well maybe you’ll recognize his site, BigRedKitty.

Oft cited and referred, BigRedKitty is one of the core sites in almost every hunter’s favorites.

Brought to you by Daniel Howell (Yes, that’s BRK’s real name. and Yes, the same Daniel Howell from WoWInsider), BigRedKitty is a site that offers news, insights, thoughts, opinions, stories and helpful guides all with touch of humor. Also, form time to time we get a peak into the life of Airman Howell (Stories of Daniel’s life in the Air Force, a can’t miss!!)

I highly suggest if you haven’t ever stopped by BRK’s site, you really should.

Enough bravado, let’s meet BRK.

How are you? Hobbs? Mrs. BRK??

All good, thanks. Hobbes is thrilled to be running Naxx and getting priestie-treats again now that PetEmote is mostly working.

So, just how long have you been playing World of Warcraft?

Since March, 2005.

When you started playing WoW, what drew you to being a Hunter?

My friends needed DPS. We had a tank and a healer. I stunk at my mage
— broken and copperless in Duskwood — so I deleted that and tried a hunter. Never changed after that.

At what point did you decide, “You know? I need to write about this stuff?”

Started writing when a very early guildie of mine started doing things that I thought was moronic and silly. So I started putting stuff in my guild’s forums: ideas, theories, and some strategies. When I had accumulated enough stuff, I realized that I didn’t want to lose it all, so I made a Blogger-hosted blog for me to “store” my writings. I say “store” because I was sure nobody was interested in reading this stuff but me.

Now that we got to know you a little bit, let’s get to the tough 20 questions.

1. I know you’ve answered this, but I get asked all the time, “Why does BRK refer to himself in plural?” So to finally put to rest all those questions, why do you refer to BRK as we or us?

I am Daniel. In the game, Hobbes and I are BigRedKitty. We are a team, a duality, an inseparable union. As such, we are always plural.

“BigRedKitty and his pet Hobbes” is a sentence you will never see written.

2. Between writing for WoW Insider, BigRedKitty, the Podcasts, and playing, what time is left for Mr. and Mrs. BRK?

Not enough. It is very easy to allow WoW and all the associate BRK-activities to take away too much from family-time. When playing WoW changed from a casual hobby to a part-time job, it has become harder to pull myself away. My new-years resolution is to spend much more time with my family.

3. Having seen the changes from the beginning of World of Warcraft, then The Burning Crusade, and now Wrath of the Lich King, has your perceptions changed? If so, how?

Elitism is being eliminated. The time a person must invest in order to see high-end content has been significantly diminished. The quality of players has increased dramatically. The game’s encounters are much better designed. But everything is smaller: zones, instances, and the differences between classes. Storm Peaks is huge, but everything is close-by with an epic-flying mount. I miss the feeling of being lost in Stranglethorn Vale. Not being able to fly until level 77 was almost pleasant.

4. Everyone sees you as the pre-eminent Beast Mastery representative. Some take this to mean that you don’t respect or support the other trees. What is your reasoning for being Beast Mastery?

I respect anybody who can play their class/spec to its fullest. I enjoy BM because I love the pet-hunter relationship. The other two trees do not have anything that accentuates that, and frankly I see no reason they shouldn’t. If the SV talents affected my pet, albeit not in the same fashion as BM, that would make me consider specing differently. As it is, regardless of the fact that BM DPS is greater than the others, I shall not be changing anytime soon.

5. Do you feel you fairly represent the other specs, or is that not your goal?

I try to represent the brand of player who cares not for gear or experience or gold or elitism. I care about fun and being kind to all, from the noobiest noobs to the most advanced players. WoW is a game about the people. A raid can wipe on a boss for hours, but if the people like each other, it’s considered a good night. Would you want to clear Naxx with 24 people who made you angry and treated people badly? Of course not. Loot is not the focus of the game; people are. I try to represent and advocate the best parts of the people in the game. If I’m ever even moderately successful, I’ll be thrilled.

6. So we’ve heard from Ghostcrawler that Hunters are being rebalanced in the Ulduar (Patch 3.1). What 3 things do you feel need to be addressed for hunters?

A. Pet-survivability
B. Pet-control
C. Eliminate the Survivalist name and make that a pure-PvP tree. Let’s quit kidding ourselves and accept that neither BM nor MM is going to get it done in PvP and make us truly competitive. Let’s trash SV and make it the PvP Tree for hunters. Other classes have “obvious” trees:
Paladins have tank, heal, and DPS trees. How about hunters get PvE and PvP trees?

7. What is your opinion of the current PvP situation? Specifically, how Blizzard is pushing Arena and its impact on the game as a whole?

PvP has been so separated from PvE that I find few people that enjoy both aspects, and have time to participate fully in both. Used to be that if a raid was canceled, people would go to a battleground and have some fun. Now, with arena-gear and the amount of time required to acquire it, if one takes a PvE-geared toon into PvP, they will get destroyed. Arenas and arena-gear has made WoW a two-part game. That may not be a bad thing, however, it’s very individualistic.

8. I have to admit, I appreciate your philosophy on balance play. You seem to be especially sensitive when it comes to scaling your hit/crit to the level of the mob. Where else do you see hunters often being off-balance?

They don’t focus on gear-upgrades. If you’re got a couple pieces of Naxx-quality gear but a green trinket, it’s time to break out the research websites and find out where you need to go to get a blue.

Casual play is fine, but not investing time to maximize your play so that you get the upgrade one needs seems to be a huge waste.

I also feel people get over-focused on Hit Rating. Yes the hit cap may be in the 260s, but we run Naxx sometimes with a 120 Hit Rating and will miss one shot during each boss fight. Considering that we’re topping our damage meters, sometimes by as much as 1000dps over the next person, we’re think we’re doing fine without going insane, re-gemming and re-enchanting every time we get a modest upgrade.

9. Do you have a favorite quest chain that’s a Must Do or Have for all your toons and friends at any level?

Since I don’t play Horde, I cannot comment on that side. For Alliance, the Howling Fjord quests with the fake robot and the carpet are howling funny.

10. Speaking of which, what alts do you have? If so, what are they and their levels?

The most advanced alt is a level 40 dwarf hunter, BRKTestBed.
Everything else is under level 25: Squishette, a female dwarf shadow priest who might be level 18; LilRedKitteh, female gnome mage, might be level 10; a male gnome warrior, maybe level 15; and my female dwarf ret pally Boudicah, who I lovingly abandoned in Teldrasil at level 24.

11. We’ve had the opportunity to see much from BRK, but what would be the one thing that would shock us? What would be something that none of us would truly expect from BRK?

I read romance novels. Have a very nice collection of 1st edition Amanda Quick and Jude Devereaux hardcovers. The Montgomery family rocks my socks.

12. Some people think because of your popularity, that you have a direct line into Blizzard. But visiting your site, it would be hard to see this as being true. So to clear the air, do you have a direct line to the Blizzard Development team?

We have never spoken to anybody at Blizzard in any capacity, other than a GM-ticket. However, the BRK Industrial Spy Network has many tentacles…

13. What about forums? I know we have The BRK Forums, but do you ever visit and/or contribute to the Official Forums?

Very rarely we’ll post something. We read the hunter and Drenden forums, but we choose not to post unless there’s a specific need, like we’re going to try not to crash a server or overwhelm the authentication system with a BRK Event.

14. Is Hobbes named after the Calvin and Hobbes Cartoon?

Yes. Calvin and Hobbes is the greatest comic strip ever and we are proud to carry the Hobbes name forward into the 21st century. Bloom County is second, natch.

15. Can you identify 3 specific things that Blizzard could do to make the game perfect for BRK?

A. Leatherworking consumables of some kind, not just gear. Jerky?
B. Greater variety of pet-food.
C. Brewmaster profession. We’ll never be truly happy until we can make 200 different beverages.

16. What is your favorite non-wow game?

Wii Tennis. We rock a 2100 rating.

17. For any that read your site, we can see that you are close with your guild. What would be your suggestion for players searching for a guild hoping to achieve the same sort of camaraderie?

Research. Talk to more than just the officers; talk to random guild-members. Accept a temporary guild-invite and just listen to guild chat for a few days. Don’t try to insert yourself into the culture, see if the culture matches yours.

18. This might be one of those questions that we really don’t want to know, but need to ask. What gets BRK ready to play? A favorite pair of PJ’s?
Beer and Pizza? What is your “playtime ritual”?

Just the knowledge that our damage-meters are running and there’s some squishy out there trying to take our top-spot away from us. That’s all the inspiration we need.

19. What would be considered BRK’s guilty pleasure? (Can be WoW or Non-WoW.)

Spicy food. I love Thai, hot Italian, Mexican, and Chinese. Curry is my weakness.

20. Finally, how much of your online BRK persona influences you in real life, and vice versa, how much of your real life persona influences your online one?

BRK is a hyped-up version of my own personality, but the basic foundation of each are the same. I don’t yell “Foshizzle” in real-life… but perhaps I should.

So there you have it folks! We’d like to again extend our thanks to BigRedKitty for taking time out of his enormously busy schedule to do this.

I hope you all had as much fun as I did!!