20 Questions with Nassira

I don’t know about you, but one of the fun things and maybe one of the more fun and misunderstood aspects of WoW is how social this game is. True, chat within the game itself can rapidly become mundane with LFG, WTB, WTS, and Chuck Norris jokes. But if you look beyond that, you can’t help but see the proliferation of WoW related blogs, sites, and other sources like Twitter.

Recently, I had the opportunity of meeting Nassira from Diaries of a Marksman Hunter. You might have read her Guide featured on WoW Insider, Basic Rules For a DPS Player. If not, I encourage you to go check out her site and for any new DPS player, the DPS guide is a must read.

So let’s get to to Nassira and see what she has to say about this week’s 20 Questions..

I want to thank you, Nassira, for doing this. I truly appreciate your willingness to take time out for this.

For you, anything.

How are things going for you right now?

Busy, but going well, thanks! How are you?

Doing good thanks. And if your life’s as hectic as mine recently I bet you are. With keeping up with your blog, game, and real life has to be real busy.

So let’s get the basics out of the way…

Can you give us a quick bio rundown? How long have you been playing? What’s your current spec?

Well, I’ve been playing WoW since 2005, but it was my noobie phase, and on-again, off-again. After an account swap and a few lowbie characters, I took a playing break for work and school until TBC and finally leveled my first maxed character, Nassira. My current spec is Marksmanship, and I’ve been Marksman ever since my very first character, a little Orc hunter named Dairina. I leveled as Marks, raided as Marks, and PvPed as Marks, and although I sometimes try other specs for the experience and the thrill of change, I always return to Marksmanship, as it is and always has been my favorite playstyle.

Thanks, now that we know a bit more about who you are, let’s get to the fun stuff.

1. For us who may not know, how did you come about the name Nassira? Does it have any special meaning?

It was actually created for a Half-Elf Ranger in my first game of DND, but I went with another name instead. Later, I found my old list of names and decided I quite liked “Nassira”. I found out later that it’s very close to the Arabic “Nasir”, which is basically “supportive” or “helpful”. But I really just made it up and thought it sounded cool. =P I like to give my characters original names.

2. You’ve written some very popular guides and even have been linked on WoW Insider. Are you looking to maybe write full time?

Well, I’m in the process of redesigning my site, and I do have some aspirations for it, although I want to keep the same attitudes and approaches to my topic. Writing is a great outlet for me, and it’s a hobby that I never get to do enough of anymore. Starting and maintaining this blog has been a great thing for me, and I plan on continuing however I can.

3. You’re successfully raiding with <Explicit>. Would you consider yourself a min/max raider?

Interesting question. Yes and no. While I’m very fond of the DPS race and enjoy it immensely, I find myself often out of time to do the things necessary within the game to stay on top of things. If it weren’t for Explicit being so generous with enchants and gems, I doubt I’d have enough time to farm everything I need to stay maxed. There is a limit to how much time I will spend on WoW when I have other responsibilities to attend to, and I often have to remind myself that there are more important things than grinding gold for min/maxing. You know, like going out, getting hammered, and stumbling home at 4 in the morning…that, and laundry.

4. What do you think about the whole “min/max elitist” raider vs. the “min/max do the best I can” raider conflict? Is it really that bad, or do you feel there are only a few who blow it out of proportion?

I feel there’s a haughty Holier-than-Thou attitude with a few hardcore raiders out there, and I’ve had my fair share of disgusting, rude comments from them. However, I’ve held my head up high throughout, confident in my skills and knowledge both as a Hunter and as someone who has attempted to master a spec to the best of my ability. I’ve also found that with a few well-chosen words, you can convince many of the “elitists” to speak to you as a human and not the scum of the earth. As I’ve stated many times, respect must come from you first if you wish to receive it. The way I see it is this: You can respect the fact that these people have spent so much time and effort to prove their worth in a video game, because you can relate to that effort and time in one or more aspects of your life. Life is all about the choices you make. Try not to judge their choices as they do yours and you’ll come out feeling much better about the both of you.

5. What is your best memory leveling up your hunter?

Oh, tough question! I’ve never much liked leveling, and after level 30 I generally start to feel the drudgery. However, running instances was the highlight of that leveling, and I have many memories of running RFK, ZFK, and ST with my ex-boyfriend. Some of my fondest memories were of running Underbog over and over again and realizing that I was slowly improving my gameplay. I was quite crazy about pets and would cross the entire ocean and enter enemy territory at level 10 just to get the pet I wanted. When I hit 18, I went immediately to Darkshore and tamed the Moonstalker Matriarch, which was the nicest looking low-level cat skin in my opinion. Then, I discovered through Mania how to obtain the black lion, Humar, and every day for almost a week, I searched for him just north of Ratchet. I was level 26 by the time he spawned for me, so the taming was easy, but when I finally got him, I knew I could never trade him for any other pet. He leveled with me all the way through to 70, and I raid with him regularly to this day. I named him Eidan, which is a Gaelic name meaning “little flame” or “fiery”.

6. Well, we can’t ask that without asking, what was the most miserable memory?

If we’re being totally honest, my ex-boyfriend didn’t treat his party-members well at all and was incredibly judgmental and rude. I remember wanted to die from shame every time he was cruel, and I spent much of my instance time being embarrassed for him. Sometimes he would turn that judgment on me, and although it was the spark that lit the fires of self-improvement, it made me dislike certain aspects of the game as well as some of the time I spent with him.

7. So, do you/have you done any research on being a hunter? Or do you try to experiment in game and learn things firsthand?

I learned from the ground up. When I first started playing, I knew absolutely nothing about the game. No lore, no MMO basics, nothing. It was my very first MMORPG, and playing a game live with other people was very new to me. I wasn’t aware that there were resources at my disposal, and the only site I’d ever found was Mania’s Petopia, which was my Hunter Bible of sorts. I knew nothing of theory-craft, nothing of group mechanics…I was a total and utter WoW-tard. Bit by slow bit, I began to learn. I began to speak with other players, and I learned how to get a good response instead of a negative one. Once I became confident in my ability, I started to branch out, and when I started raiding, I knew I wanted to dive further into it. I started to learn about theory-craft and began crafting my own thoughts. I began doing spreadsheets, analyzing tooltips, practicing rotations, and generally being incredibly geeky. It felt very, very good, and I soon realized that it was my favorite part of the game.

8. Now that you’re blogging and raiding, do you find it difficult to keep your opinions to yourself when you find a Hunter that’s just geared and specced wrong? Or do you just shrug it off as not being your problem?

Again, I try very hard not to be judgmental. If someone asks me for help in a specific area, I’ll gladly (and kindly) give them all I can, but I see anything else as picking a fight, and I refuse to pick fights. Either they have the desire to learn and will eventually figure things out, or they don’t and never will. Sometimes we forget that there are different ways to enjoy the game, and that most people see it as just another fun little game to play. Kill things, do quests, see the nice sights…and who are we to say they can’t do that? Of course, raiding with said noob is another story, and if they expect high-end, I will treat them as high-end. My expectations of them will rise accordingly.

9. Have you ever thought of starting over? Not rerolling another class, but starting over on a new hunter?

All the time. My one true love is the Orc race, and my first hunter was an Orc. I love the lore behind them, I love their gripping story and their noble leader. Unfortunately, I’d already leveled three different Orcs on three different accounts, and on my final, permanent account, I chose to do something I hadn’t seen before and created a Blood Elf. I don’t regret it, but I do wish I also had my original Orc. I will never delete Nassira because my memories and my efforts are reflected in her. I am in love with the Highborne and Sylvanas in particular, and being akin to her, I feel a tiny sense of pride. But I am not opposed to leveling an Orc hunter, and fittedly keeping her a Beast Master. I do have an Orc shaman and an Orc warlock, but it’s just not the same.

10. Speaking of re-rolling, what would be your second class of choice?

I currently have a level 50 paladin which I’m enjoying immensely. I never thought I would like the pally mechanics, but I’m finding more and more that it’s very much “me” in a lot of ways. I hope to get her to level 80 and begin tanking heroics. =) I have a warlock alt, as well, and handling 6 mobs at 3 levels higher than my own was more fun than I’d ever had while leveling. It almost felt like cheating…

11. I’m curious; what’s your view on the ease of WoW? Has it gotten too easy? Are you at all concerned that Ulduar will be too easy because of the number of players on the PTR?

WoW is, in my opinion, slightly easier now than in TBC. Leveling is easier, raiding is easier, finding a successful raiding group is easier…however, quite a bit of that feeling has to do with the fact that between then and now, I’ve personally come a long, long way in terms of skill and ability, and even game-related thought. I’m sure this has a huge impact on my views of the ease of the game.

In the matter of the PTR: to each his own. There are some guilds hungry for PTR action so they can be the first to master Ulduar when it comes out. Not me. I like to take my sweet time and savor the progression and the bonding within the guild that it sparks. I have some very fond memories of wiping repeatedly on Archimonde, and I’m hoping Ulduar will give us more of that. That sounds crazy, doesn’t it? So call me crazy, but I love a challenge. I’m hoping upon hope that Ulduar is not only fun and challenging, but also that it feels epic, that it feels like a real accomplishment once it’s completed.

12. Everyone has an opinion about how the Hunters stack in comparison to other classes. What’s your view on this?

In my experience, hunters are often either the best of the best, or the worst of the worst. In TBC, I would refuse to invite any unknown hunters to my groups, because I knew there was a 90% chance they wouldn’t be able to handle themselves, whether it be in gameplay, or more importantly in group sportsmanship. Lately, and especially after joining the Hunter blogging community, my faith is slowly being restored in the Hunter class. I’ve met many decently-skilled, well-behaved hunters of all specs, and it reminds me that our bad experiences are often the most memorable. It’s the crappy hunter we remember, and not the one who handled things well. If we keep that in mind and think logically, we know the good ones are out there. They’re simply quieter and more reserved than the bad ones, and you’ll just have to look for them instead of hoping they come to you.

13. Agi has typically been the stat of choice for Hunters, but we seem to stack gear with Agi but load it with AP. Why is that?

Currently, because of the new mechanics of Trueshot Aura and the myriad talents that we gain critical strike from, we’ll benefit more with AP gems/enchants. Crit chance has diminishing returns, and once you reach a certain point, it becomes counter-productive to attempt to gain more in sacrifice of other stats. While you gain a certain percentage of Agility from certain raid buffs, you gain more attack power through the 10% AP bonus, so forgetting about Agi and swapping to AP will give you a slightly higher yield. Think of your food buff; either you can have 40 Agility, which is 40 Attack Power and about 0.5% Crit, or you can have 80 AP. Doubling the AP for a tiny sacrifice of Crit makes more sense when your buffed crit chance is riding high at 45%.

14. How do you feel about BiS Items being purchased, crafted, or otherwise available outside of raids?

It’s crap. When something becomes available through farming, it becomes “required” and expected of you to do all you can to reach your gear/stat potential maximum. This means that in order to do my best for my guild, I will have to spend literally days or weeks farming, and by that time, chances are you will very soon replace that piece of gear in an upcoming patch. It’s simply not worth it, and it’s so much more exciting and gratifying to receive a desired item as a drop. At least, that’s how I feel.

15. Do you like questing and learning the lore? Or is it just something to hurry up and complete so you can get back to the raid?

I hate questing and see it as a means to an end, but I love the lore stories. I read them outside the game. I’m a total geek and have always had a soft spot for fantasy ever since elementary school when I started to read books by Bruce Coville. The WoW stories are so intricate and full of great characters that it’s hard not to love it and I enjoy feeling like I’m a part of the story itself. It’s one of the best things about this game, in my opinion.

16. You’ve rolled a Blood Elf, ever feel unjustly picked on for not being one of the “Traditional” races?

I’ve been picked on from time to time. As I said, my original character was an Orc and I loved her, but I simply needed a change and I’d already leveled hunters of the other races. Undead can’t be hunters, so no go on that end, and my thoughts on Taurens were that when I made a druid, I would be forced to be a Tauren anyway, so I’d get that experience soon enough. The only thing left to do was try a Blood Elf. I love Nassira. She’s super hot, she’s sarcastic, she’s got skillz…no regrets on my end. Nassira is very much like myself in some ways, and I even chose a character appearance to mirror my own. I get very into roleplaying games, and I like to feel like I am my character. Sorry, but I don’t have big feet, blue skin, and tusks.

17. Many players have different things that they would never admit to doing in game. Well, we don’t leave any stone unturned here, so what’s your guilty pleasure?

*Sigh* Confession time, eh? I do battlegrounds in the completely wrong way. I’m selfish with them. I run directly where I want to run, shoot who I want to shoot, and generally sew mayhem wherever I am. I know what I’m supposed to be doing; I just don’t want to do it. I’m one of those players who starts the need for someone to say, “Jesus Christ, guard the Blacksmith you idiots!” because I’ll have run off to chase a gnome who ganked me. I get very into it. I get angry, I get loud, and I get focused on revenge. I recall a certain resto druid who most likely regrets messing with me in AB…and several people in my battlegroup who groan when I enter their AV, because they know I won’t be defending a damn thing. But to me, battlegrounds aren’t serious in the slightest, and they’re just a way to let loose and kill, kill, kill! Winning is fine, but I couldn’t give a shit whether we win or lose, because I know I’ll be having fun regardless. Arenas are another matter, though, and I treat those similarly to how I treat raiding. My feelings are these: When you form your own tailored group of people, it’s srsbsns, but when you have to play with any ole scrub-nugget, it’s just a vacation.

18. This question was asked by Rilgon on Twitter one day, and I thought it an interesting one. “If buying gold was legal and not against the TOS, would you? Why?”

If I had money to spare, yes. I value my time more than anything else. Some people actually enjoy farming and it’s a nice relaxing time for them. I don’t. I hate it. It feels useless and a waste of time. I could be reading a book, cooking a nice dinner, visiting with friends, walking the dog, or (god forbid) doing chores in that time. I do what’s necessary for raids and nothing else, and if the best in slot trinket is purchasable for a large sum of gold, I would rather have the time and not the dollars. I don’t need much. I’m what is known as “low-maintenance” in real life. As long as I have my computer, I’m happy, and a few bucks can be translated into a night off the in-game chores but improved raid performance…I’m going to say yes to that. If something were truly an epic part of the game, it wouldn’t be purchasable anyway, so I can’t say it detracts from experiencing the game itself. I.E. Netherdrakes were an epic part of the game, and I happily spent my time earning my Drake and felt good when I got it. If it were ultimately purchasable for 2,000g, however, I would never have cared to own one and it wouldn’t feel special to me, even if I earned the gold myself.

19. What in-game achievement are you most proud of?

I am, of course, proud of receiving Champion of the Naaru and Champion of the Frozen Wastes, because not only do they show off your raiding history, but they also add a sense of pride to your Guild name. You can only accomplish those things with 25 other people who you worked with each night in close quarters. That means something, and that’s where the memories come from. That’s a real achievement.

20. Alright, before we go it’s time to put you on the spot. Name 3 of your favorite sites that you use all the time.

Heehee…Well, like I said, I use Mania’s Petopia all the time, and it’s a fantastic resource for all things Pet-related. My next favorite site for reference is Wowhead, and I use that for pretty much all of my non-pet-related searches. My last site, never to be underestimated, is the percentage calculator I found on Google. Because I suck at math. Actually, I guess you could say my favorite website is Google. It’s been good to me. I read many great blogs, lots of resource sites, plenty of forums…but I never would’ve found them without Google.

Well thanks for spending some time with us here. I hope it was as fun for you as it has been for me.

It was! Thanks for having me! =)

Anything you would like to add for our readers out there?

In a game full of people, remember that you’re in a game full of people. We’re all just humans trying to escape and have a bit of fun. Treat everyone with respect, and try to be kind. The game is much more enjoyable this way. Unless he ninjas your gear, in which case, /kick the motherfucker.