Damage Meters Considered Harmful

For years I have labored under the sad assumption that Goto Damage Meters are Considered Harmful, and it has pissed me off collectively for at least 15 years, so, yeah, let’s have it out.

Assumption: Damage Meters are BAD!

The basic underlying argument is that damage  meters allow certain toxic individuals to make LFD / LFR a toxic wasteland and therefore are bad in and of themselves.

As an engineer this upsets me in a number of ways.

• Damage meters are a source of data. And ONLY a source of data.
• Data is intrinsically GOOD.
• People that make damage meters a source of shame / hate or other kind of disrepute are the problem here, not the meters themselves.

Okay, that last point is pretty much the sole point of this article.  Which is:

People are BAD!

In that, people are the problem. Damage meters are software. People using software are the problem.

There are a lot of people advocating that there are mitigating circumstances but I disagree.  Here are my Ultimate Thoughts on the topic.

1. Damage Meters provide data.  And only data.
2. Actual people use that data to improve things in some way
3. Not actual people (from here classified as trolls) use that data as a method to harass actual people.
4. Some people support (2)
5. Some people support (3)

In case it wasn’t clear, we support (2).

“Metrics”

Ultimately, damage  meters provide a way of gauging one’s performance. In engineering terms, “metrics”. And anyone opposing that kind of data is, ultimately, in my humble opinion, on the wrong side of the equation. Basically, I view that kind of person as less interested in improving things in general, and more interested in forwarding some sort of undisclosed agenda.

This argument resurfaces occasionally. People not very involved in the game, or people with no history, tend to re-discover this topic from time to time.  All I can say is, locate a classic WoW blog, look at their blogroll, and educate yourself before opening the mouth.  I welcome the opinion, but prefer that it be informed. Right now, there is a lot of bullshit flowing on a topic that has been settled for years (as in, so what?).

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Humble Pie served piping hot

I may have mentioned how running Torghast on my fire mage makes me feel powerful.  Even running it at levels above what I am running on my Hunter (my main), I feel pretty good about my capabilities and capacity.

And then, I ran Floramel, my Warlock, at the same level.

Here’s the problem with Flora. For the past couple of weeks, she’s felt pretty damned (pardon) good. Hitting above her weight, blowing shit up, and generally having a good old time. True, she has a pretty big ramp-up as a Demonology warlock, but once the ramp is upped, we be seeing some pretty good boom.

So, Grimmy got us to, what is it, “level” 10 in Torghast. Illume handled it like a pro.  So, when I queued up for it with Flora, I thought, what the hell. She’s gonna pwn this one too.

Er, not so much.

Listen, I admit it. I don’t understand the scaling in Torghast. And Flora was operating at, um, at least two tiers above what she’s rated at. But damn.

Let me essplain a little. Grimm is the main, Illume is next tier down, Jasra is next tier down after that. Flora is more or less my fourth-tier “main”, if that makes any sense at all.

Anyway. Each level’s end boss had some sort of major regeneration thingy going on. I never figured out what that was about, but on the first level I thought maybe it was because I hadn’t killed off all the other creatures on that level, so I went back and cleared the level and then went back and attacked him again – as our guild’s resident Fury Warrior with Rogue Complex frequently said, “no witnesses”. Still was a tough kill. And the one on level 2 was even tougher.

After three hours on two levels, I finally said “no more” and bailed.  The Winter Queen was waiting for me, with a big ol’ plate of Humble Pie, but at least it was fresh.

I have frequently felt that BM Hunters and Demo Warlocks were damned near invincible. Tonight was a strong reminder that I ain’t got all the trump cards.

Noted.