I want to start this post with a firm declaration of my intentions: I am a Rift player. I recently put down a year's subscription as a show of faith in the company Trion. I have no intent of quitting the game anytime soon, and if my class isn't brought up to how I want it? I'll reroll. This isn't "my" game, but that of a company filled with hundreds of different minds, and ideas, and processes. What I view as the "best" thing for Trion to do in any given situation is, by that measure, inconsequential. That being said, as all belief's should be, they are important to me.
Whether or not others agree with me, what I believe in is simply that.
I started playing Rift about two weeks before 1.3 hit--I think it was March or May? Hard to say. My original character was a Mage, is it happens. I found Faeblight (having already established itself as having an amazing community) and never questioned my choice. The first week was spent leveling, a process some of my friends would consider eccentric. Although I was still raiding on WoW at the time (Paladin Tank, you can see her pictures up top), I put extra time into the Mage. Then, getting an itch at level 44, I rerolled a Warrior--More out of disdain for "another" desert zone to quest in than anything else.
And, once again against the norms of our great min-maxing community, I leveled as a Tank. I fell in love with the Paladin tree, and spent my game time running 32Paly, Warlord, and some VK. I did "fine", by my own measure, and eventually got to Expert DSM where I simply took too much damage. On a suggestive whim from someone in my party, I rerolled 51VK ... and practically napped through the fight. Everything was fantastic... until my WoW guild started struggling with attendance. While they've since returned to raiding (Good guild called Wolf Pack--Look 'em up on Duskwood and tell them Soliari sent you), most of our "core" fell by the wayside and, after I gave one of them a trial to Rift, fell in love with the game.
And rolled Defiant, despite my high level Guardian (something they also blame on me and an offhand comment that I wanted to roll a Defiant alt).
So, I was given the choice of rerolling a Warrior (sorry, not again), a Justicar, or a Riftstalker.
At first I chose Justicar, and the class actually felt more like my WoW Paladin than Paladin in Warrior felt. But, for the most part, I grew bored very quickly and lost interest. Instead, I rolled a Riftstalker, and LOVED it. Teleporting? Awesome. Super-crazy move-through-space/time-backstab, and the ability to Tank? I can dig it.
Another few weeks of grinding, and I was ready to take on the Expert dungeons. Around this time it became apparent that my so-favored guild on Faeblight (Gaiscioch) had a Defiant-side guild as well, and I joined alongside them until such a point that my friends asked we make our own guild. This didn't hurt so much, as I was happy to see a guild where I had a better voice in how it was run, and it turns out Gaiscioch is a gaming network of such infrastructure we could become an extended alliance member guild, getting access to everything they had. Fantastic!
Thus, <Mirage> was born on Faeblight.
And so began my foray onto the Rift Forums regarding the Riftstalker, and thanks to math from the likes of Muffin et al., I was shown just how poorly I compare to Warriors. This is paramount to the fact one of my friends started offtanking for me, as a Warrior, and in gear that netted him 2,000 less health, STILL was easier to heal for my Healing friend.
So now, I'm one of many Riftstalkers fighting the uphill battle for role equality. Not Tank Domination by the Riftstalkers... I want equality. Absolute equality. If our mitigation goes up, take some of our CDs away, if it makes us "balanced" against each other. I've no issue against that.
In the end, we'll see how Trion plays the cards. Maybe my vision of role equality (I'm even cool with making Riftblade a Ranged DPS Warrior-soul) will come to fruition. Maybe not... if not, I always have the chance to reroll another Warrior.
And, I suspect this won't be the last post I write about this. Sorry in advance.
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