Proud BC Baby greeting the Children of Wrath

I’m a proud BC Baby! I didn’t know I was until recently, when Starman of Casual Raid Leader wrote a post about the next generation to enter the game for the first time: Children of Wrath.

In his post Starman asks us: What things will the Children of Wrath never see? What aspects of the world will they miss? What aspects will have changed so dramatically that they have no concept of things we speak of? He gives us a few good examples and wants us to write posts and add some more.

Here are a few that came into my mind.

The Children of Wrath will…

• never experience the frustration of clams from nagas invading all of your bag space unless you stick to a strict open-them-at-once-routine.
• get all their achievements recorded from the beginning. They won’t have to do Dead Mines over again just to proof they were there.
• probably never do the TBC instances in heroic mode unless they’re very addicted to achievements.
• unlikely set their foot into Shattered Halls, Shadow Labs or the Tempest Keep ones, for the same reason as I never cared about doing Dire Maul. Northrend is waiting for them at 68.
• be utterly spoiled when it comes to bagspace, considering that BG tokens, mounts and pets have been removed from it.
• be more likely to collect pets and mounts since there’s no problem to host them.
• have other expectations on how quick and easy levelling should be, considering how spoiled they get on their way to 70.
• not suffer from the monotony of doing the same instance over and over again for reputation. They’ll just wear the right tabard and pick any instance they like.
• become used to carry smaller stacks of arcane powder, if they’re mages, and not know what it’s like to empty your mana pool right before a pull just because you need to buff five raid groups.

Yes, they’ll become spoiled little kids, those newbies, won’t they? But I’m so happy they’re joining our ranks. I haven’t met them yet. I think, they’re probably still levelling, and since I, like many others, am more or less permanently stationed in Northrend these days, it’s unlikely that our paths will cross.

However, the very knowledge about their existence made me smile. Their arrival means that I’ve moved up a step, gaining a veteran rank! It’s the same thing as in school when you moved from 1st to 2nd grade. Suddenly there was someone else who knew even less than I did, who couldn’t find their way to nurse, cafeteria or school library, someone who sneaked along the walls, watching all the Big Kids in awe and fear.

Time has come when I’ve been around long enough to understand most of the code words thrown around by the other veteran players. When someone described one of the bosses in a Northrend instance I did like “a little bit like Leotheras”, I knew exactly what he meant. If I had been a Child of Wrath I wouldn’t have had a clue. It’s like I’m part of a secret society.

Of course there’s a lot of stuff that I’ve missed being a BC Baby. I’ve only seen the old raid instances in an overpowered rush-through-them-at-level-70-for-nostalgic-reasons-mode, not as the huge challenges they once were. I’ve never stepped into Molten Core. And there’s really no way to make up for it now. I’m still locked out from the Inner Circle.

But now at least there are some fresh newbies around who knows even less than I do.

Sweet little Children of Wrath – welcome to our world. And who knows, in a year or two it may be your turn to climb up one level on the ranking.