User:Oldmanfranks

Oldmanfranks, the user, is probably best known from his formerly frequent appearances on Scott Johnson's Extralife Radio podcast. He is now a semi-frequent contributor to Scott and Randy's The Instance podcast.

But who really is behind the voice of the crazy old man? As it turns out, said person is neither old, nor actually named Franks. He is, or rather, I am, a 26-year old tech enthusiast and professional named Brandon.

My Characters

• Dahkar Troll Mage, level 80, constantly respeccing. Main.
• Shadothi Tauren Death Knight, Level 80, Unholy.
• Oldmanfranks Undead Warlock, Level 80, Affliction/Demonology.
• Durnnit Troll Shaman, level 80, Elemental. Semi-Retired.
• Grothi Tauren Druid, level 80, Balance. Retired, used as a bank alt.

My WoW Story

I've been a denizen of Azeroth since the fall of 2005, which happens to also be when I first was able to pay for a computer capable of running it. I had done a pretty good amount of research on the game ahead of time though, owing to several of my fellow Computer Science students AND friends from church playing it at the time. Consequently, I was prepared to make my character on day one: a troll mage named Dahkar. Dahkar does not have any set meaning, I used the random name generator to come up with something, and it came back with Dakhar. I liked the name, but it was taken. I found that switching the H and K produced an untaken name.

I set up residence on the Skullcrusher realm with my friends Akin, David, and Jeff (who was my roommate at the time), and played on the realm all the way into the 50s, getting advice and help along the way. Skullcrusher was very high-pop back then, and queues were common. When Blizzard opened the Mug'thol realm, they allowed anyone from the 8 highest populated realms to transfer over, including ours. Akin, David, and Jeff were all members of a guild called Shattered Legacy, and SL voted to transfer over to Mug'thol. Hoping to join their guild at some point, I transferred as well.

Well, so did a lot of folks, actually. Mug'thol was jam packed with 1000+ queues for a couple of weeks solid following this horribly bad decision. Eventually, Blizzard expanded the realm's capacity, and my WoW Career truly began here. I leveled all the way to 60, eventually becoming a part of SL's recruitment guild. This guild was to help them train up new members for their ranks. I was able to run MC and BWL as a part of this team. When I finally "moved up", they were beginning to progress through AQ40, and I was with them all the way to their first kill of the Twin Emperors. By this point, Naxxramas (the first) was out, and Burning Crusade was on the horizon. A schism arose in the guild. The well geared folks wanted to push to kill C'Thun and start in Naxx, while those without decent gear (like myself) wanted to continue farming BWL and AQ for better items to help starting out in BC. SL had trouble even getting raids to happen, and they ceased actively raiding. Most of us tried out PvPing actively to get some of the PvP ranks, since they were disappearing in the expansion. I got up to Senior Sergeant.

When BC came out, we all had a blast leveling to 70, but when it came time to start raiding Karazhan, the guild slowly fell apart due to the stonewall that was the Shade of Aran. Frustration led to folks leaving, which eventually saw SL die off. SL was split. About half of them transferred to join a raiding guild started by an old officer, and many others formed a new late night raiding guild called Malicious Intent. I joined it as a non-raider, unable to raid at the late night times they suggested. I played casually, leveling alts at this time. MI fared better than SL, making it into the first parts of SSC and TK, but the late night times and recruitment problems eventually killed it as well. Akin, David, and I eventually left to form our own casual friends guild called "The Espada" along with some of our longtime friends who were tired of raiding. Espada did casual instances and arenas, but unfortunately many of its membership began logging on less and less.

Around this time, I decided to give alea iacta est another shot. When the guild, known then as i eat babies, was first formed, I had made a troll rogue and joined up, but ultimately gave it up and deleted him, unwilling to start over on another server. I was there for the name change fiasco, and one of the first "guild events", a gathering in Undercity to witness the Lament of the Highborne. Now, with the guild seemingly cruising along, I made an undead priest and joined up.

However, this left me with a problem. Having 2 level 70s and a level 63, I was not exactly thrilled with the prospect of leveling again. So I transferred my druid, Grothi, over to at level 63 to be a part of the guild. I found my time spent less and less on Mug'thol and more and more on ER. I was making great friends, having a grand time, even joined a great raid team, the Over the Hill Gang, for some casual Karazhan! It was a blast. Then...came Patch 2.4. The addition of the new Magister's Terrance instance, the new Badge of Justice gear, the new daily quest hub, all terribly exciting. I believed that such a patch would signal the return of my departed friends from Mug'thol and we could all happily play together again.

So for two solid weeks I played exclusively on Mug'thol. And during that time, not one of them ever logged on. I knew it was time for a change. I bade my old server and absent friends farewell, and transferred Dahkar and Nihilus, my then-Blood-Elf-level 70 warlock, over to Earthen Ring, and fully joined alea iacta est. I have not looked back since.

I have enjoyed the rest of Burning Crusade and the entirety of Wrath of the Lich King as a member of the guild, and am now a member of one of the best raid teams I’ve ever been a part of: Not in the Face, both the 10 and 25 man version. I have met many incredible people through this game that I otherwise would never know of, and I am tremendously thankful for all of them. I will continue to play WoW for as long as it continues to be fun and I can afford it, and you, my fellow guildies, are a big reason why.

On Character Selection

As you can see from my character list, I favor DPS classes and specs, and typically ranged spellcasting DPS at that. This is a personal choice that I do not intend to alter anytime soon. I have, in the past, attempted to tank on my druid, as well as heal on him and the shaman. I enjoyed neither. Damage dealing is the role I both know best and enjoy the most, and I have no desire to subject any group I run with to my terrible attempts at either tanking or healing.

While my expertise lies with casters, I have an interest in Melee DPS, showcased by my Death Knight and Shaman, who leveled to 75 entirely as enhancement. Should I level another character, my most desired class to attempt is a rogue.

As far as racial selection, I prefer trolls for their overall design, aesthetic, attitude, and general rarity. Tauren are a close second for the same reasons. I generally dislike the "broken" armor look that undead have, but I make an exception for cloth and the excellent caster animations they have in the case of Oldmanfranks. Plus OMF just feels right as an undead. I have nothing against orcs; I simply prefer the above mentioned races more. I dislike Blood Elves for many reasons, primarily their commonality due to them being the "pretty" race, their lack of concrete well thought out lore following BC's conclusion (and even then most of it was iffy), and the trend started by their inclusion of the Horde no longer being the "Monster faction". The Alliance has werewolves now, for Titan's sake. We should be getting those, and instead we have these green shorties, and I blame you Blood Elves for this!

On Names

As mentioned above, Dahkar’s name was generated randomly. I have often given thought to trying to change it to something more personal to myself, but thus far have found anything I like enough to use.

Grothi’s name was adapted from a boss in Final Fantasy X named Grothia. I chose it because I originally pronounced it as GROW-thee, and a druid name with the word Grow in it seemed apropos. However, most folks now pronounce it as GRAWTH-EE.

Oldmanfranks used to be Nihilus originally on Mug’thol. He then became Nihl upon being transferred to Earthen Ring, and was renamed Oldmanfranks when his race was changed. The original two names are taken from Sith Lords in Star Wars; Nihilus being from Knights of The Old Republic 2, and Nihl from the Star Wars Legacy comic series.

Durnnit’s name should be obvious, it comes from Old Man Franks’ legendary catchphrase.

Finally, Shadothi, originally the first Oldmanfranks, was created in an attempt to tie him to my existing Tauren character when I changed his race. I was looking for a darker word to use in place of Grow to form the name, and ended up using Shadow, thus transforming it into Shadothi.

Links

• Focus Magic - My segment for the AIE podcast, covering mage topics and advice
• Conflagration - My blog. Infrequently updated, but I'm trying to get better about it.
• Email
• Twitter
• EL/AIE Forums