god damn it, leroy

I realized something climbing the Goat Trail alongside The Widowmaker today:

Climbing is just like World of Warcraft.

No really, bear with me. Climbers are all shamans. Or maybe White mages. At any rate, to be effective they have to constantly watch their mana levels. Just like climbing. You can't expend everything you've got right off the bat, you won't have enough reserved to carry you through the entire battle. Instead you need to try to gauge which spells to cast (Magic Missile) and which to hide in your bag of tricks for the eventual big attack.

The steep hills are big spells, they cost lots of mana. As long as you are climbing your meter is slowly depleting. But then the incline levels out a bit and you can catch your breath. Your cadence goes up, your speed goes up, your heartrate goes down, and your mana starts to rise. Hey, take a drink of gatorade, that's like mana+12! It can be difficult to gauge how much you'll need sometimes. You can be hugging the wheel of the guy in front of you, mana y mana, but then when you're about depleted at the top of a steep push and ready for the level section ahead to replenish. But uh oh. The leader has a deeper reserve and attacks, he takes off faster than you are ready for and you've got to give chase. Now you are burning out your last bit of mana and find yourself totally depleted at the base of the next 8% grade disappearing out of site up to the right. The leader plops down and rides comfortably up the hill and you're stuck huffing uphill. Slowly. In agony. Game Over, wake up in the nearest graveyard, head back to town and review your inventory. Maybe you have a forgotten restorative tincture in there that you coulda shoulda played sooner.

Next time: how your chainrings are just like Pokemon.

No comments: