Farewell, Veneretio
I’ll let you in on a secret. One of the reasons I started blogging was because I got inspired by another blogger. His name is Veneretio, orc warrior extraordinaire.
It was in late 2007, and I was an orc warrior lady who had just started TBC heroics. I tell you, I miss them. To this day I love TBC heroics fiercely. I had some of my best times running those 5-mans with friends. I had Badges of Justice to burn, but couldn’t figure out what to pick first. So one day I idly googled and ended up right up at Tankingtips.com. I was amazed! Someone who had done all the work, compiled, compared and helped me figure out what upgrades I had to focus on. Even better, he engaged in conversation with people who commented. I was hooked.
Tankingtips was the first blog I ever added to an RSS reader, Bloglines at the time. It basically opened the world of the WoW blogosphere to me. One by one I added more blogs. It was a time when the big name bloggers were BRK and Phaellia. Five months after discovering Tankingtips I started blogging myself. I started very plainly with some guides to the content I was doing, so mostly Karazhan and heroics, and started writing my very first gear list.
The niche I saw for myself was that I would be the blogger for the casual prot warriors, or the beginners, or everyone who was not neck-deep in content in Black Temple or Sunwell.
Throughout TBC and WotLK, Veneretio always delivered. He always came up with emblem pick orders, compared trinkets, exposed the value of expertise for warriors, delivered solid, great content. On top of it, he always engaged with his readers, and always managed to stay positive about warriors as class. No QQ to be found there! I tried to follow in his footsteps, with my gear lists, with some basics, with staying positive, even when it often seemed that other tanks overshadowed us.
Veneretio was the first non-guildie to leave a comment in my blog, and I remember feeling totally awed by this. Sometimes we mailed. Pretty sure he was one of the people who talked Ciderhelm into linking my blog on the front page of Tankspot, which scored me the highest amount of hits in one day ever (October 12, 2009, 5509 hits). He talked me into signing up on Twitter. He was still my warrior hero, who always passionately defended our class.
On October 24, Veneretio announced the end of his time as WoW player, and the end of his blog. While he had mentioned it before on Twitter, I hadn’t quite believed it. But it’s real now.
For me, Veneretio was the pillar of the very small warrior blogging community. An excellent blogger, a great guy, and the inspiration to several other tank bloggers, all rolled into one person. He’s leaving very big shoes to fill, guys. I’ll try my best to keep up blogging in the spirit of Veneretio, but number crunching theorycraft is not my forte. Nevertheless, I will try.
Now is the time to unite as warrior bloggers, so I will start to compile a warrior blog reference page. If you are a warrior blogger not currently in my (outdated) blogroll, please contact me! Hopefully we can inspire other warriors to pick up blogging. If I can only inspire one person the way Veneretio inspired me, I will have done well.
Farewell, Veneretio! Thanks for your outstanding work, and I hope you will still post about your gaming adventures on Twitter. And maybe, just maybe, Cataclysm will lure you back in eventually. Anything is possible. Take care, wishing you all the best! *orc salute to the chest*
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Kadomi, Lara. Lara said: RT @Kadomi: New blog post: Farewell, Veneretio http://bit.ly/97TaLK [...]
Veneretio’s blog was only one of two that I follow with any kind of regularity. I’ll let you guess what the other one is
Veneretio will definitely be missed!
Squeegiemama
Bronzedbeard-US
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Kadomi Reply:
October 26th, 2010 at 7:50 pm
Hey Squeegie, good to see you still around, alive and kicking!
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Squeegiemama Reply:
October 29th, 2010 at 6:15 pm
Back after a 7 month break
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Flattered doesn’t begin to describe my reaction to this. I wish you the best of luck continuing to represent the Warrior community. Someday it will be your time too and you’ll get to see all the lives you’ve touched as well. Have a great journey and please keep enriching the journey of others.
Veneretio´s last [type] ..The End.
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I was actually going to ask about your reading list, Kadomi, seeing as many of the blogs on there are either old, defunct or simply not worth it anymore.
It’s just a shame that something like Vene’s departure is what encourages it. For my part, I replaced my original topic for yesterday and replaced it with a cheerio to the dude that got me into blogging, too.
But you’re now carrying the torch, girlie – be sure not to drop it.
Zellviren´s last [type] ..The passing of a Titan.
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Kadomi Reply:
October 27th, 2010 at 8:45 am
It’s going to be a heavy torch, for sure. I have the new list about a quarter done and should be able to put it up later today. Time to go through my blogroll in general!
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Great Post. I think there have been a number of us posting to say farewell to Vene. As a warrior tank(Bearbryant), I felt I could always turn to TankingTips for answers to everything that ailed me. Vene helped me to embrace tanking and enjoy it to the fullest.
Tentoes
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Yours and Vene’s blog have been my two main sources of learning warrior tanking. As sad as I am to see Vene quitting, I’m equally glad to see you carry on the flag. You matter to a lot of players.
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sad news
really a good tank blog.
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I was actually going to ask about your reading list, Kadomi, seeing as many of the blogs on there are either old, defunct or simply not worth it anymore. It’s just a shame that something like Vene’s departure is what encourages it. For my part, I replaced my original topic for yesterday and replaced it with a cheerio to the dude that got me into blogging, too. But you’re now carrying the torch, girlie – be sure not to drop it.
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Kadomi Reply:
December 24th, 2010 at 1:20 am
I intend to go through the warrior blog list at least once a month to do clean up. I haven’t gone through my general blogroll for a while and really should.
I do need every warrior to contribute and point me to great warrior blogs not on the list, so the torch is in all of our hands!
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