Meet VALOR: Des
Meet: Des
Hi, I’m Des! I’m your friendly neighborhood feral player, coffee connoisseur, and pet battle lover! Let me tell you who I am and why I’m here!
Firstly, I’ve been playing WoW since I was a wee lad—like, 5 years old! And you might be asking yourself, “How the hell did you play this game so young? Aren’t you supposed to be watching Barney or something?” And okay, I get that. But let me tell you something about my dad.
He is a HUGE WoW gamer—well, was a huge WoW gamer. When I was very young, he would sit me on his lap, and I’d watch him kill deer on his characters. He’d tell me about the game and let me mess around with it (under his watch). This was way back at the end of Vanilla/start of BC era. As I got older, my dad gave me more freedom with the game. I eventually started playing on his account and sharing it with him, hijacking my mom’s account (which is the one I still use today!). My first ever character, created by my dad for me, was a Night Elf hunter named Destinylynn. I remember her vividly, and she was my main up until BFA!
When I was young, my dad would level with me, play with me, help me out as much as possible.
Some of my most vivid memories are of playing the game with my dad or making random posts on my Facebook (I’m serious, there are posts on my Facebook!). When I was young, my dad would level with me, play with me, and help me out as much as possible. I knew people from his guilds, and I was “Toby’s Daughter.” Sometimes, they’d even give me gifts! The more I grew up, the more independent I became in the game, learning how to actually play and not just kill random deer. Because, trust me, I did that for a long time thinking that was the game.
My first real memory with WoW is when my dad and I were leveling and running dungeons. We were in The Stonecore, that dungeon in Deepholm, and we were having a blast! Suddenly, the Reins of the Vitreous Stone Drake dropped, my dad won the mount, and I’m this young girl who has no idea what a “stone drake” or a mount even is. And my dad, the blessing that he is, trades it to me! I loved that dragon and rode it everywhere because my dad gave it to me! I was so happy to have it, and he was happy I was happy.
Earlier, I mentioned those Facebook posts. Well, I’ll give you an example of what my posts were like and why I made them. When WotLK came out, I had started to get the hang of things in WoW, and I quickly found out about this thing called the Time-Lost Proto-Drake—some of you know what I’m talking about. Let me tell you, that SOAB (Son of a Bitch) was way different back in WotLK. He had a longer spawn timer, could only be killed and looted by one person, and shared his spawn with Vyragosa at a 1/16 chance of him being the spawn. I spent HOURS camping him, and I would post on Facebook anytime I saw him get killed in front of me or missed his spawn. I was a young, determined little girl, and all I wanted was that damn proto-drake. That’s literally all I did for a very long time.
…I started capturing battle pets, going after ones like Mr. Bigglesworth, who I named “Love u” because he was my first ever achievement battle pet, and well, I loved cats.
As time went on, I continued to play and learn more about the game—and myself. My next big memory comes around MoP. I was still young, can’t tell you how young, but I was still playing my hunter, running around with my Skoll spirit beast (which I remember crying when I tamed him. But that’s a whole different story). I remember doing Raid Finder and maybe normal mode for SoO. I got a battle pet, the Sha pet, and let me tell you, I cherished that pet for a long time. MoP was when I really started getting into the game as a mount and BP collector. I started capturing battle pets, going after ones like Mr. Bigglesworth, who I named “Love u” because he was my first-ever achievement battle pet—and, well, I loved cats.
Now, when the Timeless Isle came out in MoP, I learned about that damn lightning cloud serpent. I spent a VERY long time camping him—about 1000 attempts before I even got him! But hey, that’s MoP. My WoW story is much longer and does NOT end here.
After MoP came WoD, and let me tell you, my obsession with rare spawns? It was full-blown at this point. It wasn’t just TLPD anymore; it was Poseidus, Aeonaxx, and now… Voidtalon. Let me say… I was a kid, and I LOVED garrisons. I loved being a hunter and collecting mounts through the stables, and I LOVED the experience of taming Gara (that purple spirit beast) in current content. I also loved taming pets in general—my pet stable was ALWAYS full.
I was very blind to the world of FOMO mounts, so even though I was raiding and doing dungeons, I didn’t understand what a FOMO mount was. It wasn’t until Legion that WoW really kicked up for me.
In Legion, a lot happened, but the most important? I met my boyfriend. By the time this post goes up, he will actually be my fiancé! I’m proposing to him a couple of days before this post is released. (I’ll talk more about my boyfriend soon <3)
ANYWAY, Legion… In order of events? Meeting my boyfriend was one of the last things that happened, but it was a huge expansion for me. Firstly, I finally got TLPD and the last of the Draenor world rare mounts too. I cried. A lot. Like, I literally fell out of my chair and screamed I was so happy. And the crazy thing? I got my last Draenor world rare mount and TLPD within 8 minutes of each other. I rode that damn dragon everywhere and dropped every other mount I’d ever loved. This was also around the time I got involved in the WoW Secret Finders Discord. I started learning about TLPD and how he worked, and weeks after I got my first TLPD, I began finding him and giving him away. I gave away hunter pets too, and I also worked on the Lucid Nightmare secret! I ended up leaving the WoW Secret Finders Discord once I started selling rares in BFA. I joined Gallywix then and worked with them up until I realized they were breaking ToS. I left two weeks before the big WoW Gallywix ban went out (that was a close one).
But I LOVE rare spawns! I love their mechanics, finding them, and giving them away! If you need one, please hit me up—I enjoy them <3 Hunter pets or mounts!
Legion was also when I started doing PvP, pet battle dungeons, and doing M+ dungeons. I did Mage Tower a lot too. I really kicked up my skill level and did very high-level keys with friends in Legion. I was pretty damn good if I remember right. That was like 7 years ago, though, so excuse my memory.
So, I’m still ranting about my WoW experiences… how did I get here? Who am I? To give you the TLDR on the rest of the expansions: In BFA, I joined a guild called Hand of Algalon and met a guy named Yipman. He’s a super good guy and INCREDIBLY smart at gold-making. We would do keys together, gold farm together, and to this day we STILL gold farm together! Yip, besides my boyfriend, is one of my biggest WoW supporters! And Yip, if you’re reading this, THANK YOU!
I was in HoA for several years, left briefly for gold-making reasons, and created several gold-making guilds on different realms. Shadowlands and BFA were pretty quiet—I didn’t really play them that much, besides at the start of each expansion. I played more of BFA than Shadowlands, though.
I came back for Dragonflight and reconnected with Yip. We had gone quiet because I stopped playing Shadowlands. It was pretty fast—he was so excited to have his “little sister” back, and I was excited to rekindle the friendship. We started gold farming again, and then he invited me to raid with HoA. I did! I went in as a feral druid, had no clue what the hell I was doing, but BOY was it fun! I got KSM with Yip and his crew, and I learned feral druid. I definitely wasn’t the BEST feral druid (I still am not), but I know the basics.
It wasn’t long until I was pulled into a meeting with Yip (who was an officer of HoA), Swatch (the GM), and Wimble (the current RL). They offered me a position as a raid lead for the team, saying I brought an energy that they needed, and I was very knowledgeable about how to lead a raid team. I accepted, and I began raiding with HoA. Yip purchased me a server transfer, and I had a grand time raid-leading them to 3/9. I ended up leaving HoA, along with many others, due to internal conflicts. Eventually, we made a new guild called Rare Spawns, where my main still resides, and I still serve as an officer! I won’t go too much into the Rare Spawns or HoA story, but if you want to know more, feel free to DM me!
I currently still serve as an officer for Rare Spawns, but I also serve as an officer for a different guild called Falsify. This guild was created by a raid leader I worked with in HoA after Wimble stepped down, and I helped him set up the guild and get things going.
Now, regarding my experience: I’m an officer in two guilds, I’ve raid-led in WoW, but would you believe I also raid-led a static in FFXIV, was an officer for a Free Company there, hosted events, and even administrate the Overseas Casuals server? I KNOW! Shocking, right? I’ve been around when it comes to my in-game experience. And that’s only my in-game experience. I also mod/admin two college servers and help students with homework and advising!
Okay, so, how the hell did I get into VALOR? Well, that’s simple. If any of you have noticed, there’s currently a pet battle tournament being run by Flip_Method and lots of other people. Well, I help there too (I know, the list never ends). It wasn’t long before I was talking to Puffin, who was like, “Hey! Let me introduce you to our CEO of VALOR!” and well, that’s how it started. I joined the server that day, and not long after, I was pulled into the meeting. Let me tell you, PrawfeT, if you’re reading this, I was literally sweating bullets and so nervous—I was so stressed you’d say no.
Anyway, that’s how I got here. I have MORE experience, and I have a life IRL, don’tcha know?
My MAIN IRL experience is that I used to work at a coffee shop called Minuti. You may be asking, “How is that leadership experience?” Well, it is, because I was the General Manager. I started out as a lowly cashier, then a barista, then a manager, then the “unofficial” assistant GM, and finally, the GM! I was stoked. I learned so much about coffee, customer service, and a lot of really helpful skills I’ll be using here. I worked at Minuti for over a year and left in August due to some problems with the job. I plan to work in a hospital as some sort of nurse. That hasn’t happened yet, but it will soon—hopefully next year (2025). At the moment, I’m in college and about to graduate with my Bachelor of Science in Psychology, with a Health Minor. Once I graduate, I plan to apply to nursing school. I really want to be a CRNA (Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist), but I also LOVE psychology and would like to work as a psych nurse, ICU nurse, ER nurse, or Med Surge nurse. Oh! I don’t know—I just want to be a nurse. CRNAs are really hard to become and take a lot of time, so I’ll work as a nurse while I’m in school for CRNA, and during that time, I’ll be anything I can. I’m really excited for my future!
Okay, so I mentioned my boyfriend earlier. How did we meet? Who is he? Let me tell you a bit about him and how we met.
I shit you not, we met during a current-content run of the Argus Achievements. We were both sitting outside the instance, and I mounted on a mount he didn’t have. He /pointed at me and said “Asshole!” and, well, I started mounting on every mount I had. We had a little mount-off right there. It was hilarious to both of us, and we ended up adding each other. After the run, we chatted a bit on Battle.net here and there, but it wasn’t until I was having a really bad day and changed my status to reflect that, that he messaged me on Discord. He asked me if I was okay, gave me some advice, offered to talk about it, and we ended up talking for a while. We started talking every day, and this was around the beginning of December. We’d call, laugh, and hang out—it was fun.
On Christmas, I asked him to be my boyfriend in a pretty unconventional way: I asked him, “My mom is going to ask us soon if we’re dating, what should I tell her?” He said, “If you feel the same way.” And that was it—it was history. We’ve been together since Christmas of 2017, nearly 7 years strong at the time of this post. We are long-distance, though—we’ve never lived together. We plan to move in sometime next year, if time and money allow, and to get married once we’re living together and financially stable enough to afford it. I love this man with my entire heart and can’t wait to call him my fiancé soon!
About a year before I met my now-fiancé, I met a friend named Legmeat/Mav. I’ve known her for a long time, and she has been one of my other HUGE supporters! We actually met while camping TLPD way back in the day, and she got it before me. We still do lots of content together today! 🙂
We will be here to help you, and that is my mission.
There’s a lot more to my story—so much more that it’s hard to fit it all here. But my mission for VALOR is to “Unf**k Academy.” That’s my task. I’ve been working hard to revamp the system and working closely with everyone, and I’m really excited to share with everyone what’s been going on. If you’re reading this, I’ll give you all a sneak peek.
We’ve started working on creating sub-roles for our mentors, allowing them to focus either on writing guides or answering tickets primarily. We’re also creating sub-roles for classes and content styles to make the mentoring experience smoother.
On top of that, I plan to start hosting more workshops! If you have any suggestions for a workshop you’d like to see, let me know—I don’t bite. Academy is the place to learn, and I want it to be a friendly place to learn and chat. You can come in, ask your questions, and get your answers. We will be here to help you, and that’s my mission. I want to bring Academy back to life (like a phoenix) and make the whole process easier for you, the readers, and the mentors I work with.
Now, that’s my VALOR story. I can give you a bit more insight into who I am outside of Valor and work. I’m a HUGE book nerd—like, I love books. I enjoy anime, and I play LOTS of games, including farming games, roguelikes, and more. At the moment, I play a lot of Old School RuneScape, but I also play Farm Together, Dungeon Defenders, The Binding of Isaac, Risk of Rain 2, Cult of the Lamb, and TCG Simulator. I also play Hollow Knight! 🙂
If you want to know more about me, I really love Legos—like, a lot! And so does my fiancé! We’ve bonded over Legos every year, and I can’t rave enough about them. I even made my proposal Lego-themed! Matthew is my biggest inspiration, and that boy means everything and more to me. I know I already talked about him above, but seriously—I’m raving! He supports all of my hobbies: art, music, reading, gaming, and more. He loves me, I love him, and I’m happy to tell VALOR about him.
Another big thing about me is every year I go to the Renaissance festival, my family and I always dress up and go to the shows! It is a super fun part of my life!
Regarding pets, I’ve had a lot of them. At the moment, I have four, split between two houses. At my mom’s house, there’s Autumn (a cat), Fiona (another cat), and Eclipse (a dog), and we also have Donner, who stays at my dad’s house (another dog). I’ve had MANY more pets over the years—honestly, I’ve never not lived with a pet, and I’m 21 years old!
But hey, that’s all for now. If you want to know more about me, who I am, and how I plan to “unf**k” Academy, feel free to reach out!
Occasionally in this world you run into someone who just has an innate ability to lift the spirits of the people around them. When I met Des we were both competitors for the Pet battle competition and I could IMMEDIATELY tell that she fit this kind of personality. She was incredibly kind, spoke highly of those around her, and made friends with everyone she met. When I talked to her about VALOR she instantly came up with several ideas to help without even being in the community yet. I know that having her join this community will only bring great things and I cannot wait to see the things she does moving forward!
– Darkpuffin
