Merlin#1312: I'm probably older than most gamers on here at 46. I'm married and have four kids and two grandkids. Yep, I'm a grandpa. I work in IT for the University of Washington and I've been there 12 years. I studied Psychology when I was younger with the goal of being a counselor and helping people, but then I started making money in IT, got married, had a kid, and the rest is history.

Merlin#1312: I've had a ton of hobbies over the years. Most recently I got my motorcycle endorsement and like to go out riding on the weekends, recently took a ride up to Mt Rainier. I also have a jetski I like to play on over the summer and give my kids rides. I used to be an avid scuba diver, but I gave up the cold water diving a long time ago and only dive now when I go on tropical vacations. I've also done a lot of waterskiing, snowskiing, and camping over the years. I love listening to music, typically a lot of old classic Rock like Rush, Led Zeppelin, Bad Company, and a lot of the grunge era bands like Pearl Jam, Nirvana, etc. Recently I've started listening to a bunch of European bands that most people have probably never heard of like Lacuna Coil, Within Temptation, Epica, Katatonia, and the like.

Merlin#1312: Well I started out playing my Atari 2600 console back in the day lol. :) My best friend's Dad had an Arcade when I was growing up, and we used to hang out there playing Asteroids, and Defender, and other games like that. They had bands play there sometimes, Queensryche before they were Queensryche, and Def Leppard played there once. Was a very cool place. After that I got into PC gaming, RTS games like Command and Conquer and Warcraft took a lot of my time. Then I got into Everquest hardcore, and played on a PvP Server, Tallon Zek. Those were good times, up all night doing corpse runs. Then of course WoW, and Diablo, and other Blizzard games.

Merlin#1312: Since I already talked about computer games, I also play Magic the Gathering most Friday nights. I used to play more frequently, but some of my friends quit so the kitchen table games stopped. I still have boxes and boxes of decks, probably about 60 decks still sitting there ready to play. I've tried to get my wife to play but it's not her thing.

Merlin#1312: Nope. I played a Sorcerer a ton in Diablo 1, and a Barbarian in Diablo 2, although I never really got into D2. I tend to focus on one class to master it as much as possible due to my limited playtime. I've always been like that with the games I play and only have one max level character in WoW, my Warrior. My wife is my opposite, she has one of every class at max level in WoW, in some cases more than one.

Merlin#1312: I've become a bit of a recluse in my gaming. Gaming has really just become unwind time for me at the end of the day, where I just veg and game, so I generally avoid the social aspects. I spend all day at work around people and a lot of the rest of my time out with friends or with family, so I treat gaming now as my alone time.

Merlin#1312: Sorry, never had one. :\

Merlin#1312: One moment I remember was doing ubers back on MP10, when they were actually semi-hard. I was grouped with two Barbarians who kept dying, and I kept ressing them. I almost died trying to res one of them once so I decided just to finish them off on my own. I was wondering if they were irritated because I was taking a bit long to finish the fights, but when I finished one of them said something like, "Man that was awesome."

Merlin#1312: I typically play melee classes, but my wife insisted on playing a Barbarian. I decided to give the Demon Hunter a try because I thought I might enjoy a ranged class. I found it very challenging to learn to kite and to use skills to keep mobs at bay. I actually played a Wizard back in Everquest days, and did a lot of AoE snaring and kiting, so the Demon Hunter sort of reminds me of that. Except instead of Vault Wizards had a spell called "Shadowstep" which sort of moved you to a random place away from the mob, lol. It was a challenge.

Merlin#1312: I've taken both approaches over the years. I have fond memories of playing builds that utilized Caltrops, and Windforce, and I learned to step and to mix that with well timed Vaults. One of my favorite old school builds was Windforce with Ball Lightning and Echoing Spike Traps to keep repeatedly knocking the mobs back onto the traps. I've also played a lot with high toughness tanking style builds that have utilized Shadow Power and Brooding with more focus on gathering as many possible mobs as possible to offset the damage loss from stacking toughness.

Merlin#1312: Vault. The ability to almost instantly move from one location to the next, and the mobility it provides, has always been fun to me.

Merlin#1312: Natalya's 6 piece, the typical RoV Stampede build. I was never a big fan of Strafe but now that I've been playing it awhile and have gotten used to it I'm enjoying the play style. It's a drastically different play style than other builds and takes some getting used to.

Merlin#1312: Spike Traps. It seems like the six piece bonuses on sets now tend to increase damage based on some factor, so perhaps increased damage based on number of active Spike Traps. I can think of several ideas for set bonus. The lure bonus that Chanon Bolter gives would be neat on a set, or just increasing the radius of traps, or decreasing the arming time. It could also be a "traps" set that affects Spike Traps and Caltrops both.

Merlin#1312: I'd like to find an Ancient Kridershot. I've always been a fan of Ball Lightning and would like to play the UE Slowball build. I played it a lot with a Windforce back when M6 was king.

Merlin#1312: Spike Traps. It seems like the six piece bonuses on sets now tend to increase damage based on some factor, so perhaps increased damage based on number of active Spike Traps. I can think of several ideas for set bonus. The lure bonus that Chanon Bolter gives would be neat on a set, or just increasing the radius of traps, or decreasing the arming time. It could also be a "traps" set that affects Spike Traps and Caltrops both.

Merlin#1312: Oh, I much prefer Lyndon quotes, "I miss every farmer's daughter", or "It isn't stealing if I give them wine in return." I miss Lyndon following me around, Kormac is a putz.

Merlin#1312: Mobility is key to the class, learn to step, to vault, and to position yourself in the right place on the battlefield. Also, it helps to visit and be active in the forums to keep up on the current meta and on alternative builds and gearing.

Merlin#1312: BubbaGump#1297

Merlin#1312: What is your favorite demon hunter weapon and why?

Merlin#1312: Zoltun Kulle. I like his voice in the story, and I like the fact you have to be very mobile when fighting him. I also like Cydaea, her voice is kind of alluring.