He whispered the Raid Leader. A moment later, an invite popped. He was in.

Determined, Kaelen spent his afternoon in a frantic hunt for "bloated" stats. He replaced a perfectly optimized Blue trinket—one that gave him much-needed Hit Rating—with a high-level Epic that had stats he didn't even use. His DPS would actually drop, but the number in the little box climbed.

Kaelen opened his character pane. There, in the corner, a small box from the newly installed hovered like an impartial judge. 4,950. He was fifty points short of "existence."

The irony wasn't lost on Kaelen. As they stood before Lord Marrowgar, he realized that the addon had turned his friends into spreadsheets. Yet, when the boss fell and a high-level piece of plate armor dropped, Kaelen didn't just see a breastplate with better stats. He saw a ticket to a 5.5k GS group.

He clicked 'Need,' the dice rolled, and as the item hit his inventory, the little box flashed a celebratory gold. He had survived the gatekeeping of 3.3.5, one point at a time.

Inside the spire, the tension was high. The addon was everywhere. If a player died, the first thing people checked wasn't the combat log, but their Gearscore. "How did he die? He’s 5.5k!"

In the center of the Runeweaver Square stood Kaelen, a Paladin whose armor shone with the polish of Tier 9 heroics. He felt ready. He had faced the Trial of the Crusader; he had stared down Onyxia. But as he looked at the General Chat, he realized the rules of engagement in Azeroth had changed forever.