Guest Post: Why Do You Play WoW?

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Matticus’ Note: I posted a small, but brief plea yesterday for help with my blog. Leiandra has helped me answer my plea. My exams conclude on the 15th of December, therefore my personal posts will be drastically reduced while I’m busy raiding cramming for my finals. But I don’t want to leave my readers hanging. I’m looking for some guest posters to help me for the next week or so. If you have your own WoW blog, chances are I’ve read it or ran into it. This is a great opportunity for you to expand your viewership and receive exposure. Your posts (if I like them) will appear here and on Curse. Simply drop me an email (look right) and we can work something out. I spend 2 – 4 hours a day blogging and I cannot sustain that kind of effort for the time being. Anyways, here’s Leiandra!

With Matticus being busy with finals, I volunteered to help him out with a post or two so that he could hopefully pass his classes :). Just a few, quick comment about me for those that don’t read my blog: My mage’s name is Leiandra, and I am a Guild Master for a raiding guild on the Bronzebeard – US server. I’ve been in guild leadership since I first starting playing MMO’s (only with the release of EQ2), and have been playing Wow for about 2.5 years now. I’ve been the GM of Primogeniture for about 2 months now, but have been part of the final decision making process for much, much longer.

The latest inspiration for this post comes from a recent person that I have been recruiting. Most of the Bronzebeard raiding guilds tend to start around 5 or 6pm server time. Our raid times start at 8:30, so we get a lot of people that want to join because of work shifts or just general night owls (vampires as one of my Raid Leaders calls them). This recent recruit registered for an account on our forums, but never filled out an app. He then contacted me in game to find our more about our guild. His work schedule had changed and he wouldn’t be able to raid with his current guild, hence the conversation he had with me. He sounded like he was interested, but told me he had to think about it. A few days later, he told me that he just wasn’t being fair to us, because he would only raid with us until his work schedule changed. I thanked him for his honesty, and we put each other on our friends’ lists in case we ever needed anything.

A few nights back, I needed another member for a 5-man run. He was online, and I asked him if he wanted to come. After a fairly successful run in which he did a great job, I was curious if he still maintained his loyalty to his guild. He told me that it was really only one raid leader that he was still loyal to, and that person was actually okay with him leaving. He filled out an application on our forums, and then again, decided that he wanted to stay with his guild.

Some people might consider this frequent changing of one’s mind quite annoying, but I completely understood. Sometimes people move on from the game. Sometimes people change guilds. The only thing that’s constant is that each guild will change. I think the successful guilds generally roll with those punches, adapt, and move on. But when is it right for you, the individual player, to move on?

To answer that question, it takes some deep introspection on the part of each individual. Questions like “Why do I play WoW?” should be addressed. What is most important to you? Is it important to be with friends? Is progression your big thing? Are you just in a guild that nobody is online when you are? Sometimes there’s drama or fights… that can happen to. Do you just want to play solo for awhile? How much are you going to regret leaving your guild, if at all?

When I first starting playing Wow, I did so to play with my best friend and his brother. The three of us started a guild because we were tired of random guild invites. The guild grew as RL friends and relatives joined us or transferred servers. We were never huge, but at our height, right before the expansion, we were getting in to Zul’Gurub. A lot of us also PUG’ed and participated in other guild raids in almost all of the dungeons (I think Naxx was the only one not on our lists). With the expansion, and me being a night owl, a few of us decided that we’d break off into a more structured raiding guild and have more than just one guild run per week. It was a difficult decision to leave my guild of friends. I knew a few of them would come with me, and hoped others would follow. We had all been together for so long that I knew I’d still talk to them often, and hopefully group with them regularly as well. Well, the grouping thing hasn’t happened as much as I had originally planned, but I still talk to most of them nightly. My priorities, at the time of our new guild, were based around progression and seeing new content. I have a whole list of new, online friends, and I enjoy being in the guild I am.

My priorities are aligned with where my toons are and the guild they are in. Sure, there are ups and downs. It’s not like I always get my way, even as GM, but I’m happy where I’m at. Are you? Is it time to move on? Is there something better on the horizon, but maybe you’re just too scared to make the change? Or are you exactly where you want to be with the people you want to be there with? I hope most of you can answer “yes” to that last question. It’s just a game. Have fun. Be happy.

So did you like what you read? Then head on over to Leiandra’s blog. While you’re there, don’t forget to subscribe to Leiandra’s RSS.

Leaving? But You Just Got Here!

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I have often wondered what drives people to do the things that they do. At about 10 PM, I saw someone advertise that they were looking for a healer to help fill out Kara. Nightbane and above were the only bosses left. I opted to join. I had nothing really going on and I was tired of reading. I brought in Saphfira to collect some badges along the way. We wiped three times against Nightbane and then cleared to Curator taking him down in the process.

Here’s where things got eyebrow raising.

One of the mages had to leave.
Then a druid just left the group and hearthed.
Subsequently, we lost a Priest due to a family emergency.
A rogue had to raid in 20 minutes.

WHAT THE HELL!?

I think we did pretty well for the most part. We wiped on Nightbane, people stayed. We killed Curator, people left. When you join a raid, there’s a level of expectancy that is involved. It’s expected that your next 2 or so hours will be free from any other activities or interruptions. Your Guild expects that. Pickup players expect that. What the heck’s the point of joining a Karazhan raid when you have to raid 30 minutes later? These people are on my blacklist and I’m sure they looked bad to everyone else. At least we cleared Prince. Then I checked the clock and it was 130 AM. I fell asleep.

But I didn’t leave my group hanging. I told them beforehand that I could guarantee awakeness until 130 AM. After that, all bets were off. I’m not as young as I used to be. I can’t stay up until 4 AM anymore.

Exam on Thursday and on Saturday. Reduced blogload this week. WTB guest posters.

5 Gaming Lessons from Matticus

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I got tagged. I’ve never really done one of these before, but I have read about them. How nice of GMW to conveniently provide me with an outlet on a slow day. I’ve been asked to come up with 5 lessons that gaming has taught us.

Without further adieu and in no particular order:

  • Game reviewers can no longer be trusted
  • A little bit of post game analysis goes a long way
  • You are represented by your actions
  • Idiots come in all ages
  • School and WoW don’t mix

Just some various notes for the upcoming math. December is now upon us. It’s the best time of year with food, presents, drinking, etc. It’s also the worst time of the year with exams. As such, I will be posting at a much reduced rate (2-3 a week).

Another layout’s on the way. Should be up before New Years. I was reading up on some design principles and philosophies. Boy I built this place incorrectly.

Curse website looks great! I wish we could move some of the widgets around and that the stupid preview function in the blog would work. That would make my life so much easier when I write there. Good grief.

Single? Lonely? Fear Not! WoW Online Matchmaking a Reality!

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There’s a whole new spin on online dating websites. If you haven’t heard about it already, Datecraft.com is a service that aims to pair up people from around the world with each other. A colleague of mine over at Curse has published an interview with Datecraft.com founder, John. Check out this brief excerpt:

TDQ: Where did the idea come from?

Datecraft: In a nutshell, the idea came from a number of different personal experiences, and a little bit of entrepreneurial spirit.

I first got into MMO’s a couple of years back. In the fall of 2001, I was a college freshman trying to figure out how to spend my time between classes, DAoC (which launched October 10th), Xbox (Nov 15th), GameCube (Nov 18th), and a number of other distractions. It was DAoC that grabbed my attention, because it was unlike anything I had played before (and was the first game I was willing to pay a monthly subscription on!). My Uncle’s sister was an actual level/environ designer for Mythic, which made it all the more attractive. I was hooked and MMORPG’s became a steady favorite time-bandit for me. But, I began to wonder “who are these people I’m playing with?” Was that Midgard Dwarf really a short stubby 40-something year old in his mom’s basement? Or was it a really attractive young female that had some extra time on her hands? In any case, my curiosity led me to begin thinking about ways in which I would be able to meet, or at least “see”, my fellow guildmates (and the random PUG groups) on or offline. And, to be quite honest, the Elf from Hibernia, was she dateable?

Fast forward 3 or 4 years to November 24th, 2004. World of Warcraft hits the shelves and MMORPG fans rejoiced! My friend got me to sign up after he let me create a t00n on his account and that was it. I was addicted. Over time, I began hearing real life stories of people who had met in game, contacted each other in real life, met each other, dated, and then married! It was an amazing phenomenon, and one that I partly intrigued by and at the same time repulsed. But, it sure was fascinating. Graduating from college, I took my first job in what I would call the “bat cave”. I was managing Cisco routers for an collocation and ISP working graveyard shifts, and what’s so funny is that even during the day we kept the lights out. What was so interesting is that out of the 8 or 9 of my fellow cave-dwellers 7 of them were married, and of those 7, 6 of them had gotten married to people they met online (2 mail-order brides from Russia, 1 online from Thailand, and 3 stateside). Online dating was real. And more than that, it appeared to be working, as all of them “seemed” pretty satisfied with their marriages!

To be honest, I figured something like this would happen eventually. It was only a matter of time before someone was ballsy enough to try it out. I’m tempted to make an account and explore the interface (I swear, it’s more out of curiosity then anything else). I’m hoping it’s an environment that’s akin to Facebook. But there’s another service out there coming out in the 1st quarter of 2008 specifically for WoW Players that resembles Facebook that GMW wrote about a while back (Read: Rupture.)

Speaking about Curse, they just launched a new design of their entire website. My thoughts about it will come after tonight.

WoW Struggles: Maintaining Reputation

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Source: sxc.huI must apologize about my lack of a post for today. I had a term paper due, and like many WoW students, I have horrible time management skills. But that’s another topic I hope to address entirely.

Anyways, onto business!

First, I want to extend Gwaendar a hearty shoutout. He has honored me with a spot on his blog roll which I will reciprocate in kind. One Among Many has also done the same. I thank them both for their links. I believe it’s important to recognize writers who link to you. Any of you aspiring writers would do well to keep that in mind.

Today, I plan to start an ongoing series of blog posts about our struggles in WoW. I guess you could call it my catch all on days when I have no material!

In addition to WoW Blogs, I also read non-WoW blogs to help improve my writing and style. Lorelle’s Blog Struggles series has inspired me here, as you can see.

An Epic Tale

I’ve been lucky throughout my entire WoW raiding career. I cannot say there was an incident where my instance raid ID or my loot had been stolen and ninja’d. Unfortunately, others have not been so lucky. Big Bear Butt had his raid instance partially taken.

Kirk wrote an excellent reaction to the situation that I think everyone should check out.

In a game like World of Warcraft where players need to interact with others, social reputation is the currency. How players view you could either open doors or close them.

A situation like this one where a player has done something unfair will cause other players to think badly of them. The Guild in question will be labeled as an organization where none of it’s members can be trusted until the culprit is found.

I know what you’re thinking.

One Question

Who cares what they think? So what if I ninja loot and commit other acts? I pay $15 a month to play this game how I see fit and I don’t care what other people think of me.

One Answer

Because if you do that on a consistent basis, no one is going to want to deal with you. Take a look at the following list and possible penalties.

  • No fun in groups because you can’t get any
  • Zero raiding opportunities
  • Crafters won’t want your business
  • Online abuse
  • …Need I say more?

He Was a Warlock

Let me cite an example. A year ago when I transferred to Ner’Zuhl (gosh has it been that long already?), I heard stories of a Warlock named Evilana. Apparently he was a bad player and had a bad reputation. To get associated with him meant serious bad news. I never knew precisely what the reasoning was behind it, but I did not want to deal with a player who sounded that bad. In fact, he was a target of many flamers on the WoW Forums. I was new to the server at the time and like a kid entering high school for the first time, just wanted to fit in. I didn’t actively participate in any e-floggings but I stayed distant.

A while later, I had gotten word that he either transferred off the server or ebayed his character (or both).

That was the last time I ever heard about him again.

The Lesson

Do not underestimate the power of a united social force. They have a mind of their own. Think of it as the online version of the mob mentality. They can spread the word about a player’s dominance and make him seem like a god. Or they can shred his reputation entirely like he is a pile of dirt. The popularity of a person depends entirely on what other people think of them. You can think of certain world leaders as an example. Popular opinion can spread like a wildfire and ruin WoW careers.

The End?

So what’s going to happen with BBB? I can only imagine. I suspect if they ever find the person involved, he’s only going to get a slap on the wrist and a stern talking to. But I plan to observe any developments with great interest.