There's all sorts of ways players intentionally inhibit themselves, and I'd like to touch on a few that have bugged me recently.
Character control
We've been running Ulduar 10 hard modes in an effort to acquire a 310% mount before Cataclysm is released. A few members of the guild are very very close to getting Glory of the Ulduar Raider finished
up. I, myself, am only lacking one achievement, which we just attempted for the first time last night and got three solid attempts in - making it to phase two of Yogg'Saron +1.
Doing these hard modes makes me realize a few things. There is NO WAY a keyboard turner can complete some of these achievements. You just can't...
Case in point, we have a few players in our guild who actually DO keyboard turn. (I find this to be more prevalent on PVE servers where you can lazily run around with out having to look for incoming attacks). And we struggled for three nights on Firefighter. One of our tanks happens to keyboard turn. So when shock blast is about to go off, he turns, starts to run and promptly drops dead. And that same player has to execute a left turn, forward run, right turn just to dodge cold flame on Marrowgar.
/facepalm. Ok, fine I guess I won't get to try out my new pve fury dps spec. Back to tanking...
And another quick pet peeve... if you have to run from something, RUN. Don't backpedal, don't keyboard turn yourself around - use the mouse to turn and then strafe (you can still move at full speed doing this) or just quickly face the opposite way and run your happy ass out of the bad stuff.
Socially
This is a multiplayer game at its core. Sure, you CAN do most things in the game solo, but for all of the good stuff (raids, pvp, dungeons) you will need to interact with people. The best way to do this is find a guild.
But you don't want to join a guild because you're not good enough? How do you expect to improve on your gameplay? It doesn't just happen naturally
For example, you learn very very quickly not to use Hand of Reckoning in a group setting if you're not the tank. A new player would assume that this spell does damage and it's OK to use in your rotation. And that new player would never change his mind if he were not exposed to a group environment where you learn how to properly apply your class skills.
Beyond that, you make new friends and acquaintances. Developing your social skills are good, albeit they're internet social skills...
Having friends in the game can really help motivate you, too. I probably wouldn't have finished out my nether drake on my warrior (third nether drake grind now) were it not for a friend wanting to do it and joining up with him. And we're even working on getting random reputations built up - things I never though I'd do. Because frankly... it sucks. Rep grinds just are NOT fun. However, having a friend there to idly chat with and crack jokes really doesn't make it so bad.
Mentally
"I've seen everything there is to see in the game because I'm a hard core raider and there's nothing left for me here." Or perhaps, "I've played this game since launch - it sucks. Xyz new game will kill warcraft." Or even "This will be my last blog post for a while, I've just lost interest in playing the game."
BULL SHIT.
I hate that sort of overly dramatic whiny nonsense. Get over yourself. There's nothing left for you in game? That's fine, to each his own. But I don't care to read about how bad you think the expansion will be and how your flavor of the month class is going to be nerfed and you can't figure out what the next class of the month will be.
SHOW SOME ORIGINAL THOUGHT. There's tons of stuff to do in the game. Level an alt, try out the other faction, finish leveling out your trade skills, play at the auction house, pick an achievement and try to get it.
I'm tired of reading about people who are stuck in the pre-expansion lull and whine about it. This is the first time where end game as been so readily available to the average player. Have you conquered all of the raids and dungeons in the game to date? If not, find a group and set to it.
Say you have actually conquered everything in game as far as raid / dungeon content goes. That's fine too. Pick a raid achievement and get it done. You'll get a spiffy reward. And you may even have fun doing so.
Don't get yourself stuck in a rut where you focus on the negative.
So the moral of the story is: Nobody likes a negative nancy, level 72 death knights, or gnomes.
For example, you learn very very quickly not to use Hand of Reckoning in a group setting if you're not the tank. A new player would assume that this spell does damage and it's OK to use in your rotation. And that new player would never change his mind if he were not exposed to a group environment where you learn how to properly apply your class skills.
ReplyDeleteYeah, you corrected me of that really early. I will use it solo when I'm separating out various monsters out in the field, or when the tank is swamped and we need some trash peeled off a squishy healer, but yeah. Do you still see that out there?
So the moral of the story is: Nobody likes a negative nancy, level 72 death knights, or gnomes.
I'm going to find out about the level 58 DKs pretty soon, so we'll see if it's the 72s or the 58s that are the issue.
I still want to be able to bap gnomes if they're on my faction. At least knock some sense into them.
Oh, one thing I enjoyed tonight was seeing how the "other half" lived in Hillsbrad. I'd only been in Southshore to pick up a flight point, so I never got the time to see how open the place is. I also had to chuckle, because there were several people from the same guild strategically placed throughout the town to ambush any Horde gankers.
I like level 72 death knights much *much* better than I like level 58 death knight tanks! :)
ReplyDeleteAwesome insight... I completely agree with you on all of these points, many of which I have first hand experience with.
ReplyDeleteI think another big handicap that goes along with all of these is close-mindedness. Too many players either think they know more than they actually do, or get offended when someone calls them out. I understand some people are rude about it and that it is hard to maturely process their commentary, but even the polite advice gets brushed aside by many players. I knew a hunter like this, who refused to feign death because she 'did not believe in it'... even after the healer in the group (who was also a guildie) pointed out how this then shifts the burden to the healer, as she would now have to heal her through the additional beating.
Every pre-expansion doldrums post I see reminds me that Q's guild is still grinding toward an Arthas kill. Considering the influx of new players into the guild, we aren't the only ones out there, either.
ReplyDeleteTuesdays are still murder to get on A-52. If so many people were leaving, you'd think that the server traffic would slow down a bit.
Good points, all! Any time I have felt bored with the game I just take a short break and then focus on something else (and more importantly, I don't usually write about it). The game is so vast, there is always SOMETHING to do, and if there isn't, go play something else. No harm, no foul, no whining!
ReplyDelete