The Good Ol’ Days

World of Warcraft is old. I can see that every time I log into a different game. I was sick last week and I didn’t have the mental fortitude for TERA or Neverwinter. Leveling in those games requires some degree of attention span, since you need to dodge and aim attacks. So I played some RIFT instead. I lasted one level before even that was too much for me. Next thing I know I was creating a Blood Elf Hunter on Dath’remar.

The very first thing that struck me as I was running through the beautiful area pew-pewing Mana Wyrms and gathering research tools was that this zone has not changed since I rolled my very first Horde character back in The Burning Crusade. A wave of nostalgia washed over me as I remembered my excitement at finally having the expansion, how gorgeous the zone was, how amazing the chocobo Hawkstrider mounts looked and the friends I made in that zone (/greet Bullet).  Symbolically, this zone represents how happy I was about a fresh start both in-game and in my personal life at that time, and revisiting it brought all those feelings back.

For the first time in a long time I was happy to be playing World of Warcraft.

Reflections

There must have been something in the air last week, because a few days later the lovely Navimie wrote about World of Warcraft nostalgia and then my good friend Beaves asked me to help him create an Alliance version of Concur back on my original server. I found myself rolling another Hunter, this time a human, to sign the charter (Massive thank you to Navi and Prinnie for helping out!). I was back in Northshire on the server where my love of WoW really started back in Vanilla. However, there was no nostalgia this time…

The Human starting area is one that got a revamp during Cataclysm. There is no denying that World of Warcraft desperately needed that update; but by changing the starting zone it has, in my opinion, lost the magic that it had all those years ago. The location may have been exactly the same as when I rolled my Rogue back when I was 19, but the story is so different to what it was back then that my Human Hunter didn’t have anywhere near the same impact on me that my Blood Elf did. The thing is, I know that it will take more than nostalgia to keep me interested in my Blood Elf. Once I am out of the starting zones and levels take a little more time to gain, I will sink right back into the monotony that has me logging in less and less these days. Revamped or not, leveling characters is something that I have done a thousand times before, and the thought of getting the ding ninety times is quite a daunting one, regardless of how quickly most of them can be smashed out.

You know your nation is in trouble when a guard can’t even handle a level 2 Wolf…

Fresh Start

Perhaps that is the reason why people are leaving World of Warcraft. In the current incantation of end-game as I left it, reaching level cap is a fair amount of work, and gearing that character is still more again. If for whatever reason you decide to change class, role or play style, you are faced with a mountain of tedious, repetitive chores that you have possibly done a thousand times before all in the name of getting yourself back to that point. All MMO’s have that element, true, but with so many new titles on the market, perhaps players feel that if they’re going to start fresh, they may as well do so in a different world where everything is new again?

For me, that is certainly the case. While I am in no rush to get to end game in any of the other titles I am currently playing, I am greatly enjoying the fact that the journey to level cap is not a chore. Neverwinter offers a different combat system, various ways to level and rich lore derived from its Dungeons and Dragons roots. Every quest I accept offers something that I have never experienced before; it offers a new piece to a story that I don’t know the end of.  And yet, none of these games I have been flirting with feel like a replacement. None of them feel like home.

Could this be the new place I settle in to?

Lost

That leaves me in a gaming no-man’s land. I still have a subscription to World of Warcraft and I log in once a day to list auctions so I can continue to be my husband’s in-game sugar-mama, but I don’t really play. I have handed off all responsibility of running Concur to my officers and they have been incredibly supportive and understanding of the fact that burn out happens and sometimes we just need a break. I have had a great time playing Neverwinter, but I made the mistake of only playing with my husband, whose schedule is insane and leaves very little time for us to actually play together. TERA is great, but the going is slow when you’re playing solo and I am still working through content that I have already done before with Disconcur (I’m sensing a theme here!). RIFT is great, but the combat is very similar to World of Warcraft and I enjoy the newer action combat systems more. I even tried playing Bioshock: Infinite on the PS3 but it turns out I get Simulation Sickness. Ugh.

I can understand now why 83 people called it a day on their blogs. It is hard to write something — anything! — when you can’t even figure out what game to launch. Personally, I find myself spending more time watching television, writing for Mama Needs Mana or learning new things like how to knit and sew. However, I still really, really love MMO’s and I know that the passion I have for writing about them is still there. It is just very hard to write when I haven’t found my new home yet.

If you are a blogger who also happens to be one of the 1.3 million people that have quit World of Warcraft since February, I strongly urge you not to delete your blog. You never know when nostalgia will hit you and your blog is a great way to remind you of the good ol’ days without having to re-roll. Besides, there is no rule saying that because you started as a WoW blog that you can never change the blog’s theme! Chances are, your readers like you as a person just as much as they liked reading about your adventures in Azeroth

By the time Throne of Thunder hit, what little momentum I had going fell flat on its face. I was completely burnt out. My listlessness toward WoW spilled into my “personal” gaming life as well, I no longer felt like playing anything because it was too much effort. Since when did one of my favourite hobbies become a soul-sucking chore?

That… that was me all of April. Not only did I not want to play World of Warcraft, I didn’t really want to play anything at all. Sure, I have played TERA a few times, and tried some different titles through the 10/10 Project, but it was a chore to get started, and I think that is reflected in the overall negative impressions that each game prior to Neverwinter has left on me. Not cool.

Casual PvP equals being stuck on guard duty, apparently.

Money, Money, Money

Something else happened as well. The Curse and Mumble billing cycle came around for our guild hosting and voice comms. That money comes straight from my bank account. The bank account that gets a pathetic $50 a fortnight added to it. The bank account that is currently funding my new-found obsession for craft. For the first time in my life I was angry at my guild. I am not raiding, and neither is my husband. Why the hell are we footing the bill for their hobby?! 

I shocked myself, really. Of all the emotions that I have felt as a guild leader, anger has never been one of them. It wasn’t even justified anger — I have been paying these bills since the guild formed and have never mentioned being unhappy with this arrangement — how on earth were they meant to realise otherwise?

Then I got an email from Mumble saying that there would be maintenance right in the middle of raid night. I found myself scrambling to organise a back up server so there would be minimal down time for them. Afterwards I felt that anger boiling up again. Why should I be organising this stuff for them when it does not affect me at all? I didn’t even get a thank you! Nevermind the fact that I logged in, sorted it out and then logged off again. I was still pissed off even though I don’t know if they even used the back up server or not.

I think it’s just come to be accepted that the Guild Master should foot the bill. I created a raiding guild, therefore it is up to me to provide the tools required for that guild. Looking at the guild website, we don’t use applications anymore and it barely gets used for raid discussion. The fact is, I don’t think we need to pay however much I am paying for no ads and a few extra features that no-one is really using. Voice comms are a necessity for our style of raiding, but I am paying quite an impressive amount of money monthly to ensure that we have a stable server (The cheaper ones I have tried in the past have been absolute garbage).

What happens when the Guild Master cannot justify those costs anymore? What happens if a GM can’t afford those costs anymore?

Cough up the dough

Alternatives

Many guild website services offer a contribution style widget that allows anyone to add premium time to a guild website. I know that Enjin offers this feature, as does Wowstead. That’s easy enough, then. I shall cancel my automatic renewal and let guild members contribute as they see fit. If no-one contributes, we lose the cool features. If no-one cares that we lose the cool features, then there is no need to feel bad about not paying anymore as it probably wasn’t valued in the first place. Too easy.

Mumble is a bit trickier. I am fairly confident that no-one will be keen to downgrade to a server that only costs $2 per month but has serious stability issues and would go down every few days thanks to DDoS attacks (Lookin’ at you, Clanforge). On the flip-side, I’m not sure anyone would be happy to hear that our current server costs $11 per month to maintain. I mean, how do you even approach that subject with people? “I know you’re already paying $15 per month just to access World of Warcraft, but how would you feel about adding an extra $11 on to that so you can hear our beautiful voices during raid as well?”  Eek, I hate asking for money. I guess if no-one is happy to do that, they can always switch to Got Mumble, the free service I organised as a back up last week, but if a $2 per month server had issues, I shudder to think about the reliability of  a free server.

Reaching A Decision

Money is a deeply personal thing. I do not think anyone should ever feel bad for not wanting to spend extra money on World of Warcraft if they don’t want to – Guild Masters included. If I, as a player, am having a hard time justifying my game subscription, paying extra money on top of that is going to be the first thing to go. However, if the raiding team does start to have issues because of poor communication, the GM will hear about it. It’s important that in that case, a GM gives plenty of warning that things will be changing, so that members have time to prepare themselves.

As for me and my guild, they have proven to me over these past few months that they won’t explode without me. In fact, I have been incredibly proud of how they have all pulled together in my absence. I think I am finally comfortable to hand over the keys and let someone else drive. Then they can make all the touch choices about money and hosting…

Do you use premium services in your guild? Who foots the bill? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

What…what is this?! THE HORROR!

I feel so dirty for even having this costume in my inventory

Aside from the rather, erm, inappropriate purchase from Valkyron Outfitters (I had free EMP!), I am really glad that I have started playing TERA again. I had forgotten how much fun the combat system is, and what a sense of accomplishment I feel when I actually kill something. Thank you, Aion Online, for rekindling my love of TERA.

Now, back to finding an outfit that doesn’t make my character look like a prosti-tot…

I haven’t fallen out of love with World of Warcraft, or even guild leadership. I have fallen out of love with raiding and everything it entails.

My last ever progression kill as a raid leader.

Sad Realisations

When I realised this, it dawned on me that I would have to make a tough decision about my raid team. I hadn’t put up the event for this week on the calendar, and instead of rushing to build hype and get people signing up, I did nothing. No event, no guild message of the day, nothing. A grand total of three people noticed and questioned what was happening with it. I knew right then and there that it was over for me; why continue to do something that I am not enjoying when my team is so apathetic?

I jumped on the forums and typed up my farewell message.

Change of Command

I felt a little guilty about resigning, as I know there are a few players who are keen to raid, but I had an idea. Just because I step down doesn’t mean that the group has to die! In my farewell post I offered everyone in the guild a chance to step forward and take over where I left off — I even offered to come along to a few runs and serve as back up leader should they get stuck on something. I am not prepared to put the work in when I don’t enjoy raiding, but perhaps someone else might.

No-one has accepted that offer, and so it looks like Relaxed Raids will die along with my raiding career. Strangely, I do not feel bad that my decision has killed off the group. Even as a Guild Master, I don’t feel bad about it. I mean, I can’t force someone to run the group! If the team really enjoyed themselves and wanted it to continue, someone would have stepped up. I know leading is not everyone’s cup of tea, but you never know unless you have a go and RR was pretty much the perfect group to learn with. It’s also not fair or realistic to expect me to continue leading when I’m not getting any enjoyment out of it.

***

As always, I have learned some valuable lessons from this. Had I allocated a second in charge, perhaps the pressure wouldn’t have been so much on me and replacing myself would have been a natural transition. It was silly of me to not do that. I have also learned that just because I am guild master doesn’t mean I have to do something I do not enjoy simply so everyone else can keep having fun. The simple fact is that our guild does not have the support for two runs. I need to remember that my guild mates are big kids now and that they are more than capable of taking charge of what they do in their play time, just like I am doing with mine. They don’t need Mama Neri holding their hand and sacrificing her own fun so they can have theirs.

It feels AMAZING having my freedom back!

Did someone say, “Vacation”?!

We Need Back Up!

I am by no means ready to throw in the towel entirely on World of Warcraft, so I don’t want to hand over Guild Master to some else. Selfish? Probably, but I really can’t think of anyone who would want to bear the burden of Guild Master while I step back and have a breather. Instead, I have delegated and expanded our officer ranks. The main raid finally has a reliable raid leader, the raid consumables are being covered by our new “Masterchef” and my remaining officer has been running a transmog competition to try and get people involved. So far so good – raids are still happening (Except for Relaxed Raids, more on that later) and entries have started to trickle in for the competition.

It’s not perfect though, not by a long shot. First off, I need a back up leader for Relaxed Raids. I was sick on Monday and accidentally slept in past raid start time. I logged in 15 minutes late to find that we barely had 5 people on who were interested in raiding. FIVE PEOPLE! I had been on holidays and then ill — it feels like without me there to remind people constantly that an event is happening, they just forget? I think my competition officer is also having the same issue. People aren’t reading Facebook, forums or the GMotD so they are just blissfully unaware of what cool things we’re trying to do for them.

That’s the second glaring issue I see: we desperately need a Recruitment Officer. Things are starting to get pretty quiet and I can see we’re going to have issues very soon if we don’t get some fresh blood filling out the ranks. I had a brief crack at it before I went away, but I dropped the ball and could have done a LOT more than just updating the website and sending out a tweet. Once again, it’s that burn out thing. It’s hard for people to whisper me for an invite if I’m not even online!

One of the many alts I feel guilty about leveling when I should be working on my mains.

The Perfect Balance

In the end, I feel terrible that I have neglected this stuff for as long as I have. I still very much love the people in my guild, and indeed the World of Warcraft community as a whole. I have had nothing but kindness shown to me lately – from a random level 90 rogue giving my scrub shaman epic pants in Valley of the Four Winds, to commentators on Youtube thanking me for my Diary of a Noob Raid Leader, telling me how much it has helped their guild progress, and then of course there is the amazing Twitter and blogging community as a whole. You guys are like crack, I can’t quit you!  I do need to step back though, and stop trying to do everything. Feeling like I *have* to log in is just sucking the fun out of it all I think.

Hmm, long rambling short – I am burnt out and yet I’m still worried about the state of my guild and if I will make the right decisions by adding to my officer ranks. Maybe I’m not actually burnt out on World of Warcraft at all, but rather, I am burnt out on leadership and feeling like I “should” be doing x and y instead of just doing whatever I want. Ugh, why didn’t I address this sooner?

I am definitely excited for Project 10/10.

I think people may have forgotten that not all quests offer rewards purely for your class or spec. It doesn’t surprise me at all that sometimes there is only an intellect choice – rarely during Cataclysm or any previous expansion was there, say, two mail items to choose from out of the possible four quest reward options. It’s usually cloth, leather, mail, plate or maybe a random weapon or trinket instead. Now, I could be wrong here and this could just be the Cold and Flu tablets talking, but doesn’t that mean there is only a 50% chance for a mail piece I can use to come up anyhow? Even less if the hidden rewards have weapons or trinkets thrown in? I wonder if they have perhaps changed how quest rewards work completely and quests will now only reward loot that you can use? I’m sure the information is out there somewhere, but my brain hurts enough already.

In other news, I helped kill a Warlock today. It felt good! Bastard killed Disconcur so I hunted him down and kept him busy until Disco could get back and finish him off. That’s what you get for killing us while we were fighting a rare, you jerk!

It looks like leveling with Disconcur, a class and race change,  as well as focusing on something new (He’s tricked me into PvPing with him) has been enough to break the burn out I have been feeling. Or it’s the drugs. It could be that, too.

I think I might have a nap now.

In case you missed it on Twitter or Facebook last week, here is the latest episode of Diary of a Noob Raid Leader for your enjoyment.

It’s not that I’ve never braved Trade Chat to fill those last few slots in a raid. Over the years we have done it countless times and on rare occasions those pick up members are so perfect that they’ve even ended up joining our guild. But it’s those other puggers that have put a sour taste in my mouth. You know the ones I mean; the rude, nasty, drunk, obstructive, AFK, elitist, sexist, racist, derogatory and downright terrible players whose parasitic presence ruin the night for everyone.

My vision for the Relaxed Raid is to create an environment where players who are new to raiding can learn the ropes in a safe environment, those who haven’t otherwise had a chance to prove themselves can show what they are made of, and us more experienced raiders can unwind and kill some bosses without the pressures that come with a more progression minded group. I worry that by taking a chance with pick up members I will jeapordise all of that, and turn something which is supposed to be a safe, relaxing event into the kind of toxic environment I am trying to protect them from.

Do. Not. Want.

No nerd rage was acquired in the killing of this boss.

While I have been lucky so far and have been able to call on my network to fill those last few spots, that network is shrinking as people move on from the game or start raiding again with their own guilds. When I inevitably run out of options, what will I do then?  Will I cancel the event? What then happens to my newbies, subs and experienced raiders alike? They all miss out and my safe, relaxing environment is replaced with…nothing.

I feel like I am in a tough position right now. I am hesitant to recruit in case I end up with too many players and people start missing out. I certainly don’t want to risk the ever present toxic pug that lurk on my server, but I don’t want to cancel events either. I have been a guild master long enough to know that cancelling events consistently is the fast track to a dead guild. The idea of standing around in Trade fishing for players who may not even exist has no appeal to me whatsoever, but I suppose it is something I agreed to when I took the job.

Perhaps with 5.2 launching tomorrow Real ID fillers from different servers will become an option again. With a little more planning, perhaps I could even turn to our realm forums a few days in advance and make it very clear what kind of players will be happy running with us and what kinds of players would be better waiting for a different group more suited to their….progressed tastes to come along. We just have such a terrible issue with attendance at the moment that I could have 13 people signed up and only have 8 show up, which makes it very hard to plan for.

Hmm. Perhaps recruitment isn’t such a bad idea after all.

Ruby Red Ret Set

Helm: Hidden
Shoulders: White Tiger Pauldrons
Cloak: Royal Cloak of Arathi Kings
Chest: Warlord’s Iron Breastplate
Shirt: Dark Silk Shirt
Gloves: Grasps of Panic
Waist: Belt of the Lonely Noble
Legs: Warlord’s Iron-Legplates
Boots: Bladeshatter Treads

I am not 100% happy with this transmog set just yet, but I am yet to find boots that match my gloves and shoulders. I was also toying with switching to Boulderfist Legplates, but I feel that they would be too black to really work. For added effect, I swung by the hairdresser on the way over to Hellfire for a bit of a dye job, and while it looks fantastic with this set, I really prefer Lylutaya’s old hairstyle. Ah well, the price we pay for fashion, eh?

Nice views, pretty threads.

The Green Machine:
Helm: Hidden
Shoulders: Zabra’s Shoulderpads of Conquest
Cloak: Hidden
Chest: Robes of Hoarse Breaths
Hands: Vicious Gladiator’s Mooncloth Gloves
Waist: Mistyreed Belt
Boots: Vicious Gladiator’s Treads of Meditation
Stave: Jinyu Meditation Staff

With the exception of the belt, I am really happy with this outfit. I feel that the staff and the robes go together really well, and of course, an appropriate amount of flesh is on display by my sultry sorceress.

“Rain? Ugh. Not the hair!”

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