Poll: MMORPG Community: The Myth

[Krythe]

Ask yourself; why does one play a MMORPG?​

The literally days of tedious grind for purple gear that's gonna become obsolete in a month anyways? Spending hours trying to throw a raid party together, only for half the raid to leave and eat dinner five people short? Training your character for PvP more adamantly than you study for actual tests, only to lose to someone spamming key-bindings?

Didn't think so.

The single greatest selling point of MMORPGs is the community - the ideology that you'll be part of a "team" with real people. Most true gamers of the elder generation became as such because they were socially inept - yet constantly heard these horribly sappy power-of-friendship speeches every time we played an RPG. MMORPGs were intended to bring that elusive quality to life. That's their main asset.

However, they overlooked the fact that most people are just as insipid and arrogant online as they are in person.
The ONLY time a stranger will talk to you is to ask for money. Your guild picked you up because they needed heals/tanks/fill-the-ranks and will eventually discard you if you let your gear score drop too low. Everyone insults you for not playing your classes "right" even if theirs are totally different. The only time anyone online will treat you with kindness or respect is if you know each other IRL - which completely belies the point of playing online in the first place.

There is no community. They've created no friendship. They've created the playground at kindergarten all over again - complete with the callousness, illiteracy, and poor personal hygiene.

 

[ThaBenMan]

Well, I just started playing WoW recently (you posted in my thread about it, and so now I'll post in yours ), so this very well may change with time, but I've had a very positive experience with it so far.

I have been mostly playing with my sister and bro-in-law, so we get along great. But there was one time where we invited a random guy into our party that seemed to be on the same quest we were, and he was very nice and helpful. And I haven't come across any belligerent strangers yet.

But on the other hand, I have witnessed some unpleasantness that my sister and bro-in-law have had to deal with. They loathe pugs, and have even had nasty arguments with their own Guild-mates. So I can understand where you're coming from.

 

[Snarky Username]

I'm pretty sure that's just how humanity is. They've depicted it pretty accurately, in my opinion.

 

[Altorin]

there isn't a decent metacommunity, but there are lots of microcommunities. For instance, there are a couple of guys I've been playing wow with for YEARS who are in completely different countries. We have our own customs within the microcommunity, our own injokes, own catch phrases.

 

[Anah'ya]

Global Chat = bad
Your circle of gaming compatriots = good

It's just like enduring in a crowded *shudder* bar/pub. Or school. Really. There's parallels to be drawn, because at the end of the day it's all about human interaction. Sans the threat of getting your face punched in thanks to anonymity...

This Taffer plays MMOs only for the company. Well. That and the RP. Send me off grinding and raiding and I'll be canceling my sub in no time, mark my words. Though give me a tight knit group of like minded folk (which I'm more likely to find in an MMO than by stumbling into a bar) and I'll be complacent enough.

 

[snow]

I donno, in the one MMO I was in, I was in one of the main guilds of the server (Those ones that did raids almost everyday and was very competitive with other guilds in being the first to complete a new dungeon when it came out,) and stuck there for quite a long time after I stopped raiding or doing any real contributing, they liked me there. I in return liked being there, we all had fun!

I was even pretty well known on that server as well. The only people that were really asshats were newcomers that didn't realize just how bonded we were as a server when they went on raging trolling sprees.

I guess you can say I found heaven amongst MMO servers... xD!

 

[Krythe]

Are the trolls gonna be drawn to The Old Republic I wonder - will that be the crucible of WoW?
From this perspective it looks like that may be the salvation of WoW rather than its downfall, if it only attracts the trolls.

On the other hand blizzard's really abused their fanbase with illogical patches, hidieous balancing, and blatant financial extortion IRL (Changing your character's name requires one use of the ctrl + H command and they charge you 10 USD for the service.)

Any WoW-vets here gonna give up the game once SW:ToR comes out?

I haven't used my 80s in a while, meaning that now I literally can't use them due to gear inflation. So I well may. How about all you?

 

[Flying-Emu]

There are dipshits who want to piss you off everywhere you go. Stop whining; get out there and be patient enough to find a collection of players who aren't total d-bags and just play with them.

What is with people expecting everything to be handed to them on a silver platter recently, damn?

Are the trolls gonna be drawn to The Old Republic I wonder - will that be the crucible of WoW?
From this perspective it looks like that may be the salvation of WoW rather than its downfall, if it only attracts the trolls.

On the other hand blizzard's really abused their fanbase with illogical patches, hidieous balancing, and blatant financial extortion IRL (Changing your character's name requires one use of the ctrl + H command and they charge you 10 USD for the service.)

Any WoW-vets here gonna give up the game once SW:ToR comes out?

I haven't used my 80s in a while, meaning that now I literally can't use them due to gear inflation. So I well may. How about all you?

I reserve judgement until I see reviews of ToR, because frankly, the game becomes less appealing with each piece of information they release.

 

[Jedoro]

I don't know where you played, but it is possible to find civilized people who are cool in groups, and who will actually pay to transfer servers and continue playing with you.

 

[Vilcus]

Everyone I've met on WoW has either been incredibly nice, or a spambot. The only people I've met who were "assholes" were the ones who keep sweating at eachother in chat... and even then it's always the same two people. I played on about five different servers (two PvP, and three normal), and all of them had a decent community. I stopped playing a while ago, and I'm waiting to get more money so I can upgrade my computer and play on a setting above absolute minimum. I did meet my guild master once by accident at Tastes of Saskatchewan, it was weird, and he was a nice guy.

Also, every guild I have joined has a raiding group that gets together and raids every so often. However, I was not usually invited to raid, I was invited because I would group with some of their members, and they noticed I wasn't in a guild. The one time I did raid with a guild was quite some time ago, and I never got yelled at for not playing my class right. On the contrary, I was complimented on my skills, even though I was actually terrible in my opinion (mainly because my computer starts killing itself when I raid).

I don't know, maybe you got unlucky or something, or maybe there are more assholes than I've seen, but I personally like the community on my servers. Although I wouldn't go so far as to say that I've made any real friends, just people who I can chat with wheneve I play.

 

[Stollos]

there isn't a decent metacommunity, but there are lots of microcommunities.

This. Times one thousand. As a whole, most of the people were dickheads. But when you found your niche/clique, it was all that much more enjoyable.

I used to play WoW, and when crunch time came and I re-evaluated my current position in life, the only reason I was submitting to the endless grind and time sink of raiding endgame was for my guild. My computer was increasingly more frustrating to maintain to a decent standard, I would have rather been going out on weekend nights, and generally I felt isolated from my goals in reality because I was so focussed on chasing these goals in virtuality (is that even a word?), and all for what? Virtual achievment? I would rather have actual achievment.

The only thing holding me back was the guild. The friends I had made. The laughs that were had. The not wanting to bail on them and leave them a man short. And really, it wasn't them holding me back at all: it was me holding myself back. I had attached myself to the community.

Despite this, I quit anyway. Something which I am thankful for. I still keep in touch with the community though. I am a welcome member of the guild forums. The closer friends I even added on facebook, making the random quip here and there or just saying 'hey' over chat.

The longer you play, the further you progress, the greater the friendships you make, the harder it is to quit later. GET OUT WHILE YOU CAN. Haha, but seriously, for some people, that kind of thing is great. For me, I had just had enough and it was time for me to get out. Not worth the effort.

 

[Mymla]

I've played WoW a whole bunch, and I plan to start again when Cataclysm comes out. In my opinion, there are two reasons why people play the game, character progression (lulz omg epixx), and because they have friends there.

See, those of us who don't have any real life friends have to rely on expensive chat programs like World of Warcraft to get our social fix.

Also, it might just be me, but the gameplay really isn't that bad. Battlegrounds are pretty entertaining if you don't take them too seriously. And the game world is pretty enough to justify running around sightseeing in.

 

[Tanis]

Humans are naturally jerks, what did you expect?

 

[Lt. Dragunov]

I play em to help pass time, when I'm not horeing on ps3 I'm on an mmorpg grinding away. For some reason i kindda like grinding

 

[Erana]

You must be playing the wrong MMO, 'cause with my first experience, it seemed like every time I went to town, everyone'd bust into dance, or I'd have hours-long conversations with strangers 40 levels higher than me, or anything like that. I used to party with level 70 people at level 25 'cause we were friends. I didn't get any experience, though 'cause there was anti-powerleveling what-nots.

 

[asteroth21nox]

You know, if mmorpgs where more like nox they would take off. Drop the whole silly questing shit that wont happen in a community of gamers anyway and just play games like capture the flag, verses, and survival where they have to work together or suck...really hard. Give everybody all sorts of abilities but limit actual use to maybe ten out of forty, and you would see strategy, team work, and all sorts of on line community fun. Nothing like tricking somebody into a well laid trap or out smarting a group of pretentious wizards or sneaking past the enemy lines.

OR

Just make it so the only reason people work together is so they can get quest item number 290230409839390384.....whooohooo.....fun. Oh, and then make it not worth the ridiculous amount of trouble of organizing a team, keeping together,fighting outrageously difficult enemies,or being rewarded with nickels and dimes compared to the hours slaving away at doing not fun tasks.

 

[Willsor]

Playing an MMO with real life friends is very fun, and it means you don't have to talk to the retard monkey fest that is global chat. Me and my mates got into Age of Conan pretty much at the same time, and while getting to level 80 was a grind, it was fun with questing together, and just the general banter.

Trust me, if you can get some of your rl friends together on an xfire voice chat while you all play the same game it will make your MMO experience much more exciting.
There is also an element of competition when you play with your friends, as presumably they all play nearly the same amount of the game as you, so it can kinda be a race to see who can get to max level first, or who can get full epic gear first, or whatever..