Mark WallaceEven when every game mechanic is designed against it, there are still occasions when gamers would rather be social. Mark Wallace narrates one of these occasions, a personal experience from World of Warcraft.
Issue 28: Casual Friday - One Night In Arathi
- Thread starter The Escapist Staff
- Start date
Original Comment by: Seasought
I was hoping for something more unique than this seeing it all the time on the various servers I've played on. However, for those uninitiated with the game as players I suppose the article holds some value.
I was hoping for something more unique than this seeing it all the time on the various servers I've played on. However, for those uninitiated with the game as players I suppose the article holds some value.
Original Comment by: Louis
http://www.pojclan.co.uk/
An interesting article, considering I don't play MMORPG's. However, on that note, I would really like some articles that are specific to other game genres, I see around 1 MMO article per issue, it seems a little one sided. Even going so far as to have a few editors 'slag' off some of the other genres true gems (Half-Life 2, for example). Perhaps the escapist should considering focusing on something else for once.
http://www.pojclan.co.uk/
An interesting article, considering I don't play MMORPG's. However, on that note, I would really like some articles that are specific to other game genres, I see around 1 MMO article per issue, it seems a little one sided. Even going so far as to have a few editors 'slag' off some of the other genres true gems (Half-Life 2, for example). Perhaps the escapist should considering focusing on something else for once.
Original Comment by: Cat Rambo
http://ww.kittywumpus.net
II think there is a distinction to be made between IC (in-character) and OOC (out of character) interactions. IC, I can swear at the Alliance and scoff at the night elf hunters running along side, but if I see one of them getting ganked by an NPC that I can take, I'll probably step in and pull it away from them so they won't die. Yesterday, I had an Alliance pally following my Tauren warrior around happily skinning the corpses of mountain lions and gray bears that she was leaving in her wake.
I run into this on the game I run, where on the one hand players want new players to get as enchanted as they are by the harsh, gritty atmosphere and yet don't want to ruin that harsh and grittiness by being nice and helping them out. I wonder what would happen if WoW allowed full emotes between the two sides -- as it is now, you can only use the canned emotes (which are familiar to the diku-based minds among us) to interaction with the other side.
http://ww.kittywumpus.net
II think there is a distinction to be made between IC (in-character) and OOC (out of character) interactions. IC, I can swear at the Alliance and scoff at the night elf hunters running along side, but if I see one of them getting ganked by an NPC that I can take, I'll probably step in and pull it away from them so they won't die. Yesterday, I had an Alliance pally following my Tauren warrior around happily skinning the corpses of mountain lions and gray bears that she was leaving in her wake.
I run into this on the game I run, where on the one hand players want new players to get as enchanted as they are by the harsh, gritty atmosphere and yet don't want to ruin that harsh and grittiness by being nice and helping them out. I wonder what would happen if WoW allowed full emotes between the two sides -- as it is now, you can only use the canned emotes (which are familiar to the diku-based minds among us) to interaction with the other side.
Original Comment by: Sean L.
http://www.xanga.com/talonkarrde/
I think the article was a nice article on the possibility of faction transcendence in games where it is not designed for it. The fact that one may see it all the time on other servers just enhances the value of the article. Also, MMORPGs are one of the newer and more social genres, that allow for free character interaction in a way that is not in say, Half-Life 2 Deathmatch.
That being said, the use of pointing of IC and OOC is interesting but not necessarily relevant - people as a whole are more concerned per se with leveling and everything than playing necessarily "In Character". This can be seen in the fact that even in Role-Playing servers, there is a lot of non-RP going on.
http://www.xanga.com/talonkarrde/
I think the article was a nice article on the possibility of faction transcendence in games where it is not designed for it. The fact that one may see it all the time on other servers just enhances the value of the article. Also, MMORPGs are one of the newer and more social genres, that allow for free character interaction in a way that is not in say, Half-Life 2 Deathmatch.
That being said, the use of pointing of IC and OOC is interesting but not necessarily relevant - people as a whole are more concerned per se with leveling and everything than playing necessarily "In Character". This can be seen in the fact that even in Role-Playing servers, there is a lot of non-RP going on.
Original Comment by: Kotoko
http://kamatue.livejournal.com
I have encountered a similar situation. I am a gnome warlock on a PVE server. i had a group to go to the hinterlands to get the Mallet for Zul ferrak and they died and all left me there alone in the middle of a repopped zone. along comes this group of horde watching me try to kill everything and they must have felt bad because they /wave and /flirt. so i followed them all the way to the end. when it came to the end boss they pointed. i tagged it and they helped me kill it. one of them came on an alliance alt and asked me if i would go pvp and let them kill me to pay back the help i just got. i graciousl;y did so since there was no way in hell i was going to change another PUG to go do that and i was happy they offered to help. I have learned ( unless it was fixed) that 1337 speak worked but only non letters were acceptable.
http://kamatue.livejournal.com
I have encountered a similar situation. I am a gnome warlock on a PVE server. i had a group to go to the hinterlands to get the Mallet for Zul ferrak and they died and all left me there alone in the middle of a repopped zone. along comes this group of horde watching me try to kill everything and they must have felt bad because they /wave and /flirt. so i followed them all the way to the end. when it came to the end boss they pointed. i tagged it and they helped me kill it. one of them came on an alliance alt and asked me if i would go pvp and let them kill me to pay back the help i just got. i graciousl;y did so since there was no way in hell i was going to change another PUG to go do that and i was happy they offered to help. I have learned ( unless it was fixed) that 1337 speak worked but only non letters were acceptable.
Original Comment by: Morshanis
http://www.the-unholy-trinity.com
Another thing that a few of us priests have discovered is the ability to mind control members of the oposite faction and the mind controlled player can be made to understand us by using /e "hey, we're just trying to help" or some other message. A few alliance made their way into the Undercity the other night and we all just hung out talking through the MC'ed characters. It adds some fun to cross-faction interactions when you can speak freely...
http://www.the-unholy-trinity.com
Another thing that a few of us priests have discovered is the ability to mind control members of the oposite faction and the mind controlled player can be made to understand us by using /e "hey, we're just trying to help" or some other message. A few alliance made their way into the Undercity the other night and we all just hung out talking through the MC'ed characters. It adds some fun to cross-faction interactions when you can speak freely...
Original Comment by: William Thomas Hughes
Just a word of praise and thanks to Mark Wallace and other writers of the Excapist Staff. I found it extremely refreshing and comforting to discover so many excellent writers in a gaming magazine venue. The Internet has brought the "keyboard" back to life and has probably made millions of people learn to type. But, language and writing cannot be so easily infused in our TV clogged minds.
So, thank you once again for your gift of reading pleasure.
Just a word of praise and thanks to Mark Wallace and other writers of the Excapist Staff. I found it extremely refreshing and comforting to discover so many excellent writers in a gaming magazine venue. The Internet has brought the "keyboard" back to life and has probably made millions of people learn to type. But, language and writing cannot be so easily infused in our TV clogged minds.
So, thank you once again for your gift of reading pleasure.
Original Comment by: Mark Wallace
http://www.walkering.com
Am I to understand that if you mind-control someone, you can then chat as them? That's fascinating, if so. I love Morshanis's story of cross-faction chatting via MC'd toons. If only I had ever played a priest...
http://www.walkering.com
Am I to understand that if you mind-control someone, you can then chat as them? That's fascinating, if so. I love Morshanis's story of cross-faction chatting via MC'd toons. If only I had ever played a priest...
Original Comment by: Mark Wallace
http://www.walkering.com
To William: I and the other writers of the Escapist thank you for reading! It's amazingly gratifying to see that there actually are gamers out there who like to think about things in a deeper way than just where the cheat codes are. I mean, we knew they existed, we just were never really sure how to find them. Thanks to Julianne and Alex, we now have this great venue for this kind of writing and we get to see that people out there actually like it as much as we do! (for the most part, anyway)
http://www.walkering.com
To William: I and the other writers of the Escapist thank you for reading! It's amazingly gratifying to see that there actually are gamers out there who like to think about things in a deeper way than just where the cheat codes are. I mean, we knew they existed, we just were never really sure how to find them. Thanks to Julianne and Alex, we now have this great venue for this kind of writing and we get to see that people out there actually like it as much as we do! (for the most part, anyway)
Original Comment by: TJ3
First, I'd like to further explain the Mind Control 'communication system.'
In World of Warcraft you can type /e followed by text to create a custom emote. However, members of the opposing will normally see, "(your character name) makes some strange gestures." the exception to this is when a player is mind controlled. If a priest, we'll call him Morgath for demonstration purposes, mind controls you, his custom emotes, which would normally have come out as "Morgath makes some strange gestures" will instead be completely readable. Now to my actual comment.
I personally like that you have to be crafty to communicate in world of warcraft and I think it was a great design decision on blizzard's part. I like it partly because it keeps pvp from degrading from the compairitively mild mannered /spit to "OMG I PWND JO NOOB!" and because it also allows for experiences like the one you had Mark. It gives players the opportunity to rise above the differences ingrained in them for centuries of azeroth's history.
In reference to your statement, "In the end, it's easier to just kill." it is easier just to kill, which is what sets apart the people that ganked you, and allowed to express himself, the kindly gnome who helped you.
First, I'd like to further explain the Mind Control 'communication system.'
In World of Warcraft you can type /e followed by text to create a custom emote. However, members of the opposing will normally see, "(your character name) makes some strange gestures." the exception to this is when a player is mind controlled. If a priest, we'll call him Morgath for demonstration purposes, mind controls you, his custom emotes, which would normally have come out as "Morgath makes some strange gestures" will instead be completely readable. Now to my actual comment.
I personally like that you have to be crafty to communicate in world of warcraft and I think it was a great design decision on blizzard's part. I like it partly because it keeps pvp from degrading from the compairitively mild mannered /spit to "OMG I PWND JO NOOB!" and because it also allows for experiences like the one you had Mark. It gives players the opportunity to rise above the differences ingrained in them for centuries of azeroth's history.
In reference to your statement, "In the end, it's easier to just kill." it is easier just to kill, which is what sets apart the people that ganked you, and allowed to express himself, the kindly gnome who helped you.
Original Comment by: MrHen
http://mrhen.com/
While I haven't played WoW in quite some time, I have experienced similar things in other games. Most surprisingly, I often run into strange occurrences in (of all things) Halo 2.
There are many things that can cause a Halo 2 match to skew away from traditional bloodletting. Modding and de-leveling are two examples. Less common is a total and utter slaughter: one team is significantly better than the other causing a lack of motivation in the other team and they just give up.
Depending on the people in the match it can often end with all players in the game causally taking in the middle of the map, showing each other tricks, or just screwing around.
Easy examples: my brother and I were playing a 2v2 match against 2 gamers that were trouncing us. They ended up gaining map control and positioning themselves on a particular ledge we didn't know how to reach. My brother and I knew we were going to lose, so I ran forward asking them to wait and show us how to get up there. They were skeptical at first, but when they eventually took us to where they started the jump sequence and gave us a tutorial whilst we chatted about various things.
Another time during a 4v4 match we ended up playing against a pack of 4 kids de-leveling together. As they continued to kill themselves over and over the team I was on stopped trying to kill them. The match ended up with all of us trying to learn a particular trick, with no killing at all.
All in all, I've discovered that there are generally two kinds of gamers, and they correlate to two kinds of people: givers and takers. People who aren't selfish and care more about enjoying the social aspect of gaming then their pride will often stop what they are doing to help an honestly nice person. This is true in WoW, Halo 2, Starcraft... any game I've played.
The opposite are people who insist they receive their vengeance for accidental betrayals by betraying the poor fool back. Generally, these people tend to end up with a pack of friends that are just like them while they all wonder why they cannot reach level 25 without cheating.
Ah well, such is life. Thank you for an excellent article.
http://mrhen.com/
While I haven't played WoW in quite some time, I have experienced similar things in other games. Most surprisingly, I often run into strange occurrences in (of all things) Halo 2.
There are many things that can cause a Halo 2 match to skew away from traditional bloodletting. Modding and de-leveling are two examples. Less common is a total and utter slaughter: one team is significantly better than the other causing a lack of motivation in the other team and they just give up.
Depending on the people in the match it can often end with all players in the game causally taking in the middle of the map, showing each other tricks, or just screwing around.
Easy examples: my brother and I were playing a 2v2 match against 2 gamers that were trouncing us. They ended up gaining map control and positioning themselves on a particular ledge we didn't know how to reach. My brother and I knew we were going to lose, so I ran forward asking them to wait and show us how to get up there. They were skeptical at first, but when they eventually took us to where they started the jump sequence and gave us a tutorial whilst we chatted about various things.
Another time during a 4v4 match we ended up playing against a pack of 4 kids de-leveling together. As they continued to kill themselves over and over the team I was on stopped trying to kill them. The match ended up with all of us trying to learn a particular trick, with no killing at all.
All in all, I've discovered that there are generally two kinds of gamers, and they correlate to two kinds of people: givers and takers. People who aren't selfish and care more about enjoying the social aspect of gaming then their pride will often stop what they are doing to help an honestly nice person. This is true in WoW, Halo 2, Starcraft... any game I've played.
The opposite are people who insist they receive their vengeance for accidental betrayals by betraying the poor fool back. Generally, these people tend to end up with a pack of friends that are just like them while they all wonder why they cannot reach level 25 without cheating.
Ah well, such is life. Thank you for an excellent article.