Day 7?

I lose track!

Friday: Ran home, went to Sears, got some toys; A tool chest, and a lawnmower, and a grill, at long last!!! They are delivering next saturday, i can't wait. The garage will be clean finally, and we can get to work on the lawn finally.

Was supposed to play with Jim, it was unclear so I didn't log in until late (sorry!). Once i got on the guild was doing a heroic HOL. The tank and healer were undergeared I guess. It was a wipe fest, but hopefully people got something out of it. I enjoyed hanging with my friends, and i guess it doesn't matter if we wipe a zillion times or not. Yeah its frustrating, but what can i say. The tank isn't all that great but she's a good person. Would rather play with a good person but bad tank vs a tank with attitude (20 million of those running around). Spent about 2 hours then finally bailed at midnight!

Weekend was just jam-packed with non-wow stuff. I was at work all saturday, doing some needed experiments. Then ran to our friends house for a 'finale' dinner.

Then home, and finally WoW! Jim was on, so we tore through STV. Thank god, i really think i would have given up on the game if he wasn't there to help me level. Its pretty bad at that level, just takes alot of time and patience, neither of which I have. I think we spent about 2 hrs on sat night, i got a whole level out of it when all said and done.

Sunday, insanely busy. Friends came over, dropped off their cats (they are showing their house alot, which means alot of work to get the cats to a safe place. We stick them in the garage). We went to lunch (Jimmy Johns, which we decided was pretty bland), then Home depot, spent a small fortune on plants (hopefully they will last through the unexpected freeze tomorrow night). Then, hair cut, and grocery store. Got home, put in the plants, raked some more (it's a never ending cycle, but at least all the dead leaves are finally off the oaks out front). Then homework (did this alot over the weekend), wife made cookies, i made soup for lunches, NCIS with dinner, and more homework until 11 and bed. Whew!

Oh, and i totally forgot the bike ride! Sat evening around 6, after repairing the garage door again, and finally getting the front derailor on my wonderful carbon bike fixed, i took it out for a 10 mi ride. The longest in a year! I'm so excited, because I missed the big ride of the season on saturday apparently (i didn't know about it, and was working). Felt really good to be back on the bike, and my muscles are telling me i got a good workout out of it. I rode down the only street with a bike lane in durham (as far as i can tell). Was a major 6 lane road, lots of traffic, but at least a bike lane).

Tonight probably dinner, NCIS, more homework. Tomorrow, class, wed maybe raid? Who knows!

So far this week, about 6 hours spent on WoW. Much better than previous weeks.

12 steps of wow recovery

I think there are two types of people in this world; addicts and non-addicts. For addicts, you can get addicted to just about anything. For me, my drug of choice is WoW. Here is a twelve step program from the Wiki. This twelve step program originally started from Alcoholics Anonymous.

These are the original Twelve Steps as published by Alcoholics Anonymous:^[11]

1. We admitted we were powerless over WoW—that our lives had become unmanageable.

What is unmanageable? It means (to me) that your life has been put on hold, relationships and health jeopardized. We are powerless over people, places, and things. That includes the people who play and the game itself. We can't control if others want to spend their lives playing the game, and not participate in the game of life.

2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

Once you realize you have no power over anything but yourself, you realize that if you are going to break the addiction it's up to you. If you believe in a higher power, fine. I don't, not really. I believe in myself though, and I believe I can stop destructive behavior through shear force of will.

3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.

To me, this means that I'm tired of answering to the game. Want to do something in real life? Consult with the guild,make sure it doesn't conflict, or let down the raid team down.

4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

I think this means recognizing that I have an addictive personality, and with the recognition seeking to do a better job safeguarding myself, so I don't get into something too deep.

5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

I think this means apologizing to the family members and friends who you let down, while being addicted to WoW. That, plus a plan of action to rectify the wrongs.

6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.

I don't believe higher powers have the capacity of modification. I believe this power must come from you . Regardless, the knowledge that you are an addict is a powerful recognition.

7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.

Maybe this means destroying the game and the media (CD/DVD)? I think if you are a serious addict the only way to give it up is to give up your broadband access or your computer. Not sure if most addicts are ready or need this step. I plan to taper off, i'm not sure it can be done. But i'm going to give it a shot.

8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.

Pretty self-explainatory.

9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.

Pretty self-explainatory.

10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.

I think this means that your road to recovery is never complete and you could relapse at any time.

11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His Will for us and the power to carry that out.

I'm not sure what this means to an atheist. I think focusing on constructive things builds your will-power and self-esteem. So maybe that is the message here.

13. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to WoW addicts and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

You gotta preach it IMO. Its so easy to log in, discover twenty things you 'need' to do, then you're emeshed all over again. You can't blame the company (blizzard) as i've seen many do, its like blaming alcohol manufacturers for alcoholism.

Day 4

Day 4 of not much WoW.

Mon, Tue: Got in fairly late Tue, we made dinner on Mon and Tue and actually sat at the dining room table (2nd and 3rd time we used it). Then watched TV, read, went to sleep. No WoW.

Wed: Made dinner again I think (memory hazy), watched NCIS. After that I did a Naxx raid, showing up 1.25 hrs late (i forgot they moved the time). We did alright, got the last two bosses on spider down. My dps inproved to 2500 on boss fights.

Thur night i got in so late i was eating dinner, watching NCIS, then bed.

Tonight i hope to play with my wife and Jim. If that doesn't happen i probably wont play.

Sat night we're hanging with our friends, should be fun. Sun night, maybe wow, maybe not.

So far just one hour of wow since monday! I'm hoping to spend less than 5 hours a week playing.

WoW Addiction

I wrote about this before on here (somewhere, gotta find). Anyway here is a interesting site about wow addicts after they break the addiction.

So...after Phalea and BRK left the game to spend more time with family, and visiting that site, it was time for a wake-up call. Recently things have been rough; both of us are extremely stressed, but whereas I saw WoW as a stress relief, it actually made my wife more stressed. So...I'm going to try hard to scale down WoW time. That means no more going home, heating up something, and eating in front of the computer. No more playing on weekends all day or during the day at all. I'm going to try to limit my WoW time to 5 hours a week.

Am I an addict? Well, life would be better for us if we didn't play, but it would be hard for me because the only friends I have are online. However I dont sit in front of the computer for 12+ hours a day, I haven't lost anyone (yet) due to playing, haven't lost my job due to playing. Certainly it hasn't helped my career, but my career is of the type where if you are going to get ahead you need to be both talented and willing to invest 60-80 hours a week. 40 hours a week gets you nothing but a paycheck.

I think the game is a symptom but not the problem per se. It's like alcohol, if you are abusing alcohol you are doing so to mask other problems. But I can see it developing into the problem. You can't meet friends because you are online all the time. You can't have normal relationships because that would take up all your wow time. And it doesn't really matter that all your friends (people you know in real life) are WoW addicts. It just means there is more people on the sinking ship.

However, I find myself asking continually what is better? Is it better to go out with buddies and drink instead of get online and play with them? You are still socializing the same amount. Is it better to sit in front of the TV with your spouse instead of playing with them? I think for us the answer is yes because we can have normal conversations and its a limited time frame, whereas when we play we are focused on the game at first and its hard to have real conversations.

People say WoW is cheaper and healthier than drinking. Yeah, but again it's all the missed opportunities in life. You give up healthy meals, working out, and relationships. You miss out on career and life development, for an endless circle of pixel satisfaction, which is completely virtual and lacking.

Anyway i'll attempt to chronicle my recovery here in the hope it helps someone.

Confessions from a Server First ex-guildee

This is in response to the excellent article on Snarkcraft about getting into a top guild.

Factors for successful applications.

I was in a raid guild for a year and we all saw every app that came in. 90% didn't get through the door. It has as much to do with the app's attitude as it does gear and what the guild needs.

If the guild doesn't need anyone, you are probably SOL. We denied dozens of great people just because we had full rosters. So do your homework there.

If you have a bad attitide, forget it (this shows up when people ask questions about your spec and gear. Always say "I did X because I think Y, but I'll try what you said and see if that works better" (and then do that)).

Networking

If its a guild on-server, you are best off doing PUGs, forming friends, getting to know people in good guilds. What really stands out is when a guildie said "i puged X with them and they were pretty good". If you had an off-night, they are going to use that judgement and say "don't take this guy".

The more I get into the real world the more i see how getting into a guild is alot like getting a job, its a relationship with the guild but you also get in 80% of the time through knowing someone.

Fit

Most importantly, make sure you and the guild are a good fit. That's a huge part of the application. In my guild, we tend to make off-color jokes (not racist or anything, just dirty i guess you could say). That's how the guild is, and if you are easily offended, you just not going to fit in.

Make sure you can raid when they say they are raiding. If you can't do the 3 nights a week they are raiding, why are you bothering to apply?

Gear

Also if you are looking for a top guild, make sure like Seri said that your gear matches their progression. People who are doing T8 raids are not going to want to have you come in heroic gear, your dps will be half of what it should be. Run Naxx PUGs, even if they are painful, get that gear. Run Vault when you can. Run the daily heroic. As dps it's hard to get gear, but its doable.

Consumables Expectations / Time Commitment

If you are in a point of your life where you can't devote all this time to raid, don't apply to a hard-core progression guild. They are going to want 3-4 hours 3-4 nights a week, un-interrupted. Sure, stuff happens but generally if you are in the raid team but not raiding, then you are taking up a slot for people who can raid and are willing to do all of that.

Top guilds make you burn through money like crazy. You are expected to flask on everything, even naxx10. Bring consumables, etc, basically everything you can to increase your performance. Everyone else is doing int, why shouldn't you. Don't expect the guild to fund anything for you. In my old guild we had 30k in funds, but it was deemed that the raiders needed to farm for their own consumables.

Sacrifices/Attitude

Know what you are getting into. Top guilds run 3, 4 raids a week, 3-4 hours each. That's all that plus your dailies to bring in enough revenue to cover repairs and consumables. When you get a piece of gear, people are gonna want to see you get it gemmed and enchanted with the best enchant asap. Don't be stingy on epic gear, it really shows your attitude.

If you want into a guild which is the best on the server, expect sacrifices. Yes, everyone has lives outside of the game, but, just to give an example. In my guild, almost all the raid team took 4-5 days off work and leveled to 80 within a week (within a week, just to emphasis). Within two weeks they were in naxx10. Within 3 weeks they cleared naxx10 and were in naxx25. Within 4 weeks they cleared naxx25. This is on a 3 night/4 hour each schedule. You can guess that during the first month they played 80 hours a week. This is insane, but what a top guild does. It was at this point I decided this guild was way too much for me (so did about 25% of the previous raid team). I fully expect when Ulduar hits, if they don't have server firsts on all the bosses, they will be neck and neck with one or two guilds.

Attitude

Speaking of attitude, lastly don't be intimidated by the guild's attidude. So what if it's the best guild on the server. They have bad nights. The thing about top guilds is that they are willing to spend weeks in game and out learning strats, memorizing, gearing up their char as much as possible, so that you get to the raid, everyone is on top of their game, and your performance is maximal.


The Gkick

We never used to kick people because they couldn't show up, but often people were alted if they only make 1 raid in 5 (for example if 26 people showed up, the alt would have less priority). We only kicked people on the spot if they were a poor match for the guild ideals and doing asshat behavior. If they turned out to be true idiots then they were benched. This happens alot. I heard it over and over 'players who don't perform will be benched'. This has as much to do with not dying than what your dps actually is.

The Heroic/Raid Trial

Almost every guild will make you do trials before you can roll on loot. This is to make sure that their investment isn't wasted. For your trial run, absolutely do not slack off. Do it when you are ready. My trial occured right after i transfered server, everything was a mess, i couldn't get on vent (didn't have it set up - relax, it takes 5 minutes to download and config it). I don't know how i got in (it was a new guild). I ended up ninjaing the first piece of loot from the heroic (They didn't bother to explain their loot rule of passing on everything then rolling). I got alot better, but I wouldn't have been accepted as the guild is now (they are much more hardcore now).

Main thing, be sure you are ready for the heroic. Your gear enchanted, gemed. Your consumables. Everything repaired (this is extremely important)

End is nigh?

I'm bored with WoW. I've been pulled into too many things in WoW. 4 different sets of friends started characters on 4 different servers, half horde and half alliance. I have 4 active mains, have leveled them all to 70+, i've done borean tundra now 4x.

To me the game always seems like a rush rush rush mentality. At first I started a few weeks behind my hardcore guild because i was busy doing RL stuff. When I got back, the hardcore raiders were all 80, and I got to grind to 80 while they were getting guild and server first achievements. (were #1 or #2 in alliance progression). Then I got to 80, did a total of 4 raids, decided I hated raiding now with my life the way it is.

Then! My horde guild decides it wants to do Naxx too, and I am the raid leader. So rush rush rush to 80. I'm now 75 and they are doing Naxx10 without me this weekend (sounds great to me).

Anyway main point is that I see several flaws in blizz and especially Wraith, and i predict that this is the last great expansion of the game.

1) The leveling time is far too long for a person to pick up and enjoy. The game has been out 4 years, but instead of doing horizontal content, they do vertical content. Granted it's shorter now, but we're still looking at 6+ months for a newbie to pick up and hit 80 in (as a first time, i could probably hit 80 in a month if i put my mind to it).

2) Wraith zones are far too narrow. We have quest ranges within zones that are only valid for characters in the back half of the zone requirement. For example, in ZD at level 75, you can only do half of the quests. You need to be 76 for the rest. Shol. basin? Need to be 76. What this means is that friends cant play together readily, unless they are the same exact level.

3) Problem with the game as a whole. Given that players are char levels 1 to 80, the likelyhood of your friends being at a similiar level are quite low, and in general unless you work very hard at it, its impossible to level together. The only way to actually play with your friends is only play that toon in the others presence.

Yes, recruit a friend helps, but that requires starting a new account. And sorry, not retroactive either. A friend recently picked up the game but didn't ask me about it, and thus didn't know about recruit a friend. By the time he told me he was already entrenched and didn't want to throw away a month of play time to start up with the recruit a friend method. This is a serious flaw and makes playing with friends that much harder.

4) Wraith is far too easy. Everyone just facerolls the content, and multiple wipes on bosses is rare unless people are truely clueless. Then people hit 80 and think they can stroll into 80. This is a mindset problem that blizz encouraged by totally lifting the rep requirements for heroics. Further, the attunements have been almost totally lifted in wraith (and they have no plan to bring them back). Yes attunements were a pain, but it was a roadblock meant to slow progression.

Now many guilds are done with all content and are focusing on achievements such as 3 drakes. This is far worse than TBC when guilds spent months struggling through kara, then had a whole another tier to look forward to (SSC/TK), and attunements to make sure people were prepared for that content.

Anyway, WoW is the best thing going, but all things end. After playing a game for thousands of hours its quite natural to be bored and want different things. But now the issue becomes how do we get our friends to try new MMOs?

Bad news for B3

Well the recession seems to strike deeper and deeper. Big Bear Butt got layed off today. I wish his family well and know times are indeed tight.