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Officers' Quarters: A moral dilemma
Every Monday Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership.Every once in a while I get an e-mail where I think, "This person has to be pulling my leg." At first, I thought the e-mail below was one of them. As I read on, however, the author's heartfelt anguish over the decision she has had to make convinced me that there really is a guild leader out there doing this. Judge for yourself:Hello there,I'd love your opinion along with your readers opinions on an issue going on in my current guild. I'm an officer of a Horde guild that is still relatively young (3 months) but very dedicated. We transferred from other servers in order to form an off-hours raiding guild. Things were going very well until several weeks ago when I looked at our guild forum and was shocked to find the GM posting character accounts for sale and urging other guild members to buy them! And if that wasn't bad enough a week or so later he decided to buy a current guild member's account for himself and his girlfriend (another officer and the purchased account's owner supposedly wanted to stop playing those characters).
I Was Wrong. So Very, Very, Wrong.
After the heated reaction by some readers to my previous post about selling accounts, I was confused so I decided to talk to Blizzard directly to get final clarification on the subject. They responded to my email suprisingly rapidly, and were very helpful in clearing up any confusion that I had.I was wrong when I stated that it was within the player's rights to sell their account. The EULA, which I drew my conclusions from, only applies to the actual physical game manuals and disks. Useless though it might be, anyone can attempt to sell those items to their heart's content.The Terms Of Use governs WoW accounts and everything associated with them, such as gold and items. The TOS states that accounts cannot be bought or sold.My confusion stemmed from the EULA's repeated reference to "the Game", "the Game Client", and "Service". "The Game" doesn't include the account, merely the physical items in the box, but I didn't make that connection.Anyhow, I made a mistake, but I hope that my continued research into the topic and succesful attempt to get a definitive answer will atone for my offense.
Selling Characters in WoW
I confess, I'm an eBay junkie. I love to browse around and buy and sell useless knickknacks, so when I started to get bored with my lvl 60 warrior, I sold him. This was relatively early in the game, so I was astonished at the price that I got for him. it was almost double what I had expected, and it got me thinking, "Someone has payed a (relatively) obscene amount of money for my character, and they have no idea how to use him." Playing a character up to 60 is a daunting task, and, once accomplished, should give you a good idea of how to handle your character. Every class has nuances that can only be appreciated if the player has spent hundreds of hours with that class. A beginner starting at 60 would be a waste, because he or she would be deluged in items, special abilities, and talents. Not having acquired these a few at a time, learning how to use them gradually, they would be lost. I imagine the people opening up their freshly-purchased account and scratching their heads in confusion.The level of competence required from endgame PVP and instance raids is very high, and those who don't measure up are quickly blackballed, so I feel a certain remorse in taking these people's money and throwing them to the wolves.The other option is that an experienced player purchased the account, which I can't even begin to understand. The majority of fun which I receive from WoW is in gaining levels, or a "levelgasm" as I call it. Once I hit 60, the fun plateaus.Anyway, have any of you ever purchased an account online, and if so why, and did it work out for you?
