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The Summoner's Guidebook: Getting friends to enjoy League of Legends
I find the mainstream success of League of Legends to be extremely baffling. If you break down the skills you need to be an effective player in the MOBA genre, they are daunting. The mechanical skill cap to be acceptable is unacceptably high, and the knowledge burden is enormous. Other MOBAs have dozens of characters and hundreds or thousands of matchups. League of Legends' character pool is so unbelievably large that even professionals cannot grasp the entirety of its design space. While I can't fathom how normal people find a game this hard fun, I can simply accept it. That makes it quite possible to get our friends and significant others hooked. However, because League is a hard game, it is probably best that we be careful when we try to teach our friends. It's pretty easy to scare them with the enormous difficulty in the game.
Drama Mamas: Girlfriend gamer
Drama Mamas Lisa Poisso and Robin Torres are experienced gamers and real-life mamas -- and just as we don't want our precious babies to be the ones kicking and wailing on the floor of the checkout lane next to the candy, neither do we want you to become known as That Guy on your realm. Do you remember when WoW was shiny and new? Ah, memories. Dear Drama Mamas, I am fairly new to gaming. I started playing about 4 months ago and have since become borderline obsessed with how much fun I am having. There are tons of things to do and I love discovering new things all the time. Currently I belong to my Boyfriend's guild. We play on a very low pop server and there are currently only 4 active members in the guild. He and His friends like it that way- and that's fine. They are all in charge and have been gaming forever. Mostly they focus on occasional PVP (and pet battles- don't tell him I told you!). I really enjoy playing with them and don't feel self conscious about my occasional noob-ness,However I feel that being a part of his guild/ playing on a low pop. server is a limiting experience for me as a newer gamer.
Breakfast Topic: The GM's wife
This Breakfast Topic has been brought to you by Seed, the Aol guest writer program that brings your words to WoW Insider's pages. My husband is our guild master. He's also our guild recruiter, website maintenance man, raid leader and master looter, as well as one of the top DPSers on fights he doesn't have to choreograph. He's the reason I play the game, as well as part of the glue that holds our guild together. As such, he's a big inspiration to me. Not only is he in a demanding leadership position, but he knows the classes and helps people improve their characters and rotations. Between us, we have many classes at 80 and he plays them all well. Me ... not so much. I raid endgame on a couple characters, but I wouldn't be the player I am without his help. Now, I've heard many of the stereotypes out there, from the dreaded wife aggro, to the girlfriends/wives who play and people wish they would go back to the kitchen, ad nauseum. I will be the first to tell you my downfalls. Heck, my idea of successful PvP is Nova, Blink, Invis and fly away! But I try my darndest to not be that GM's Wife. If I look bad, he looks bad, and that reflects poorly on the guild. I'm sure we all have horror stories of wives not pulling their own weight, but I like to think I'm here on my own merit. I am a DPSer, a healer, the guild chef, the potion brewer, a pet and mount collector, a girl and the GM's wife, and I'm proud of it. Are you a gaming wife, or a GM's wife -- and if so, how do you assert yourself among the good ol' boys? On the flip side, where have you seen significant others not making the cut?
Breakfast Topic: Should the girlfriend play WoW?
I have a confession to make.My girlfriend doesn't play WoW. However she probably knows more about it than most people. She's been there when I hoot and holler over vent when I've defeated hard bosses like Kale'thas. And she's listened to me whine and complain about how I think everyone on the internet hates me (I'm kidding of course, it's only Retribution Paladins and Death Knights who hate me, or maybe it was Protection Warriors and Elemental Shamans, I can never remember).Occasionally she can be found browsing the site to see what I've been working on. Like the time that I was in LA at BlizzCon and Mike Schramm sent me forth to risk my life in a fire. That went over well.But despite my immersion in the game and the community surrounding it she has yet to pick up a sword and fight the Horde.I'm trying to figure out if that's something that should change.
Cake of the Lich King
If there's one thing we love, it's cake. If there's two things we love, it's World of Warcraft and cake. And so, when our two favorite things are combined, as they were by reader Mike W's girlfriend (he plays Valaar on Kargath), we get more excited than Millhouse Manastorm when he's about to light some sweet-cheeks up. She made this confectionary piece of art for his birthday the other day, and we think you'll agree that Arthas has never looked tastier.And Mike points out that this is completely and totally hand- and icing tip-made -- no fondant here. Beautiful. I especially like the "spikes" around the outside -- I don't know if that was designed that way, or just the way it looks when you put icing on a cake like that, but it looks great. If we had Dalaran Cooking Awards to give away, she'd get one.We've added the cake to our ever-growing gallery of favorite Warcraft-related cakes -- if you've got another one, feel free to send it in.%Gallery-31459%
World of Warcraft vs. my girlfriend
I'm a big fan of McSweeney's, the web home of Dave Eggers' McSweeney's publishing house (and whenever I can, I try to help out 826 CHI, the Chicago chapter of their writing center) -- they offer up quick little humor pieces every weekday in addition to various events and shows around the country. And the other day, as a few readers have kindly informed us, they focused their literary light on World of Warcraft -- writer Tyler Curry has a fun piece about how he was forced to choose between the game and the woman he loved.It is very funny to hear WoW locales and situations stuck in between the usual patter of a couple in a relationship, and though this is, we presume, a fictional account of something that Dr. Phil claims happens all the time, it's well-written. Plus, the dig at "role-players" made us chuckle, too.But we do have one nit to pick, one issue in here that we just can't ignore and/or laugh casually at as we're obviously meant to. Seriously, with the leveling changes since 2.3, why would anyone run Gnomeregan anymore? If he doesn't know that there are much easier and more profitable ways to level through that range, maybe he deserves to be dumped anyway.
PAX schedule gets posted, devoured, fretted over
PAX 2008 is less than three weeks away, and they've finally released their schedule. The best way to describe it is chock full of goodness. There's something for everyone in here, with panels like, "History of Harmonix: THE ROCKENING" and "Writing For Video Games," but we imagine all the attention will be focused on the "How To Get Your Girlfriend Into Gaming" panel at 11:30 AM on Sunday. Of course, that conflicts with the Wil Wheaton panel, so you're going to have to choose your poison.Joystiq will be there frantically trying to clone ourselves so we can cover as much as possible. There should be some surprise announcements, plenty of hands-on gaming action (including a lot of tabletop games), and of course The Omegathon! Stay tuned to Joystiq during PAX, August 29th through the 31st for as much coverage as we can pack in.
Forum post of the day: You and me against the World ... of Warcraft
Gotnerf of Vashj is facing a not-entirely-uncommon dilemma. His fiancé is has shown no interest in playing WoW. He believes that once she spends some time seeing him enjoy the game she will want to join in. Gotnerf asked other guys how they got their wives to play. While some suggestions were entirely unhelpful, many seemed encouraging. Leadfoot of Feathermoon suggested a direct approach "You know how you're always saying we should spend more time together? We can share this together, honey." That's more or less how it worked for me. Zelkari of Spirestone recommended something most ladies can't resist, "Show her druids and their flight form." Strumpet of Eldre'thalas had some very grounding advice from experience:
Forum Post of the Day: I'm a WoW Widow
And Belfaire doesn't care.Reader Kyver tipped us off to a gem of a post on the Customer Service Forums today, titled "I'm a WoW Widow" (moderately NSFW, PG-13 rating). The story goes like this: A girl, Missmegan, lost her boyfriend to the Burning Crusades [sic]. They used to play together horde side, but after buying the expansion he turned to the alliance and is dedicated to his guild mates. All is lost, as he's no longer interested in his girlfriend's "assets" and rambles like a two-year old.Of course this makes our forum posting protagonist upset, and she needs her boyfriend back. Now obviously this is a joke. At least I hope it is. And Katie (my girlfriend), if you're reading this I promise I'll never let it get this bad. I mean, I only play for 5 hours a day, not 13 as the boyfriend in the story does. And I make money with all this, so it's okay, right? Sweetie? Darling? Honey... D'oh....Tagging the first response to this thread is Belfaire The Mighty, with the simple response "Dear WoW Widow, It's actually Burning Crusade. Yours, Belfaire." This had myself and the other writers here laughing. We had to share it.So dear readers, I ask you, are you a WoW widow?
Officers' Quarters: When your mate is a member
Every Monday Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership.This is going to be a tricky week for me, since my girlfriend reads this column. Like most subjects, I'm not claiming to have all the answers about this, but in this case I'm really clueless sometimes. I'm wondering how other guild leaders and officers out there handle it. So this week, I'm the one providing the question! Dear Readers: How do you deal with having a significant other in the guild -- especially when he or she isn't an officer?Thanks!Scott
Azeroth Interrupted: Reader Mail -- Balancing WoW and a non-gamer girlfriend
Each week, Robin Torres contributes Azeroth Interrupted, a column about balancing real life with WoW.This week I'm answering an email from Guilty Gamer:Dear Robin, My problem's not too much school or work, but a girlfriend who'd rather have me in bed (we live together) than leveling in the wee hours. As it is, I sneak WoW into my life. If she's got a one-hour class, I've got time for five quests. But my play is ruined by the fact that I have to hide. I'm not looking at porn for crying out loud. I just want to enjoy my game. I want to sit down for a whole evening and sink in to an instance, but it seems impossible considering we always plan so much. Her hobbies/interests can be accomplished in an hour or less while mine eat a whole evening. She's not geeky like me. I tried to get her to into WoW and it made no sense to her (fair enough). I usually get an evening a week but even then she's mad or distant if I'm not talking and paying attention to her while I play. At points, I wish I could play so much more or just give up the game entirely. I really enjoy WoW and love my girlfriend. I don't know how to find harmony between them. I'm always either deprived of my time-consuming hobbies or guilty for enjoying them. Sincerely, Guilty Gamer
Moving on: Deleting your ex's Mii
Heartbroken, Chris Buffa did what any sentimental guy would do after a painful break-up: wrote about it in his blog. The GameDaily editor-in-chief made sure to update his readers on the event, how he has been coping, and his dilemma over what to do with the Mii his ex-girlfriend left behind.Ultimately, after several hundred words of introspection, Chris erased her large-headed avatar, wishing her the best. Would you have made the same choice? Or would you have loaded your ex's Mii into Wii Sports boxing, pummeling him or her until your own body gives out, exhausted and sobbing?As for us, being the maudlin fools we are, we would've left her Mii to live there, only a few button presses away whenever we'd need to see her again. Friends would try to take us out for a night on the town to cheer us up, but we'd look for any excuse to head home early so that we could sit by the TV, our fingertips on her digital face, singing to ourselves, "I've been looking so long at this Mii of you, that I almost believe that it's real. I've been living so long with my Mii of you, that I almost believe that the Mii ... is all I can feel."
WoW completely ruins another life
The Australian media is at it again (why is Australia such a hotbed of this stuff?), with another report on how playing online games can horribly ruin your life. This time, they profile a guy named Mark Nichols, who apparently "played out his days in a virtual world... while his real life crumbled to pieces." Not surprisingly, he blames the game.The best part is when he mentions WoW itself: "Then I heard about a game called World of Warcraft. That's when it all went south." Before he played WoW, he was apparently logging four hours a day in Half-Life, which is enough to make any sensible person reconsider what they're doing. But he was compelled (no choice involved, obviously) to install and play the game anyway. You can imagine the rest-- he loses his job (because, playing on a US server, he'd rather play during the day), loses his girlfriend, gains all kinds of weight, and generally becomes a mess. All because of the game. The last part is great, too: "Games have eaten away at my 20s and I was in stasis for a while," he says. "Hopefully it's not too late." As if the rest of his life will be completely ruined just because he chose to install a game.I can't say much more about this than I've already said, but I will give the mic to the very insightful Rushster over at WorldofWar:"I do hate the term 'real life' when used in the context of 'gaming ruining real life.' WoW is real life. It's a real-life entertainment activity just like knitting, watching TV, going to the movies, gardening etc. I do wish people would stop saying their 'real-life' was falling apart. I'm sure if you watch too much TV or go to the movies for 12 hours a day it can't be good for you either or your relationships."Well said. If you're playing WoW for 12 hours a day-- stop now. Just uninstall the game and walk away. Leave the rest of us to enjoy the game responsibly, and have a good time without the media buying the stupid line that it's the game's fault for ruining this guy's life.
Multiboxing madness
I'm not sure I understand the idea behind multiboxing. I mean, is it really worth it to spend all that money and time just to completely rock a whole PvP battleground with 15 of your own toons, or down a raid boss all by your-- oh wait, maybe I do understand it. Still, if multiboxing is your thing, then these pictures, sent to us by the great Xzin himself (whom we interviewed a little while ago), are right up your alley. Not only are there some c-c-c-crazy monitor setups (I especially like the guy who tilted his EQ monitors around himself, like a little MMORPG womb), but you also get some neat screenshots, like the all-Shammy run of SL that Xzin did above-- bonus points on the tanking Earth Elementals, but I'll bet cash that zero Shaman gear dropped.Bobbo also sent us this Dual-Boxing.com forum thread, which gets just insane-- this guy runs 23 characters, and his girlfriend runs 23 sitting next to him for a total of 47 characters together (his picture actually shows 57 different WoW boxes, so that's at least $1000 right there, even without all the hardware). I can't imagine the amount of money and time going into something like that, but Blizzard nods vague approval to the whole thing, so more power to them, I guess. It seems like a completely different game than the one we know and love, but twinking is the same type of thing (a game of resources), and lots of us do that and have no problem with it. So multibox away, you crazy character-controlling overlords.
Nintendo Australia teams up with teen girl mag Girlfriend
Nintendo of Australia is trying to get the attention of bubble gum-popping princess in the land down under as they've teamed up with teen girl mag Girlfriend. They'll be making available their DS and Wii systems at each location the Girlfriend Model Search makes a stop at, in the hopes of hooking new consumers. The following locations are listed as being stops where you can try out either system: Adelaide: 16 June - Westfield Marion (9am - 3pm) Brisbane: 23 June - Westfield Carindale (9am - 3pm) Melbourne: 30 June - Westfield Southland (9am - 3pm) Perth: 7 July - Westfield Carousel (9am - 3pm) Sydney: 14 July - Westfield Parramatta (9am - 3pm) Any Aussie readers going to stop by one of these locations?
Azeroth Interrupted: How to get your wife or girlfriend to play WoW
Each week, Robin Torres contributes Azeroth Interrupted, a column about balancing real life with WoW.WoW players do have girlfriends (and boyfriends and spouses), contrary to the taunts heard in The Trade Channel and Barrens Chat. Many Players even play WoW with their Significant Others, but often, players have trouble getting their significant others to join them in their hobby/addiction. In general, the problem lies with the girlfriend or wife not being a gamer. Following are some tips for getting your lady to play WoW.First of all, have you tried the sincere, straightforward approach? Just throwing out "Well, if you played WoW with me, you'd understand." here and there is not the same thing. Neither are hints or endless stories of how much fun you're having. Try saying something like "I would have more fun playing WoW if you joined me and I think it would be a great way for us to spend more time together. It would really mean a lot to me. Would you please give it a try?" If this doesn't work, it is time to analyze and tackle her objections."It's just a stupid game." Take a deep breath -- don't let it hurt you. She probably isn't a gamer and sees computers as tools, not sources of fun. Easing her into games is a very good approach to counteract a lack of interest. Be patient, this could take several weeks. Start her off with a simple and addictive solitaire game like Bejeweled. Once she catches the bug, and this is a double edged sword, move her onto something more complicated that has a wide female fanbase, like Sims 2. This will introduce her to the fun of character creation and a minimum amount of roleplaying. Once she grows tired of this, she may be ready to try WoW, but if she still resists, introduce her to your favorite single player roleplaying game. It can be an old one. The quality of the graphics is not as important as the gameplay (which is arguably always the case), and your passion for the game as well as your interest in how she is progressing will be flattering and encouraging.
BlackBerry email outage ruins relationship
Okay, so maybe the writing was already on the wall and the recent BlackBerry email outages aren't solely to blame, but still, being the proverbial straw to break the camel's back deserves a portion of the censure. While we already knew that most fellas would undoubtedly choose a hot new gizmo over a foxy new lady, this mentality probably changes once you're already committed, and in the case of Rafael Paz, the recent email glitches cost him the latter. In another story hampered by horrific timing, Paz and his SO suffered through "a really bad argument" shortly before the breakdowns began, and after writing her man several emails and getting no reply, she cut the cord on their relationship for good. Of course, Rafael received the notes hours later, but apparently, his lady isn't "falling for" the so-called BlackBerry outages excuse. So while your business plans or daily routine may have been momentarily on the fritz, we're fairly sure the mass failure was kinder to you than it was to Mr. Paz.[Via Fark]
Date and WoW? The Digg crowd doesn't believe you.
The image says it all (click for a full size version), here. A digg regarding a WoW-themed cake (hey, we've seen some of those recently!) made by a player's girlfriend resulted in the response seen above. What do those 1816 commenters have in common? None of them think you can date and WoW.[Via Joystiq]
How to get your girlfriend to play video games
Speaking from years of experience, we know how hard it can be to get your girlfriend interested in playing video games. Granted, it might be impossible to drag her into play-til-dawn Halo 2 sessions online, but dropping into casual gaming with a Wario Ware: Smooth Moves round or two is entirely doable. Need some tips? Wikihow has an entry up on how to get your girlfriend to play video games, which offers up some gender stereotypes like this: "Don't get games that involve things like strippers, prostitutes, and sex. Unless she has a really good sense of humor about such things, she probably won't like it." Well, where's the fun in that? Oh, we keed, we keed. True, most of the article is common sense, and it might actually be helpful to some of you out there who have had a hard time getting your significant others interested in jumping into the game with you. However, some of it is just plain whacked, like explaining to your girlfriend how to stretch and uncramp her hands. If your girlfriend doesn't know how to do this already, then you've got more serious problems.For those of you who need a girlfriend in order to find this article useful, check out Wikihow's hilarious "How to get a girlfriend if you're a nerd" entry. We're not sure whether to laugh or cry. For all of you female gamers out there, let us know how they could improve this entry, and don't worry about being gentle ... blast away.[Thanks, WebPimp]
Shocker: Americans spend more time with PC than spouse
While one may argue that a computer doesn't talk back, disagree, or rub one the wrong way as we're sure just about everyone's spouse / SO definitely can, you must have somehow avoided the BSOD, kernel error, 404, clicking HDD, invalid drivers, and the host of other "cyber stresses" that can elicit all sorts of rage and frustration. A recent survey conducted by Kelton Research discovered that a majority of Americans (52-percent) said their "most recent experience with a computer problem provoked emotions such as anger, sadness or alienation," yet a whopping 65-percent of these same folks spend more time with their beloved computer than their own spouse. Adding even more fuel to the computer addict fire, 84-percent of responders stated that they were "more dependent on their home computer now than they were just three years ago." Interestingly enough, rather than founding some sort of rehab facility to coax folks away from the keyboard and back into reality, SupportSoft is looking to provide loving, caring advice to help folks suffering from "cyber stress" solve their PC troubles without tearing down the house. Essentially, the service actually encourages folks glued to their computer to stay that way, as the new startup looks to provide answers to the issues that could eventually run even the most loyal computer user back to their oft forgotten spouse, but the company does insinuate that by solving PC quandaries, folks will have more time to spend when the ones they love. Nevertheless, we can't say these figures are entirely shocking, especially when you consider that folks would take an iPod over booze and nearly anything trendy for an SO.[Via TGDaily]
