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Drama Mamas: Making a fresh start after an honest mistake
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. The Drama Mamas roundup post with followup from letters we've featured in previous Drama Mamas columns will run in just a few more weeks. So there's still time to send us an email at DramaMamas@wow.com if you would to share what's happened with your situation since we last heard from you. Dear Drama Mamas, I started playing the game about a month after The Burning Crusade was released. I was still a kid, and gave my toon a foolish name. I know my name gets some weird responses, and when I race change to a worgen in Cataclysm, I am going to change my name. Anyway, I play on a RP server ... which only happened because my brother (who now does not play) randomly picked it when he started. I started playing after him and thus chose the same server. My server is fairly weak when it comes to progression guilds, with only one having defeated heroic Lich King-25 (and it was after 4.0.1). For the duration of my Wrath WoW career, I was in a mid-level progression guild for my server, which got to 11/12 in ICC Regular. I was fairly disappointed, because I really want to get an achievement mount. The guild leader gave up trying to lead, and this week he joined the #2 guild on the server. He said he still plans to lead the guild I am in on his alt, but I know that is not going to work out. You can't lead a progression guild on an alt, while competing for server firsts on your main.
Officers' Quarters: Cataclysm guild roundup
Every Monday, Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership. He is the author of The Guild Leader's Handbook, available now from No Starch Press. This is it, ladies and gentlemen. Tonight at midnight PST, Blizzard will knock down the velvet ropes around the expansion's leveling zones and usher in a new era of World of Warcraft. At the same time, Cataclysm will provide new guild features, including leveling, achievements, and reputation. Certainly this is one of the most exciting times in WoW's history to be a guild officer. This expansion provides new tools, new goals, and new opportunities for guilds and those who lead them. The question remains: Is your guild ready for it? After the break, I've linked to every Cataclysm-related Officers' Quarters column, as well as some other columns that may help you with issues related to the increased level cap, the redesign of WoW's raid system, and other expansion matters. Our members are counting on us to provide a stable and effective guild community before and after we all hit 85. Let's not disappoint them!
Drama Mamas: Control freak
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. We continue to receive the results of advice that we have given over the course of this column. But we're greedy and we want more! If we have answered a letter from you and you want to participate in our roundup column, please email us at DramaMamas@wow.com. We received the following letter a couple of months ago. It is impossible for us to answer every letter in a timely fashion, unfortunately. Still, we hope that this can still be of some help. Note: "Control Freak" was the subject of the letter writer's email and that's why we chose it as the title, not to be judgmental.
The Guild Counsel: Time to pack your bags?
With the arrival of beta for games like Rift and Star Wars: The Old Republic, and several big games due to launch next year, it's inevitable that some guilds will choose to leave their current game for the green pastures of a newer one. But moving a guild from one game to another can be as challenging as a real-life move. Sure, you might not need to deal with trucks and heavy-handed movers, but you certainly have a lot of baggage to handle! Thanks to some terrific questions sent in by Starseeker, I take a look at the difficult task of moving your guild to a new game. Read on to learn how to transition as smoothly as possible and start your guild off on the right foot in your new surroundings.
Drama Mamas: Breakup drama
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. We received some great responses so far from our last call-out for results from letters written to Drama Mamas, but we want more. If you have had your letter answered by us, please send us an email at DramaMamas@wow.com with what happened afterward, if you would like it included in our special results post. Hi there, Drama Mamas, I'm writing today because I really don't know the best way to handle this situation. My ex has recently started playing WoW again, and returned to the server and faction we were playing together. Now, he had quit for a fairly good time, so I returned to the server where I had friends -- IRL and in game. I had assumed that because the break up was fairly nasty (with me finding out he had cheated on me and spread lies about me), that he would follow the deal we had made and not return to the server. The deal was: wherever we knew one of us would be, the other would not be. Obviously I would return to the server, and I fully expected him to start playing another server so we would stay out of each other's hair. When confronted, he told me that he would transfer if I payed for it and then ignored me.
The Guild Counsel: It's a playground, not a sandbox
Last year, I volunteered to be a playground monitor at my daughter's kindergarten. Armed with nothing but a whistle, a dodge ball, a few jump ropes, and a box of chalk, I took on a class of 15 adorable, energetic, screaming kids. The first day, I left with my ears ringing, my pulse off the charts, and a desire to run far away and never come back. But over time, I began to learn how to organize fun games for the class, keep things under control, and provide enough flexibility and freedom that everyone could find a way to enjoy recess. Let's take a look at the lessons I learned on the rough turf of the playground.
Drama Mamas: When NSFW guild chat aggros a parent
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. We are planning a special Drama Mamas that talks about the results of our advice -- good or bad. Some of our letter writers have responded in the comments, but we'd love to hear from more of you. If you have had your letter answered here and would like to be included, please send us an email at DramaMamas@wow.com letting us know how your situation turned out. Now on to this week's letter: Last Saturday night very late in the evening and pushing into the early morning, our guild chat erupted into the usual filthy conversation as drunk people came home and got online, and those of us that were online slackened our usual standards to join in. However, this time, one of the guild members exploded after about half an hour of this, claiming that her 12-year-old child was on, that we had scarred him for life and ruined his childhood. I helpfully pointed out that perhaps she was not being the best parent for allowing her young child to be playing the game very late at night with an unfiltered chat box -- not the best move I have ever made. This has now blown up to the point where I have left a guild I was very happy in to attempt to ease the obvious grief that the guild leaders were getting from this person. Unfortunately, this has not stopped it, as many of the guild members who were involved are still arguing about the situation and are disappointed that I have left. This guild member is now going to report us all to Blizzard and attempt to get us all banned from the game permanently. I was hoping for a neutral view on this.
Drama Mamas: Family or fun?
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. The family that plays together, stays together ... or do they? Family playstyles are not always compatible, as The Groom discovers. Dear Drama Mamas, I have been engaged to my fiancée for more than a year now. Since last June or July, we have been playing WoW together. I have been an experienced Warcraft player since Warcraft 3 -- knowing the ins and outs of lore, the game, etc. Her only experience was being powerleveled previously by friends who just needed an extra person -- so not much experience sitting down and learning the game. We decided to level up fresh characters together, and it was wonderful teaming up together, with her being a female draenei warrior and I a human paladin. It seemed like a good teamwork-building exercise for us as a couple. Going on in the background, my two brothers took over and began maintaining a serious raiding guild. They've been doing serious raiding with their level 80s and gearing up for ICC and Ruby Sanctum. Obviously, my fiancée and I were not high enough level to participate but we were invited to the guild as their loving brother and his soon-to-be wife -- who is cool enough to play WoW with (many guys cannot seem to find a girl who will willingly participate in their leisure activities, fantasy sports or what-not).
Drama Mamas: The case of the nice guy and the social leech
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. I really don't think nice guys finish last. Sure, being the Nice Guy comes with pain and challenges, but overall, you are better off. At least at the end of the day, you know you did the right thing and will always have that to fall back on. But there's a difference between being nice and being a pushover. Sacrificing your leisure time every once in a while to help out a friend is good. Sacrificing your leisure time because your "friend" has alienated all other friends and is using guilt trips and pouting to ensnare you is not good. Dear Drama Mamas, I am an officer in a casual raiding guild. We were running 10-man ICC with a core group of about 12 people until the summer slump hit. As we progressed, we started getting all 12 people showing up on raid day, so we had to choose. The problem came when one of our DPS was showing up on time but was constantly going AFK, not paying attention, and being obnoxious in Vent -- generally holding the raid back. He started getting skipped over every time extra players were online. When he outright asked about this, the officers decided he was always going to be last pick. I insisted that we tell him that he was on backup status and why. The other officers didn't think it was necessary to say anything to him, but I did it anyway because I felt it was the right thing to do.
Drama Mamas: Dealing with absent RP guildies
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. This week's is a long one, so let's get right to it. Dear Drama Mamas, I belong to a small roleplaying guild on a fairly heavily populated server. Two of our guild leaders have recently retired, and the discussion that followed seems to have opened up a particularly ugly can of worms. There are a lot of complicated drama subsets that are going on at the moment, but I fear I may have started the one that's now bothering me the most. Previous to our guild leaders retiring, we had a few incidents of members who had been very active suddenly disappear with no word of why or when/if to expect them back. (We have a forum for the guild, so the means of communication are readily available). We have a very strong policy of RL > the game; but as a small, close-knit guild, I feel that someone disappearing impacts guild members both in story lines and in the way they feel OOCly.
Drama Mamas: Raiding while female
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. I love that song and the way it makes me want to join a conga line around New York City. But just because I wanna have fun, doesn't mean I can't get serious as necessary. Duh. There are more male raiders than female, just like there are more male gamers than female. That gap is becoming smaller by the year, however. It's a numbers game; it's not about skill. Does anyone really think top raiding guilds shouldn't have females anymore? Tell me. I want to know and I want to know why. But first, read about Raider Girl after the break.
Drama Mamas: Transgender bullying
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. I really, really wanted to embed People are People by Depeche Mode, but Warner Brothers won't let me. Rather than rage about that here, you can go to my tweet, if you wish. So instead of an awesomely appropriate video and song, you get a screenshot taken at the <It came from the Blog> Brewfest 2010 event -- because people are still people, even when they are multiboxing druids dancing with blood elves in bunny ears. Let's just move on to the letter. Hello Drama Mamas, I've been playing WoW for about a year and a half now. While I've always been a member of some minority groups (I have a few disabilities, for example) and have always had a problem with the pro-bullying majority environment on WoW, the problem kind of got a bit worse for me about six months into that time when I joined the most maligned group yet and came out as transgender. I really enjoy the game and I'm in a guild that handles this (and many other) things about me quite expertly, but the backlash I get in pickup raids mostly because of Vent (which is how quite a few people on my very small server know my trans status), has me seriously considering quitting the game or at least quitting raiding, which is my favorite part of the game.
Drama Mamas: Spearheading morality
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. I strongly believe that your fun should stop when it starts to infringe upon the fun of another. However, the behavior of funsuckers is not something we can control. Sure, we can report the blatant offenders to Blizzard. Yes, we can put them on ignore. But no matter how hard we try, we will never be able to make them change their ways. The question is: Does it hurt to try? Dear Drama Mamas, Recently, I've taken a more active role in trying to combat the rampant immorality and indecency that has taken hold on the WoW community. I used to be content with ignoring it, and I even left trade chat in an attempt to isolate myself from the more concentrated locations. However, I couldn't just sit by while the problem gets worse each day. It's gotten so bad on my realm that people are actually cheering at people who ninja, troll or gank. I have been brought up right: instilled with values by my parents to make moral choices in my life. I had hoped to reach out and bring some of this awareness to others, but so far it's only lost in the flood or so bashed that people simply laugh at my efforts now.
Drama Mamas: I think I'm in love with my RP partner
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. Throughout history, there have been more songs written about love than any topic. Sad songs, happy songs, angry songs -- all of the facets of love have been and will continue to be explored in popular music. And as long as there has been roleplaying, people have been falling in real love with each other through playing fake characters. Keep reading for fake love turning into real love and me going off on a tangent about love songs. Dear Drama Mamas, I've been a roleplayer for several years, and for the first time I developed a crush on my character's in-game partner. Our characters have been a couple for six months. While their relationship evolved from flirting and banter into deep, passionate love and then sharing a home, our out-of-character relationship tightened too. We would flirt, exchange secrets we told no other soul, pull all-nighters chatting. He really is a charming, understanding, considerate and giving person.
Drama Mamas: When friends feign death
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. I can totally understand feigning death to escape from a horrific family life, organized crime or a group of extremists with an irrational vendetta. But fake your own demise in order to get out of playing a video game? Really? Hello Drama Mamas, I'm not sure if anyone else who plays WoW has this same problem, but I unfortunately do. I've had two WoW friends "die" then come back after a few months with the stories of: "My cousin stole my computer and told people I died," and "My parents took away my internet and told my friends I died." Now I have another WoW friend who died this past summer. I believed this death with the details his brother was giving, until I started to get outside friend requests from my friend's name. Is there a point where we should just stop believing the stories of friends dying in WoW without outside proof? Should I mourn and then be happy when they suddenly reappear? Thank you for any advice you give. Doubtful Mourner
Drama Mamas: Keep it secret. Keep it safe.
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. The Lord of the Rings references stop at the title and this sentence. We're talking about drama here, not an all-powerful ring that sucks your soul and -- oops. Now the first sentence is a lie. Anyway, keep your drama out of guild chat to keep your guild a happy place safe from grievances and transgressions that are best handled behind closed, virtual doors. But in order to be successful at this, you absolutely have to deal with what caused the drama or else it's just going to creep back in again. This week's letter isn't so much about handling or preventing drama, but how to make sure guildies know that drama-causing issues are being addressed without extending the brouhaha.
Officers' Quarters: Mailbox roundup redux
Every Monday, Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership. He is the author of The Guild Leader's Handbook, available this spring from No Starch Press. Here at Officers' Quarters, I receive a number of emails every week that don't get featured in the column for various reasons (which I explained last time I did a roundup). Once again, it's time to examine some of these shorter -- but no less interesting! -- topics. This roundup's theme is Cataclysm concerns and preparation. Just the two of us Hello, I have tried to find this info but I cannot seem to find it anywhere, or I am really terrible at finding things. Is there going to be a minimum guild size to participate in guild leveling? I started a small guild for myself and my son to play in and we are having a great time, but I hoped we could take advantage of these new features without joining a larger guild or recruiting into the existing one. Obviously we would not get any experience for raids or dungeons, but what about questing and professions, or even rated battlegrounds? Thank you for your time, Callidor
Drama Mamas: When a guildie does something abhorrent
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. We often make the point in this column that WoW is in fact real life. It's real people interacting in a real way that has real consequences. This week's letter is a stark example of this. Sometimes the guildie with whom you are friends, whom you used to think well of, does something unethical, immoral, illegal or just plain cruel outside of the game. When he brings it in game, how do you handle it? Public Service Announcement: Regardless of how you feel about animals or what the animal has done, it is generally accepted that unwanted animals should be given to a shelter (link goes to how to find an animal shelter in the United States) rather than abandoned. It's not just about the animal's welfare; it is also best for the welfare of your human neighbors. Even if you are only thinking selfishly, there may also be legal ramifications, depending on what you do. On to the in-game drama: Dear Drama Mamas, I like playing this game. I like my new guild. I like the people I raid with, but now I'm starting to doubt my feelings toward my guildies. Today our tank didn't show up to the raid, so we were trying to find a replacement. After we replaced him and started the instance, he came online. We explained the situation and he seemed OK with not being in the raid. Ten minutes into the run, I saw him write in o-chat that he got rid of his cat today.
Officers' Quarters: Accelerating guild achievements
Every Monday, Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership. He is the author of The Guild Leader's Handbook, available from No Starch Press. News broke last week of a new Cataclysm beta patch that added a host of guild achievements to the game. MMO Champion has the full list. Some of these achievements -- such as looting 200,000 gold from creatures -- you may decide to allow to simply accumulate over time. After all, most of them can be earned through the natural course of events, assuming your members participate in all aspects of the game. However, if you'd like to pursue these guild achievements aggressively, this column is for you. Let's take a look at how you can accelerate some of these achievements and how you can motivate your guild to help. First of all, let's talk about the motivation that the game itself will provide. Earning guild achievements, according to August's guild advancement Q&A, provides "nice, fat chunks of experience [that] feel great when you get 'em." We also know from blue poster Mumper that "anything that grants guild XP will also grant guild faction." Putting two and two together, we can conclude that earning a guild achievement will also award the players who earned it a hefty dose of guild reputation. This extra guild rep and guild experience may be motivation enough. But why stop there? Let's take an active role, as officers, in providing organization and incentives.
Drama Mamas: Friends fight and the guild suffers
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. Friends are going to fight or at least disagree every once in a while. This really should be a private issue and not one that should spill over into a shared guild ... in a perfect world. What actually happens is drama -- awkward drama that affects the innocent bystanders and fellow guildies. At least that's what happened in this week's email. Dear Drama Mamas, I'd been playing in a guild with a couple of RL friends of mine and their friends/relatives. It was a nice, relaxed, casual environment to do some dungeons and 10-mans, and I very much enjoyed it. However, there had always been some sort of drama happening -- the worst of which was last month when, just before a raid, I whispered one of those RL friends of mine with some advice for the fights we were about to do. He was playing a new 80 and he hadn't done a raid in that role before. He immediately logs off, then logs back on a second later and says in raid chat, "DOES ANYONE HAVE A PROBLEM WITH ME!!! OTHER THAN [my name]!!!" We managed to get it sorted out, with appropriate apologies made from both sides, and continued with the raid.
