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Drama Mamas: 20 signs it's time to leave your guild
Many of the letters the Drama Mamas receive are from players who don't actually have a problem they need or want to solve; they're simply seeking support and permission to move on. Boy, is it tough to let go! People naturally feel trepidation about leaving a known environment, even when it's the very thing making them unhappy. We cling to the familiar, losing sight of the fact that if we change nothing, nothing changes. Sometimes, though, the best thing to do is to calmly pick up, dust off, and move on. While the columns we've linked below don't necessarily represent times the Drama Mamas thought moving on was the best or only solution, they do illustrate the tangle of denial many players find themselves in over circumstances that are right there in black and white. You know it's time to move on when ... Your guild condones or even promotes public drama. Your guild has no firm rules. You're expending emotional energy to tolerate an atmosphere that doesn't fit what you want from a guild. You've made it a rule to refuse to group or speak with a guildmate who plays with you frequently. You don't actually play with the people in your guild -- and you're lonely.
Drama Mamas: Witch hunt
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. Mobs and justice don't tend to mix. Drama Mamas, I joined a new guild, and everything was great. People were happy and talkative, they were doing things together, and the guild leader had made it clear people could approach him if they had a problem with his leadership and he would step down if they thought someone would be better. This lasted all of about 2 days after I joined. I came home and was immediately pulled into a conversation where I was told the leader was sexually harassing female members, sending them creepy messages and making them feel unsafe. This was serious, and the first thing I asked was did anyone bring this to him. I got a vague 'he was told' and no more information, so I accepted what they were telling me. They initiated a public vote on the forums to have him removed from the guild, after telling everyone unaware about it (before giving them a chance to hear the leader's side) and expected us to vote based on that.
Drama Mamas: Dealing with a stalker
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. Harassment comes in many forms. Sometimes it's a one-off, like last week's letter. The bullying was ongoing, but by different people in discrete incidents. Harassment can also be felt from generalized statements made to the public, such as racial remarks in trade chat. But this week, we talk about ongoing harassment or stalking. The actions we say to take are not for someone who was being harassed, but the stalker stopped. Nor are they for someone who just doesn't want to ever hear from another player, but nothing offensive has actually happened. Stalking = ongoing harassment = a serious problem. This week, we tackle the issue by offering some advice to help reduce -- and hopefully eliminate -- this very harmful drama.
Drama Mamas: Bullying is not welcome here
Mishandled humor is one thing. But stereotyping, disdain, and bullying? The WoW community has no room for players who've made those a part of their rotation. Dear Drama Mamas, Starting things off; I'm a Moonguard player. Hear that sound? I know you do, because the mere word Moonguard invokes it in so many players now; words like "obscene" or "immature" or "inappropriate" jump to mind. And it drives me absolutely crazy. Let's get the obvious out of the way; Moonguard has a bad reputation because of Goldshire. And Silvermoon City. Okay, fine, yes, we get the point. But every single time I get into a group, every single time I enter a Battleground, or an Arena, the moment I even say anything (or sometimes when I haven't said anything yet), it begins. The more polite chuckleheads spew it into the public chat, every possible Moonguard joke and comment they can think of, and a couple of personal attacks against anyone who would dare to touch the place with a ten foot pole. The less polite ones start whispering, telling you to get out of the group, or to disconnect, to stop being a child or stop being a freak of nature. Heaven help you if ANYONE in that dungeon group turns out to be bad, because it can and will get blamed on you. If your team ends up down 0/2 and you mention it's because so-and-so is dancing on the roof not attacking or defending, you could be in the enemy flag room, with the flag, having downed half of the other team solo, and it's your fault because you're a filthy Moonguard player (this is also about the time you get the wonderful suggestion that you should kill yourself).
Drama Mamas: Sex talk
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. Sex. Hello Ladies, I am not sure if you can publish this as it's very adult themed but I am hoping you can because I really need your help! I honestly believe that if I was a man, this wouldn't even be an issue but for now this is really pulling me down. About three months before the new expansion, I came back to WoW and joined what I thought was an awesome guild. I've been through my probation and for the most part it's been great fun. The thing with this guild though is that it's very... sexually charged. Most threads get hijacked by something sexual and they even have a NSFW section that is filled with more naked photos than all the men's magazines combined. Even new members are greeted by sexual questions in their application thread. How you response to these questions seems to almost dictates how the guild will receive you.
Drama Mamas: Of friendship and hate
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. All About Eve: delicious drama, delicious acting, delicious writing. Do watch. This week's letter has not-so-delicious drama. Do read. Dear Drama Mamas, I met a person that I instantly hit it off with roughly 5 years ago. We became best friends almost overnight. She played DPS and I played a healer. We ran dungeons nightly together and formed a raid team where I was the main healer. We chewed glass weekly and the people in the raid were all awesome. We joked around, didn't get upset over wipes, and were generally stress-free; for a time, it was good. Then there was the heroic ZG run. I will never forget that night. It was my friend, myself, and an officer in the guild who I didn't know very well but was told was a cool guy. The tank was pugged. The tank had been a jerk to me throughout the entire run and wiped us twice because he kept attacking CCd targets then blaming it on me being a 'baddie'. So, I refused to heal him anymore. He could either leave the group, or we were kicking him in 10 minutes when the cooldown was up.
Drama Mamas: Too skittish to face the mob
When the fear factor of an MMO revolves more around social hits from fellow players than it does physical hits from monsters, you know something's out of whack. After reading this week's letter, I certainly felt like whacking something -- namely, the ugly atmosphere that makes grouping a hellish prospect for anyone who's been dragged through the dirt one too many times. Dear Drama Mamas, I've been playing this game for three or four years now (I'm still a teen, though) and I really wanted to ask you about something. About two years ago, I first started raiding. I continued going to the pug many times, always with the same raid leader. (Let's call him R.) I started talking in vent with him and his guild, and raided with them quite a lot. I was really sheepish at first because: 1. I was a kid, 2. I'm afraid of social interaction, and 3. I'm a girl. Everything went fine though, for several months. It was when R needed to go off to work, and couldn't lead the raids anymore when things got bad. I wasn't in his guild, but he felt that I could be trusted enough to be the raid leader. He passed it over to me, handed over his group macros for recruting, and told people I would be leading. He also put two people with me to be my raid assists. (Let's call them Andni and Pir. These are not their actual names.) I would always start of the raid slightly paniced, but by the end I was joking around with everyone and having a good time. But during one Black Temple run, everything went bad.
Drama Mamas: He's ready to plaaayyy ...
Time for a nostalgic trip back to Ulduar, boys and girls. This week's letter writer? Like a certain clockwork creation from our past, he might be just a little overeager to come out and play ... Hi WoW Insider Drama Mamas, So ... I'm a WoW n00b. I get the impression I'm a rarity these days (even with the release of Mists of Pandaria) (I'm so n00b I've only recently worked out that WoW means World of Warcraft and not like "Hey, man, WoW!" with a badly placed capital letter). IRL I'm a pretty outgoing bloke as well. I'm not short of mates, and friendly to most people I know. I even have a young family, and a wife I love very much. I'm an internet veteran who remembers ICQ and IRC chat. I've hung out on rock band and football club forums and successfully existed online there. I've played MMO style games before, in particular Second Life which is all about being social, and I've done well in the whole making friends thing there. But when it comes to WoW, I don't seem to be able to strike it, socially at least. I've got one mate on my friends list, who I know from RL; however, I worry I make him sick of me bugging him with my n00b questions. (What's the Dungeon Hunter? Where do I get leather from to make stuff with? Who's Leeroy Jenkins?) I had a brief "fling" with a girl kind enough to take me on my first dungeon run. I kept dying. I'm sure she was laughing her head off. But she was very gracious, kind, and friendly. I friended her, however I think she's since culled me from her friends list which of course makes me sad, but hey maybe she had to cull her list because it was too busy for her to concentrate on playing perhaps. I understand that sort of thing completely and I'm certainly not hurt over it. Other than that ... Every time I chat publicly to someone I'm either ignored or they run away. Comments in the casual guild I've joined seem to get ignored. And like I say, I don't want to drown my RL mate in-game either. Would love to see what you both have to say. What makes the WoW denizen different from other online hangout denizens? Many thanks, Scott Nofriends
Drama Mamas: Of flirtations and gquits
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 letter writer is busted. Dear Drama Mamas, I recently had a bit of a blow-up with a guild I used to be in that's really making me feel kinda crappy about myself...and I'm not really sure if it wasn't my fault. Okay, so I was a casual member (i.e, not a raider) in a raiding guild with a female GM who has an....admirer, I'll call him B. B is a core raider who flirts openly and rather explicitly at times with GM (also a raider) over guild chat. GM does nothing to encourage it, but nothing to discourage it either, and as far as I know she's already in a relationship, and she and B live in different parts of the country. She added me to Real ID so we chatted and still do from time to time - I have no romantic interest in her whatsoever since I'm already in a relationship.
Drama Mamas: The dull, gray blur of skipping content
Whenever I struggled with some painful but ultimately voluntary "solution" in my young life, my mother was fond of reminding me, "If it hurts, stop banging your head against the wall." Motivational monster Susan Powter put the idea a little more forcefully for her legions of followers in the '90s: "Stooooop the insanity!" This week, an admittedly WoW-obsessed player overshoots the mark while ramming his partner through what was intended to be an enjoyable Recruit-A-Friend introduction to WoW. I have a little problem that the two of you may be able to help with. I am a slightly obsessive WOW player (9 max level toons) who is currently in the honeymoon phase of a relationship. I have been able to convince my partner to join me in game and we are currently using the recruit a friend option. I am running him on my Protection Warrior while he plays his Mage. The thing is we are leveling so fast in dungeons that I am unable to convey the lore behind the things we are doing. All of the things that I loved about the game when I first started (the discovery, exploration, story etc.) are not carrying over to his experience in game. And when I look at things through his eyes I feel as if we are indeed playing a very boring game. He seems more glad it's over when we finish dungeon rather than excited and ready to see what's next. I know he only joined the game to spend more time with me since I would regularly leave him to his own devices while I got my WOW fix in and I would really like for him to enjoy it as much as I do. And who am I kidding the more time he wants to play with me the less time I spend feeling selfish and guilty that I am not spending time with him outside of the game when I play. I suggested that we do BG's but he is a little bit apprehensive about diving into those and who could blame him he is a level 70 Mage with barely enough play time to be level 20. What would you guys suggest that I do or incorporate into our playtime with each other to make it more interesting for someone seeing WOW for the first time but playing the game with a seasoned vet? Should I bite the bullet pull off my heirlooms and quest alongside him even if doing this would make me into the bored one? He is really eager to learn the game and I am sure that he would enjoy it as much as I do if I could convey even a little bit of the experience that I had in the beginning. Sincerely, No time to smell the roses
Drama Mamas: Crushed by a crush
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 play WoW with someone you secretly have a crush on? How is that working out for you? This week's letter writer is worried, and Lisa and I disagree as to what to do about it. Hello Drama Mamas, I am a very happy WoW player, enjoying every aspect of the game and always being able to find something funny and rewarding to do - I have done Arena, Raiding, leveling and also achievement hunting with the same level on enjoyment - I truly love this game and what it has to offer me. Despite enjoying end game content I am not the player that like the environment of a progressing raid guild or a pvp Guild that runs RBGs or other high-ranked PvP action; I am one of those players that is able to play regularly with a casual approach. This is the first step that made me join a "Casual/Social" Guild about one year ago; there, I found a lot of players with my same interests and since then I had even more fun playing this game.
Drama Mamas: 51 more things you should (probably) never say in game
Attention, literalists: As you probably noticed from the comments on last week's column, these are not things that should never never be said in game. They're more things that should probably never be said in game. Or sometimes just not said in game until you've thought about them first. Or maybe only said in game if there aren't other extenuating circumstances or unless common sense would dictate something completely different. Context is king, right? Here are a bunch more things you should (probably) never say in game. Robin's even brought in a fresh take on the infamous #7 from last week. (It's at #7 this week, too.) Click the links on each entry if you want more context. Click, click. "Well, maybe we should give her another chance or three -- after all, she's gay/young/old/single/a parent ..." Your fellow players are real people with real lives and real problems, sure -- but at some point, inappropriate or downright bad behavior is simply not cool. "It's just a game. Real life should be separate from a guild." Are you guilded with real people? Then it's real life. The game is just the medium you are using to interact with them. "I just think everyone/another party should know about the bad things that this person is doing..." Big yellow caution flag. Nothing good can come from butting into a situation in which you're only a bystander without complete information. Appropriate action -- then back off! "It should be a rule that everyone has to say hello to guildies when they log on. And they need to grats everyone too." Gosh, wouldn't that be sincere and meaningful. /sarcasm "What I said was only words -- and besides, he deserved it." That's what an online environment is, "only words." Those words and their effects are still quite real. Don't take an eye for an eye in WoW. Nobody deserves poor behavior in return for mistakes of their own.
Breakfast Topic: What WoW spell would you most like in real life?
We recently tackled the Blog Azeroth Shared Topic: What spell would you most want? The question was meant for your class in game, but reader Andrew wanted it to be about having spells in the physical world. So here we are. For my part, my answer would be exactly the same: Zen Flight. This minor monk glyph won't be released until Mists of Pandaria, so you can't find it in game yet. But you can see my monk Krikkit above being all zen-like in the beta. Wouldn't it be great to float in line at the grocery store, looking all relaxed and glowy? Sure, people would look at me funny, but they do that already -- I have shocking pink hair. Oooh the Zen Flight colors would look great with pink, wouldn't they? Hmmm ... maybe a bit too 80s. Anyway, I could use it everywhere. Waiting for mass transit? Yes. Crossing the street? Yes. Disneyland? Yes, please. What spell would you most want in the physical world and why?
Drama Mamas: 40 things you should never say in game
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. When Lisa and I started to tackle this list, we thought we'd come up with 5 or 10. But after looking back over the advice we've given since we started this column, we discovered that there are many more un-smart things to say that are almost guaranteed to cause drama. Captain Obvious helped with many of them as usual, but some of these no-nos are not so apparent. "Yeah, I know the requirement is 18 years and up -- but everyone says I act mature for my age." If you have to excuse your age, you won't fit in. Find a guild or group that won't be making exceptions even to simply include you. "But Mooom, you SAID I could play an HOUR!" Don't whine for more. Tell Mom how much time you need and why: "I can zip through all my dailies and banking – those are the chores my character uses to make money and maintain her stuff -- in about an hour and 20 minutes." "Yeah, baby, I love you too – oh crap, sorry guys, I'm on the phone here and I didn't see that one from the side coming towar – yeah, baby, I heard you! Sure! We'll leave in 20 minutes!" If you're going to play with the group, turn off other distractions. If your girlfriend won't leave a phone message, perhaps you should be spending that time with her instead!
Drama Mamas: Can you keep calm and carry on?
We all choose how to react to the world around us. Nobody's exempt -- we're so much more than the sum of our knee-jerk reactions to life. Yet it's also true that harnessing raging emotions is hard, especially when things hurt, and sometimes we're just not up to the task. When continued pain seems inevitable, sometimes treating ourselves with respect means making a measured retreat. The trick is knowing which situations merit dogged perseverance and which deserve said measured retreat. Hey Drama Mamas I am a raid leader for my guild, I handle guild progression and the GM handles farming and alt runs, After a long struggle we finally are all set up to make some serious momentum in Mists of Pandaria after using DS to bolster our ranks. Furthermore about 2 years ago I brought my girlfriend into the game and guild. Recently one of the guild members we picked up in dragon soul started raiding heavily with us. He quit his other guild where he had lots of friends to join us. I am a tank and for our progression I asked him to be my Co-tank. We did arenas together for a while and became fairly close. Then the other day my girlfriend (also on the progression team) and I broke up. If that was not enough, she then started dating my Co-tank. I found out that the two of them had been in contact ever since they first raided together.
Drama Mamas: The prodigal GM returns
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. Actions. Consequences. Drama. Hello Drama Mamas, When I joined over two years ago, our 25-man raiding guild used a 2-headed GM system. Of course, only one had the guild controls, but they would pass things back and forth at times and had equal say in policy. Over a year ago, one of them, the creator of the guild left the game due to some heavy real life issues. Guild control was passed to the other, and another co-GM was assigned. We were told often that the old GM would be returning soon, but none of us ever heard from him.
The Drama Mamas guide to teen video gaming and World of Warcraft
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. Lisa and I love it when parents parent and teens try to reason with them rather than just mindlessly rebel. To the Drama Mamas, I am a teen male who plays WoW and has for about a year and a half. I enjoy playing and have a joined a good guild with several good irl friends and enjoy the game immensely, however my parents don't seem to have the same perspective. My parents limit the time I can spend on the game to about one hour every day which is not something I am particularly fond of. I may not be the Mr. Outdoors my father hoped for, but I get good grades and am not involved in any of the bad things that occur in school or in my age group.
Drama Mamas: The case of the raid leader and his future wife
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'm not usually a fan of Coldplay, but my new favorite show, Newsroom, made me like this song. It's also appropriate for this week's letter. Note: You can't fix people. Hey Drama Mamas, I'm writing you guys to talk about a situation that is on the brink of breaking open. Just to say ahead of time, this is a situation of a couple who are in the upper ranks. She is an officer, one of two and he is the raid leader. As the GM, I leave the raid leading to my raid leader. I participate in the raids as well, but I prefer not to be the one giving all the directions in the middle of fights. The issue is his fiance. We'll call her A. Out of the two, she wears the pants. More often than not, she is either talking over the raid leader ( we'll call him B) or running the show through him where the rest of us cannot hear (their computers are right next to each other). This wouldn't be much of an issue, but it undermines the person I put in charge so when he actually tries to lead, our others don't give him the respect and attention he needs. Often times, I will step in and start calling the shots when things get too out of hand.
Breakfast Topic: OK, fine, hit me with your best pandaren pun name
In vanilla WoW, it was gnomes: Gnomebase, Noplacelikegnome, Etphognome ... You know the drill -- wherever an obnoxious pun could be made, it was made. Repeatedly and endlessly. It wasn't so bad in The Burning Crusade, but Cataclysm brought the worgen and another cavalcade of pun names: Worgenfreeman, Captnworgen and so on and so on. Now we've got the pandaren coming in Mists, and I've heard hints of terrible puns here and there as suggestions for horrible names that will have everyone in a 30-foot radius groaning. So let's have it. Give me your best pandaren pun names. Go on, let it all out -- I know you've been aching to share all the absolutely terrible puns you've been thinking up. Here's your chance to unleash all those pent-up puns you've been dying to inflict on people. I'm only saying this once though, so you better get it all out while you can. And when I'm done reading the comments and laughing, I never want to hear another pandaren pun again. Well, maybe one or two more. Just for giggles.
Drama Mamas: Problem guildie vs. inassertive GM
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. Brownie points to the person who can concoct a connection between the above video and this week's letter. I failed. I was just in the mood for the song. Dear Drama Mamas, I've been thinking of writing for some time, and have reached the tipping point. There is one obnoxious and rude guy in guild who ruins the fun for the overwhelming majority of the rest of us. He curses, bullies, and complains nearly constantly in guild chat in what has to be intentionally improper English (since still spells his class incorrectly after years of playing), and yells loud obscenities in vent if he doesn't win a drop. He shows a lack of respect for everyone (and our time) by coming to raids woefully unprepared (like tanking in an alt group without an offspec so he has to be MT, without gems or enchants and improperly specced, while not knowing what he needs to do in his new role and not knowing his own abilities) and causing us to spend hours on wipes and not be able to complete the run. The GM is stuck in a place where she's damned if she does and damned if she doesn't, because if he doesn't come he makes things even more miserable for everyone. No one is sure why she puts up with him, because he's been rude and very inappropriate to her as well.
