Wednesday, February 17, 2010

The State of Things

It's really been over a week since my last post?

Guess that's a reflection on my current gaming situation...at least as far as WoW is concerned.

So, I'm starting to experience the oh, so familiar pains of "burn out" that seems so common these days in the blogging community. Finding myself logging in less and less. Honestly, there has been more days that I don't log in at all. The days that I do log in, it's to check on the guild or transmute or mill or disenchant things for someone.

What's causing this burn out? That's totally opinionated I'm sure. It's different for everyone but for me I believe it's the lull before the storm. It's a combination of things. It's the anticipated down time between now and the release of Cataclysm. It's the guild, it's the grind, it's the boredom...

I had such a wonderful "Bucket List" of things that I thought would help tide me over or at least help me get prepared for Cataclysm. hmmmm

So what's going on?!?!

I know how the Lich King dies, I know how the story ends...what's left to do? Push to see him die myself? Why? I've already seen it on Youtube. I've successfully tanked all of ToC over this past weekend. Found it more stressful then fun, that was another warning sign for me that I'm getting close to "burn out".

I've got a well geared tank and a well geared healer. I've got a shaman that I can't make myself gear because..well, apparently shaman just aren't my thing. Can't find any fun in her. Couldn't find it in BC, can't find it now.

I've got a lovely little gnome warlock that is slowly, ever so slowly, working on her gear and maybe a Loremaster title. If she gets it, that's great, if not I don't think I'll be too disappointed.

The guild...well this all comes down to a question asked by a reader.
"Do you think the LFG tool is killing guilds, or do your think the lack of useful guilds created the LFG tool?"

Morph posted this in the comment section of my last post a couple weeks ago and got me thinking. The result? Well, the more I think about it the more if I wonder if this isn't part of the reason for my potential "burn out"?

So which one is it, you may ask. The new LFG system or the guild?

Well, I think the answer to this question on my part is simple. I think the LFG system is the start of the end of the smaller guilds. I don't think it will totally kills guilds in general but I do strongly believe we will start to see and have already, the smaller guilds disappear.

Why? Well because you don't need a guild anymore. Think about it. It use to be that you "needed" a good guild, or any guild really, to be able to easily run instances and heroics. You needed that guild if you wanted to see the end game content.

The guild that played together stayed together. It was that simple. You kept your members by making sure they got to see what they signed up for. They were more willing to work with the guilds raiding schedule because that's the only way they could see the content. If they couldn't work with your schedule they found a guild who's schedule worked with theirs.

Back in BC and the early days of Wrath, hell even in vanilla wow, guilds used their calendars, scheduled events, talked in guild chat, made plans with members when they wanted to raid or grind out some emblems. Guild chat, at least for Last Call, was always full of chitter chatter from the members looking to put together heroic groups or world events or unscheduled raids. It was never a silent game for sure.

This "chitter chatter" that started as looking for people to form the group led to other interesting conversations. It led to people getting to know each other. People forming more then just a group...they formed friendships.

That group might have to pug a spot or two, yes. But if they needed to pug that spot, it was often the opportunity to recruit someone. That person they pugged often wasn't in a guild..thus looking for a home and on more then one occasion, we ended up gaining a member.

Yes, you had those rare people that joined for the community or for the guild chat or other benifits but mainly, guilds were needed for raiding and end game content.

Fast forward to the current day. Getting into a heroic is as easy as clicking a button and waiting a few minutes. It's even easier then that if you're a tank or a healer. Just click the button and your in. Deal with a little bit of stupidity, walk away with your loot and call it a day.

There is no reason to "chat" unless you're the social type of person that wants people to talk to while you quest or instance. Even if you are that person, you have general chat or your pug group to chitter chatter with if you like.

What about the end game content? Well, obviously you don't need a guild for that anymore either thanks to Blizzards super simple gear up policy. Push the random LFG button a few times and *poof* you're fully geared to get into Toc and ICC.
"Oh, but I need a guild for that, right?"

Nope...not anymore. Tune into the "LookingForGroup" channel on any well established server and what do you see ever 30 - 45 seconds?
"LFM, ICC 10, pst your role and gear score"

Thus the cycle is never ending. Push the button, get the loot, pick up the pug and see the end...

So tell me again, why do we need the guild when I can grind it all out in PUGs????

Exactly...and now I know why I'm looking forward to the release of Cataclysm. Give me something to do beside push the button, damn it, this isn't LOST!

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