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The latest patch 5.4 newsBreakfast Topic: How do you make time for WoW?
by Andrew Ross 
Mar 12th 2011 at 8:00AM
There is such a wide variety of WoW players. Everyone from college students to 70-year-old gaming grandmothers play. Some people play for an hour or two every few days. Other people play for hours every night.
No matter what your play schedule is, you more often than not have to find time to play, and that can be hard. School, work, family, friends, other commitments ... All those things and more make a huge impact in finding time to play WoW without interruption. Making time to play can feel like planning a rocket launch sometimes. If you're a full-time college student, you spend a good portion of your day in class, you have to study almost daily, and when exams roll around, you live in your books. Someone with a full-time job and a family might as well feel like planning a rocket launch. There are so many things to do in one night that you can't even begin to list them all.
I knew a nurse who was working full time in the trauma room of the ER, going to school full time and had three kids. She was not only in one of the best raiding guilds on the server but also managed to do arena and go just over a 1,900 rating. I asked her how she made time for everything. Her answer? She took her laptop to work when she knew there would be a slow night and could do arenas. She would rotate on her nights off with the kids. Her husband was also a raider, so they would take turns getting the kids to bed for the night. Luckily, they were both gamers, so it was easier to find time to play.
How do you make time to play WoW? Are you limited to a few hours every night, or do you plan for a weekend of WoW?
Filed under: Breakfast Topics, Guest Posts
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 3)
Sergel Mar 12th 2011 10:55AM
For me its similar. Between music, writing and homework, I tend to be too lazy to play games.
a.atchinson Mar 12th 2011 9:18AM
Or she was lying how busy she was and wasn't a nurse at all :) Some people come up with incredible stories to be "incredible".
exogenesis. Mar 12th 2011 9:23AM
My shifts always fluctuate, so I basically get up at a time that allows me three or four hours of me-time playing WoW before work starts. I only work part time, while I look around for some animal care work that will allow me to get into the course I want to do. I can't remember the last time I had to struggle to find time for WoW - from October through to January, I was on sick leave, so practically had all day, ever day to play, since this thing people call "a social life" is a completely foreign concept to me. I have a boyfriend, but he lives across the Channel in Belgium, so I only see him one weekend a month, and play with him on WoW when our schedules allow it. So much time to play WoW has caused me to suffer burnout. I now only play to level mine and my partner's tank/healer duo with him. I'm playing another game before/after work until I get bored of that and can return to WoW. xD
Kenneth1971 Mar 12th 2011 9:34AM
I have bin playing wow for nealy a year now
I have a wife to look after as she became bed bound
So i do all the house work cooking cleaning washing.
I have a time limit to play wow about 5hours a day and i mostly play
At night when all my work is done.im not doing to bad i have 2 mages 1at73
And 1at 67 horde and alliance. Sometimes i dont have the time to play wow but when i get time
I enjoy it . I dont do many dungens or raides i enjoy questing……
Kat Mar 12th 2011 10:13AM
I'm a single mum, work full time and study part time. There's maybe an hour or two after my 2 year old goes to bed, after the house is clean, and after I've done some studying in which I can squeeze WoW. I probably should sleep instead but I really enjoy my WoW 'treat' after a long hard day. Better than staring blankly at the telly anyway!
Trilynne Mar 12th 2011 9:55AM
I'm a nursing student, but I tend to be very efficient with my studying, so I have a couple hours a day to play most of the time. The only times I tend not to is on clinical rotations: I get up at 5:30-6am, go to the hospital from 7-3 if I'm lucky, 7-5 or 7-7 if I'm not, come home, make supper, make sure I have a lunch and snacks for tomorrow, do research and whatever else 'reflective journal' project my profs have come up with, go to bed, repeat. Those times, I only play on weekends. xP
Sergel Mar 12th 2011 10:55AM
I'm a nursing student also, but I haven't gotten to clinicals just yet. What exactly are they? Are they basically field work studies?
Trilynne Mar 12th 2011 11:26AM
I imagine it might differ from school to school, but here's how mine work: a group of nursing students, 5-7, and one clinical instructor who is an RN her/himself, are assigned to one floor or floor section in the hospital(or long-term care facility if you're in first year). You get a patient assignment each day, anywhere from 1 to 3 patients, and you have to research your patient's condition and medications the day before. Then, when you go in for your clinical day, you do as much of the patient's care as you can at your skill level, so starting with things like personal care and working up to medication administration. Your patients will also have their official nurse assigned by the floor, and they will either double check your work or leave you to it depending on their personality. If you need help with anything, you go to your clinical instructor or your co-assigned nurse. Your clinical instructor will check in with you at various times during the day to see how you're doing, usually.
Hope that helps! :)
Sergel Apr 18th 2011 9:21PM
Thanks for that! It was really helpful. I'm worried about not getting into my school and not finding volunteer work, but hopefully it all goes well.
DarkWalker Mar 12th 2011 9:59AM
In small chunks, usually 30 minutes at a time.
Which means I will only consider returning to WoW if at least 90% of LFD random heroics are successfully finished in less than 30 minutes, or if Blizzard adds some other way of gearing up for raids that is not much more inefficient and can be done in 30 minutes chunks.
Oh, and if tanking heroics become fun again. Cataclysm heroics are more frustration than fun to tank.
Zirus Mar 12th 2011 10:15AM
I personally play whenever it doesnt conflict with my personal life, work, or gym. Which is generally 1-2 hours beginning at 11pm. Ive been playing since BC and this is how its been when Ive been active. Im finally getting drawn back into the raiding scene on my Tank and the game is becoming more fun.
teejmorrison Mar 12th 2011 10:20AM
I usually just play when I happen to be off and my girlfriend is working. That way it doesn't interrupt us doing anything and I can play interrupted :D
I generally work on weekends so its usually during the week that I get my play in
Pryn Mar 12th 2011 10:24AM
I'm full time at home with two pre-school kids, if they nap during the day I'll get some ingame time, maybe a random if they sleep at the same time. If they are having 'downtime' with a movie or something then I get some crafting and AHing done (laptop ftw!). Once they go to bed in the evening both hubby and I like to get our wow on.
We both raid but on alternating nights so that one is always free to parent-spec on the rare occasions it might be needed. The nights where we are not raiding we spend at least one out of game and doing something else together. When we have a social event and a babysitter available, we just bench from a raid and enjoy the nights out when we have the option.
I've 3 lvl85s, my raiding main just started working on heroic raids with 2-3 nights of raids a week. I run a small RP guild in between too. Supporting each other in persuing our favourite hobby to the best we can while we have small kids is something that makes 'us' work.
Prelimar Mar 12th 2011 11:07AM
simple: I gave up watching TV.
krko Mar 12th 2011 11:26AM
This, a thousand times
dannyflorida Mar 12th 2011 7:53PM
Me, too. I cancelled my cable TV (to save money, but I wasn't watching TV anyway). WoW is more fun!
Another way I make time for WoW: I don't play other games and don't care to.
Prelimar Mar 12th 2011 8:08PM
@dannyflorida -- yes, me too. cancelled cable, don't care about most other games. WoW is my entertainment and online socializing, all in one package these days.
neogramps Mar 14th 2011 6:10AM
^this
Took a while for my gf to adjust to the fact that me sitting in the same room with her watching tv and me playing wow wasn't that different from me sitting watching tv with her.
Still sit down together to watch films and a few shows a week, but other than that, TV holds little appeal for me.
Monger Mar 12th 2011 11:16AM
COMPROMISE!!!
Hellwraith Mar 12th 2011 11:42AM
While studying I always cancelled my account during the months of university. Architecture can be this huge black hole... sucking every little bit of time, health, humanity... Once I was done with that and started working, I usually cancel my account when I see huge amounts of working coming up. As a freelancer architect sometimes I'm juggling with 3 projects, so when I'm about to close a deal with customers, I program my agenda and cancel my account for the amount of months that I consider I will be working :P If I don't do that, I don't get money to pay for WoW so I try and focus on the money making matter, to have an active account and later cancel it due to work :P
My social interaction is barely non-existant, so I never feel as a sacrifice to keep inside playing WoW; pretty much all the people I hang around play WoW :P