Posts with tag meeting

15 Minutes of Fame: House party!

by Lisa Poisso Jan 27th 2009 at 6:00PM

15 Minutes of Fame is our look at World of Warcraft players of all shapes and sizes – from the renowned to the relatively anonymous, the remarkable to the player next door. Tip us off to players you'd like to hear more about.

Wrath of the Lich King marked a turning point for WoW guild life. In a raiding environment based on smaller groups, Wrath allows players to gobble up endgame content in much more intimate groups. Many guilds have grown smaller, and many friendships have grown tighter. Many gamers who've been around the block with MMOs a time or two care a little less now about being in it to win it (with a rotating cast of a thousand relatively anonymous guildmates) and a little more about kicking back for some good times with their buddies.

Meet the members of Vivid (Frostwolf-H, US) – literally. Meeting in real life is the glue that has cemented the friendships in this energetic young guild. Vivid has gathered four times over half as many years, from a "small kegger at Chico State" to a recent New Year's house party with more than 20 guildmates cozying up at a cabin in North Lake Tahoe.

We visited with some of Vivid's real-life friends to find out why their meetups have become integral to their guild life.

Filed under: WoW Social Conventions, Features, Interviews, 15 Minutes of Fame

Azeroth comes through on the love hunt

by Mike Schramm Jul 23rd 2008 at 5:00PM

This is one of the sillier articles that PC Gamer UK has probably ever written about massively multiplayer online games, but still, I enjoyed it. One of their writers went (only half seriously) looking for love in a few popular virtual worlds, and he found it, surprisingly enough, in Azeroth.

Neither EvE Online or City of Heroes were very helpful in the love-finding department -- despite finding a fetching young lady superheroine in CoH, the writer was a little disappointed to find out she was a he behind the keyboard. But WoW, as usual, provides the best of MMO experiences -- the writer finds some cute love in the Night Elf starting area.

Sure, it's silly (and probably not true -- just because someone says they're a Finnish college student means nothing at all online). But I found it strangely touching, the thought that a real human connection could be made in an online game. And isn't that why we play these in the first place?

[via WorldofWar.net]

Filed under: Night Elves, Fan stuff, Virtual selves, Humor

The secret society of WoW players

by Mike Schramm May 5th 2008 at 7:30PM

Rufus on WoW LJ had something happen last weekend that I'd be happens to a lot of us players: He was introduced to someone who he had nothing in common with... except that they played World of Warcraft. It happens a few different ways -- sometimes, it's like what happened to Rufus, in that you share a mutual friend who knows you both play WoW. Sometimes, it's just someone (or you) overhearing something about WoW and realizing that you've found a fellow player. And sometimes it's just your guildies -- out of game, you have almost nothing at all in common, but the game has brought you together.

In my experience, it's usually just as awkward as Rufus makes it out to be -- especially when you're brought together by someone else, they have no idea that there are different factions and realms and that there are probably a good nine million, nine hundred and ninety thousand people you haven't ever met in game. There are some things that we have in common, obviously -- everyone has died to the Defias pillagers at some point, and almost everyone knows how tough it was getting past Moroes that first time. Sometimes, people can actually come together on these things -- I had a good old friend whose husband and I bonded a little for no other reason than that we both played Shamans.

But usually, especially if introductions are made by a third party, it's just awkward. Have you been in this situation? Did you come away as awkwardly as Rufus did or did you make a new friend thanks to your time in Azeroth?

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Virtual selves, Odds and ends

Breakfast Topic: Meeting WoW folks

by Amanda Dean Feb 23rd 2008 at 8:00AM

I've met some really cool people playing World of Warcraft. With the exception of a small handful of my RL friends, most of them are just friendly voices on Ventrilo. I had the opportunity to hang out with a guildie last spring. It was an awesome time.

We had been running lowbies on a new server. We had a Warrior, a Rogue, a Warlock and a Shaman that we were leveling together. All but the Warlock player live in Las Vegas. decided to spend part of his spring break with us. I went to pick him up at the airport holding a sign with his character name on it- probably not the strangest thing you'll ever see at McCarran International Airport. With the exception of a couple dinners out, we spent the entire weekend playing WoW. No casinos, no strip, no shows, no clubs- just WoW. I wouldn't have had it any other way.

Filed under: Events, WoW Social Conventions, Virtual selves, Breakfast Topics, Instances

Real life guild meetings

by Krystalle Voecks May 30th 2007 at 11:03AM

Over the years I've played a great many different MMOs. There have been communities as varied and interesting as the surrounding lore of the worlds involved. That said, the thing that has continued to keep me coming back for more in World of Warcraft after two and a half years is undoubtedly the absolutely fantastic people I'm honored to be guilded with.

While there have been the occasional odd visits and meetings, this weekend marked the first concerted effort at a real life "guild meeting." While sadly not everyone was able to make it, I feel relatively certain that I am speaking for the livers and/or tummies of all the people involved when I say that it was a smashing success. From Thursday to Tuesday we grilled out, drank, sang, danced, invaded local nightclubs, eateries, shops, and even "raided" both the zoo and an art museum! Many truly bad inside jokes were born ("Philosophically, you have already eaten the cookie.") and many people were introduced to a drink that has been dubbed "the Smitey Paw." (This is due to it's noxious green color, it's reference to a certain evil cat, and especially the fact that it has a tendency to smite you with very little warning.) But the absolute most amazing thing that came out of this weekend was getting to spend real-life time with my guild mates in the picture above -- and those were just the ones willing to pose for WoW Insider!

Over the last two years we've geared our mains, geared our alts, raided everything from AQ20 to Ragefire Chasm. (Yes, you can raid RFC.) But no matter what we've done, we've been focused on doing it together. Some folks have come and some have gone, but our core group has stuck together despite setbacks and guild drama and everything else that is no surprise to anyone who's ever been in a fairly large guild. This weekend was a celebration of that togetherness and those friendships that have been formed (or grown closer in some cases) thanks to World of Warcraft. So to my awesome guild mates -- and to all other guilds out there who have members that get together in real life to show that Gamers can party down too -- I raise my Smitey Paw in /salute to you!

Filed under: WoW Social Conventions, Guilds, Odds and ends, Humor

Need one more at meeting stone

by Mike Schramm May 11th 2007 at 1:24PM

Elizabeth put a good post up the other day about lazy folks who don't take the time to run back into an instance after a wipe, and this forum post by Eleutheria on EU Earthen Ring points out the other side of instance group laziness: Meeting stone standoffs.

Here's how it should work: if there aren't yet two people in your group standing by the meeting stone, everyone in the group should be running, riding, or flying to get there. But of course that's not what really happens-- what happens is that the leader of the group makes it there first, and everyone else continues grinding, or goes to check the AH one more time, or has to run repair, or finish a BG, or any number of things that don't involve getting to the meeting stone and summoning. Worst case scenario is that people start trying to convince others to go for them, and one guy is left at the meeting stone shaking his head.

Now, some people say that whoever made the group should be summoning, and in most cases, that seems like a good idea. But there are always exceptions. Even if I'm the last to enter a group, I usually start making my way towards the instance anyway-- the trip is never that long, no matter which instance you're going to, and it's better to be nice and use the flight to get another beer/soda then to sit around demanding a summon.

Unfortunately, there's no real way to fix this except to call out people for just plain being lazy. I guess it would be cool if Blizzard gave a nice timed buff to the first two people in a group to use a meeting stone summon, except then you'd probably have tons of people hanging around the RFC meeting stone in Org before they queued up for the battleground. As a few people point out in the thread, probably the best way to deal with it is just to give up on the group. Maybe next time they'll be ready to work together outside the portal as well as inside.

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Instances, Raiding

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