Ambitions and frustrations

If I currently sound less happy about World of Warcraft it is because I know what I want, but can't seem to get there. And come to think of it, that is also the reason why other people I know are unhappy. It doesn't matter whether you are casual or raider, PvE or PvP, if you can't do what you want to do, you are likely to become frustrated.

I know a lot of raiders who are frustrated because either they can't get raids organized at all, or when they get a raid running it isn't as successful as they think it should be, or they would like to join a uber-raiding guild and don't get accepted. I know PvP players who either are frustrated that the PvP pickup groups they find always lose against better organized PvP groups using voice chat, or they are frustrated that some battlegrounds never open up, or they have to stand in a waiting queue for a long time. Casual players get frustrated with bad pickup groups, or not being able to get a group with a good class mix together.

No wonder that leveling from 1 to 59 in PvE solo is so popular. If you can solo, you don't get frustrated about not being able to get a group of whatever size together, and you don't get frustrated about other people playing badly and making your group "lose". You might still be unsatisfied of not being able to beat some specific encounter, but while you still level that problem solves itself. You just go somewhere else first, level up, gain some better gear, and then come back and beat the encounter you had problems with.

Of course playing with other people has its own rewards, and for example playing in a good 5-man group is my preferred mode of play. But having to rely on other people being there, helping you, and being competent about it has all numbers of pitfalls built in, which can easily frustrate you. So before somebody else adds it in the comments, I quote Sartre with "Hell is other people", which might be even more true in online games than in real life.
- posted by Tobold @ 10:28 AM Permanent Link