http://www.justonemoar.com

Tuesday 09 August, 2011 at 12:22 am / 0 comment

The Raid, friendships and the purpose of guilds

I’m not really a raider and have never done it in World of Warcraft, but I’ve read about it for years. It was to my understanding that the best guilds were typically run by players that could be well organized in real life. The store manager that managed his employees well, The college student who knows what he has to do in order to get good grades, the stay at home super-mom that knows how to make people get things done on a tight schedule, and many other people with healthy, developed skills can aid group projects. I believe it’s been shown on WoW Insider and other gaming sites over the years that even some of the very best guilds don’t play a whole lot. They simply play more structured. They plan everything out, meet around their real-life schedules and when they do get to play,  they don’t mess around. This is all part of my little critique of The Raid(That’s being facetious – it’s over 1800 words).

I’m guessing <Months Behind>(or Double Dragons?) is one of those middle-of-the-road guilds that may get fairly high-up in rankings or placement because they have the time to devote. And this isn’t a black-and-white bashing of people I don’t even know: This is a critique based off their performance in The Raid. I can’t help but think many other successful guilds play only half or even a quarter of the amount of time and are just as successful. It’s a successful raiding ratio. A guild playing many hours a week might wipe a lot due to a less cohesive guild, while a guild that really has it together can get the job done right the first time, more often. I don’t think raiders would admit that time alone is all you need to excel in WoW, but for the obscene amount of time some MMO players devote to the game, time might be on their side.

As for a documentary intended for non-gamers: I’d never ask anyone except my gaming friends to watch this. I’m not saying because I think it’s bad or anything. I simply would not show this video to anyone. It pretty much would give them license to say “nerd” and I don’t think they’d want to watch until the end, anyway. Accurate though it may be, it doesn’t sum up the entire gaming community. Rather, I would watch this as a gamer with gamers and if others walked by, saw it, and snorted “nerd” I’d proclaim proudly my geek status – just like I would for anything gaming related I do that attracts that reaction.

This is coming from a very gamer-centric mentality, but I disagree with Lore’s description that sets the stage at the beginning of the film to explain why we play:

“The primary goal of the MMO is to make your character the best you possibly can.”

The primary goal is to have fun and that fun is not contingent on making your character the best it can be. Yes. That’s true even in raiding. Doesn’t it sound a little contradictory to say you play MMOs for the camaraderie and friendship when people are easily kicked from guilds because they’re not helping the guild achieve leetness – Even if the people that didn’t make the cut could’ve benefited both of you, as far as friendships are concerned. Meanwhile people right now, in countless guilds, collectively agree they have at least one member who is a less-than-nice person, but he or she gets to stay because he or she is a better player? That’s why the “I stay for the friendships” phrase always sounds like a cliche used for rationalizing bad behavior to me.

People get angry, annoyed, frustrated and upset – even with friends. We don’t need to rationalize why we do it. Ultimately we should want to stop being angry, annoyed or generally unhappy while we play a game meant to entertain us, have more fun and get along better with the people we willingly choose to consort with. Short and long term friendships can, and do, crop up, but to say it’s not about the game, but about the people just sounds too one-sided. It comes off sounding a bit like a lie – in contrast to guilds that want to beat other players or other guilds in MMOs. I think laypeople who watch The Raid will know there’s simply more to it than that. It’s an idealistic possibility, but more often than not it doesn’t ring true in light of seeing all the frustration, fighting and desire to do whatever it takes to achieve.

Guilds can recruit, shed the unsightly in lieu of nice as well as good players, slowly develop a good membership and eventually create a group of people that work well together, could be a top guild and could also become the best of friends, but what if you and all the members that were kicked for simply being “bad” players were already friends? Would you still kick them? If it’s not about the game at all, but only about the people, I’d assume no one was getting kicked from guilds for not playing enough or being good enough to compete.

My guild in Runes of Magic is very tightly structured. We have many sensible rules and the leadership circle is extremely friendly and all about the individual. There are specific ways to do things to keep the machine running smoothly for the benefit of each player. We help each other no matter how long it takes. We are slowly getting better because we care about just having fun – so we’ll take the time it takes to help players that can’t keep up or are much less skilled. We won’t make top guild nearly as fast as others. Maybe we’ll never be on top, but we’re a group of people slowly becoming friends by hanging out with each other and being generally kind and helpful people while playing a game we all enjoy.

Many guilds – raiding guilds included – don’t have to be purely social groups only filled with like-minded people who gravitate towards each other. Those aren’t guilds built around friendships or the idea of starting friendships – although friendships can come out of that. They’re little social circles that have people of the same interest (The game, a particular raid, winning, etc…) that will have people that don’t like each other, players putting up with other rude, obnoxious players or players that really don’t want to socialize with anyone else in the guild, but they are there because they want to beat the game and they saw a particular guild – or any guild – as conducive to helping them achieve that, and they found the other members hilarious, friendly, kind or just barely tolerable.

It begs the questions: Are people joining and staying with guilds based on how successful they see that guild becoming, while trying to tolerate a group they really might not like all that much? Do they ignore all loot, speed of progression and success rate in lieu of finding good personalities to interact with? Or are people much less selective when choosing which guild to settle down in?

This is going out on a limb, but I think the current trend in gaming isn’t conducive for guilds who want to form for different reasons. Older MMOs like Vanguard, Everquest, Everquest II or Ultima were fuller. The nature of the beast allowed for guilds to nitpick specific goals within the entire game, or try to complete everything and feel rewarded personally and by how the MMO operated. Players can and will do whatever they want, even in WoW, but how many different activities can the guild complete together other than raiding? Are there less casual, non-raiding guilds today than back in the day? Are there less alternate achievements and activities today for guilds than back in the day? Or is there as much personal and game rewarding accomplishments to be had in todays MMOs?

I’ve seen people who really love ferrets, obsessed fans and other hobbies that have a negative side. Many things in life simply do. To that point, I think it’s about time we saw a healthier, more informative to the mainstream and more fun representation – and appreciation – of gaming. Does raiding have those qualities? I have to agree with GameDames: I’d rather show a non-gamer The Guild. It introduces gaming stereotypes, gamer slang, how MMO players interact, negative and postive aspects of gaming and it does this wrapped within a comedy sitcom.

Now. If I wanted to tell my non-gaming friends, “Well this is unfortunately how a large percentage of gamers act.” then I might show them this film.

I think this is a good film. I think it’s one of the best gaming films that I’ve ever seen. I also have rose-colored glasses and it can be hard to remove myself from viewing the material from the perspective of a gamer. People on the outside can also be much more perceptive than the members of any community give them credit for. People will be able to see the players, the professionals and the information presented in this film on many different levels.

To me, a good documentary is like a good anthropological study. Anthropologists know, going into a culture, that the people they interact with won’t be acting how they normally act if the anthropologist wasn’t there. The only way to paint an accurate picture of a given culture is by gathering information from many different sources while being immersed in the culture. I don’t think this is the best documentary that could have been made on the subject. It doesn’t seek to fully document raiding in all its aspects.

I think people who don’t understand MMOs or raiding won’t quite understand a lot of the film. They’ll be assuming this group of people don’t speak for everyone, but that just creates questions for them about little details and nuances of the culture – which should be answered by the documentary. In the end, people – non-gamers – will just know this isn’t a documentary as much as it’s a biography of a guild that portrays aspects of the culture.

It’s a great film, really. I just would have made it a biography of a guild. Come to think of it, that would be really cool to turn this into a series of short films – each one a biography of a different guild from different MMOs. I’d still keep interviews from professionals talking about the culture of raiding and gaming. Through the length of an entire series, that could really flesh out what would amount to a documentary.

I respect the guild members who volunteered for The Raid. They all allowed the world to see themselves and how they act while gaming. Not many people would be that brave or outgoing. Raiding can cause frustration, outbursts and disappointment and they laid themselves bare for all to see. Kudos to them.

Did you like The Raid? Do you feel it was an impartial documentary? What exactly would you have changed, if you were behind the camera?