Challenge Exists In Chaos

Valdesta — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 17:19:28 +0000

**It's Only Skellies** (pre-wipe words)

Admit it - sometimes when you're playing World of Warcraft, whether it be a guild raid, a PUG raid, a PUG dungeon, or even just when you're playing solo and out there adventuring and questing - sometimes, the chaotic times in the game provide the most challenge, and the most learning.

Okay, to be truthful, I don't need you to admit that for me to feel better, I just felt like opening the post that way, because that's what the Muse said to write.

Being a Law of Attraction geek who knows that Society teaches us to think differently than LoA states, I know that some people simply don't find chaos to be the exciting learning experience it tends to be for me these days.

The View Of Chaos Around Me

Most of my Social Guild friends hate group chaos with a passion and play solo a lot as a result, but some of them have come to terms with the fact that they, themselves, create chaos and therefore there's no use in battling against it.

The latter people find joy in Chaos in a similar way that I find joy in Chaos, but we definitely find joy for distinctly different reasons!

When it comes to my raiding guild friends, the split is about the same between Chaos-Haters and Chaos-Lovers, but the Chaos-Haters have enough good players to dungeon/raid with within guild that they don't need to turn to the solo route in order to keep the game joyful.

And the Chaos-Lovers are of a different breed than in my Social Guild as well - they love it for the same reason I love it, which is because I'm a solid enough player in a solid enough raiding team that Chaos isn't the norm for us. We actually have to go out and SEEK it in order to experience it.

Chaos Exists At All Levels Of Play

I've definitely noticed myself going through stages of playing challenge within the game, and noticed myself improving in skill and survivability in terms of personal self-defense over time.

Initially when I started, dungeons were scary places for me because every time I went into them, I was the cause of wipes as I tried to get far enough away from mobs to DPS them on my Hunter (before the "dead zone" was removed).

I killed people over and over until the fact that we had a guy needing on EVERYTHING that dropped became less of a priority than the fact that I was killing us all so regularly.

Shammy and crazy 71 Warrior friend in BRD

When I first entered into Blackrock Depths after many levels and dungeons of practice since SFK where I kept killing everyone, I was surprised at how HARD those darn Dwarves hit, and how difficult it was to run with three Hunters as DPS (because of course, trapping wasn't a forte for any of us) and my Turtle Pet as the main tank.

Entering into the Outland instances itself was delayed until I got my Mage up from 23 at BC release to 60 where he could start taking part in the Ramparts runs that were crying for DPS/CC - I was too scared to try to bring my Hunter in for the job, since I was still feeling so ill-coordinated with her!

And then there were my first Heroics. The first time I saw myself get one-shot, ever, in the game. For a while, I went back to killing my DPS friends. The pattern was Pull Aggro, Iceblock, friend next to me is dead. Oops. Good thing I'm good at CC, or I would have been a complete dud.

From Heroics, I dabbled a little bit in 10-man Karazhan, but I had only been a part of that 4-5 times when I was invited to join a raid team who needed me each week to fill out their 25 man team doing SSC and TK.

Heroic Raiding = Chaos

I had no idea what Chaos was before I got into 25 man raiding.

Naxxramas Heroic Raid: Heigan the Unclean

I mean, even the ping-pong game of mobs that had been pulled off of the tank in a dungeon situation, where they spent the next 15 seconds taking turns at DPS and Healers until the Tank got control back wasn't chaotic in comparison.

At least you could see where the mob was going (and to whom), and there were a limited amount of people the Healer had to protect while the Tank got everything back under control.

But 25 man raiding - holy crow. As you can see in the image to the left, just the stack of people on Heigan the Unclean's platform makes the fight seem chaotic - you can't even see yourself in the mess of people unless you've turned off everyone else's name but your own.

What Chaos Is Best For

Aside from practicing feeling joyful no matter the circumstance that faces me (another Law of Attraction thing), I find that Chaos has been the best teacher possible in terms of giving me a lot of practice handling personal self-defense within the game.

Personal self-defense is, simply put, the art of surviving during a battle.

Whether you are faced with additional mobs joining in on your solo fights, or your tank or healer has died in a group situation, or you're an over-eager DPS who pulled aggro accidentally, life suddenly isn't as easy as you had planned, and it takes a certain degree of quick thinking and skill to live through the encounter.

Thankfully, most of us don't have to seek out Chaos in order to get adequate practice at these lessons. The solo lessons come naturally at a very low level, and anyone who runs low-level dungeons with strangers can attest to how much Chaos exists there, too.

Do You Seek Out Chaotic Groups?

Depending on how much time I have to spend/waste, and depending on my personal mood, I'm certainly one who seeks out Chaotic groups. Simply joining any PUG lowbie instances (ie: below 60) or any PUG raids gets me into these without fail.

I feel like I'm largely alone in this way of finding joy within the game, however.

Friends and guildmates who regularly get the honor of being in raid groups that are non-chaotic and fast-moving seem to get more uptight about groups that don't go that way, instead of appreciating the awesome runs our guild is capable of in comparison.

Am I really such a unique person that our awesome guild runs are Appreciated, while still being able to appreciate the learnings and practice and variety of play that Chaotic groups present?

I'd love to hear from readers who get just as much joy out of bad raids as they do from good raids - but in a different way from one another, of course.

Is it you? :)

My first attempt at SFK, aka "Killing My Party"

Valdesta — Mon, 23 Jan 2006 20:26:20 +0000

Okay, wow.

I went on my first instance run with my new guildmates last night, and wow was it a rough time. I got us killed twice because of my pet, then still managed to get us killed AGAIN when I left the pet behind and just went in with myself. My guildmates were understandably frustrated at the deaths.

It even looked like we had a gold farmer in our guild and on our instance team (he kept rolling "need" on things he likely didn't need and wouldn't respond at all or talk at all when asked questions or talked to), and because I kept on KILLING US ALL, the focus went totally away from what to do when there's an individual like that in the group or guild.

I hope my guildmates won't be branded with my name as a bad thing, thinking I was purposely doing this. I tried to keep communicative and admitted this was my second party with more than 3 players in it, but we'll see what the future brings I guess ;)

My first attempt at SFK, aka “Killing My Party”