And so the Epic tale of Instance-Based World of Warcraft Heroism continues. The Wailing Caverns (15-21), a cave network full of big snakes, insane druids and dinosaurs, came and went without much to report to be honest. It took a while to get a decent group going, but once that happened, the trip went perfectly – everyone knew what they were doing, and did it well. We only got wiped out once, and most importantly, no-one logged in a huff when that did happen. All very good from a game experience point of view, but lousy for ranting material.
Next was Shadowfang Keep (18-25), a creepy werewolf infested-castle of the grand Transylvanian tradition, and a different story. Me and my Shaman friend were strangers to the Undead lands, but turned up at the swirley entrance anyway, clueless but keen as ever. That’s when we met The Simpleton, a Mage. I have no idea how long he’d simply been sitting there, staring forlornly into the swirl, and indeed, how many goes at the place he’d tried to solo, but he soon hopped up when we arrived. ‘Promising start,’ I thought. Tank (Me), Healer, and Crowd Control. He joined us and I began to think about members four and five. With the three 'Big Jobs' covered, pretty much anyone would do, although my own preference is for pet classes (Hunter, Warlock) – just in case the tanking gets a bit too hectic.
Then The Simpleton pipes up –‘lets go’. Clearly he’d been there a while, and was losing the will to live. I should have put my foot down I guess – certainly we were on the top edge of the suggested level range, but that level range is generally arrived at with five people in mind. I umm’ed and ahhh’ed, suggesting that three might not be enough, and desparately hoping that the Meeting Stone would come up with someone quickly, but in the end we went in anyway.
While it is a commonly accepted truth that there are only three main roles needed in a group, this does rather rely on each of those roles having a perfect understanding of what they are. I study a lot, and had finally got to grips with WoW’s rather elaborate hate-list AI, and my Shaman friend had worked with me a lot, and knew his stuff by now, enduring any number of lectures on such topics as ‘Threat is My Friend, Not Yours’, ‘Rare 2H Axes With Rockbiter Buffs Are A “Sometimes” Weapon’ and ‘I Have Twice Your AC For A Reason’.
The Simpleton on the other hand seemed to have come from the ‘Arcane Forces Are The Only Friend I’ll Need’ school of extreme over-nuke soloing. I always know when things are about to go badly when I have to have the ‘You know you have a spell that turns them into sheep?’ conversation. Today was no exception. He nuked, he pulled (often at the same time as me, but different targets), he dump-burned mana as if his life depended on it (which it then subsequently did) and then ran out all the time, and seemed not to know he could summon mana-drinks, and generally Gandalfed it up big-time.
It happens, and I try to be kind, pointing out helpful and potentially party-saving tips as we went, but it seemed not to sink in, and I started to lose my patience. My shaman friend had lost his some time ago, and was being a great deal more vocal with The Simpleton and I suppose it must have seemed like we were ganging up on him.
It’s easy to just assume he’s just an idiot out to ruin our day, but there could be all sorts of reasons for it: English might not be his first language – a particular problem on European servers. He might just be very young, or simply out of practice for group-work, which in pretty much every case, is a totally different sort of play-style to soloing, whatever your class.
But as our already underpowered half-group struggled further and further into that dark and twisted castle, barely surviving each clump of werewolves, so too did my own mind go into a dark and twisted place. My own response to that kind of anger is to seethe, and I just clam up, and start taking more and more outrageous risks with pulling, as if getting us all killed would be the ultimate expression of my pent up malice, a potent demonstration of why I should be listened to. My shaman friend, who I suspect was going through something similar, tends to be more outspoken, and harsh, and between the fire of his rage, and the frost of my silence, the poor Simpleton must have felt distinctly unwelcome.
We got perhaps a third of the way in, and finally it became too much. He just sat down, went ‘sorry’ and logged off there and then. He didn’t even Hearthstone teleport out to safety. I’m not sure I’ve ever actually sent someone away from their PC in tears before, and indeed usually go to great lengths to avoid any such situation, but this is one ‘first’ I am not particularly proud of.
I generally assume that pretty much everyone I meet online is really some kind of ball-busting hardass who should be treated with wary suspicion, or gruff camaraderie at best. I suppose it never really occurred to me that many of them could actually be just normal, insecure and paranoid human beings with feelings as fragile as my own. A lesson to be learned - there’s no need for group-hugs, but always a need for civility.
And as I stood there repenting my sins, and thinking about how better to handle it next time, Karma must have felt appeased; in a rare conjunction of planets, our long forgotten Meeting Stone click promptly joined us up with another group of three who were having trouble with their own version of Shadowfang Keep – they needed a Tank and an extra Healer.
We romped through (once we’d managed to all end up in the same Instance), killed the Ebil Uberwerewolf Wizard-Lord, won the day and came back with the shineys, but all the way back to the city, I wondered what would become of The Simpleton, whose name I’d already forgotten. I hoped he’s found a more understanding group by now, and completed his own Shadowfang Keep, learning a bit more of his craft along the way, but I strongly suspect that now he just wanders the wilderness, throwing out any (Dungeon) quests as soon as he’s given them - that is, if he now plays at all...
I’m sorry.