I was just crawling around the net today, reading up on some EVE, since I just installed it last night. No, not the 21 day freebie, I actually broke the bank and bought the box for $40 big ones and I’m going to play EVE. There is a reason for this but I can’t get into it right now, but you will be excited to find out why in the coming future.
Anywho, the theme for today seems to be grouping, the dislike or like thereof. My friend Mystik writes in his blog on why he doesn’t like grouping and Stradden’s Staff Blog pretty much sets the record straight on why people that like to solo don’t normally have to be shunned off to Planet Single Player RPG. I know that there are a lot of single player rpg lovers out there, I am definatelty one of them, but for some reason I prefer to be around other people while I waste away behind a computer screen. I don’t know call me social or something.
Then it occurred to me, Maybe some players may be new and don’t really know how to “get into and run successful groups”, which for myself was something that came in time and practice. So I decided to call up my man GOOGLE and ask him for “MMORPG Etiquette”, etiquette is really just a fancy word for following a rule of polite behavior.
Well, my good man Google never lets me down, so I am going to share with you the best 8 I found.
1) MMOHUT.com has a very clear cut do’s and don’ts article that most of the stuff an experienced mmo player will know such as…
“Don’t: Be a jerk. This one may seem obvious, but being a Jerk is a quick way to get ostracized in a game. If you steal someone else’s kill or harass other players, the word will get out and other players won’t group with you.” And…
“Do: Be a team player. Don’t try to do something your character isn’t good at. If you’re tank class, focus on absorbing damage and staying alive, not dealing damage. If you’re a healer / support class, do your job and heal, don’t try casting offensive spells.”
This seems to be the common theme amongst most threads I read, some people just don’t know how to handle themselves. There are many others, such as Don’t use a third party program, don’t kill steal, don’t ninja loot and don’t just add someone to a group without first sending tell. That seems to be a biggie in this next guide from…
2) Tentonhammer.com: They give ten tips on mmorpg etiquette and this is number one from them:
“This is perhaps my biggest annoyance in MMOG's and I saved it for last. When you invite someone to a group or a guild, have the decency to send a tell first. Don't you want to know what or who you are inviting to where? One of the most annoying things you can have happen is to be running along and for no good reason get a guild or group invite window pop up in your face. I can't emphasize this enough, "SEND A TELL FIRST!" What good does it do a person to join a blind group invite only to have to leave it because they don't want to go where you are going.”
TBQH, it annoys me too. I just click the decline button and then wait for the tell, no tell, oh well. I ALWAYS ask someone first if they would even LIKE to group, not just send an invite. After awhile, once your friendslist starts to get meaty then if you want to send an invite off the fly to one of your buddies, I don’t think he/she will mind.
3) Something Awful: Yes! For once in my life, something good comes out of something awful. They have a very simple and funny comparison using screenshots between two different wow personas and how they carry themselves. For example…
I rofl’d irl, is there something wrong with me?
The comparisons are very funny but also do go back to the basics of “don’t be a jerk”, there is the polite way about it and the unpolite way. Mind you, I am not an angel 100% of the time I am online, but if it has to get ugly I never fight in Guild chat or in public. It’s in /tells or let’s just duke it out in a duel and get our frustrations out that way.
4) I wasn’t surprised when E-How.com had a list about mmorpg common courtesies; personally I have always been generous with the loot, unless it was something that I was specifically in the raid party or group for. It has always been, “Is that a direct upgrade to my current stuff?” If not, then greed, if it is I usually throw up the dice to the Dice Gods and hope for the best. They put my personal pet peeve of don’t be a loot whore at number 4.
“The typical convention among pick-up groups (i.e., strangers that just met in game right before the group) is that you should only choose Need if the item is something that your character can use right away, and is better than what you have. It is highly frowned upon to say that you Need an item for another character that you may or may not even have. It is also not OK to say that you Need the item because you need money and want to sell it.”
5) AOvault.com surprised me when someone wrote a very short but honest review on mmo etiquette. The biggest one that stuck out to me was aimed at the veterans, you know who you are. You have Epic everything down to your socks, 3 level 80’s and you eat Naxx cereal for breakfast, this one’s for you…
“Remember when you were a newbie? All of us were not born in to this world and suddenly knew how to play MMORPG type games instantly. We all had to start from somewhere. Keep this in mind when a new person asks you for help. If you have some time, spare credits or equipment you can not use anymore; let them have it. In another game I gave a new person some equipment and gold that was meaningless to me. Needless to say the next time I saw that person he was higher level than me and in return for my kindness he gave me a very rare item. What goes around, comes around.”
That is a biggie for me, since I have been ‘tweening games for some months now I am constantly a newbie. As far as I could remember from my time at Anarchy the community was always nice and helpful; the game itself was another story. In my opinion a community can make or break a game, I stayed on AO for a few months and was coming up on level 100 on my martial artist. The graphics were the dealbreaker for me, that’s for another story though.
6) Massively.com just gives the lesson on Barrens Chat. Anyone who played Vanilla or Pre-BC wow knows the deal with barrens chat. This pic pretty much says it all…
Insert pic here
I am not only a survivor of Barrens chat, but the Valkurm Dunes of FFXI weren’t a walk in the park either. And if you had subclasses you needed to level, then you found yourself in the dunes. I went through the dunes 8 times, and sometimes I found myself /facepalming and sometimes I would laugh, but when it got ugly and nasty I usually took a break. Public humiliation is just not my style, I’m in favor of a good joke but the “so’s your mom” punchline get’s played out after awhile. Try to keep your material fresh, “somewhat” pg-13 and don’t insult people in public chat for a cheap laugh, you wouldn’t want it done to you.
7) Gamespot.com just has a list of abbreviations, so the next time you are in Undercity you can decipher some of the gibberish in trade channel like a pro. But always be careful…
Seller: WTS L60 Shld, pst 100g
Whisper to Seller: What shield is that?
Whisper to me:
Whisper to Seller: lol you got me! DX
Whisper to me: RoFL
This is an old joke from Dethecus.
8) Last but not least is Chris Pirillo’s site, he basically just tell us not to pester people. And some things can be annoying when playing online, especially in chat programs like Teamspeak or Ventrilo. Even I, yes moia, have commited some ventrilo errors, such as…
“Don’t play music over the server, but make have your sounds levels good. You don’t want to be too quite or too loud. You may also want to make sure that the people are not hearing echos or game sounds effects from your side. It is also good to set your vent/ts client to have a P-t-t (Push to Talk) button configured. This way, game sounds wont activate the micrphone, and it also won’t allow your clients to constantly broadcast out.”
Hee, hee, hee…ooops. Never said I was perfect.
There you have it, the top 8 MMORGP Etiquette guides I found online. If you are new to a game or to the MMO scene then these are definitely worth a read. If you are an old-timer like myself and some other people I know from the site, it’s good to brush up and if you see someone having a problem getting invites then you can direct them to these helpful sites; and to my blog as well!
See you soon!
Play safe,
Ink
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