1. I’ve noticed a disturbing trend in gaming message forum topics: the use of the <3 in the post title. I can barely tolerate its use in net speak — I <3 loot! I <3 OtherPlayer! I <3 priests! — and now its appearing ALL OVER message boards. This is particularly irritating because <3 had such great potential to be used for evil: insincere <3, sarcastic <3, hateful <3, et al. Such a waste.

2. Another disturbing trend, professional farmers who name their characters or fake-farmer-guilds with Love-Something: Loveusa, Loveyou, Lovekiss, Lovefree (which doesn’t really mean what I think they intend), Lovehappy, blah blah. Honestly, is this fooling anyone into thinking they’re NOT professionals or that they’re Americans? Frankly, we Americans see someone named Loveyou, we want to beat them for suggesting that we’re gay and looking.

3. Please let the “O Rly?” owl die a quick and immediate death. This is one of those things that was amusing the first few times because it had a high rude factor, but that time is past. However, if you’re responding to a Community Manager who had previously threatened to ban your ass for overuse of the O Rly owl and you O Rly again, now that would be hilarious. Otherwise, someone shoot that damn owl in the head. Two times.

4. Two message board /rudes that I’m still enjoying, even after many months, is “cry more, noob” (CMN) and “learn 2 play” (L2P). CMN has almost run its course unless it starts morphing into alternative insults like “beg more, noob” or “die more, noob”, etc. L2P, on the other hand, has legs. The permutations are endless: Learn 2 Buy Gold (© Foton), Learn 2 Farm, Learn 2 STFU, Learn 2 Heal, ad infinitum. L2P = instaclassic.

The comments are now open for abuse, but remember this: it has to be very, very clever to be funny.

If it’s that clever, I’ll probably use it in game and claim that I made it up myself.

From my observations, usually this begins around the time when the first max levels pop out of the woodwork (or the first few Jedi unlocks, for you Star Wars hags) and is accompanied by much namecalling from both sides, and various accusations about lifestyles, or lack thereof.

Probably the truth lies somewhere in between for most people: at times, we powergame, other times, we don’t. And truly, nothing is accomplished by labeling people based on their levels (or lack thereof) or based on their time spent in game (or out).

Still, I get a great deal of enjoyment when the hardcores rationalize their game time by describing how rich and full their real lives are.

People are allowed to make their own choices on how to spend their time and that’s cool. But, let’s cut the shit. The math is just not working out here on the “rich and full real lives.”

Let’s use as an example those hardcores that cite jobs (extremely well-paying jobs at that!) and children as their rich and full real lives. Here’s the math: Let’s assume a minimum of four hours sleep each night, leaving twenty hours of waking time.

A job takes eight hours a day, typically (more hours with commuting and The Man demanding overtime and such) … that leaves twelve hours for the family, household chores (like EATING … grocery shopping … CLEANING the litterbox), and/or the mythical girlfriends that all powergamers invent have.

What’s the minimum time that people spend with their kids at night? I hear they’re quite time consuming. At the bare minimum, they’ll greet the kids, maybe listen to the blather about the school day. Plus, kids need to be fed. Every day, even.

I suppose they could squeak by with just saying “hey” to the kids and throwing a Happy Meal at them. That would only take an hour, tops. But that’s doesn’t sound like a rich or full life, for the kids anyways.

Don’t spouses require some maintenance time? I think the imagined spouses and girlfriends wouldn’t require any maintenance, but the real ones definitely do. Half an hour at least? Maybe some days more time than others, but a minimal average of thirty minutes. Considering that spouses are sleeping with the powergamers AND covering their asses on the family time, I would think thirty minutes each day isn’t too much to ask.

Then there’s bio time. This is time that absolutely must be spent out of game: bathroom breaks, hygienic needs, getting food from the kitchen, etc. If they’re really efficient, I could believe thirty minutes minimum for that, also.

All told, that leaves ten hours for gaming every night AND time for a “real” life … as it were.

Perhaps I stand corrected! The rest of us, we’re just horribly inefficient with our time. Or are we?

That extremely well-paying job? That’s really going to be at least 10 to 12 hours a day. (Sometimes 16 if your boss is a slave-driving asshole like mine.) Those kids that some people hide behind as evidence of a real life? FOUR HOURS, not a single hour, FOUR or more. If someone claims less, they are either lying or treating their offspring like accessories.

Spouses, girlfriends and/or boyfriends, in general, don’t give a shit about level 60, rare loot or checking the bazaar or auction house. They need at least an hour or two of “I’m pretending to be interested in your day” time. Bio needs. For crissakes, a daily shower and shave is necessary and I don’t care how hairless and stinkfree someone claims to be, it’s got to be done. Make bio time two hours: one hour to wash off filth, another hour to wolf down food a few times.

Three hours for games. The rich and full life leaves three hours to game … maybe.

Hey, it’s cool that people like to powergame. Their choice, really, and certainly none of my business.

But that shit they’re trying to sell me? I ain’t buying.

Rogue unlocks the box to find a rare item with a nice sales price inside. (Let me point out to WoW noobs, this hardly ever ever ever ever ever happens … as you’d probably expect if you’ve played any MMOG before.)

Hey, let’s hear it from the accused rogue himself, Unitcry of the Sargeras server (which is his alt, I believe):

To what i think is a pretty sorry suspension, i got suspsended for steeling lockboxes anyways some guy was spamming general to open a lock box, he opens up trade i look down at the Do not trade slot, and dont see anything, then i see it in Trade slot… Then my Grinch starts to come im thinking “Hey i could just take these since this guy is so ignorant to do this”, then i think nah ima tell him to put in do not trade slot, But im to greedy and i hit trade and i open them, find a blue item worth 3 gold and /ignore… now i dont understand why i was suspended for this considering it was THERE fault for puting it in the trade slot, either way i got a good item, and some gold and now i can stop grinding and watch Irobot

(Obviously, not edited for errors or clarity) The discussion was continued here with many others discussing the merits of Blizzard’s smoting of the rogue account.

I wish I could say this type of thievery was rare, but you can read for yourself. Many, many players think there’s nothing wrong with stealing from stupid (or naive) people.

Now that is alarming.

I’m as annoyed by the stupid as the next guy. I just don’t see this as a moral dilemma. Dilemma, by definition, indicates there could be an alternate choice. Like stealing. It’s an option, apparently.

Just because you CAN, doesn’t mean you SHOULD. Why is that so hard for some people to understand?

Anyhow, today, while waiting for a MMOG release to save me, I was watching Court TV and caught some hosebag’s testimony … let me summarize for the cheap seats, this mom puts a few bullets in this assbag’s body after she finds him jacking off in bed while watching porn … o ya, her three year old daughter is in the bed with him, also naked.

Do we really need to waste government dollars prosecuting this shit? He’s a confirmed drug dealer, jacking off in bed to porn with his live-in girlfriend’s three year old daughter, also naked, in bed next to him. And there’s some question about this? There is someone on earth mourning this fuck’s death?

Back to the hosebag testifying on the assbag’s behalf. Hosebag was high 40 percent of the time (her words) and yet (and YET!), whether she’s straight OR high, she has the same clarity … even when smoking 8-balls. I don’t even know what the fuck an 8-ball is, but it sounds expensive, as it involves solid cocaine (which I learned from the witness).

Yes, she delivered this testimony with a straight face and yes, the Court TV anchor team agrees that she is a VERY credible witness because she can be so blunt and honest about her fucked-up lifestyle. (Oops, did I forget to mention that the hosebag is the GODDAMN BABYSITTER?)

This doesn’t really have to do with the State of MMOGs Today, other than, while I was pondering the sorry state that I’m in because I need something to go gold to give me hope … I realized that I may be taking Crazy Pills here.

Am I the only one that thinks hosebags should go away before they can be sworn in? … and, certainly, anchor teams should understand that hosebags can’t possibly be credible witnesses. For fuck’s sake, listening to her was like reading a Hollywood treatment for Scarface II.

O ya, and I flashbacked (in a “I haven’t really spent significant time being high and for sure not around children” way) on this hosebag when I read the latest Happy Happy Joy Joy Star Wars shit.

[Hints: Cyber (online) Sex (jacking off), Lies (anything SOE tells you), and the Beatles (happiness is a warm gun, bang bang, shoot shoot)]

Back away from the 8-balls … whatever those are, they sound bad.

Ever notice that when people write “this is my last post on this thread” or “I won’t post on these boards ever again”, that they always prove themselves a liar within the next 24 hours?

Ever notice that a common method for assclowns to prove their INDISPUTABLE authority is either:

A. They played in Beta. (oh, so it’s partially your fault that this game has always sucked ass?)
B. They know a real life GM/CSR/Developer in real life, really. (again, your fault then?), or
C. They’ve played every race/class/zone/server/online game at least 49 times.

Ever notice that when people start losing an internet argument badly, they start detailing how HUGE they are in real life? But not fat, it’s all muscle. Now, when they finally get a driver’s license, the object of their wrath might have to actually worry about a personal visit.

Ever notice that the players who fly off the handle the easiest are the ones with the worst language skills? Really makes me wonder if there is a direct correlation between rage control and damaged DNA.

Ever notice that game forum ho’s assume that every player knows them? Forgetting for a moment that probably only five percent of the game population read the forums regularly, why do they assume I’m aware of their presence just because they’ve mastered pushing the Reply, New Topic and Post buttons?

Ever notice that when jagbags get into an Internet argument with a female player, they start hurling the cyber or shemale accusations? As if either of those would be worse than being an asshole like them. (Hint: Asshole is worse.)

Ever notice that there is a direct relationship between number of paragraphs and intelligent internet discourse? One long, neverending paragraph = single-celled organism brain activity. Several, shorter paragraphs = at least a few relevant points worthy of an advanced central nervous system.

I could go on, but fuck it. I’m done with this topic and I’m never posting here again!

One drama queen will be slain and finally, BLISSFULLY, is out of my gaming life, but, like lopping off a head of the hydra, another drama queen will arise to take the former’s place. After careful analysis (five minutes of drunken thinking one night), I concluded this was because nature abhors a vacuum.

Every stage must have a drama queen. WHY? I do not know, but drama queens are drawn to captive audiences like flies to shit. God love ’em.

Back in my EverQuest life, when I belonged to a high-end raiding guild, we had to endure a nightly live performance. For you noobs out there, a high-end raiding guild is like smoking EverCrack with a pressure cooker. I wasn’t really PLAYING EQ anymore, it was my second job and I was working it. Every night we had an assignment, and if it took two hours to complete (rare), I would get a full night’s sleep. If it took until 5 the next morning, then I got zero sleep.

I played with the same people every night, in just a handful of zones, killing the same handful of boss mobs, usually for zero personal reward, other than the reward of a job well-done and a guildmate pleased with his/her/its new elite lewt. (I am making that up … after about six raids, I was over the “helping others” thing.) Most nights we logged off barely speaking to one another.

Along the way, we recruited this druid, female (maybe), who, initially, was a valuable addition to our numbers. As time went on, my patience began to wear thin as she was CONSTANTLY chattering away in guild channel about her nonexistent sexual relations with her husband (did I need to know that?), what weird ass p0rn she had looked at while at work, or what her dog was doing at any given moment. And! she would end every sentence with lol.

Few days of that shit and she went straight to my ignore list. Sure, there were some embarassing moments when it was obvious that I had /ignored a guildmate, but the peace was well worth making up some bullshit lie why I hadn’t heard her seven responses to my question in a public channel.

Eventually, a few other guildies /ignored her also, to get some respite from the prattle, and it got so prevalent, that we had to arrange a system where we took turns taking her off ignore and reporting if she ever said anything important. I rarely took a turn — I couldn’t be trusted.

Fast forward a few weeks and the guildleader admits defeat in trying to reconcile The Ignorers and The Ignored. So he shitcanned her (after three hours of makeshift psychotherapy –comforting her while she sobbed, ranted, then sulked). W F E. Thanks for stopping.

NOT EVEN ONE WEEK LATER, one of our clerics starts up on the guild stage. How come she’s not the cleric lead? She’s just bitchy lately because she’s pregnant. Her hemorrhoids are so painful, she can’t sit through a whole raid (unless there was cleric loot coming up). Christ.

After a few weeks, I was begging for death.

I realize now that it IS too much to ask that we just play the game. Nightly dramatics, courtesy of the Queen Collective, are mandatory.

It’s always open mic night online. *insert sarcastic clapping*

One of our members was pulling a psycho, bipolar, disassociative personality routine on us. One night, he/she/it was cooperative, rah rah for our side and all that. Next night, moody, sullen, wondering when the hell we’d get off our asses and fetch him/her/it some uberness.

Needs to up the thorazine dosage?

Wrong. (You ARE new around here, aren’t you?)

It’s obviously the Dual-Driver Syndrome. (I should also mention the rare, but not unheard of Multiple-Driver Syndrome — three or more drivers for one toon. There’s more drama with one of these hoes than a trailer park with hourly rentals.)

Whenever I run across DDS toons, I like to have a little fun with them at their expense. Once I’m sure I have Driver2 on the hook, I “remind” it that it owes me virtual money, or promised to help complete an annoying quest, maybe even a powerlevel for my alts … all courtesy of it.

It’s the perfect crime because, unless Driver2 wants to confess and claim no knowledge of such an agreement between the toon and me, it is trapped into doing my bidding. All night, every night. Until Driver1 gets back and asks me wtf kind of crack I’m smoking.

This latest DDS toon was being driven by this woman and her RL boyfriend. The woman was roleplay married to this other toon which irritated the hell out of Driver2, the boyfriend. Naturally, each time I knew it was Driver2, I made sure to chat, in a very conspiratorial manner, about the intimate exploits (all made up, of course) between the toon and the fake husband.

Driver2 held out for quite a while, refusing to confess, until I finally tired of my prank and asked the toon, “When was it that you and (fake husband) were going to meet irl again? It was soon, right?” (ffs, just confess, mf’er.) Driver2 logged soon thereafter.

In yet another one of those instances where I am so right I frighten even myself, turns out it was true … Driver1 and fake husband did have a RL hookup planned. She admitted as much to her RL boyfriend and he dropped her like a disease-ridden whore.

I would feel guilty about my small part in this drama … if I had a soul left.

I think it got nerfed a few years back.

Which brings me to my Short List for Dealing with Game Companies:

1. Take it to the mattresses. Actually, the rule is “Take it to the phones”, but I like to throw in a Godfather reference whenever I can. People at work don’t like to be bothered by phone calls; I’ve been known to feign hysterical deafness so I don’t have to answer. Using the phone is the closest you will get to being “in their face”, so unless you’re willing to fly out to their offices (and if you are, seek help — you’re a catass), use the phones.

2. If the Game Company is unwilling to resolve an issue to your satisfaction, have them cut you a check for the box price + subscription fees paid to date. Until they’re willing to do that, you’re not going away.

3. I’m not jumping through hoops, so just send the fucking check already. Takes less of my time to make phone calls than to paw through boxes of receipts. (Hint: takes them less time to make YOU jump through hoops than to resolve issues on their end. See the “game” they’re trying to play?)

I think Game Companies get away with this shit because a large portion of their player base are children that are intimidated by threats of character deletions and the FBI crawling up their ass with a microscope.

Not me, I can be bought. And my price is box price + subscription fees.

An actual lol statement: “i dont know *GUILDNAME*, so that would mean i dont know them lol” See how he inserted lol at the end so that you know there was humor just prior to the lol? This is your clue that he finds himself amusing AND YOU SHOULD TOO! Of course, you and I both know there was probably very little humor there, or else he wouldn’t have to remind us that it was, indeed, there.

An alternative method to point out flat humor: “lol so that was you he was talking too….i was wandering about that.” In this case, the writer has put the lol at the beginning so that the reader is warned ahead of time to be prepared for gut-wrenching laughter.

Here is overkill: “lol i care man and why the hatred i thought it was pretty funny watching *playername* talk to himself lol” Start laughing NOW BEFORE YOU READ THIS and after you have, you will CONTINUE LAUGHING — this sentence is THAT funny.

Someday, when I’m bored, drunk and have a massive head injury, I’ll tell one of the lollers: lol You lol are lol as lol funny lol as lol a lol tumor lol named lol Bleedy lol.

It’s been my observation that over 90 percent of posters can be categorized into one of the following profiles:

The Attention Ho – Look at me!  Look what I’m doing now!  Respond to my thread! Definintely, the most prolific posters around — every minor victory, every inconsequential slight and every excrutiating minutae of their virtual and real lives is documented in great detail.  (The attention ho will also usually dabble in incredibly bad roleplay fan fiction.)  JFC, wipe the cheeto dust off your fingers and realize that no one gives a fuck what you’re doing.

The Drama Queen – O M G, I’m quitting the game!  O M G, Soandso stole my noob mob!  O M G, you will NOT believe how mean PowerGamer04 was to me!  O M G stfu!  Not only am I not surprised that you’re the game’s whipping boy, I wish that I had been the one doing the whipping.  And btw, fucking quit already — I just know you’re going to return to the boards FOR MONTHS to annoy us all.

The Moral Barometer – These types chime in on every single thread involving any sort of game dispute, no matter how minor, with their self-important judgmental bullshit.  Get a clue Judge Judy, only the ho’s and queens bring their disputes to message boards.  Everyone else, and this is SHOCKING, settles their disputes in private rather than parade them on the internet.

Post Count Ho – This buttmuncher is just farming post count totals, because that statistic alone proves how super popular they are (on the internet).  They bump all the ho’s and queens’ threads, they bump every single auction of in-game items … no matter how STUPID the auction is … they bump all their guildmates’ threads (*bump* for my homey in the guild!), and some will resort to necro-bumping (resurrecting old, ancient threads) just to enhance their leet post count.  FYI, dumass, *bump* is not content and post counts don’t translate to dick size.

The Ghet-TOE Banger – Their board shit is peppered with alot of lingo, PROVING that they are not an internet nerd, but rather an incredibly cool person IRL that just stumbled onto the message board.  (ya, right)  They do a lot of posturing about their posses, their biatches, yo yo, werd bro, runnin wit da guildies to fuck shit up.  Get over yourself, yo!

The best way to deal with all these assclowns is to just stay away from gaming message boards.  Sure, it’s tempting to open Pandora’s Box just a tiny bit and peek inside, but once you do, you’ll want to rip your eyeballs out and stomp on them.  And trust me on this, you won’t find any useful information there, so just google what you seek far, far away.

Even 23,980,590 pop-up ads are better than that shit.