“Referring to the World of Warcraft as a simple “game” has never settled well with me, I simply cannot refer to something I commit such a large portion of my life to as a game.” - Argos

This except was taken from a comment left on Stop the Warrior’s Blog. I encourage you to read the entire comment as it is an excellent articulation on how changes that cater to the “casual” player make “hardcore” raiders feel disenfranchised. However, reading the entirety of his comment in context is not necessary to the comprehension of my post.

Argos’s comment is a rather poignant and concise statement of one of the most fundamental differences between the “hardcore” and the “casual” player. To the casual player this is just a game. They come home, log in for an hour maybe two after work, school, or whatever on a week day and maybe raid on the weekends. It’s a form of entertainment but it doesn’t take priority over other things in their lives. To a “hardcore” raider this “game” is a way of life. They come home and clear their schedules to meet their raiding commitment and that commitment does take priority over other things.

Some psychologists and casual observers point to this difference of perspective as an indication of unbalanced priorities or “video game addiction.” I’ve read more then one article portraying World of Warcraft as an evil thing that destroys lives and marriages. But this isn’t the only past time that people have different perspectives regarding. To the kid in the school yard tossing a ball around with his friends, basketball is a game. However, to the college basketball player who spends 4 nights a week in practice and weekends going to away games, basketball is a way of life and if he’s good enough maybe a career. I’ve never heard of anyone being accused of having a “sports addiction.”

But Auz, sports are different from video games, they promote physical activity and valuable life lessons. Yes, sports promote physical activity and video games do not. But video game playing does not exclude physical activity either. Many of my raiders are also avid exercisers, and the ones that aren’t, wouldn’t be exercising in their spare time even without WoW. I believe hardcore raiding teaches many of the same life lessons as being in a sports team. To be a successful you need to learn the limitations of what you are capable of and then learn to push those limitations. You need regular practice, you need fast reflexes, you need to learn a playbook and most importantly you have to learn to become part of a team.

Beyond what a sport will teach you, WoW raiding will teach other real life skills. WoW raiding requires resource management. Consumables are a part of every day raiding and learning how to manage both the resources of consumables and the resources of your non raiding time are a very real part of raiding. WoW raiding requires math skills, evaluating gear to determine which one will better help you be successful in raids can be a simple as “which one has more armor” (love you Hogun) or as complex as involving calculus. Personally I just have a spreadsheet, but one of my raiders actually wrote a computer program to help him compare stats. In addition, comparing which abilities to use to help you generate the most threat, most damage or keep the most people alive requires even more trial and error, math and/or analytical skills. Wow Raiding requires typing skills and written communication. Even guilds that use voice communication (I believe that’s most of them), also must rely on text communication if only because not everyone can talk in vent at once. Also, most raiding guilds have forums. We use ours to bullshit about upcoming changes, discuss boss strats and share interesting links we’ve encountered in our web browsing.

Okay but Auz, if you excel at sports you can make a living at it, no one can make a living playing video games. Actually people do make a living playing video games. I have a WoW friend who for 5 years of his life played Warcraft (not WoW but regular Warcraft) competitively and made $30k a year doing so. In addition to the 30k earning he also traveled the world for free. He retired from professional Warcraft playing now that he has a wife (met on his Counterstrike team) and child and needs a guaranteed form of income rather than something solely performance based. In America this player is largely unknown, but his peers in Korea were lauded as children’s heroes and had equal standing as popular sports athletes.

But Auz, hardcore WoW raiding causes people to lose sight of what’s important to them outside of the game. No. Addiction causes people to lose sight of what’s important to them outside of the game. There are WoW addicts. There are also work, sex, alcohol, drug and many other kinds of addicts. I have met some WoW addicts in my time playing this game, but every “hardcore” wow player is not a WoW addict. As a GM, I often find myself having conversations with my raiders to help them find a way to balance their raiding commitment and their real life responsibilities. From relationship counselor, to time management advice, to homework help, and even sometimes telling them they cannot balance the two and they have to take a step back, I often find myself listening to my raiders include wow in a list of many priorities. In addition, I’ve found that WoW addicts actually make poor raiders, with so much of themselves tied into this game they tend to blow WoW issues and conflicts out of proportion. They may excel at playing the game, but they often fail at being a part of the team. An addict, of any sort, isn’t generally fun to be around.

In conclusion, I share Argos’ difficulty conceptualizing my interactions with WoW as “just a game.” World of Warcraft is a game, but hardcore raiding is more than that, hardcore raiding is a way of life, a commitment. I believe that commitment that raiding requires transcends the boundaries of the game and makes it something more, in much the same way that being a basketball player makes basketball more than a game.