Once upon a time I met a boy. Leveling my priest in Ashenvale me and their toon did a couple of quests together – this turned into a lot of quests in Ashenvale, I would heal him ( in my shadow Spec, and he would do his stuff and I would throw up dots and the like) and entirely over text in game chat – we played, and chatted, and quested – he taught me I was a bad priest for not dispelling, ( see my bugbear about priests not dispelling goes way back to my leveling days – I learned well!) I learnt about add ons, and eventually after leveling and getting my first pieces with gem slots – taught me about gems.
He invited me to stay with him one time I was on holidays from work. This freaked me out. I said no.
He offered his phone number – I never called
He gave me his email when he left the game, and we emailed a couple of times, but I didn’t give him an email account I checked regularly, and once we were no longer playing, there was less to talk about. then nothing.
It was ok to talk to him, level with him, spend time, get to know him – it was all rather platonic – no flirting – but never in my brain did I ever consider him as more than just an avatar. It’s going to sound cold, but I thought it was like playing with a friendly NPC – he was part of my game.
How things change.
Then I met another Boy – it was my first real pug – we did gruls, I had vent installed and used it only for our guild Kara runs, and I spoke – and was not prepared for the OH MY GOD A GIRL reaction. ( my Kara guild had women, so I wasn’t really a novelty) and then after the raid – I was basically recruited to his guild – “you have potential but you need to fix stuff.” This boy ripped apart my spec – my gear – adopted me as a pet project.
When he left the guild – he got upset I didn’t follow – I didn’t understand why he would get upset over a pixel girl, and I asked him ” I could have really liked you” he said. ” But you don’t know me.. ” I was confused how he could like someone with so little to go on. His suggestions I hop on a train and go see him were met with – polite – yeah not going to happen.
I was introduced to the idea of a WOW boyfriend when a Guild I was in had 2 players that played in separate countries – but where together. I didn’t understand this concept – in my understanding it wasn’t a real relationship. Could not see how an emotional connection could be made from so far away.
Then I went to my first guild meet up – walked into a hotel room with half a guild and had a drink shoved in my hands immediately. Met a shammy that tried to walk on water in real life ( yes he had wet jeans) and also met a Wow couple that lived in different states, but saw each other regularly, and this meet was another time for them to see each other.
Wow people became a little more real & fun. Relationships became possible, & sustainable, and then the stories of relationships developing from gaming got more prevalent, and common place.
And then my own story which I told with limited detail a while ago – about the confusion in where that line becomes crossed, when you look forward to their company, and want to spend time speaking with them alone, playing with them. .
I had come a long way in even seriously entertaining the idea of being connected to someone so far away – I asked someone else who had been down a similar path. How long did you wait to meet? and they said a month, and I thought about it, and realised I never really intended on going out of my way – flying across an ocean for him and so it had to end.
What I have learned even since then, is it is quite possible to connect possibly even emotionally with someone online,
A date is a where you RP with your avatars the saving of Gnomer wearing Superhero type gear ( big hat – big boots, limited or skintight clothing, a belt and a cap) or a Trip through the barrens killing flightmasters, or chain running every single quest in a region
But if they are far away then you don’t get to have that first snog to check out their dental hygiene – you can’t go to the movies, or coffee with them. Then you think about what needs to change / what efforts you – they have to make for it even to be considered a realistic possibility.
I think now I have come full circle. I understand this connection. It’s fun when it’s good, and horrid when it’s bad – complicated might be fun and exciting initially, but then it wears you down.
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Pugnacious Priest's Warcraft Blog 
You.. met with your guild… irl..
FAILFAILFAILFAIL
1. Do you not read trade chat? What is wrong with you.
2. Why would you ever want to meet up with a bunch of sad wow couples, fat kids, and weirdos.
3. What’s the point. Most likely you all would end up playing wow, just next to each other or in the same area.
*gives you a cookie.
1/ trade chat is funny to read. It’s like watching a soap opera.
2/because the other alternative is meeting people who share your attitude – and if you break the gamer sterotype why shouldn’t other people.
3/ no, the idea is to get knocked up – get the kids farming ore and herbs so I can play farmville all day – and raid at nights.
That is not all true. Why are wow couples sad they met doing something that they both like, like two people meeting in a gym or class or anything. not all people on there are fat kids and weirdos. i think you are just a loser for thinking that way
Aw, you got a troll. It’s cute. Can I borrow it?
I don’t have much in the way of WoW-RL linking. Some guildies live nearby, but I’m not sure how interested I’d be in meeting them. A few friends and a cousin play, but on different servers and different content. Maybe I prefer that they be separate, with only some minimal overlap for conversation. But maybe I shouldn’t leave out fellow WoW bloggers, who I haven’t met, but have shared more with them than with guildies. And there are a very few players who I’d call friends, but geography separates us.
Yes you can borrow him, and I was only saying to someone the other day I don’t get trolls. Maybe I should write more trollable posts, guildies come and go, but bloggers just won’t go.. mmmm well not quite.
I am sure you know me by now and dread my epically long posts because I never shut up.
But, a little bit about me. I am 24, I’ve been playing online MMO games since I was 10. When I was younger, my parents kept me isolated. They were strict, and I spent my time either in school or at home. Never outside, never anywhere, never at the mall or at parties. They didn’t loosen their grips on me until I was in 11th and 12th grade.
My only friends were the people I could talk to in school or the people I met online. See, the internet was a wild and un-tamely thing then. Little did they know.
To me, everywhere on the internet I see real people. I can tell the difference between an avatar and the player behind the avatar who has emotions and feelings. And sometimes — I don’t know if you’ve been playing WoW since release — it causes me to react in a certain way; for example when Alliance were chain zerging Crossroads/Xroads and destroying all the npcs… I realized it was griefing. And I disapproved.
That was basically ruining the game for dozens/hundreds/thousands of real players. Yeah, it was immersion/roleplay/whatever the Alliance hates the Horde, but that degree of griefing on a pve server was something I simply couldn’t condone.
In a similar way, but not directly related, this is how I view relationships. I’ve been around strong relationships all my life. My sister was married for 20 years before being widowed. Most of my aunts and uncles have marriages that span 30 to 60+ years. To me, I realized the physical attributes of a person matter a lot less than the mental or physical attributes of a person. Beauty is a thing which fades quickly. People get wrinkles, or skin sags, or they get shorter or fatter. What really makes a relationship last are the non-physical attributes.
That’s not to say I can’t tell the difference between a hot girl (or guy). And I am not attracted to people with certain body-types or eyes or eye colors or hair. Just I know a lot of those things are going to fade.
I also know the effects of having relationships with someone who isn’t necessarily as intelligent or smart. Those are also difficult when one partner can’t keep up with the other.
I guess, to me, physical beauty means nothing if the person isn’t intelligent, thoughtful, well-meaning and loyal. Being bored sucks. Relationships should be about equals. I want someone to talk too, to banter with, to interchange and exchange ideas. Not a hole in the bed or a stick on the wall.
After re-reading my post, I really just feel a need to say this. I am not trying to steal your spotlight or anything. I know you made a post — and I am sure you’re confident in your stance and don’t need my opinion or “judgement”; but I just wanted to share my own view and hopefully reinforce yours or open a different window.
I think of WoW and the internet as a whole as a medium. A medium which transfers and allows people/persona/identities to connect.
Shiva.. Start your own blog you do have much to say 🙂 but in the interim your quite welcome to write epic comments on mine 🙂
Wow has indirectly shaped my ideas and expectations as to what qualifies as a friend, what qualifies someone that you feel something towards, and even all the negative stuff about how others make you feel about yourself, about your abilties, about your idea of fun while playing – It isn’t just pixels, and thats the scary part. Do you stop it before it takes over – or try and keep a clear distinction between this is a game. This is real life, and never the twain shall meet, and I have lost that battle – perhaps too accepting of fantasy as reality, and maybe trying to reclaim it a little, and it wasn’t so much a stance, more a massive brain purge of mush with a dose of TMI of my part,
It’s a game with real people who also exist in real life. The game is just a medium. There is something important to be said though. Real people exist, but not all personas/characters are real.
And TMI is subjective. You had something on your mind, you shared. Isn’t that why people like us read your blog? Or should I just assume you aren’t a real person either and you’re some computer generated script without feelings whose sole goal is to get readership and/or entertain me! =p
😛
Aww a troll! How cute!
Congrats on your first troll. You might want to enable moderation now >.>.
At any rate – I totally understand where you are coming from. The scary part is how real ID can continue to blur those lines.
I have seen what happens when people blur the lines too much. I knew of a person in their 40s who was raiding since Vanilla. By BC they were in a fairly great guild. This gentleman met a young woman who also played and did the whole cosplay stuff too.
This young woman broke off her engagement, and moved halfway across a country to be with this guy. It didn’t last. I felt bad for the young man who got left behind for someone in a game. To me, that was horribly real and totally unfair as well. They were engaged to be married for christs sake.
Its scary, but through your blog posts and comments here we, as readers, get to see parts of your personality much like you do in the game. It’s kinda creepy – but I reckon sitting down with you and a cold beer might be a fun experience. Never gonna happen (Perth lad here) but it just goes to show that the internet, not just WoW, and as Shiva pointed out, breaks down barriers and opens up communication to people you might not have ever met.
BUT! there is a line that needs to be drawn. How we choose to draw this line, and when we choose to step over it is up to each of us.
Based on your last two posts – good luck with whatever you are dealing with 🙂
Slightly OT – your twitter feed made me look twice!
Yeah, I had to read the “I popped my cherry” twice. Now THAT would’ve been TMI.
WA beer is pretty awesome though.. You guys have Beez Kneez, Fat Yak and Little creatures all worthy beverages.
Just to name a few.
There is a few micro breweries around here doing all sorts of great drinks.
It has always seemed to me that meeting someone online via a hobby is no worse than dancing with a random stranger at a club/bar and then agreeing to go out for dates. You just come at it from a different angle and in both ‘methods’ of meeting someone there are very real personal risks and emotional risks. One method is not superior to the other.
I met my partner of 7 years via a hobby forum – it worked because we moved the connection to real life as soon as we could, and made a real commitment to each other early on. We’re very happy, but we were very lucky at the same time. I wish you luck with your emotional connection 🙂
Narx – You are correct in that it was sad that this young woman’s relationships didn’t work out, but it was a choice that was already made in her mind at some point. I have been engaged 2 times in my life, but never married. Emotions can change over time and sometimes you come to a realization that things just won’t work out in the long run. Really there is nothing wrong with that. It wouldn’t be fair to keep the other person strung along either while you are going through this. If it wasn’t the guy she met online and moved to be with, it could have just been the cashier at the supermarket who she saw on a regular basis.
I see it as emotional bonds have no distance. You either have them or you don’t. You can meet someone who you are compatible with via the internet or by hanging out in a line for some concert tickets. What happens then is only up to the 2 people with those emotional bonds. As was said, people would much rather spend time with someone who they get on a personal level then someone with superficial beauty. I guess that is where many of these WOW relationships come from.
It’ll be 3 years at the end of July, Zahrah. 🙂
I’m trying to work out who the guy who left and got upset was…
was in guild before i joined N 🙂 and 3 years is awesome 🙂
Hi, first off, first time commenter and only been reading your blog for a few weeks, love your writing style and take on things!
I found your latest post really interesting, and got me thinking and reminiscing…
I first started playing in classic, and some of my fondest memories (and the ones most applicable to this) was as an officer in a fairly hardcore progression guild on Jubeithos.
Chatting with these guildmates on vent and chat, spending minimum 15 hours a week all together with a common interest and goal, you got to know these other 39 people fairly well, especially the ones you talk to a lot.
It didn’t take long for these online interactions to start trickling over into a social setting. A few of my WoW friends and I exchanged mobiles and MSN (Facebook wasn’t around back then), and I’d start bumping into and talking to a few guildies at music festivals and raves completely off chops.
Fast forward 5 years, I have only started playing again last 4 months after a massive hiatus right after BC launch, and I still am in contact with a very select few of these people I would genuinely consider friends. One in particular I tend to somehow always bump into when I go interstate for music festivals and the like, and we talk like old college buddies, except pretty much none of the people we are out with have any idea what were talking about!
With RealID out now, I only have a select few RL friends on there, as well as these old raiding buddies. The ones that are playing again, we are all on different servers and factions and to be honest, I love being able to chat to them through RealID.
With Starcraft 2 and eventually Diablo3 coming out as well, I think that’s when RealID will shine, but for now, it’s pretty cool to be able to catch up with people that I talked to practically daily after 5 years of only occasional contact, and IMO, just goes to show that their truly are people behind those pretty 3D models on the screen.
Hi – thanks for your comment, maybe real id will take a little time for people to get comfy with it, and not worry so much about their real name, but stories like yours – and peoples positive experiences might make it more acceptable.
I am getting ready to meet up with my guild members in real life in 2 weeks. I’m really excited about it! (and also nervous!!)
I live in the states and my guild members are all RL friends and live in Canada. I really feel like I already know them through our interactions online. I know it may seem crazy to others that I would want to travel to another country to meet online friends but I sort of look at it this way: You only live once. Why not live that life to the fullest? Why not meet friends in RL? I do feel that you can really get to know people online, and that I have made real friendship connections with my guildmates.
As for the stigma of meeting people online. Everyone is online now-a-days. I figure, I’m not a freak, and I’m online… so there are probably others. 🙂 I really feel though, that meeting people online (either friendship or romantically) has become less faux-pas.
In my RL though…Some of my friends have been really accepting of my decisions, while others quite judgemental. I guess it would help if I really didn’t care what others thought. I like to think that I don’t, but then it does sort of sting to know you are being judged.
At the end of the day, I know our guild meetup is going to be a good thing. I am a little nervous, but reading your post has put my mind at ease.
I do agree that a lot of the stigma attached with meeting people online, whether romantically or just for friendship has lessened considerably the past few years.
Unfortunately not every story gets a happy ending. A husband & wife team were part of our raiding guild. The wife starts up an affair online with another raider. The husband is suspicious but there’s no real proof. Hey, he’s several states away, what could possible be happening?
Fast forward several months, the wife decides she wants to be with this other raider. Asks for divorce; husband moves out. New boyfriend moves out to shack up with her.
Husband quits game. Friends are torn. Raiding stops and guild eventually breaks.
Now, obviously the blame is not with WoW. The above events could have all still happened without the game being involved. It’s just sad that people hear this story and pretty much pin it on WoW destroying a marriage.
You are very right. The blame is on the people that chose infidelity.
I found this article a few months ago:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/facebook/6857918/Facebook-fuelling-divorce-research-claims.html
I don’t think Facebook is to blame either. I think these social networking sites (and I will include WoW in that catagory for all intents and purposes) are just giving people more opporunties to be bad. But at the end of the day it comes down to the person. The person makes the choice to cheat.
I also wonder if social networking lends to more proof of infidelity. I had a friend that put a key-logger on her home computer and was able to hack into her boyfriends email and find evidence of cheating. (they are both crazy, fyi) lol
You have got good stuff in this article.