Be Excellent To Each Other

I've got two mates now who have had to make a concious effort to give up WoW, and they actually had withdrawal symptoms - one couldn't sleep and the other got very short-tempered for a while. One of them actually had the other take his copy of the game away but then went out and brought it from a supermarket at 2am so he could play again.
I refuse to play it because I know I'll probably end up the same way. I've never even seen it running (save for the Leroy Jenkins video).
My question is this: Is WoW actually dangerous?

The only thing I know about it is from that South Park episode.

It is addictive..but so is any in depth game tbh.
Have the common sense to get up, go out for a walk or something and save your eyes and back.

I play far too much.

A dude I used to live with played it, a fair bit, but nothing psychotic and he eventually bored of it and gave up.

Despite having never played it, I'd wager the problem is that it takes a massive investment of time to get to any kind of physical/magical power which rather negates just playing it for 30 mins here and there.

I used to hellishly love RPGs and levelling-up based games as a kid, and if I was 10 years younger I could seriously have seen myself getting dangerously sucked in. I've got other shit to do now and my love of those old games is much less, which is probably just as well.

Do you think you could stop playing tomorrow, if you had to?

Yes. I know this because I do have time off and not play for weeks. The longest break I had was about 6 months.
If I had to stop for good? I could, I would have urges to play, sometimes strongly, but I would get on with it, find something else to do.

My situation being as it is, mostly I don't have a huge amount to do, so WoW gets my attention..I have loads of characters, I do sit here too long and have to remind myself to get up and move around..more so than most people..and I do sometimes suffer as a result of grinding or raiding. I know this, I know it's my fault and I do try to get out of the house as much as I can..or at least walk downstairs. (I have a disability so I don't go out a lot).

I play, but as Shewolf will attest to I can be amazingly apathetic about it. I have spurts where my interest is high, and then I go off it for a bit.

If I had to give it up tomorrow I'd be able to burn the box and snap the cds, but every so often I'd feel like booting it up again...I probably wouldn't though.

You're doing this on purpose now surely

Arse.

Its never held that much interest to me... sure, I've reactivated my account 3 times, but I keep getting characters to about Level 20ish, then re-rolling.

Basically if you have no will power then don't play it.
Perhaps it should have a warning for those people who find it easy to become addicted to things. It can happen, I have experienced some of these withdrawal symptoms too but not that bad.
I can wake up and the first thing I think about it what I'm doing on wow today...I'll go over stats and plans in my head at night when I am trying to sleep.

I've caught myself tidying up and wondering if I should vendor some old thing ><

Will power..common sense..you'll be fine.

I play Lordy Lordy of the Rings Online and its a lot of fun, and I can see how you could stay up too late playing it, but I can't really see the addiction qualities in MMO's myself. Maybe Eve Online due to its bizarrely complex and emotional corps vs corps but WoW and others I just don't understand.

I think I play about eight to ten hours a week of Lordy Lordy, usually two nights of three hours and a Sunday of four hours. Other nights I've just got other stuff to do/read/listen or people to see or things to drink.

Hardcore players annoy me a bit in fact (I wouldn't consider Shewolf a hardcore player, and I have woken up myself thinking - 'ooh, I'll be exploring that tonight') because they're always bleating and whining about more high level content added, and the programmers can never make enough to satisfy them because they burn through raids and levels too fast in the pursuit of trinkets. When I play I play at a really relaxed pace, dabbling more than anything. I'm still only on Level 37 with a L13 alt and I got LotR:O at launch. (Though I did have a big break admittedly.)

I think it should have an ingame health warning. If you've been logged on too much in one session it should flash up an icon of bleeding eyes that can be expanded to detail a list of short term medical complaints. And if you play too much in a week, you should be followed by a bloated wraith like version of your own avatar that makes increasingly sarcastic and cruel comments and cites medical information about the dangers of carpal tunnel, lack of excercise, lack of social contact and so on. And one that all other players could see.

That would be awesome.

But then the developers would probably add drops for your wraith, leading to more frenzied grinding and collecting.
! !

I love LOTRO too but I can see my wow addiction because I cannot explain why it dragged me back from LOTRO when I was happily playing.
I forget which game it is, but one I used to play does have a warning when you have played for a long time.

World of Warcraft just isn't my thing, baby. I cannot dig the addiction...

*Mimi shall not mention that fact that when she first imported Animal Crossing (Gamecube) from the United Slaps of Amoonica she played for 20 (yes, twenty) hours straight with only loo breaks and a single ice lolly...)*

Guild Wars does that. I think this is how it went. I only ever got to stage 3, but I asked after the others.

(Paraphrased)

1 Hour: You have been playing for 1 hour.
2 Hours: You have been playing for 2 hours. We recommend a break.
3 Hours: You have been playing for 3 hours, please take a break.
4 Hours: We recommend calling it a night on Guild Wars.

And so on...

Aye that's it..GWs. Couldn't place it for a sec.

I don't mean to sound out of order to anyone who's 'addicted' to WoW, but really, stop being so bloody silly and just put it down. And as for health warnings, what next? Health warnings on packets of jam tarts, just because some weak willed people find that they're eating too many?

LOL. Grim... has a dread in eve.

heh heh heh.

You don't like my idea? Sarcastic mocking clone wraiths bullying the player for being a lethargic fool for playing for too long? But I thought it was a winner.

A scary wraith menacing an obese socially retarded player, yesterday - >

Do you also think that anorexics should just shut up and eat something?

[edit]No offence to any sufferers or friends of sufferers, it's just a dev'ad example...

To someone who is vulnerable to addiction this comment is stupid and offensive. Most people can put it down but some really do have issues.

hell yeah

i do have addictions towards chocollates and candy in general. I can't eat just one or two. If there's a box, i eat them all in one siting. Because of that, i never have any candies in my place.

But i can't see myself getting addicted to something like wow. I know a friend that is addicted tough. Now he's a gold farmer and got something back from his addiction like 1000€/month (if he's not full of shit).

Oh my God, this is getting silly rather too quickly for me. *ducks out of thread*

Mm, working in the public sector (housing benefits/libraries) I do encounter quite a few unfortunates who have obsessive personalities and compulsive disorders and they are basically mental illnesses that can only be mitigated and never quite overcome. Whilst there are some people out there who should know better who could wrench themselves away, but are foolish fools, there are people who play online games, eat too much, drink too much, obsess about their weight, who are genuinely gripped by a vice like conviction that their brain tells them is the only way for them to go. And it hurts to see it. I guess that's how these genuine WoW casualties come about.

That being said, my sarky-clone-wraith idea is still great.

Your friend has an addictive personality and a compulsive disorder, like the ones I cited below. Fortunately for a mere 999.99 euros a month I can cure him with my World of Herbcraft!

In seriousness, there might be a bit of a difference to 'playing a game that one enjoys' and 'addiction' and stuffs. Thank goodness I never had to grind 1000000000000000 whatever in eve to level up and can make passive income in the game.

However, I have been on MAJOR gatecamps a coule of times.

FTFY

They oughta hang the bastards (haven't read thread).

OK, so I didn't duck out. A difference of opinion warrants a piss taking on here does it? Can someone remind me of the name of this forum?

Cripes, I'd hate for example the first fight on this forum to be caused by World of Warcraft.

Everyone make peace immediately. The creepy love police are in town.

Dunno - you called me silly (I'd probably get into trouble if I changed the name of the forum to suit my reply, right?).
But if you hadn't have (of?) said 'ducking out now', I'd have said: People that are properly addicted to something can't just 'put it down', just like anorexics can't 'just eat', and WoW is deliberately made to be addictive.

It wasn't. You missed it.

Phew, that's okay then.

Man, I hate fights almost as much as I love these new smilies though.

But instead you just used your super Mod powers to post with my username and try to make me look silly. Huh.

Um... No I didn't (and I can't do that, anyway).

Tmuk - I don't want to speak for Grim... but I'm sure he was acting mildly. He reworded your post when quoting it. Your actual post was not changed (check the previous page), and such a practise is common place, mate.

See?

Yeah, OK fair enough. Sorry if I touched a nerve Grim...

See?

No harm. I just didn't want you to think I was wandering around messing with what you said.

Indeed. One of the principle tenets of this forum is to leave behind the Stalinist purges of WoS, even if it has mostly coincided with me having a spazz fit.

Anyway! Speaking of stupid spazzes acting like idiots - WoW, eh?

TMUK didn't say that, it was Grim... To make him look silly!

Conspiracy!

If there's one type of piracy I hate....

This is all too much for me! I'm going back to my Druid....

I hate that type of tipation as well.

World of Warcraft is made by Blizzard.

I threw mine out because I played it too much. A few months ago the fuckers sent me a trial of the new expansion pack. I was tempted, but chucked that as well. It's like crack.

I have had a WoW subscription for a year, and have only one level 70 character, who hasn't even seen "Kara". So I haven't found it addicting.

I am generally rubbish at MMOs, though. I was in EVE for about three and a half years without getting a kill mail, despite mostly playing as part of a gang/fleet. I did have about 40something million skillpoints though.

WoW for me, is something to play for an hour while watching TV. I got suckered into helping guildies with a dungeon that took three hours and my whole evening, when I told them I only had one hour, so I'm completely in the "lonely curmudgeon why are you even playing an MMO" phase now.

Tip for WoW- don't play a tank or a healer class. Your fireball spamming pew-pew guildmates will just always beg for you to help them Look Cool and Kill Big Things. Unless you love being constantly in group play every time you log on, in which case, play a tank or a healer class.