Travel time in AO is a nice point to touch on. There’s a lot of debate on ‘meaningful travel’ and I think your example is a perfect illustration of why it *should* take a while to go from point a to point b — it gives value to the journey, in a way.

And Nordock… that was something truly special, and whenever I think of it, I think of Xavitor standing under the waterfall getting his monthly shower. What was his character’s name? Lord Bahael? Or was that Pokke? I forget the characters, but I remember the people. Rest in Peace, Xavitor — you were taken from us much, much too early.

AO, the world was SO immense, it was easy to “do something new” today, even if it meant exploring an area well beyond your level, full of fear and trepidation for how far you could go before dying. Plus death, unless recently insured, was costly. Hundreds of thousands of experience points that took some time to gain gone. Even worse, depending on where one last insured, it could be literally hours to get back to where you were — minutes were only for those smart enough to insure locally… assuming one remembered to reinsure back at base when they returned. A wicked catch 22, that insurance system. Not to mention passing into 0 suppression gas areas and suddenly being open to attack from anyone. Once beyond the “newbie” zones, lots of places were not only unsafe from a creature point of view, but just plain unsafe such that anyone approaching could be friend or foe. I loved that emotional engagement. THAT made an adventure out of every play session where I was willing to wander. And if I wasn’t, if I wanted to be safe (relatively speaking), I could stay in areas I knew were in my limits and 75% suppression gas (no PVP).

DAOC I think was the only game where I was in an RP guild that really grooved on and embraced roleplay. I’ve been in some WoW guilds too that made that claim, but really it was more a “the real me is my character” kind of RP. DAOC was fantastic for that, I could spend hours being a forge rat, happily in character with the other forge rats. Lots of memories of Edeor and I, in higher tiers of crafting, laden with metal from the remote areas it could be found, trying to get back to base without the enemies spotting us and killing us on the spot. Couldn’t run, couldn’t fight well, pockets so full of metal and neither of us smart enough to enlist friends or even hire rogues to come along and guard us. I still vividly remember my first foray outside the walls of Camelot and into the Frontier, certain I’d be dead before I’d even left the gates. Which in fact did prove to be the case, but that’s only because we all ran off the cliffs like a pack of lemmings and fell to our deaths. Not the most auspicious beginning, but certainly memorable!

I love playing WoW, mostly because I like the character class and like the gameplay. But it’s not an adventure. I play it more like a single player game than any other MMO I’ve ever played (and I’m content to do so). But I’d give anything for a game that made my heart race, made me afraid as I ran for my life or giddy when I managed to sneak to the heart of a crazy dangerous place, still intact. Or a place that spawned the imagination and great roleplaying — where have all the good roleplayers gone?

Not coincidentally, that’s why I keep harping on the notion that MMOs aren’t the place for strong NPC storytelling; you can’t really change the world. Single player games can give the player enormous power and really build up the hero mythos within a strong story. MMOs have to rely on “phat lewt” and interpersonal hero worship, for better or worse, and let players tell their own stories.

Me, I like the quiet ones with more introspection than vivisection, which is why I’m not all that fussed by the general “conquer/reward” paradigm. It’s a matter of personal taste, nothing more.

Those are good memories, but they aren’t good stories (IMO). I mean, they’re good personal stories, but they don’t relate well unless you were there. I don’t mean to infer they are somehow less valuable just because they’re not as relatable as more ‘action-driven’ stories.

@Sisca — How do you know that every group kills Onyxia in the exact same way, though? If you didn’t know… if you and your friends played the game without ever reading forums or discussing strategies with other players, and you beat Onyxia, wouldn’t that be a satisfying event for you? And if so, how does then learning that other people did it the same way cheapen that experience?

What happens is, again, the (in this case indirect) dumbing down of MMOs, thanks to the crazy amount of coverage they have on the internet. The only ones who figured out how to take down Onyxia were the first groups that encountered her. The people that came after looked up how to do it online, and followed that plan.

That’s like doing a crossword with the answer key in front of you, and looking up the answer every time you’re the least bit stuck. Of course it isn’t going to be satisfying, but the players can control that. They don’t *have* to research the ‘best’ way to defeat an encounter and follow that best way like a script, if they don’t want to.

But the temptation to do so is admittedly huge. And the time requirements of getting to Onyxia mean that for most of us, beating her via trial and error would take months…

Hmm, interesting points. Thank you, everyone, for sharing.

The issue isn’t that 100 other groups have killed Onyxia but that 100 other groups have killed Onyxia in exactly the same way. Or even worse, the only way you’ll ever kill Onyxia is to follow these exact steps.

What has always made the most memorable experiences for me in MMO’s is when the group I was with survived impossible odds (or even attempted impossible odds) and had to use every skill at our disposal to do it. Clerics rooting to handle crowd control while the Chanter medded etc.

It’s these loss of options that are making it hard to create memorable moments.

I’m talking about finding joy in the journey, and memorable moments in just being alive and playing in an interesting, beautiful world. A sunrise at just the right time, a random act of kindness, seeing someone do or say something funny, that sort of thing. I suppose that any of those could be framed as being a reward for being in the right place at the right time, though. (Like being struck with lightning is being in the wrong place at the right time.)

In a game that’s largely reward-driven, this sort of transient joy that has nothing to do with the major combat minigame or political gerrymandering will indeed be less obvious, just because the game isn’t designed for that. They happen as a result of the world state, random other people, and even your own frame of mind.

Games are all about rewards and punishments, so perhaps I’m looking in the wrong place for this sort of ephemeral trancendental moment. I’ve hoped that “virtual worlds” might provide something closer to those than Street Fighter, but perhaps the “game” mentality is indeed too strong (by design).

I can honestly think of about 2 things in the past four and a half years that even might be worth a story from WoW. The game just doesn’t lend itself to that kind of adventure, and that’s really sad. I had a good time playing, and I’m kind of hankering for getting back involved with my druid right now, but in the end, I know it’s not anywhere near the adventure that other MMOs have been in the past.

I hope that TOR or some other game can try to rekindle that sense of adventure for me.