Old Guy Griping

Community General Discussion
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MMO = Group content.

Guild = Community focused on group content.

Why do so many people join the game let alone a Guild and proceed to roll solo, queue solo into group content and refuse to socialize via Discord?

I mean, it’s understandable to a point but it’s nearly all people I’ve encountered do. What happened somewhere between 2007 and 2023 that’s caused this massive shift in the persuasion to just queue solo or play solo in World of Warcraft? It’s hard to find a community that doesn’t treat the game as feast and famine (content) or simply roll solo outside of raiding.

Of course I do it involuntarily because I want progression, but I find it relatively empty and meaningless if not actively engaging others and coordinating the gameplay.

::EDIT::

The amount of response and opinions regarding me referencing Discord. Ventrilo, Teamspeak, CS, TF1/2, HL2 and many more. I remember being required to register and interview for most communities via some platform to get involved in progression or group content.

Even EQ2, DAoC also was very heavily focused on voice comms.

Just because it’s the trendy Discord nowadays, it’s all the same tool.

Also - The allure of an MMO even Diablo 2 was the multiplayer foundation in the game. We had baldur’s gate, warcraft 3, D1&2, morrowind and many more games of that era that better suited solo players.

This is not me bashing solo players, it’s also not a cry to blizzard to funnel people into my desired result. I’ll re-state the main point: Why did this shift occur?

Anecdotal side again, PUG groups are harder than they should be more often than not. Guilds are centrifugal for group play. Why would so many people want to play a multiplayer game solo. Saying that WoW’s cornerstone was solo play is definitely an OPINION just like my feelings about what MMOs are supposed to be.

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Just a bunch of people on the same server/game as you. You can play alone, you can group up, that’s the nice thing of a proper MMOrpg.

The average age of the player base went up, the queue system was introduced, and the trend shifted to convenience which made others dispensable.

Forced socialization, forced communication happened then and went this route and it happened again… so conclusion is; people just treat this as an escape and want to achieve what they want to achieve, without you getting in the way.

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Some people like to RP even outside of RP realms as well, it emerses them more. Some people feel riding solo is just what feels right for the RP

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This goes counter to your old guy claim in my book. What self respecting old guy would want to talk to other people on a social media platform. I feel like I’m suppose to be too old to even know what discord is, never mind use it when I don’t have too.

Get off my lawn.

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…why am I playing? :thinking:

edit: I’ll consider leaving after the megadungeon. :thinking:

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Stopped reading there, where you completely lost any “Old Guy” cred you might have been lent.

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Who cares what their reasons are?

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I wish people were more respectful of others when they just want to play solo, not everyone wants to do what you do all the time.

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Nope. MMO stands for massively multiplayer game. Which means the following:

A massively multiplayer online game (MMOG or more commonly MMO) is an online video game with a large number of players on the same server.

MMO stands for massive multiplayer online game. It refers to games that allow large numbers of players from all over the world to join in and play at the same time.

None of that means “group content.” It simply means “there are other people around.”

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Solo play has always been a tent pole feature of WoW. Why do you think it exploded like it did? Especially when it’s competition was Everquest and Asheron’s Call which required groups to do anything in the game because soloing a mob 5 levels lower than your toon was a suicide mission (for most classes).

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There seems to be a misconception floating around the internet:

Just because you see X people playing a multiplayer game, does not mean those people like playing mulitplayer games.

Please let that sink in. There are those who like games, but not necessarily playing with other people. They are forced to do so, however, because that’s where so many of the resources are put nowadays.

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I am temporarily in casual mode. Shadowlands bummed me out. I suspect that I will be back on Discord sooner than later.

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I would suspect that open world MMOs are attractive to people who are introverts or socially anxious. Maybe they join a guild because they like the activity around them but aren’t secure enough to jump in. Same with content. If you only pug content, you won’t disappoint those people in the guild. Even if you play well, there could be this nagging part of your brain saying that you failed in that content.

Or maybe they are neurodivergent and normies are saying things like “We’re going to do instances.” Which isn’t inviting the neurodivergant player. You’re just informing them what you’re going to do. “Great have fun,” is what the neurodivergent is thinking. They are also thinking they never get invited because no one says “Hey, Bob (random name inserted) do you want to run some keys with us? What is your ilevel so we can help out?”

Or the guild appears to have grouped up into cliques that this person can’t break into.

Or all of the above. Just speaking from experience but how it is perceived isn’t how it always is. Some of us need to try and remember that as well but it is difficult.

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I went solo after WOD- couldn’t handle doing group content with people bashing others and people not speaking up to stop that nonsense. I couldn’t keep my mouth shut if others were being put down and this was in LFR…Didn’t need that kind of behavior out of game why should I deal with it in game?

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Discord is full of weirdos and predators. You aren’t gonna catch me touching that app with a ten foot pole.

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Due to medical reasons I rarely rarely group. I need to afk a lot randomly. I just don’t want to force other people to wait on me. So I just solo the game now. I have psychically pushed myself into things like raiding normal / heroic content, and I was in pure misery. I did KSM season 1 and it was hell. I just don’t think I can do it again. Which sucks cause the season 2 coloration on the mount is awesome. I also feel bad telling guild mates, no, sorry I cannot come. No sorry I need to afk. So I barely interact with my guild anymore.

I am happy doing old world content. It isn’t a challenge at all sadly. I get to collect a ton of mounts, pets, and toys though. Fun showing them off in Valdrakkin. Love making gold in the game too. Really love the new crafting system, I’ve made crazy bank this expansion.

It does get lonely, and depressing. So I tend to just take breaks from the game. Maybe 1-6 months at a time. Come back enjoy 1-3 months playing. I miss the good old days of EverQuest 1. 2001-2005. That game was insanely social. No one cared if I needed to AFK. Most friendly bunch of folks on the planet there.

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The moment you said this it disqualified you from old guy griping.

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Mistakes were made, I’m not a smart man. Don’t worry, I’ll quit soon.

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Be the change you want to see in the world.

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That’s where the resources have always been. Since the game released. Always. There has never been a time in WoW history that they dumped resources into solo play more so than group content.