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Player Perspectives (Archived) : Holding out for One Million Heroes
Posted Sep 03, 2010 by Suzie Ford
In MMORPGs, being heroic is the name of the game right from the start. But are our favorite characters truly heroic? Can they be heroic when the Lich King respawns over and over rather than dying when slain by an intrepid band of characters? In this week's Player Perspectives, MMORPG.com columnist Jaime Skelton takes on that very issue. See what she thinks and then jump into the discussion on the forums!
So, what are these heroic deeds? In most media and cultures, these deeds represent a task that fulfills a few special criteria. It must be something that has either never been done before and will never be done again (slaying the mighty dragon), or something that is done on rare and momentous occasion. The mission must be given for the good of all, not the benefit of a few; often a mission of world impact rather than simply helping a local family. Finally, the mission must be nigh-impossible at its end: it must be a challenge so stupendous, the hero-to-be must be prepared for certain doom.
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A hero is someone who acts above and beyond what a normal person is capable and willing to do. Therein lies the problem. When everyone is performing a heroic feat, well, it's not so heroic anymore.
When everyone is a hero, noone is a hero.
My dream class would be to get to play a truly austere Monk style class that doesn't need or want most gear. Who can either eschew rewards for quests or have some manner to quickly donate the rewards where needed. To drift along unnoticed in the world and try to leave the smallest ripple of good behind.
I know that is not entirely on the subject, but to me that is a hero. Selfless, unassuming, unarrogant and not flashing big shiny weapons and gear around feeling that they are somehow superior due to having them. The biggest problem with current MMO design to me is that so many of them are just about chasing the next "carrot", that next big gear upgrade. Why can't there be other rewards than gear? ughhhh, if I put my Gamer DNA up here it would explain a lot though as far as my own views on gear and such, lol.
Good article subject.
For non-instanced, named boss mobs it gets even weirder. You have to find and kill someone so horrible and evil that it requires you to wait in line behind other heroes that are also waiting to slay this villain that just so happens to already have 3 corpses laying on the ground that haven't decayed yet.
Standing in line to heroicly kill someone already dead...one of the lowlights of MMORPG unique features.
Jaime,
I really think MMO creaters have it all wrong with this "You are the one", "Save the World" type garbage that they are pushing. Of course that seems phoney and plastic and cartoonish....because IT IS. Heck, it's that way in Novels and Movies that go that route too. So unless you are going for cartoonish on purpose...that's really a bad way to go (IMO).
That's NOT the way a game/novel/movie needs to go in order to make a protagonist feel heroic...as fas as I'm concerned...that is even a little bit the anthisis of heroic.
Lets take an example from real world events.... The guys who landed with the 1st wave on Omaha beach, survived, breached the Sea Wall and started pushing inland and helped make victory in WWII a reality..... Were these guys any less "heroic" then Luke Skywalker, Conan, etc? Not in my book.
I'd love to see an MMO developer that pushes for that sort of feeling... because I think it's both achievable from a Multi-Player standpoint and it's far less plastic then the "Save the World" junk....and it certainly should give the player every much a feeling of heroism, if not more so.
Can't agree more.
This is why quest driven, storyline MMOs leave me feeling less immersed rather than more immersed in games. I wouldn't mind a game where I end up becoming a farmer, an entertainer, a crafter, a trader, or simply a wandering, exploring mercenary. I'd rather create my own motivations and my own stories. I never got to play the old SWG, but the way people describe it, I think I would have liked it, and I'm sorry I missed out. I suspect this makes me a niche gamer and that I shouldn't hold my breath hoping quests will go away simply because I loathe them with the same deep loathing that looking at a grocery list or a to do list inspires in me.
Such a world already exists in EVE. No one person is a cartoonish hero or villian, yet the EVE universe is full of players of both types. There are legendary fleet commanders who manage to take over large sectors of 0.0 space, only to have it all taken away again for a varieity of reasons both dramatic and logistical.
There are famous spys who manage to disolve corps, or steal billions or scam someone out of even more. There are battles where few prevail against many. There are minor heroes in every fight, people who make or break the battle on their actions, w/o it all seem shallow or fake.
There's even heroes who help people, leading training corps, or help out new players just to improve the game community.
All sort of heroes running around EVE, and I wish more games could provide this experience. Outside of a sandbox universe though, I can't see a themepark game being able to offer the same experience, though there's some titles like Citidel of Sorcery that claim they're working on such a system. We'll see.
MMOs exist in a grey zone between fiction and simulation. In fiction the author shows you the consequencs of actions. In a simulation the author provides you a way to test the consequences of actions. Ideally, watching a single run of either game should feel the same. In a fantasy fiction, you should find yourself believing that there was a real consequence on the other side of every choice. In a fantasy simulation. the stories that emerge should feel epic as all the components link together. Where fiction is a risk of failing is when we cease to believe that the consequences shown are true to the world imagined or where we want to take the road not taken. Where a simulation is at risk of failing is when it degenerates into a rut - repetitive and unfulfilling. But there isn't a clear dividing line between the two - an MMO is mix of both.
But thinking about heroism, are there better ways for a game to *offer* opportunities of heroism. Pure fiction forces heroism upon you. Pure simulation offers few guarentees that anything you do will feel heroic. Do you really need to save the world to be a hero? Or can a game of saving kittens be as fulfilling as overthrowning world-shattering demigods on the brink of ultimate power?
As long as nothing in MMORPGs matters, there can be no player heroes. You save the princess, you and thousands if not millions of other people. Usually while you are saving the princess, thousands if not millions of people are doing it as well in their own little instances or quest chains. Before you saved the princess, thousands if not millions of other people did as well. After you have saved the princess, thousands if not millions of other people will do so as well.
There is no risk. How can there be any reward?
This is why I'm really... REALLY looking forward to Guild Wars 2. True, it still keeps the whole "You're character is special... you are destined to change the fate of everything (just like everyone else)". But at least the whole game mechanics are going to change. You wander into a field where there are angry boars around and kill them, they won't respawn. You decide to hit the bathroom during that bandit attack, the town they were attacking is destroyed. Every move you make could have consequences in the shifting dynamic, pendulum world. I'm sure eventually that field will be populated with boars again, but only when the chain its a part of makes sense for the boars to return and not just magically reappear. This, to me, sounds like a real MMO. Every choice you make, even in indecision, will have an effect. The PC's will esentially still be mercenaries, performing deeds for the sake of a reward... but the results will be more visceral.
I know... I'm a fanboy, already. Heck, even RIFT will have more dynamic content... but if they can pull it off, it will be a genre changing MMO.
When everyone's a hero... no one is a hero.
The hero status should be a limited earned RANK or NPC only.
For mmorpgs anyway...
That's what I liked about DAoC in its old days, before ToA. No one was a hero straight off the bat. The PvE was designed to fit in with an idea of the realm at war. The PvE really didn't matter. What mattered was the RvR and how players perceived each other. Some players became well-known amidst the community: spies, scouts, battlegroup leaders, great guilds, etc. That to me is more heroic than anything PvE can provide.
Is it such a big deal in PvE what a hero is? I don't think so, but player recognition can be a great addition to any game experience.
It's pretty much impossible to feel like a hero in a MMO. I've never felt like a hero in any MMO I've played. When I want to be a hero I go play single player games.
I don't see how a hero can be made when there's no way to save the universe or whatever. Any action you make in a MMO doesn't matter at all. The game still goes on whether you "save the day" or not.
Yea, I can't do more than grin when in MMOs NPC greets ya as Hero and Savior of the World and then mentioned - there is 10 rats in my cellar, would ya be so kind and save me from those :)
One thing a bit closer was in old EQ1 (pre-instance period) when some gods and very hard bosses were on timer 1 or even 2 weeks. That means from tens of thousands players in server only 52 or 26 in year could have chanche to get that Famous Sword/Wand/Ring etc. And when ppl woke up Sleeper and could manage to kill him (what wasn't in plans of devs) that was real event about what knew all EQ-world in every server.
That possibility is hardly underestimated by devs - they good drop sometimes legendary mobs for short time (or why not only once). OK, I understand in instanced game it's not imagined to disain one hard instance to have it ran once but in open world ya can change a bit stats-dmg type etc of roaming dragon, give him new name and let it drop not game-breaking items but some kind of normal high-level goods with Name plus say tooth for every participant he can master his ring, necklace or whatever.
This gives variety into game and some feeling of uniqness and Be-Hero for them who happen first to solve how to kill that mob and whose raid could it do too. To say ppl start to whine - I pay for game and must be able to get Everything - isn't correct. That is into what whiners trained devs. There is many competitions and tournaments in world where ppl pay to participate in them but nobody whines if not everybody gets gold medals or Grand Prix's.
Which is more important: the sport of the game or the empowerment fantasy of the game?
Go out and become a hero. In real life.
Empowerment/fantasy... for mmoRPGs. Sport of the game for FPS/Lobby games, which WoW actually fits into now, as a sports game mmorpg ha ha.
This however means different things for different people. I began playing mmos a long... long time ago even though I'm only 22.
For console games, they can keep doing what they are doing. I'm a big fan of Demon's Souls difficulty, but Metal Gear Solid/heavy rain story. Those things saturate the console field very well. MMORPGs, however, should be something else, in my opinion. Now, they focus on the console style single-player aspects more so than the fantasy world. I have a hard time believing a world like WoW's as I had a world like Lineage 2s. You needed friends in L2...lots of them to succeed. It had way more "worldly/massively cooperation" and the best could obtain the title of Hero and receive special perks.
People hated L2 because they didn't care about the other things it offered. People enjoy WoW mostly because there's little inconvenience. Quests vs grind? ...both are just as mindless as the other. Inconvenience can add to the fantasy and the world and make it more believable. I'm actually a pretty casual player, but I still feel this way.
That being said, there should be games that fit all preferences. There should be games that focus on the world/fantasy/ believability. There should be games that one can just jump in and have fun, without caring about some of the more artistic aspects of video game development. But no one should discriminate against the two. Some look for quality of fun and some look for quality of something else... and something else. There's always an niche that can be field. There's money to be made everywhere.
I did rat on WoW, but it actually fits a whole lot of niches at once. It deserves the number rating given on this site... which happens to be equal with L2s.
*Sorry I derailed, but I just was answering a question*
You can /msg me if you want to respond to it.
very simple solution for heroes in MMO: let players make heroes among themselves. not everyone is fit for it. it's just fact of life. if player wants to be pampered, they should play single player games.
I try, but every time I kill someone, the cops show up before I can loot the corpse!
Go attempt to motivate people. In a motivational forum.
Don't get your panties in a knot just because a king or other mob respawns!
It's a GAME!!
"Number 27, now serving number 27! Number 27 please come to counter B to claim your one and only awesome sword of awesomeness."
"Number 28, now serving number 28! Number 28 please come to counter B to claim your one and only awesome sword of awesomeness."
In this case, you would have been the villain. The cops would have been the hero. They would exhibit their own disillusionment in the fact that the game mechanics of the real world did not allow them simply to slay you and here you are posting on a gaming forum.
You realize that MMORPG is a motivational forum...think about it.
Exactly. Simple and to the point.
This is why I'm not fond of the "story" elements of games like AoC ( you and a couple hundred thousand other players are the chosen ONE ) and the upcoming SW:ToR.
Yet I love the story in LotRO. Why? Because none of the players are "heroes". The "heroes" are running to destroy the ring and Sauramon. The players are trying to support their efforts and protect their lands until such time the heroes are successful.
Being "the hero" only works in a singleplayer game.
Quote, "A hero is someone..."
In games there are player characters, not real people. In real life there are times when several or many people perform acts during the same time period, in the same area, during the same action, that make them all heros.
However, very often in real life, people that should be recognized as heros are not.
I was strictly referring to the use of heroes in mmorpgs. What real life has to do with any of this I have no idea.
I wish I could get into EVE, it really does seem like it generates meaningful interactions. I just couldn't get passed the idea of such having to both learn so much to play and stare at a frankly dull looking galaxy for the whole game. Good to see at least some are enjoying it though. On topic, I feel EVE does not make heroes so much as it makes you feel like what you do is meaningful in some way.
On topic, I feel this whole idea is overblown. Yes, it's lame showing up to kill a dragon and then having to wait for the respawn because some other group slew it just as you arrived. Yes, it feels like what you do often doesn't have an impact because there are a never ending amount of mobs. And yes, one of my pet peeves, every weapon and armor you will acquire from level 2 onward will be magically enhanced as that is somehow the status quo. At the same time, I have felt heroic many times in MMOs, and for those of you who desire examples, here they are. Some heroic moments/snippets of my MMO career:
- Kicking a thug off a building in City of Heroes, or sending 3 off with a gale. This game was my first experience, and most memorable still, of knockback. FTW!
- Sapping named bosses in WoW as a rogue, taking down the henchmen, slinking back into the shadows, and then going in for the kill on the boss. Made me feel like quite the mercenary dealing with so many people.
- Guild Wars Campaign. Enough said, I think. If you haven't played GW, stop what you're doing and go pick up a copy. Even if it's just you and the henchmen, it's worth it.
-Defeating the tutorial boss in Champions Online. I never bought the game because of the super negative release-patch backlash, but damn I enjoyed that open beta.
-Another CoH one: finding Luska and the many super heroes trying to down her, and assisting despite being such a low level.
-Most of the quests in Runescape, my first MMORPG. Those were the days... I tried it recently, and their tutorial involves you caving a basement in to kill a dragon, the company still delivers.
-Playing WoW instances. IDK, they were just fun.
-Most recently, the VG trial. Try it, it's great, I'll prolly sub.
I liked your examples, though I admit I see things differently. I never felt like a hero in an MMORPG. The only times I've felt like a hero in a video game was in a long single player RPG like BG1/2 or having the same main character in NWN1 and all of its expacs. I probably would have felt like that in NWN2 as well had I finished it.
WoW, EVE, etc., I never felt heroic enough. In EVE it's not the point (that game promotes infamy more than heroism). In WoW, it's too much like a queue of 'awesomeness' of every single player who participates in PvE. In DAoC, I came the closest to feeling like a hero when I helped protect the relic in the days of strong realm pride. Or if I staved off maurauding Albs in DF, protecting the newbs trying to level up in there just a little bit longer. Those were awesome days!
This is where I disagree. MMORPGs are virtual worlds where the PLAYER action determine how other gamers percevie him. Most of the MMO gamers behave like scum - and as far from heroic as possible. The developers allow this behaviour in many cases (after all PVP is all about ganking) and many build their game on antisocial behavior -giving biggest price for the biggest scum of em all.
Now... It is ofc possible to build a world where heroic deeds are rewarded. It is hard tho - and doesn't really pay off long term for the developers and publishers. So - welcome to the real world... yet again ... where heroes are extinct.
I think you are confused what a heroic deed is. It is rarely killing the boss creature and getting fancy loot.
It is those that go out of their way to help others, whether it is in the giving of good advice, helping with a hard quest, helping someone being ganked, providing someone something that helps them greatly for no remuneration.
There are all sorts of heroic deeds being done everyday in MMO's you just don't recognize them as such.
Parading around on your fancy mount, displaying fancy equipment does not show one iota of heroism. If you think it does, you are sadly mistaken and I feel sorry for your misinterpretation.
Most MMORPGs are descendents of Dungeons and Dragons and in that game, heroes weren't in for the heroism, as XP was linked to gold earned.
"Handing out experience points for collecting gold fits in with the '20s and '30s pulp fantasy works that inspired the game, which are fairly gritty tales with heroes are mostly in it for personal enrichment." — John Harris, Game Design Essentials: 20 RPGs
From a design point of view it is easier to design on quantifiable objects, like acquiring gold or amount of monsters killed. This is not unlike high scores. It is much more difficult to design games about terms like truly "heroic" deeds. We can't make players truly sacrifice something, so one of the main things (putting your life, soul, etc at stake etc) is out of the quotation. We can design games where a dragon terrorizes players, and people who want to slay him may loose their character in perma-death. And then here is no reward whatsoever (other than getting rid of the beast), so those who kill the beast and stay alive become famous among the playerbase. Is this a good thing? I don't think so.
How can this article have so many words in it? The first response told us everything in the article in like 3 sentences and he even repeats himself.
Huh? There was no correlation between gold and experience in the D&D we played. Experience was decided on by the game master prior to play on what goals you achieved. The game masters I played under rarely put any emphasis on gold at all. Not as if there were NPCs around to buy things from, you found most of the things you used.
You have to remember that there is a lot of crap out on the web that is not true. Sometimes it is hard to decipher what is and what is not.
If you are trying to quantify Heroism, you are flailing at windmills, it is not quantifiable.
This is a good post.
That's the point. Even if your game master didn't link gold to XP, the early RPGs were still about dungeon crawling and treasure looting, not heroism. I was just suggesting two more angles to this (good) article: history of RPGs (about treasure hunting) and feasibility of design (difficult to measure heroism).
People engaging in RP can be heroes by adding something to other people's experience.
So does good guild leadership (in that case the heroism often even requires some self-sacrifice).
It is beyond my understanding why people call someone or themselves a hero for an action taken in a game. It is a game!!
Helping someone else in a game is not heroic; it is simply a kind or helpful act. Being kind and helpful indicates character, not to be confused with a heroic act.
Putting your life at risk during a real life action to help another human being can be considered a heroic act. Helping someone in a game is a not being a hero.
Player characters in a game or NPCs can be hero classes because it is pretending, not real, just a game.
I'm sure that most readers understand that we're talking about the context of a game, not the real world. Seeing as we are an mmorpg forum...
Get your facts straight before attempting to "debunk" someone else's statement of fact. First and second edition D&D rewarded players with one point of experience for each coin obtained in addition to the set XP value of the monsters defeated. GM goal-based rewards did not exist in the game before third edition, unless they were "house rules", which is not what Stormwatch (or the quoted resource) was talking about.
There is a lot of crap on the web that is not true because people make emphatic statements of opinion that are not based on fact. I think a large number of respondents here HAVE successfully "quantified heroism". Just because it can have different meanings to different people does not make it unquantifiable.
Well been playing D&D since the late 60's and we never tied experience to gold ever. I have played under multiple DM's without any of them using that feature. So if it was in the rules, it was not something that was used much in my experience.
You ARE a hero in CITY OF HEROES.
Hrm, well then what is heroic in general? Does it always have to be saving someone's life or the lives of others in every case? I don't think it does. Heroes can be of MANY sorts. One could very-well be a hero in a gaming venue; and I think it was defined earlier. One can be a hero to someone who is alone and having trouble playing the game. Entertainment is a big deal and people spend a lot of time attempting to have a little bit of extra fun in their lives . . . hence, helping to facilitate just that in an environment where you are attemptitg to do the same thing is a sacrifice. Sacrificing your time to help another person enjoy themselves is still a sacrifice; and what greater is there than your time, a piece of your life . . . and for no return.
While I don't consider myself a hero, I've spent a lot of time in many games just answering questions and grouping with people to help them out. I've sacrificed a lot of my time to help people enjoy themselves. I don't consider myself a hero, and I don't expect anything to come from it but my own personal satisfaction that I helped someone, but perhaps the people I've helped do . . . and there would be nothing wrong with that. I don't get any extra gear, I don't get an achievement and if the player leaves or moves on to a paid subscription they'll likely soon forget me, but they are having fun and I know how great that feels. Mission accomplished.
In the most extreme of situations, there are those who are looking for one last venue to find friends. For some people, it's the desire to communicate and make a connection in a world better than (so it may be or so they may just think) than their own. Often-times, more often than will ever be recorded, there are likely those times when finding a friend (online or otherwise) makes life that much more worth enduring. There are individuals who have killed themselves over gaming and likely MMORPG gaming to boot; so you never know who you may end up helping. Though those instances are few and far between, they are worth the time to prevent just the same. Even without the option to save a life (whether known or not), making someone happy is almost never anything less than heroic to those on the receiving end.
Large-scale PvP gives you the opportunity to be a real hero or feared opponent. Games like Warhammer Online or Dark Age of Camelot have lots of (in)famous players on each server.
Heroic in a game is simple. Heroic = overcoming challenging obstacles. It's beating that boss you couldnt beat before. Finishing that quest that seemed impossible at the start. The problem is, overcoming one obstacle, however great it is, wont be enough to satisfy a gamer for a long period of time. We need new obstacles, more challenging problems. This is where it gets tricky for the developers. They have to determine those difficulty thresholds in a way that will be meaningful to their player base. And once that content is beat, they have to do it again, with new twists, and new angles. Some people use story as part of those twists. To me, story is used to get you in the dungeon, or make you care about the outcome of the challenge. But gameplay and difficulty is what makes each moment feel heroic to the player.
I continue to believe that a hero should be a class or a class that has reached a level of distinction, or an NPC.
In my opinion human acts of kindness or helpfulness toward other persons playing a game is a separate issue from being a real life hero. This in no way detracts from the importance of kindness, selflessness, or helpfulness; it is just that I feel those terms should be used when describing such acts. Also, game social structure is important. However, should one be considered a hero simply because they are social?
I am trying to present my definition of a hero in a game. It should be considered an avatar class or class level of distinction, not actions taken by a human through a character in a game.
As to the argument that someone may be saving a person's life by helping them, persons that kill themselves because they do not get what they want from a game [or anything else] need psychological or spiritual help, and I doubt much of that will be provided by people helping another person make it through a dungeon.
Personaly, I derived FAR more of a heroic feeling from playing WWII Online (essentialy a semi-permanent FPS) and from playing an old text based MUD called Gemstone then I ever did from playing any of the so called MMORPG's out there. Because in those games...what you did on an individual level actually MATTERED to people beyond yourself.
Let me illustrate with an example from Gemstone to describe what I mean. First you need to understand a little bit about the mechanics of Gemstone to understand WHY characters have the ability to feel like what they do actually matters. Let me explain what happens when a character dies in Gemstone. Firstly, whatever is in your hands DROPS to the ground (weapons, shields, etc). These items can be PICKED up by any mobs presented and WEILDED by them. So if you were carrying a deadly vorpal blade when you died...the Orc you had been fighting that was previously armed with a plain old rusty shortsword would now be weilding YOUR vorpal blade and therefore be far more deadly to other players. Next you lost EXP when you died. You also lost a thing called a DEED. Deeds were essentialy lives... if you died and decayed when you had zero deeds...you were gone forever (Perma-Death)... Note that you pretty much had to be entirely reckless and purposefully put yourself in a situation where you risked Perma-Death...as you could obtain deeds by sacrificing treasure to the gods at a temple to get them when you wanted. While deeds weren't cheap, they weren't cost prohibitive unless you were getting killed every 5 minutes while hunting.
The next thing that happened was that you got put on a Decay timer...like many games have. Your body would lay there (with you in it, unable to do anything) until the timer ran out and you decayed...or until some-one came along and ressurected you or until you purposefully DEPARTED (decayed). Decaying meant that you lost extra EXP and Deeds.... more importantly...you would wake up naked in a Temple. ALL the items you had on you at the time you decayed would fall to the floor where your body had fallen and would be PERMANENTLY lost....if not recovered within a few minutes of your decaying (if no one else was in the area). Furthermore...good items were not very easy to obtain...many of the things you had might have been tailor made for you by GM run merchants/craftsmen during RP sesseions... not really replacable. Thus dying and especialy DECAYING really had some sting to it.
Now with the mechanics out of the way. On to the story. So I was hunting one day with a few companions in a Mine that happaned to be one of the higher level areas in the game at that time. The area was dangerous and people could get killed if they were unlucky...but generaly folks used tactics and made preperations (like hunting in groups) to minimize those risks to some degree. My companions and I started wandering through the mine hunting... and we shortly came across another small group of adventurers doing the same thing. As was customary in that game... we moved a few rooms away so as to not interfere with the other groups hunt.
After a short while we saw the notification ** So and So just bit the dust **. In the game, there was a system wide broadcast when some-one died (although these could be turned off by players, I believe).... followed rapidly by another death, then another. Now we reckognized these names as belonging to the other hunting group. With 3 bodies on the ground and 3 sets of magic weapons/shields potentialy on the loose we new the situation could be pretty serious. So we did what was customary in those days...We moved over to the area where the other group was hunting to try and effect a rescue. That's just what players in that game did for each other.... as the adversity and danger bred a sense of community among the player base. Even folks who played villians often helped in such situations...as they knew the next time it might be them lying on the ground.
Well we got to the site of the other group...and 3 of thier 4 members were dead on the ground, the 4th badly wounded...the monster's swarming with the dead adventurers magic gear in thier hands. So we started to straighten the situation out and were regaining control of the battle when our own luck turned against us. Another monster came in and executed one of it's special attacks that ended up knocking us all to the ground. Before we could get up...2 of my 3 hunting companions were dead along with the remaining survivor of the other group. My last remaining companion was prone, wounded badly and suffering from a long term stun. I was hurt, but not bad...and still functional ( I happened to be playing a tank class).
Well, it was clear to me at that point that the rescue mission itself was in need of rescue itself. So I decided the wisest course was to try to get out alive and get word out back to town as to what had happaned...so more help could be organized to deal with the situation. I sheathed my sword and started to drag my remaining stunned companion out toward the mine entrance. In Gemstone, you could drag people...and corpses as well... but you needed 1 hand free to do it. Putting my weapon away and trying to drag my companion out in that situation was a risk to me...as it slowed me and left me more vulnerable to attack... but I wasn't going to leave a man (or in this case a woman) down to die..while I was still functional no matter what. Battered but functional, I managed to drag my companion (still stunned) ALL the way to the last room before the exit and safety. However, before I could get her out...I got knocked down myself...the monster then killed my companion with one blow...picked up her nasty two handed sword and proceeded to whack at me with it. Somehow, I survived...and got to my feet.... though I was bleeding very badly and close to death. I got out the mine entrance...put away my shield and took out a teleport ring I had set back to the Town Square where people who played healers usualy hung out (a standard hunting precaution in those days) and activated it. When I arrived at the square, in front of a couple startled healers....I was very nearly dead...and realized I had only a couple seconds left to do anything before dying....So I typed out 2 words, "Wharf's ... Massacre!" before litteraly droping dead at a healers feet.
The healers took care of my body....and started getting the word out about what had happaned. Rescue missions were quickly organized... involving probably more then 2 dozen other adventurers. The rescue efforts probably lasted a good hour or more...and resulted in at least another half-dozen deaths...with monsters swarming everywhere...magic gear in thier hands. However, eventualy the mines were cleared out...every piece of dropped gear was recovered and back in it's origional owners hands (i.e. no one tried to ninja anyone elses gear) and everyone had been recovered and restored to life. Fruthermore, there was no reward for anyone (exp, gold, etc) then the thanks and acknowledgement of the people who were helped....and that was more important then any bit's of data added to a character sheet could be.
Now THAT was what felt like a truely heroic experience. I haven't had a game experience that was anywhere close to as fun or exciting in any of the modern MMO's. Forget Lich Kings and Dragons and whatever other massive Bosses you might encounter in some pre-fab instance.... those DON'T make for meaningfull experiences. It's facing risk...working through adversity...and making a difference for other players/characters...that make for a meaningful RPG experience.
Something most of todays designers, just don't seem to get.
I grew up in a time before video games existed, even before D&D existed. My friends and I didn't have games to tell us we were hero's. We grabbed a stick and it became a sword, or a bazooka, a magic wand or whatever we wanted it to be. We used our imaginations.
Seems to me gamers now days must not use their imaginations much. I don't care how many other people have previously slain the dragon, when it's my turn, I can be the hero if I want. Or I can kill the dragon and go quietly to the next town. It's all up to my imagination.
Not necessarily. Vigilante justice doesn't sit well with cops, but there are times when it's a heroic path to take. Plenty of cops and politicians even in the US are corrupt, racist scum just taking tax dollars in one hand and bribes in the other, and in many countries it's much, much worse.
Oh, and anyone who comes into a thread about heroes in MMOs and tells other people to go be a hero in real life is pathetic. Think about it.
Someone told other people to be a hero in real life? I must have missed that post.
These days too many confuse their game life with real life, or some way or another they cross over into ea other.
The hero platform in mmo's has become nothing but a popularity program or elitest jerk status to look down on everyone else, or to give themselves a rank of importance to the point they can feel better about themselves in game.
It's gotten boring, something new and innovative in how game story mechanics run would be nice in this generation.
I think you are hitting on some truth there.
People going around telling other people they are a hero because they have a tweaked character have some kind of problem.
Are they going to have gaming stats carved on their tomb stone and a small round shield beside their grave with the name of their favorite game and every year have an national flag placed on it on Memorial Day, next to the grave of a WWII vet? ...
You are not heros, you may be kind and helpful, however, it is not the same thing.
Having NPCs classified as a hero or a hero class for your avatar is OK with me because it is PRETENDING! It is a game! Play time!
Now, if during this time of play some people become proud and look down on others, as Flynnigan has said, just because they have virtual armored up Ken and Barbie dolls, something is wrong again.
Is it cool to achieve something and have nice gear because you worked for it? Yes! However, a virtual armored up pretend toon does not make a person a hero.
Again, games need good and kind people and I am not talking about them, unless they think good and kind = hero.