These days there are so few new mmorpgs that we have to live on the memories of long past days.
I started playing WoW in the summer of 2005 and joined a casual raiding guild that planned to start raiding Molten Core. I was the third tank who joined the guild and would spend my days in MC tanking adds or doing dps. We had great success on the first few bosses, and we had one farm day and one progression day. On the farm day 60 people signed up, but on progression day we struggled to have 30 in MC. So we got stuck on Baron Geddon for over 3 weeks, first it was the living bombs that wiped the raid, then the MT just died probably because the dps was so low that the healers just ran out of mana.
The third day was coming to an end and Geddon was still alive, the 2 Main tanks had switched on trying to tank him to no avail they kept dropping dead. Just before the raid leader called it, one of the healers said on the Comm, "What about Paul? Why not let him try tanking?", That's how I ended up tanking Geddon. I had spent months working on my Fire Resist gear, it was a ragtag collection of lvl 50 green,blues, and some epics, but it had balanced stats and high FR.
On my first attempt tanking Baron Geddon we killed him for the first time. It's not because I was a better tank it was a good memory but that I finally got to use the Fire Resist gear I had painstakingly farmed and spent loads of gold on in the Auction House.
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EQ1, EQ2, SWG, SWTOR, GW, GW2 CoH, CoV, FFXI, WoW, CO, War,TSW and a slew of free trials and beta tests
Underlight was a MMO where you expected everyone to be roleplaying all the time. Can you imagine how well that would go down with the casual easy mode gamers of today?
Sometimes you did "quests" given by players for "advancement" sort of reputation, house acknowledgment and actually getting powers. I was given a physical item (a scroll of sorts) to deliver to another player on which a message was written, I was not to open the item and read the message. It was that simple, or so you might think, but this person proved rather hard to find. Message delivered, job done.
I had a mate in game who was quite new to it all like myself, he told me he had done that quest but opened the letter first. So what happened I asked, nothing he said but the women he gave it to did seem annoyed. We carried on adventuring.
A day or so later we met both of these women who were very "high level" characters. The one who sent the message immediately wanted to know why my mate had opened the letter. He did not have much to say...then they started hissing. "Why are they hissing" he said. "Get the hell out of here" I said, we ran.
I guess my favorite was a GM event.
To set the story, there were these 3 GM played bad guys who were leaders of a mysterious cult that was intent on destroying Sosaria, the game world.
(At the end of beta, the evil forces defeated that "shard" world and beta ended with the world full of Demons that killed all characters except a few who logged on in hiding, and didn't move.)
In a previous GM event, one of these GM played cult leaders had been captured and imprisoned by the players, who were led by "good" GM characters, friends of Lord British in the game's lore.
In this GM event, the task was to move this captured GM cult leader from the Trinsic jails to the Yew Jails, which were below the Yew Courthouse. A trial date had been set, for a later GM event.
It was a long trip along the roads, over bridges, passed mountains, etc.
Along the way, naturally, the GMs set many MOBs against us. Mostly Orcs. These were pretty good battles, but then I noticed one of the other of the 3 GM cult leaders was running along the train to Yew, and jumping in from the forests to help the Orcs weaken our numbers, in an effort to rescue the captured GM cult leader.
I went after the evil cult leader, and 3 others who noticed him did too.
The 4 of us gave chase through the forest, but his constant evasion and escapes from brief battles soon led to us getting spread out a little. It's hard to keep up with a fleeing enemy in an over-the-should view, but not impossible as you know the general direction. Plus, you could hear from distances the sound of battle. And then there was the tracking skill too.
I found the cult leader in combat with 2 of my fellow chasers. He killed one of them after what looked like a tough battle just as I came into view. (These GM played characters were skilled out and had top gear, but so did many players.) The cult leader then took on the other, but between the constant need for heal potions and spells between all involved, and seeing me approaching, he made yet another escape. I was able to set my tracking skill on him though, which meant as long as he was in range I had an indicator of which direction he was from me.
The survivor gave up the chase in order to protect his dead companion's loot while he found an NPC Wandering Healer. So I left them behind to continue the hunt, and I knew there was a 4th guy out there somewhere as a possible aid to me.
I followed my tracking indicator and soon heard the sound of another battle. As I ran up, I saw that both my companion and the cult leader needed healing badly. I quickly chose to cast a heal spell on my companion, rather than try to drop the cult leader. I didn't think my character had quite enough to do so and a lapse in healing likely would mean the death of my companion, but I did save him for the moment. The cult leader made another quick escape, while we pursued him, still using my tracking indicator.
We again caught up with our quarry, and another battle ensued. It was tough going, lots of running and weaving about, lots of potion use (healing, blessing, strength), spells were cast, and the battle was wild as it ran our way, then his way, and back and forth, as it always felt like it could end at any moment in either side's favor. But in the end, my companion ran off. No doubt because he was out of heal potions. I was almost out too, and hurting.
I expected the cult leader to take me down, he had all the advantages. But instead he gave out a "HA!", and ran off to attack the prisoner-train again. I let off, I was in bad shape for potions and spell reagents and I wasn't skilled out like my companions had been, so I returned to the train and followed the rest of the way to Yew, where the prisoner was transferred to his new jail cell.
All in all the event took quite some time. I think it was 3 hours, if I remember right, but it was a long, long time ago.
And still one of the most memorable events that I ever had the honor of participating in.
Once upon a time....
I got into my first raiding guild after running PUG raids in the "Nurmall channel" on EverQuest (that man was a saint, a SAINT I say!) and getting keyed for the elemental planes in Planes of Power. Oddly enough, Time had not been tackled on that server yet, and the guild I got into was neck and neck with one other guild to get people geared and keyed for Plane of Time. After weeks and weeks of farming all of the lower bosses (you had to share raid zones, no instances, literally had to schedule raid times around other raid guilds and hope they didn't screw you over), we finally killed Quarm and got the server first Plane of Time kill. I think we were like world 10th as well. Actually felt kind of accomplished for a 23 year old newlywed.
Kind of did that again with the first raid in Cataclysm. For the first 2 weeks, we had all of the server firsts (world 20s or so), but then we stalled out on a boss and the new healer we brought in was a mouthbreather and I yelled at him so much that the whiny tank (his brother) refused to raid with me anymore so I just quit playing. I normally don't yell, but when you are sort of "cutting edge"-ing it on your server and the healer is high and giggling about how he's too stoned to dodge simple mechanics and wiping us at 5%, I tend to get testy.
12 years old, Everquest, I had no clue what I was doing, I created a barbarian shaman I think, walked down an ice slope and saw everyone wearing polar bear armour! I loved it and had to have it, this is when I knew I'd love mmorpgs'.
21, WOW had been out about two months and I started playing. I loved it all but one day I walking through Dusk wood and another Night Elf ran past with a helmet on! I whispered him as quick as I could to find out where he found it, LOL. We chatted for a good half hour and I joined his guild Sacred on Hellscream server, we had a great time learning to clear MC and BWL for a long time.
I really miss enjoying the community side of an MMORPG, wheres it gone???? (maybe I need to join a mature guild? Oh yeah, another new game will come out and everyone will leave and have no commitment to their "guild friends" or game)
Good stories folks!
EQ1, EQ2, SWG, SWTOR, GW, GW2 CoH, CoV, FFXI, WoW, CO, War,TSW and a slew of free trials and beta tests
Back then you had to read quests to know what to do. You had to sit down so often to get your hp or mana back. People just hang out in towns. The long walks towards your next objective. The danger of being attacked and so teaming up constantly with strangers for your own protection. It was amazing.
It's not one thing that happened. It was truly one long amazing experience.
Man those were good times. The next few months and years even were also nice but most of all I enjoyed the long leveling to 60 on my first character.
2) Successfully tanking a raid boss in Neverwinter (first time as tank, kind of fun really)
3) Not an MMO but in starcraft 1.
- I liked to play 1 v 1 and every time a person signed up to a game i check out their stats. So this one guy signed in and his stats were like 500 wins or something. All the wins didn't have to do with 1v1, they didn't always mean much, but i felt that i was going against a relatively good player for my ability.
He was the type of char that would wait till the end to switch from random to zerg. I always stayed random.
I got hit with Terran (my worst) and when we played. I made a judgment to go for an airship drop on his resources. I wasn't good at Terran but I figured i'd try something. So i was able to drop on his base with a drop ship as he was about to get air technology and had already expanded. I took out his main base and I had the advantage.
From then on out, i made dropships and marines and scouted the other expansions until i killed him off. It's the only 1 v 1 match in starcraft I remember. It was a feeling that I had actually beat a "good" player. I expected to lose the game horribly but it was a nice win for me.
4) Building my EVE trading empire. Basically, in some 0.0 zone, i'd buy minerals at 50-60% cost for billions, pay my corpmate to ship it up to Jita (25 million per ship) and transfer to my char and sell at just below market cost. Made 1 billion per week in 2007-2008.
You can see my sci-fi/WW2 book recommendations.
I maintanked on the top alliance raid group but for personal reasons I simply couldn't get friends I played with to join as well. Can't even remember if we or the horde guild was first but my first reaction of killing him was telling my friends "I'm quitting, time to start our group".
I stuck around another week until I quit and first time we were a group of 30, and I had no clue who most of those people were. On week 2 we were stuck because no-one could douse the runes and still not raiding at full strength. Week 4 it was back at ragnaros for a few attempts.
What I do remember of the kill night is that it was a sunday, the week before we had some solid attempts so it felt like it was time to get that kill. First attempt was alright, second attempt damage was really good, at 1% it submerged for second time and we wiped. We had three people disconnecting immediately that got stuck in a 45 minute queue and ragnaros would despawn after two hours.
In a wait that felt like an eternity we knew there was only time for one attempt. It was one of those perfect kills.
During those 1.5 months I learned a lot of myself that I had never considered. I had never felt comfortable contacting other people but suddenly I talked with everyone. I had never liked talking before a crowd and I never ever wanted to lead but suddenly I led a group of 40+ people of different nationalities, most that had never done raiding.
Without gaming I would never have learned those things about myself so that time playing were far more than just gaming.
We trashed everything we ran into until we got to Tyrant. I rushed in, insulted his mother's fashion sense, and the fight was on! It went on for about 5 minutes and he was down to about 50% health. Then my health started dropping. I took a green, and then another, then another. I looked over at the defender and saw she was not moving - Uh oh, disconnect! Then she faded from the screen. The blasters started dropping greens and purple (resistance and defense) inspirations (like potions) on me, but my health was dropping too fast. My friend sent me a PM asking for a re-invite, which I did.
With the healer on the way, and being out of inspirations, I triggered Unstoppable. Fast regen (health) and recovery (endurance, or mana), 90% resistance to any damage he was throwing at me, and an accuracy and damage buff. Awash with power, but only for 3 minutes. We fight and fight, and get his health down to 20%. Then I see the Unstoppable icon flashing, damn, it is going to drop in 10 seconds! Not only does the power drop, but my health drops to 10% and my mana drops to zero. Those blasters are going to be one shotted if I'm not drawing agro, so I move away from the group. Then Unstoppable drops. very low health, no mana and all of my toggle defenses drop. Tyrant rushes at me. One shot and I am done.
Then the Ice Blaster fires Freeze Ray, and he gets the one in 50 chance; Tyrant is locked in a block of ice! At that time the defender gets in the room and fires a heal. I drop my last blue (mana) inspiration and toggle back up. The fight is over in two minutes, and we are victorious!
That very awesome fight could have come right out of a comic book! Of all of the fights I was in playing City of Heroes, this is the one that I won't forget.
The world is going to the dogs, which is just how I planned it!
Not my "best" memory in a positive way - but one that will stick with me forever. Getting throw in f'ing jail in FFXI for fish botting. The audacity to punish me when there were literal armies of japanese players standing next to me doing the same thing was one thing. But the fact that they put you in a jail where you had to sit online and wait for a GM to come talk to you was icing on the cake. I straight quit playing as soon as that happened and never logged in again. I really liked FFXI too - too bad I was a petty teenager haha...
I feel this may be the most important factor in MMO gaming because even within games i can't stand,the time spent was made more enjoyable because of people around me.Yes that even includes Wow and EQ2 and my fave FFXI.
Weather or not player interaction should outweigh the actual game is up for argument.I feel the decision is made easier for myself because player friendship cannot be denied but developers on the other hand feel like they are against the gamer's,not listening to anyone but themselves and well just trying to piss people off.
There lies another topic,i don't hold any grudges against past players i have come in contact with but developers,well they can frustrate me to no end,i feel like i an watching the 3 stooges make a comeback.
Players/friends create memories,developers create nightmares !!.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
In Metin2: watching (and dying to) a single mage player kill hundreds of players from the two enemy factions in open world 3 faction pvp. Yes, that's how bad the P2W was in Metin2, but watching that guy slaughter 2 factions on his own over and over was awesome.
I played a lot of MMORPGs using that memory.
In UO, early days (again).
I was pretty much a noob at this point, but from the forums I knew quite a few hardcore Ultima gamers.
One was Spectre, who ran a forum called "The Mage Tower."
This forum's participants worked together to build the first Tower in UO, and they named it after that forum, "The Mage Tower."
But Spectre turned bad and into one of the leading PKers.
I needed gold badly, so I started going to Dungeon Covetous, to the lower level, in a room full of crates. These crates would respawn an assortment of loot, and there were a lot of crates. Nothing special, but good for some fast cash.
There was often about 10 others there doing the same thing.
Most of us stayed in hiding most of the time, in case of PKers.
One day, a Gate opened in the middle of the room.
Out poured Spectre and his gang of PKers, and they quickly set about killing anyone who broke "Hiding" and tried to run.
Then they set about "Revealing" those who were left hidden, and killing them too.
I thought I was the last one left, still hiding. I waited for the PKers to clear out, as they were heading out to chase would-be-escapers, and then to run through the Dungeon on their killing spree. Spectre was the last one left in the room. I suspected he was "Tracking" for anyone left, and I feared the worst.
But Spectre "Revealed" one more guy.
He then hit him with a Fire Ball, then used the tactic of Paralization/Explosion (with a timer before it exploded)/and Lightning to finish the guy off.
As I hid in silence, and as Spectre was running through these spells, the helpless guy says between spell effects:
"Lets..."
"Be reasonable."
Then he died.
I laughed so hard at this that I almost forgot to run!
Once upon a time....
Vault-Tec analysts have concluded that the odds of worldwide nuclear armaggeddon this decade are 17,143,762... to 1.