Being a raid leader was just practice

I used to think that running a raiding guild back in the Molten Core and Black Wing Lair days took a lot of preparation and coordination. We would have to crank out all kinds of food and potions, coordinate arrival times, make contingency plans, adapt to changes in attendees, figure out who to invite and not invite, and deal with all sorts of drama. I would spend hours and hours making sure everything went just right.  Turns out I was simply practicing for planning a wedding.

I’ve still managed to squeeze in some gaming time despite having my days filled with work, venues, and excel spreadsheets out my ears for everything from food to invitees. I got into the Heroes of the Storm Technical Alpha! I’ve played only a handful of matches but I’m really enjoying the gameplay. It’s simplified DOTA. Heroes of the Storm reminds me of those Hero Arena games I used to play back in the custom games for Warcraft 3. Lots of fun and I look forward to playing it more this weekend before giving even more thoughts on the game.

My Barbarian in Diablo 3 Season 1 is still coming along quite nicely too. Something about spreading my playtime very thin with D3 gives me a renewed sense of love for being able to log in, get loot, and kill lots of monsters. In one morning I went from not being able to do Torment 1 to being able to clear Torment 4 with ease. All it took was a few runs in rifts and I got 3 set Ik, 3 earth, a Bovine bardiche, and Lut socks. Now I’m leap quaking everything to pieces.

Graev picked up Civ Beyond Eearth. I’m going to watch him play it for a bit today (tomorrow?) and decide if I want to get myself a copy. If you’ve tried it by the time you read this post feel free to give your impressions. I’m eager to hear if dropping the $49.99 is worth it. Graev actually saved a bit by using some deal Green Man Gaming has going for 25% off. We’ll get our impressions up soon — Graev seems to be reviewing games like crazy these days.

I’m just glad all of the MMOs out right now suck. If something like Camelot Unchained or EverQuest Next was out I’d be really hurting. I remember every year I’d go back up to college after a nice summer break and a new MMO would launch right in the first week of classes. This is good karma coming back to me now. Best drought ever.

  • Did you get an early copy of Beyond Earth! I’m so jealous. I can’t wait to play the game. I’ve pretty much watched all of the movies that I could find on You tube, I know it unlocks for me at 11:00 pm cst thursday night and I’ve already prepared by taking Friday off.

    You failed to mention that the few hours you spent playing D3 getting all that phat loot you had some help ;).

  • Totally had some help from this really cool guy named Yotor and his pet named Damage. (Hence not being able to do T1 then jumping to T4 in like 2 hours.)

    I think I messed up the dates. Looks like we might have a little longer for Civ than I thought. I guess it’s in 2 days and not today? I don’t know… Guess I’m early to the party and won’t be watching Graev today afterall.

  • Planning a raid or managin a guild is done in a closed environment. You can still control some part of it, there are less factors that could affect it and, well, you can fail withtout harsh consequences. Organizing anything IRL ? That’s another story! You are exposed to so many random and no-so random variables, it drives some people completely nuts as they are not able to control everything !

    I also advise against failling at the whole wedding thing, before, during or after. 😉

    Beyond Earth will be released this Friday by the way. The game can be pre-downloaded in Steam at the moment, Graev won’t miss a beat !

  • What you go in heroes of the storm? Aww I am not jealous at all… actually I am.

    I signed up the first day you could and still no invite.
    Maybe they treat Europe different…

    Well… have fun for 2 then I guess.
    Good thing they no longer wipe progress in the game.

  • Since this a general topic type of post I thought I would mention that GMG is giving away copies of XCOM: Enemy Unknown for voting their best game categories on a The Golden Joystick Awards; plus you’ll get the expansion Enemy Within for 80% off.

    I just love that game so I thought I would share (no I don’t benefit from this in any way) as a free top flight game is something to share!

    I think that offer is ending soon though.