Operation Tyler Durden

I thought I’d posted this but looking back now, it would appear I didn’t. Luckily I typed it up in Word, so I’ll just post it now.

Today was a great day for the Warjammers. We accomplished much in a very short period of time, and have many interesting results to report for it. Team Order met in the Thayer computer lab and got to work with two main goals:
• Establish contact with and interview an in-game addict
• Set up a fight club on the beach in the RvR area between Order and Destruction
For the first objective, we met in our capital city and the five of us formed a party. Since the party limit is six, we had a berth waiting to invite our target. Before long, we targeted Leigheas and invited him to our party. A shrewd dwarf character, he quickly caught on that we were no ordinary party. A few questions about his playing habits and Leigheas started going along with us, calling us a ‘support group’.



One of the most eye-opening realizations I came to from listening to Leigheas was that not only was he obsessed with video games, but he was entirely aware of and okay with this fact. When asked what he’d be doing if not playing Warhammer right now, he actually said he’d just be playing a different game. It was as if he was so enthralled by the concept of gaming that he didn’t even question the act. If not one specific game, then another, but definitely some game. Given the repetitive grinding nature of an MMORPG, I guess I can see how one would have to have this kind of mentality to ever play enough to reach maximum level and access the later stages of the game. That kind of hardcore approach is the only conceivable one with the patience and persistence to overcome the boredom of the transition stages of leveling up. Anyway, before long Leigheas left us to go grind some more. Our group tried in vain to find another target but the few people we stumbled upon (more on that when I get around to posting about it) seemed too enthralled in whatever they were doing to respond.

We decided it was time to move on to the Fight Club idea. Contacting our counterparts on the Destruction side of the server, we agreed to meet at our old stomping grounds on the beach. Initially it was difficult getting enough of us on each side all present at the same time in order to intimidate and if necessary, kill anyone who was opposed to the idea. Eventually we were able to get around five of us there from each team and I felt relatively secure.



Basically, our idea was simple. A controlled environment, complete with a cheering crowd, where two characters could duel without worrying about the influence of other characters. Due to the inability to communicate with the other team, we worked out a system where one character walked up to another, emoted using /point, walked to the center of the circle, then jumped three times and began to battle. It actually worked very well, as this signaled to the duel target and others who would be fighting and when to begin. When one character died, he’d respawn in his last city and make the two minute run back to the beach. Once we had it worked out, we began to advertise in the regional chat box, which broadcasted our Fight Club to everyone remotely close to us. Surprisingly, we had the very encouraging result of non-Warjammer participation on both the Order and Destruction sides. It was as if we had constructed a game within the game framework that had actually interested other players, which felt like a major success.



We felt we had to celebrate with a naked party on Peace Island.



More on the state of the server in my next post.