The Community Element

One thing I love about Guild Wars is the spontaneity with which a plan can come together. This morning was a great example. Any of you that play will know about the Zaishen missions and bounties that change each day. The rewards are great, and, if you can get the right team together, it's a lot of fun. The bounty this morning was Z'him Monns, probably the harder of the two Bogroots quests. Still, fairly easy with the right team.

We started at perhaps 9am GMT, not the most active time for our particular guild. However, we originally managed to pull together a team of 3 people and made up the rest with heroes. Just as we were discussing what we were missing, Hayley signed onto msn. Seizing the opportunity to make an even better team, and to spend some time with her, I asked her to meet us in the guild hall. Her boyfriend Ash joined us too and we were now left with a team of 5/8 real players.

When I logged on to Guild Wars at 8 I couldn't have foreseen this event, at best I thought I may be doing a mission with Sean alone. Instead, through spontaneous happenstance, we pushed our way through one of my personal favourite dungeons. The banter in the group kept it light-hearted, even when faced with the wipes and near wipes. In the team there was no blame, there was no anger, there was just the refreshing love of the game and enjoyment of the company. This, I would say, is the reason I play Guild Wars; because, no where else that I've ever been, can you make an elite team and not have people get annoyed when things don't go perfectly.

I loved the sudden formation of a team of guild-mates. AoM is like family in a lot of ways, and this morning I could see us moving like a family should, each person supporting the rest, working as a team instead of playing solo. This is what MMORPGs should be in my opinion; not grinding, not raging, not berating people, not trolling, but about working together for a common goal.