I thought I’d write up a few stories about WoW.. which if nothing else has changed my life for certain. In the end I hope to tell you how I:

Lost a Girlfriend to Wow (not really.. lol)

Met My Wife on WoW.. (true story.)

Spent most of my time thru I think about 2 years playing it and running my own guild.. only to quit then come back later.

First tho, Pre Wow Todd:
About 8 years ago ish.. I was working for Dell, I was and am still not a gamer.. I did not buy a playstation 2, I half owned an Xbox with my Brother only because he didn’t have enough money to buy it himself… at this time I would occasionally play Battlefield 1942 and host servers on Linux probably because of the challenge of running it on Linux.. and nothing else. I had thought about maybe picking up Star Wars Galaxies, or Everquest, but I had heard they were addictive.. also.. I didn’t like what else I’d heard about the game play.. it was sort of cookie cutter. I was with a girl who I’d just had a child with (this was my second child, Vivien.) And I’d changed jobs, and was now working for Dell, which I think was late 2003.

Time passes and WoW is released later in 2004, and people all around me start playing it, including my good friend James, who was a Gamer. First James would talk all day about whatever game he was playing.. which were all console games.. James even though he worked at Dell did not have a PC at home, he just didn’t have one, there were a few guys who didn’t. I think I had like.. 2 at the time.. anyhooooo.. WoW was spreading like fire amongst the other Dell Techs around us, a guild called The Sentinels sprang up, and James needed a PC.. I remember going to either newegg or mwave and showing him I could probably put together a cheap PC for less than what Dell wanted for a cheap one even with his discount, So James was playing wow.. and naturally.. he wouldn’t stop talking about it.. and talking about it.. so I just had to know what the big deal was.. So I think in July of 2005 it must have been..

Within a couple of months I was 30.. this is embarrassing to me now.. but the game was harder then.. most people didn’t know how to play, lots of general game mechanics now that everyone is just expected to know simply wasn’t really that important to you as a player.. or you didn’t care enough to know. Want a good example?

My wife tells a story that her Mage was asked to heal in Uldaman.

want another?

I decided to roll a paladin (Savory on Blackhand).. and while getting my rez quest done, I ran into a level 7 warrior.. and I heal him.. and we are wearing similar things.. and he said “r you magic??”

OLD WoW vs. New WoW

If you are new to Wow.. and you want to get into a dungeoun you have your finder.. back in this time.. there was no such thing.. first.. you could go to a city.. and in the city you say in general chat:

LFG (Looking For Group) Name of Instance.. usually an abbreviation.. which was normally an agreed upon thing.. like SFK was ShadowFang Keep..

You would spam the channel.. usually boring everyone.. and this would make places like IronForge and Ogrimmar into really really busy places.. and most PC’s couldn’t take the loading of all those shapes at once.. so you’d lag hardcore.. if you’ve ever heard of those pits in IronForge being called “Lag Pits” that’s why, you’d end up down there alot.

I’ve run out of time to write for today.. I’ll do more later