Then and now
I’ve two stories of pick-up groups to share, compare.
I was cruising around with my LotRO Champion today when I ran into a Lore-Master with three mobs on him. I stopped to see if he needed assistance, it’s not polite to just “help” these days so I watched his health and that of the mobs. He looked like he could use a little assistance on the last mob so I chopped the mob up and moved on. He said, “TY” which I should have responded to, I just continued with my business. I was working on one of those discovery jobs where if you find all five things you get a reward. I needed to fight my way through a bunch of goblins. Every time I engaged a goblin, the Lore-Master I assisted would “help.” He helped five or six times and I finally broke down and gave him an invite. We said hi, I canged loot rules to free for all, and I continued on, it was a small area - he must have been going my way.
The Champion and Lore-Master combo kicked some goblin butt. I soon reached the area I was headed to and received my finders notice. I didn’t know what the Lore-Master was after. We were working a dead end with a large camp of goblins at the end. I continued on into the camp and we worked our way half way round. I messaged that I was done with this area and asked what he was after. If I accept, or offer, a group invite I feel it’s only right to stick around until every one gets what they need, if you can. He messaged, “I need a bow.” I didn’t know a Lore-Master could use a bow, and I didn’t know what I could do to help him acquire one. With no clear direction on what he wanted to do, I killed all the rest of the goblins and started working my way out. Once we were in relative safe spot, I messaged that, “I’m leaving this area, thanks for the help,” disbanded, bowed, saluted, and went on my way. I didn’t write down his name, though he seemed like a decent enough player. If I ever run into him again, I’ll not know who he is.
Eight years ago, I was playing a level 8 Warrior in EQ on the Test server. I was working the goblins and orcs in Misty Thicket. I was the only one in the zone, not a lot of people played on test. It was a little hard to break the orc camp with a Warrior, but I had and was scientifically timing the spawn and taking care of business. Out of nowhere a level 8 Druid shows up. I didn’t need the Druid, but it was a small camp, it was test, I invited, the druid joined. Mark and I still play together, we are scheduled to play our level 11 toons in LotRO Monday night.
Have I changed that much over all these years of playing online? Was Mark some outstanding Druid? The pace in Misty, on test, was much slower than today in the goblin camp. The population on test was so small you were forced to appreciate anyone you met. I wrote down Mark’s character name and followed his progress. On a production server, there are so many people playing, even the good ones are, at best, a minor annoyance. I love the new games. I guess I miss the slower pace of the old ones. Mark was a pretty good Druid, for a Halfling, btw.