New Addition to Demise, or...

Parenting Using an MMORPG...

Yeah...this will be an interesting topic to explore.

So there I was...9-year-older playing a blood elf hunter on her mama's account while annoying me incessantly with "but I can't..." regarding just about everything you could imagine in-game. Rather than allow her to grow into adulthood with the expectations that "but I can't" means someone that says "yes we can" will somehow provide you with all you need just for asking; I decided it was time to teach her HOW to fish...so to speak.

So we decided it was time she had her own toon on her own account. For me, this is a selfish reason--I got tired of asking guildies to do dungeon runs for guild achievements. Getting 3 Demise to focus on something for more than 3 minutes, post Lich-King, is asking a lot. For Ange, she gets a friend account. For Evelyn, she get triple XP and the added bonus of an evil stepdad who screams at her for looting Mail items from bosses (she's a druid). Did learn that telling a 9-year-old that she's being mean to her mom for looting her gear makes an impression (ahem).

More importantly, this gives young kiddo an opportunity to learn about everything from online social norms to network-centric warfare (although she's frickin' deadly in first-person shooters)...and made a GREAT segue into teaching her the basics of computer systems, networks, and programs. Hmmm....

MMO...RPG...Internet...Computer...as a learning device and parenting tool. Me likey.

So there we were...blowing up Wailing Caverns (Guild Achieve!), Ragefire Chasm (Guild Achieve!), Shadowfang Keep (BASTARDS!!), and Blackfathom Deeps (Guild Achieve!). Managed to teach her the basics of game controls, a little bit about aggro (dunno how many times I heard Ange say "QUIT RUNNING THROUGH THOSE GROUPS OF MOBS!!!"), and played TOGETHER...AS A FAMILY.

Weird. My dad would probably shudder right now to think of geeks closeted up in the house slaying virtual dragons. YOU SHOULD BE OUTSIDE, BAREFOOT, PLAYING FRISBEE...OR HAVING A WATERBALLOON FIGHT! Ah, well..40-degree weather tends to keep us inside atm.

So I have to say...playing with friends...family...sharing discovery or teaching someone...ROCKS, regardless of MMO. I thought WoW might be a little more forgiving for her to learn (right up until she hit tradechat, natch, and her ignore list is pretty big now)...so don't judge. Ange is NOT going over to Rift, as she's still somewhere in the 70-hour a week range, picking up a gym membership (since working out over lunch is more conducive than attempting to start a workout at 8pm), and she has to prepare to pitch a business proposal to her boss in 2 weeks...which may require up to 40-hours of whiteboarding with me at home...after hours...and much caffeine.

And scotch.

So, just FYSA, if you see a lowbie toon named Skayla, it's my daughter Evelyn. Ange is playing a Tauren Pally to help out the baby drood.

Letting peeps know in case they're around to run any lowbie dungeons on the weekends. Will try to finish them all!

BT BT

So Ange drops the girls off with their erstwhile deddy (or in Harmony's case, male legal guardian NOT me) and the young'un asks dad "hey daddy, I have my own WoW account now...can I play it at your place?" To which he responds, "I dunno, I'll have to think about it..." To which the apple of my eye retorts, "Whatever, I'll just ask gramma."

Heh, I had to wipe a tear from my eye. My child understands realpolitik.

Unfortunately, she also saw the other side of realpolitik when she got back to gramma's and her dad pre-empted her question. So, she cannot play WoW while she is over there.

But apparently, it's okay for her to get on XBOX Live and play Call of Duty with him.

Question I raised to her a few weeks ago was whether or not it was FAIR that she could play with him while at our place, but that she thought he wouldn't let her play online while she was there. Well...she didn't think it was fair then...and now, she gets a taste of it.

And...deny a child...you know what comes next.

Will keep the frustration on a slow burn for her...and lavish her with online attention during the weekend. Oddly enough, I don't think she'll have all that much time to play with dad anymore. Not that we'd start denying her...and THAT is perhaps the most important lesson for her here.

Good times.

J

What a great tool to use!

So there we were...waiting patiently for the kiddo to log in...so we could run a few dungeons and maybe score a few levels.

Guild achieves ABOUND. Down to something like 3 classic dungeons left to finish the guild classic achievement...and she's still getting triple-xp while grouped with ange. Good times.

However...we are slowly introducing her to add-ons, and the security vulnerabilities they can introduce to a computer. Teaching her about network security. Letting her die in groups when she pulls aggro, to underscore the need NOT to do EITHER--and that typically, the former leads to the latter as a dps. Trying to teach her some game etiquette (which is a bitch when you have chat trolls trying to teach her how to be even MORE annoying than kids usually are).

So the 4-5 levels I had planned to get them turned into 24. Yeah, casually gaming for about 10-12 hours, with a level 85 running two friend accounts through the progression of classic dungeons yielded 24 levels (19 to 43), without burning any of their rest xp (which I expect to vaporize when they hit 60). At 55 they are eligible for the BC dungeons, although I wonder if we can actually GET into BC except via the dungeon finder until a higher level. Will try regardless.

So as I am blowing up bloodsail buccaneers and whatnot, waiting for the young miss to train her toon and buy her mount...I happen to loot...wait for it...

The Hyacinth Macaw. 1/15,000 drop rate. To quote JJ, "Well, you put enough tokens into WoW's lottery system for loot..." Yeah, always so kind. At least Brundon called me a lucky bastard.

Also managed to knock out a dungeon run with teh Mimic the other morning--hella more fun than running solo (which is what we're doing in Rift until we get more peeps to 50, natch). Overconfident tank and mediocre healer made for an ENTERTAINING stonecore run, with Mimic leading my overal damage by some 4k. Heh.

All in all, pretty enjoyable weekend despite the cartoonish graphics and pavlovian mind-candy of WoW's "CHA-CHING, GUILD ACHIEVEMENT" popping up every hour.

But then, I drool for mind-candy anyway, so it's all good.

See ya in whatever virtual reality I'm playing.

J