Playing with a Purpose
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pixiestixy on Monday, August 3, 2009 - 15 Comments Tags: concentrate, distractions, end game, future, future toon, goal, goals, leveling, picturing your toon, play styles, purpose, starting out, toon
pixiestixy on Monday, August 3, 2009 - 15 Comments Tags: concentrate, distractions, end game, future, future toon, goal, goals, leveling, picturing your toon, play styles, purpose, starting out, toon 
As I get closer and closer to level 80 (no, I'm still not there yet. But that's another story...), I've been thinking a bit about my end goals for Locomomo. They started out vague, long ago when I rejoiced at finding a piece of gear that was one measly armor point higher than what I already had equipped. Back then, I could only dream of what my toon someday would become. And as I've leveled and discovered through experience my play preferences for my class, those goals have solidified quite a bit.What I know so far: I like being sneaky, as a proper rogue should. But even moreso, I like dealing the DPS. One of my primary motivations for leveling is the fact that I want to start raiding with my guild. I'll have to start small to get some better gear, I'm sure. Then hopefully after not too long try out some heroics and get down my raiding rotations. I know, they're still pretty general goals, but it's something to look forward to.
And while looking forward, I realized that really, the best way for me to play is to have smaller goals along the way. It seems I'm always playing toward something - trying to reach the next level, and the next and the next; aiming to get my stats up; completing enough quests in an area to get the related achievement and moving on to another zone. Each little step leads to another and another. Blizzard knows how to keep its players motivated.
But there have been times when I've found myself a bit puzzled at what to do next. For the most part, leveling is self-explanatory. Just go to an area for your level, click on the NPCs with yellow exclamations points, and go kill things. But sometimes there's the issue of having too much to do. Do you level in zone x or zone y? Do you focus on your professions or continue leveling? Ultimately, there's a million decisions we must make in game, and each one will lead to a different experience.
Of course, once you're a more experienced player, it becomes easier to picture your future characters. You know what equipment, skills and talents are out there; you have conquered the zones; and you have played either with or against other high-level characters that you can use for inspiration for what you one day will become.
And once you reach 80, there's still all the end-game content. I know a lot of players find it a bit harder to keep playing once they reach a certain point and no longer have those little steps to motivate them along. But I think I'm a very long way from reaching that point. I've got dungeons to explore, enemy cities to sneak into, equipment to be had, achievements galore to earn, and only so much time to play. The future Locomomo, as I picture her, will be awesome. But it's the journey getting there that I'm looking forward to.
In your own gaming experiences, what drives you to keep playing? Is there any specific goal you're currently playing to? Do you picture what you hope your future toon will be, or let that picture shape itself as you go?
Reader Comments (15)
Right now, I'm trying to get ranked up in my guild so that I can raid. Once I've experienced raids up to and including 25 Ulduar and I have some t8.5, I'll really slow down playing. That goal always seems so far but so close every day.
My main is a hunter and I am currently lvl'ing up a warrior cause want to be able to act as one of the tanks in my guild. I am using my main to get some money for my alt while enjoy working on some achievements.
I always level. I've tried raids, I've tried dailies, and proffessions, but I always go back to alts.
I'm an achievement whore!
It always kept me playing WOW trying to reach the level where i could raid.
When i finally got there i stopped playing because it just didn't seem all i thought it was going to be.
@ John
WTF?
I have two friends of mine that keep going back to lvl alts up, because they don't like playing there main or whatever reason
Achievements are fun to collect.
I just recently hit 80 on my priest so I'm gearing her up. I haven't been in the mood to raid lately so I've been neglecting my guild and my main making sure I don't log in when they are raiding. I just don't want to sit around for 5 hours killing bosses and doing stuff I never get gear from.......
I'm addicted to topping recount within my guild.
Whenever we have to pug a member that's sufficiently better geared than me and tops my dps by like 400 on a boss fight, and I'm in second place, I get a little peeved.
I use other programs and spend more time calculating stats and potential upgrades than I do playing the game (thanks to things such as RAWRcraft lol).
But it's what I enjoy doing. I'm also fairly immersed the lore so when I'm not reading up on making my character better, putting what I've read in to practice, or farming gold for repair bills, I'm reading the Warcraft novels.
Well pixie I enjoy leveling alts working on my 3rd to level 80. you say what should i do first professions or leveling. I see you're a leatherworker and you're a level 78 there is some awesome level 78 crafted gear that a leatherworker can make for yourself. If I may suggest you grind out your leatherworking, because the gear will carry you through to level 80 and give you a starting point to go from as you work on getting into the endgame heroics and raids once you do finially reach level 80. then you can start collecting those epic gear pieces from the heroics. I found the good thing about the crafted gear is they also carry the resil stat which means you stand a little chance of surviving in PvP if that's your thing too.
Well GL on your journey and I say this
Have fun if your not having fun playing the game either change the way you play it or quit. I play to have fun and pass time if the game wasn't fun to lay I'd have quit 2 years ago.
I´m almost level 80 (76 now) and i really don´t know what will happen when i get to lvl 80.
I am not in a raiding guild and hunter´s (as i started to notice) are not in very high demand for raids. The ones i tried to enter or i was dismissed entirely, ignored or refused...I don´t see a future for my hunter in end level content.
Well PVP is always there and i do love BG.
I like achviments but i´m no whore.
I really don´t know if i will maintain my main or go to other class in more high demand...
The problem is i like to play hunter. It fits me so we will see
See you in Northrend
Keltoroq
Me and my frinds hit 80 a few weeks ago and now my targets for my balance druid (main) are these (I am very humble you know)
1-All of the achievemets connected to instances and raids in Outland
2-Achievement and title Undying (Naxx without any party member dead Kel'Thud wiped us)
3-Title Field Marshal (at the moment i use the title blood guard or the one from cenarion expedition)
4-Achievement Leeroy Title Jenkins
5-Ulduar 25 men
Personally, it's the small but significant steps that matter most to me: working towards a certain level to acheive a certain goal (Boomkin here I come!), working towards that next level on my professions, achieveing any cap, etc. Now what I'm focusing on (besides countless alts), is helping people who are newer to endgame experiences; helping healers and new melee dps find their spots, rotations and generally giving advice on where they can improve...seems to me that kind experience is the most rewarding as it does tend to pay off for me personally in the long run and leads to others teaching others to play and not just random calls of 'noob' and 'learn to play!' in trade chat...this IS a co-operative game at it's heart after all.
I am lv 79 right now and will hit 80 tonight. i know exactly how you feal about always having a goal to reach. i have spent my entire WoW life leveling and playing for the one goal of reaching the cap, but that has become so much for me that now that im here, i dont know what i can do to continue inproving my charicter.
I know raiding isn't for me. I don't have a regular schedule and very seldom can count on an uninterrupted 5 hours of play to take part in longer raids (I do OS and VOA but that's about it).
What keeps me going is 5-man content. I love running them with my guild or without. I geared my Hunter main to the point rating sites say he can go to 10/25 Ulduar and I've outpaced my guild. Now, due to the nature of WoW, we have tons of DPS members and very few support roles so I took an old alt Pally up from the 50's and have geared him as tank and soon will off-spec to heals and gear that up.
Blizz does it's part because it always changes (emblem changes, new pvp sets come online, etc.) so there's always a "carrot on a stick" but I've reached a point where I play it for the people more than the game.
My goal is trying to have fun with this game...
Some people just takes the game to serious, some raids ago we wiped at the last boss in naxx 25 because someone didnt heard the tacts.
Some guys screamd noob and other dirty words which made the raid fucked up.
So i kicked those guys out of the raid and killed the boss without them.
There goal might be having the best gear and trying to pown everything but i see it different. Its an mmorpg.
Try to have fun with people.