Maybe the lesson I’m learning about gaming this year is to not overthink and overplan — but just accept what’s fun and what’s not. The most enjoyable and addicting gameplay experience I’ve had this year has been in Hardcore Classic, yet I kept walking away from it. I would get annoyed at Blizzard or think about the subscription or try to override my positive feelings by telling myself that this was the most temporary and transitory of all online gaming experiences. That it was better to spend that time elsewhere.
Yet here I am again, foolish or not, accepting my fate. I’m not overthinking it this time around, not going to fret about the long-term anything, just have fun where the fun is to be had. And since I deleted everything off my computer a couple of weeks ago, the fresh install meant that I had to start over due to how the Hardcore Classic addon works. That’s OK. Here we go again with another Dwarf Pally.
Right away, fortune smiled upon me and a six-slot bag dropped from my fifth mob. When I got my second, a black bag, everyone was quick to tell me that it was a sign that my run was doomed. DOOOOOMED.
That’s one thing I really like about HC — everyone in it is super, super chatty. I think it’s a combination of the slow gameplay, the wealth of common ground for conversational starters, and the general desire to have social backup while engaging in risky activities. It’s also a good place to vent about some of the most frustrating players, such as the line-jumpers who deliberately ignore the queue for quest mobs in an effort to be as “me me ME FIRST!” as possible.
Other players really are both the best AND worst parts of Hardcore Classic. On a good night, people are chatting merrily, being mutually supportive, and excited to see the increased activity in the game world. On a bad night, jerks steal your kills, zone chat oozes with toxicity, and your guild is populated with immature idiots. Sometimes you get both worlds on the same evening. I’m hoping to find a more stable, mature guild to join for HC than the mega melting pots that seem to be the default.
And as much as I really do love the electric buzz of people questing willy nilly all over the starting zones, it does make for a frustrating experience when you’re trying to finish quest objectives. There’s so much camping for certain spots and mobs going on, which raises tempers. My approach is to just keep running all over the place, finding mobs when I can, and casually doing quests if I can. I hear that the crowd starts to thin out nicely in the 20s, as a bulk of HC players die and are reborn before or by their teens.
Bio Break 