My dear friend Jen from the Inside my Head and Hyper nonsense podcasts has begun to play on my home realm, Argent Dawn, in order to get to the level she wants to be at in order to be at the wedding of one of my characters to his in character paramour. I asked her the other day if there was anything I could help her with, and she responded 'a bag'. Being flush with mats and knowing any helpful guildies, I promptly went out and made her level 15 rogue 5 Netherweave Bags.
It was as I was mailing them off today that it hit me. 'Maybe this won't be the most helpful thing for her'. Playing over on the Beta servers, with limited resources and auction house prices that would make any capitalist glow, my little Death Knight has been stuck with mostly the bags he finds and the ones he had at creation. That is to say, 12 slot and 14 slot bags. I thought back to my days of leveling, and I recalled how much I hated to have to choose between items if my bags got full too far from a vendor.
I am beginning to think that maybe, just maybe, helping lowbies excuses them from learning some of the key lessons that any character leveling up needs to learn. How to wipe gracefully. How to conserve bag space. How to manage what you spend on to allow for training and repair. How to find a group for an instance. These and more are things that we all have to learn, but also things that I think we often forget. Back when I was playing the original beta I was a Leatherworking Paladin. Yup, I wore my leather gear proudly until just after the time when a Warrior I had become friends with asked 'why are you wearing a robe?'
To be fair, I was holy at the time, but even then I already disliked group healing as too often people died. Of course I was stacking totally the wrong things and didn't see that I was to be the healer in plate who could survive where the priest might be turned into Night Elf Jam. I was wearing resto druid gear, not Holy Paladin gear. This was the first of many lessons I learned leveling up, and I wonder if far too often these days, as the game is over ten million now and only going to grow as Wrath gets closer; do we spare our friends the lessons we learned at their own detriment? I still sent the bags, and will still help where I can, when I can. I will always wonder, though, how much I really help.
It was as I was mailing them off today that it hit me. 'Maybe this won't be the most helpful thing for her'. Playing over on the Beta servers, with limited resources and auction house prices that would make any capitalist glow, my little Death Knight has been stuck with mostly the bags he finds and the ones he had at creation. That is to say, 12 slot and 14 slot bags. I thought back to my days of leveling, and I recalled how much I hated to have to choose between items if my bags got full too far from a vendor.
I am beginning to think that maybe, just maybe, helping lowbies excuses them from learning some of the key lessons that any character leveling up needs to learn. How to wipe gracefully. How to conserve bag space. How to manage what you spend on to allow for training and repair. How to find a group for an instance. These and more are things that we all have to learn, but also things that I think we often forget. Back when I was playing the original beta I was a Leatherworking Paladin. Yup, I wore my leather gear proudly until just after the time when a Warrior I had become friends with asked 'why are you wearing a robe?'
To be fair, I was holy at the time, but even then I already disliked group healing as too often people died. Of course I was stacking totally the wrong things and didn't see that I was to be the healer in plate who could survive where the priest might be turned into Night Elf Jam. I was wearing resto druid gear, not Holy Paladin gear. This was the first of many lessons I learned leveling up, and I wonder if far too often these days, as the game is over ten million now and only going to grow as Wrath gets closer; do we spare our friends the lessons we learned at their own detriment? I still sent the bags, and will still help where I can, when I can. I will always wonder, though, how much I really help.
Reference Links
There is learning and stumbling on your own, and there is being guided.
If the best way to learn was solo, we wouldn't have schools.
If the best way to get ahead in life was struggling, we wouldn't have birthday, wedding etc gifts, we wouldn't have wills etc.
There are enough difficult lessons in life and WoW to learn without a hand.. sure you may not (initially) appreciate the value of the assistance, but that time comes for all of us.
I expect it is going to come soon for a whole lot of players with WoLK. helped by mates to get to Kara and beyond, helped with gear via badges, no attunements etc...
Well, it's back to learning the hard way...