Unsolicited Advice
Yesterday I finally hit 80 on my priest. It’s been a long journey, from slow horde-side leveling pre-LFG, pre-heirloom, to somehow accomplishing my goals to get through the horde Wrathgate before Cata, to her faction transfer from Blood Elf to Night Elf. I was thrilled to finally have her ready for Cataclysm content.
I ported back to Stormwind after abandoning all my Northrend quests, relieved to leave the cold continent of the undead. I spent some time working on my professions – disenchanting some greens my Jewelcrafter had made for her cheaply.
Not five minutes after my return to Stormwind, standing in the Enchanting trainer’s shop, I received a whisper. “don’t you know that heirlooms don’t work from 80-85?” It was from an 85 mage. A little irritated, I replied, “I just dinged 5 minutes ago.”
This encounter left me a bit annoyed, and got me thinking. Who the hell walks around Stormwind inspecting people and telling them what to wear? What if I was wearing RP gear, or my fishing outfit? And so what if heirloom gear no longer scales after 80 – it’s still the best gear I have until I start questing in Hyjal or Vashj’ir? What the hell does it matter to this random person what I am wearing while leveling enchanting?
I get that this mage was trying to be “helpful”, but instead it just rubbed me the wrong way.
If I was in a Cataclysm instance, and wearing the heirloom chest/shoulders, I feel like the whisper would have been more justified. Having everyone in the group contribute fully is important. Seeing someone wearing sub-par gear in a group setting to get a non-existent XP bonus might be reason enough to give them a gentle nudge.
In Stormwind though? I can’t remember the last time I inspected someone wandering around a city. I suppose I might, if their outfit or weapon looked cool. But even if I inspected a hunter wearing cloth and strength rings, I wouldn’t find it necessary to tell them they were wearing the wrong gear. It might be a joke, or RP gear, or perhaps they’re just a solo player that likes doing things their own way. When someone is wandering around a city, they’re not actually doing anything combat related, so gear is irrelevant.
The problem I suppose I have with these kind of whispers, is that it’s hard to determine the intent. There are two basic types of people who give others unsolicited “advice”, and which type you’re speaking to makes all the difference.
First is the genuinely helpful, knowledgeable player who answers questions in trade chat and goes out of their way to assist others. They feel like they are contributing and improving the knowledge and skill of the general WOW populace. I’ve heard many bloggers/podcasters say that they feel that it’s their obligation to teach others and encourage others to play correctly. These people are genuinely trying to be altruistic or friendly.
Second is the guy that just gets a kick out of being “better” or knowing more than other people. This person laughs at other players gear and criticizes their spell choices. This type of player is not trying to be helpful, they just get off on feeling superior. They’re judging everyone around them and making comments to cut others down.
Unfortunately the second category of people seems to be much larger, as evidenced by numerous PUG conversations. WOW is filled with trolls (not just the Horde race) that continue to prove the “Greater Internet F*ckwad Theory“. When we run into the first type of person, it’s hard for us to believe that they are genuine. We’re so used to people being jerks, that everyone we meet is automatically lumped into that category. How do you tell the difference? Let’s not even get into the fact that even some people who believe they are being nice, are really motivated by an unconscious superiority complex.
It’s very hard to determine motivation from a few short typed words. Misspelling and swearing can certainly help identify the incompetent asshat, but sometimes even asshats know how to type.
On the other side of things, it’s very common for the receiver of the advice to get defensive, responding rudely and causing a conflict where there was none. This spirals out of control until you have a bunch of normally decent people acting like asshats.
I’d like to leave you with some questions to ponder.
How do you react when someone tells you that you’re doing something wrong in WOW ? Do you ever want unsolicited advice, or does it always piss you off?
What about outside of the game - do you like receiving unsolicited advice from co-workers, or strangers in the grocery store? Is this different or the same as in-game, and why?
Are you the type of person to whisper other players with tips? Do you only do this in a group setting, or when randomly wandering around? How do you expect a player to react when you give them advice? Would you ever do this outside the game?
How I react depends entirely on the situation and how familiar I am with the subject of their whisper. If it’s something I don’t know then I’ll ask questions to figure it out, but if it’s something I’m very familiar with then I’m more likely to get pissed.
The same holds true for IRL as well. I don’t have any issues taking advice even when it’s not asked for so long as it’s on a topic that I’m not very knowledgeable on. But even in my chosen field I know I’m not anywhere near the top of the knowledge chain so I’ll take advice from anybody as long as its legit. But people who have no idea what they’re talking about but think they do? /pissed.
I whisper people with advice all the time, but only when I see that their performance is hindered by whatever it is that they’re doing wrong. I don’t just throw the advice at them every time though unless I know the person or they’re completely screwing things up. Generally I whisper the question first, “hey bud, are you open to a little advice?” Their response determines where the conversation goes from there.
I do the same outside the game. Teaching is just a natural thing for me I guess, or helping people at least. When I know something and I see others who can benefit from my knowledge I like to share. Yeah, I’m one of those people who can spend 4 hours in trade chat helping people. I feed the occasional troll when doing it of course, but there really are a lot of people looking for honest answers who don’t know where else to look.
Psynister recently posted..Professions Leveling- Enchanting 1 – 525
I tend to avoid confrontation, so whispering someone about what they’re doing wrong, even when its obviously harming their performance, is hard for me. I think your opening line, “are you open to a little advice?” is very civil and a good approach to determine whether they will get defensive or are willing to listen.
I love sharing knowledge on my blog, but when it comes to a one-on-one teaching scenario I tend to lose my patience, and even my confidence. I”m glad there are people out there that are willing to answer trade chat questions – sometimes when I do stop to read it, I feel bad for the people asking questions who get laughed at by the trolls. Maybe I should make an effort to be more generous and answer them once in awhile.
I do well with people I know (including the fairly casual “know” that comes with working together for a while) offering suggestions and criticism when it is clearly intended to help or clarify.
I’m always pleasantly surprised ingame when I’ll get a comment from someone that does have a useful bit of “we’re you aware that THIS would be a better way to do that?” content in it. I’d always prefer that that be in a /whisper and couched in civil language, but I’ll make allowance for people who are actually making me a better player.
The “egad, you suck, and what is UP with that gear?” yo-yos just make me rude. And, given that I have a well suppressed mean steak, that’s a bonus in itself.
Twice recently posted..Finally
With people I know I’m perfectly fine with giving/listening to advice. I think that in person in general, its easier to determine the intent. I can go “oh, I know this dude, he’s a decent guy and I will listen to him”, or “this guy is not the sharpest tool in the shed, I can tune him out”. Or in the case of random strangers, it’s just easier to tell by their inflection and general manner in which they carry themselves. With all that said, after the tenth “you’re getting married? You should do X!”, or “I can’t believe you didn’t do Y”, I tend to get a bit pissed, even if its from someone I would normally listen to.
In WOW, I find myself getting riled up more often than I would like when it comes to complete strangers telling me things, especially when I already know the thing they’re telling me. I haven’t found a lot of people in PUGs even attempting to help others out, and usually when advice is given it comes from someone who obviously doesn’t know how to play their own class let alone others. I’m doing my best to keep an open mind though, as I know that there are good people out there. From guildies, advice is always welcome because its easy to assume it’s well intentioned.
The heirloom +XP bonus still functions perfectly well for a lvl80 character. It’s when you ding lvl81 that it switches off. So to make things worse the “advice” was factually incorrect in addition to annoying you.
See thats the kind of information I can use! Thanks! I hadn’t looked carefully at Blizzard’s wording of “past 80″ and realized that it actually meant 81 and beyond. You have been very helpful.
My mage just hit 80 yesterday; so I ran some simple tests.
Turns out the amount listed in the quest turn-in window matches the amount actually awarded. And when I took off my heirloom cloak (+5% xp, Cata), sure enough, the listed xp reward went down. Taking off the heirloom robe and shoulders (both Wrath pieces, +10% xp each) did not change the listed xp reward.
Conclusion: Wrath heirlooms stop giving xp as soon as you ding 80. Or at least the Tattered Dreadmist pieces do.
Agreed Boo, I forgot to mention that a few days after this post I went and tested it myself. I’m guessing that they did give XP on the beta, which is what caused the confusion.
I hate typing to strangers. I am always fearful that it would be taken the wrong way and so I’m usually way too slow to type out responses when running through dungeons (back in Wrath).
If I see people looking obviously confused/bewildered or going the wrong way in RL, I will say something, usually to save them from what I just ended up doing. ie. Heading towards an entrance that is locked or is a dead end.
In WoW, I seem to do the same thing. The most recent unsolicited advice that I’ve given was simply because I had done the same mistake. The first day of the new cooking dailies, I had tried to fish for crawfish for about 10min. Took me another 1min to wowhead the solution up. A couple weeks later, one a day when the same quest was given, I saw a person fishing by the quest given. I got the quest, chased the crawfish and returned to see the same person fishing in the same spot. I hesitated and then took a chance whispering them “In case you didn’t know, you have to pick up the crawfish like Wolvar Pups. You can’t fish for them.” They replied “Where were you 10 minutes ago – I had just figured that out”.
In your example, I can see how you didn’t appreciate it. “Don’t you know” is a great way to put someone on the defensive…. I believe that person needs to work on his opening line quite a bit.
I think some people can’t enjoy playing unless they demonstrate how much they know about the game to others. That mage probably does wander around SW inspecting everyone elses gear.