There seems to be a roughly 50/50 chance that gaming will go well. If I am playing alone, there is only the potential frustrations with the game itself, so my rate of enjoyment is more consistent, but multi-player games add all the things that can go wrong with other players. I’m calling it 50/50, my wife might guess lower, I would guess higher when I am on new game high (and exploration beats frustration).
If things go well, I will probably still be “on” when we finish. I go to bed with hobbits or pyros scurrying about my skull. With any luck, my wife is still awake, which can help flush games out of my mind in ways we do not discuss on family blogs. If not, I lie there, buzzing, unable to sleep. The plotting is fun, but work the next day may not be.
If things go poorly, they are likely to continue to. Even nights that go well head in this direction. If the marginal utility of playing is still high, keep playing! And you keep going until there are wipes, idiocy, or whatever drives down your utility from playing. Then the everything is ruined forever, and you can do naught but whine on your blog about it. Whine whine whine. So the night ends on a low point, and because we are most affected by beginnings (probably a stretch of waiting of group followed by a while to get rolling, followed by a while to try to fall into a groove) and endings (when it rolled over the cliff), the whole thing is a debacle.
Should I just stop gaming after 8pm, so nothing can send me to bed in bad state A or B?
: Zubon
What happens to me is I cannot go to bed if B happens. If B happens, I log in a different character and relax once more and get something done away from other idiots.
Or I whine on a blog post THEN go to bed :)
You play a druid, don’t you?
It sounds to me like you don’t necessarily enjoy the “multiplayer” in MMOs you play:
“And you keep going until there are wipes, idiocy, or whatever drives down your utility from playing. Then the everything is ruined forever, and you can do naught but whine on your blog about it. Whine whine whine. So the night ends on a low point, and because we are most affected by beginnings (probably a stretch of waiting of group followed by a while to get rolling, followed by a while to try to fall into a groove) and endings (when it rolled over the cliff), the whole thing is a debacle.”
Wipes are, by implication, caused by other people. Waiting for a group is not something in the game’s control; it’s caused by other people. “Trying to fall into a groove” implies coordination with other people.
You know you can skip all that and just play a game that… doesn’t involve other people.
I always aim to finish something of note before logging off, be it that extra level or perhaps the completion of a quest chain.
At level 80 in WoW I think thats what made me burn out, I just didnt get a feeling that I was doing anything worthwhile or of note. If this teaches me anything its that im more of a leveller than an end game addict
Kinda like not having caffeine after a certain point in the day, not playing a competitive game after a certain point is probably a good idea too. ;-}
It’s weird how you can literally have off-nights with TF2. I still need a damn hat. Then I could dream of not being some smelly unfortunate.
I’ve noticed lately, that when I’m having a bad night of gaming, I end up staying up later because I want to end on a good note and losing repeatedly is extremely unsatisfying. So it’s often dangerous to try and end the evening with a multiplayer game, because you never know when you might login to find yourself on the eternally losing team, which can be frustrating.
“And you keep going until there are wipes, idiocy, or whatever drives down your utility from playing. Then the everything is ruined forever, and you can do naught but whine on your blog about it. Whine whine whine. So the night ends on a low point, and because we are most affected by beginnings (probably a stretch of waiting of group followed by a while to get rolling, followed by a while to try to fall into a groove) and endings (when it rolled over the cliff), the whole thing is a debacle.â€
Hell is other people, Z. Join the dark side already. :)