4. well /played sir!?

As I write this I have around 275 days /played - 51 of those are on my AH alts so one might argue that they don't count.  After all until the nerf to autoposting came in my process was to post and then afk leaving the alt online to hopefully annoy the stuffing out of the competition.

That in mind one could say that over four and a half years I've played approximately 3 1/3 hours per day...

That's a lot!

What this stat misses is that in the early days of WoW I was playing with much more intensity.  In terms of the longest play session I had I'm pretty sure we're talking somewhere between 8 to 10 hours.  This was de rigueur in our old Aman'thul guild during Karazhan clears.  People went afk to get Hungry Jacks, we lacked dps, or healing, or tank expertise and wiped continuously, people had to port out of the instance to /2 broadcast for more members.  Themz were the days (not)!  And it wasn't uncommon to do two such days in a week whilst grinding for advancement.

These days I'm playing about 8-10 hour a week, sometimes less.  Not raiding is a big factor but even so I'm finding this is sufficient time for my rest and relaxation which is primarily why I play this game.

The forums love this topic.  I'm considered soft with my 275 days /played.  400+ is where the action is.  Invariably it comes down to a slanging match - I did say "WoW" forums right? - heavily based on people who play this game stating that other people who play this game have no life.  Defences offered are:

1. It's my time and I'll do what I want with it (i actually think this is the only one with rigor)
2. At least I'm not watching TV (not bad)
3. I play less than people who watch TV (fail - it's true that many people do watch a lot of TV - seemingly hours each evening but playing less than people who watch too much TV does not cut it)
4. I play with my family (Umm...)
5. It's cheaper than drugs (okay I made that one up)
6. It's the only way I see my husband (sorry, that one I didn't make up)
7. I'm actually saving money playing WoW (comparatively true)
8. It's high-quality entertainment, it's social, can be done with friends of similar interest, requires active brain activity ("Active brain activity"?  Well, even with that I still like this one the best /agree)
9. TV again - quoting the average time spent per day watching TV - quoted as 4 hours - and noting that it's considered more socially acceptable than WoW (tru dat)
10. Production of a shopping list of achievements achieved "while" playing 50 hours of WoW per week.

Okay - for 10 I had to provide the poster's list - here goes:

While playing this game I managed a few things:

Graduated with a Master's Degree in Computer Engineering.
Got Married
Bought a House
Adopted 2 kids
Had 3 of my own kids
Started working on my Doctorate
Started working my dream job
All this without getting a divorce :D

So where do I sit with this?  Well, I'm a little uncomfortable with the time I put into this game.  It's a pleasant and enjoyable distraction but it occurs to me that there are other things I could be doing.  Food for thought.

Talking of which let me leave you with this thought... WEEKEND CRICKET!  People who play it regularly engage in two to three 2-hour training sessions during the week and then a couple of 6 to 6 1/2 hour game sessions over the weekend during the season.  With travel taken into account they're logging up around 20 hours a week.

Games... humans have always enjoyed them.

Feel like sharing your /played?  : )


Stay liquid folks,


Mogul.