I’ve always liked stories of grand quests, of heroes and villains, and great battles, and mythical creatures and places all set in worlds much like that of the Lord of the Rings. So it’s not surprising that I used to love playing Dungeons and Dragons with some mates during Uni. I really enjoyed it but inevitably we all got jobs and then families and the D&D, or the new improved AD&D, gaming sessions started to drop off and then one day they just stopped. It was just too hard.

It was sad in a way ’cause I missed the adventure, the adult ‘play’, the make belief and creativity of story telling, of riffing with like-minded mates as fantastic heroes went about smiting evil doers in fabulous far away lands.

Some year’s later after earning my spurs with some pretty lame D&D inspired computer games I joined the online community. I played Ultima online with a refugee from those ancient D&D days. It was good but I soon discovered that to really do anything cool in this game, I had to spend an awful lot of time laboring away at repetitive tasks and chores so that I could in turn ‘level’ up. The realization was similar to receiving my first pay cheque and discovered that the tax man never went hungry. The Ultima gaming sadly became too much like work except that at work they paid me for my efforts whereas with Ultima - I paid them. So I passed and retired back to my family and day job. The taxman has gotta eat after all. And so do my kids. .

And then another mate encouraged me to join World of Warcraft (WOW) online for a night or two each week. During the day he was a very accomplished event manager but when he logged on he became the great Kezlar Qvist. A mythic Shaman hero, and importantly a famed guild leader who kindly offered me much insight and assistance in making my own little mark within the game.

I played dutifully for a couple of months but I was always considered a ‘newbie’ – it was like I started within this particular gaming world about eight months way too late and it was always going to be eight months. Every gaming session, it was my quest to play hard and in turn catch up with my much smarter, more powerful, more worldly friends who had already reached the level cap of 99. It wasn’t long before I came to the realisation that I was unlikely to ever ever close the experience/level gap (the highest I reached was a pitiful level eight) and I soon tired of being the small kid on the block. I passed, called it a day, cancel my account and uninstalled the software with extreme prejudice.

And then one day out of the blue Kezlar dropped me an email. He declared that a new improved gaming world was to commence, Vanguard, and his entire guild were transferring across en’mass and I should really give it a look. It was brand spanking new, sure - infested with programming bugs but that was okay as the world concept was really intriguing. A nod to the traditional D&D world scenarios heritage all these games draw upon as well as incorporating Asian and Middle Eastern culturally influenced worlds.

Very cool, so I signed up, loaded up, and logged on.

This time however – I decided that I wasn’t going to get hung up over the group modes, and instead I’d set my own agenda by adventuring solo style. The past couple of weeks of adventuring has seen my Ranger character (a particularly independent style of character) rise to a hard earnt level 10. Meanwhile Kezlar and his guild cronies are all sitting between level 20 and 30. Not so bad and certainly within spitting range that if I wanted a more of a group experience, and was fortunate enough to be ‘guilded’, I could still hold my own.

This did however get me wondering about the advantages and disadvantages of solo and group or guild gaming. Admittedly I have been having a lovely time running solo, but was I missing out on something by not grouping, even occasionally? Possibly. Possibly not.

As fate would have it, I received an unexpected invitation from a level 12 character (a rogue, a thieving character, which should have set off alarm bells but didn’t) to group up against a particularly aggro group of fire spitting giant frogs [1]. What the heck I thought, I’ll give it a go, no harm no foul. We formed a casual alliance and dived headfirst, shoulder to shoulder, as it were, into the great frog carnage of 920pm Sunday night.

All was going well, the frogs were in full retreat but I kinda started to notice that this new gaming pal seemed to collect all the rewards from these kills. Still, I was having a great time - but no treasures for me. Oh well, I figured, it’s ’cause he’s a level 12 and he’s leading the group so I guess this is how it is in group mode. And then he led me into a nearby valley. A dark forbidding valley with what seemed to be one way in and one way out.

On entering the valley I was quick to discover it was full of some seriously scary redback type monster spiders. They were spitting acid, directly at me, and were ready to spider-rumble. Bugger. Still, there are two of us, so we might pull this off if we are smart and quick.

What sort of gameplan should we adopt? Should we run? Should I try an entanglement spell? Perhaps use my sweeping ice sword of vengeance move?

And then the first spider raised up, pivoted on it’s many legs, and adopted a death strike position. It was then that I suddenly realized that not long after entering this valley of death, say four milliseconds, the treasure hogging thief had deliberately scampered and had left me behind to be slaughtered. Torn from limb to limb. And I was.

And then I logged off. Swearing to remain on the solo path and only trust those I really do know from now on. It’s certainly a cruel and unforgiving world – but not half as much as these virtual gaming worlds. The upside is I get treasure and fear no one… certainly not the taxman…. although perhaps I should start fearing passing group partners. And without a doubt big-arse monster spiders.