Unwelcomed Teleports

Greetings Spiralites, and welcome to another exciting installment of Through the Eyes of a Sorcerer. Today's feature presentation includes yet another fanfic meant to educate youngsters (and some older players, too...) about some important issues in the spiral.

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I wake abruptly from my slumber in Lifeglen Manor to the vibrant colors of a teleport mere minutes after drifting off from a lengthy day of library research.


 "What the heckhound is going on??" I ask to the person who dropped in unannounced.  They reply with a weak "sorry" and immediately jump into a long winded tale about how Malistaire is actually alive and remarried to Morganthe.  Please! 

Finally, rather grumpily (as I am NOT a person to deal with immediately after I get out of bed...), I ask the person "What do you think you are doing? Dropping into my home at hours that no normal wizard keeps, and starting in on a tirade about Malistaire and Morganthe secretly raising Dworgyn after rescuing him from a clocktower in France.  Goodness, haven't you heard of "knocking" first?  There's this marvelous feature called a Whisper that lets you reach me before porting...and everyone wonders why I never leave my teleportation locator turned on!"  My friend and I then had a LONG talk about teleporting after receiving approval.
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I, for one, prefer to be asked before dropped in on unless I happen to be in a publicly accessible area that is not combat based.  For instance, if someone drops in on me at the Bazaar, in the Shopping District, Celestia Base Camp, the Commons (though WHY would anyone EVER go there unless it was to sprint through at top speeds?!?), Pet Pavillion, etc, I'm fine with it.  When someone lands on top of me in the Science Center as I'm offing some Aquabots with a 1-shot Ra when I have my short-stack on (short-stack is how I refer to my quick and easy short decks...in case you were wondering) then we have problems.  Also, housing is a touchy subject.  Some people only log in for long enough to tend a garden or drop a furniture item off, and some others really don't want their houses to be viewed before complete. 

Different people have different levels of privacy. The rule of thumb is to always ask before you port unless you are certain the party you are porting to is alright with it.

Moral is: Ask before you port (especially in private locations and combat areas). Establish "safe port areas" with your friends about where you can port to each other without asking.  That will make life easier on everyone!

I'll post this in the "fanfic" tab as well, check that out sometime if you haven't already!  If anyone has any ideas on future "Tips via fanfic", please let me know!

Your Friend Always,
John Lifeglen

Wizards Speak Out! (But Not Obnoxiously, Please)

Hello Wizards of the universe (spiral to be more specific).  As many of you know, I have my hand in quite a few community related locations throughout the spiral (and beyond).  Well, I did up until college...and over Thanksgiving Break I kinda started to get a bit more involved again.  Piggle Rallying, completing CL for the first time, etc.  Yes, yes, I'm all legendary and stuff now. [INSERT EVIL GRIN HERE]  Really though, I'm seeing some issues in the community I was once so active in.

The issue I'm talking about is one of language.  Yes, language.  No, I do not mean the language barrier between English speaking players and Foreign language speaking players.  The language in-game (in the spiral [ITS]) and also outside of the game (in the greater Wizard City area where the vast majority of wizards' islands spend their time floating around so that we all have places to stay when we're not off combating evil and where we can continue to keep in touch with friends from the game [AKA Twitter, Wizard101 ConnectX, Facebook *though I don't have one for wizards...*, blogs, Wizard101 Central, etc.] has been rapidly declining.  ITS at least, KingsIsle has language filters in place (that some naughty wizards circumvent for their own purposes...) but Twitter has nothing of this nature to protect its younger users from the foul mouths of some older players.  This needs to stop; and it will stop if wizards will just start using their heads.  It is well understood that the Wizard101 Twitter Feeds are meant to be safe for players of all ages to view.

Would you ever run into battle without a deck equipped?  What about a wand?  These are vital pieces of a wizard's battle kit and completely necessary for survival.  All of that is nothing without thinking about which cards to play.  Yes, I said THINKING.  I am aware that many of you enter the spiral to decompress after a long day (I know I do quite often) but the thinking is still there.  It might be semi-automatic now, but you still carefully consider which cards to play when and in what order.  Trap stacking specifically requires much thought.  Why isn't this much thought being put into things that small children read? 

Basically, we need to think before we tweet (yes mom, I know it's supposed to be think before you speak but I'm modifying here...)  Older twizards (wizards that use twitter) should not have to be consciously monitoring what is being said to ding people on saying inappropriate things.  Even phonetic spellings of words not meant for young ears should ever be sent out. 

So, I'm being a bit rambly today but it's something that just really irks me.  We should be protecting the the minds of the future generations so that they don't end up as twisted as they might if we keep up the language.  Please everyone, let's put on our filters before we speak, or there will be people there to call you on it. 

Your [Overly Protective] Friend Always,
John Lifeglen

Psstt...*Whisper Whisper*:The Rumor Mill

John Lifeglen here to talk today about rumors.  I'm taking a few minutes between lunch and next class (because my time is incredibly limited these days :/) to say hi and discuss an issue that I see growing in our fare game.  I'm sure we've all heard things similar to this:

(Note, this is a hypothetical conversation, not one that actually took place)

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Person A: Pssttt......Hey did you hear about the [insert epic items here]??

Person B: Um, no...what does [item] do?

Person A: Well, it looks REALLY COOL and it happens to do [insert string of stats].

Person B: COOL, where can I get one, and can I see it?

Person A: Well...I think it's rare, I may be the only person that has one.

Person B: Please tell me, but let me see!

Person A: You get it as a drop from [insert obnoxiously tedious boss].
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What you have just witnessed is a very meanspirited prank pulled by players all over the internet.  Usually, the item doesn't exist and is only advertised to make players waste their time hunting for something fake.  Recently, the Triton pet rumor began.  A lot of players were really excited at this prospect.  This rumor has been shut down by the lovely Professor Greyrose.  In the past, rumors of a Kraken, Ice Kraken, and Fire Kraken were all started by an unknown entity on Wizard101 Central.  These rumors have never been confirmed, and follow a similar format: "My friend told me in whisper he got [pet] on a drop, but he isnt online and it hasn't hatched yet.  He said he got it [boss]."  The player who posted this was told a dirty rotten lie and was the victim in this scenario, and his reputation could have been hurt because of what his friend told him.  His so-called friend wasn't playing very nice.

The rumor mill in games isn't quite as big of an issue with people getting hurt in games, at least not on the pets/loot topic.  However, starting rumors can hurt credibility and cause mistrust.  Also, rumors about other people can hurt friendships, feelings, and have extreme consequences. 

Long story short, rumors are bad.  Let's try to confirm our facts before telling even one person about them.  Asking a person to confirm the truth in it and telling someone that something is true are not the same thing, and asking questions is always a plus.  Ask questions about rumors, don't just pass them off as fact until it is known for certain.

Your Friend Always,
John Lifeglen