How often do you "hide out" on an alt?

[Tater]

There are some days I just don't want to be bothered with guild stuff. I generally hide out once a week. Anyone else?

[semiiramiis]

I occasionally switch over to my other faction toon if I'm just too sick of watching my guild. However, as that toon has progressed (never HIDE on a 68 priest!) it becomes more and more difficult.

[Maticus]

I've been doing it since before Patch 3.1 came out :P My poor guildies think I haven't been online all that time but I've been frolicking around on a new Druid *giggle*

I did log on my Paladin the other day to help out the group I was in on my Druid, and my guild asked me if I'd help them in Ulduar... awful situation, I had to explain what I was doing and say no, which didn't go down well :S

It annoys me that people should even have to hide though, or at least not mention what you're doing with your guildies. I used to enrol my alts in my guild, but I've found that to be a very bad idea. People constantly bug you to help them with stuff. Maybe that makes me a bad person, but meh, sometimes I want to level my alt, not do something that won't benefit my characters at all. I don't mind helping from time to time though.

[odinsnephew]

Quite a lot on my Horde although i'm the only member of the guild online for months (the guild creators were a husband and wife who split up) I have stayed in the guild as I like the name and I only really PvP on them anyway. My friends list is full but hardly any of them play since WotLK - anyone else notice this?

My Alliance characters are in 2 bigger social guilds so I get all the interaction there.

[Maticus]

My friends list is full but hardly any of them play since WotLK - anyone else notice this?

A lot of people I used to play with left before WotLK, in the drought of content during the months leading up to it. I've moved servers since then so I don't know if they came back.

[det]

Have had those phases, but they are over. :)

[Janfader]

I do often enough especially during the week. With two Alliance 80's and two Horde 70's on another server makes it fun.

I'm currently trying to play on a PvP server on the Horde side with my BE Priest. Trying to uprade my PvP play plus a RL friend is on that server.

I think I have 30+ toons overall on 6 different servers.

[Manaru]

i have 2 80's and a few between 50-75.
Only a few RL friends know of my alts, guild only knows of the alts that i bring into the guild.

And if i really want to be left alone, i just go to my twink BE lock i transferred to a normal server, he is guildless and friendslist is empty. (transferred all my horde there, but took most back to their original server when rl frinds came back)

[Tater]

I feel guilty when I do it. You guys (and ladies) are just plain unsocial and rotten

:]

[semiiramiis]

I feel guilty when I do it. You guys (and ladies) are just plain unsocial and rotten

:]

Unfortunately, too many people know the identity of my not so secret alliance alt. Add this to the fact that my husband and best friend both play on my server, as alliance, it makes it not very antisocial. I do it when I've had enough of my guild, and they're jumping on my last nerve.

[elsegundo]

There are some days I just don't want to be bothered with guild stuff. I generally hide out once a week. Anyone else?

90% of the time now.

i only go on my main to make gems and do the cooking and jc dailies. otherwise, im just rotating through several alts depending oh my mood.

[Maticus]

I'm not the only person I know who 'hides', it's quite popular :)

The next best thing would be to have an option to hide your online status, but as Blizzard said recently, that's unlikely to ever happen.

We don't particularly like the idea of people appearing as if they are offline because it would give the wrong impression that the world is empty when it's not. I know there are times when people just want a bit of solitude, and that's OK, but we don't feel there is a benefit to the game overall by allowing something like this.

*Just a quick edit and perhaps there are some that don't know this, but you can turn on DND and type a note after it so that other players are aware of your status. It helps you feel as if you're not being rude by ignoring them and they get a better understanding of why you're not answering without you having to say anything at all. Another trick that people do when they don't necessarily feel very sociable is to create a new window for all chat and "hide" it behind another window. This way, you can still periodically check to see if any of your friends have tried to contact you and still not feel as compelled to answer others.

I'm not encouraging people to be solitary, but there are ways to get some 'quiet' when you want it.


You don't play a main tank, do you? Or a healer?


Incorrect on your assumption. Been there, done that, bought the t-shirt. :) I get it. But, if you're having issues with what your guild expects of you, then it's something you need to work out with them. I doubt that them discovering you're actually around if you had such an option as being anonymous would help make the situation any better for you.

If I don't want to raid and I don't want to group, I don't. People are generally pretty understanding if they know you're just tired, you just want to finish that one more quest, that you just want to work on your fishing, etc. If they aren't then that's on them and not on you. No amount of in game tools are going to change that and again, it would make the world feel like a very empty place.

[odinsnephew]

I was at my friends recently and he was sending mats to his jewel crafter for a guildie when the phone rang. He asked if I could log his warrior and make the gem as the guildie wasn't on for long. I said ok and logged on. I was quite amazed at the amount of /w asking for boosts while I spent time figuring out what gem the guy wanted!! Both from guildies and randoms it was 5 or 6 I think.

I said this to my friend when he finished and he said "yeah damn annoying but I just ignore them now". I only have lower than level 60 in this guild as I transferred my old main so I don't see this a lot but get it on my Horde more from randoms in Orgrimmar.

I can understand why people would want to hide :)

[Shellar]

Sometimes, I hide from in-game problems on my IRL character.

[Maticus]

EDIT: Nevermind. Very funny Shellar :)

[Wintrow]

Sometimes, I hide from in-game problems on my IRL character.

And the quotemaster strikes again!

My next MSN message :grin:

[rgirty]

Never, and i can't see why anyone would.

[Marlous]

Sometimes it feels rather liberating to go to a toon that nobody has on their friendslist. I'm an Officer and Site Admin in my raiding guild, so I tend to get a bit more attention than the average guild member, and sometimes I just don't feel like spending my time standing around Dalaran replying to whispers/ochat/gchat. Odd thing is that I did list my Horde alts on the guildsite and I occasionally mention the names of my alts so it's not a secret, but they never bother me there - I suspect they just cba to add people's alts to their friendslist the way I do myself, heh.

[clevins]

Maticus et all who say you hide because your guild's annoying you: did you read the blue?



Incorrect on your assumption. Been there, done that, bought the t-shirt. :) I get it. But, if you're having issues with what your guild expects of you, then it's something you need to work out with them.

I was about to say that as well - if your guilds are a whiny bunch of drama queens who alwasy beg for help... well...

[semiiramiis]

I'm not hiding anymore I guess.... since, as of this morning, I am....guildless. It's kind of odd to be that way, having been with the same guild for almost two years, but the past couple of days ended my tenure with my guild. It's both sad and a little refreshing. The problems stemming from my dk just finally boiled over to the point where it was time to go.

[clevins]

sad, but if there's drama over what toon you want to play etc (not sure what the specifics are semi) then it's time to move on. And, I guess, that's my point above - if you have to hide out on an alt, something's wrong between you and your guild. Could be the guild, could be the person, could be a bit of both... but the solution isn't to hideout it's to deal with the issue.

Good luck semi.

[ptarn]

I have to say I've started toons on two other servers to get a little 'peace and quiet'. It's not that I felt in any way obligated to do stuff in my old guild, but I just wanted to be 'invisible' or 'anonymous' again, kinda try and relive the 'old days' where I had to do everything myself (like finding quests, pugging, etc.). But... After a while I started to long for a guild again and now both of my new toons are guilded again! ^^

And I have to say I like it better this way. Low-level toons are guildless, high-level toons are guilded, just the way I like it. And it feels kinda nice to be able to speak up in gchat and say 'hey, guess what? I have a high-level alt I want to bring into the guild!'.

@Semi: It's hard to leave a guild you've been a part of for a while, I recently did the same thing after a year and a half. Took me a while to come to that decision too. But from what I've read in your posts, it was the best decision for you at this time. And don't worry, there a lots of other guilds swimming in the Azerothian Sea if you want to join a guild again. Or stay guildless for a bit, see how that turns out. Good luck!

[Maticus]

Sorry to hear that Semii, but you will probably find it very refreshing for a while.

Yes Clevins, I did read the blue post (I posted it!), and I agree that if your guild is bugging you and giving you trouble, it's an issue that needs to be resolved, but I'm not in that position really. It's more that I don't like to refuse people help. I'm often asked for boosts or help with quests or to join a raid, and truth is I'd rather just level whatever alt I'm working on at the time. They're generally fine about it if I say no, I just feel bad. So I'd rather they didn't know I was around so I don't have to let them down when they ask.

[Wintrow]

I am less inclined to log into my main now that I joined my brother's guild. He knows my wife (obviously) so he might inadvertently blurr out an anecdote that would cause my wife to ask me why I was playing at that particular time of day :grin:.

Other than that... no :smiley:.