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A few question for the warcraft players
Isiodos
Member Posts: 6
Hi everyone.
After about 3 years of playing Anarchy Online (my first MMO) i think i need a change. I have been looking around for a new game to play and WoW seems a like it will be my final choice, hopefully for the next 2 - 3 years.
So i have a browsed WoW forums to get as much information i can but still i have few questions that i hope someone could answer for me and i will try to put them in some order.
Servers.
There are a lot of them and the choice is kinda tough. People from AO told me that in general rp servers tend to have a more helpful/mature community and maybe as a first time player i should avoid pvp-servers. Is that true in your experience and do 80 level people hunt lowbies for fun or it isn't that often. I like the idea of world pvp but without any high level friends things could be really bad for me. Any recomendations for a server are welcome.
Guilds.
Going through the realm section of the WoW forums and looking at the various recruitment posts from guilds there i am a bit confused as how the guilds work there. Are there any guilds that recruit new players to level in, answer questions get the occasional team together and finally doing end game raids with and/or some pvp? Most guilds in AO would constantly take in new players (when there were new players at least 
) and unless i understand things wrong at best i can hope for a leveling guild of some kind that i will have to leave later on to join an endgame one?
Team/Solo leveling content.
One of the reasons i want to try WoW is the huge amount of people that they are playing it so i hope i could get teams for doing whatever team content is there. On the other hand i read that you can level to 80 mostly solo. So what i am trying to ask is, is there team based content from 1 to 80 and in your experience do people actually do it or is mostly skipped. I am a slow leveler even if i play a lot of hours every day. I try to do most of the content that there is and stop and gear my characters as best as i can along the way, explore every area that i have access to, do the quests and have some pvp fun at the range that i am in.
I think that is all, thanks in advance if you took the time to read it and answered a bit too 
Comments
I recommend RP servers for exactly the reasons you stated. Great communities. However if you want open world free for all pvp, then maybe a pvp server will suit you better (rp-pvp maybe?). It is my experience that pvp centric players are far more aggressive than pve players and the communities reflect that.
I can't really give you any advice on pvp servers as I have only played on pve servers mainly. A few people I know who split time between pve/pvp servers say that high levels prowling low levels isn't really a problem anymore since the world has expanded, just stay out of strangle thorn vale
As for guilds, there is a guild for just about every type of player, but that also means you are just as likely to find a guild that doesn't fit your playstyle. So do your homework before joining.
Team based content doesn't really start until around level 10ish and most people do skip it, depending on the age of the server. That doesn't mean if you are active about getting groups it cannot be done. This might be a reason for you to join one of the newely created servers as there will be more new players as opposed to just long time players leveling alts.
Servers
I'd agree - average maturity level is higher on RP servers.
Whether you go PvP or not is largely a matter of taste. Don't expect many close and skillful fights (although they can happen). In practice most combats occur between people of widely different levels, skill or gear. Mostly playing on a PvP server will mean occasionally being ganked, and having the opportunity to do the same to other people. So ask yourself whether that's a good thing or a bad thing. PvP realms also tend to attract more competitive personalities, and often have the strongest raiding guilds.
A few PvP servers take world PvP more seriously. For example on mine (EU-Ravenholdt) there are player organised PvP events every Sunday, with large numbers of people on each side.
You may also want to look at: http://www.warcraftrealms.com. This site allows the population of realms to be browsed. Be aware that on some realms, there may be a large imbalance between one faction and the other. You may also want to check the relative class balance on your chosen realm. It's generally better for a first timer to avoid the more over-subscribed classes.
Guilds
Guilds can fall into large number of categories. Here are a few of the more common types:
a) Endgame raiding guilds. These are the more serious guilds. You're unlikely to be invited to one of these until you are close to max level.
b) Casual guilds. These have much looser membership requirements. Some will invite anyone who asks, others will invite friends they make whilst playing (e.g. doing group content). This is a good type of guild to be in whilst levelling.
c) Vanity guilds. These are very common. Someone decides one day "I want to make a guild". If you walk around guildless, you may frequrently be asked to sign charters to set up such guilds (you can make money be charging for your signature!). Sometimes you'll get the opportunity to hang around after the guild is created. This sort of guild does very little for you , but very little is expected from you.
d) PvP guilds. Some of these concentrate on endgame PvP, whilst others focus more on creating low level twinks.
e) RP guilds. Normally these only occur on RP servers. It should be relatively easy to get an invite if you're prepared to make an effort to RP. Another good type of guild to be in whilst levelling.
Generally, guilds aren't really necessary before max level. All many offer is an extra chat channel, which can be useful for forming groups and just for company.
Team / solo content
There are two real types of group content before endgame. Instances and battlegrounds.
Instances are dungeons designed for 5 people. Two of the earliest ones are "Rage Fire Chasm", a level 13-16 instance located in the middle of a horde city, and "The Deadmines", which is located in an alliance area and is designed for levels 15-23. Most of the early instances are quite easy, with the main problem being putting up with the kids who are common at lower levels. Many experienced players choose to avoid instancing whilst levelling - partly because after doing raids and heroics at quite a high level of play, putting up with merely "average" players can seem frustrating. How easy it is to find a group will vary a lot between servers and factions. Your best bet may be to ask on the relevant realm forum.
The other type of group content is battlegrounds. These are special instanced PvP events designed for 10 or 15 players. Success in battlegrounds can earn superior gear. However many battlegrounds will be dominated by twinks, particularly below level 30.
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Like the others said: RP servers are the way to go if you want a more mature crowd. PVP is there for people who want it in designated areas. Far as guilds, I rarely do them so other people will be more helpful in that regard.
Currently Playing: World of Warcraft
I've been in since the last part of beta, (Death Wing PvP, then Silvermoon PvE) . The PvP servers started out bad(gank wise) and then got worse as higher levels grew bored. Entire parties(or more) would roam around and gank lower levels. Given the level and gear different it was just slaughter. As was mentioned STV was one of the worst on most servers.
Over the years thats pretty much faded out(except for a number of people who still think its fun to gank lower levels). There are still epic geared gankers roaming around, but not nearly as many as in times past. Most higher levels can't be bothered with such these days. Thats on the PvP servers. On the PvE servers you can't be ganked these days unless you are flagged. It allows for a much lower pressure gaming experience. Some of the more "creative" gankers came up with ways to trick people in to flagging themselves, but most of those have been addressed in various patches.
WoW is first and foremost about *gear*. The eternal treadmill is all about the next bit of digital symbolism, that will add to your various stats. That being said, WoW is actually a good game all the way to level cap(currently 80). Then its pretty much only raiding, PvP and dailies(you can do up to 25 per day now).
Raiding guilds these days tend to be rather closed societies. Since the main attraction of the end game is raiding(or hard core PvP) they tend to be rather exclusive about membership. Lets face it, not everyone has the time, talent and dedication required to be an effective raider, and thus a continuing asset to a guild. I'm numbered among those who lack such. My guild tolerates me because I help lowbies with their quests, and contribute to the guild when I can. Bottom line, give the game a try and see if its for you. I'd suggest one of the PvE servers to get some idea of the game dynamics. If you like it and can handle the higher pressure situations of PvP, then try one of those later.
1. RP servers are fine in general, but Blizzard did make some mistakes with them. There is always a strong demand for a 'new server'.. this demand builds up over a few months.. and then if Blizzard released a 'RP' server, a lot of the people who just wanted a new server would jump on it and not really care about the RP part of it. These 'locusts' are generally the worst type of players and it would have been better if Blizzard had always released regular servers right before releasing an RP server. RP servers in general are more mature than regular servers, but there will always be a bunch of people on those servers who only joined because it was a 'new' server.
2. Once you join a server.. post on the official realm forum for that server and say you are looking for a guild and describe your play habits. You will find a good guild that way. A lot of guild recruitment on the forums revolves around endgame raiding, but there are other guilds there too.
3. I'm going to disagree with some of the other posters.. from 1-60, it is very unlikely (IMHO) that you will find a group to run an instance with.... at least the way it was meant to be done. More than likely someone in your group will say " hey, I have a guildmate who will run us through this"... so you get the loot and experience, but not the actual gameplay as it was intended. My suggestion for this is to just level without doing instances.. then when you are at 80, and have some free time, go back and solo the lower level dungeons to see the content. You can also usually solo a dungeon about 10 levels after you were 'supposed' to do it. This was actually one of my favorite things to do and can be quit challenging.
When someone does that, I often just make my excuses. Other groups can happen - for example I ran SFK only yesterday on one of my alts, and we even took along a new player who'd never been to an instance before :-)
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Looks that i am going to try an rp server and see how i like it there.
I am kinda dissapointed in the whole i ll get a higher level guildmate to run us through though. Can't say i am surprised, in the game i used to play is the norm too unless there is a level lock in the dungeon and that extends to leveling which results in end game people who have no idea about their class or their tools.
Thanks a lot for your replies again.