mmorchive

November 2000 tweety.bowlofmice.com

Tweety:

“You may need to re-run the patch server, although there may be connectivity issues at this time.” When the play servers commit suicide, or someone forgets to feed the gerbils that power the game engine, guides are asked to log into the chat servers and help out - also known as “Please take some heat off our paid employees.” The rooms would be filled with weenies screeching about how much Verant sucked, how they were going to demand refunds if they couldn’t get in to play RIGHT NOW PLZ.

As if I could do anything about it, sitting in my basement eating pizza and wondering if I could train my dog to get me beer refills. “I’m gonna lose my camp spot if I can’t get in now!” What the little paint chip eaters forgot was that NO ONE was playing until the server came back up. I had one walking talking pubic hair accuse me of bringing down the servers so that the Verant employees could play in lag free zones, sort of like Employee Day at Disney World. The mind reels - I didn’t realize so many states allowed siblings to marry, but that’s the great thing about Everquest. You get to meet flaming morons from EVERYWHERE, not just your little corner of hell.

But back to the chat servers. Watching the chat GMs squirm was reasonably entertaining for a few minutes. After the frothing masses got done twitterpating over losing their ubergroovy camp spot, they would suddenly realize they were in the presence of a CAPTIVE VERANT EMPLOYEE. And the bombardment would begin: “Why did you take away Tumpy Tonics?” “When are you going to reimburse me from when I lost my bronze dagger?” “Y did u ban my cuzin, he didn’t do nuthin, u suk.” “Why is this quest so hard?” “Why are you sitting here instead of fixing the server?”

The humor here was that a chat GM is often the newest GM possible - he’s too new to be trusted with a play server, so they stick him in a cage with a whip and a stool. He doesn’t know a quest mob from a lynch mob yet. It’s like tying a virgin to a stake and letting loose the jackals and fire ant combo. I tried to help a few times, but I was asked to stop when someone noticed my answer to “Why is the server down?” was “Someone tripped over the extension cord again.” My alternate reply of “Brad spilled his coffee on the router hub” went over about as well. If someone had bothered to TELL the customer service staff what happened, maybe I wouldn’t have tried to handle the problem with a little comedy. The old saw about being mushrooms (kept in the dark and fed lots of shit) applied.

But the BEST parts of server outages came when an actual Verant employee (meaning “salaried” as opposed to “6.50 an hour temp who can be fired for pointing out that Michelle Butler smells like tuna and tastes like chicken”) would take on the role of chat GM. How long they lasted depended on how out of touch with the masses they had gotten. You could tell who the really experienced people were - they’d pop in, chirp “Thanks for your patience folks, we’re glad you love the game so much!” and vanish like the metaphorical fart in the wind. The not-so-jaded types would listen, try to speak, and then panic and log off mid-question. I’ve been told that the GMs all work in one big room called “The Pit,” and I always pictured the GMs huddling together and hoping the walls were reinforced against nuclear bombardment. “Why didn’t I take that job at the Jiffy Mart? Why didn’t I listen to my mother and go to medical school? What’s that fishy smell?”

I never did manage to figure out why Verant wouldn’t tell their loyal guides why a play server went down. My pet gerbil is always telling me horror stories from his cousin in San Diego, though.