Sunday, December 27, 2009

What is an "alt"?

One of the D's from the D&D's of Wizard101Info asked this question:
I was listening to you on the 5th Episode of Ravenwood Radio, and I heard you and Stephen mention "ALT"'s a lot. Like, Stephen said that he had an "ALT". What IS an "ALT"? I've heard it mentioned a few times in game, and I would love to know what it means.

/smacks head . . . how many gamer terms did I use during that thing?

Ok, Alts are your "alternate characters." This is a throwback to other MMOs where, if you were part of a guild, you usually had to declare a "main" or an "alt" because of raiding.

/smacks head . . . I did it AGAIN! "Raiding" is when you get a large group of players together to slay the dragon . . . or whatever other huge boss there is in your game.

You see back in my days of Everquest, World of Warcraft, or Lord of the Rings Online, I'd have to combine forces with between 12 to 72 players (depending on the game) and hunt down bosses that dropped really good gear. The problem was that these bosses only dropped maybe 1 or 2 pieces of gear for the entire 12 to 72 players, so it took a long time to get one character fully decked out with the best robes, shoes, swords, etc. that the game offered.

The way these games were designed was so that good gear on your character actually made a huge difference in how easily your entire raid force could defeat more powerful bosses . . . so much so that it was essential to a raid force to have well geared "main" characters over well geared "alt" characters. (It was not strange for people to sometimes have 2 or 3 max level characters on their accounts.) Therefore, In most raiding guilds Main characters received looting preferences over Alt characters.

In Wizard101 EVERYONE GETS LOOT! It's part of what makes this game great, you know? I don't have to roll against any other players to win loot at the end of the battle. So, it really doesn't matter if there's an alt or a main in a group.

In Wizard101, I suppose your "main" character would be the character you are most invested in or embodies you the most. So for me, Thomas Lionblood is my "main" character and all the others are "alt" characters.

Hope that helps you understand that bit of confusing gamer lingo.

Happy Dueling!

4 comments:

Kestrel Shadowthistle said...

Wow- you are such a NERD! Just kidding - so am I!!!!!!

Sierra Starsong said...

Up to 72 characters in one group?! Holy Cow! It's hard enough coordinating attacks with just three or four in a group, I can't imagine running with a huge crowd and hoping to be the lucky one to get the loot at the end.

BTW My Storm alt finally made Grandmaster over the weekend, yay!

David TitanRider said...

72 PEOPLE! So i guess it was a game like whoever deals the most damage in a "raiding" group like a couple games I know of.

Just so you know that was Dustin's question not mine

David TitanRider said...

P.S. He thanks you for answering his question and thanks for giving a link to us. It gave us a little more fame........ well not a WHOLE lot but anyway, thanks friendly!