Since starting this 24 hour run of LOTRO I've made a couple of changes to the way I approach my MMO gaming, in an attempt to get back on track after months of doing not very much not very often.
I'm now aiming for 2 hours a day, with an update here every two days. If I play more than 2 hours in a single day then I'll write an update after every cumulative 4 hours and put it by until it's due. If I'm a couple of posts ahead then I'm less likely to fall off schedule and get discouraged.*
*But I'm also wary of getting too far ahead. A couple of days of no MMO could all too easily turn into the kind of extended lull I'm trying to avoid.
So I'm writing this on the 9th, but it won't go up until the 12th. It provides an impression of consistency at least.
This is far from the first time I've tried to impose a little order on my MMOing. I've commented on aspects of why I do this before – to make it less likely that I'll give in to my long running tendency to starting new characters when I return to games rather than continuing where I left off, and to keep my altitis in check so that perhaps I'll get a little closer to endgame more than once a decade.
There is, however, more to it than that. When I'm not MMOing all too often it's not because I'm doing something else. It's because I'm doing nothing else. I have other interests, but when I drift away from gaming, and from MMOs specifically, it's almost always a sign that I'm in for a spell of losing interest in the other things as well.
(This is only exacerbated by the sense of the world being on hold that I'm sure many are currently feeling.)
So I want to see if I can stick to this schedule for a while. I'd consider that an achievement, and one that might inspire me to form and keep to other better habits. That's really what 24 Hours In... is for. It's a way for me to track my successes and failures – less a blog and more a personal diary that I just happen to leave laying around for anyone to read.
It also acts as a good reminder of what I've done before, where I left of, and what I'm doing next.
Which in this case is the final 4 hours of this run of LOTRO, in which I might make it to Evendim. Or not.
I've got time.
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