WoW's burnout/return cycle

Hi. I'm Matthew Rossi, a writer here at Blizzard Watch, and I've been playing World of Warcraft since December of 2004.

In that time, I have gained and lost and regained and lost again my interest in the game, because I'm a human being and nobody can do something like this without ever taking a break from it. I've unsubscribed twice, and likely would have done so again if I wasn't paid up till 2018 thanks to the WoW token. Why do I keep coming back to WoW?

Because it keeps being something I enjoy. But just like attempting to sit down and eat a gallon of ice cream can cause one to swear off ice cream for a while, too much of my favorite MMO can give me a metaphorical upset stomach. Burnout is real. As a long time player, I wanted to take a moment and talk about burnout and how one can cope with it.

Just stop playing

First up, there is nothing wrong with not playing WoW. For some reason, a lot of players get caught up in the 'I'll be too behind if I take a break' mentality, but after thirteen years I know this much -- there will always be gear resets, catch-up mechanics, and new patches that change the status quo. WoW is a treadmill, and it's always okay to get off that treadmill for a while for your own sake.

Also, don't try to force a return. I have lost count of the times a player has come back seemingly raring to go only to flag out a week or so later, because they weren't actually back for their own reasons, but out of fear of letting others down. Yes, WoW is a social activity, especially when you're in a guild. It's good to think of others. But it's a game, and if you're not having fun playing it, you'll just end up angry and resentful of your fellow players and that's a recipe for disaster.

Play something else

Sometimes it's not the game you're tired of, but your role or class. I've never actually stopped playing a Warrior for another class, but I have gone back and forth between tanking and DPS over the course of years because the two roles are fairly dramatically different and often, a change is as good as a rest when it comes to MMOs. I've even switch to my Shaman to heal on occasion, and that's actually worked out -- although it's been a few years now.

This isn't always feasible, of course. If you're MT for your guild and you're happy playing WoW but you want a break from tanking, you tend to be in a situation where that's hard to accommodate . One solution I found when I was in that situation was to play an alt. Playing an alt means you'll get to level and run dungeons and, in time, even do some raiding on a completely different character with different mechanics. A lot of tanks and healers I know play alts, often of other classes that perform similar roles -- I know one player who played every healing class in the game -- just to get a different perspective on their class or role.

Also, don't be afraid to take a break to play other games. They don't have to be Blizzard games, although I have lost count of how many times I took a break from World of Warcraft to play Diablo 3, and I hear good things about Overwatch. But I also have taken breaks from WoW to play lots of other games, and have come back refreshed.

Don't try and overdo it

"I'm MT! I have to be at every raid!"

If that's true, you need to recruit more tanks or tank-capable players. Same goes if you're healing lead, or raid leader, or even if you're just a very popular player who is constantly being asked to run Mythics. If you feel like you can't even take even a night off then WoW has gone from a fun activity to a job, and a job that you're likely not even getting paid to do.

You need to be sure you can take the breaks you need, and moreover, you need to be able to say no to activities that you either don't enjoy or just don't have time for. If you love raiding but hate five player dungeons, do not force yourself to run them, not even if your guild runs a lot of Mythics and needs a healer. If you hate World Quests, don't run them. If there's an objective you're pursuing that requires you to, either rethink the objective or pursue it sensibly, don't push yourself into a lather over it.

I've seen so, so many players work themselves up into a frenzy feeling obligated to play content that wasn't to their taste. Don't do that.

Do what you enjoy

I love WoW. I don't love PVP.

For four years I made myself PVP pretty constantly. And that was a mistake that made me unhappy, and I shouldn't have done that. I did it because back then the gear from PVP was pretty solid, especially at the end of Vanilla WoW and for the entirety of The Burning Crusade, which were essentially my PVP golden years. Even when resilience was introduced into the game and served no real purpose on gear -- although my shaman put together a PVP set to allow him to tank Karazhan as resil allowed you push crits off the table -- you could still fill gaps in your itemization with PVP gear that was still pretty good, at least until that piece you wanted dropped or you got enough badges to buy better.

I hated it. Even on a Warrior (an Arms Warrior, no less) I didn't feel like I was a very good PVP player, and a lot of the time it felt like the second I tried to get into a fight I'd get focused down by six players because everyone believed Warriors were OP juggernauts of destruction. It didn't help that I wasn't using a mace and back then Mace Specialization was key.

Me trying to keep on with PVP ruined a big chunk of my time playing WoW. It was a mistake and an easily avoidable one -- I could easily have not done it but I was stuck in a cycle of chasing after an end result that even I realized wouldn't justify what I was enduring to get it. Sometimes we have to stop ourselves from doing things we can do, but which we personally don't enjoy. The designers give up options, but we don't have to pursue all of them.

Basically, do what's fun, don't do what isn't

This all boils down to, "Do what you enjoy and take breaks when you need to" because that's all that I've ever found to work in terms of dealing with burnout. Nowadays I run dungeons, do WQ's, occasionally stick my toes in LFR and run old content for transmog and I'm pretty happy with my choices. There are things I simply can't physically do anymore and things I can do, but I choose not to because they made me unhappy or stress me out too much. You have to find that balance, because this is a game, and it should never become a grueling obligation.

What are your tricks to avoid burning out? More importantly, what is it you find yourself consistently getting burned out on?