Magnifisyncopathological

Via Hit & Run, I learned about The Sleeper's death in EverQuest.

This is an interesting story, but I liked this part the most.

They killed what Sony Online Entertainment intended to be unkillable. But rather than actually make it untargetable, Sony just gave it a ten billion hitpoints. For those non EQers out there a reference scale: a snake has about 10 hitpoints. A dragon has about 100,000. A god has 1-2million. This sleeper thing really does have about ten billion or more. It took close to 200 players almost 4 hours to beat the thing down into the ground.

Why, you might ask, would anyone waste four hours of their life doing this? Because a game said it couldn't be done. This is like the Quake freaks that fire their rocket launchers at their own feet to propel themselvs up so they can jump straight to the exit and skip 90% of the level and finish in 2 seconds. Someone probably told them they couldn't finish in less than a minute.

Copyright 2003 Andrew Phelps. All rights reserved.

The first point is, humans have an unlimited desire to accomplish goals and enhance their lives. These gamers set aside their valuable time to confront and defeat what was considered an unstoppable creature in an online MMORG. They could have read a book, ridden a bike, or drag raced cars at an abandoned airport. Of the millions of options available, they choose to play video games and entertain themselves.

They choose to take on a task that if completed, would leave them with an unknown reward. It wasn't even known if The Sleeper could be killed, what would happen if it died, and what the players would get for their efforts. Using 175 characters working for 3 hours results in 525 man-hours of coordinated effort for an outcome that was far from certain. Pretty impressive and a shining display of the power the human spirit will front in order to "do the impossible." Imagine the outcome of unleashing that human potential without restraint, without the roadblocks of taxes, licenses, and paperwork in it's way.

It simply cannot be said that mankind will ever be "satisfied" with some current level of material progress and comfort. We can't remain in status forever, treading water at some point externally and arbitrarily defined in our lives. I'm sure a more educated Austrian could expand upon the importance of this, but I'll say that it is one of the fundamental driving forces of human action and a crucial thing that free market capitalism respects.

With thousands watching and waiting, the Sleepers health inched ever downward.

Almost three hours into the fight, when victory looked possible, he disappeared, violating every rule in the world of Norrath on how a monster is supposed to behave. We thought [SonyOnline] understood us better. The fact you let it happen the next night means very little - the point is on that first magical evening when warriors rode off to battle the supreme, you meddled. They thought of something you didn't, something legal by the rules of the game you set forward, and you meddled. In the parlance of the world you created: "shame & ridicule".

My other point to make regarding this is how even the best-laid plans can be eradicated by human determination. Sony set Kerafyrm's hit points and regerating ability to a level that was considered absurdly high...for that time. Since then, the context surround the game has changed.

I draw an analogy to this and the central planning that governments engage in on a daily basis. The most recent example would be the prescription drug benefit for seniors. Congressional bill authors simply cannot understand how people will change, what the economic impact of their laws will be, and how influences outside their jurisdiction will interplay with everything. The $400 billion price tag is an estimate based on incomplete data, an estimate that is subject to political meddling and obfuscation. It won't be worth a damn in one year. Well, that may not be true. It could be useful to use as a sharp reminder why the idea was terrible in the first place.

SoE, on the other hand, is a private entity that owns the system in question and it can meddle quite effectively and with complete discretion. But notice that when it did, when it decided the players were going places they shouldn't, it recieved rebuke and condemnation. The players used a legitimate way to beat an opponent and Sony freaked, worried about it's control over the system.

SoE owns EverQuest, so that's no big deal. But imagine that things are different and SoE is really the local zoning board and the players are really business proprietors who want to set up companies that otherwise jump successfully through all the regulatory hurdles. Imagine the irritation and anger at the announcement that no, you can't build here...you aren't "local" enough or you'd throw a neighborhood's "funky culture out of whack". It's authoritarian and disgusting and demonstrates a disrespect for individuals.

Congradulations to the people who took down The Sleeper. Let's hope that the current Leviathan government we face won't need such an effort to destroy.