Without being in a guild with someone or they follow the lovely every character has a similar name, it is generally difficult to connect various characters in WoW to the people behind the name. Recently joining a new guild, I have found this to be wildly true. Learning new people, then learning their dozens of alts has been a challenge.

But what about people who aren’t in your guild? People you generally don’t run with every day? Sometimes they connect themselves, for example, I have several toons named Pandara, Pandari, Pandare, Pandaree and so on and so forth. Clearly these characters are likely connected. Other than that, there really is no way to tell.

So?

Why does this matter? Well, you never know who you might be talking to.

A real Azerothian example. I was leveling my main through Hyjal on launch day, someone I didn’t know whispered me and asked me where something was in a quest. I, in my usual standard annoyance for people who ask others for help instead of doing the legwork themselves, told this person “Look at your map.” And went back about my business. To be fair, any quest objectives are in fact marked on your map in WoW. The person gave me an equally curt reply and that was the end of it. Or so I thought. That night, as I hopped into a guild group with several close friends, one of them commented “Yeah, especially meanie Joyia, who is rude to people asking for help.” Turns out, the person whispering me had been his wife, and she asked me because I had been nice to her previously.

I pointed out that she had not identified herself, nor had she ever played that toon with me, not to mention that the toon wasn’t even in our guild. She was only one of dozens of people who whispered me that day with various idiot questions. I had no reason to be nice to her. As far as I knew she could have been anyone.

Looking back and thinking about it, I was entirely wrong.

I had every reason to be nice to her. I didn’t know who she was. I had no clue as to her allegiances. What if she had been my grandmother? What if she had been R.A. Salvatore (who has been known to play WoW). She could have been *anyone*.

I have even had times where someone was blindingly nice to me on one character only to be exceptionally rude to me on another.

In a world of magic and digital trickery, we need to remember, the people behind the avatars are people. Until proven otherwise, assume they are someone kind and deserving of respect. Perhaps if everyone acted like the person behind that character was someone they liked, the World of Warcraft would be a much nicer place.