World of Goals

I am the greatest virtual tanker alive.

Okay, perhaps I just think I should be the greatest virtual tanker alive. I mean, I have plenty of experience showing me that I am not even close to the greatest, so it must be a distorted view of my own talents and value that allows me to say that first statement.  I know this, but…I don’t always feel this.

Let me back up a bit. I play World of Tanks. A lot. Recently WoT added what they call “personal missions” where you can earn award tanks for achieving particular things in your matches. Suddenly, my goal was to earn those tanks. As the greatest virtual tanker alive, even if only in my mind, no problem, right?

Grinding, grinding, grinding, buying tanks, selling tanks, re-equipping tanks, I changed my habits to match my new goal. The only problem was: I wasn’t getting it. I would have outrageously good (for me) battles, and still miss my mission by a single shot, a missed opportunity, or just having a horrible, terrible, brain-dead team. My frustration level rose to temper tantrum levels… unseemly for a guy working on 40 years old.

And then, I decided to check my stats.  Wasn’t I having really good battles? Isn’t being good at the game one of the main reasons I like to play it in the first place? A week before, I was content playing the game, and those award tanks weren’t in my radar, and now?

I am what the stat-checking websites call “Good”. In other words, I am more generally an asset than a hindrance to my team. (Kind of slight praise for the greatest virtual tanker alive.) However, my stats for the week I had been working were two steps above “Good” range and into the “Great” range. That is: top 1% of players. This insanely frustrating grind, this inept attempt to get an award, was bringing out the best performance of my virtual tanking career.

But… is that even the goal I tell myself I have for World of Tanks? No, it isn’t. You see, a little while after starting on WoT, I joined a clan. (what we call guilds, teams, etc.) Christian Soldiers 7^th Division… CS7 for short. The clan grew quickly, and now we have three branches… we got so much notice that people complained about our name, which apparently violated the EULA, and we had to change it. So, we just went to CS7, which stands for CS7. We have some terrific times, joining teams, wrecking enemies, hunting each other down when on opposite sides… we pray for each other in time of need, we celebrate when things go well, we uplift, we encourage, we pick on each other mercilessly. If I didn’t tank with these guys, I’d have stopped playing WoT a long time ago. See, I’m not even the greatest virtual tanker alive in my own mind, I’d like to be, but I’m too realistic for that, and owning a virtual tank doesn’t really hold much value for me. This isn’t even my genre of game. I like slow strategy games.

But what I do like is our mission: to fight the good fight. To show our fellow gamers that one can be a Christian and be competitive. That I might blow you up, but I’m not going to insult you. That when you do something good, even one-shotting me with your arty…I’ll say, “Nice shot”.  No, my general interaction isn’t going to be me sharing the Gospel, but maybe someone asks themselves what is different about those CS7 guys and gals.

And, oh, this goes past gaming. So often I think that God should bless my activities. (because I’m such an awesome person, right?) I’ll go all David on God and say, “I’m your guy, here, God, don’t let my enemies triumph!” or skip David altogether, “Do things the way I think they should be done!”  Hmmm, yep, I just went from having my goal being to glorify God to trying to make His goal to glorify me, and I’ll call it as I see it: that’s just stupid.

There is another aspect to those World of Tanks personal missions that relates to life outside of gaming. In some of those missions, you need to join with other players and work together. In fact some of the missions require one member of the team to submit to a secondary role in order for another member to get his or her mission accomplished. It happens in daily life too, I need to be the guy behind the scenes helping my fellow man to succeed. It isn’t easy sometimes, and sometimes it gets downright grating to see all the honor go to someone else.  That is when I know it is time to step back and look at my real goals, again.

Hey, I still want my award tanks, I even earned one of them. But, God, if I don’t succeed at another personal goal, let me strive for the greater prize. Lord, make your glory my greater goal, and don’t let me forget it.

www.worldoftanks.com
www.CS7clan.com