So I play Puzzle Pirates periodically. I&#039ll go days not messing with it, and even then a lot of times I&#039ll just log on, play a few crafting puzzles and log off. I like the mini games (because that&#039s essentially what the entire game is) and sometimes I like being on a ship with other people looting and pillaging. Sometimes. Most of the time, I&#039d rather be left alone, but the crew I&#039m with now is fairly nice and they all seem to get along well, so I enjoy chatting with them.

The first crew I was with, however, was not that much fun or easy to get along with. The Treasure Seakers headed by Captain Medley wasn&#039t a very big crew, so there wasn&#039t always someone out pillaging or it wasn&#039t always easy to avoid newbs. When I finally got my own ship, I took it out a lot because I wanted to learn how to do sea battles really well. You&#039d think this wouldn&#039t be an issue because you&#039d think the crew would want their captains to be good at sea battle, but just taking my boat out was a chore. Newbs kept hopping on and off the boat without asking to board. Medley would hop on just to chat and then leave, oftentimes right before I entered a sea battle leaving me one member shy. I was irritated at the way Medley ran the crew and I was more irritated by the way people mishandled me. I was fine pillaging on other people&#039s boats, and when asked, I joined in and always did what I was told. I was a model pirate and other than my prediliction for sailing alone, I never did anything that the crew could construe as obnoxious.

I left that crew after having been with them a few weeks. The captain just drove me nuts and the newbs were everywhere. I had been talking about forming my own crew with my sister who also plays sporadically, so one evening I just quit their crew. I couldn&#039t form my own because I lacked the proper level in Navigation, but I figured that as soon as Katie got her skills up, we could form one together. The only thing was that we don&#039t often catch each other on at the same time, and I wasn&#039t even sure if she was playing much at all. I wanted to take my boat out, but couldn&#039t, so I sort of stopped playing even more.

One afternoon, I was jobbing with the crew Chaos Theory, and I really liked the captain and the crew, and the way they handled newbs who wouldn&#039t play right was in-line with what I think: plank them. They asked me if I&#039d like to join up, so I did. I don&#039t even think I&#039ve been with them a week, but I&#039m already an officer and I&#039m already having way more fun than with the Treasure Seakers because they don&#039t hop on board without first asking and they don&#039t treat me like an infant like Medley did. This meant that I could take my boat out, and since Ian&#039s gone and I don&#039t feel like cleaning, I thought a couple hours sailing the high seas would be fun for a while.

I was right about the &#034for a while&#034 bit. It was a short while. A boat attacked mine and it was captained by Medley. She hailed me and I said hi back, hoping she wouldn&#039t try getting into a conversation. Her boat beat mine since she had humans and not computer pirates. She said something about how she taught me well (which she didn&#039t; her first officer Ronaldini taught me well) and said thanks for the booty. I didn&#039t respond and just sailed on, hoping that was it. Nope. She started messaging me a little while after that asking me if I wanted to ally my flag with hers. I said I couldn&#039t do that since I wasn&#039t the captain of the Chaos Theory. She got confused (as usual; she&#039s not very bright) and said she thought I was forming my own crew. I said I was going to but I stopped playing a while and needed to up my stats first so I joined another. Then she got all huffy and started asking questions about why I left. I told her that some of the crew irritated me and that I hated people hopping on and off my boat without asking. She asked if I meant her because she was perpetually hopping on and off my boat, and I said yes, that she could have sent me tells rather than interrupting what I was doing. She asked what crew members were upsetting me and I said that it was mostly newbs and that since it had been a while, I&#039d forgotten names, which was partly true. Hers was the only one I remember among the group of fucktards.

From here it just got irritating. She started accusing me of not being a team player, of hurting the entire crew by leaving, and of being selfish. She called me a user, saying that she had taught me everything that I knew (lies) and that I had used her and the crew. She said that if I wasn&#039t having fun with the crew it&#039s because I was always by myself (which she said also hurt the crew somehow) and I never pillaged with the others. Now here, I started getting pissy. I had pillaged with them quite a bit before ever joining or ever getting my own boat. Even after getting my ship, I sailed with them when they asked and never griped when they were being shitheads. I very calmly told her that it&#039s just a game. I didn&#039t hurt anyone by leaving and if I wasn&#039t having fun, I just wasn&#039t having fun. Who cares? No one can control me or how I feel, and if I didn&#039t want to be with that crew, that&#039s it. It&#039s just a game. No matter how many times I pointed this out to her, she just kept going on about how I used her and the crew and how I was a horrible person. The conversation ended while she was bitching about the fact that I sailed alone and me pointing out that when no one else is sailing, I have to go alone and isn&#039t it a good thing that I practice anyway? She just stopped talking after I made some comment about how awful it was that I was trying to get better at sea battle.

The funny thing is that when I was in her crew, she used to interrupt my sailing all the damned time either by coming aboard or asking dumbass questions. Here I was, not in her crew but still being interrupted while trying to sail because she was treating me like a child and calling me names. Retarded. Just fucking retarded. I mean, this game is heavily populated by kids between the ages of 6-14. Idiocy abounds. The game is made up of a lot of mini puzzles so it&#039s hard to chat and honestly get to know other people. It&#039s not a game for being social. It&#039s not a game that&#039s very hard. I don&#039t even think it&#039s much of a game to take seriously, and here she is moaning about me using her and her crew and being a bad person even though none of this matters. I could stop playing tomorrow, and other than being out some cash for having paid for the rest of the month, it won&#039t affect me. It&#039s not the end of the world. It&#039s just a fucking game.

Medley, being the childish little bitch she is, said that she was glad she had beaten me at sea battle. I told her whatever, it&#039s just a game. Isn&#039t it sad that so many people can&#039t get past that?