Zoom Is Down So This Afternoon’s Meeting Will Be Held Using the Online Role-Playing Game Dragon War: Blood Feud

9:34 a.m.

Hey Team!

It’s Courtney, your favorite office manager, here with a quick update about today’s brand-strategy meeting. In the latest twist of our work-from-home adventure, we’ve been having issues with our usual video conferencing software.

So we’ll instead be hosting this afternoon’s meeting using the popular online role-playing game Dragon War: Blood Feud.

Feel free to drop a message in the chat if you have any questions!

9:40 a.m.

WOW. Okay, there were a lot of questions! Lol!

To enter the meeting, first create a character by selecting a race and class. We strongly believe in championing workplace diversity, so rest assured that elves, centaurs, orcs, dwarves, minotaurs, and gnomes are all equals in the eyes of management.

9:42 a.m.

Good question, Todd! There are eighteen playable classes including Sorcerer and Warlock. If you’re in ad sales, just select Barbarian.

9:45 a.m.

Okay, next steps! Once you’ve created your avatar, it’s time to log into the game world for our meeting. I’ve set up a conference room on the ground floor of the Pigbelly Tavern, which is conveniently located on the edge of the Whispering Wastes just past the Witchblood Forest. Ask a peasant or other NPC for directions if you can’t find it.

Please come directly to the meeting at 3 p.m. EST and don’t stop on the way to fight goat people or break pots.

9:52 a.m.

I’ve been getting some concerning DMs, so I want to circle back and resolve a few pain points.

While Dragon War: Blood Feud is a player vs. player game, we don’t want to foster a coworker vs. coworker environment. However, we all know that stray fireballs and intentional crossbow bolts can happen. So if your avatar IS killed and looted by a team member—say, Bethany from marketing—the issue will be handled in a private message mediation session with HR.

11:24 a.m.

Creatives! I’m seeing a lot of confusion about certain aspects of this, honestly, very minor venue change for our meeting, so here are just a few more best practices to make sure things go as smoothly as possible.

11:26 a.m.

NO side quests! I can’t stress this enough. We should be able to resolve all of our agenda items in the scheduled three hours, but that won’t be the case if marketing decides to run off looking for the Great Axe of Garthor. Don’t be selfish and make everyone stay late because of your own lust for powerful magic items. (I’m looking at you, Bethany!)

11:29 a.m.

Also, no killing n00bs! By which I mean the interns. This meeting is all-hands, so Julie, Jeff, and Jyle will have avatars like everyone else but their characters will remain at level zero to realistically reflect their post-pandemic job prospects. Please make them feel welcome and remember that our interns are unpaid and are doing this for the experience points.

11:31 a.m.

That’s all from me. See you this afternoon and have fun!

2:27 p.m.

Okay guys, the meeting is in a few minutes, and I’m seeing a lot of messages in the chat to the effect of “Why are we doing this?” and “Zoom isn’t down!” and “What the (bleep!) are you talking about, Courtney!?” So just a quick note:

You’re right. Zoom is working “fine” but I honestly can’t keep looking at you bobbleheads all day as if I didn’t have important looting or item crafting to do.

2:29 p.m.

When we were in the office, I played Dragon War from 9:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. every day and ate at my desk. But since we’ve been working remotely, not five minutes goes by that I don’t get an annoying little email, Slack notification, or help request from some gingham-covered freak who doesn’t know how to unmute himself.

2:30 p.m.

I’m lucky if I can fit in forty minutes of dungeon-crawling during my lunch hour. My minotaur is barely leveling up anymore. Do you guys get that??

This is all to say that as office manager, I’ve decided that all future meetings will take place via Dragon War: Blood Feud until further notice or until I reach level 75.

2:32 p.m.

For any further questions, see above.

2:35 p.m.

See. Above.

2:37 p.m.

Courtney has changed her status to: Update: I won’t be attending today’s meeting for personal reasons—i.e., questing for the Great Axe of Garthor. FINALLY.