I’ve been playing a game on my iPad for almost two years. Those who know me are already well aware that I’m a geek, and although I don’t have the constitution to play God of War or Mortal Kombat, I can get into slower paced games that involve teamwork, building, and collecting. In this case, I play The Hobbit: Kingdoms of Middle Earth.
As part of the growth of the game, I built a city and joined an alliance. Alliances are important, because when you are part of an alliance, you can share resources that are necessary to build cities and train soldiers, you work together to defend each other or attack enemies, and you can send your resources and gold over to another ally if another player is coming to attack you. Aside from that, members of an alliance often talk, strategize, and enjoy a certain level of camaraderie and friendship. In my case, I have belonged to several alliances. In each case, I quickly moved up the ranks to serve in an Officer role, and in some cases, Vice Regent and Regent, which are the top leadership positions available in an alliance. I have always attributed this to my tendency to teach and encourage. In each case, my alliance merged with another alliance to form a bigger, more powerful, more competitive alliance, where I learned more advanced game techniques, made more friends, and rose up through the ranks again.