Even Share for Dummies

As I've said in a previous post, it's really so difficult to explain something to non-gamers and I just found out that even the simplest ones like the concept of even share is difficult to explain.

Two days ago, I was trying to explain the concept of even share to my friend Maida. The discussion started in the office and continued over Starbucks coffee. Maida did not, does not, and has no apparent intentions of being a gamer.

Here's how my explanation went:Even share is an option in a party that allows party members to evenly share experience points.

Pretty clear right? No. Not for Maida. In this definition, there are two things that she has no idea of 1) party, and 2) experience points. So I have to explain them both first.

A party is what you have when two or more players decide to band together to fight monsters. Two of the main options in creating a party is deciding if it is to be "Each take" or "Even share". Each take means that each party member gets experience points for the monster that that party member killed. Experience points are what a player needs to earn in order to level up. For example, A kills Poring and gets 10 experience points. His party mate B does not get any experience points. On the other hand, Even share means that party mates share experience points. So, when A kills Poring, the 10 experience points is shared with his party mate B. They each get 5 experience points.

Whew.