Streaming project: naguura
by Sarah Pope
Who is Naguura?
Caroline Forer (Caro, as everyone calls her) is one of the top-rated and watched English-speaking World of WarCraft streamers on Twitch, standing at 252K followers on Twitch, 68.1K subscribers on YouTube, 36.5K followers on Twitter, and 36.9K followers on Instagram as of May 2021; these numbers may seem small for such a large streaming community, but Naguura actually excels past other famous World of WarCraft streamers, such as expert healer AutomaticJak (80.3K followers on Twitch). It’s difficult for any World of WarCraft streamer to surpass Asmongold, who sits at nearly 2 million followers and has over a 1 million follower lead over the second most-watched WoW streamer, Towelliee.
Naguura lives in the Italian province of South Tyrol and can speak both German and English, as well as understand spoken Italian. She primarily sticks to playing and streaming World of WarCraft, though she does venture outside of her comfort zone once in a while to play games like Valorant, Scavengers, It Takes Two, and others, adopting a relaxed streaming environment (as compared to some of her World of WarCraft streams) and typically falls into the “Just Chatting” category as well. Naguura is an individual streamer but is supported by a laundry list of sponsors, such as gaming accessory super-giant Corsair. She is also one of four casters that participate in Blizzard’s World of WarCraft MDI (Mythic Dungeon Invitational) Tournaments, working alongside AutomaticJak (Dan Anzenberger), Dratnos (Tristan Killeen), and Tettles (Peyton Tettleton). On rare occasions, Naguura will stream yoga/fitness as it is one of her real-life passions, but I assume the lack of frequency is due to the influx of inappropriate and predatory-like viewers that specifically search for streams like that.
Naguura’s Audience
Naguura’s Twitch channel fosters a vast demographic of viewers, and it’s hard to determine whether or not her audience is dominated by a certain age group among other demographic factors. Above all, nearly everyone who tunes into her channel enjoys playing or watching World of WarCraft. Since the game itself is male-dominated, it can be assumed that Naguura’s audience is primarily male-identifying. Of course, there are many female-identifying viewers who specifically subscribe to and watch Naguura because they are able to relate to and understand her better than most of her male counterparts. She averages approximately 1,500 viewers per stream and gains about 24 followers per hour. Her stream has received almost 30 million overall individual views, and the highest number of concurrent viewers Naguura has had at one time is 9,577.
Additionally, every 2€ ($2.40 USD) and above donation is displayed and read out loud by Naguura during her stream. Other animations show up on the stream while she is playing in terms of user interactions, like new subscribers. Subscribers have the ability to access the #sub-only channel in her Discord server and are able to see exclusive content before it reaches the public. She also has a P.O. box set up for viewers to send in cards and other things they’d like her to have, but she advises against sending food or anything perishable, as it “might take [her] awhile to pick it up.”
Due to the amount of attention that Naguura’s stream receives on a daily basis, she has a group of independent moderators that help manage the chat and audience while she plays. This important especially because many tasks on World of WarCraft (like running dungeons, where she has to be focused at every second) make it impossible for her to read the chat herself and communicate with her audience. Of course, she does chat with and engage with her viewers when she can, but there are many times when the game is encompassing 100% of her attention. Naguura’s biggest piece of advice to streamers who are struggling to manage their audience is to not be afraid to ban or timeout viewers. In an interview with Defias Sisterhood, she went on to say, “timing someone out doesn’t
immediately mean the person will leave the stream, sometimes people are just ‘testing the waters.’ If they see that you aren’t allowing certain behaviour, they might still stick around.” She also mentioned that viewers tend to reciprocate the environment being created by the stream itself, so if the streamer themselves encourages toxic behavior, it will be mirrored by the audience. It’s important for Naguura’s moderators to be vigilant and on top of the chat at all times, as she does experience quite a bit of misogyny and sexism due to her popularity as a female gamer in a male-dominated community. There are no chat rules publicly displayed on Naguura’s channel, but it’s easily assumed that she follows the Official Twitch Channel rules which include behavior like being kind, respecting others, and listening to the moderators. Her moderators work together on an individual case-by-case basis to manage the audience’s behavior and messages and foster an entertaining and enjoyable environment.
The Where and When: Naguura’s Schedule
Being a full-time streamer, Naguura typically streams an average of four to five days a week. Her schedule changes weekly, though the adjustments are minimal, such as starting her Monday stream at 10:30 AM CET instead of noon, and so on. She typically takes weekends off which is impressive because many streamers rely on the influx of weekend viewers to keep their stream afloat; it can be assumed that Naguura can make these schedule decisions because she has so many viewers and sponsors, meaning that she does not have to rely on other ins-and-outs like other streamers. #1 World of WarCraft streamer Asmongold also keeps a similar schedule and does not stream on Saturdays, one of the busiest days for Twitch streamers.
A FEW REASONS WHY YOU SHOULD CONSIDER TUNING INTO NAGUURA’S STREAMS AND YOUTUBE CHANNEL.
She’s funny, and is not afraid to have fun with others and entertain her viewers with special, themed streams like Drunk WoW.
She provides detailed, informative guides for both new and experienced players.
She’s honest, and acknowledges that she has a life and other responsibilities, making her more relatable to the vast majority of casual gamers.
It’s hard to find established, female-identifying streamers.
Making a name for yourself as a bilingual, female streamer in a world and community that is male-dominated is not easy. The amount of respect that Naguura garners from her fans and viewers is insurmountable, and she continues to reciprocate the support that she receives from them by producing consistent, high-quality content, and offering exclusive opportunities to her subscribers and top fans such as subscriber-only emotes, giveaways, badges, and Discord access. Even if you’re not the world’s most hardcore World of WarCraft fan, Naguura is fun to watch and listen to, as she loves to joke and meme with her viewers as she plays. Naguura is also sponsored by a variety of companies which makes her success tenfold more impressive, and being witness to someone who has continuously made a name for themselves through multiple media channels is nothing short of phenomenal.