Raiding guilds will look at armory and your gear and spec can tell a lot. Where you’ve been, how well you know your class, how broke you are, etc. Always log out in your best gear, always!

1. As pointed out before: PuG! It helped me become a better healer, learn my healing tools, get to know tanks and deal with damagedealers taking damage.

2. Don’t be afraid to apply early/while leveling. I applied to a Guild while around 65 which already had 25 man raids in Gruul up and running. It helped me get a raidspot already knowing my guildies when hitting 70. WotLK has formed many new guilds looking for members, take your chance!

3. Write a well thought out application. Keep it short but answer everything asked in the application form. Be honest, check your grammar and slip some personal notes into the app. Offer a talk over vent/teamspeak for additional questions.

4. Think about teaming up for an app. I did so with my girlfriend, do so as well or apply with a good friend. It helps you starting out the daily guild life and many guilds welcome apps of 2-3 people (not-so much high-end guilds).

5. If you get into a guild an there’s nothing going terribly wrong: try to stick to a guild. Help build up the raid rather than hop to the next guild and progression level. Especially as a shaman there were times nearly every sunwell guild would have taken me even with the crappiest gear. But even if i haven’t seen sunwell pre 3.0.2 i did enjoy my guild and becoming an officer. CAVE: Do know when it’s time to move on if you’re guild just can’t meet your needs but do leave with respect and kind words.

(6. Be prepared. There WILL be guild drama.)

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Thanks Sydera for all the advice and insight to the dilemma!

Copra

Copras last blog post..Incoming: plans for a Guild

Also it’s important that they shouldn’t hold their leveling waiting for an instance run. It’s good to find a group, but it’s not worth holding back.

Learning to heal with two spells has questionable value. I leveled moonkin and I learned to heal once I had the whole toolkit, at 70. It just takes looking up what to do, memorizing the theory, and then applying it.

In any case, for me the game starts at max level. That’s just the sort of player I am. Everything that comes before is easier, and thus, not worth a lot of sacrifices if you miss something.

I don’t see PUGging as a solution, but it seems to be the only way to get there with the power levelling.

My solution is to visit all instances, even though it takes a bit more time. I’m playing for fun, not having fun for playing.

Copras last blog post..Incoming: plans for a Guild

I have to say I agree. I pugged a lot on my way to 60 especially, because I was in a casual guild and that’s what there was to do in Vanilla WoW, and there are certain lessons about playing in a group that even transfer between characters. However, I think it will be hard for people to get pugs below 70, so I don’t suggest it in the current climate.

I think that “run-throughs” of old dungeons, where a high level takes a low level through, don’t pay off at all in terms of the low level learning his or her class. That’s mostly what’s available for old dungeons, and you have to call in serious favors to get your guildies to do that.

However, at 70+, people are going to be excited to run the new stuff. I have every confidence that a new player could learn his class by pugging one or another of the Wrath dungeons every day for three months.

True story — I started this April, hit 70 late May, and was raiding Karazhan by June… and jumped to Hyjal/Black Temple in August.

Personal willpower and the ability to learn quickly will get you where you want.

As I see several others have commented, I’ve got a thing or two to say about pugging. I definitely agree it’s the best pre-raid ‘training grounds,’ but I’d suggest pugging very early. By early, I mean in your 20’s (SFK, BFD etc) or even RFC in your early teen’s. Especially because I was going through the levelling process with my very first character (2 failed Rogues that I quit at levels 8 and 16 nonwithstanding) that gave me the chance to experience old-world content as I went. I never farmed any instances and simply did one or two depending on my level and what quests I had. It might not have been as fast as straight solo questing, but I began picking up group etiquette and the role expectations of a non-tarded Hunter early on and continued to hone them as I levelled. By the time I hit 70 I had lots of experience, and despite the “huntard” stereotype and having no references I quickly was accepted into a T4 guild. I was raiding 3 days after I hit 70.

I still lacked some rather key knowledge at that time — namely the importance/available selection of gems and enchants and raiding addon “musts,” but guildies quickly filled me in on that.

After I had my own credentials and skills down pat the rest of my guild/Tier ascension was purely a matter of friends. I met the friends of friends, or people I got along with in daily heroic PuGs. When I ran into drama issues with my first T4 guild, I had better places to go.

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