http://www.worldofmatticus.com/2009/06/26/aura-of-command/
.-= Rahana´s last blog ..Twin Valkyrs heroic down… =-.

To answer your question – yes and no. It would definitely help them see, understand and appreciate all the work raid (guild) coordinators are putting into dragging 20 other people through – just seeing how much logistic work is behind a single raid makes the more sensible raiders appreciate your work as leader and well, bitch less. Got two anecdotal evidence stories if you like…

I know it was in TBC, Karazhan namely, when I was rather fresh RL and MT, some guild newbie had a go at me how am I doing things wrong and what a wrong leader I was – and he did it in public. So I offered him to lead next week Karazhan – from the general feedback it was a disaster. He thought he has what leader must have, but he didn’t (there was some blog about leading over here at WoM methinks… can’t find it atm). The main problem here was that he was “the absolutist”. ie, even back then, whenever I led, I talked to people about their assigments, strats and whether they are comfy with them. Although in raid I came out as single individual, the decisions were usualy long thought about before and tailored to fit the raid for the moment. His didn’t. And well, you can bend your raiders to your will and ideas – but only up to a point. Needles to say this newbie quit the guild very soon.

My second story dates to BT farm run. One of our great raiders and guildies asked if he could maybe try and lead the raid next reset, cause he wanted to see how it was and he was already running “friends only” Karazhan. Officers gave him a green light on that. The raid had some hiccups as some of the strats he came up worked well for him from his dps perspective, but others had hard time to follow them sometimes and well, I’d quite frankly took him as backup RL when me or the other officer doing it were occupied elsewhere. To my surprise, after the raid, he thanked me and told me he won’t lead a big raid ever again. The power was nice he said, but the responsibility and the chat traffic – cause I redirected all of that to him – was horrible. Tank assigments and requests, healers and other stuff, he was the main person to settle it (of course we helped him to distribute the final orders). He was as well surprised by the amount of random raider whispers he got dealing with this or that. He overcame that and last time I heard, he was progressing tank and co-leader of nice guild.

So yeah – if you let others, especially unexperienced, to lead a raid once in a time, prepare for it being a disaster. The more if you are long-time leader of that raid force. Cause during that time, you got to know your people, you without thinking adjust strats a bit to suit them – new person in lead lacks this ability / skill that you naturalized. In the end, you may get a pissed raid and pissed raider thinking others did everythig to fail him, or you can get a normal raid and one more person understanding how much time it takes to lead three raids a week. In best scenario, you will get reserve leader and someone whom you can trust when hitting dead-end progressing.
.-= Rahana´s last blog ..Twin Valkyrs heroic down… =-.

Also, on the tactic writing front – Ekatrina has made all the salient points. When your group is looking at new content for the first time there can be a *lot* for them and you to take in, a lot of which will come naturally the more used they get to the fight. But at first, when you’re all going into the unknown, it’s important to prepare briefings which are short, informative and memorable – and relevant to each person’s job in that fight. Anyone interested in an example of how I do it, feel free to direct message me on twitter and I’ll send it over. Might be useful for comparisons for other raid leaders/ your own style.

@smeedsc – your stlye is entirely up to you of course. In my experience, though, people may appear stupid if a tactic hasn’t been explained clearly enough to them. Clear tactics explanations mean that you’re imparting them the information they need to get on with their job, and that you’re trusting them to do it. They’ll return that trust by giving it their best because they’ll feel they’re being trusted with knowledge and being treated equally. It’s a meeting-halfway thing.

Also, I don’t know whether you talk to your raiders as you referenced in your comment – but I find that addressing my raiders in a polite and friendly manner rather than a rwar-50-DKP-minus way gets the best out of them.

@Rahana – no worries at all, thank you for bringing it up! I think you’ve got a good point there. Any raid leader, however experienced, can benefit from being a raider and learning what works and what doesn’t from examples set by other raid leaders. I know I’m still learning. Just wondering – turning it on its head – do you think that people who normally don’t raid lead *should* (if they feel comfortable with the concept), just to see what it’s like?

@Azrax-Firetree – Thanks! And yes, that is great news about the hit requirement – it had escaped me, so it’s great to know for the future.
…Though thinking about it, I don’t think that the raid I talked about had one priest of any spec… ah well, perhaps they were being optimistic.
.-= Mimetir´s last blog ..Juddr: Strange concept that spending time tanking PUGs can count as research for me. Bring on your worst, Ravenholdt! =-.

Most raid spam is very badly written from a tech authorship point of view. It’s written from the assumption that people will cheerfully read and digest huge amounts of text. It’s also usually unclear. I’d run with the following rules:

- . If any of your points is over 15 words, it’s too long. Cut it down.
- If you’re expecting any of your raid members to read more than 100 words on each boss, UR DOIN IT WRONG. Use less words.
- People will read and remember things with jokes in them better.
- Tie each point to the reason why people will want to remember it. “Don’t stand in the fire” is OK. “Don’t stand in the fire, or you’ll die” is better.
- Try to think about things that could be misinterpreted or are unclear. Classic examples are not telling people how you get the Light or Dark essence in the Twin Valkyrs, or using the word “Right” in more than one context.
- Remember your readers may not have huge vocabularies, may be young, or may have English as a second language. “Do this now” is better than “proceed immediately”. Short words good.

There’s a language analyser out on the Web somewhere which will analyse your writing for overly-long words, but I can’t remember where it is.

@smeedc – sure, you can assume that anyone who doesn’t already know the tactics is a noob. But I find that explaining tactics clearly and concisely, and then checking everyone knows what they’re doing, results in less wipes and lower repair bills. And, you know, I prefer to raid with less wipes and lower repair bills…