Rez Me First!

….Or at least another Priest.

It could be a Soulstone, a Divine Intervention, a vanished Rogue with a pair of cables, or a clever Druid with a well-timed battle rez taken once the coast is clear. The idea is to save the raid the lengthy corpse-run, and to pick up and move on as quickly as possible.

Wipe Prevention - (n.) - \ˈwīp\ \pri-ˈven(t)-shən\ - the concept of having at least one raiding member with the ability to Resurrect other members still alive after all other raiders are dead, and the boss or mobs have reset.

Because the entire purpose of wipe-prevention is time-efficiency, it has always frustrated me when the player charged with reviving the raid seems to have no concept of whom to rez first, second, or last. It gets worse when no one else in the raid seems to know what to do, either. After my guild’s last efforts in Sunwell, I decided to write a quick tutorial:

Always resurrect other rezzers first

This is the most crucial point, but even within this simple concept, it makes the most sense to pick some rezzers over others. Three classes have out of combat resurrection spells. Priests have Resurrection, which costs 60% of our base mana. Shamans have Ancestral Spirit which costs 72% of their base mana, and Paladins have Redemption which costs 64% of their base mana. It makes sense to pick up your Priests first, since they will be able to resurrect the most people without having to stop and drink. Remember that HEALER doesn’t necessarily mean REZZER. Druids can obviously not help here, but non-healing Priests, Shamans, and Paladins should. Don’t let them be lazy.

Personally, 60% of my base mana is 1,500. My Shammie brothers-in-arms’ rezzes cost as much as 3,000. I only have to drink to the point where I have 3,000 of my mana back and my regen will allow me to chain-cast rezzes without stopping until the whole raid is up. It makes more sense to pick me up than to pick up an ele shaman with only 250 mp5 and a 9k mana pool.

Resurrect raiders who need to do extra prep second

This means warlocks who need to summon healthstones and demons, Hunters who have to revive their pets, and buff-classes who will need to fill their mana in order to buff. (Mages, Druids)

Last are classes with little prep

Rogues who may need to apply poisons, non-buffing (usually feral) Druids, and Warriors.

Other speed-recovery pointers

That can sound like a whole bunch of rules, but the underlying principle is very simple: Rez the people who can help get the rest of the raid up as quickly as possible first. Rez the people who need time to get ready second. Rez the people who need the least time last. You can save enough time this way to get in more attempts, avoid re-clearing trash, or keep a night of farm content from drawing out much longer than it should.

Luv,
Wyn

How to Successfully Pick up a GM

pickup-gm

Image courtesy of dbking

Making the first move and first impression counts when you’re looking to join a Guild. Excellent Guildmasters (I prefer General Managers) have a way of cutting through the random crap that applicants throw at them. They’re able to translate what applicants say and interpret them in a more precise way. As my Guild’s first line of defense against “R-Tards”, I’ve seen my share of bad opening introductions from players that were interested. Here’s 10:

  1. You say: “I can maintain 100% attendance.” GM thinks: “Even if he does make 100% of the raids, he’ll probably afk for a good portion of them.”
  2. You say: “I am willing to listen and pay attention all the time.” GM thinks: “Good, because my guild is full of players who do whatever the heck it is that they want at will.”
  3. You say: “I’m not quite sure what level your Guild is at in terms of progression, but… ” GM thinks: “No homework or research done and you’re applying for our Guild blindly? If you can’t research Guilds then we can’t expect you to research boss strategies.”
  4. You say: “I can lead PvP battlegrounds and form a top notch arena team within the Guild.” GM thinks: “We’re a frackin’ progression guild, not a PvP guild! Besides, this Guild can’t handle more than 1 emo BG leader.”
  5. You say: “I’d like to see end game raiding and experience it.” GM thinks: “You willing to die for it?”
  6. You say: “I don’t think my gear is good enough, however…” GM thinks: “Nope, probably not.”
  7. You say: “There’s not much time left before the expansion comes out, so…” GM thinks: “We’re not a sightseeing operation.”
  8. You say: “I’m willing to sit on the bench for a while and stay as a trial if you’re full.” GM thinks: “Great, someone whose not even going to try and compete for a raid spot.”
  9. You say: “You’ve made these mods mandatory for use in the Guild, but I don’t think I need them because…” GM thinks: “You can’t even pass a simple test of just downloading and installing mods. How will I know you will do as I instruct during a raid?”
  10. You say: “The only way for me to get better as a player is to get better gear.” GM thinks: “A million dollars to anyone who invents a device that allows for strangulation across the internet

The best opening lines to make to a GM or their representative is to say something similar to:

Hi, my name is __________, I would like to raid as a __________ spec and I have experience up to this encounter in the game.

For a much better insight into the application and mental thought processes of GMs, I strongly advise you read Chick GM’s post about the very same subject in more detail.

Post inspired by Guy Kawasaki

Why I Always Care About The Meters

You’ll frequently hear raiders knowingly make comments about “the meters.” DPSers who have to crowd-control or dispel have a bit of a case; it’s harder to be #1 if you have more to worry about than standing still, popping pots, and hitting your spells in the right order. Healers occasionally have a point, too: Purge, Dispel, Cure, BoP, PW: Shield, and buffs all take not only mana, but global cooldowns out of our resources to be the “best” healer on the charts.

Here’s the thing though: you will rarely, if ever, find someone complaining about the unfairness of the meters when their name is consistently at the top. Here are a few reasons why I never forget to check the meters:

Supervisory

Whether you think a player is afk’ing trash, throwing out the wrong heals, or making a serious contribution, it will show up on the meters. Add-ons like Recount or WWS allow you to access your players’ habits with an unbelievable level of detail. If you don’t know what’s wrong, you can’t make it better. If you don’t know what’s right, you can’t give meaningful encouragement. Especially when making quantum leaps in content, (10-mans to 25-mans, or jumping tiers) being able to coach your players effectively through the transition is important.

Consistency

This works a couple of ways. On a micro-level, some classes are better suited for certain fights than others. If your Druids typically own highly-mobile fights like Leotheras or Supremus, and a new Druid isn’t keeping up with their peers, it’s a good indication that they need some help. On a macro-level, if, week after week, no matter what the fight, a certain player is always dead-last or near to it, there’s either a gear, hardware, or player issue. The raid leaders need to be able to address underperformance quickly. Why give a raid spot to a 9th healer when you’re effectively only fielding 8? Bring in another DPS, and make the fight shorter instead.

Personal Benchmarks

The first time I consistently broke 1,000 HPS was on Illidan. At first I was proud, but then I realized that I should be pushing my limits that much on EVERY fight. The first screen shot of me breaking 2,000 HPS serves as a constant reminder of my capability, and pushes me to work, heal, and fight harder; every boss, every time. It’s also fun to have some small competition to wake you up when farm content gets boring. Personally, if my favorite resto Shaman gets within 1% of my heals, I start working harder to keep my #1 spot - and he’s not afraid to point it out when he’s gaining on me.

Comparative Benchmarks

I’ve heard the arguments that the meters are skewed: AoE healers always win, healers assigned to players taking the most damage always win, healers that can hold still always win, healers that don’t have to Dispel, Cure, etc. always win. It’s not about winning. It’s about proving to yourself and your raid that you’re doing the best you can. I’ve fought for the top spot with Shamans, Pallys, and Druids. Every guild and healing corps. is different, and the sooner people stop making excuses and start pushing themselves to be their absolute best, the faster the bosses all die.

Accuracy

No meter is perfect. Some of them don’t ascribe things like the last tick of Lifebloom, or the ping of a ProM to the caster. I haven’t seen one yet that records the absorption of PW:S as the life-saver it is. You can tweak some of them so that overhealing or out-of-combat heals show up as effective healing. They all have their quirks, but any data collected over time irons out a lot of the inaccuracies and shows you real trends. I would never chew a player out over one bad night. But if that same player has nothing but bad nights, it’s important to have specific concerns to address with either them, or their class leader.

Timing

Even if the quantity of healing going out is enough, if the timing is off, it doesn’t matter . A tank taking hits for 10k needs an 8k heal. Unless they’re already topped off. Or they’re already dead. Overhealing is sloppy and wasteful, sure, but it’s also unavoidable to an extent. And to be completely honest, if no one’s dying it doesn’t matter much. But if they ARE dying, you need to be able to identify the problem. Grim-meters let you know if poor timing (and inattentive healers) were the culprit, or if the tank needs to put Shieldwall on their bars and learn to move out of fires.

Fairness

Let’s face it. No one wants to be stuck working on the same boss for weeks on end. If the definition of insanity is performing the same action but expecting a different result, it can’t be far from madness to randomly change set-ups without any data behind the decision. If you need to replace a player, you have to know whom to replace. The last thing good leaders want to do is pull a player that’s really doing their best, and keep someone who’s not working hard. And if you’re the one on the cut list, having some data to back up your desire to stay is always a good idea.

No metric is perfect. You can nitpick any measurement of success as biased in any number of ways, and healing meters are no different. The meters are absolutely not the end-all, be-all identifier for the “best” healer - but they are an invaluable tool for improving overall raid performance. My bet is that if you watch them for yourself, and for your raid, and make some key decisions based on the information you learn, you and your guild will progress further, faster, and with better players.

Is it Time to Quit Raiding? 16 Questions to Find the Answer

With the recent disbanding of Death and Taxes, it’s time for another moment of introspection.

When is the best time to retire? Or at least, go on a hiatus from raiding? While it may not be applicable for everyone and their guild. Here’s a few questions you’ll want to ask yourself before hanging up your armor and weapons for good.

  1. What are the goals I have for this game? Have I achieved what I set out to do?
  2. Am I even interested in raiding anymore?
  3. Am I getting personal satisfaction from raiding?
  4. How many raids have I attended in the last 60 days? How many mandatory raids have I missed?
  5. Do I have the time to dedicate myself to raiding so that I don’t hinder the progress that is being made by them?
  6. Am I satisfied with how raiding is being handled?
  7. Are my contributions being noted or appreciated?
  8. Did I give this guild’s raid groups enough time to stabilize and progress?
  9. Where does this Guild expect to be in raiding a month from now? 6 months from now? A year from now?
  10. Do I have conflicts with the leadership that cannot be resolved in a way I’m satisfied with?
  11. Will I still be raiding in 6 months or will real life activities take over? (School, work, etc.)
  12. Is this guild dying?
  13. Am I getting tired from raiding? Is it sapping my energy and cutting into my life responsibilities?
  14. Am I an asset to this Guild’s raid?
  15. Could I be doing anything else other than raiding right now?
  16. How will my departure affect the guild? Will they survive without my presence?

EDIT: I forgot to hit the save button. I wanted to add an extra note that this post was inspired by this post at Problogger. Don’t forget to attribute your posts if you borrowed the idea from someone. Stuff like not crediting the original source would’ve gotten me expelled.

44 Resources for the New Guild Leader

I just wanted to highlight some links for any up and coming Guildmasters who aren’t sure where to start looking for the various services they will need to set up and organize their guild..

Guild Webhosting

Guildomatic - Free, Offers forums, item mouseovers, roster, news management, Ad-Supported (Demo, upgradable)
MMO Guildsites - Forums, character profiles, image gallery, events calendar, guild bank interface, polls, and the ability to show on google map the location of the guildie’s ass you have to kick when they screw up on the Teron Gorefiend fight  (Free trial, $8.99 /month)
Guild Launch - Free, Forums, calendar, guild progression, RapidRaid loot management system, guild bank interface, armory interface, 10 MB file storage, Ad-Supported (demo, upgradable)
Guildcafe - Free, Forums, event coordination, achievement showcase
WoW Guilds - DKP system, bank management, raid progression module, WoW MP3 player, event management, over 70 templates to choose from, guild stats, armory interface (Demo - $9.88 /month)
Guild Universe - Forums, calendar, event management, guild application, roster, news management, polls (Demo, upgradable)
Guild Portal - Forums, polls, mail, content management system, bank management, roster management,  (Demo, equals to $5.00 /month)

Webhosting

Dreamhost - Sponsored Link: Dreamhost powers World of Matticus (500 GB Disk storage, 5 TB monthly bandwidth, $5.95 /month depending on prepayment).

Forums

Make Forum - Free, runs phpBB3
Forumer - Free, choice of Invision or phpBB2
Free Forums - Free, runs phpBB2
Invision Plus - Free, runs Invision

Raid Calendars

Raid Calendar - Free, ad-supported

DKP

Free DKP Host - Offers RaidPlanner, Itemstats, CT_Raidtracker (1 time payment of 5€ required)
DKP Hosting - CT_Raidtracker, Itemstats, Raid Planner, Raid progression ($14.99 setup + $5.99 /month). I’ve used these guys before for several months. I had no problems with their service and they served me well.
DKP 4 Guilds - Inhouse DKP management, raid attendance logs, raid bank, item mouseovers,

Ventrilo Voice Servers

Nationvoice - Sponsored Link: My personal vent provider of choice. I’ve been with them for over 5 years since my early days in Counter-strike (50 users for $14.99).

Typefrag - An alternative to Nationvoice. A number of Guilds I know use them (50 users for $9.99 and they have a special where if you order for a year, you get 50% off).

Articles

Healer LFG: 10 Ways to Speed Up Your Raid - Carnage tested, Matticus approved. Shave off as much as 30% off your raid time (of course, 65% of percentages are always made up).
Teeth and Claws: Building a Casual Raiding Guild - Building a Raiding Guild.
4 Haelz: Speech 101 - How to properly communicate with the players around you
Teeth and Claws: 4 Types of Raiding Addons - In order to maximize raid performance, I suggest consulting the list and downloading the appropriate tools you feel you might need.
Dwarf Priest: 3 Links in Guild Relations - I found the first 3 links insightful. The rest were just downright funny.

General

Warcraft Realms - Online WoW census. Tracks a player’s guild history.
WoW Jutsu - Ranks guilds based on their progression. Filterable by battlegroup, server, and faction.
Be Imba - Online tool for figure out what gear to get next on your character
WoW Lemmings - WoW forums aggregator. Sorts the latest posts on the Guild Recruiting forums on the official WoW site by faction and class.
WoW Web Stats - Think of it as a really indepth damage meter. Takes your combat log and outputs it into something meaningful.
WoW Wiki - The encyclopedia of WoW. Useful for learning about raid instances and the trash therein as well as boss strategy.
Boss Killers - Various strategies for killing bosses.

6 Ways to Stay Inspired in Your Guild by Dr Randy Pausch

I watched the most touching presentation the other day on Presentation Zen. It was delivered by Dr. Randy Pausch. You see, the professor was diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer. His doctors informed him that he would only have a few months left before his condition would deteriorate. At Carnegie Mellon University, he gave a presentation that generated an impact worldwide on how he has approached his life.

Here’s the ABC promo on the special of the "Last Lecture".

 

The professor offers a lot of insight into how a person should live their life. But that doesn’t mean that his lessons can’t be translated into World of Warcraft. The actual presentation can be found at the bottom of the post.

Inspiration

We cannot change the cards we are dealt; only how we play the hand

Item drops in the game are completely random. There is nothing you or I or anyone can do to influence what item drops. If your weapon drops and you want it really badly but it ends up going to someone else, are you going to be thrilled for them or brood in a corner? I know that when Archimonde dropped his staff, the first thing that came to my mind was sweet! Why? Because I’d have less competition for it! When it dropped again, I was ecstatic. But then my feral tank just HAD to go and set the bar for 30 DKP effectively forcing me to spend almost double to ensure that I received it.

When you’re screwing up and nobody says anything to you anymore, that means they gave up

Whether or not you have just started your raiding career or consider yourself a veteran, criticism will come in many shapes and in many forms. I’m notorious for occasionally lapsing in attention during raids every so often (because there is generally a game going on) and I’ve heard about it several times. I can also deliver words of my own. But I don’t do it for the sake of putting them down. I do it because I want them to get better. Like Dr Pausch says, your critics are the ones who still love you and care.

Brick walls are there for a reason. The brick walls aren’t there to stop you. The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something. The brick walls are there to stop the people who don’t want it badly enough

Do you remember when WoW had attunements? They were usually there for a reason. Blizzard has slowly but surely lowered the barriers. Experienced raiders know that a free ride is not expected. Loot is earned not given. You can’t show up to a raid and go AFK. Raiders have to actively contribute. The same thing applies with DKP. If you really want an item badly enough, then start spending those points. All too often, I’ve seen items drop and have seen people complain when they were unable to get it. A quick look verified that they had more than enough DKP to bid.

Wait long enough and people will surprise and impress you

This goes for any new players that I pick up for the guild. I have no say over who goes to the raid, but I do a majority of the filtering and the handling of potential recruits. I ran a pickup Kara group with a few of my friends many months ago and looked for a healer. A certain Resto Druid whispered me and asked to come. After the successful run, we parted ways but kept in contact. Fast forward a few months later, and he is now an active healing contributor in our raids. You never know when you’re going to find good people. Sometimes it will take days, other times it will take weeks.

Guys that was pretty good, but you can do better

These are words every raid leader should say after they kill a boss. There will always be room for improvement. Never set a bar because in doing so, your raid will only do that much and nothing more. That’s when they get complacent. It’s better off if the raid has no idea where the bar is so they can still keep pushing themselves to become better.

Don’t bail; the best gold is at the bottom of the crap

Truer words have never been spoken. This applies to anything from new players, new guilds, or new instances. There’s a lot of coal to filter through if you hope to find diamonds.

The Last Lecture

If you have time, I highly recommend watching the clip. It’s about 60 minutes long but I found it to be an inspiration for me.

 

20 Characteristics of a Mature Guild Member

Our beloved WoW is full of many different types of players. The people behind them are people of all ages and all maturity levels. I’ve met my share of intelligent 16 year olds who have shown signs of wisdom and humility. I’ve also met 23 year olds who wonder why they’re shunned by other players. In my past guild, we would always debate amongst the officers if we should impose age restrictions. Eventually we did but it was solely because of the content and nature of our guild discussions at times and not because of maturity levels.

What exactly is a mature guildmate then? There are 20 characteristics that I can think of:

  1. Exhibiting patience and calm after wipes.
  2. Knowing that bosses do not go down right away after 1 attempt.
  3. Looks at the bright side of a wipe and learning from the mistakes that were made instead of trying to assign blame.
  4. Able to control their own temper.
  5. Is empathetic and is able to keep the feelings of other players under consideration before taking any actions.
  6. Is aware that being prepared for raids on time and always showing up is better then being skilled and talented.
  7. Willing to listen to negative feedback in order to become a better player.
  8. Has a high sense of self esteem and confidence.
  9. Knows that WoW can be a communication barrier as in game text does not fully communicate the emotion or feelings of the other person and does not hesitate to ask for clarification.
  10. Willing to ask questions until understanding is achieved.
  11. Willing to answer questions until understanding is achieved.
  12. Knows the difference between needing an epic and wanting an epic.
  13. Aware that World of Warcraft is like computer technology and that whatever you have now will be outdated later.
  14. Accepts responsibility for their own actions and mistakes.
  15. Knows the difference between confidence and arrogance.
  16. Realizes that there are real people behind the characters and treats them as such.
  17. Understands that gear is earned and not freely given.
  18. Behaves gracefully under pressure.
  19. Gives 110% effort in everything they do.
  20. Has an open mind and is willing to try anything.

Most importantly, mature guildmates will not object when they are asked to do something. They are aware of their own capabilities and limitations and they are downright dependable.

Leaving the Guild the Right Way

Leaving the Guild

So relations have soured and you feel like you want to leave and start fresh. Several days ago, two of my most respected and trusted colleagues left with almost no word or reason why. It was a surprise to many people. One of them had done it before and to be quite honest and open, I had a feeling that person would leave again. The second was a real true surprise because I honestly had no idea.

Before you GQuit, I’m asking you do one really important thing.

Talk to your GM

As much as your feelings may be overtly obvious to you, it isn’t to anyone else. Not every GM is psychic. You cannot expect things to happen if there is no idea nor awareness. It’s unfair to expect your leadership to understand you inside and out. Pick a time and a date and talk to your GM about it.

Let your leadership know of your problem

Let me make clear that I have no problem with anyone leaving the Guild. You’re paying your 15 bucks a month to play this game. It’s your right. The fact is, you and your Guild got this far together. If you have a problem with someone or an issue with a system, let your leaders know. Speak up about it. If you don’t say or mention anything, then nothing will get changed.

It’s like people who complain about the Government and don’t vote. By not voting, you’ve forfeited your right to complain.

A month ago, another colleague of mine left. But he did it the right way. He expressed his misgivings and it was clear that the Guild progression rate was not enough to satisfy him. That’s okay. That can’t really be solved unless by some miracle. There are always going to be people like that in this game where everything isn’t going to be enough. At least he was mature enough to be kind and forward about it.

Don’t lie or deny

If it’s plainly obvious that you’re dissatisfied because you’ve been silently mentioning your problems to other people, then don’t deny it when your GM gets wind of it and asks you up front if everything is okay.

If you have an issue with the way loot is handled, then for cryin’ out loud speak up. I’ve BEEN an officer before. I’m a grunt right now. I like being a grunt because I don’t have to be the poor guy stuck dealing with brushfires week. I can tell you nothing is more frustrating then not knowing what the issue is.

“Avoiding Drama”

I’ve had issues and problems with people and systems before. In the past, I would have quit overnight too to “avoid drama”. Upon further reflection, I realized I was just sugarcoating the answer. I didn’t want to avoid drama. I wanted to avoid confrontation. I didn’t have the guts or the courage to speak up. That’s why I used the drama avoiding excuse to ease my conscience. I’m doing it for the “good of the Guild” right? Can’t they respect the fact that my leaving overnight will save the Guild trouble in the long run? No, they can’t because you left them hanging. You quit without saying why.

Ever since I was an officer in my past Guilds, I realized what a pain in the ass excuse that was. My heart goes out to every GM and officer on the planet who knows what I’m talking about. It’s a tough job to have such unrealistic expectations placed upon your shoulders and that makes this game less fun.

Do it the right way

So you finished speaking to your GM about it and have explored every possible solution. There’s nothing more anyone else can do. Be classy about it at least. You can leave your Guild the same way you entered it: with your pride and dignity intact.

Common and recommended excuses

How you do it is entirely up to you. When I left Angelic Advocates, I posted a long and lengthy explanation on the forums explaining my problem. I left that Guild because I could no longer commit to their raiding times. When I left Aurora, it was right after a raid on a monday before the reset. I went from vent channel to vent channel explaining that I was leaving. I was no longer satisfied with the direction the Guild was going in and I received a contract offer to sign with Carnage (an organization I am still a part of to this day).

In regards to the 2 that left, I’m not angry at them. It’s worse. I’m disappointed at them.

Raiding Horror Stories and the Opportunity it Brings

Cracking a 25 man raid roster is not the easiest thing to do in the world, especially when it’s been set in stone for a while. Every now and then, a slot or two will open up which could allow any other player in the guild to fill it. They just have to be given the opportunity to step into it. Benching a raider is a strong message to deliver and it should only be used sparingly if that player’s performance is not up to par. On the other hand, it allows another person the chance to replace them. But when do you determine who gets to sit and who gets to go? Surely the following will help you shape your opinion.

Stories

Every Guild has their AFK stories. Every Guild has their horror wipe stories. These are all true stories, I guarantee you. They’ve been collected from friends and colleagues of mine as well as my personal experience.

We clearing to Kael and as we enter the room, one of our mages appeared to be quite fidgety. So he starts strafing left and right because the raid leaders is going over trash or something. Before you know it, the mage goes from the raid group to the middle of a kael trash group and promptly dies. Turns out his blink key was bound to his “f” key. I can say with absolute confidence that he no longer has blink bound to a key.

We’re doing Al’ar and it’s phase 1. It’s right after a flame quill and one of our tanks goes rushing up the platform to pick up Al’ar. He grabs him and oversteps the platform and falls off the edge. Goodbye Charlie.

FPS problems are a plague for some players because it drastically affects their ability to perform. During the Pre TBC era, there was a boss called Baron. He’s essentially like Solarian. Every now and then, a person gets a debuff and he explodes taking out people around him within a certain radius. There was this player who raided with about 3 FPS. Now at the time, it’s a 1 in 40 chance of who gets the debuff. Sure enough, he gets chosen. His bomb warning is processed too slow which leads to a slow reaction time which leads to him literally taking out half the raid. Does anyone believe in lightning striking twice? Yup, minutes later he gets debuffed again and blows up another half of the raid. The policy now was that this 1 player gets his OWN position without anyone around him. You can’t make this stuff. You just can’t.

There’s this Gruul’s run. The Guild’s in the ready position. Out of no where, this Paladin darts straight ahead right into Gruul. Over vent you hear cries of “WTF” and “OMG”! And then there was silence. The Paladin sheepishly says “Sorry guys, that was my kid on my lap and he was just smashing the keyboard!”

Players who alt tab back in the game when they hear “Shatter” over vent during Gruul.

There was this Gruul’s run. While the main tank was on High King, one of the Paladins DI’d the main tank! Naturally you can kind of guess what happened.

Opportunity

For the GM’s

There’s going to be players in Guild’s that display similar behavior or rationality like the ones I mentioned above. This is a GREAT time for you to try out that new guy in your Guild. You know, the one that joined a few days ago. He’s shown up on time and ready to go. He expects to get shot down but he waits outside the instance logged off in the event hes needed.

Give them that opportunity.

For the new guy

This is your chance to show of your ability and skills. Don’t squander it. If you’re ever unsure of anything, ask. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Work hard and you’ll get your shot soon enough. Turn over in Guilds can be low but they are by no means non-existent. There’s always a player that has to leave at some point and there are always going to be players to take their spot.

Here’s a brilliant example right here. Ryan Shannon is hockey player with the Canucks. He hasn’t fully transitioned to the big club. He’s usually on the farm team (minor leagues). Whenever there’s an injury on the Canucks or if there’s a hole in the lineup for some reason, players are called up from the farm team to help fill their positions. Sometimes, you just never know what they’re going to do. You just have to pray that they’re going to do their job and do it well.

In this case, Shannon not only does the job well, he looks good doing it. Remember, minor leaguer called up to play in the big leagues.

By the way, I know I can’t be the only raider with some stories to share. I’d love to hear your funniest wipes (or most stupidest). So how about it GMW, Karthis, Phaelia, or Galadria?

Structuring Your Casual Raiding Guild

King and his Pawns

A couple of days ago, I had the opportunity to read Karthis’ post on Building a Raiding Guild. In it, he posed several excellent points:

The other day, an ingame friend of mine asked me to help him create the blueprint of a raiding guild from top to bottom identifying positions and the like. I figured my current Guild model would be a good one to use along with an explanation of each role both within the Guild and within the Raid.

Gnometastic posted a request for input about diving into the T5 instances which I will also address at the bottom of today’s (long ass) piece.

The first thing I will stress to any casual raiding guild is the following: Drop the casualness. The moment you decide to step foot in you T5 instances, you are an official raiding Guild.

What IS casual

From my various experiences and chats with other guilds, casual to THEM means:

And they wonder why they have such a hard time in SSC and TK.

This is what casual means to me

1 definition describes a guild that is struggling night after night in T5 instances and wonders what they have problems. The other is having a blast exploring Mount Hyjal and Black Temple.

Guild Positions

Here’s the framework of our Guild:

Guild Leader

We only have 1. There are no ifs, ands, or buts. The ultimate decision rests on him. Any hard calls are his to make. We are not tied down or restricted in any kind of way. Your Guild Leader should be rational, intelligent, and must actually have a pair.

I’ve seen a lot of paper tiger Guild Leaders who were not willing to stand up for themselves and their Guild. Everytime someone made a request, they would immediately bend over backwards to accommodate them. The way I see it, if you’re not willing enough to say no to someone in your Guild, you are not fit to lead. I wrote more about Leadership earlier in the school year. Any aspiring GMs, I encourage you to read it.

Your Guild Leader obviously cannot run the show alone. But he must be willing to listen to opinion of his officers and guildies. The guild in turn must respect the decision he comes to. If they don’t like it, they’re free to hit free agency.

Don’t run a CO-GM kind of deal. In my experience, I’ve found that it rarely works well. When 1 GM puts their foot down, the other may not be as firm. In fact, the 2nd GM might even reverse the first GM’s decision. You cannot that kind of instability in a Guild.

Officers

If you read Kestrel’s interview the other day, then you can see his best advice to any GM is one simple fact:

These are players that people can turn to for help. There isn’t really much for them to do. They could assist in various day to day guild affairs. Honestly, whoever you put in these positions depends primarily on what your Guild Leader lacks.

If he lacks time and organizational skills, he can delegate an officer to help him set raid schedules.

If he’s lacking people skills, delegate a recruiting officer or 2 to help find some raiders and personnel.

What they do isn’t important.

The bottom line is that these are individuals that your Guild leader can trust and depend on. There is no perfect set of criteria that can define who is eligible to be an officer and who isn’t.

Raid Structure

Here’s the real meat and potatoes. I think our raid structure is a pretty damn efficient model.

Raid Leaders

Note the plural. We have 2 raid leaders who feed off of each other because it’s impossible for 1 person to track everything going off simultaneously. It’s nice to have another leader around to call out something the other might miss.

In addition, it helps reduces burnout on 1 person. We have 1 person research and call the play for 1 boss. We have the other raid leader research and call the play for another boss. For example, our GM doubles as a raid leader (let’s call him Bob). He calls the play for Lurker, Fathom Lord, Tidewalker, and Al’ar. The other raid leader (let’s call him Fred) calls the plays for Vashj, Kael, and Leotheras.

During trash pulls, they light up the marks on the various mobs. They call for what it is that they want to happen. They might want a sheep on square, a misdirect on skull, or a trap on circle. They don’t care who does it as long as it’s done.

They have delegated duties down the chain of command.

Mage Leader

The job here for the mage leader is to set up and organize sheeps, plain and simple. If Bob calls for a sheep, the mage leader picks a mage within the raid and tells them to sheep that target. There’s going to be pulls where there could be 6+ mobs involved and keeping track of sheeps can be difficult. It’s the job for the mage to know who sheeps what when. It’s also the job for this mage to be able to “oh shit sheep” a mob incase 1 of the other mages fall.

Set up a mage channel.

Hunter Leader

Typically, our raiding arsenal includes 2 Hunters. They’re usually good about working out misdirects and traps amongst themselves. If you have more then that, it might be valuable to set up a go-to hunter to work out which mob or boss gets misdirected to who by which hunter so that there are no overlaps. Our Hunters usually interact with the mage leader in case they run out of mages to CC with.

Hunters: The Plan B.

Heal Leader

We like to dub ours “Gold Leader”. We even have our own healing channel. His purpose is pretty obvious and straight forward. He assigns the rest of the healers their targets. He’s intelligent enough to reassign or switch people around if it’s necessary.

For the love of god, if you’re a healer, ACKNOWLEDGE YOUR ASSIGNMENT. Echo back to him who you’re healing so that he knows there is no confusion!

Other Things to Know

I’m going to make a comment directed to Gnometastic in particular to all of his main points that he wanted to know more about.

Main Tanks

Carnage runs 1 Main Tank and 1 Off tank. The MT is a Warrior and the OT is a Druid. We also run 2 DPS Warriors who can slap a shield on and help with any extra parts of an encounter. We also have a Holy Paladin who’s willing to go Prot and vice versa as we need depending on the encounter.

Speccing into Raiding

As quoted by gnometastic:

I believe in freedom of choice and as long as you can play it you should be able to (within reason) spec it.

Normally, I’m inclined to agree. But this must be balanced by asking the following question:

The 2 DPS warriors I mentioned above? They are willing to respec prot if the encounter requires it or there is simply too much healing required. Both of them respecced prot to allow healers an easier time during Kael.

On the flip side, if I were asked to do something like respec to Shadow, I would not. I’ve never played or levelled as Shadow. I wouldn’t know what to do. I would gimp the raid even further. I have no objections to sitting out a night in favor of another Shadow Priest.

If I were to become benched for the remainder of my time, then nothing stops me from parting company on good terms. I’m sure there are Guilds out there looking for a veteran healer.

Looting System

Hmm, it’s a toughie. It depends primarily on the Guild. Guilds have to start being strategic with their loot at some point. No matter what system is used, always ensure that Officer discretion can come into play at some point.

Carnage had the past policy of awarding MT priority on loot. That is, if it’s a substantial and noticeable upgrade for the tank, he gets first option no matter what his DKP is. If you think the MT might abuse that privilege, then I say to you to go find yourself a new MT.

There was a situation the past where a Defender token dropped. It would have been a marginal upgrade at best for the MT, but the 2 piece set bonus would have been a huge boon for the Priest. It was lobbied quite hard by our healer lead to have the MT policy revised to keep things like this in mind.

PvP vs PvE Gear

I made a quick note about this a while ago as a response to a reader. Before I believe that PvP Gear could not subsitute for raiding. Now I believe that there are different factors to take into account when deciding this.

Although I still would not suggest raiding with full on Season 3 gear, I am open to the idea of substituting a a piece of gear or 2 depending on how the fights are. The Vindicator’s bracer would hands down blow away any kind of bracer that Attumen drops.

In any case, the gear choice isn’t that different for DPS classes I don’t think. But as a healer, I would value PvE gear way more then PvP gear.

By the way, be hit capped before worrying too much about spell damage and crit. That’s what my colleagues tell me and if you think about it, it does make sense. After all, what is the point of having insane spell damage if your spells get resists half the time?

Attendance and Raid Breakdown

From my experience with certain DKP systems, I’ve discovered that you can also apply a certain decay rate over DKP via a simple formula. For example, DKP earned x percentage of raids showed up to over the past 60 days.

Raider A has 100 DKP but his attendance has slackened to 30% attendance to real life factors. His effective DKP is now 30.
Raider B is new to the Guild and has 30 DKP so far but has been to 100% of the raids. He doesn’t have a penalty applied since he has showed up to all of them.

Here’s the standard Carnage configuration that we bring:

4 Tanks

14 DPS

7 Healers

For Voidreaver, Gnome, bring a Resto Shaman or 3. It makes the other healer classes kind of moot. I always wonder what I’m doing there when we do Voidreaver.

In terms of attendance, we do it inversely. If you can’t show up you make a note on the forums in advance. That gives the Raid leaders time to go scramble a replacement instead of having to do it last minute. We build the raid out of whoever is there with the core members. They are the ones that usually show up 9.9 times out of 10. I think I’ve only ever missed 2 official raids ever since I signed with Carnage back in May. The guys that should be raiding are the ones that want to raid and are willing to make the dedication for it.

We also don’t switch our MT/OT combinations. The MT is made the same no matter what. However, there are certain encounters where a Bear tank is better suited then a Warrior tank (Leo).

Class Balance

It honestly depends on the boss and the instance. We like to bring in 7 AoE. It makes killing things that much faster.

In the end, it does come down to how serious and committed you are. I think 20 hours a week is a bit much. Attrition will take it’s toll sooner or later. I know some successful raiding Guilds going at 6 hours a week. We clock in about 12 hours of 25 mans plus an additional 6 hours of optional 10 mans if we want.

This piece is probably one of the longer ones I’ve written. I probably should have broken it up and divided it. At the least, I would have had material for 3 days worth of posts. But you’re always welcome to bookmark and come back to it at a later time. I’m hoping the experiences I’ve had can benefit you in some way.

I’m kind of curious as to the experiences of other raiding readers. How is your guild set up in terms of class balance and leadership? Is there only 1 individual leading the entire raid including direction sheeps, heals, and so forth (Bless him)? Have you had any success with other styles of leadership?

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