Chick GM

Navigating the Initiation Period

2008-06-16T10:59:00.001-04:00

Congratulations! You got accepted to that guild you wanted to join!! How do you make sure your initiation period is successful? Below are some tips to try and pitfalls to avoid to make sure you move from "Who the heck is that?" to "Gee what did we ever do without you?"

Avoid making it the "Me Show" - I know you're worried about making an impression, but sit back and observe for a little while. First watch the others in the guild and the guild chat and make sure this is a place you want to be. By getting a feel for what the guild chat and members are normally like, you can learn what's generally accepted banter and who's more sensitive. You can use this information to make a good impression, rather than just an impression. Once you've watched long enough, start slow. Add an insightful or funny point to an existing conversation and add to what they are saying rather than changing the topic. After a little while it'll be easy for you to slid into a conversation or even start one of your own.

Even though I've cautioned you about not making it the "Me Show" do be yourself. If you try and pretend to be someone you're not or curb your bad habit of letting puns loose it will slowly wear you out or slip out on it's own. Let the guild see your quirky personality traits as you slowly introduce yourself, it's what makes you different from everyone else.

Know your Leaders - Quickly learn who the leaders are, what they do and how they do it. Every leader has a different personality and a different way of interacting. While the best leaders are willing to take feedback, the way you approach them will determine how willing they are to listen to you. In the end, if you and an officer disagree, take a guess who's going to win? To illustrate how not knowing who your leaders are and how they interact can hurt you, let me tell you the story of an initiate who didn't make it in The Guild.

Once upon a time Auz tagged a shaman. Now Auz is a generous leader and so one day when our guild's enhancement shaman had to take a night off, Auz lent her new shaman to the melee team. Once in the melee group, our melee lead said, "New shaman please drop Windfury for the melee team." The shaman said, "I think Grace of Air is the better totem to drop for this group, so that's what I'm going to drop." The melee lead responded with, "I'd prefer that you drop Windfury and since I'm melee I believe I have a better understanding of which totem will benefit us." To which the shaman retorted, "Too bad they are my totems and I'll drop what I want!" At this point our melee lead ended the conversation and came to me. "Auz your new shaman is not only an idiot but he's also refusing to do what I asked." After getting the whole story from my melee lead my new shaman receives the following tell from me, "The player you are speaking with is our melee lead. If you wish to be successful in our guild, you will respect all the leaders of this guild and drop the totems you are requested to drop as well as the attitude." The shaman did drop those totems, but never did drop the atti0tude. Needless to say, his initiation period with us did not end in membership.

Do your homework - I spend a lot of time making sure the information my recruits need is available to them on our website. I typed it out there so I only had to type it once. Nothing irritates me more than when an initiate fails to respect that time and the time of the 24 other people in the raids by failing to read the information I have provided. Even if your leadership hasn't explained the fights, Boss Killers, MMO Champion and several other sites have.* Take your time and read all the information that is available to you. After you've read that information if you still have questions ask them before the raid. When you are coming into a new situation make it your responsibility to know what you're doing before you get there. Bonus points if you can get that accomplished without taking a guild leader's time.

*Note there are many different ways to kill the same boss, when you read over a third party site, don't get married to the strategy they suggest. Do make sure you learn the boss abilities and go over the tips that are specific to your role.

Mind the feedback - I've said it before but I believe it so strongly that I want to say it again:

Receiving honest communication from a [person] is a gift, even if you don't like what the [person] has to say. When a [person] comes to you with something on their mind, they are creating an opportunity for you. If you make them feel like they aren't being heard, or worse derive them for their opinions, you ensure they won't give you another.

If you get feedback from a leader, listen to it; make an effort to incorporate what they've said to you into your playstyle. If you don't agree with the feedback you've received, the time to ask questions or disagree is outside of raid times. Remember, most leaders are promoted to that position because they have experience and a deep knowledge base. It can never hurt to at least try what they've suggested. Who knows, maybe they know something that you don't. Remember it's okay to disagree, but in the end the person with the final say is your leadership. If you find that you disagree too much you may want to look for a new home or you may be asked to look for a new home. Honestly, I'd like to think I'm an approachable and reasonable person, but if giving you feedback becomes a chore for me, I'm more likely to look for someone else who's more receptive to feedback, even if their initial skill set is weaker.

Make a friend - Auz, this is too far, I wanna know how to do well in a raiding environment, not how to make friends. Random internet reader, I promise you this is good for both. While you're watching your guild (like I suggested at the beginning of this post) I want you to find two people. First find the person in your class role who everyone respects but isn't an officer. Next find the person who everyone likes and enjoys talking to. Then go to both of them and ask questions. You've read the strat for the next boss and you're not sure you understand it. Ask the person in your class, often they can coach you and are flattered that you've asked them. This takes the strain off your leaders who may be doing other things and makes you look good for knowing it without having to go to them. Just choose wisely, picking a bad person to use as a resource may end up making you look worse than if you hadn't asked anyone at all. Okay Auz, I see the wisdom in that, but what about this popular person? I'm glad you asked, while you are getting used to your new guild you're going to have to learn to interact with new people. If you need to give feedback to a leader or even another member, the popular person probably knows how best to approach that person. They wouldn't be popular if they didn't know how to talk to the other members of the guild. (Though if it's a chick and you're not a chick, you might not be able to use all their tricks) Ask for this person's help when you need tips on how to approach your new teammates.

Now it's your turn, tell me your horror stories either from the perspective of evaluating an initiate or from the perspective of being an initiate

Who interviewed whom? Auz Visits World of Matticus!

2008-06-13T13:22:00.011-04:00

I was interviewed on World of Matticus today but when we got to the rapid fire section of the interview I turned the tables on Matt and Wyn. Anyone who's been reading too long knows I can't give single word answers. Below are Matt and Wyn's single fire responses.

Ladies First: Here's Wyn.
For those who don't know Matt has a new woman in his life (well at least his internet life) Wyn has joined the writing team, and she's very much the ying to his yang. Despite all stereotypes about women and Asians, she schools him in math.

Auz: I need rapid fire question for you before I publish my link

Auz: Shaken or Stirred?

Wyn: shaken

Wyn: wait

Auz: Dwarf or Nelf?

Wyn: chocolate milk or a martini?

Auz: you don't get to ask back!

Wyn: it's important! i like my chocolate milk shaken, and my martinis stirred!

Wyn: this is crucial!
Auz: fine milk

Wyn: okay, shaken

Auz: Dwarf of Nelf!
Wyn: Dwarf. Nelfs are only marginally cooler than Belfs

Wyn: and they're too emo

Wyn: dwarfs are drunk, which is better

Wyn: this is fun

Auz: Screaming child in the background or leet speak in vent?
Wyn: zomg, 1337 haxx ftw

Wyn: *h4xx

Wyn: h4><>

Wyn: hmm

Auz: Combat pets; cool or omg what a waste of space?
Wyn: both of my priests have worg puppies. i don't have the space or desire to collect, but i like having one special one

Auz: If you were forced to chose between going IDS or going Shadow what would you pick?

Wyn: lolsmite?

Wyn: (ids)

Wyn: i've had to before

Auz: Now that you've been both, Dirty Whorde or Bunny Kissing Alliance?

Wyn: FOR THE HORDE!

Wyn: interesting trivia: if you read the lore, the horde are the "good guys," if anyone is

Auz: Don't mess with my world view lady!

Wyn: hey now

Wyn: HEY NOW

Auz: /wink

Wyn: /hug

Auz: Best pick up line

Wyn: "I want you more than I want my 2nd Warglaive" so freaking pro.

And now here's Matt. Matt and I were more organized, I think Wyn and I had more fun.

Who's intro is more irritating, Kael or Illy?
Kaels.

"I kissed a girl and I liked it" or "Don't Stop Believing"?
Neither. "Livin' on a Prayer"

Wisdom or Kings?
In a high performance situation, Matticus recommends you use protection. Blessing of protection.

DoTA or Counterstrike?
Counterstrike. Great source of stress relief.

Best Vent Quote Ever:
"Hey Matt, I need a heal!"
"Why don't you get some ****ing raid frames then you'd know that I'm dead ***hole!"

Leading a Pug Kael or Leading a Pug Archy?
Kael. It's more methodical and less random.

How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?
No idea, but I can stop all of them.

Favorite male Blogger:
Other than me =)?
Toss up between Big Boss Bear and Kestrel. But Bear wins by a whisker.

Worst fight to DC in:
Archimonde

Favorite class to Arena with:
My Elemental Shaman

So there ya go, more than ya ever wanted to know about Matt and Wyn. Plus if you click the link, more than ya wanted to know about me.

An Open Letter to my ISP

2008-06-12T08:04:00.004-04:00

After WAY too many disconnects holding us up on a recent raid night, I've written the following letter to send to my ISPs customer service center. It amused me enough I've decided to share it with you guys too.

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Dear Internet Service Provider,
We've been together for 6 years now but recently your instability is endangering our relationship. I've always relied on you to protect my data as you take me all around the world (wide web). We've shared interests, games and even some more private moments. We've connected with friends and family. You've taken me to places I've never seen before and shown me things beyond my imagination.

Recently, you've been dropping out on me when I need you most. You've embarrassed me in front of my friends, and you've made me appear like someone they can't count on. You laugh it off and say; "It's only for a moment." "What about all those other times I've been there for you?" "It's not a big deal." But it is a big deal. People DIE when I disconnect. I lose documents I'm in the middle of -

.....

- writing. Worst of all, every time it happens, I lose a little faith in you.

I know you're going to tell me you can change. After everything we've been through together, I really hope we can make this work. But I think it's fair to tell you there is a new guy in town. His name is FiOS and I've heard that he's a real lady-pleaser. I'm sorry. I do care about you. However, if this instability continues, I might have to see if there's an opportunity to make a connection with him.

Sincerely,

Auzara

Chick GM

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PS. Chick GM has now been viewed in 49 of the 50 states plus DC! Quick someone fetch me a reader from Wyoming!

Anatomy of an interview

2008-06-10T16:05:00.003-04:00

NOTE: This post is more geared to progression or raiding focused guilds.

So you've successfully navigated a guild's application, and scored an interview with a guild. What exactly is the person doing the interviewing looking for? Interviews are as varied as applications, but again, it's my corner of the intarwebz so it's my opinion you get here.

My goal in an interview is to get a more in depth view of what the player is looking for in a guild, their understanding of their class, their attitude towards raiding, and how their personality might mesh with our members. First, let me clarify by saying my interviews are not a set process, depending on the applicant's answers, and how the conversation goes the questions change. What I'm outlining here are just a few of my frequently asked questions, why I ask them and what I'm looking for in the applicants answer. It's also fair to inform you that I do not currently conduct primary interviews for my guild, so my questions may be a bit out of date.

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How has playing a changes in raids and 5 mans from level 60 to level 70?
This question is one I've retired, but I used it when TBC was less than 3 months old. I wanted to learn how the player had integrated the new tools available to their class. I found that some of the most skilled players adapted these new tools right away. Some of the more mediocre players were slow to make changes their familiar patterns.

What's your weakest piece of gear and what's your plan to upgrade it?
I believe good raiding requires self awareness and, like it or not, your gear is part of what your character can do. You can be an AWESOME priest, but if you have 900 +healing you simply CANNOT put out enough healing to keep an Illidan tank alive. I like to hear the player be able to answer right away. Bonus points for already working on it, and for the upgrade being available outside of raids.

If you had to play another class in raids, what class would it be?
This is just a discussion question. I'm listening here for what aspects of the game the applicant enjoys.

Pretend I've never seen the Illidari Counsel (or another complicated fight they have listed in their experience) before, explain the encounter to me.
Every person focuses on different parts of the fight. I'm listening here for a complete understanding of what their class does. Bonus points if they can explain with confidence all parts of the encounter and each boss ability.

What do you want out of your raiding experience and guild?
I realize that applicants ARE probably going to bullshit this answer, but even in the bullshit you can learn something about how they think. Also, if later on I'm getting feedback from them that they aren't happy with the amount of loot they are getting etc, it's nice to remind them what they told me in their interview.

What do you anticipate your raid attendance will be? Do you have any real life obligations that conflict with our raid schedule.
Again, what an applicant tells me and what they actually do can be expected to differ. This is an opportunity for me to express to them that it's OKAY to have a real life. Also, I am going to hold you to what you tell me. I might be looking for a druid who an make Sunday nights religiously, because one of my druids can't ever make Sundays. If you tell me you can make Sundays, I tag you and you miss 3 Sundays in a row, we are going to have problems mister.

When was the last time you died in a raid in an avoidable manner, and what killed you?
This often takes people by surprise and I tend to get an honest answer. It's good to know that a player is aware of what kills them. Bonus points if they tell me what they've changed so it won't happen again. Negative points if they tell me they've never died in an avoidable way.

Are you willing to respec if asked?
The initial response to this question is to BS me and tell me they'll be whatever the guild needs the most. I always counter this and tell them. I am the GM, my primary focus is this guild's success but I am NOT willing to go shadow. I know I'd be terrible at it and frankly don't enjoy dpsing. I clarify that the point of this question is to find out what experience have you had with other specs/roles of your class and if you personally enjoy them.

How you you like to receive feedback about your gameplay?
This is for me. Every single raider in my guild has recieved feedback from me. From "good job" to "dude quit that shit." Each one of them prefers to get it in a different way. One of my shaman likes for me to call it out in vent. One of my priests gets very defensive if I call stuff out in front of others. One of my pallys likes to hear stuff right then in the raid. Another shaman would rather I give them a short instruction in the raid but always after the raid would like me to explain my feedback in detail. I will have to give you feedback and your preferred way has to be something I can actually do. Note: I rarely ask this question unless the interview has gone well.

Have you read our guild policies?
If they say yes - If I allowed you to change one of our policies what would you change and why?
My guild does not run exactly how I want it too. There are 40 raiders in my guild and 150 accounts. When you gather that many people together you have to compromise. I seriously doubt I have a single player in the guild who doesn't have one thing they'd like to see change. Knowing what they'd change gives me insight into what they value in a guild.
If they say no - This information is available here, please read this over before our scheduled recruit run (again only if I am thinking about tagging them)
I spend a lot of time, keeping our public policies up to date. It pretty clearly outlines what to expect from us and what we expect from you. I want EVERY potential member to come into the guild with this information, so there are no surprises.

How do you evaluate yourself at the end of a raid night?
This question lets me see what a player sees as their job or role in a raid. Some hunters will tell me top dps, others will tell me strong pulls or saving a squishy with an Ice Trap. There really isn't a wrong answer, but I've found players are typically more content in a raid environment where their supervisory officers agree with what the player values.
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I'd like to note the topic I tackled this time is a broad one. I have gotten great feedback regarding the application post I made. I'm hoping for similar results from this one. What questions do you ask, or have you been asked in an interview?

Applications: The good, the bad and the WHAT were you thinking

2008-06-07T21:40:00.004-04:00

In my last post I broke down the structure of my guild's application. That post was prompted by an application I received that made me shake my head. It's been about a week since I got the app and I'm still shaking my head over it. So I've decided to expand on the last post and share with you some of the best, worst and scariest apps I've received in the past few months.

The Good

Why did you allocate your talent points where you did?: I experimented with a couple trees, but mostly influenced by shadowpriest.com for my spec and posts I read there. I feel that it maximizes by ability to mana regen my group and keep misery debuff on mobs. I also think it's the best spec to maximize my dps with my current gear. As I get gear with better hit, the tree will change slightly.
This answer indicates he's researched his class, and placed priority on the synergistic qualities of his class and spec.

What do you believe your class (and spec) brings to raids?: I believe COH priest are the best healers in a raid. We have a wide variety of heals that cater to every situation and also we can put out a large amount of effective healing.
I like to see confidence in applicants, if you don't think you're the best then why are you wasting my time? This confident app turned out to be mostly right, he's an amazing AoE healer and puts out a large amount of effective healing. I, however, remain the best healer in the raid. (Sarcasm intended)

What do you believe your class (and spec) brings to raids?: The hunter class brings one handy tool to raids which is misdirect, can be very useful in the hands of a skilled hunter to be able to help out keeping healers alive that may be getting whacked on in certain situations or to just help the tank establish a strong aggro base for boss fights. Other than that we're a high dps class if played well that doesn't need group synergy with other classes to be able to perform.
What he lacks in sentence structure, he made up for in completely nailing what we expect out of our hunters. I especially like that his answer indicates that he doesn't rely on a synergy group.

What do you anticipate your raid attendance will be if we were to offer you a raiding position within our guild?: I can attend every raid. This semester, I have a class ending at 6:30 on Thursday, so I may be 5-10 minutes late for the Thursday invites.
Sweet. This tells me he didn't mindlessly tell us 100% and it's good information to have.

What do you want out of being in a guild?: Teamwork environment. Raiders that enjoy raiding and are willing to do the work, including wipe, to learn and master the encounters. Being that my balance druid raided balance prior to TBC, open minded on the abilities of the players and classes available to them for an encounter. People with a good sense of humor.
That describes us, without being too generic, though it is still pretty generic answer.

Tell us about your last guild and why you are looking for a new home.: [Name removed]. This question is a struggle as my decision to leave [Name removed] is a personal decision and I don't want to air "dirty laundry." All I really want to say is this is based on recent changes in raiding attitudes and behaviors. If you wish more of an explanation, please contact me in game.
I liked the respect this applicant gave her former guild despite having pretty serious personality conflicts with the leadership of that guild.

We ask you to prepare yourself for a new boss encounter, how do you go about this?: Get reagents together, get some gold, get some beer to soften the wipes, load my handgun in case I need to become an hero. Make sure I read up on Bosskillers so I know exactly what not to do.
This single answer got this applicant an initiation opportunity within our guild.

The Bad

Why did you allocate your talent points where you did?: Excellent solo play, and the occasional time I get to group
This is not a solo guild.

What do you believe your class (and spec) brings to raids?: I bring the best my class can offer, I chose a paladin because it has a higher survivability rate, wearing plate and using shields, meaning I will not be one shoted by a boss like a priest.
This answer scares me, because plate or not, you're going to get one shotted by a boss. Also how does this guy play that he's managing to pull aggro as a paladin healer?

What do you believe your class (and spec) brings to raids?: I believe it will bring DPS, CC is sum cases, and also missdirects.
I hate poor spelling and bad grammar. I don't want "sum" showing up in my guild chat on a regular basis. Maybe that's petty, but I'm the GM so what I want sometimes matters, even if it is petty.

Pre-BC raid experience: I ended up reaching Level 60 as soon as BC came out, so I never really went into the instances, just continued up to 70. The thought had crossed my mind but ofcourse my friends would leave me behind if i didn't continue to level. Yes yes I know.. I said friends... I had some back then :P *cry
Maybe this was meant to be cute, but it rubbed me the wrong way.

What do you anticipate your raid attendance will be if we were to offer you a raiding position within our guild?:I will be able to make possibly all of the raids, with exceptions of work and school and certain family issues.
Um, duh?

Tell us about your last guild and why you are looking for a new home.: [Name Removed] on Kael'Thas. I entered the guild, started asking simple questions, and was promoted to officer after a few months because I wasn't a retard. I left because after beating HARDMODE bosses like Solarian, VR, Lurker we were running into walls of shitty healing, shitty tanking and retarded DPS, and a Raid Leader that called for breaks so he could get more stoned. But this isn't a QQ session, and they've since gone on to become a 5/6 3/4 SSC TK + 2/4 MH guild. Whoooo.
While this applicant took me up on my opportunity to make a jerk of himself, the rest of his app was good. I interviewed him and realized this was the product of frustration. This guy is now a contributing member of the guild; he still gets grumpy when he's frustrated.

Tell us about your last guild and why you are looking for a new home.: [Name Removed] has nice people but i dont like that they raid with DKP , i havnt done DKP since mc , onyx ect feels outdated .
We use a DKP system.

What do you want out of being in a guild?: When I join a guild, I expect people to respect my time and in exchange, I respect theirs. So much fucking time is wasted in wow because people aren't prepared and/or don't pay attention during raids. If you join a raid and you don't know the strategies, you're wasting 24 peoples time, which is pretty damn selfish.

Also, I enjoy joking around in g-chat, dropping metalocalypse references and frequently linking to southpark clips and lolcats. I like getting to know people and running alts through instances and the like. I also -LOVE- ganking lowbies and camping instance stones, but y'all are on a pve server ...You really don't know what you're missing
If you like pvp so much, stay on a pvp server. This guy does have some points, but he made a jerk of himself and it wasn't even the question where he was supposed to.

What do you know about The Guild, and how do you know it?:
they raid ssc and other raiding instances, ive seen them around and played with some of the people in the guild
We don't raid SSC actually....

What do you know about The Guild, and how do you know it?: From what i have herd they are a great guild and a great raiding guild to be apart of
Did I mention I'm not a fan of poor spelling? I think this is a great raiding guild for you to be apart of (from) too.

The WHAT were you thinking?

Why did you allocate your talent points where you did?: I absolutley LOVE to heal. I play a healing class in all RPGs.
This is not an answer to question I asked.

What do you believe your class (and spec) brings to raids?: Im a VERY well rounded player ive cleared illidan 100 times on my shaman , i know how to keep things rolling. Totems/ VE/VT my spell rotations are accurate to the notch,.
Wait you have Totems and VE? Also the character linked (A shaman) was Friendly with the Deathsworn Ashtongue.

How long have you been playing WoW?: I started playing wow two years ago with four friends from work, all in the 27+ age group, with one of them being 250lbs, gay, and bald. They are all cool peopel but alas we eventually parted ways. one was into pvp and I started realy playing a lot more. Oh and I don't have anything against gays , nor am I a homophobe. In fact Im quite into women thank you very much. hence my hot sexy toon :P
Well I'm glad we've cleared that up.

What do you anticipate your raid attendance will be if we were to offer you a raiding position within our guild?:Thursday-Sunday might be able to make Monday and Tuesday on some days.
That's nice, we raid Sunday to Thursday and require 75% attendance. I'm glad you did your homework before you apped.

Tell us about your last guild and why you are looking for a new home.:
[Name Removed]. I was in the guild for only a few days, and after some stupid forum drama, (some retard accused me of being a "ninja accomplice" <--What the hell is that? Anyway.. They kicked me saying it wasn't worth the chances because they had recently had some ninjas in there guild. So I actually know the GM of [Name Removed] and the whole story ended up being that he'd ninja'd two items. The first time he got a warning because the facts couldn't be 100% confirmed. The second time he ninja'd an item from an officer of their guild and was removed.

Tell us about your last guild and why you are looking for a new home.: My last guild i was in, was on Rexxar, named [Name Removed]. I was asked to leave because my CL was threatening to kill himself over me. I was told it was over my constantly asking why i would raid for 2 months, then would sit out for 1 month.
Your last class leader wanted to kill himself because of you? I'm not sure I'd advertise that.

What do you want out of being in a guild?: to have fun and raid on my preist and make GOOD friends not fags like the ones ive met in this guild that i xfered my shaman to. I need a new home.
Goodness! That's a strong word for an application.

Who do you know in The Guild?:Oppomcpuff, corey
This person is not in my guild.

Anatomy of a guild app

2008-06-06T16:37:00.007-04:00

Let me preface this by saying there are LOTS of opinions about guild applications. My opinion is but one of many. However, you've chosen to visit my corner of the intarwebz, so mine is the one you get to hear.

I view an application to be a tool for eliminating people I clearly don't want in my guild, with the least amount of reading possible. Basically when I'm done reading the application I want to be thinking, "Gee I'd like to talk to that person" or "Ewwwww no thanks." With that goal in mind, I'm going to take you through my guild's application. Here is a sneak peak into the pitfalls and what I'm really looking for when I read an application to my guild.

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We ask that all applicants read our guild policies before applying.
Please use the following template for your application.
This is your warning, make sure you know what you're signing up for, and fill this stuff out.

Character Name: I do need to know what to call you. Also if your name is Buttfloss or something equally dumb I generally stop reading here.

Class: Yep, this is important too. If you spell your class wrong, I'm not interested.

Armory Link: Sure we could ask for your detailed history OR you could just give me the link. I check this for rep (Don't tell me you've been farming BT for 6 months and have your Deathsworn Ashtongue Rep at Honored.) Did you gem, gear, enchant, or spec in a way that meets our expectations for raiders?

Why did you allocate your talent points where you did?: Defend your choices. If I see the words pvp or solo here I normally stop reading. This is a raiding guild. It's not a pvp guild and it's not a let's go solo guild.

What do you believe your class (and spec) brings to raids?: This is the first question I ask where I'm looking for an insight into the player's class knowledge and play style. "I pew stuff" indicates a different personality and understanding of a class than "I provide CC, biscuits and high AoE damage."

How long have you been playing WoW?: I'm honestly not sure why we have this here. I think one of my officers wanted it. As long as the answer is above 4 months or so I'm normally fine with it.

How long have you been playing this character? I want this answer to be over 4 months also.

Pre-BC raiding experience: What did you do before BC? Honestly at this point Naxx isn't a deciding factor, but it does tell me that you've had experience in our type of raiding environment before. With less experienced players you have to determine both if this type of raiding commitment AND if this guild is for them at the same time.

BC raid experience: What do I have to teach you to get you up to speed with our current progression?

What do you anticipate your raid attendance will be if we were to offer you a raiding position within our guild?: I don't trust 100% I don't want to hear about well my dog or school comes up sometimes. I want a good guesstimate of how often your real life interferes with your raiding plans. If you tell me 95% and it ends up be 60% imma be pissed.

What do you want out of being in a guild?: This is honestly about your expectations meeting our offerings. If you expect a military style raid that's not what we offer. If you want us all to be best friends and not care that you have green gems, this is also not the place for you.

Tell us about your last guild and why you are looking for a new home.: This is my "Plays well with others" section, where I give you a chance to make a jerk of yourself. If you trash your old guild as a bunch of jerks who don't understand, that raises red flags for me. (Especially if I know your old GM.) If you were booted for ninja looting, I'd make up something about not having compatible raid times.

What do you know about The Guild*, and how do you know it?: Have you done your homework about my guild? If you haven't, how flattering can you be?

Who do you know in The Guild*?: Do you have someone in my guild to vouch for you? If you do, do they actually know and like you?

We ask you to prepare yourself for a new boss encounter, how do you go about this?: This is kind of a give me. Tell me you read strats, get consumables, and/or talk to friends that have done the fight. Just remember, I keep this application if I tag you. So I'm going to remind you that you do these things.

Please allow us up to 3 days after acknowledging receipt of your application to review your application and post an update before you contact us and ask for an update.
Don't pester my officers 20 minutes after you apply.

If your contact requests that you get in touch with them and you fail to do so within a week, your application will be considered withdrawn and no longer considered.
Don't make us go looking for you.

Unless otherwise stated, officers are not available to discuss applications during TD's raid hours. We're all an active part of the leadership of raids and it's unfair to our guildmates, our applicants and ourselves to attempt to give both your application and the raid the attention they deserve at the same time.
Don't pester my officers during a raid; they are raiding.

Please delete the instructional portions of this form before submitting your application.
This is my idiot check. I don't need to read my instructions to evaluate your app, however, if you've deleted my instructions, then I know that you have read them. If you don't follow directions on your application, you probably won't follow them in raids either.

*Name changed to confused the truly obtuse.

Reviewing a healing strat

2008-06-05T13:38:00.002-04:00

Sorry for being quiet, it turns out that away from this mystical land of intarwebz there are demons that via for your time and attention. I just faced down an elite one, and as I'm a holy priest (and I was caught in my healing gear) all I could really do was put my shadow word pain on it and heal myself and wait for it to tire of me.

So aside from the intro that probably means I've been reading too much Ratters, we were able to test my Brutalus healing strat Monday night. Like any good strat it took some tweaking. Like Runycat suggested, I pulled in one additional resto druid and tasked him with HoTs on the Burn victims (The holy pally and resto druid were then put into a team I called "The Burn Unit") and when possible toss some HoTs on the active tank or on a transition the next tank. My pally IS amazing, but the burn damage ended up being a little more than he could handle on his own (which honestly was the most presumptive part of my strat.) Once that was in place, the healing strat looked pretty stable. We had some wipes due to healers getting used to what to expect from Stomp damage, some due to tanks figuring out the best time to taunt, some due to soakers that didn't understand Burn plus refreshing your Meteor Slash = dead DPS. (It's the increased fire damage for those of you who also don't read closely) But at the end of the night we were getting solid attempts with stable healing, which to me means a successful healing strat.

But Auz you said there would be evaluation! All I see is carebear happy stuff, where's the numbers. Well I'll be honest, when the raid's successful I don't dip so deep into the numbers. I did wander through every pre-wipe death in WWS and figure out what happened. (THANK GOD DEATH REPORTS ARE BACK!) What I saw bore out my thought to bring in the druid for burn HoTs. I've found that if my tank healers don't chain cast through Stomp, the tanks won't live. My Disc priest did a nice job making sure the two of us weren't synced the whole night. Inspiration was on the tank about 90% of the night, leading credence to my raid leaders's and my inspiration math. I'm currently trying to decide how to make that math available on the intarwebz. If I keep feeling lazy, you'll just a get a link to spreadsheet you'll have to download.

In even better news, Illidan finally dropped his car door for our main tank, so our attempts tomorrow will be even easier for our healers

Building a healing strat for Brutalus

2008-06-01T13:35:00.008-04:00

So I've hesitated to post this for fear of being wrong and looking like an idiot, but I've decided this is part of what I do as a GM and maybe it'll help someone. Also, after singing to you guys, I can't really embarrass myself much further.

We finally killed the big blue menace on Tuesday and I've spent the past few days building our Brutalus healing strategy. I've looked over kill videos, WWS reports, and strategies that include listing of the boss abilities. I know that at my guild's place in progression I could jack someone else's strat and do no actual thinking for myself, but my EQ roots make coming up with my own plan a matter of pride. Also no one else knows my healers as well as I do, so I doubt their strats would be as strong as my own for my guild.

So here's the plan for our guild's initial Brutalus attack:
1 CoH Priest and 1 Shaman to heal Meteor Slash
1 Pally to heal Burn targets (With help from the meteor slash shaman at the final tick)
1 Holy priest, 1 Disc priest, 1 pally and 1 shaman on the MTs.

The shaman and I are going to spend some quality time together figuring out what rank of Lesser Healing Wave he can cast continuously for 6 minutes (fully raid buffed). In the fight he will stand still and continuously cast Lesser Healing Wave. The holy priest will be casting max rank Greater Heal to land in time with the main hand weapon swing (both 2.5 seconds, coincidence I think not!), and keep renew up and the Disc priest thinks on his feet and will alternate his heals but I anticipate at 4 casts in 15 second average. The pally is a Holy Light spammer.

The heart of this plan is maxing our inspiration/ancestral fortitude uptime to counterbalance Stomp. I've done some math with my raid leader and determined that with this configuration we can keep inspiration/ancestral fortitude on our tanks 94% of the time.*

So, that's my initial healing plan. As my raid leader buddy says, "no good plan survives contact with the enemy." I'll check in after our first night's attempts and let you know what worked and what didn't work.

*I found that in my scouring of the intarwebz there is no Inspiration/Ancestral Fortitude uptime calculator or formula published so I had to make my own. It's not perfect but it's the best estimation I could put together without delving into derivatives. Using the math my raid leader and I put together I will be creating a calculator in the hopes of preventing someone else from having to do all that math.

Promised Intarwebzs Embarrassment

2008-05-31T23:55:00.004-04:00

Rate this performance at The Sims On Stage

Lyrics by Anna of http://toomanyannas.com

This is the product of the evil corruption of BA Chat.

Auz visits EJ forums

2008-05-30T12:55:00.003-04:00

I'm not a frequent denizen of EJ forums but this thread, Raid Healing Leadership, caught my eye. So there's a good conversation going on there, and CLEARLY I need to put in my two cents. (I've posted 3 times now so they've actually gotten six cents) I finished up my response there and thought this is good stuff Auz, you should put it on the blog.

So Mondays asked:

Apart from that when i assign healing i get almost no replies from any of the healers and we usually end up wiping due too the healers not doing what they're told. Not only that some of the healers simply do not read forums,enchant and gem their gear properly. Is it a lack of dedication and respect or do i simply fail? I've been healercl in my previous guild and i've never experienced this before so i'm quite frustrated.
Also the overhealing and the flash heal spam is freaking me out how can i tell people to change their gamingstyle in a non offending way?

The best way to get respect from your healers is to give it, and to be a resource of information. We don't have any way to pay these people other than shiny epics, so I find positive re-enforcement works better than berating. Set yourself up to be their mentor and personal coach rather than their boss.

I try not to tell my healers how to heal, but rather give them information that leads them to the conclusion. People tend to own more what they come to rather than what people tell them. (I call it the fine art of letting someone else have my way) "PallyZ I see that often when a tank that I've assigned you to dies, you're casting flash of light but it seems like you're losing ground on the tanks health, how can I help you fix that?" (Have links to WWS for the inevitable "nu-uh")

Another pitfall I've learned to avoid is trying to cram a bunch of information in at once. I work with my healers and give them one task at a time to focus on. Once they've made improvement on that one thing, give them another "DruidQ I see that you've really mastered the rolling lifeblooms rotation we were talking about, I think now it's time to shift our focus to how you can incorporate swiftmends into that rotation to help us recover from spike damage."

Be clear with your healers regarding your expectations of them in raids. I don't say "bring consumables" I say, "every healer should make sure they have 20 golden fishsticks or 20 blackened sporefish" 20 guardian elixirs and 20 battle elixirs or 2 flasks and 4 charges of weapon oil for this raid, if you are unsure about which of the available consumables are best for this encounter/your class, I'll be happy to talk to you about it in tells BEFORE our raid time."

Reward good behavior! When you write a wall of text healing strat, hide an easter egg in it. "Whisper Auz the red dragon flys by night for a 10g prize." When someone blossoms under your tutelage praise them! When someone got that clutch heal and keeps the raid from a wipe puff up their little pixelated egos. When we were learning Kael, I went out one night and bought a bunch of cockroach pets, and at the end of the night I gave one to every player that didn't die before a wipe was called that night. I told my raid "Be the cockroach." When we killed him there were a bunch of cockroach pets running around the raid like a badge of honor.

Over recruit. Your healers have no motivation to do what you ask them if they know you have to take them regardless of their behavior, enchanting, gemming, etc. I keep a mental note of how many healers I need for the average encounter and make sure I have enough healers on staff to sit 1 or 2 a night. This allows me to maintain flexibility in healing composition, sit tired raiders and occasionally say "I see you're having trouble getting that new weapon enchanted so I'm going to sit you tonight to make sure you have the time to farm for those enchanting mats"

Officer Offer

2008-05-29T15:04:00.005-04:00

So I've just offered you a spot as an officer in my guild and now I've asked you to sleep on it before you answer me. What things would you consider before answering me?

Below is a list of questions I think any member should answer before taking on a leadership role in an established guild:

Do I intend to make a long term commitment to this game?
Do I intend to make a long term commitment to this guild?
What will my responsibilities be?
Do I want to make a long term commitment to these responsibilities?
How are my views inline with that of the current leadership core?
How are my views different from that of the current leadership core?
What strengths do I have to bring to this guild in a leadership role?
Which of my weaknesses might affect my ability to hold a leadership role?
Is my GM aware of these weaknesses?
Am I willing to commit to being a good example for my guildmates?
Can I establish a good working relationship with the other members of the leadership core?
How do the other officers interact with the GM(s)?
Is that how I want to interact with the GM(s)?
Do I respect my GM(s)?
Why is the GM looking for a new officer?
Does your idea of the authority you should have as an officer line up with your GM(s)'s?
Does your idea of the role you would play in the leadership core line up with your GM(s

What things would you consider?

I have a name!

2008-05-29T14:07:00.006-04:00

The Gold Star goes to Bell from 4haelz! (I took artistic liberties to fit it on the header) Thanks for all the suggestions. They were all much better than what I came up with on my own. In fact, I had such trouble picking that I made Mikedabutcha help me. While I was adding Bell, I updated my blog list, because I now read a lot more blogs. Thanks to the friendly people at BA, I've been introduced to many good blogs, RSS feeds, feed readers, better layouts, using pictures, copywrites, disclosures, and questionable chat content. They've also gotten me to promise to throughly embarrass myself on the internet this weekend, so check back for that.

Second Chances

2008-05-26T14:57:00.006-04:00

Warning opinions expressed in this post are mainly from the perspective of a raiding guild and may not apply to other types of guilds.

So recruiting a new raider is always an interesting experience. But what happens when someone who has already raided with you applies as a raider a second time?

On the positive side, you've raided with this person. You know what to expect from their attendance, attitude, raid preparation, comprehension and consumable use. Sure apps tell you what to expect, but everyone knows the right answer and reality don't always match. Additionally your team knows them, and integration into the guild should take less time.

On the negative side, it didn't work out once. Like I'm fond of counseling one of my friends "There is a reason he's your ex." Unlike an app, this player carries baggage from their previous experience with your guild.

Generally when I'm considering a previous raider as an applicant, I focus most heavily on why and how they ceased raiding with us. Was it a philosophical difference or a lifestyle change? When they ceased raiding how did they treat their peers and the leadership core? Did they disappear overnight or did they take time to talk about what was going on?

If the player left for a philosophical difference, what has changed? If your policies haven't changed and their perspective hasn't changed, then I believe tagging the player again will only lead you back to the same place. If your guild's policy changed or the person's perspective changed you should still do an inventory, are these changes sufficient to prevent further friction?

If the player left because of a lifestyle change, how permanent is this change? Are they likely to have real life obligations pull them away again or are they now able to make a stable commitment to your guild. If their lifestyle is not stable, the raider may fall into a yo-yo pattern of commitment and flakiness that cause your more stable raiders to question why they are stable when this player's mercurial nature is tolerated. While I will occasionally give this type of applicant a second chance, I won't give them a third.

How was this player's attitude when they left? If they said unpleasant things to other team mates or leaders, those people may be hesitant to allow this person to integrate back into the guild. If your other raiders are opposed to this player's return then you are probably better off bringing in a player without that baggage.

Finally, how well did this player communicate with the leadership the last time they left? When people have to leave a guild, the way they chose to communicate and how much they chose to communicate tells you a great deal about their level of respect for the commitment they made to your guild. If they didn't bother to talk to you the last time they were in your guild, I wouldn't give them a second chance.

Auz, you didn't discuss what happens if you removed a player. Yeah I didn't. Generally I won't remove a raider unless I feel there is absolutely no hope that this player will integrate in the way I need them to. Because of this, I won't generally consider a player I've removed from a raiding position.

Some Lamaa support

2008-05-22T16:59:00.002-04:00

I don't have time for a full post today but I wanted to draw some attention to TJ's post that I've renamed in my head "When WoW Bans happen to Good people."

While we all understand the need for banning those that aren't playing by the same rules, I would hope that Lamaa finds some recourse.

Byline me baby!

2008-05-21T15:23:00.004-04:00

Description: The "Insert Witty Byline" part of my blog header was supposed to be a placeholder until in a fit of creative inspiration, the perfect byline would fall from the heavens into my lap. It's been a little while and no such inspiration has come. I think maybe I'm just too close to the blog to step back and see it as a whole. So I'm calling upon you for help.

Entertainment: To aid your creative inspiration, I'm providing you a list of bylines that didn't make it:

10 years of gaming, 6 years of GMing and a great set of tits too - Rejected because if you don't know me it's not funny also, it may draw the kind of attention I don't care for.

I have 35 kids - Rejected, I don't really think of my raiders as kids.... most of them anyway =P

Wrangling at the funny farm - Rejected, the farm reference was supposed to be a play on "chick" but that didn't really come through, and again, I don't really think of my raiders as animals... most of them anyway =P

A Medivh Carebear - A play on Stop the Warrior's byline "A Medivh Badass." Rejected, I don't want to be too closely associate with Stop's blog, as our topics are largely unrelated and our tone is much different. Also, while I am known as our guild's carebear for positive reasons, carebear has gaming connotations I don't embrace and may soften the message I want to send.

An over opinionated chick's thoughts on GMing - Rejected, too close to the truth so it might scare people away.

PWNing boys since 1998 - Rejected, this is more confrontational, and egotistical than I want. Ideally I want others to be able to catch a glimpse of the world from my perspective, not alienate them. Also it's a little less mature than I normally am. I'm still grumpy with masculine side of our species, so to me, it's kinda funny today.

Prize: As a baby blog or as Matt put it, "Upcoming Blog" (made my week Matt) I don't have much to offer. The winner gets a link on my blog roll (if you aren't already there and have a blog) and a gold star.

A Rare Non WoW Post

2008-05-21T01:52:00.004-04:00

For the record, I don't understand boys at all nor do I understand the way I interact with some of them. I think it was simpler when they all had cooties. I'll be back to regular blogging after I get my cootie shot.

The back seat

2008-05-17T14:44:00.005-04:00

And on the 6th day, I rest. (Sorta)

I don't lead raids on the weekend. Some people can lead raids 7 days a week but I am not that person. I make myself available for one on one sessions with my raiders regarding raid performance, real life, personal interactions, gear plans, etc. But leading a group of 25 raiders, just drains me.

My guild, however, has become it's own living breathing thing. With 148 accounts and 358 characters (only 38 of which are raiders) our guild has four hour raids five nights a week that are "official, " and 5 Karas, 4 ZAs, 2 Mag/Gruul runs, and a smattering of pre-bc runs scattered in our off time. The runs are sometimes run by my officers, partner-in-crime and sometimes by random members that just stepped up and started running it. Sometimes they consist solely of members of my guild and some are a collection of people from various guilds.

Normally I avoid the ones my officers don't lead. It's hard for your guild not to look to you for leadership, and it can make the leader feel like they need approval for the things they would otherwise just do or say. This weekend however I decided to go to one. My baby druid is coming along nicely, and I thought she was ready for some 25 man content. It was interesting. I bit my tongue while some interesting healing assignments were made and watched my member as he made careful adjustments to his instructions. We ended up one shotting, High King, Gruul, and Mag with a group of alts and casual friends. He didn't do everything I would have done, but we were successful. One time I was unable to contain my advice, so I whispered it to him rather than blurt it out. (Taking two very observant players off cube duty and instead having them watch nearby cubes as back up, if you were curious) He handled it with grace (namely listening to me =P)

I can't say I was a perfect raider. I can say it was very interesting to be in the back seat, watching the raid from another perspective. It was also interesting to note how he established his authority, how he handled questions, how he put down rebellion and how the raid in general responded to general nuances of his personality. I'm thinking about using fraps to record myself in vent and the raiding effect. It would be interesting to see if I can recreate my observations and translate them to my own leadership skills. I can never hope to be unbiased, but maybe I'll be able to learn something anyway.

On a side note, I've about had it with that little blue dragon. I've tried about all I know how to try from a leadership and strategy perspective. I've done indepth WWS analysis, made graphs, pictures, wordy explanations, set up captains, educated captains, worked on a one on one basis with those that are repeatedly not executing, recruited new raiders to replace the ones that are not executing, tried different strats, spoken to leaders of guilds that have killed him, spoken to members of guilds that have killed him, everything I know how to do. If we don't kill him soon, I'm not really sure what to try next. We have the gear, strat, ability and desire, it seems we lack the focus and execution. All guilds have high points and low points, and we'll get through this one too, it's just frustrating to be in a low point.

So you want to be a raider?

2008-05-13T17:05:00.004-04:00

Long Boring Intro:
I have a secret. A long time ago, I was a "casual" player. For about a year I had a real life priority that took enough of my time to prevent me from raiding with any regularity. In that time I was part of a pvp team (where I met my partner in crime! Mikedabutcha) and then part of a real life friend guild. (You had to know someone in real life who was in the guild, A la Kevin Bacon). Once my real life priority had passed, I found myself too bored to play casually and sought out a raiding home, but I've always stayed in touch with that real life group of friends. Recently one of those members e-mailed me and let me know they were considering "raiding" and wanted advice. What is "raiding" and where might they find a good home? I e-mailed them back a specific response, and then upon re-reading it decided some of the advice I'd given him could be generalized and may be interesting to others.

The better player myth:
Intrinsically, dedicated raiders aren't any better or worse than their casual counterparts. Rather than a reflection of skill, dedicated raiding is reflection of effort. Most people do become better with time and effort, but I've seen some really terrible players in some really good gear. In fact, in some cases I've been responsible for putting some good gear on bad players.

The "raider" mindset:
In another post, I've already talked about how the commitment to raiding, alters a players view of the game, so I won't rehash that here. The advantage of this mindset is that you feel more involved in the game, you are able to see more things and the encounters do challenge you to master your class. The disadvantages are the you have to make raiding a priority in your life, you may end up playing with people you don't necessarily enjoy outside of raids, and gaming time becomes a little more stressful.

Defining your commitment:
Often times in discussions we'll put players into boxes: "Casual," "Hardcore," "Elitist," "Scrub." But in reality it's not that simple. Rather than black or white there is a grayscale of levels of commitment to raiding and ability. So while considering raiding, consider realistically how much time do you want to spend playing this game? How much time can you spare from your everyday lifestyle? Remember that you are committing to more than just raiding, but also to being prepared for raids. A good rule of thumb to consider is that you'll need about 15 minutes of preparation time for every hour of time you spend in a raid.

Finding a guild that matches your expectations:
This isn't always easy. In fact, it was so hard for me that I ended up making my own guild. One of the easiest tricks to finding a guild that raids when you want to is to just type "/who Serpentshrine Cavern" (Or whatever zone you're interested in raiding) and note the guilds of the people who are in that zone. Do that for a few days and make a list of the guild names you see. Once you have your list, do a search on the internet for "GuildName WoW Servername" or ask a member for the guild's website. The first thing you should check is that their raid expectations match up to what you want to commit. Second, check their available information and see if their culture seems like the kind of culture you want from a guild.

Impressing the guild you want to join:
Once you've decided you want to join them, you have to explain to them why they should want you. Take a look at their raiders who play the same class/spec that you are playing in the armory and see how they have gemmed or enchanted their gear. Take a moment to evaluate your own character and used the "find upgrades" button to see if there is something easy you can do to make your character stronger. If this guild is killing bosses you haven't seen yet, read information about those bosses. Remember in an interview, the recruiter is checking you to see if it's worth making a time investment in you. The more things you can do to show them that you are investing time in yourself and your own progression, the more likely they are to feel that time invested in you and your progression is worthwhile.

Everything I need to know about GMing I learned from my mother!

2008-05-11T14:16:00.006-04:00

"It's better to be hated for who you are than loved for who you aren't." - Your guild, however amazing it is, isn't going to be the place for everyone. If you are talking to an applicant, be sure to be honest about what they can expect from your guild. Bringing in a member who clearly desires something your guild doesn't provide will only breed discontent.

"Cleanliness is next to Godliness." - This may be a stretch, but I use this advice as motivation to keep my information organized. I can tell you in 30 seconds or less the attendance of a raider since the first day they stepped into the guild, who broke a sheep in the raid, the resistance each raider has on, how many symbol of kings one of my pallys has, the average mana level my priests have, who's isn't flasked and who's missing what buffs in a raid. My raiders are impressed. I tell them it's because I'm omnipresent, but it's really just because I'm well organized.

"Don’t say anything you don’t want on the front page of the newspaper." - Electronic information is forever. Between screenshots, vent recording, and forum archives, what you say can be shared with people you didn't intend for it to shared with. Be sure before you speak that you would willing stand by and support your statement if it were published in the newspaper or more topically, shouted in the Trade channel.

"Never argue with an idiot, he'll drag you down to his level and beat you with experience." - If someone is being unreasonable, you cannot reason with them. Sometimes it's better for you just to say "I'm sorry you feel that way" and move on.

"It's better to eat soup with the one you love then to eat steak with someone that you do not." - If I find a new recruit who looks like an awesome player of his class, but I don't think his personality is going to mesh well with our guild, I pass on him. First and foremost this is a game, if we're not having fun no matter what bosses we're killing, we've failed at the basic concept of entertainment.

"Anything worth doing is worth doing right." - If you're going to put your time and energy into something, don't half ass it. Your members will respect one well done project to better your guild much more than 3 halfway done things. If you don't have time to do something well that needs to be done, then delegate the responsibility to an officer or trusted member who does.

"Well behaved women rarely make history." - If you do what everyone else is doing, you're going to end up where everyone else is. Sometimes you have to push the envelope and operate outside of the normal to accomplish something extraordinary.

"Deep down most people just want to be understood and valued for who they are." - More than shiny purples and getting into every raid, most of the people in your guild want to feel like they contribute something important. If you take the time to get to know what's unique about your raiders and make an effort to capitalize on that uniqueness, you will inspire more loyalty in most people than if you just give them purples for showing up. That being said, in a raiding guild you have to give them purples and get them into raids too.

If you have any sage mom advice you think could be applied to GMing I'd love to hear it!

Zomg Drama!

2008-05-09T16:59:00.015-04:00

If you get enough people together, drama is an eventual byproduct. This week it happened to our guild. I'm sharing it with you because A) this is probably the only place I can vent where it reflects on me and not my guild and B) I hope someone can learn from our drama or at least be entertained.

So a few days ago I was summoned from my book writing via a MSN message from a guildmate "Check the realm forums." I yawn, stretch, and direct my browser to the realm forums. To discover this gem.

It's posted by a level 12 alt, but the genius was intelligent enough to use an alt tagged with the same guild as his main. So it was easy to identify the poster as a hunter we'd given an initiate opportunity to but decided not to retain as a member. The post was clearly bait and the realm community had already responded with some additional trolling but mostly skepticism. I asked my raiders not to respond however the request missed a few of our non-raiding members.

Sidenote: Who starts a flame thread with "I know everyone else like you guys."

So Operation ignore the troll was put into place and we ignored him through this post:

But I'm afraid one of my soldiers broke ranks and posted a response on an unguilded alt prompting this response:

I haven't figured out which member it was, and to be honest I haven't tried too hard, but I suspect it was one of mine because the information shared wouldn't have been public knowledge. I think raising to the bait does reflect poorly on my guild in some ways, however it is at this point that he moves from the slightly sophomoric to the absolutely absurd, conveniently diverting attention away from my errant member's misbehavior.

Unfortunately for the poster, he's now entirely lost the crowd prompting this next gem:

Now thus far it's been easy for me. Ignore the poster as he slowly digs his hole. I know, if left alone, he'll dig his own grave and eventually tire out. I know that nothing I say to him will calm him down. But now he's growing hostile towards my server mates, and he's told his first complete untruth. Everything else has just been his interpretation of the events that do have some base in reality, twisted as his perception of that reality may seem to me. I know better, I really do, but at this point I feel compelled to make an attempt to reach him, resulting in:

I'm not sure if I reached him or not, but it's 7 hours since I posted and he's yet to respond. The "Drama" thread has derailed into a Monty Python sketch. Yes, I did try to recruit in the drama thread. What can I say, I'm shameless.

So that's my drama story. I hope you've been entertained, but I also hope that you and I can learn something from this example. While examining this situation or any unpleasant situation I don't care to repeat, I try to look at the following things:

Prevention: The drama in this event comes from an initiate who was not granted member status. Unfortunately the purpose of an initiation period is to determine if a player is a good fit a guild and the guild is a good fit for the initiate. If there was a way to ensure a player and a guild will work well together there would be no need for initiation phases. I would say the conversation in which I informed the initiate that he would not be offered a member position within our guild could have been smoother, but honestly that conversation was as pleasant as that kind of conversation can be. We parted on amicable terms and allowed him to remain in our guild on a non raiding rank until his server-transfer cool down was up. (He chose to return to his previous raiding guild, despite my offer of assistance finding a new guild on our server.) Frankly, I was quite surprised to see his post in the forums. That being said, we've previously relied on the interview process to inform cross-server applicants that we make no guarantee they will be invited to member status. I believe that due to this event we'll add this information to our application, so we'll have documentation this information was provided.

Room for Improvement: The post made with information only known to members of our raider core, should not have been made. Once it's all said and done I'll have to track down who and have a heart to heart about why that post, while cathartic, was probably not in the best interest of our guild. As a guild leader, I'm not a tyrant, I'm not capable of nor do I desire to control the actions of my members. That being said, I don't make requests idly. By explaining the rational of radio silence, I could have gotten higher buy in. Also we did a good job letting our raiders know we preferred they not post, but we did not get to our friend rank members in time to prevent a few of them from making comments. An outside observer doesn't know the difference between the girl friend of a raider who logs in once a month and a core member of our guild from their forum posts. I'm considering adding information to friend rank induction reminding friends of this fact and asking them to consider how their posts will reflect on our community before posting.

Gold Star: I probably shouldn't have responded to the thread, but given that I did, I think the response was professional and did not take the bait to indulge in mud slinging with him. I was tempted and could have cited that:

In our raids he did an average of 400 dps less than he promised in his interview.
He caused wipes on fights he claimed to understand.
His ability to follow directions regarding when to misdirect was so bad that we had to create a safety word to be his cue to pull.
His interpretation of the events of his initiation period was suspect to be generous.

I didn't (but I must say, it is nice to get that list off my chest in my own personal corner of the interwebz) take the bait, instead I focused my comments productive things that did not lend themselves to debate. I reminded him that I was available to speak with him one on one to clarify and address any outstanding issues he may have. I expressed my regret at his dissatisfaction, without taking accountability for that dissatisfaction. While it may have been in poor taste, I used the free publicity to highlight my guild's recruitment needs (and to my amusement have had two potential applicants get in touch with me as a direct result). Finally the reaction of the server including the lack of people to jump on the bandwagon with their perceived slights, leaves me to believe that all in all our interactions with our server mates have been fairly strong.

Damage Control: When all is said and done, there isn't a lot of damage control to be done. Should the thread continue, I may need to re-evaluate, but I feel like in it's current state this has been more of a nuisance than anything else.

Int vs mp5: a lazy post

2008-05-06T15:05:00.008-04:00

I'm feeling lazy, but also feeling the need to update. I've decided to cater to both by sharing some healer math I posted in response to a friend rank guild member's question in our guild forums.

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Question: "Healers in general, but specifically for paladins (as we have other perks to int) What is the perception on mp5 versus mana pool? Is a weak mana pool ok with enough mp5, or vice versa a huge mana pool ok with lower mp5?
I'm worried I might have stacked too much mp5 and sacrificed some of my overall mana pool. My mana and mp5 stats should be in my signature, i can regem to get my int up higher, but I'd lose some mp5 in the process. Not to mention one of my rings has zero stats on it, and desperately needs to be upgraded.
But yea, anyone have some advice on mana pool vs mp5? "

Long nerdy AuzAnswer(tm): "The significance of a large mana pool is relative to the length of the fight. I did my calculations based on a 10 minute fight which I've found to be the average length for a NEW boss fight (I emphasis new because as a boss fight becomes farmed the time it takes to down it shortens). For a 10 minute fight 1 mp5 is equal to 8 int. (I'd like to add a caveat that this is for MANA REGEN only.)

Ooo look math:
1 int = 15 mana
8 * 15 = 120 mana

1 minute = 60 seconds
60 * 10 = 600 seconds
600/5 (mana per 5 seconds) = 120 ticks
120 ticks * 1 mana = 120 mana

So in 10 minutes 1 mp5 gains you 120 mana or 8 int gives you 120 mana to start the fight with. As you can see from the math portion, the shorter the average fight you experience the more important int becomes relative to mana regen.

In addition 80 int = 1% spell crit (NOTE: I'm certain this is true for PRIESTS, I haven't done all my fact checking for other mana users, honestly I just care more about priest minutia than other classes) I know that as a Pally you get 60% mana back for a spell that crits. So you can 1/800 * .6 * average total mana you use per fight and add that to the total mana you gain via int. (To be honest this number will probably be small enough to discount.)

Other considerations:
Blessing of Kings will multiply your int by 1.1 giving it a greater yield in comparison to mp5 which does not scale with Kings. This changes the ratio of a 10 minute fight to 7.27 int = 1 mp5, but this is only when you have Kings active.

When you get to a ridiculously small mana pool, the mana gained is too slow to meet up with your usage curve. (Remember 1mp5 is given out 1 mana point at a time) For 5 mans this is probably evident with mana pools below 6k and in raids below 8k but I've never seen gear allow you to drop below this pool unless you're making an effort to avoid int)

If you use spirit, which as a pallidan you don't, int also raises the amount of regen each point of spirit provides you. Given your small spirit score it's not worth calculating.

5 man fights and 10 man fights tend to be 6 minutes or less, I won't redo the math for you but you can see this will skew your ratio more heavily in favor of int.

Mods:
If you want help gaining the assumed statistics I used, I reccomend RegenFu (if you use Fubar) it will post your total mana regen and the length of the fight after each combat in it's display.

Caster Weapon Swapper also does the same thing (and switches weapons for Spellsurge procs automatically!) only it reports in to your chat window.

Healpoints is a stand alone mod that will allow you to theorycraft changes to your stats and how they will affect your healing per second as well as your endurance (how long you can heal before you go OOM) Maybe if I get bored I'll make a Healpoints theorycrafting guide.

/nerdmode off

{Name removed to protect the guilty} will tell you to maintain a 9.5 - 10k mana pool and ignore my nerd math, {Name removed to protect the fanatic} will tell you "FUCK REGEN" and request that you hit 14k mana by tomorrow"
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So that's my lazy post idea. Also now that I've discovered people actually read this stuff, if you have your own questions feel free to post them and maybe when I'm feeling less lazy I'll provide an AuzAnswer(tm).

Kalegos and wow comments!

2008-04-30T13:30:00.008-04:00

When we first started this guild I was trying to figure out how to measure success in raiding. It seems to me that relative progression is dependent on other people and therefore a poor indicator especially given our late start. With this in mind, I decided I'd measure success on if I thought we were capable of killing a boss with the experience and gear we currently had. We have Kalecgos to 14% and I think we should have killed him last week; but we didn't. So I've spent a large portion of the past 3 or 4 days figuring out why. Since this research took me away from blogging for a bit, I figured I'd try and make it up to you by documenting "Auz's OMG Why Haven't We Killed This Yet" strategies and analysis tools.

Let me preface this by stating my perceived credentials AND lack of credentials - I am not a raid strategist. If I were a raid strategist I might do this differently. I do believe I have an excellent understanding of raid healing and healing teams and that this understanding is in some ways linked to a fairly good understanding of tanking (though I'm a terrible tank) but when it comes to DPS and what to CC for the trash etc, it's just not my thing. Thankfully I have an amazing raid leader in my employ to do those things for me and let me do "the healing thing." I also have 6 years of statistical analysis under my belt and I'm not afraid to confuse you with it.

So for me the first step was to limit myself to my strengths and go find someone to look over the DPS for ways to strengthen that. Sure I could poke my head in the DPS numbers, but I know my lack of experience and understanding will just make me look like an idiot. So I started with asking my amazing raid leader AND my amazing fury warrior what they thought of the DPS. Their feedback bore out what I was seeing too, that the DPS is not currently what is keeping us from winning this fight. With that in mind, I still asked them to look over their DPSers for any improvements they can make in anticipation of Brutalus and because despite some boss mechanics being designed to challenge one aspect or another of a raid, all raid roles can help compensate for each other. I also asked them for their perspective on the tanking and healing regarding threat generation and early DPS deaths. I learned that threat gen was fine and the few early DPS deaths we'd had were mostly avoidable by those DPSers.

So with the concerns of the DPS heard and knowing the DPS was in more capable hands than mine, I shifted to what is my focus, healing. Before we continue, I'd like to take a moment of silence to mourn the lose of my Assessment death reports to the combat log changes and point others who share my woes to GrimReaper (from WoWAce.com) as the only semi working in-game death report mod I've found since 2.4. For "what went wrong" from a healing perspective, a death reporting mod is the quickest way to find out why a tank died. That being said, I had no such tool for our Kalecgos attempts, so I started by crawling through our WWS logs and manually finding tank deaths. Hours later I emerged from my hole muttering about demons, dragons and looking for Advil. I also had a sheet of paper noting the first tank that died for each of our attempts, what healers were in that tank's side, what spells they were casting, what damage the boss was doing to the tank, and what tricks if any the tank has used to aid in his survival. I promptly put that list down and took a break.

Once I'd recovered my will to look at Kalecgos information again, I started drawing conclusions from the information I'd gathered. We were taking 9 healers to this fight. 3-4 Shaman, 2-3 Priests, 1 druid and 2 Pallys. We were using either 4 shaman, or 3 shaman and 1 priest for raid healing and the rest as tank healers. I noted the following things seemed to be true for most of our tank deaths: healers were in the process of being ported from one side to the other, our druid was on the tank side or pallyA was on the tank side. I noted that PallyA was mostly casting Flash of Light. I noted that our druid was pretty much exclusively casting Lifeblooms. I noted that my healers that typically cast big heals were generally on the other side when tanks died. And I discovered one of our tanks was not making any attempts to save himself.

Okay Auz good job, have a cookie! Nope not done yet. I'd figured out how we were not killing it, but now it was time to figure out what guilds that are killing it are doing. So I went WWS hopping. If you don't know how to do this, just go to their site and browse by boss. The first thing I did was pop over to damage in and see how many tanks they are using. Since my illustrious raid strategy dude pulled together a 3 tank rotation I decided to ignore the 2 and 4 tank reports I saw. It seems counterintuitive to teach my raiders a new rotation strat this late in the game.

So I found 3 reports from different guilds that used three tanks. I took a look at the damage in and found something odd. For 2 of the 3 fights the damage the tanks were taking was 20% lower than our tanks. Looking deeper I found that our tanks were taking an average of 300 more damage per hit than those 2 sets of tanks and it seemed they were dodging more attacks than my tanks. These fights also lasted about a minute longer than our best attempt. I wrote this down on my paper and looked into the other one. On this one the tanks were taking slightly more damage than our tanks so this looked promising to me, what could these marvelous healers be doing? It turns out that guild took 10 healers and 3 shadow priests who were healing a large amount with their VT. Note to self: Bring more shadow priests! I also noted with pride that our DPSers kicked the shit out of the other guild's DPSers and it made me proud. (I might need a bumper sticker or something)

So my end notes came out thusly:

Tell druid more direct heals or pair a direct healer with him.
Tell PallyA to use holy light.
Ask for shadow priests to help raid heal, freeing more healers for tanks.
Ask MT if he and other tanks are wearing avoidance or mitigation gear, ask about important tanking pieces our tanks might be missing - see about loot counsel assigning those piece to the tanks if needed.
Make armor pots for tanks to be used on healer transitions (thanks fury warrior of awesomeness for the idea!)
Speak to illustrious raid leader about other ways we can help boost our tanks mitigation.
Personal note, I'd like my 4 piece set bonus.
Blog about this process, maybe it'll help someone else.

Lastly, holy jeebus people commented on my blog! I wasn't really aware anyone else read it. Thanks Coriel for the link and thanks for the kind words guys! For the one that asked about the book, it's a general "leading a guild requires the following tasks" book. It covers things like recruiting, websites, voice communication, leadership structures, loot distribution methods, choosing officers, etc. Thus far, it has 13 chapters, 5 of which are written in a readable format and 8 of which are notes scribbled in an outline format. I've found one editor who's interested publishing the book when it's completed but we haven't formalized a contract yet (I have to finish it first!) I'm trying very hard to make it a general reference and leave most of my opinionated leadership philosophies out of it. The idea is that the book will help you think about how to accomplish the common tasks guild leaders face rather than be a lecture on how I lead a guild, kinda like a becoming a GM handbook. (I know I wished such a thing existed when I started guild leading!) I'm sure as I come closer to finishing it or it's closer to publishing, I'll blog about it more.

Blancing the spectrum

2008-04-16T00:31:00.002-04:00

Every guild has an identity and goals. It's what draws people to your guild over another. But, even within a guild there's a spectrum. No matter how "hardcore" your guild is there is someone who is the most hardcore and someone who is the least hardcore. No matter how talented your guild is, someone out there is the most talented and someone is the least talented.

My job is to bridge the gap. How do I keep my hardest core and least skilled player working together? How do I drive policy and raid nights to cater to the majority while still keeping both my most skilled and least skilled players involved?

Some of this is self regulating, your worst players either realize they can't hang with your guild and get better or find a guild that is more their speed, or if they are a detriment and don't realize it, are removed. Your best players either work to better their peers, or they find a guild more progressed and leave (A credit to our guild, this hasn't happened to us yet). But in someways the nature of a guild's mechanics help to narrow the gap. But even with that self regulation, the gap will always exist, and no matter how narrow the gap becomes, it will feel huge to the people on the far ends of it.

I won't say I have the answer, but I've picked up a few tricks that I think help the process.

1) Know your raiders - I know, there's like 30-40 of them and one of you, but it's really not that hard. When you first recruit your raider set aside 20 to 30 minutes to talk to them. Make sure you do it in their first week. The key thing points you want to make and get are: Where do they fall in your spectrum? What do they want out of being a part of your guild? What are their initial impressions? And make sure they feel like they can approach you. About a month after recruitment, touch base again. Here you just want to get their impressions and remind them you are available. After that touching base can be much more low key. I try and pick one raider a night and at some point just touch base and just say "hi." By going to them, you create an opportunity for them to talk to you about whatever is on their mind without them having to work up the courage to talk to you or worry about bothering you.

2) Be open to feedback - Receiving honest communication from a raider is a gift, even if you don't like what the raider has to say. When a raider comes to you with something on their mind, they are creating an opportunity for you. If you make them feel like they aren't being heard, or worse derive them for their opinions, you ensure they won't give you another. It takes an experienced ear to know if a raider's problem is sign of larger discontentment that may be shared with other raiders, a sign that raider has just had a bad day, or perhaps an indication that that raider may need to get over it or find a new home. Regardless of the nature of the feedback or what you do with it, coming to you is a sign of respect and a request for help.

3) Be honest - If you've identified a raider that's on one end of the spectrum or the other, be honest with them. I tell my raiders that I appreciate what they are feeling, but this is a guild of 30-40 other people who all have different needs and their needs aren't shared with the majority. I'm honest about what may change and what will not. If a raider is on the lower end of the skill spectrum I'll tell them that they are most likely not going to get in for new content nights unless I don't have another option, but that there is still a place for them in our guild and in our raids. Often times I've been able to take my guild into new content because those "bench" players have been there when a "starter" is sick or on vacation. When those times occur I am quick to thank my "bench" player and remind them that this is why they are important to my guild. On the other end of the spectrum, I listen to the needs and desires of my highly skilled or hardcore players and try to accommodate what I can without disenfranchising the other players. I try to give them the recognition they deserve and remind them of why we need some of our weaker players. More than change, I think most of these end of the spectrum raiders need to know their needs are understood and need someone to help manage their expectations.

4) Don't be accusatory - Just because someone may not fit the average need of your guild, doesn't mean what they need or want isn't valid. No matter how foreign their needs/wants may seem to you, it's their $15 and it's their free time. Don't make them feel bad for wanting to spend it differently than you do. If their wants/needs are irreconcilable from the guild's it's in your and their best interest to tell them you don't think they'll find what they are looking for in your guild, but try not to make them feel bad for trying to find it. Remember in someone else's eyes you're either a "scrub" or a "freak with no life."

These solutions may not work for you or your guild, but it's been my experience that they help minimize the drama and they work for my leadership style. I think in the end no matter how much people want to say that the driving factor for people playing this game is the loot, they have missed the mark. I think the driving factor for people playing this game is a sense of accomplishment and a sense of being an important part of a community that shares their values. If you measure that accomplishment in loot, mounts, non-combat pets or the number of people on your server that know your name, we're all just here to have fun with friends.

Play the game you have

2008-04-04T11:59:00.002-04:00

I've been blog surfing lately, to see what other WoW bloggers are discussing. One almost universal thing I've hit upon is that everyone seems to be blogging about what is wrong with WoW, what they'd like to see added or removed from the game. As a long time MMORPG player, I can tell you that I have a laundry list of things that I think could be done to improve WoW. You aren't going to see that laundry list here.

Blizzard developers aren't wandering by my blog to see what I think about game mechanics and how much I want a little instanced house of my own. Blizzard has a suggestions/feedback forum, and, while the CM presence on WoW forums leaves much to be desired, it's your best chance of being heard by someone who can make a difference.

I find bitching into the wind to be a waste of time. As players we need to realize that Blizzard is making decisions that give them the largest profit margin. They are making decisions that make their game accessible to the lowest common denominator. It's what they should do, that's capitalism. You time would be better spent, and you would be a happier person, if you just figured out how to best operate within the game mechanics.

Your class has been nerfed to oblivion, roll a new class, or figure out how to work around it. Last night my guild had the following classes on top of the dps meter at one point last night, Enhancement Shaman, Fury Warrior, Ret Pallidan. But Auz, Enhancment Shaman is a support class! Yeah, tell that to my enchancement shaman, cause he's putting his mace in your face. But Auz, Ret Pallies aren't worth a raid slot! Mine is. But Auz, don't you have rogues, Why yes, yes we do. To be fair, this was one snapshot in a raid with many factors that I didn't explain, but I'm willing to bet it's a snapshot that doesn't happen often. Most players have accepted their class is a support class and they aren't competing on the damage meters. My guys, well you can't tell them to go sit in their support corner, it only makes them fight harder.

Blizzard makes it hard to be nice and progress in raids. Yeah, it is hard, but if it's worth it to you, you can make it happen. As you can tell in my previous post, we do struggle to maintain a balance, but the fact is, we maintain that balance. Something that's worth doing, is worth doing even if it's hard. Furthermore, "nice" isn't something legislated in game mechanics. It's about respect and dignity. Sure Blizzard doesn't reward these things in game, but they have their own intrinsic rewards. My guild does kick ass, and it does it with the kind of people I WANT to be spending 20 hours a week with. I'm a very happy raider. Blizzard didn't give that to me, I did.

People should help each other in WoW. Some people are helpful some people aren't. You're not struggling against Blizzard here, you're struggling against human nature. Did you sleep in a nice warm bed last night and is your tummy full of good food while you read this? Someone else in your city slept outside last night, and is hungry right now. Do you help them? As human beings we're just wired not to care about what we don't see, and not to care as much about strangers as we do about people who are close to us. It takes effort to see and care about the needs of others. This is going to show itself in our leisure time activities just as poignantly as it does in real life.

So that's my rant. It's probably also a waste of time, because I doubt the other Bloggers are reading my blog any more than the game developers are reading theirs. What can I say, this hypocrite suit brings out my eyes.

Refocusing for Sunwell

2008-04-01T12:30:00.005-04:00

The advent of Sunwell has unsettled the raiding scene on Medivh, the number one progression guild on our server has collapsed and a new raiding guild has appeared on the scene. With new content on the horizon, my co-gm, officers and I find ourselves with the need to re-focus as we prepare to enter and conquer Sunwell.

When we formed up we knew we wanted to be an end game raiding guild. We defined the raiding commitment we required from our raiders. We defined our loot system, our member expectations, how we distribute our resources and picked our officers. Somewhere along the way we went from just trying to get ourselves established and organized to being one of the well respected guilds on the server. In that transition we stopped focusing so much on where we were going and settled into a routine.

Our biggest challenge is that with about 4 months of BT/Hyjal raiding and only one week of a full clear of both, we are slightly under the gear tuning for Sunwell content. Our current loot system as been serviceable for our 9 months, but really does a nice job of distributing loot fairly equally among our raiders. Some officers and members are in favor of ensuring we do more to gear up our main tank and maybe a few other of our highest level attenders to allow us to catch the gear gap for Sunwell more easily. This and a few other suggested changes, are causing us to question, how far is too far to go to ensure rapid progress.

Our raiding guild isn't like the stereotypical raiding guild. Anyone who has read my other posts, knows how much I focus on the humanity of my raiders. I believe in loyalty and I know the best way to get respect is to give it. When my co-gm and I created this guild, we sat down and talked long and hard about what we wanted it to be and how we wanted it to differ from other raiding guilds. One thing that has never changed is that we want to carry ourselves and treat our raiders and server mates with dignity and kindness.

It's become readily apparent that in addition to having fostered the environment we wanted, we've also gathered a collection of highly skilled players, who are capable of doing more than we have. Some of this can be attributed to our late start to TBC raiding, but some of it is also, that in an effort to be fair and keep all of our members involved in this guild, we are spreading resources equitably, but not always where they will have the largest impact in our raiding success.

The reason we've stood behind this policy is that my co-gm and I believe having a strong bench is what's allowed us to have nearly uninterrupted raiding for 9 months. (We took a week off for Christmas and one night for the Super Bowl) but now, I'm coming to question if this is the best direction for our guild.

While it can be unsettling as a leader to stop and examine something that has been a part of our guild since the beginning, I believe that continuing something because "it's what we've always done" leads to stagnation. Every good leader needs to take a moment every now and again and examine where they are leading their guild and how the needs of their guild have changed. Regardless of what we decide, I'm certain my guild and it's leadership will be stronger because we've taken the time to examine what would otherwise be routine.