Today, I had a discussion with a friend who is in a raiding guild, about a guild policy that they had. Their policy, as I gathered from my friend’s words and my own observation, is as follows:

On any and all raids, progression and farm alike, you may be pulled out of the raid for any boss, if the leaders feel they do not need your specific role or class at that moment. This might be for the rest of the instance, or just a few bosses, you may not be told anything definite. It might be a hardmode or normal, it might even be something you could have steamrolled in your current setup.

The policy seems to be that if there is a better option, that better option will be utilized, regardless of whether it is needed to beat the encounter. My friend spoke of this as if it was perfectly natural. (He did casually mention that if you kept signing up and were “very good”, eventually they would stop replacing you, perhaps assuming that this made it all okay. I inferred that “very good” should also refer to the state of your relationship with the people in charge.)

The other day, while I was “helping” this guild on a farm raid, I kept noticing that every boss attempt, a few people would hearth out or log off, and some new people would be summoned in. Knowing that the guild had problems with attendance, I had just assumed those people were filling in spots until the latecomers arrived, or maybe they were alts just helping, or maybe some of them had irl issues and had to go.

I was astonished when I realised it hadn’t been just those. Some of those people were simply being removed, because there was a better option online to beat an encounter they had on farm. Maybe they would be invited back, maybe they would not.

When I said that I could never commit four hours a day, three or four times a week, to raiding, knowing that I could be sat out on any content for an unknown amount of time if a better option came up, my friend responded “With this attitude, how will you find a better guild? I have been in many guilds, and most of them had this policy. You will not be able to get into any guild thinking like this.” He added, “If I am left out, I just go PVP and earn DKP by not even being in the raid. I don’t see why it is such a big deal.”

“Barring the fact that you set aside this time to raid, with an implied promise by the guild that you were being invited to raid – and now you’re spending it PVPing just in case you are needed again, when the boss would have been just as dead with you there?” I wanted to respond, but somehow managed to hold my tongue. He is rather protective of his guild.

I, of course, acknowledge that this policy and similar policies have a place. In an extremely high-end guild, or on progression content, or on farm content that is not manageable with the current setup. (Even on progression content, I know of many guilds who would rather make it work with the people who have signed up and stuck with the raid through the wipes, than bring in new people, but I digress.)

The guild in question is middle of the road by the server standards. Which was the reason why I looked into them to begin with, and which was the reason why this policy was a big surprise.

If an encounter is otherwise not defeatable, sitting out isn’t just selfless, it’s the only option. This situation comes up in every raiding guild. It is completely understandable. However, if people are frequently requested to sit out to obtain optimal makeup through content where the guild is beyond needing it – it really scares me that I’m seemingly the only person who has a problem with this.

If we take a general look, many guilds expect that you will fully dedicate yourself to the guild, and maintain this loyalty. You will be expected to keep certain attendance requirements, turn up on time repaired with needed consumables, read up on strategies, contribute to the guild bank, and various other rules that are laid down by the guild. It is all for “the guild”, this faceless entity that demands your time, effort and respect.

What most of these faceless entities don’t realise is that this is a two-way street. The guild and its members enter into an agreement, and both sides make implied promises to each other.

If members will be loyal to the guild and its aim, a good guild in turn is expected to be loyal to its members, and not just those who are favored by the GM and officers. If the members provide for the guild bank, the bank needs to provide for them. If members turn up when the raid is due to start, they expect that the raid is started on time, and ends on time. It should not only be the individual members that are expected to fulfill the promises they made when they filled out the application form.

I was in a 40 man raiding guild for roughly a year during vanilla. This was a guild that raided seven days a week, and had strict attendance requirements. Expectations from members, in attitude and skill, were high. You had to be punctual, you had to play well, you had to have read strategies and had to be able to follow commands. You were expected to have the best gear you could have outside of raids before you were even considered for a raid spot. Leaving before the raid was called was absolutely unheard of, being late always cost you DKP and a raid spot.

In return, the members knew that the guild would not just be a guild, it would be a true home for them. Most members knew each other very well and greeted each other by their real names. New babies, weddings, engagements were celebrated together. The camaraderie was encouraged by the guild leaders, who themselves were very close friends.

Loyal members who had to go on extended breaks always came back to the raid spots they left, even if that meant the guild would have to go with one or two less or a class for some time. We had a longtime member who had to be away for very long periods every summer. Everytime he came back he would promptly start signing to raids, and he would still be welcome with his old rank, in his old spot, as if he never left. He had stuck by the guild during rough times, and the guild was returning the favor.

My guild had an enhancement shaman. With a Sulfuras, which was awarded to him by the same guild. (You must realise that during vanilla WOW, a raiding enhancement shaman was more of a rarity than the actual legendary.) We even had a second one. We had an elemental one, too. We had a demonology warlock. We had arms and fury warriors. All of these were specs that no sane raiding guild would recruit at the time, yet my guild had them on their roster – the leaders being of the mind that the person behind the character is much more important than the character itself.

In exchange for the required donations to the bank, we got flasks, high end enchanting materials, and various recipes upon request. We were always required to do the best we could, on our own, nothing less was expected – but when we couldn’t, the guild bank was there to help.

Raid signups were on the website every week for the entire week. We would be expected to only sign for raids we were absolutely sure we could make, as soon as we humanly could. In exchange, lineups were often finalized one day in advance, at the latest a couple of hours before the raid – our leadership realised that those who were not chosen would want to know ahead of time so that they could plan their night differently. Those who sat out were not expected to be present at raid time. Notes of who had to sit out were kept, to ensure the rotation was fair.

I come from a guild culture like this. A guild where the members obeyed the rules laid out and made everything run smoothly. In exchange, we got more than a raid every night – we got an atmosphere where we were respected and loved as individuals and treated fairly. We had a 40-man raiding guild where the majority of the members were in harmony, and those that weren’t didn’t last long anyway.

My guild was not a nameless, faceless entity – it was the quiet rogue I lent some Greater Eternals to, it was my arrogant, talented demo warlock friend, it was the amazingly skilled mage officer who got our first 8/8 T2. It was the boisterous hunter with the Scottish accent, the bouncy Pakistani shaman, and the French mother of one. My guild was those people whose company I genuinely enjoyed, and those I meant something to as a person.

The guild was not perfect, but the basic premise was simple: Give effort and respect, and get effort and respect in return, no matter what your position in the guild.

In this case, again, it is all about respect. I found the guild’s attitude towards its members extremely disrespectful. If I commit my time and effort to raiding, I would like to know in advance whether I’m in or out. If I have to sit out for a boss once in a while because the encounter is undefeatable otherwise, no problem. Just let me know when I will be needed back. Doing it any other way implies that the members’ time is somehow not valuable.

I can’t imagine agreeing to all these conditions that everyone who plays the game and deems themselves fit to raid agree to. I can’t think of myself in yet another guild, fulfilling my end of the agreement, with the guild barely attempting to fulfill theirs. I can’t fathom being in a guild where I’m just another priest who’s expendable if something better happens to log on, damn the loyalty I’ve shown.

But most of all, I could not understand my friend’s matter of fact demeanor, the way he looked down on me when he said “With this attitude, how will you find a better guild?”. Is this really the norm? Is this really what the current raiding scene is like? Shall I just give up and throw in the towel, because I will never find a guild “with this kind of attitude” – because apparently, having expectations from your guild besides “ok, kill these bosses and gief me epix” is not acceptable? Why is it that most guilds etch their requirements into the brains of their members but don’t bother to treat them as something slightly more valuable than dirt?

When I join a guild, I am willing to not only offer my services as a priest or a druid, but also respect, dedication, loyalty, maturity, understanding and friendship. These things are what many guilds out there claim they look for, and what every truly good player should be able to provide. And any guild, if they aspire to be a truly good guild, should perhaps consider that the price tags on such things are not simply a few epics, but much, much more.

Seriously. Quit your bitching. Spirit benefits all clothie casters right now. MP5 benefits mages marginally, priests more so, warlocks not at all. That means most cloth gear with spellpower is gear wanted by all three of said classes. No, that offhand isn’t only a healing offhand just because it has spirit on it. No, calling me a retard because I pointed out the talents/skills which benefit clothies from spirit does not help your cause.

I know how you felt like your life was in mortal danger because you had a mob on you for .002 seconds and absolutely needed to fear, right into the other group. Which resulted in a 7 mob pull, which by some grace of Elune we survived, so next pull you had to do it all over again, which we didn’t survive. \o/ Although the best bit was when we survived the first pull, and you patted yourself in the back with “Wow that was some great healing!” instead of “Whoops, sorry for the fear”.

Don’t Shield before pulls. I know you feel it’s a great idea, but it really isn’t, because I won’t be able to generate rage, and the mob will again lunge for you, at which point you will fear and we will pull the next group again. Seriously. Priest 101. Don’t fail it.

Don’t HoT during LoS pulls. Again, Priest 101. I AM NOT EVEN TAKING DAMAGE.

When we wipe because you were retarded, “lol” is not the right thing to say. That wasn’t amusing. That was just absolutely idiotic. Preferably say sorry and shut up.

<3,

Luminaria.

On unrelated news:

I got kicked from Distortion because among other things, I pointed out that the guild leader is a loot whore (which I got flamed to death for). A couple of days after said gkick the guild leader is made to step down from guild/raid leading, because, hear this, he ninjaed the sword from KT25.

The sad bit?

He’s still in the guild, the guild thus giving the message that they really don’t mind if any of their members is a ninja.

Understandably, my only regret is that I didn’t get 5/5 T7 and the KT mace before being kicked.

Risking bitching, there were so many things wrong with Distortion, I don’t know where to start. Raids were usually scheduled a couple of hours before raid time (”Everyone knows there is a raid every night!”), they usually started 45 minutes to an hour late (”I can’t help if people log on late”), raids ran at least an hour past the end time (”You don’t even have to stay, stop bitching”), you could point out the DKP loss that you’d suffer but again, you’d be bitching and being told that DKP doesn’t matter (slight irony there), at some point someone was impersonating me on Vent and saying all sorts of stuff to people which the guild leader did absolutely nothing about (”Fuck off man, what can I do about it”), and it went on and on in this vein.

Although I still think the funniest was the mage who told the resident feral that he should ditch his Maul glyph and get something more useful, because *gasp* the Maul glyph was breaking his sheeps. “Something useful”, he said. “Like the Rake glyph. It’s awesome.”

No I swear, he seriously said this. I’m still facepalming.

So these days we’re looking for a new server.

Pretty much tired of the low-popness of Haomarush and every bad thing that comes with it – zero PuGs available, especially for normal instances, on any given moment there are maybe 3-4 people on the LFG tool (I have yet another rant about how availability of gear from honor plus no further need for rep for heroics killed normal instances, but anyway), perpetual tank shortage (tired of having to spec Roch to prot everytime I want some badges, and my non-tank chars might as well give up unless I manage to get stuff together with friends), a pretty inactive economy especially for certain professions.

As far as PvE progress goes, it’s pretty bad. We had a single Horde guild who had downed Illidan, and a couple who downed him on Alliance side, but that single Horde guild and some of the Alliance guilds very recently migrated. Choices are very limited if you want a stable raiding guild with decent progress – Horde side there are maybe 2 guilds to apply to, beyond that you’re screwed. We’re one of the very few EU servers who still hasn’t completely unlocked the Isle.

And last but not least, we’re in a horrible battlegroup.

Okay, so this doesn’t have anything to do with the population issue – but if the realm wasn’t so bad, the battlegroup would have been bearable. As it is, I just want to get out of this battlegroup. Our problem is that Alliance heavily outnumbers Horde – this results in most matches aside from AV starting with numbers like 5vs10, 3vs15, etc, in favor of Alliance.

It’s gotten to the point where it’s silly to even put up a fight, especially in BGs like AB or EOTS where it’s hard to close the resource gap once it’s been widened. By the time Horde has filled up their team, Alliance has likely 4-5 capped, 1000 resources ahead, and is HK farming at the starting area. Most Horde at this point just /sigh, stop ressing, and resign to their single mark and 0 honor. I’d really love a battlegroup where I actually stand a 50/50 chance of winning upon entering a battleground, rather than “instaloss, here is your single mark, /shoo to AV nao”.

So our ideal server would more than likely be:

1. A PvP server. Because I’d like to have the option to transfer back, plus I don’t think I could live without random world PvP on a carebear server.

2. Medium to high populated, but not full. We want a healthy population and a healthy amount of activity, but queues to even log on and quest areas so cramped that it takes years to complete a quest are a big no-no.

3. Preferably no concentration of a certain nationality. Not sure how big of a problem this is on US servers, but on EU servers it is a big problem – to the point that not belonging to a certain national group can hamper your chances of ever getting in a PuG/guild. Haomarush is predominantly Swedish, to the point that they are now the butt of many jokes due to the constant “hi swe????” whispers from random lowbies needing boosts or money. So… a homogeneous server population please.

4. Decent PvE progress – ie at least a couple of guilds on each side who kill Illidan on a regular basis and a few more who are working on it. This pretty much ensures a healthy economy as well.

5. A good battlegroup. By good I don’t necessarily mean a competitive one that churns out super high rated teams like mad – just one in which the queues are decent and one side isn’t overpopulated. Starting a match in equal numbers would be nice.

On another note, random PVP thoughts as usual:

Ban defending Galv. Seriously. Alliance is smart enough that once they realise Galv is off limits this match they move on to towers, while the “defenders” at Galv are shooting the shit in /bg about how awesome they are. Result, the entire map is blue, but it’s okay, Galv is alive lolz!!!11 Btw, more people to north :D:D:D

I am not amused about how easy it is for Alliance to win AV nowadays, amazing what a little QQ can do.

7k honor short for my first S1 piece that I’m getting because I’ve pretty much got nothing else to get and it’s a nice PvE upgrade as well. Defender tokens are in demand at the moment in the guild too, as the current alt situation shows, so it’s a good idea to have another out prepared.

I could save honor for the mini Last Stand trinket (which would also be a PvE upgrade because Starlet’s trinkets suck) but 30k honor is QQ, I could save honor and marks to immediately grab the belt and necklace as soon as S4 hits but we haven’t got the 2 week warning yet. And I hate “saving” honor. If I have honor, I must spend it nao in true girl fashion.Plus, it’s really not fun to keep grinding BGs in gimp gear.

Ugh, as soon as S4 hits I’ll need to regrind nonset epics for Elysiane as well, since she has the S2 ones… really not looking forward to it.

Lose is not spelled loose, and wipe is not spelled whipe. God. We even had a guild called Whipe. I cringed everytime I saw the guild name.

The honor grind… is soulsucking.

No really.

I think my paladin was about the only class I ever really enjoyed it with – WSG flagdefending with Sareya was fun, but it only went too far. I loved every battleground with Rochalie, especially when I had Zilli running with me. But now I _have_ to do it across five level 70s if I have any hope of remaining competitive, and this kills me.

I grinded out some offspec stuff for Ely and Kali a few weeks back. I took a liking to PvPing as shadow and it went pretty well, likewise for my new love for elemental. But now Starlet is 70 and all those need to take a back burner if I ever hope to get her geared for small bracket healing.

Speaking of Starlet, well, it’s not half bad being a druid. I love the mobility (remember, I swapped over from playing a paladin) but my HPS output is horrible with only about 1k healing, and I don’t know if it’s my gear but I go OOM painfully fast. I’ve never had regen problems on any of my previous characters, so this quite bugs me. Will just wait to see if it improves with gear. Did do a Karazhan though (yes, I got carried) and buffed to the teeth it wasn’t THAT bad.

The next Alliance to whine about how AV map favors Horde will eat a Hammer of This Really Fking Hurts to the face. No archers to deal with – check, FW Keep only missing its red carpet – check, Galv/IB/TP on a neat straight line to FW Keep – check. If you can’t win, it’s not our fault you suck, really.

Horde actually _have to_ defend if they have a hope of winning, because due to archers and NPCs it takes significantly longer for towers to get capped. So in a straight out rushfest Horde will lose the majority of the time. Plus, some classes can’t solo cap towers as Horde whereas every Alliance class is capable of going through a ten second channel, conveniently uninterrupted by NPCs.

After only two days I’ve given up on flag carrying in WSG. Bringing the flag all the way to our base solo, watching half the team HK farm in the middle, then getting owned by the recap team they send because no one can be bothered to help out the FC, good stuff.

AB is even worse, horrible honor/hour plus the chance to lose on this battlegroup is massive considering Horde always starts 8 vs 15 if not less. By the time we’ve filled up the team Alliance has likely 5-capped and is HK farming in Defiler’s Den. Although that would be the merciful end to the match, don’t get me started about the 3-2 node holding, half hour matches.

At least I outfitted Starlet with a pair of rings and a trinket so far (also makes me wince to see someone all decked out in full S1/nonset epics but no PvP trinket). Going for the bracers next, then probably neck –> boots –> belt. It’s a wise idea to grind the S2 PvP ring now if you want to double it with the S3 one, seeing next season rings will have an arena rating requirement.

Having some trouble with a guildie who basically believes all of his alts are entitled to being carried through content – he pretty much just levels them up, signs them for a couple of Karazhans with fresh Netherstorm greens, gets all the loot and badges and moves on to a new character to level.

Horrible thing is that he has all those characters, and he has not learned to play endgame with a single one of them. Is his warlock in the raid? Forget about any Soulstones being cast unless you verbally remind him every so often, and you’re better off not assigning this guy to do anything but straight out uncomplicated DPS. Any CC he takes on is sure to break, he deliberately does not use focus macros (”It’s just not my thing”), clicks all of his abilities, puts +7 to all resists enchants on his shoulders because “OMG I have 20 resistance to all spellschools with my racial, sooooooo cool!” and generally gets carried by the rest of the raid. If anyone criticises his gear/playstyle or makes suggestions, he completely laughs them off and dismisses the person.

I usually don’t object and accept that we will be 9manning this raid tonight. He’s got a great personality so he’s loved by a lot of people. He’s sort of the guild mascot etc, and I try to not make a big deal about his inability to play his given characters properly.

Until this past Karazhan.

He’s got his freshly 70 druid all ready to tank the place – it’s appreciated, he put as much work as he could into his tanking gear and with Zilli covering the other tanking spot I’m hoping everything goes well. After all, it’s just Karazhan and pretty much the only boss we need him to properly play on is Netherspite, what could go wrong?

Oh, plenty.

At the small trash packs before Moroes, Zilli is trying to keep them at himself best as he can, and instead of Swiping to help keep the mobs, this guy pops out and starts…. CHANNELING HURRICANE. With about 5 mobs on him. Luckily healers saved the day healing up the real AoEers as well as this guy.

We warn him to not ever pop out of bear when he is tanking and that he needs to focus on keeping the mobs on himself. He just laughs it off, and next group does it again – this time we aren’t quite that lucky and healers start dying to loose mobs, we wipe.

Yep. Wipe. On a trashpack before Moroes.

/facepalm

We’re running a melee heavy Maiden, so this guy is asked to just not go into melee range – heal, Wrath spam, whatever. Halfway through Maiden we find him channeling Tranquility. Untalented, doing about 20-30k worth of healing in 8 seconds. With everyone else Repentance’d. It really is a wonder he pulled no aggro.

Move on to Opera, we got Romeo and Juliet. This guy is supposed to tank Romeo… except not.

Try 1, he faceplants because healing sucked.
Try 2, Romeo starts chasing the DPS as soon as he spawns because he’s too busy shooting the shit on Vent to notice.
Try 3, likewise, except Joey finally gives up and says look, I’ll tank both, you just make something of an effort to pick Romeo up when he pops with Julianne.

By now he’s really getting on my nerves. I mean, someone’s got to explain to this guy that the most fun thing to do is not necessarily the wisest thing to do, sort of like unprotected sex, because by Elune I’m sick of faceplanting every pull.

We move on to the backdoor to take on Nightbane and continue with Curator from there. He’s supposed to be tanking those really hard-hitting ghosts. Who also happen to do a 3-4k Cone of Cold, so I tell him, turn the ghosts away from the raid (and preferably don’t tank them in the middle of a raid). 10 seconds later we have all collectively eaten a CoC to the face. I guess it’s a bit hard to position mobs when you are keyturning and clicking Mangle etc.

So I go “What’s so challenging about turn it away from the raid?” and he completely blows. Basically, I’m spoiled, I’m an ignorant little girl, I have no right to be talking to him that way, I owe him an apology, etc. Rota, our GM, chimes in with “You need to be more accepting of criticism” and that makes him launch into yet another tirade about how I need my friends to speak for me because I’m guilty.

Then he moves on to roll on Light’s Justice – with two other actual _healers_ competing with him. And wins. (To be fair he did pass the Nightbane staff to Starlet, though.)

Him taking that mace was a kick in the nuts for most of us, since he _might_ go resto someday but we had a shaman and a priest, one of which was already holy and the other awaiting raid end to respec, both of whom would have made much better use of said mace. He still hasn’t decided what spec he wants to be, so he pretty much feels free to roll on anything and everything that drops. Last week he was arguing with one of the other druids over Uni-Mind Headdress, because he might or might not go moonkin in the future, and if he does, he needs “teh gearz”.

Basically, I have no idea how to deal with this guy as the de facto raid leader – being harsh obviously backfires, he dismisses all polite criticism by making jokes about it, he’s a really great person but generally a terribad player. (And “I haven’t done this before” doesn’t really cut it when he’s Violet Eye exalted on half a dozen other chars.) It really bothers me to think that in a clutch we are not able to rely on him to do his job correctly. People really love him and not inviting him to raids isn’t really an option, but sometimes you need to make people understand that by acting a certain way you are wasting 9 other people’s time and resources, no matter how “fun” it might sound at the time you are doing it.

That and I really, really hate loot rules, our entire system is based on trust and one’s ability to discern whether people other than them are in need of the item more. But if it goes this way I might actually need to implement and enforce loot rules, because I really dislike this “I can has for offspec I might or might not spec into one day, even though others with said spec as their primary spec need it more”.

If you want the loot for a specific class role, spec into it and use that spec in raids, so that others will know and act accordingly. I’m sure if his druid was resto no one would have objected to him rolling on the mace, he’d be entitled to the roll same as any other healer present, but this is just wrong. I know for a fact one of our priests felt cheated out of the item, having been the one to heal the entire run.

I’ll wait to see if there is improvement on this week’s raid but I highly doubt it. He’s already in the process of leveling yet another character, and I have no doubt that in a few weeks his shaman will be in Karazhan with us in fresh level 70 greens ready to roll on everything he can use.

My ex-guild’s forums are full of drama these days. It saddens me for a couple of reasons – first off, because most times I get dragged into it. Someone mentions a name and boom, accusations start pouring in. Over four months since my friends and I typed /gquit, and still, some people blame us for everything that went wrong in the guild. They still think we have enough influence to direct what goes on in the guild, from afar.

Secondly, because it shows how much the guild has died, despite the so-called “progress”. We used to be, above raiders, a bunch of friends. Everyone looked out for each other. Everyone was protective of each other. Loot wasn’t the reason to stay in the game, friends were. We had class channels in which lots of funny banter went on, we had an active guild chat, AND we had progress, even if that wasn’t enough for some.

Sure, some of us disliked some of us, but certainly not enough to flame each other on the forums every day. Now I check out the forums… and each and every post I see is either yet another “goodbye, I’m transferring off the realm, thanks for everything” thread (inevitable flames on loot whoring or lots of good wishes follow from this point on depending on how well the person is liked), or yet another flame thread. And I already wrote about the story of the guild master who transferred off pretending he was accepted into Nihilum, making posts complete with fake Illidan kill shots.

What happened to the guild that actually had a spirit, not in words but in actions? What happened to the guild that actually had a fair, unbiased, solid leadership? What happened to friends before epics? What happened to the guild who scrutinized each and every application for weeks before saying yes or no, who actually interviewed its applicants making sure they’d fit in and be happy? (Zilli has a memory of being interviewed for an hour and a half by his class leader before he got an invitation – mine certainly wasn’t that long, but I did get talked to.)

I ask all this… because my guild used to be home. I was in it for a year. Its people were my friends and I wore its tag with pride. I believed in everything my guild supported and represented. And I can’t help but wonder where it went wrong, and whether its people could or should have done something, anything, to fix it.

From leadership that fell into wrong hands, to an ex-GM who stepped down but insisted on keeping full admin access to Ventrilo and forums so he could ban people as he saw fit, to a biased officer council (which one could get on simply by flirting with the GM irl, but that’s another pet peeve entirely), to completely incompetent people being recruited because “we need so and so class for such and such encounter”, to everything being progress focused and those who didn’t adapt said mentality shunned… I think it’s too late to fix all these now, the damage has already been done.

I have friends in the guild who hardly log onto their mains now, because they no longer know anyone in the guild. It went from having very tight rules for recruitment with an extremely low turnover rate, to a guild who loses and gains members by the dozen every week, and makes no attempt to change this, all in the name of progress. PvE progress is everything, people, nothing. Some leave, new ones come in, oldies simply forgotten.

I used to think that my guild was different in that aspect – that’s why I chose that guild, and only that guild, to apply to. If I wanted progress, I had my choices, but I wanted one on the same ethical ground as me and my then-best friend.

I guess this post is just a shout out to what my now ex-guild used to be, and sadness for what they have become – at this rate, with their member base, I don’t see them going anywhere really fast once Lich King hits, perhaps even disbanding. Because the people in it aren’t really in it for what the guild represents but merely the progress. And once the progress levels out, it’s simply too easy to see people leaving for greener pastures. Or purpler pastures, as the case may be.

Rest in peace, PN, my beloved guild. You are missed.

So yesterday in a fit of boredom, I decided to go back to Roch the paladin. Rochalie is my highest level alt among those who are not 70, and it feels like if I just make the push I can get her to Outland.

Now, I’ve always hated paladin leveling. No matter what way I do it, it feels horribly, horribly, horribly time-consuming. Holy? I’ve already grinded enough with a holy priest, thanks very much. Retri – SoC autoattack lol? Granted it’s looking a bit better after the patch now with the changes to Crusader Strike, but it still is every bit as boring as it used to be, plus mana issues even with Wisdom… argh. DO NOT WANT.

And prot, the new leveling spec. Okay so, in the beginning, prot was looking better than retri – many numbers, many mobs, what’s not to love? So I dragged Roch’s skinny elf ass to level 35 asap and went berserk on the DWM murlocs.

Result? After 5 levels of doing nothing but “SoL swing swing, Consecrate swing some more” I stopped liking it in a hurry. Holy Shield made no difference other than “SoL swing swing, Consecrate swing some more, oh look Redoubt procced, Holy Shield swingity swing!” Prot leveling is hard to mix up with questing in my opinion, because single target prot DPS is somehow akin to pulling teeth. And if the quest involves mobs spread apart or are ranged/casters – bye bye efficiency, don’t bother to write.

But if you don’t quest, you sure as hell ain’t getting the good XP or the couple of pieces of gear upgrade. Rochalie is still walking around in a crafted level 25 breastplate. At level 55.

So after level 40, Rochalie leveled in long painful pushes, mostly comprised of boosts by my favorite warrior. (He always jokes that there should be a new rank in the game, Boostmaster. Complete with a tabard.) My primary aim was getting her to 50, where she could max out her jewelcrafting, since my little group of friends needed a resident jewelcrafter. And it is a pretty lucrative profession to boot.

After 50, I don’t know how I did it, but I somehow got her to 53, where she sat for quite a while, being logged on only to prospect/craft for friends and stick gems on the AH. Until yesterday.

After looking at my quest log a bit, and trying to figure out what to do, I decided I didn’t want to complete the Ungoro grind after all, nor did I want to quest. To hell with this, I was going to go back to prot and see if it felt any better with the hordes of undead mobs to grind in WPL.

Some things I found out really fast:

1. DO NOT go to Felstone Field. Most prot leveling guides speak of Felstone Field as THE spot, this is simply not true. There are way, way, way too many casters with an annoying snare (3 Frostbolting skeletons when you are trying to gather a group to AoE ftl). Even if you are outleveling the place, avoid Felstone Field.

2. DO go to Sorrow Hill, even if it is a bit too close to Chillwind Camp for comfort (for Horde, at least), and pretty far away from the Bulwark to boot. All mobs in Sorrow Hill are melee, thus can be comfortably pulled in groups of 5-6. The Ghouls cast an annoying poison that drains mana, so you have to cleanse that as often as you can, but it’s nothing you can’t deal with. In Sorrow Hill, I was regularly doing 8 mob pulls with ease, it really is a good spot (also the human rogue who took ages to kill me with 3 mobs beating on me can QQ more).

3. If you are Horde, oh God… repair fully and make sure you have tons of food and drink before coming out to WPL. The vendors in Bulwark sell fk all, and it’s one hell of a ride back to Undercity.

You may also opt to park a main close by at this point in order to repeatedly dispose of any dumbass who thinks engaging a prot paladin with 500 mobs on her is in any shape or form fair. It’s fun to make arrogant lowbies suffer. Even better if you can get them to bring their own mains.

4. As soon as you hit 54, you can move to Dalson’s Tears, which owns Felstone Field in the face. Again, all mobs are melee, they cast two diseases which you don’t really have to ever cleanse (one of them will interrupt your drinking/eating though, so cleanse that after combat if you like), and they are in tight little groups that respawn fast. I loves me some 10 man pulls, not to mention 500 xp/mob I was getting with rested.

5. Make a macro that announces in /s I am AoE grinding, I am specced and geared to handle many mobs, please do not assist. Because it felt like every passerby had to stop, dismount, and assist me with the group I was killing, even after explaining that I am prot and fully qualified to handle massive mob pulls.

I admire your kindness, dear strangers, but just no. If I’m not getting hit, Redoubt and Reckoning ain’t proccing. If Reckoning ain’t proccing, I ain’t getting my sweet sweet chain SoL procs. If Redoubt ain’t proccing, I ain’t blocking, and thus not dealing any of that sweet sweet holy damage. I have to be hit for this whole concept to work, not to mention, you are stealing my XP by assisting my kills. Thanks for being sweet and lovely, here is a Kings for your trouble, /hug /love /lick, but please move along.

6. When you are in deep excrement, a good combo is bubble/Holy Wrath/bandage. Then resume the pewpew. I don’t like bubble HL HL to get my health back up, since it takes up too much mana for my liking. Bandage is a better option, especially if you like to twink yourself out by maxing First Aid at 50 – you’ll have bandages that easily heal for more than your max health.

7. If you are specced into Ardent Defender, which you should be, you can comfortably hover at 30% health forever while things drop dead around you. It’s fun.

8. Carry potions and bandages. In between bandages, health potions (some people prefer mana potions, but I carry mana oils instead, leveling enchanting on alts ftw), bubble, Lay on Hands and BoP, you should take quite a while to die.

This was quite fun and I really enjoyed the XP, fully rested I was comfortably running 60k+ XP/hour in Dalson’s Tears. I started doing this yesterday night as a new level 53, and this morning Roch dinged 55, probably the two fastest levels of her entire leveling career.

Now I’m considering a Thorium Shield Spike instead of a Mithril one, and Lifestealing on my mainhand to make things go a little faster. Not sure if I want to shell out the cash for Lifestealing since I might end up replacing my mainhand soon, but eh. We’ll see about that.

On other news, most of my guild has gone back to playing their characters on Grim Batol EU, claiming that our server is dead. I’m personally not too bothered since I wasn’t particularly close friends with any of them, or friends in any shape or form to begin with – just feels like now it will be harder to get a ZA run going.