OK let me provide a little more context
I play on Scarshield Legion (EU), a rppvp server that launched in January. I play Horde
No one in our faction has killed Cthun or the Eye of Cthun. No one on our faction has killed a boss in Naxx
So if we could "only" do up to and including Twin Emps that's progress equal to the top Horde raiding guild on our server
I just left that guild. I helped them get the Twin Emps kill and helped them try Instructor Razuvious
We have approx 15 Horde raiding guilds on our server. Most of them stuck somewhere in ZG or MC
Now let me tell you a little about server culture
Our skill levels are generally low. We had a big problem in raids with aggro managment. We had to gkick someone who simply couldn't grasp that landing an Aimed Shot before the tank had even hit the mob was a bad idea. I recently wiped in Strat with one of the best geared Warlocks on the server. He simply couldn't grasp that stealing the aggro then tanking the Baron on top of the casters was a bad idea. I was tanking (supposedly). It was exasperating
The faction's best players are the healers. Healers learn not to go afk during fights. Healers learn a lot about aggro - the hard way. We also have some super tanks although too many of the server's tanks are the "hit one mob till it's dead then pick another mob" type
Also, inherent in the guild design, is a lot of practice and understanding of different raid roles which can only improve people as players. Spend a month raid healing, then a month raid tanking then a month raid dpsing and you will have a very good understanding of raiding. Better I think than if you spent 3 months doing one role
So if this healers' guild has the potential to clear MC, ZG, AQ20, Ony and BWL then we also have the potential to match all but our faction's three top guilds for achievement
That's fine as far as I'm concerned
Now turning to the objections made so far
A lot has been made about lack of dps. Healer classes generally do poor dps because of itemisation. Not only does feral gear simply not feature in MC but also healers are usually encouraged not to spend dkp on it. Comparing the dps of a feral druid with MC gear relative to T1 Rogues to the dps feral druids will be able to do with the low end level 70 raid gear is not valid. TBC brings in off-spec dps gear and this guild would support people in collecting it
I've raided with a lot of very lacklustre dps, rogues who wouldn't know a Mongoose if one bit them etc, and I simply am not seeing that a crew of motivated hybrid dpsers with decent gear would be unable to match a crew of variably geared dps classes with motivation ranging from very focussed to watching a movie
TBC is interesting because it allows for wildly varying raid dps. One raid might include a Survival Hunter and a Discipline Priest, in fact 25 different spec permutations so as to stack as many of these little +5% raid damage buffs as possible for an incredible total output. The next raid might have people mainly with cookiecutter or pvp builds who lack those talents. If there is raid content available for the second group of people (and it's my guess that there will be) then the first group will find it trivally easy
Next I find it ironic that Sunder Armour's AC reduction is being touted here as a raid-critical ability. I've only ever been asked once to maintain Faerie Fire (which does the same thing) on mobs while raiding. In fact I've felt shy about using it in case I get told off for wasting mana when I'm meant to be healing. When I was raid tanking as a Feral Druid the Rogues never bothered to Expose. Now suddenly AC reduction is raid-critical :rolleyes:
You guys have convinced me about the Suppression Room (unless there's a spot by the gate out of the aura maybe?). For us this would therefore be a Plan B encounter (see below)
I'm not convinced Nefarian would be impossible. It's AOE intensive but Blessing of Protection is very useful. Paladins also get another AOE to use just on Undead/Demons for Phase 3. We've had red/blue spawn and still beat Nefarian despite the huge hit to AOEing that combination gives. Unlucky class call would hurt but we probably have the versatility to cope. I think the main thing for us would be gearing up the paladins with lots of +spell damage but I'm sanguine about the possibility that we may take longer to gear up our people to the point where we can beat encounters than other guilds would. You mentioned Horde, Lissa, please bear in mind that in TBC the only distinction between factions is racials which are pretty trivial
Tranq shot is a big loss. I think our strategy woud simply be to take the pain. So it would be a matter of us needing more gearing up than other guilds need to beat certain encounters. It's not critical on Magmadar, we've beaten him with a guild fresh to MC without Tranq shot (killed Luci first raid, Hunter who got the book wasn't available second raid)
On AOE: as I understand the game mechanics: crap level 70 spell + a ton of +damage approx = great level 70 spell + a ton of spell damage since most of your oomph comes from the +damage gear. I'm wondering just how good several pallies aoeing with heavy +spell damage gear would be. i'm unconvinced that it's unplayably bad
Plan B: if we can't beat an encounter without a certain class we have 2 options. The first is guesting in a few people of that class. So if we needed Rogues to beat an encounter fill the raid with 22 guildies and invite 3 Rogues that are friends of people in the guild. The second option is a joint run, sharing loot and progress with another guild
So if, hypothetically, we could complete all of BWL except Broodlord we could just sub in 3 rogues for that fight clearing the rest of it with the guild. I don't think we would have trouble finding people who want to come
I'm not so far convinced that this is such an awful idea that it's unplayably bad. I also think it will be very popular on my server, a lot of people playing these classes have given up raiding and just do pvp since they are frustrated with not being able to kill anything
If we ended up with a schedule where we run MC and the 20 mans solo, BWL with 3 guest Rogues joining for half an hour then leaving again and AQ40 and Naxx with a partner guild that would be fine, in fact that could exceed what any guild is capable of on my server
I'll go do some reading up on the Beta raids and quests forums. From what I've gathered so far about Beta instancing a major change is that aggro is harder to manage (which suits us: 2 tank classes, one mail class and a class with Fade). What remains to be seen is how many encounters are designed with the intention of requiring a specific class and to what extent we can find creative alternatives to those requirements
My view of the current raid game is that there is a sharp player skill curve. MC is a gear instance, pure and simple. Decent tank or two and a few decent healers and the raid can plough through it. BWL is an instance where if you don't play well you die. AQ40 and even more so Naxx are instances where if you don't play well everyone dies
It could of course be the case that Suppression room type encounters are going to be the standard in TBC's end game raiding in which case the idea doesn't work at all
I would guess that TBC will maintain something like the same skill curve and that there won't be too many class dependent encounters in the early raid game simply because if all the members of that class are idiots your guild can't beat the encounter. I think it will get more class dependent and more min/max dependent as a guild goes deeper into the end game but I think it would be very interesting to see just how far we can get
If we get midway while developing a guild full of people who have the confidence, gear and player skill to handle diverse hybrid functions in a raid that's good enough
Yeah you're absolutely right
But I think it's just my poor explanation rather than something inherent in the guild design. There's no need to label healing a chore or denigrate people who like to heal. I can just re-write that bit to accentuate the positive, to portray us as Healing +. I'll need to reword the rota section, scrap the rota points system, and I should stop assuming that we won't have enough willing healers.
We'll better be able to allocate raid roles once we have a guild up and running
I play on Scarshield Legion (EU), a rppvp server that launched in January. I play Horde
No one in our faction has killed Cthun or the Eye of Cthun. No one on our faction has killed a boss in Naxx
So if we could "only" do up to and including Twin Emps that's progress equal to the top Horde raiding guild on our server
I just left that guild. I helped them get the Twin Emps kill and helped them try Instructor Razuvious
We have approx 15 Horde raiding guilds on our server. Most of them stuck somewhere in ZG or MC
Now let me tell you a little about server culture
Our skill levels are generally low. We had a big problem in raids with aggro managment. We had to gkick someone who simply couldn't grasp that landing an Aimed Shot before the tank had even hit the mob was a bad idea. I recently wiped in Strat with one of the best geared Warlocks on the server. He simply couldn't grasp that stealing the aggro then tanking the Baron on top of the casters was a bad idea. I was tanking (supposedly). It was exasperating
The faction's best players are the healers. Healers learn not to go afk during fights. Healers learn a lot about aggro - the hard way. We also have some super tanks although too many of the server's tanks are the "hit one mob till it's dead then pick another mob" type
Also, inherent in the guild design, is a lot of practice and understanding of different raid roles which can only improve people as players. Spend a month raid healing, then a month raid tanking then a month raid dpsing and you will have a very good understanding of raiding. Better I think than if you spent 3 months doing one role
So if this healers' guild has the potential to clear MC, ZG, AQ20, Ony and BWL then we also have the potential to match all but our faction's three top guilds for achievement
That's fine as far as I'm concerned
Now turning to the objections made so far
A lot has been made about lack of dps. Healer classes generally do poor dps because of itemisation. Not only does feral gear simply not feature in MC but also healers are usually encouraged not to spend dkp on it. Comparing the dps of a feral druid with MC gear relative to T1 Rogues to the dps feral druids will be able to do with the low end level 70 raid gear is not valid. TBC brings in off-spec dps gear and this guild would support people in collecting it
I've raided with a lot of very lacklustre dps, rogues who wouldn't know a Mongoose if one bit them etc, and I simply am not seeing that a crew of motivated hybrid dpsers with decent gear would be unable to match a crew of variably geared dps classes with motivation ranging from very focussed to watching a movie
TBC is interesting because it allows for wildly varying raid dps. One raid might include a Survival Hunter and a Discipline Priest, in fact 25 different spec permutations so as to stack as many of these little +5% raid damage buffs as possible for an incredible total output. The next raid might have people mainly with cookiecutter or pvp builds who lack those talents. If there is raid content available for the second group of people (and it's my guess that there will be) then the first group will find it trivally easy
Next I find it ironic that Sunder Armour's AC reduction is being touted here as a raid-critical ability. I've only ever been asked once to maintain Faerie Fire (which does the same thing) on mobs while raiding. In fact I've felt shy about using it in case I get told off for wasting mana when I'm meant to be healing. When I was raid tanking as a Feral Druid the Rogues never bothered to Expose. Now suddenly AC reduction is raid-critical :rolleyes:
You guys have convinced me about the Suppression Room (unless there's a spot by the gate out of the aura maybe?). For us this would therefore be a Plan B encounter (see below)
I'm not convinced Nefarian would be impossible. It's AOE intensive but Blessing of Protection is very useful. Paladins also get another AOE to use just on Undead/Demons for Phase 3. We've had red/blue spawn and still beat Nefarian despite the huge hit to AOEing that combination gives. Unlucky class call would hurt but we probably have the versatility to cope. I think the main thing for us would be gearing up the paladins with lots of +spell damage but I'm sanguine about the possibility that we may take longer to gear up our people to the point where we can beat encounters than other guilds would. You mentioned Horde, Lissa, please bear in mind that in TBC the only distinction between factions is racials which are pretty trivial
Tranq shot is a big loss. I think our strategy woud simply be to take the pain. So it would be a matter of us needing more gearing up than other guilds need to beat certain encounters. It's not critical on Magmadar, we've beaten him with a guild fresh to MC without Tranq shot (killed Luci first raid, Hunter who got the book wasn't available second raid)
On AOE: as I understand the game mechanics: crap level 70 spell + a ton of +damage approx = great level 70 spell + a ton of spell damage since most of your oomph comes from the +damage gear. I'm wondering just how good several pallies aoeing with heavy +spell damage gear would be. i'm unconvinced that it's unplayably bad
Plan B: if we can't beat an encounter without a certain class we have 2 options. The first is guesting in a few people of that class. So if we needed Rogues to beat an encounter fill the raid with 22 guildies and invite 3 Rogues that are friends of people in the guild. The second option is a joint run, sharing loot and progress with another guild
So if, hypothetically, we could complete all of BWL except Broodlord we could just sub in 3 rogues for that fight clearing the rest of it with the guild. I don't think we would have trouble finding people who want to come
I'm not so far convinced that this is such an awful idea that it's unplayably bad. I also think it will be very popular on my server, a lot of people playing these classes have given up raiding and just do pvp since they are frustrated with not being able to kill anything
If we ended up with a schedule where we run MC and the 20 mans solo, BWL with 3 guest Rogues joining for half an hour then leaving again and AQ40 and Naxx with a partner guild that would be fine, in fact that could exceed what any guild is capable of on my server
I'll go do some reading up on the Beta raids and quests forums. From what I've gathered so far about Beta instancing a major change is that aggro is harder to manage (which suits us: 2 tank classes, one mail class and a class with Fade). What remains to be seen is how many encounters are designed with the intention of requiring a specific class and to what extent we can find creative alternatives to those requirements
My view of the current raid game is that there is a sharp player skill curve. MC is a gear instance, pure and simple. Decent tank or two and a few decent healers and the raid can plough through it. BWL is an instance where if you don't play well you die. AQ40 and even more so Naxx are instances where if you don't play well everyone dies
It could of course be the case that Suppression room type encounters are going to be the standard in TBC's end game raiding in which case the idea doesn't work at all
I would guess that TBC will maintain something like the same skill curve and that there won't be too many class dependent encounters in the early raid game simply because if all the members of that class are idiots your guild can't beat the encounter. I think it will get more class dependent and more min/max dependent as a guild goes deeper into the end game but I think it would be very interesting to see just how far we can get
If we get midway while developing a guild full of people who have the confidence, gear and player skill to handle diverse hybrid functions in a raid that's good enough
Quote:Some people *like* healing. People like me like the intensity that comes with watching over an entire fight and keeping everyone up rather than targeting a mob and squeezing the trigger until its dead mindlessly over and over. Other people like dps classes where they target a mob and hit the same two buttons repeatedly. I don't understand the fascination with that, but apparently a lot of people like that. The premise of a good guild should be to find some people who like to tank, some people who like to heal, and other people who like to dps. If you start off your guild with an attitude that healing is a chore rather than an intense pleasure, then you're missing out on a great deal.
Yeah you're absolutely right
But I think it's just my poor explanation rather than something inherent in the guild design. There's no need to label healing a chore or denigrate people who like to heal. I can just re-write that bit to accentuate the positive, to portray us as Healing +. I'll need to reword the rota section, scrap the rota points system, and I should stop assuming that we won't have enough willing healers.
We'll better be able to allocate raid roles once we have a guild up and running