Make or Break
Posted 07-27-2009 at 09:11 AM by Horacio
Wow frustrates me. Not so much the game but all the little things to do with it that in the end, boils down to the people.
I like to raid. I like getting together with a group of friends and trying to outsmart the computer, overcome challenges and set goals to achieve.
I think in alot of ways, hard core raiders have it easier in that you have a defined purpose and a unified goal. With a set of casual leaders, I get the feeling sometimes that I'm herding cats.
My 25 man is okay, I guess. We are close to knocking out Vezax but we've screwed around more than I would like. My 10 man is horribly inconsistant and plagued by poor attendance, diverse levels of commitment, and a lack of situational awareness.
I thought about it some over the weekend and I decided to stop being so damn emo about it and start looking at things a little differently. I made a long post this morning through email and website pm's to the group and letting them know I wanted some things to change.
At the same time, someone else was making a similar post but the two posts were very different. He's our best player. He's no more perfect than the next guy but he does his job and delivers very high DPS.
His post was an ultimatum...straighten up and fly right or I'm dropping this raid. He said that if we are not working on boss X by date Y, he's gone.
whoa.
And...I agree with most of his points. I'm a little peeved about how it came down but its something I should have done myself and was so afraid of pissing off people...or even worse, having them ignore me....that I hadn't.
I have a real issue with leadership in certain settings. My style is appropriate for many settings IRL and some in wow but calling out people for dumb mistakes, inattention and distraction for a casual raid team has been difficult. I either go too far or not far enough and triangulating the right position is difficult.
Aside from that, I deem some of it to be flat out mistakes on my part.
So....hopefully this will stick. Hopefully it will wake some people up but I'm dubious.
I like to raid. I like getting together with a group of friends and trying to outsmart the computer, overcome challenges and set goals to achieve.
I think in alot of ways, hard core raiders have it easier in that you have a defined purpose and a unified goal. With a set of casual leaders, I get the feeling sometimes that I'm herding cats.
My 25 man is okay, I guess. We are close to knocking out Vezax but we've screwed around more than I would like. My 10 man is horribly inconsistant and plagued by poor attendance, diverse levels of commitment, and a lack of situational awareness.
I thought about it some over the weekend and I decided to stop being so damn emo about it and start looking at things a little differently. I made a long post this morning through email and website pm's to the group and letting them know I wanted some things to change.
At the same time, someone else was making a similar post but the two posts were very different. He's our best player. He's no more perfect than the next guy but he does his job and delivers very high DPS.
His post was an ultimatum...straighten up and fly right or I'm dropping this raid. He said that if we are not working on boss X by date Y, he's gone.
whoa.
And...I agree with most of his points. I'm a little peeved about how it came down but its something I should have done myself and was so afraid of pissing off people...or even worse, having them ignore me....that I hadn't.
I have a real issue with leadership in certain settings. My style is appropriate for many settings IRL and some in wow but calling out people for dumb mistakes, inattention and distraction for a casual raid team has been difficult. I either go too far or not far enough and triangulating the right position is difficult.
Aside from that, I deem some of it to be flat out mistakes on my part.
So....hopefully this will stick. Hopefully it will wake some people up but I'm dubious.
Total Comments 9
Comments
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That other guy is already gone. Does he seriously think that his post will suddenly make people change their ability? How are people going to "wake up"? Are they standing in the fire (ok, the rune) on purpose? Are they playing the game while watching TV or drinking with friends? If not, then what are they going to do to straighten up and fly right?
It is clear to me that telling people e.g. not to stand in the fire does no good. Nobody is doing it on purpose - they are doing it because they are easily distracted, or because they have trouble multitasking, or because their computer is slow, or because they are just not very good at video games. Telling people to get better or to pay attention or to become more serious does no good. They are already doing the best they can, or are willing to.
If there is a concrete behavior that you can change, such as showing up without food or watching TV or chatting about baseball while raiding, then by all means it is worth bringing those things up. But a person who tells people that he is outta here if they do not generally perform better had better just plan to go.
If change is what you want, then your approach sounds more intelligent. Work with people, give them specific ideas, point out things they can do to improve. I recently had to come down on one guy who consistently showed up without flasks. That is behavior we can change. I'm not going to come down on the gal who too often runs into a room and pulls before we are ready. Sure, she should pay more attention, but I have teased her, have coached her to stay behind the tank, and so on, to no avail. At this point, I know that she really does not mean to, so laying down an ultimatum about it would just make her mad at me without effecting any change - except possibly to make one of us change guilds. She plays well otherwise, so at this point it is just a cost of doing business.
To summarize, giving people knowledge will work. Telling them "play better, dammit!" will not. If performance in the game becomes more important than relationships, it is time just to find more talented people to play with.Posted 07-27-2009 at 10:59 AM by Myranmys 
- It seems to be common to think of a casual raid as dysfunctional. Now that's a bold statement let's take a look at a couple things.
Hard Core Raid:
Focus on common goals
Pressure to not make mistakes
Large time commitments to goals
Casual Raid:
No serious goals
No pressure (we're just having fun)
No real commitment (this is casual)
Now this is clearly over simplified but hits on certain key issues. In the end a casual raid tends to be carried by a select few talented players that work double time to pull everything together for everyone. I agree with Myranmys these players are not making these mistakes on purpose. It's of my opinion that the mistake being made here is being made early on by the leadership. It's the mistake of creating a casual raid team without setting a bar for performance. Trust me, I've made this mistake and am also working on finding a solution.
Originally my solution was to quit because clearly my leadership skills (no matter what I or anyone else on the team thought) were not good enough to get the job done. So my answer was to toss in the towel until I found what I was doing wrong and specifically how to fix it. This meant that I would lose my entire team and that if I came back I would have to start from scratch. So, I did a lot of soul searching this summer trying to figure out where I failed.
First was to define my personal goals (they may differ from yours but not far enough to make them irrelevant) clearly and actionably. From day one I've had no interest in gear other than its means to an end nor did I hold in high regard those individuals that would slave for hours a day everyday to get their gear. And in those days of 40 man raids half the raid could nap while the other half got the job done. With the advent of Heroics my interest got perked and now with the achievements I have something to focus on. From back in the day when Black Rock was still considered a raid instance we were three manning it before LK was launched we were 3 manning Karazhan so hard mode's been in our blood from early on.
My mistake? My mistake was that I didn't clearly state my goals (nay the guild's goals) from the beginning. I was laid back, relaxed and simply wanted to enjoy the game... casually... right? But in actuality I wanted to have a tight niche group with finely tooned skills that simply work well together bringing high level performance without micromanagement. The only thing, the nice thing, we would not need to spend 20+ hours per week to get the hard modes done. We'd be efficient with our time and focus on the task at hand which would help us all to accomplish our goals.
So, I introduce a third stereotype call it My Style Raid (this can be anything you are driving for):
My Style Raid:
The Very specific goal of obtaining Glory of whatever raider or heroic that's hot off the Blizzard press
A competitive pressure to perform to our absolute best accepting productive criticism as one means of improvement
Maintaining a comfortable flexible schedule for raiding such that we can kick the hours WAY up as needed for specific encounters and be able to scale way back while that time is not needed.
I'm not really that good about writing things like this up and this is a crudely summarized version of what I've been going through lately. It seems that we're not in too different a spot.Posted 07-27-2009 at 12:14 PM by Falkor - I have to disagree with Myr. I find that 80% of issues with players relate to controllable actions. The choice is do you set the bar of what you accept and hold to it, or do you simply fill out a 25 man raid. I prefer to set the bar, set it at a level realistic, and hold people to it.
I do fear that folks won't make the level asked (or will simply chose not to bother). Late BC & most WotLK content shows a high level of individual responsibility. Someone may be able to save you from a mistake, but reliance on it is going to get you killed. As a great example, there's in achievement for killing Sarth with less than 21 players... but I sincerely doubt many folks would want to face Sarth 3D knowing five players are going to be dead on the initial fire wall or void zone.
The ultimate irony is how weak players push to do everything, without acknowledging they are hindering progression. I find a lack of interest in doing hard modes knowing the folks that benefit most are also those least deserving.
@UltimatumGuy - I hope his goal is realistic/reasonable, and not something like Alone in the Darkness. If reaching that goal isn't possible, it's going to demoralize far more than pressure. On the other hand, if it's a boss you 'should' already have dead, then it may be enough oomph.Posted 07-27-2009 at 12:24 PM by Esch - I've done a similar thing H to my raiders. I told them that they needed to perform at X level, spelled it out in detail or they would be permanently placed on standby status for raids and will only see content when we are short handed or people have to leave early.
2 people out of 25 have made the standby list, 21 that are golden and 2 others that are skirting the edge but are working on improving.Posted 07-27-2009 at 12:34 PM by Shadevarr -
The thing to remember here is that its hard to split the difference and account for progression and being ultra casual/have fun.
Now....certainly, hardcore raiders have fun. There are varying degrees of each style and its not two distinct camps but a sliding scale. The important thing is to achieve a homogeneous mixture of goals and levels of commitment.
In our 10 man, we're all friends but some players within that group are outstanding players. Some are good players who try hard. Some are bad players. Some are good players who don't pay attention.
Its time for us to fish or cut bait. I'm tired of it. I'm tired of wiping when we shouldn't be wiping. I'm tired of watching people die to things they should not and then giggle about it and make excuses up to and including "oh, well, I just suck"
If people want to step up and start winning, great. I think we can. If they don't want to, screw it, we'll cut back to one night and go to Naxx and farm welfare epics for alts. That's fine. What hurts and is difficult to deal with is trying to throw ourselves at stuff we are not beating.
And its especially hard when we have a rogue that consistently brings 6K DPS and watches his aggro well. I think I am a solid tank, but as a DK, my DPS isn't massive but its good enough and I never die to stupid crap or suck up healer mana. But we cannot continue to go at it half assed or we'll go back to content wher frankly, we can half ass it and giggle and grab ass and collect our badges and gear out alts.Posted 07-27-2009 at 12:57 PM by Horacio - @Horacio
I don't know if you're the guild leader or even the raid leader so what i say may not be relavent.
I had a similar problem with my guild. Its fairly new guild and when i started it i made officers of my friends that had been with me for years in another guild. Well over time performance and turnout started to suffer. I couldn't figure out why. Long story short, the other leadership in the guild just wasn't helping the guild. They were my friends, but for the good of the guild i had to remove them from the officer ranks and make them regular raiders. I then went about picking the best player of each class that i had and made them class leaders. I put each of these players in charge of all the other players of their class. They are also incharge of applications from people of their class.
Due to the fact that none of the officers were helping me i had taken too much on myself. It was partly my fault for just expecting them to help and not setting forth things for them to do. But regardless of the reason, I was not able to do everything myself. Now with the more structured enviroment, and leadership that is actually helping me run the guild, everyones performance has increased, and turnout is better than ever.
I guess what i'm saying is take a look at the rest of the leadership and evaluate what they are actually doing. Talk to them all and spell out what it is you expect of them. It sucks to demote a friend that you've been playing with for years, but if you're trying to progress as a guild, and all they are doing is looking out for themselves, they are really just hindering the entire guild. You need leaders that will help you. People you can rely on to evaluate other players. Its almost impossible to keep up to date all every mechanic for every spec, however its much easier for 10 people to know 3 specs each.
As for your actualy raiders, make sure you spell out what is expected from them, and then make sure it is enforced. If they don't comply dock them DKP(if you use such a system), bench them for the night, or if they continually don't comply cut them loose.
Sorry to ramble, hope it helps a bit, and even if it doesn't, good luck.
-ThaakPosted 07-27-2009 at 01:45 PM by Thaak - Very happy to read this post. Don't get me wrong - not happy that people are having problems, but happy that my guild is not the only one with these problems.... Lot of good advice there though. Thanks guys. WTB reliable players.
Posted 07-27-2009 at 04:45 PM by Flamedurant - I actually felt the same way last night. On our 25-man, we've cleared everything up to YS and are now starting on hardmodes.
We have one 10-man raid which has gotten the Glory achievement.
My 10-man on the other hand ... we can't kill YS. And last night was pretty much the final straw for me.
We actually had an opportunity to go back to Ulduar 10-man on a 2nd night to finish off General and YS. Instead, someone says "hey, let's go do Naxx10 to get they Undying achievement instead". What happens? We end up waiting 1 hour to fill the raid (since not everyone was interested in this) and then we have people dying on Heigan, another hour wasted. That leaves us with about 1 hour plus to try to kill YS.
We reach YS and people who have done the fight on 25-man play like asses. Not watching aggro, running into clouds, becoming insane.
The thing is, this happens every week. Once we hit 10-mans, they become idiot players. Or maybe the truth is that the better players in our 25-mans cover up for their mistakes, I don't know.
But I feel your pain and that's why I hope you can find the right balance for your 10-man.Posted 07-27-2009 at 09:40 PM by law90026 - I am the GM of my guild and we are a very wealthy guild so this may not be of use to many guilds who cannot do this,
In my guild we cleared YS 10 man then went onto 25's, we 1 shot boss's including keepers but tend to wipe on trash, like.... Repeatedly which is just crap considering it takes longer to clear trash than to down boss's.
I thought 1 night while writing the crap that comes into my head down on paper and came up with a great thought, how can i get everyone to be focused on not screwing up other than yelling at them.... reward everyone for hard work they do in a raid....
(we raid 4 nights a week for 3 hours a night)
Soooo i set a Quota/performance for the night that i want to achieve and if we did this i would put up Guild Repairs up until the next raid for them to use how ever they want. aslong as it was a smooth run with no mucking around, sure ppl can talk during trash and what not but there is a time to stop.
Wed: Lev > XT > Kol > Aur > Thor
Thur: Mim > Freya > Hodir > Vezax
Sun: YS
Mon: YS
Now for us getting to thorim on wednesday night is easily achieveable and normally we get at least 2/3 keepers down on a wednesday night, so setting an easily achieved target is a great way to boost guild morale. So basically if they do what is required early and keep that going they will be rewarded, come raid time the following night turn it off and set a new quota for them to meet.
Give them something to focus on other than boss's. You will be suprised just how poor some people are and cant afford wipe nights, U set this goal for them to not fail and u'll be suprised just how little they actually have to repair.
I set a special Quota for Mimirons room (more like a game) If we have no wipes on mimirons trash then when we get to mims room we will have 5 minutes of trying to kill everyone with bombs..... Our guild loves trying to blow me up with bombs, this makes the entire raid crack up with laughter everytime and is also another great way of boosting raid morale... Remember a Happy raid is a good raid, a Sad or angry raid and your not going to kill anything but yourselves.
Thats my 2 cents whether it helped or not i wont know, just how we do things to get guild morale up in a raid setting.Posted 07-28-2009 at 01:53 AM by Shodowz
Updated 07-28-2009 at 01:59 AM by Shodowz
