Sunday, September 23, 2007

Just a thought!

There is a certain aspect to end-game raiding that a lot of people don't really think much about... it's something that can really bring out those who are dedicated from those who are just along for the ride. Back in the AQ40 days it exsisted and even in Naxx, somewhat... now with Mother Sharaz, you see it again.

For Mother every single raid members needs epic crafted shadow resist gear... at least for learning. It's quite possible that some could do it without everyone in full gear, but that's another story. My point is... it takes dedication to farm the materials needed to craft the gear. One of the items required in order to make the gear is called a Heart of Darkness. These things only drop from within Black Temple, off of trash beyond Najentus (and not usually very often, I might add). Every single raider needs like... 8 I think it was, for their whole set. Now on some servers I'm sure there are multiple guilds in BT... therefore the economy may include things such as Hearts of Darkness... but for us, it's taken a lot of dedication and outside effort to help get a solid group of 25-30 people their Shadow Resist set crafted. On nights where we've cleared everything up to Mother, we've spent the night clearing trash to her and then resetting it... just so we could gather hearts for gear. Meanwhile it was expected of each raider to do their part and farm the other mats needed... such as Primal Shadows.

This is where my original point can be made now... with something like this it takes a lot of dedication by the core raid group to stick together and get things done for one another. If we want to down this boss, we all need to be on the same page. There are times when you can carry a few slow members through an encounter... but this isn't one of those moments. Every single person has to have that gear and have it enchanted. Every person needs to do their part to assure they have the most hp possible in order to ease healing and lower their risk of dying to something simple... like falling damage and a hit of something else just before. It's a fight like this in which you can figure out really quickly who your actual motivated raiders are. You hope that everyone is... but it shows through who isn't in a lot of ways really quickly here.

So... for those of you out there who haven't had this kind of challange in WoW yet, just know that they do exist, and sometimes they bring a little drama with them. Either people don't want to put their effort forth on their own, or people just give up and leave for one reason or another. Regardless... sometimes raiding can require a little extra effort, but when we got Mother to ~50% the other night with people fresh into their gear and unflasked... it all made it worth it. It felt amazing to see something go smoothly that could so easily go wrong if people weren't prepared.

All in all, it takes some time to farm the shit needed for the gear - but at least the fight is hella funny, although frustrating in it's randomness. She hits like a BEAST, by the way. Oh, and it's awesome when I can wear my resist set and be fully buffed... and have 13,000hp. hahaha. These kinds of fights are what this game is about. It's a gimmick fight, but very much fun when she doesn't throw someone into the raid with the debuff. >.> It's frustrating as a magic user, because she throws up a resist shield that can screw anyone over at any time.. BUT... that's part of the fun. Viscidus was fun for the same reasons... it was different and every person had to do their part to be a part of it. FROST WAND!!!! Lol... good times. :)

3 comments:

Jagoex said...

It's funny that this is a recurring theme across all factions on all realms. One could call it a social-bug within the WoW programming, even.

It seems to me that if one wishes to be a serious raider, this game requires an investment of time nearly comparable to that of a full-time job, and sometimes even more.

There is an epic thread on just this topic on our forums, with Pay from RA making it very clear that he is willing to put in such an investment of time, whereas most Hordies don't wish for their "escape" to require responsibilities similar to that of their RL.

It all comes down to a personal choice (or at least I'm hopeful it does) and personal responsibility. If a player has made a decision to join a serious raiding guild, then they should live up to the expectations and responsibilities that come with it. If for whatever reason they cannot, they should walk away. Plain and simple. Otherwise, the individual is wasting everyone's time.

To me, the individual who makes the responsible decision is the "good" player, and that's a point which isn't emphasized enough in discussions like these. No one is a better person for choosing one path over another, but how one goes about their play AFTER making the decision speaks greatly about them.

For those in your guild whom are riding on coattails at the expense of many, I would measure in that light more-so than their gear or guild's progression. It all comes down to the individual, and those individuals make the guild what it is.

That is why some hardcore guilds misstep and get frustrated. It has nothing to do with players with different tags, and everything to do with their own.

I hope you guys pull through this, and get what ~most~ of your guildies deserve.

Maybe then, you guys can take a f'n break from your 2nd job. =P

Jesika said...

:) honestly, it wasn't a pain in my ass to farm the mats for my resist set. I knew 2 weeks before we got to this point that we'd need it, and started farming then. As you said, it comes down to the individual. It isn't a tasking 'job' to take care of something like this with a little planning ahead. It's people who wait until the last possible second that get frustrated and blame others or the servers economy, etc.

That post on the realm forums is funny to say the least. I guess the only opinion I have regarding it is that... Guilds know the content they are approaching. Vashj. for example... end boss in an instance. There's TONS of information out there that allows you to know EXACTLY what you need for it. In this case, it seems a guild/faction lack dedicated raiders. Wellll... it's not like a guild couldn't figure out what classes they need ideally and start recruiting weeks ago... for that fight specifically. That goes for anyone though... just look into things, plan ahead... and there's nothing to stress about.

And it is everyones personal experience and choice in this game. It's just a game... that's it. Enjoy it however you want to. Yes, I understand the frustration that was voiced in that post originally, but what I don't get is the fact that there are options... such as off-server recruiting, that don't appear to be widely used to solve the issues at hand. So what if the current available population isn't worth a damn for their purposes... you either accept less than what you want and mold them into what you need, or you seek out someone from the outside and bring them in. Simple as that - you can't bitch and moan and make things change if you don't activly even try to help them change.

I dunno... it's nothing to stress about. It's a game and every single person in it is replaceable as a raider. So... you simply have to put forth the extra effort sometimes to replace people... hell Invictus has lost it's top dps many times over in the process of clearing BT and Hyjal - and every week when this has happened, we simply pick up the pieces and kick ass without them. Life goes on in WoW... :)

Kergen said...

hey kergy has just over 13k hp in his out of date kara gear!....i miss grinding for stuff, i dunno why, but i liked it alot mainly cuz all that grinding pays off when you down a new boss and you feel like all those hours of grinding were worth it =-)