Guildleader chores - The Draenor casualties and pressure of Mythic

The raid leader of another guild on my server was chatting to me the other day, and saying "What's going on with your guild?  So many people are leaving!"

People never believe me when I say to be patient and things settle down. It's as if they think I'm making it up when I say I have been in this guild at the start of EVERY EXPANSION and I watch people come and go.

Since raiding started, I saw Dragonray's Caelestrasz friends (Ravzz, Drauka and Daenerys) leave and join another guild. Brahski had a few friends who came back to game but got bored and have already stopped playing. Siness, Genesis and Sunny were fun to play with, I am sad that they aren't around, they seemed like decent people. Vaakis, who came back to game and moved his toons back into the guild, moved his druid out to a New Zealand guild so he could see a bit more end game - I can totally understand that (though he left his alts here in Frostwolves).  Souglyy and Vexil left for personal reasons, and the latest round of leavers are Roshii and Chosenx who are going to raid with their real life friends who have come back to the game.

Roshii leaving was sad, as he has been here since Cataclysm, but it was hardly surprising. He objected very strongly to EPGP and found the whole system unfair, the concept of "buying" your loot. He is not the only one who had those concerns, Aza said the same thing too.

Xyn said that he also thought that loot council was a better loot option than EPGP, however, in a casual guild, I think loot council doesn't work well and Xyn even agreed with that. It alienates the casual people who may feel like they are turning up just to ensure that the regulars get loot, and that's not exactly fun.  It would just encourage them to turn up LESS.

However, on a positive note, I think I'm finally seeing the group beginning to gel.  The raiders all know each other now, and there is more comraderie between them, and a little less tension. Raids are a little quiet but most people are trying to concentrate, I guess. But I'm happy with how it's all going! Heroic cleared and a mythic done - yes there's only one week left to go, but we can step into Blackrock Foundry and hopefully get a bit more momentum than we did when we were starting raiding in Highmaul.  Also, Sunday is going so well, and a really solid group of casuals are turning up (if only there were more healers!) and I am really pleased that it's going well. There are also a regular group of the mythic/heroic raiders who turn up to the raid as well, and that's great to see.  On Sunday I was a little late and there weren't enough healers and we had 4 druid healers, it was pretty funny. An overload of druids and hunters and no warlocks or rogues... guess what are the coolest classes to play!

I've been really impressed with Arelion and Bleidd's tanking.  The two have been communicating well and Arelion has been really calm and patient. I am hoping that we can squeeze Arelion into some heroic raids so he can gear up for the weekend and at least sub in for heroics, which would be really good.

If we can just keep the current numbers, we'll go OK.  We can still raid mythic with our current raid team setup, if we don't lose anymore people.  A lot of guilds are recruiting on the server, and our chances of picking up people if we drop below 20 are very very slim.  Siege, which made a comeback with the release of the expansion, has dropped below the numbers they need for mythic, and it's a vicious cycle once that starts - people want to do mythic, but can't, so they look for other guilds that can accommodate them but that only reduces the number of raiders further, and then now they'll need to recruit even MORE people... it's the slow spiral towards death for a raiding guild without the social cohesiveness. I look at our current crop of raiders and wonder if we were in that position how many of them would stay and how many would leave looking for greener pastures? I think I would lose somewhere from 3 to 5 raiders, but we could still do heroic.  I wonder how far we will get in the next raid?  There are only 3 days left of Highmaul before Blackrock Foundry comes, and I am excited!





Comments

  1. I know a few of the concur people have mentioned that things still feel rather cliquey, but it's probably just a combination of being on at the wrong times and missing out when there is chat. I know things are still incredibly quiet whenever I'm on, but I really don't mind it at all :)

    I want to come to Sunday runs, but I just find it hard to have everything I need done by the 6pm start time! My sub runs out on the 16th and I won't be back until 6.1, but I'm hoping that by then daylight savings will be over and I can be a more regular carry in the healer department :P

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    1. I've been trying to get Zura and Faulen to come to Sundays (so glad Kaida comes - but she's so quiet!) but they are always so busy with family! That's the tough thing about being on WA time I guess :( I think peak times of chatter tend to be too early for you guys which is a bit of a bum - though it shouldn't stop you Blackrock guys from yabbering away in guild chat :)

      And Disco should be doing stuff on Sundays so you could get your 2 hours of loot!

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  2. Kinda funny that this is a problem on the other side of the world, too. I'm the Guild Leader of Zero Sound, EU-Thrall, playing a Resto Druid (Buddhatoast) and I'm checking my feedreader everyday for your posts since I really enjoy your blog and the insights in your guild and leadership style. Thanks for that!

    I don't know if it's directly related to the Expac itself, but we're seeing the same kind of coming and going resulting in problems to properly raid the Mythic content since Warlords has launched. Maybe it's the fact that all raid IDs below Mythic are flex and people have way more chances to explore other options - maybe it's the fact that the expac itself became very fast very boring. I'm so thrilled for BRF not only for the new bosses but also for the new raid content that keeps everybody busy and hopefully shifts the ranks of the raiding guilds a little bit so there are more dedicated raiders available for recruitment - people that will actually STAY so you can progress in Mythic without having randoms in your raid.

    Anyways, thanks for your posts and keep them coming daily :)

    Best
    Buddhatoast

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    1. Nice to meet you Buddhatoast! Thank you for reading my GM rants and concerns - it surprises me that people actually read them since it's mostly me sifting through the zillion thoughts in my head.

      Roshii and Chosenx were high risk at leaving because of how they were playing - they would PuG all their Highmaul and not do it with the guild, which I think a lot of people do, and that loosens guild ties. It's great for those who haven't got a guild that they can go with, but it can be very frustrating for smaller guilds who have good players who feel frustrated that they can PuG and have better success than when they do things with their guild.

      Hopefully we can chat more some time - I'd love to chat to another Guild leader (who is also a resto druid - super cool!) about Guild leader type stuff! And healing :)

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  3. "it's a vicious cycle once that starts"

    Kind of is, yeah. Reminds me a bit of BC, actually, where you had "feeder guilds" that stalled in Karazhan that fed guilds stalled in TK/SSC that fed guilds in BT/Hyjal/Sunwell. People interested in raiding BT/Hyjal/Sunwell would basically climb the ladder and cycle through those guilds -- staying just long enough to get enough gear and experience to move to the next rank.

    I'm not saying it's THAT bad right now, mind you, but I do worry that guilds doing most of heroic but who get stuck at like 16-18 people will either have their guild splinter (and those people will go and join guilds raiding Mythic) or people will join (and the officers are like "Yay, only a few more until we can raid Mythic!") and then leave shortly once they have some gear/experience...putting the guild right back in the same position.

    It's kind of the worst position to be in, the "Heroic isn't enough for us but we're having trouble getting enough people to do Mythic."

    Crossing my fingers for you.

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    1. For you as a guild that lives at the top of the food chain, I like that you can appreciate how these things eventuate. I haven't got that problem (yet) but I hope it doesn't get to that. I loathe recruiting.

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    2. Hey, I hate recruiting too! We can make a secret club or something.

      I'm not sure if I'm able to appreciate it due to being interested in game design, being empathic (I hated what it felt like we had to do in BC), or just seeing it go on for so long.

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