A few old tips for excellent Guild Raiding...

[Awenina]

Hi there, HunterAwen here,

I have not guild raided for a LONG time, but have been playing since vanilla, March of 2005. My first guild was a group of friends whom I had met in another online game which was cancelled. We had played together for a long time, knew each other well, knew our play-styles and our strengths and weaknesses. Our raid leader was one person, but his role was purely that of scheduling, person to go to for information and problems, and coordinating.

However, he had established some pretty awesome raiding rules on our previous game, which translated into wow very nicely indeed. Particularly as our guild grew and more individuals came in fresh off the street at a time when no one was a wow expert. So I thought these "rules and suggestions" might come in handy to our new exploration of raiding:

1. Commitment (within RL constraints) is key. If your RL is unpredictable, don't enter the raid team. Do the casual raiding groups instead. Why? Because working as a team is something that we learn on the long run and also because most raids are complex and need to be learned. Which brings us to point two. With LFR a good training ground might be creating groups of 10 or more for lfr during the week. But remember that lfr raids are NOT the same as full groups in content or strategy.

2. Learn the present raid. Get yourself a notepad, or make notes on your computer FOR YOUR CLASS. Research your class strengths and key components for raid success. Watch at least 3 youtubes, read the articles, and go to your class specialist forums, post questions and read cheat sheets. This is VERY IMPORTANT. This will take no more than half an hour per raid and will probably save you several hours of frustrating raid experiences. And can be a LOT of fun in and of itself. Remember that some bosses are immune to certain spells or weapons, so you need to decide what you will be doing at that point, alternate weapons, other job.

3. Don't use raid chat for social conversations. Keep voice and chat to a MINIMUM so that instructions and problems don't get missed. If you want to know your teammates, organize social or planning meets. This is true for low level casual guild raids also, as bad habits can be learned and carried over to the higher level raids. Really, the only person who should be heard is the raid leader and not much else.

4. The first few times through a raid are learning experiences. Take notes and make sure that you talk and discuss the raid a couple of days after the event. NOT during the raid, unless it is to change strategy after a wipe. This is the perfect opportunity to gather and write down questions you can post in your specialized class forums.

5. Gear (gems, enchants) and skills can sometimes vary depending on the raid. Make sure you read up on these too.

6. Food and Elixirs etc.. Find out if you are meant to organize these or whether the guild has people in charge of it. This can get very expensive if each person has to buy off AH, so organizing a guild supply is a good idea. Organize a gather mats day, and have various people (not necessarily raiders) in the guild creating the necessary potions, elixirs and foods. As these are time consuming, it's best to spread it out to many people. These are excellent social gathering events for whole guild experience. Gathering and creating raid supplies.

7. Strategize for worst scenarios. If one or more tanks die, find out which of your players has the skills to take over. And for how long, and what do the other players do. Depending on the raid, this does not necessarily mean a wipe. Same with healers. But it can give the team a few seconds or minutes to place themselves in the right place for a fast and efficient wipe return.

8. Plan what to do just before or after a wipe. Allocate a person to release and return to rez the rest, or plan mass rez with a class that can dislodge from the fight by invisibility, play dead, or some other skill. If mass rez is on cooldown, then other abilities can be used, engineering (although it fails often), hunter pet and other possibilities, can rez one of the healers. If choosing a person to come in to rez the rest, make sure it's a person who doesn't get lost easily! Someone with good locational skills that can find their way to the raid entrance, and the group within the instance quickly and easily. This might sounds basic, but you would be surprised how often healers are sent out who cannot find their way back. So it's not about class at this point, but ability to rez at least one person, and a player who is FAST. Again, this is totally different to lfr which is to never expect a rez and be extremely thankful if you get one. Very RARELY is having the entire team release a good plan.

9. This next point was mentioned in the Raid Meeting this week: Be courteous! Bad language, raging, and insults are not helpful.

10. Give new members at least three raids probation runs. Most players will realize they don't like raiding with the group within a few minutes of starting the raid. But sometimes a person requires a longer commitment for themselves and for their learning curve but most importantly to see if they are compatible. And if you find someone who is compatible but has a very slow learning curve, invest time during the week training them. They are worth it.

11. Have a forum thread for each raid. This is where information, links, deeper discussion and strategies can be figured out, and they can be a lot of fun. So, a thread for SoO, another for ToT... etc.

12. REMEMBER we play and raid because it is FUN! When it becomes a job, or stressful, or upsetting, stop.

Anyway, this is what I can remember from 2005, with a few additions and edits as the game has progressed. Feel free to add more information we might find useful!

[Awenina]

Hi Juljia

Yes! Raiding can be a lot of fun, preparation for a raid takes roughly half an hour per raid/week for one's class and can save a lot of frustrating wipes and hours in raid.

Another thing I learned this week were the use of raid macros to give instruction for each boss, I saw it in action and it was GREAT. These are fabulous for achieves too, giving instructions on what to do for the achieve. Loved it.

Awen.

[Awenina]

Hi Zuljia,

Not sure why you are being so defensive about my posts. Sorry if they offended you or made you think I was attacking your leadership style. FYI I have no interest in taking over your role, and think you taking on leadership is commendable. I do find it interesting that you call the guild raid group "your team". I thought this was a guild experience, but I guess I was wrong. Absolutely NOT trying to step on your toes, and sorry if it came across that way

Play styles are set by the raid leader, and I can tell by your posts that we are very incompatible, which is a good thing to find out outside of the game. I prefer a team that's ready and knowledgeable about their class in each raid, has one person (leader or interested dungeon master) who will give out reminders at the beginning of each boss, and is open and friendly to new ideas. I personally find the "learning as we go" style of raiding to be extremely frustrating, expensive, and tiring. What I have seen is that this style simply means doing the googling and researching during the raid by one person, or relaying on another person to tell one what to do. Lot's of time and gold wasted.

Again, neither style is right or wrong, they are simply VERY different.

See you ingame! And I hope you have every success with your group.

Awen