Last night we had another thrilling round of Wipe on Putricide. It's similar to Killing Putricide, which I understand is popular with some guilds, but with this twist we die instead of him. It's not really for everyone, but that's how niche guilds work.
If you've done him, you might have noticed that in phase two he drops two beakers which reduce your hit by a lot if you step in the clouds they create. In 10-man we (other people in the guild, I get bored enough with only one ICC run per week) have the tank move and the melee follows. This gets them away from the orange miss gas.
Last night I made a small suggestion: that melee watch for these. That was the totality of the suggestion. Okay I technically said to watch the ground so they can notice them sooner. Notice how this has no bearing on what the tank does. Or what the melee does. Or really anything except reacting faster to something which would wreck their DPS.
I pointed out that a process of [tank notices] and then [melee notices tank move] is slower than [melee notices]. Or more accurately, since melee aren't watching the tank, since they're rarely trying to stab him, the process would be [tank notices] [boss moves to catch up to tank] [melee notices boss move].
I know, how RUDE and OUT OF ROLE of me to make this ENORMOUS change to the strat. The very idea of suggesting that melee pay attention and possibly even react to their environment without the delayed orders of someone else is... unthinkable.
Some jackass raider [in the original post I'd mistakenly refereed to him as an officer, so some comments may seem off] decided to give me shit about this. He was in a harcore guild (or so I've heard) and in raid chat it was all figured out (they barely say shit in raid chat, it's mostly on vent, where they hadn't much either) and in tank chat too ( because I was totally privy to that, thanks for expecting me to know) and something about how I talk a lot but don't take much action. What the fuck that would even mean I don't know. Am I supposed to be a unthinking bot?
The whisper from him started with "we all know you have a blog" and then something about theorycraft vs. practicecraft. I explained that I had no idea what he was talking about. What does having a blog have to do with anything? I got the answer I sought: and it made no fucking sense. Apparently bloggers are part of a group which can only theorycraft pretty numbers and never actually play. This was new to me. He didn't seem to get my point when I explained that if he thought my blog has anything to do with theorycraft, he's never read it. I left out any mention of how so many unplaying theorycraft bloggers aren't formerly in hardcore guilds, they are currently in them, killing Arthas or hardmodes or hardmode Arthas, while we're wiping on Putricide.
Supposedly there was offense taken by my comment that there were "too many dicks on the dance floor". This raider decided to give me shit about that. If you knew me in game, you'd know I make jokes a lot, but I don't just randomly insult the entire raid. A person who is attempting to not jump to conclusions like a power-tripping douchebag will think "maybe that's some reference that I didn't get." In this case, it is. He had not taken a survey (I asked) but had heard comments in channels. An officer could not verify any cases of offense.
Eventually I ended the discussion with a polite (I'm lying) promise (lying) that I would not (lying) do any more thinking or suggesting (lying) no matter how much it did not affect the strat. Then I ignored him and spit on him on my way out. Perhaps not the most mature of responses, but when someone harasses me with no justification or provocation, I get pissed. The ignore did seem to shut him up though, so that's a plus.
I'm going to do a bit of rare theorycraft here. By theorycraft I mean insult people.
Former hardcore raiders who try to push a casual guild towards hardcore raiding and/or who constantly bring up their former status: Are worthless players. They are arrogant and lack the skills to match their egos.
They could not have voluntarily left hardcore raiding and voluntarily stayed out. They must have been called out for being not quite so great. Or for being egotistical douchebags. In other words, they were kicked out. And they can't get back in. If they could, they would. The fact that they try to change a casual guild indicates that they are not good enough to get into a pre-existing one or are socially incapable of creating their own. Despite their arrogance and sense of superiority, they effectively want the guild to carry them, to do what they cannot.
They are the "link achievement" person in trade chat, who does not have the achievement. They are the gearscore whores in blues. They are the people who whine that "WoW is too easy because Arthas died in X days after the patch" when they're still on fucking putricide. If even that.
I've run into some former hardcore raiders who got burnt out and didn't want to do that anymore. You know what? They were nice, good players. They knew their stuff and knew what they wanted. They didn't flaunt it except as a slight "yea, back in the day..." kinda thing to give cred without seeming to be bragging (or at least not too much bragging).
Then there are the ones who are out and want back in, but suck too much as players or people to do so.
This probably reflects poorly on my guild. That's too bad. I don't mean anything against the guild as a whole. Certainly there are all sorts of things which annoy me, but that's what happens with groups: nothing is perfect for anyone. This post is about the particular officer and his dickishness.
I guess there really were too many dicks on the dance floor.
The dick on the dance floor
I have a handy addon called Cellular. Most often I use it to separate conversations from chat log spam. It also logs them, which has been a huge help a few times when I've gotten whispers from people, thought "who is this person and why re they talking to me?", and then a scroll up show "oh, I bought herbs from them a few weeks ago". It's also easier than taking a lot of screenshots and resizing my chat log on the fly. Sorry if it looks odd, that's the formatting it uses. Be thankful blogger is ignoring the two dozen spaces before each line (or so the preview appears to be).
"<02-28-10>[Hornwood] we all know you run a blog. practicecraft is better than theorycraft, imo", -- [33]
"<02-28-10>[Kelpsacovic] huh?", -- [34]
"<02-28-10>[Kelpsacovic] you've got me all confused now", -- [35]
"<02-28-10>[Kelpsacovic] I mean, what does blog have to dow ith practicecraft?", -- [36]
"<02-28-10>[Hornwood] what we've discussed in tank and raid channel works. I read a lot of theorycraft on a lot of blogs. a lot of folks who like to look at the numbers and come up with strats don't seem to know how to do the actual work when playing the game.", -- [37]
"<02-28-10>[Hornwood] if the tank moves, melee moves. it works in 10 man and it should work in 25.", -- [38]
"<02-28-10>[Kelpsacovic] I'm not saying to not move him, I'm saying melee need to pay attenttion too", -- [39]
"<02-28-10>[Kelpsacovic] besides, I somehow doubt you've read my blog if you associate it with theorycraft", -- [40]
"<02-28-10>[Hornwood] you're one of several who talks more than acts. you're not the only one, and not the only one who broadcasts it on the net. the thing is, when the raid leader says \"we've got it\", and the tanks say \"we've got it\" -- we've got it. both of us have been i", -- [41]
"<02-28-10>[Hornwood] in harder core raiding guilds. we both know when to talk and when it's enough.", -- [42]
"<02-28-10>[Kelpsacovic] do me a favor and drop the damn superiority act and actually read wtf I said", -- [43]
"<02-28-10>[Kelpsacovic] it didn't have a damn thing to do with the strat", -- [44]
"<02-28-10>[Hornwood] I did. you told the raid what to do, and then called the raid a bunch of dicks. it wasn't appreciated, even as a joke.", -- [45]
"<02-28-10>[Kelpsacovic] it was a reference to a show", -- [46]
"<02-28-10>[Hornwood] that's fine. to more than a few people it sounded like \"you jackasses don't know what you're doing\"", -- [47]
"<02-28-10>[Kelpsacovic] you took a survey?", -- [48]
"<02-28-10>[Hornwood] it was brought up in a few class/role channels", -- [49]
"<02-28-10>[Kelpsacovic] alright, in the future I will make an effort to never try to think about anything or offer any suggestions, no matter how much they don't affect the strat the slightest bit", -- [50]
},
Keep in mind this was while we were wiping, and not to an enrage or "oops I cleansed the abomination" or something that can be blamed on mere luck or a mistake. No, these were the wipes where you should be looking at what happened and figure out what to do about it. Maybe that's me thinking too much and the solution is to mindlessly zerg the boss without attempting to correct any problems. Of course there's also the little thing of my suggestion being directed at melee DPS, not at the tanks or the raid leader, so it doesn't matter the slightest bit how they're doing.
Don't worry, this isn't going to be a regular post type. I'm not a fan of negative posts. But sometimes I get a little too irritated.
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24 comments:
Oh no! Be careful you don't end up getting yourself into even bigger guild drama by posting about it, like poor Tamarind did! :o
That video was hilarious, but I have to admit that not having seen it before, your post title did sound like you were just being insulting to other players (to me anyway).
Screw that, Post what you wanna post! It's not like the internet or these blogs actually have a bearing on your day to day real life. Let the Guild drama ensue. Way I see it, blogs are diaries, that we the public can view at our discretion... If your officer has a problem with showing up in YOUR diary then he has more control problems than he does brain cells.
Fight the power!
Blogging rots the brain, encouraging independent thought. Divergent opinion is a disease.
"when the raid leader says \"we've got it\", and the tanks say \"we've got it\" -- we've got it. "
And when the DPS don't move quick enough... we've got it? Sorry Occifer, I don't buy it.
You called him out on the most serious of 'hardcore' raiding sins: standing in the fire. For him to react so strongly makes me think he knew you were right.
Good for you.
As a former herdcore player I can tell you that you did wrong!
They way you handle encounters is: 1)you read a strat you like
2)explain to the raid what to do
3)zerg the thing
4) if you wipe find someone who could have done better ("tanks dont die" "healers heal more" "dps, we managed to hit the enrage")
then you keep going at the boss untill he falls over or your raid night ends.
Suggestions? from a non-officer? PHFFHF
what are you? a pvp'er??
It can be hard to tell if a wipe is due to bad strategy or simply a few people not paying attention and fucking up.
I've also experienced people joining the guild I'm in and then bragging about how great their old guild was, as if that would earn them respect. You're right of course, if their old guild was really that great they'd still be in it, unless they got kicked.
I first took your title as something along the lines of " too many people shouting over vent and it's chaos", without the reference. But either way, he should've let it go.
Jerk was way out of line and on a power trip though. Although ignoring and spitting won't help matters, atleast you got the point across :D.
He tried to use your blog as a reason why you were wrong (and totally fell flat on his face). Once he realized that, he probably tried to cover up for it, unwilling to admit it.
the "well, my other (hardcore) guild does it this way" is just a way for him to place the blame on everyone else, and not himself. It also makes him feel more important. Problem is, the same strats don't always work for different people. If some hardcore guild does x, but your guys can't do x, and COULD do y easily, then USE the Y STRAT. a decent amount of the time, your strat might even be better. Just because one way came out first doesn't make it the most efficient or 'right' way.
PS: The easiest way for us to deal with flasks on Put is to have a melee call out when they're almost off CD (DBM has a timer, i believe). When he says 'flasks', by the time the tank starts moving it's perfect. To each his own, but it might be worth giving a shot for you guys ;).
( maybe you should make someone else suggest it, and see if the officers go for it. Now wouldn't that be hilarious)
@Shintar: I'd not seen Tam's post. Well, I don't intend to flee. Standing my ground!
@Salvaenus: Fight the power, that's got a ring to it.
@Suicidal Zebra: I've learned my lesson about cleansing diseases.
@Tyben: Heh, I don't know if he ended up in the clouds, but I know some people were. So odds are pretty good.
@Dwism: It makes much more sense now. I understand my place.
@Anonymous: I've found they often go together; a bad strat confuses people and makes them play in awkward ways which are prone to mistakes.
@tyra: I'm pretty sure he's not in a harcore guild currently, and hasn't in a while, but yea, different strats for different guilds. I seem to recall we did some weird way of dancing on Heigan.
The flasks having a timer is new to me, I'm going to suggest that, to someone else. If melee don't have to react, that saves even more time. Thank you.
I encountered the same kind of resistance to my suggestions, but I took comfort in the fact that I knew I was ultimately right. I at least had the support of one officer in the guild. Eventually I became a raid leader as a result of my continued intelligent suggestions. :-)
Good luck and just try and steer clear of him OR talk to your other officers who are a little bit more even keeled than he is.
I understand your frustration fully. Recently the guild I am in has finally made it to the Lich King in 10m (we're stuck on the Prof as well in 25m)after a raid extension for two weeks on Sindragosa. (Problem is that many of us could still use the badges from the bosses we have missed as well as gear, but that's another babble.)
But for such an epic thing to get to see and be apart of, our Raid Leader (who in himself is a complete ass), decides to start yelling at random members because we weren't doing the right strat. Keep in mind it was our first night, and we all took a 15 minute break to watch the video when we got there. Then, he decides to change the strat, stating that the video was wrong. (Even though the guild in the video defeated the lich king.)
So after about 2 hours of beating our head into the wall listening to this jerk spout off how we all suck, I "accidentally" dc'ed and watched the tele.
It's been 4 days, and other to log in to do my Frost run, (which I would be done with if I got the bosses we skipped for the raid extension) I have stayed off the character and just played my alts. To have something that we all worked towards all expansion be wrecked by a complete ass tells me where this game and it's community has went.
Ew. We had a near total collapse due to a slight majority of our raid first deciding they were going to turn us into a hardcore guild, and then ultimately realizing that it wasn't working and then leaving. (All for another, single guild. Mysteriously, they are now all in separate guilds. WUT HAPPENED?) The only hardcore achieved was the degree of suck for the players who were there to have fun for three hours rather than to gain epeen. It was a good experience in terms of establishing values when we rebuilt, though.
As with Nick's examples, non-officers who make suggestions have a specific place in the eyes of the officers and raid leaders: good raiders who get more spots in raids and get considered to lead our next team.
And as a total sidenote this is why we have separate event-callers on vent for a lot of fights depending on role. Tanks calling incoming deformed or empowered adds on Deathwhisper while DPS call the status of the mana shield during Deathwhisper, etc. Speaking as a tank sometimes we are just too damn busy to know everything relevant that needs calling.
I did not know the reference to Flight of the Concords.
How easy would it have been to be offended by being accused of being one of the dicks on the dancefloor (Putricide's room)?
Should I expect that you were being clever? Or should I read that as a slightly veiled slam against the melee?
I do not know how you relate to your guild, and I do not know the reference. As an outsider, I can see how hackles could be raised (or whatever happens to hackles).
A rather stupid addition, stupid on my part: I was confused, the player in question was not actually an officer. I guess that puts him at pretty much the same level as me, so perhaps I should have ignored him much sooner and not been discouraged from suggestions.
@Nick: That's my plan.
@Anonymous: Raiding has always had its asses, but it is terrible how one person can cause so much trouble.
@Jim: From a complete outsider's perspective, it is understandable. However if a frequent raider is thinking the same as a complete outsider, something is wrong.
clearly he has not read you blog then...... what an ass of an officer :P
And it is a mortal sin for the melee to stand in the 'Bad'... good for you for telling them to watch out for it! :D
I don't normally delete anything but spammers, but what a comment is nothing but unsupported personal attacks, what am I supposed to do?
I think to be honest sometimes you just have to take moments like this on the chin in order to play games with strangers on the internet as part of an organised group.
Even if they got the reference (which it sounds like most didn't) it's provocative. If you make an allusion to someone talking about a bunch of dicks then you're pretty much calling people a bunch of dicks. (To be fair if they keep standing in crap they are being a bunch of dicks but you're still being provocative).
From the point of view of a former raid leader I tend to need to nurture failing players through an encounter or play a Wake The Fuck Up card from a very limited supply of those cards. A good leader plans carrot and stick and if you're aiming for 95% carrot 5% stick it really screws your man management up if random peons start tossing sticks around upsetting people.
Maybe they shouldn't get upset? I don't know. But they did.
I make them right for shutting you up. And yes if they did it to me I'd be annoyed just like you are.
You made a choice not to lead, to be a regular grunt. If you get stamped on for trying to lead it's the consequence of that choice.
So either deal with it or move to another guild where you get to call the shots.
Agree with Stabs. There's time to make suggestions and there's time to shut up. Try leading raids sometimes, you will get to know what I am talking about in no time.
It depends on the kind of guild, of course, but, in general, in a raid, the only persons telling people what to do should be the raid leader and whoever this raid leader authorizes to handle various parts of his work (eg, it is pretty common to have a separate person sorting out healing assignments). This is especially true when things get tough due to wipes / AFKs and whatnot.
You seriously underestimate the amount of stress a raid leader is over. Among other things, you seriously underestimate the amount of flack a raid leader gets from people for letting *other people* loose on the tiniest raiding customs. To give you a sense of it, consider the following whispers which raid leaders get pretty much constantly:
- hey, A is missing a flask,
- hey, take a look at B's damage, he must AFK'd half the battle,
- hey, we wiped because C failed to heal me,
- hey, we wiped because D drew aggro, he does this every time and I am sick of it,
- hey, just letting you know that I have to go in half an hour,
- hey, I am sorry but E just isn't up to tanking this, he keeps getting one-shotted,
- hey, we have wiped on this boss 4 times already, let's go instance F instead while we still have time,
- hey, what if G goes tanking and I go DPS?
- hey, what if we divide the groups so that H is in the same group as myself?
When you come with your:
- hey, melee should watch for such and such,
...made in the raid chat no less, you are bound to draw some leader aggro. You were wrong to take issue with that aggro and you were just super-wrong to leave.
Next time, please, take it like a man and make your suggestion *after* the raid, preferrably in the form of a forum post.
I'm not sure where anyone got the idea that I was attempting to lead,or that I had any 'leader aggro'. I got a series of harassing tells from a non-officer.
Oh, a non-officer... You said you were approached by a "jackass officer" and referred to him as "this officer" after that, so I took it you were talking about an actual officer in your guild.
If the whispers came from a non-officer, this is different. But then, your ignore / spit / leave shtick is even worse than it seemed to be before. Geez...
"I'm not sure where anyone got the idea that I was attempting to lead,or that I had any 'leader aggro'. I got a series of harassing tells from a non-officer."
Ah sorry mate, I got the wrong end of the stick.
I still think there are leadership issues. If your leadership is good then the rank and file shouldn't get into these pissing matches over tactics.
I'm not saying good leaders never ask the raid for advice. But people should know where the tactics are coming from, that problems causing a wipe are being worked on, what each individual needs to fix and that way a good raid can wipe without bickering with each other.
You still might need to rethink your home if they don't get their act together. Doesn't sound like you're having fun at all.
@Stabs: I want to emphasize that this is an isolated incident. Overall I'm happy.
Sorry, I'm late the party due to my own guild/blog related angst. You've shamed me with your awesome standing-your-groundingness. I salute you, Sir!
@Tam: Thanks, but your drama seems to have been actual guild drama. Maybe I'd have caved if I were in your shoes, even if I claim I'd hang in there and get gkicked if I'm going out.
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