How I left my guild

OK. It’s Friday night and I admit I’ve had a drink or possibly two already, which means that I’m in a mood for talking and sharing, possibly more than I normally would. But sharing is a bit of the point of blogging, isn't it?

There won't be any pretence or cover-up. This is the truth, the reality the way it is, including cracks and less-than-perfect. But even if this post starts in misery, I assure you it will get much better towards the end. Don’t worry. Just have a seat and a pint and relax while I'm sharing my story, OK? And don't forget I love my guild.

Now let's get started, shall we? (Larísa fills a pint to the brim and heads for her favorite armchair, takes a sip and clears her throat before speaking up.)

What made me leave
If you’re a frequent reader of PPI you probably have noticed that things haven’t been quite as bright and rosy as usual recently. Last week I hinted about a sleepless night and hours of crying, but I refused to say what it was all about.

However I don’t think it was too hard to guess. What WoW-related issue could possibly make Larísa that sad? A wipenight? A lost loot roll? A nerf to my class? No way. Such trivial things aren’t even worth a shrug. It’s nothing. The only thing that possibly could cause me such a grief must be related to the people I play with. My guild. And of course you were damned right.

This is what happened:

Despite our struggles to fill our roster, Adrenaline has put up daring goals for Cataclysm – even raising the ambition level a bit compared to earlier. We aimed for the hardmodes and we wanted to come to those and to progress through them fairly quickly. This was announced early in the expansion, and we also were told that our performances would be followed and noted and that players who couldn’t live up to the requirements would be removed, regardless if you were an old-timer or a new recruit. Fair enough.

A month or so after this “evaluation period” had been declared, our GM gathered a bunch of players to a special meeting on vent after a raid. He wanted to have a discussion with the players who were considered to have “issues”, the players who were most likely to be removed from the guild in case we would have to give up on 25 man raiding altogether, cutting down to a 10 man guild. And yes, I was one of those players.

Not a surprise
To be honest it didn’t come as a complete surprise. I’ve shared my struggles and efforts many times here at PPI. Especially fights that required a lot of movement and multitasking have always been a challenge to me. This very day I’ve still not gotten to terms with that son-of… cough, sorry. I mean Hodir. While my survival has been quite OK, I’ve been messing around at the bottom of our damage charts ever since Cataclysm was launched. I’ve done my best, as always, but my best isn’t always good enough.

Calli at PewPewLasers seems to be in a similar position as me. As he wrote in his post of confessions a little while ago:

"The problem is, I’m 41 next month. My reflexes aren’t what they used to be, there are youngsters in our raid who act like they have the reaction times of rattlesnakes on crack and they handle fights like this with ease. Me, I need time to process things, time to let muscle memory take the slack that my reflexes can’t handle and my brain can’t process. "

This could just as well have been written by me. So when I was told that they were afraid that my learning curve was too slow and they feared I might hold us back from progression in hardmodes, it wasn’t exactly a shock to me.

Nevertheless – it sucked to hear it said openly. While most of the others that were called to this meeting had issues that were quite easy to solve – such as attendance issues – mine was far worse. With exception for Hodir, I usually learn fights like everyone else. But if the learning curve is too slow, is there really that much you can do to speed it up? If you’re already giving everything in every raid, if you’re already preparing, watching strats, adjusting to the latest advice from the theorycrafters, practicing with dummies, what more can you do? I am who I am. Larísa. And after about 300 raids it should be quite well known to my guild what I was capable of and not capable of. It wasn’t something I could fix or change within a week.

After all those years of fighting to deserve my spot in the raiding team, to be someone who contributed to the success of the raid like anyone else, it felt as if I finally had reached a roof. I had reached the limit of my potential as a player and if this wasn’t good enough with regards to where Adrenaline was aiming, I should recognize this and take the consequences.

Hesitation
No one told me to leave the guild. The idea was entirely my own - and that was the point of it: to take the initiative, to be proactive and in charge rather than just waiting for a verdict to fall.

Of course it wasn’t easy. I had raided with Adrenaline since I first stepped into Black Temple in the summer of 2008. My entire existence in Azeroth was built around raiding and around my guild and I couldn't imagine the game without it. What would I do? Where would I go? Even if I suspected that I probably could find a new home if I advertised my need for it at my blog, I wasn't sure that I even wanted a new home. After so many years, starting all over in a guild where I didn't know anyone, where I had no shared history, no sense of belonging together, felt close to impossible.

Leaving Adrenaline would mean that I would try WoW as a solo game, alt playing and pugging my way through the world. Since I never have had time to explore all the revamped content and the worgen and goblin starting areas, it probably could hold my interest for a while. But deep inside I knew that leaving my guild, most likely was the beginning of the end of my time in WoW. An era coming to an end. No wonder that I hesitated.

Sunday night I had made up my mind after rewriting my farewell post to our guild forums four times and waiting a few days, just like I had promised our GM. I spoke a final time with my closest friends in the guild, and then I got to work, removing my characters from the guild one by one. And all the time I thought about the guy who cut off his own arm when it was stuck under a rock in the desert. I hated what I was doing but I didn't see any alternative. I didn't do it to cause drama, I didn't do it to make a point or make anyone feel sorry for me. I did it partly out of a sense of pride, dignity and self respect, partly because it seemed to be the logical thing to do, the best solution not only for me, but also for my guild.

After two and a half years I was no longer a member of Adrenaline. I was alone again. Lost in the big voids of Azeroth. I didn't cry. I reckon I had already emptied my resources in that field. All I felt was this huge emptiness.

Letters and comments
Little did I expect what would follow the next few days. It turned out that my departure didn't go unnoticed. Letters were written, in- and outside of the game. Comments were written and all those efforts that were made to convince me to come back to the guild brought tears into my eyes. One guildie wrote to me: "If there are hard modes we can't do with you, then I do not want those hard modes. Do not leave, please." You would have to have a heart of stone to resist that.

Another one sent me a compass in the hope that it would help me to find my way back home. He was also rather brutal on our poor GM (who goes under the name Stumps), starting to send me stumpy feet every day, threatening to keep cutting our GM into pieces until I got back to my senses. and returned. And he wasn't the only one to take to blackmail - one of our sweetest, most peaceful members swore that he'd kill one innocent puppy every day until I came back.

Most unhappy of everyone was our GM, who regretted the turn things had taken and was determined not only to get me back into the guild, but to help me work out anything that could be missing for the hardmodes, if it so would mean that he'd had to buy an airplane ticket to Sweden. He made it clear that he'd never give up on getting me back, and he would keep pestering me until I gave in.

Who can resist so much love, coming from a family that I've spent so much time with? Well, I certainly couldn't. 48 hours after my departure I was back in the guild of my heart, back in Adrenaline, the only guild I'll ever belong to for my remaining days in WoW.

25 man struggles
So is all well again now? Sort of. I'm fine with my relation to my guild, but to be honest I'm not entirely sure for how long we will survive. Times are tough for 25 man raiding groups, as Spinksville wrote about the other day, and God knows we too have been struggling a lot over the last month, never sure if we could make the raid take off, more often than not undermanning our raids.

The other night we got a blood transfusion in form a of a whole bunch of players from a smaller guild joining us and hopefully this will take some pressure off us. After rain comes sunshine and things actually look a little brighter now then they have for a long while.

Let's not worry about the future though. All I need to know for now is that I'm back, at home, in the guild where I belong. A happy end and I've put the issues we had behind me. That's a good way to end a week, isn't it?

The toast of this week goes to my GM Stumps. For all the pain the last couple of weeks have brought us both, I think we've learned and ended up a little bit wiser. And we've still got some great adventures ahead of us, I'm certain of that now.

As you said when we talked about it on vent - this book hasn't come to its end yet, and I still have a part in it to play. You haven't given up about my learning curve, so why should I?

This one is for you and and actually for all other guild leaders out there, struggling with the fine balance of pushing their guilds up and beyond while maintaining the atmosphere and level of happiness. It's a damned hard balance act you're doing and there's no wonder if things go wrong once in a while. The crucial question is if you have the ability to recognize when it happens and make something about it.

Cheers!

(Larísa raises her jug and let's her eyes sweep around the room, smiling and nodding to all theose friendly and familiar faces.)

But look over there! Our musicians for this evening have arrived! So let's put those past events behind us and sing and dance and enjoy ourselves until the night ends. Dark shadows may lure around the corner, but tonight I assure you we're out of their reach.

A Haunted Week

I won’t hide it to you. This week is best described as “meh”, which is odd. After all it’s Patch week and we should be bouncing and clapping our hands – alternatively raging and knitting our fists over the buffs and nerfs to different aspects of the game.

But it’s quiet. Too quiet. I see apathy in the blogosphere and I see apathy in my guild and it’s damn hard to not get somewhat affected by it - even if you’re blessed with pink pigtails.

Adam wrote a post the other day claiming that old bloggers like me have a “responsibility to rise to the occasion and inspire others”. Are you serious Adam? I’ve been doing this for three years now, don’t you think I deserve a rest at some point?

But OK, I’ll do my best not to be too dark and whiney as I’m about to ramble away, sharing what’s been on my mind lately.

The haemorrhage in our guild
So, what’s up? Well, first, there’s the constant underlying worrying about the future of my guild. I wrote about it a while ago and we’re still struggling with our recruitment. While we still get an application here and there, we’re losing our older players at the same rate as the new ones join – or actually slightly quicker. The veterans aren’t leaving us for other guilds; it’s a case of reaching the point where the game doesn’t have a grip on them anymore. They’ve had their fun but now they’re done with it.

Of course this was bound to happen at some point, but I must admit that I’m a little bit surprised at the timing of it. We’re still just a couple of months into the expansion. It’s not like when we had been raiding ICC for six months and there was nothing new on the horizon. I wonder if this is just our guild or if it’s a sign of an overall change in the game. Are we seeing a shift of generations here? Are the vanilla veterans marching out?

The shift in the blogosphere
And then there’s the blogosphere. The part of it where I hang around took a huge hit this week as Righteous Orbs closed down. I still stand by what I wrote in a comment – that I’m happy for them, since I think that their talent was too to be spent on solely writing WoW-related blog posts. I understand and support their decision to move on, and somehow it’s almost a bit inspiring and liberating to see them let go so of it so easily.

But this said – Tam and Chas are leaving a huge void after them as they’re moving on. Normally I remove blogs that have shut down immediately from my blogroll, but in this case I can’t yet bring myself to do it. The community won’t be the same without their voices. They brought colour and life to it and as I look around in what’s left of bloggers, we all appear a bit grey and dull in comparison, to be honest.

However - life goes on and I suppose the rest of us will recover eventually. But I can’t deny that it feels as if I too am getting closer and closer to the day when it’s my turn to bid farewell and head for new pastures. The thought has crossed my mind, more than once.

On the brighter side: when oldies like RO and – at some point in the future – PPI shuts down, it leaves more space for the newcomers to flourish. And there isn’t any lack of new blood. Every week several new blogs are introduced in the Blog Azeroth forums. I keep getting letters from newcomers, such as most recently Stubborn at Sheep The Diamond, asking me how to get started and noticed. Maybe he will grow up and find his own voice and eventually and become the next generation’s equivalence of RO? You never know.

The LFD buff
So what about the patch that dropped this week? Does it get a “yay” or a “boo” from Larísa? Well, I think the biggest news in it was the introduction of the up-to-15 percent buff to LFD parties, which made some players cheer and others moan. I’m in neither party since I’m currently only doing dungeons in guild groups, so it really doesn’t affect me at all. And I don’t give a crap about if it’s easier or not for non-guild parties. It’s not my concern.

For me the most interesting aspect was the fact that we had been doing those random dungeons for such a long time without anyone noticing that the 5 percent buff didn’t work. It reminded me a little bit of when you’re teaching a child how to ride a bicycle. As long as you assure them that you’re holding the rear luggage carrier, everything will go just fine. They’ll keep going until the moment they realize that you’re actually not holding them anymore and haven’t been doing for a long while. As they see this, they’re bound to fall over, and they’ll be very angry with you, claiming that they can’t ride the bike unless you support them.

I know there have been come complaints, but I can’t help being a little amused thinking of that so many players seem to have been riding that bike damn well without anyone holding it. However, now all of a sudden, GC isn’t just holding the bike for us, he has even put on supporting wheels.

Is it for good or for bad? I don't know. I don't pug and I'm not the target audience for this change, so I'll refrain from judging and raging this time; I've done enough of it in the past.

Drop of the week
Let’s end this post on the brighter side. After four years of playing WoW, I finally got my first epic world drop in the form of a pair of plate trousers. For some obscure reason a crocodile in Tol Brad carried them in his pockets, so I killed him and sold them for over 20 k gold. This is a sum that I personally never ever, under any circumstances, would pay for a piece of gear that inevitably will be replaced in the next content patch. But of course I’m happy that other players think differently!

On the other hand, I'm prepared to spend ridiculous amounts of gold on other sorts of items that I suspect other players would consider utterly useless. Worthless fluff, filling your bags with nothing. And that’s exactly what I did for a part of the income from the trousers: I bought myself a shadow.

For ages, I’ve been cursing myself for losing my Haunted Memento, somewhere along the road. In case you’ve forgotten, this was an item that you got during the scorge invasion in the pre-Wrath events. If you have it in your bag, it will give you a haunted buff or debuff, (considering how you look at it), and occasionally you’ll also see a dark figure discretely following you in a distance.

Once upon a time I had one of my own, but I must have lost it during some bank clear-out, in the belief that it was just another trash necklace (the icon model is not unique for the item). And ever since, I’ve been a sad panda for being so careless and stupid.

However, rich as a goblin after my world drop, I entered AH and bought the one that was up at 5 k gold. It was worth every copper of it!

Finally I’m back to myself again. This is Larísa, this is me, in a nutshell. A gnome with bright pink pigtails, carrying a shadow she never quite can escape.

It’s been a haunted week indeed. So let’s end it here with a toast.

I’ll have a big one myself. I think I need it.

Cheers!

25 man raiding – how long can we defy the law of gravity?

Back in April I asked if anyone will bother to do run 25 man raids in Cataclysm, considering the announced changes with shared lockouts and loot in 10 mans becoming the same as the 25 man loot.

As someone who loves 25 man raiding, I was concerned, even though I also could understand why the 10 man raiding guilds welcomed the changes and thought it was about time. The gain of someone is the loss of someone else.

Here we are now, one month - soon to be two, into Cataclysm. How did it go? Has the world changed or were my worries unfounded? Is it business as usual?

Hitting hard
Well, I suppose that it’s still a little bit too early in Cataclysm to make the definite call. People have only been at max level for a month. Players who aren’t on the bleeding edge, but still plan to raid in Cataclysm, are still in the process of gearing up in heroics. And the post-Cataclysmic guild landscape on each server isn’t set in stone yet; it’s a process in progress. We’re only seeing the first tier of several and each one might have an impact on the social structure and how people choose to raid.

So there are a lot of reservations and maybes in this post, in the usual Larísa manner.

However, if I’m putting up my finger in the air to feel where the wind is going, I would say that Cataclysm has hit the 25 man raiding pretty hard.

I can only speak about what I see on my server, but where there used to be at least 15-20 guilds on the alliance side that did 25 man raids back in the days, there are just a handful who do them in Cataclysm, so far.

If you look at the recruitment ads on the forums, there are plenty of guilds who claim that they’ve got plans on 25 man raids. However, when you look a little closer at their raid progression, it turns out that most of their kills, if not all, are from 10 man raids.

Not everyone will agree with me. I read a post by Gavendo at Rapid Fire, who argued that the hardcore guilds such as Paragon still are rocking it in the 25 mans. He also talks about why 10 mans are harder than 25 mans, since there among other things is less room for individual mistakes. So according to Gav we were wrong to worry about the future of 25 man raiding.

And sure, I’m certain that the top class guilds of the world are doing just fine. But the world I live in is different. What we currently experience is a distinct lack of people who want to do 25 man raiding. Recruiting is harder than ever been before. For all the efforts we’ve made, we don’t get many applications, and I find it hard to believe that it would be because it’s not as if we’re not an attractive guild. We’re one of the oldest, most reliable and well organized guilds on the server if I’d dare say so, with an infrastructure that works and a solid record of progression in the past. If we can’t recruit, it’s not just because we’re not good enough. It’s something else going on.

Was it only about the loot?
Last spring we had quite an intense debate going on in the blogosphere about 10 vs 25 man raiding. There was a lot of talk about the loot aspect, where 25 mans always had been at advantage and things now would be more or less equal (although with a little more points awarded to 25 man raids.) Many argued that if loot was all that kept people doing 25 mans and that players really didn’t enjoy it for its own sake, then it was just as good if it disappeared.

And I’m sad to say it, but it seems as if this is what we see happening now. With the promise of better loot to show off in the cities gone, the gravitation towards smaller, easier-to-handle, more tightly knit raiding formats is turning out to be strong, maybe too strong.

Our guild is still determined to defy this gravitation. Loot or not, we think that 25 man raiding has a certain “something” that 10 man raiding lacks. Not that there’s anything bad about 10 man raiding. I enjoy the smaller format immensely too, with the intimacy and cosiness that a tighter team brings. However, it’s a different creature and it can’t really replace the experience of having a 25 man team climb a learning curve, click and pull it together.

But unfortunately, people like me seem to be a dying breed and the question is for how long we can keep doing this. And how much worries and stress can our officers put up with before it’s wearing them down?

History repeating itself?
The other night our officers set a date. If we can’t fill our vacancies before March 1, so we’re sure that we can pull off every raid and progress as planned, we will no more be a 25 man guild, but a 10 man guild spotting only one team, and the roster will be cut down accordingly.

No one wants it to happen and everyone’s prepared to do whatever they can to help out recruiting. Hopefully Adrenaline won’t become one of the victims of the 25 man raiding death of Cataclysm. But there’s no guarantee we’ll succeed.

If you forget about Paragon and their buddies, I think it’s a tough time for many 25 man guilds in Cataclysm. I was never around for the 40 man raiding in vanilla, but I’ve understood that the transformation for TBC, when they were removed from the game, was painful to say the least. While we still have 25 man raids in the game, I can’t help wondering if what we see now is the beginning of a repetition of the past.

And the next question that comes to mind is of course: how could Blizzard possibly motivate keeping making content for 25 man raids in the next expansion, if it’s just a small minority of the players who bother to do it? It sure carries a symbolic value, but it also pulls development resources, and the question is how much they can allow it to cost.

Again: it probably is too early to judge out the 25 mans completely. This is not my “The End is Near” post. Not quite yet.

But the situation is indeed worrying for all of us who love to raid in 25 mans, but wouldn’t qualify to do it in Paragon.

Mist's Edge revisited

There was never any doubt about where I would take my farewell of this expansion. Mist's Edge, by the deserted coast of Darkshore, the same place where I spent the last night before Wrath arrived. Not once had I visited this beech since that moment. It's not a place where you go to seek out adventures or company. It's a place for solitude and contemplation.

I always knew where to go for this ceremony, but I wasn't certain on how to schedule it.

For the longest I imagined that I'd go there the night before the launch of Cataclysm, on December 6. This was until the blogosphere exploded with posts where bloggers took a fond farewell of the old world, soon to be washed away by the tides of time, and I realized that my timing was wrong. If I wanted to come back to the same spot where TBC ended to me and Wrath took off, I had better do it at this point, before the Shattering had shaken up the world forever. Who knew if this piece of coast will even exist tomorrow? Maybe it had been replaced by a murloc heaven or a new quest hub?

I for sure didn't have a clue, since I miraculously not only had stayed out of the beta, but also managed to stay fairly oblivious about the incoming changes. I had been told that Thousand Needles would be flooded and I thought that I might have caught a glimpse of some new holiday resort looking place, probably operated by goblins. Considering the cinematic trailer I assumed that Stormwind would change. But I certainly had no idea about the whereabouts of Darkshore.

One thing was clear: If I wanted to take a proper goodbye of Wrath at Mist's Edge, I'd better hurry up.

Steady progression
There is a saying that once is a trend and twice makes a tradition, and since rituals is something to hold onto in times of change, I kept it. First I lit a campfire. Then I used it to cook a Delicious Chocolate Cake with the ingredients I had brought, including some small eggs I just had farmed from the crazy owls in the camp nearby.

Two years! How quickly hadn't they passed? It felt like yesterday I was here, thinking back on my journey which had brought me from Zul Farrak to Black Temple. It had been quite a career, with a lot of bumps and jumps on the way, including server change and guild changes a couple of times.

Wrath had been different and way more stable. Adrenaline had steadily progressed through the tiers, week after week, boss after boss until we got our Lich King 25 man kill this spring. Sure, we had had some raiders joining us in Northrend and others leaving us on the way. But we were basically a well oiled raiding machine. While many guilds on our server succumbed, split up, stopped, departed, disbanded, we kept going on. We were never in the very top of the progression chart, but always right below it. Our raiding team for Cataclysm was already set, and it was pretty much the same team as had participated in the last official 25 man raids in June. A few of us have switched classes, but the people are the same.

The good stuff
But what about the game play? I asked myself if I had enjoyed Wrath. Was it a good expansion? Yes, definitely. There was so much good stuff when I thought about it. The landscape. I really had learned to love that continent at the other side of the sea. Outland had some nice places, especially Zangarmarsh, but in comparison to Northrend it didn't stand a chance. I loved the snow theme, the wilderness, the mountains and the Scandinavian influences. It all held nicely together and it felt appropriate for a fantasy themed game where you fight with swords and spells rather than lasers.

And then there was the questing - far superior to anything we had seen before in WoW. Phasing, vehicles, nicely put together questlines, even cinematics, you name it. Gone were the days of kill-ten-pigs! And they assembled them together so nicely in quest hubs and a logical order, which made levelling guides unnecessary.

Then I thought about the raiding. It hadn't gone free from criticism in the community. According to some it had been way too easy. A faceroll. And what about the hardmodes, did they really offer variety and options for the players, or was it just lazy design, giving Blizzard an excuse not to provide more content?

For my own part I actually thought the raiding in Wrath was pretty good. I can understand if Naxx had been a disappointment for those who had done it in the original, but for me those encounters were new and fun, even if they could have been slightly more challenging. They certainly didn't feel like a step up from Black Temple.

Ulduar on the other hand was brilliant, probably on par with Karazhan in quality, and with the teleport devices which made it a much more enjoyable experience than most of the 25 man instances in TBC. ToC... well what to say of ToC? The bosses weren't that bad, but it showed clearly that for all our complaints and grumbles about trash, it fills a purpose. To only fight boss after boss in the one and same room doesn't make a good raid experience.

Finally ICC. It was a good instance and I think the LK fight beats most other encounters in the game, but one year is way too long time to spend in the same place. We were burned out on it and yet we kept going, since there was no alternative.

If anything should be criticized about Wrath it was the fact that we only did one instance at a time until the next tier was released and we finally could move on. We never had much of a choice, if you don't count the single-bosses such as Malygos and Sartharion. The menu was too short to satisfy our appetite. But I think Blizzard has listened and learned their lesson, and Cataclysm will fix it. Amen.

Goodbye and hello
I took a bite of my chocolate cake and saw the fireworks light up the sky. I smiled to myself in anticipation.

Goodbye old world! Hello new world!

I can’t wait to see what awaits us on the other side of the reset.

When progression raiding becomes a grind

She looked surprisingly elegant, not the destruction and death you could expect from a pile of bones coming alive. Her wings moved ever so smoothly as I took off from Krasus Landing, as if they were put together by baby soft, weightless feathers.

I couldn't stop smiling. Finally, after all those wipes, The Bloodbathed Frostbrood Vanquisher was mine. I experienced a sensation of lightness, as if I had been released from something. A burden. Most definitely a burden, even if it felt a bit odd to use that word. After all, weren't we talking about a game I'm supposed to play for fun and relaxation? But I think I simply was relieved that I got it done before we were hit by the enrage timer of any raiding in this expansion.

Getting the meta achievement
Sunday night I completed the 10 man version of the Glory of the Icecrown Raider meta achievement - my last, serious goal for Wrath of the Lich King. This doesn't mean that I've stopped raiding entirely. We've got a few more drakes to get before we're finished. But we're closing in, oh yes, we're so closing in.

It has been a strange couple of months, where our guild has been put at test. I knew we had a strong sense of belonging, but the guild loyalty and comradeship has gone beyond my expectations.

In theory it doesn't sound too bad, does it? You grab 10 players, you head off to ICC and you progress through the hardmodes and achievements, wiping a little, learning the fights one after one until the box flashes up on your screen. Glory of the Icecrown raider, yay! Shouldn't take more than a couple of weeks at our gear level and with the ICC buff, should it? Tick, tick, tick, BAM, done!

In reality it's been way more complicated. It isn't exactly as if our guild is perfectly well balanced for those purposes. We're still a 25 man raiding guild, but until Cataclysm, we can go on a break if we want to, without risking to lose our spots as raiders. Running 10 man raids, which is what we can do with our current squad, is optional. Some players have taken the opportunity to a hiatus. Others have kept going, at least to grab the ICC mount, which was one of our set goals. The result has been a huge surplus of ranged dps, compared to the amount of tanks and healers. We've rotated a lot, which has meant that it has taken longer for the dps:ers to complete the meta, especially for the ones who also have missed a few raids due to the summer vacation season.

A painful grind
Our tanks got their mounts more than a month ago and most of our healers shortly after. They've had absolutely nothing to get for their own benefit in ICC. No achievements, no shiny upgrades, no progress, nothing.

All they've had to look forward to as they have signed up for raids has been yet another grind night with content they've done before. And yet they've kept signing. Week after week, raid after raid have they turned up, to make sure that every active raider will get a shot at the mount. In the meanwhile, our officers have made spreadsheets, keeping track on everyone's status, trying to make the achievement hunt for the guild as efficient as possible.

My mount was the 16th and it hopefully won't be too long before we've got the last few, putting an end to all this.

I can imagine how painful this must have been for those who got their Sindragosa achievement or Putricide heroic weeks and months ago. They did their share of wiping and learning back in time. They downed them and they know exactly how it should be done. The problem is that everyone isn't on the same page. In every raid there has been a couple of players, still in the beginning of their own, personal learning curve. And there are no shortcuts in the most difficult fights of those achievements. Every single player has to learn the dance steps by himself, sorting out exactly where to put the feet.

Those encounters are technically demanding, putting pressure on every individual to not make any mistakes. You can't rely on a couple of veterans carrying everyone else, since it's "on farm". Everyone has to execute it well, and while it can be useful to watch videos before an encounter, most of us need to learn, practice and wipe a few times before it eventually clicks.

Week after week, our veterans have patiently been wiping until the newcomers have learned their lesson. Hardly ever have I heard anyone of them getting annoyed. They've shared what they have been able to, and have patiently waited.

Progression - and grind
It's a strange situation. Normally it's the same for everyone. Sometimes you do farm runs, sometime progression and we learn it together. But so not in this case. While a few in each raid group have enjoyed fun, interesting and engaging progression raids, the same encounters have been horrible, tedious grinds for others. But as opposed to other grinds, those raids have included a lot of wiping.

However our tanks and healers haven't fled in terror. They've stayed. Sure, they're a bit tired, but still they keep showing up, willing to help out everyone else until the job is done. Not just their own mounts, but mounts for everyone.

I know that this attitude isn't something you find in every guild. The world is full raid groups that fall apart as soon as a few players have completed their goals. All of a sudden player will disappear without any previous notice and they suddenly start prioritizing their real life as soon as they've reached their personal goal. That's what you could expect.

The patient fight to get everyone a mount is an amazing effort and I'm truly proud to belong to a guild with such a team spirit.

I smiled as I cruised above Icecrown on my new dragon. I'm well aware of that she's not super exclusive compared to for instance the Naxx meta mount, which was brought out of the game in a patch. I've even heard first hand reports that it's common in the beta, so apparently quite a few players have managed to get her.

Regardless of this: in my eyes she remains a beauty with a very distinct look of her own and I love her. She will forever remind me of our guild spirit at its best. We are guildies and we help each other out. In grind as well as in progress.

Our legendaries won’t count

We had a little discussion on vent the other night, where we were asking ourselves if the deeds we’ve done in Adrenaline the last two years will be recorded as already completed guild achievements.

I reckoned – or at least hoped –that they would. After all, when the achievement system was introduced for individuals, we got a ton of achievements recorded. Admittedly the game didn’t remember everything we had done. I remember that it felt particularly weird to have to revisit Mechanar, which I farmed so excessively in TBC, just to get it documented that I actually had completed it. But a lot of it was there from the start.

So wouldn’t it be natural if long-time guilds would get credit for our glorious past? I thought it would, but apparently Blizzard thinks differently.

I’m quoting a blue post, referred by MMO-champion:

“Dark Phoenix Mount Reward
[…] First and foremost, they must be unlocked via a guild achievement. Let's just say, that for example, you need to complete the new guild achievement "We are Legendary" in order to unlock the Dark Phoenix. That achievement requires the guild to gain access to all 6 legendary weapons currently available in the game. (note that all guild achievements start on Cataclysm launch, so anything you have now will not matter, it must be done with your guild after launch)”

As with anything related to Cataclysm I suppose that this isn’t set in stone. Maybe it will change before launch. But he does sound worryingly certain about this thing. And it makes me rather disappointed.

So far my guild has managed to get two legendaries – the mace and the axe in Wrath. Oh, and yeah, one alt got an Illidan legendary as we ran a retro raid in BT, although I’m not sure if it was guilded or not, so it might be out of our hands. That warglaive didn’t take a ton of effort, but on the other hand, the mace and axe did. And all this work was for nothing?

I can’t help scratching my head seeing this. Are you serious? Really? I know that Blizzard has good reasons to try to make us go back and relive old content and take away some of the pressure from them to produce new. But isn’t this to push it a little bit too far?

Of course the situation could be that they haven’t got any choice. There might be technical limits that prevent them from tracking historical deeds of a guild. But it seems strange to me. If guild ranking sites can track guild progression automatically, why shouldn’t Blizzard be able to do the same?

We should be half way to “Legendary” as Cataclysm is launched, or at least a third, if there was any justice. As it stands now it appears rather unlikely that we’ll ever get it.

The post in which GM Huw restores Larísa's confidence in Blizzard

Oooops! You spotted me. That wasn't really intended.

No, I'm not taking back the charge of the bar disk quite yet. My trusted stand-ins are obviously doing just fine and I'm still on vacation, only stopping by here for a couple of hours to change my clothes, and then I'm off on the roads again.

But since you've seen me, I could as well bring you a little piece of news that has reached my ears.

You remember that post I made about a guildie of mine that lost the right to his name after a conflict with a GM? I'm pretty sure you do; it's the by far most commented post I've ever had on the blog, and to be honest the majority of the readers thought that I was wrong in taking the side of my grumpy fellow player. Most of you thought that he got the treatment he deserved. I still don't think he did. But I don't mind disagreeing with my readers from time to time, it makes a much better discussion.

Anyhow: Blizzard has now come to a decision on how they look on this incident and they actually give Eräjorma right! A guildie of mine published this in a comment to the original post, but most of you will probably not see it there, so I thought I'd better post it separately. I thought I owed you the conclusion of the story.

This is what they wrote:

"Hello [real name]

Thank you for your mail. I am sorry that we took so long to get back to you. Starcraft 2 launch had an effect on all of our response times :(

Firstly; allow me to apologise in the matter your issue was handled. It is with deep regret that we see this type of issue.

We aim to be at the forefront of customer support for online gaming and strive to provide a level of support to match the strength of our products. This occasion highlights that we are, at times, far from this.

We will certainly be investigating the manner in which this was handled further.

Regarding your name; I cornered a Finnish colleague who assured me that your name was perfectly acceptable. so we reverted the name earlier today and removed the warning from your account.

We never change names unless they have been reported by other players and we have verified, so this was an unreasonable and needless name change for which I am again sorry for :/

Hopefully this incident has not tarnished your image of our support and you will feel
comfortable coming to us in future with other concerns.

If you require any further help or have any other issues, please feel more than free to get back in touch with us and we will respond as swiftly as possible.

Regards,

Huw
Senior Game Master
Blizzard Entertainment Europe"

I can only say that I'm really, really happy about this. What the first GM did to Eräjorma may have been unprofessional (although understandable from a strictly human point of view), but that wasn't the end to it. This shows that they take customer concerns seriously. The e-mail address where you can complain about issues you have with GMs isn't just there as a marketing gimmick - it's there for real and if you have a good reason to use it you should do it.

To be honest I was quite surprised to see the response. I really hadn't expected them to listen to Eräjorma - which actually is a little bit saddening to think about. When and why did I become so cynical? When did I start to see Blizzard as a faceless giant who doesn't care about an individual player any more than a cow cares about the whereabouts of a fly? Is it the RealID thing that has affected me? The general atmosphere in the community? Playing for too long without a break?

Oh well. My eyes are pinkish and sparkling again. Our grumpy ret paladin is back, and hopefully he'll focus his fury on attacking monsters with his Shadowmourne axe rather than GM:s in the future.

So I'll finish this little unplanned post by bringing out a toast for GM Huw, who put everything right again. Here you are - a pint of The Black Sheep, a wonderful local ale I picked up in Yorkshire - a perfect match for an inn run by a mage if you ask me. Cheers and enjoy! It's on the house.

That's all folks. Now, go back to where you were. I heard there's been some great storytelling going on in the bar...

Thanks for keeping this up, Tam and Ixo. See you again in a couple of weeks!

(Larísa goes invisible and sneaks out through the backdoor.)

A power demonstration of a GM

I've never ever had a problem with any Blizzard GM. On the contrary: I've always found them helpful, sometimes more than that - cheerful, friendly, humorous in a way that goes beyond what you could expect.

Nowadays I have very little to do with them. There are two reasons for this: 1. They've made changes to the game so we have less reason to contact them, for instance the two hour span to trade soulbound loot. 2. They seem to talk to us less and less in chat form, preferring the in-game mail system as their main channel for communication. At least that's my impression. I suspect they have good reasons to do so. It probably is quicker and more efficient than to contact us in game. And you can just do your job without risking to take a lot of crap from dicks who seem to have their default setting on aggressive. I don't blame them at all for this, although I miss our silly little confersations.

Bear this in mind when I'm writing this post. I don't complain about GM:s in general - I love them - and I think that players have no right at all to be offensive and rude in their communication with them. However the other night something happened to a guild mate of mine that made me quite upset. An exception to my previous good experiences. My guildie wasn't free from guilt - far from that. He certainly deserved some kind of consequences. But what he got was more than that. It was nothing but a demonstration of who was in charge and I think it was childish.

I can't help seeing the irony in it all. First I write a post about how we recently got our Shadowmourne completed. Then I write a post about criticism. And now those two topics knit together into this one.

Because the victim - and originally offender - in this is no one less than our grumpy paladin who got the legendary axe. He's now risking to quit the game without using the axe in a single raid, unless Blizzard changes their decision and gives him an apology. Which I'm far from convinced that they'll do. It's a tragedy - not just to him, but to our guild, losing one of our absolute core players.

Here it begins
But I'll tell you the story from the beginning. Here we go:

Earlier this week there came a plea for help from Eräjorma in our forums. It turned out that when he logged into the game, he found that all of his macros - and he had loads of them after many years of playing, macros that had cost him a lot of time and effort to create and collect - suddenly were gone. Gone without any trace, just like that. It shouldn't happen since they're saved on the server side these days - and yet it did. The only connection he could make was that he had had a game crash with an error, just as he logged out of the game for the night.

For all the good advice we usually can give to guild members with technical problems we were unable to help out this time and Eräjorma wrote a GM-ticket. Three days went without any answer. And when he finally got one, it was an in-game-mail, which according to Eräjorma (I haven't seen it myself) was unsatisfactory, not answering his questions or helping out, just telling him to check out the support forums. Not useful at all. So he wrote a new ticket, was contacted by a GM and a heated conversation took place.

I'm afraid the resolution is to crappy for you to read it here, but I hope that this link might work if you want to follow it line by line.

Behaving like a dick
As you can see from it if you bother to read it, Eräjorma behaved like a dick as the conversation started. He was very angry, to say the least, and I can absolutely understand why the GM got pissed. I definitely would have too and I feel genuinely sorry for the Blizzard representative about this part.

Eräjorma is, as I said earlier, a bit grumpy in his nature. Sometimes he says more than he should and speaks before he thinks, which actually rendered him a guild kick once in our guild. He was let in again though, and he had learned his lesson after that and has a way better behavior nowadays. He bore his punishment with dignity, he learned his lesson. He's definitely not one of my closest friends, he barely would say hi to me, but all in all he is an OK person, a person I can live with, even if he'll never be good at sugarcoating anything. If he's pissed about something after a raid he'll let you know. He's the salt in our flesh and I think guilds need a bit of that too, although in very small dosis.

But how was the GM supposed to know that? All he saw was an overly angry customer, threatening him to call his superiors and being generally rude. Of course he got mad at him. However I don't think this justifies the measures he took against Eräjorma. He could have given him a warning (which he also did). And if he did want to do something more he could have given him a temporary ban for a few days as a marker, giving him time to cool down and think over his attitudes. Or maybe they could put Eräjorma in some sort of special category, heavily limiting his future GM service. Anything. But he did something else, and that's what upsets me.

Banning the name
From the middle part of the conversation and forward you can follow how Eräjorma's name suddenly, out of the blue, after 5,5 years of playing, is considered inappropriate and he's forbidden to use it anymore. The GM claims that according to another Finnish speaking GM, "Eräjorma" a body organ that shouldn't be mentioned. It doesn't matter how Eräjorma pleads that it really doesn't, that it means "Jorma (a Finnish name) from the wilderness" and nothing else. The GM won't listen and with a robot like manner he enforces his decision, wiping away Eräjorma's name forever, suggesting that he should call himself "Pirath" instead.

To Eräjorma this would mean the end of the game. He has called himself Eräjorma not only in this game but in others. Eräjorma is who he is. I can understand why he got so upset about it. So would I if someone suddenly banned Larísa.

Before deciding to write this post I asked Eräjorma: are you sure there isn't anything offensive about your name? Because it seemed strange if this idea came right out of the blue.

And Eräjorma replied:

"From wikipedia (Sorry in finnish, just stating it's a person's name)

Translated small section in middle:

"In some slang, jorma can mean also penis. Other place you can find 'jorma' other than as finnish male birth name is the word 'eräjorma' which refers to camping, wilderness, hunting, fishing."

Or like I've said it myself a few times "man of the woods" . In a sense a ranger.

The only way it can be remotely offensive would be that Jorma is also childish nickname for cock. Just like in America they say "johnsson". You know? That man had one huge 'johnsson'. But do we go banning everyone with the name johnsson? 99.999% of any decent adult will first and foremost think always it's a first name.

And my name isn't even Jorma, its Eräjorma, other is first name, other is a CONCEPT! As you said, basicly a man of the wilderness, hence why many Eräjormas in armory are either druids or hunters.

Should we start breaking up everyone's name, looking if there in somewhere middle of the word is another word and then ban them because of that. F.ex. micunten, innocent name, but hey lets ban it, there's CUNT, it's offensive! .."

Renaming 49 Eräjormas?
It will be interesting to see what happens. Eräjorma isn't the only one who wears this name on the EU servers. There are 49 of them, and even though I think that a few of them might be alts to our paladin, he's not the father of everyone of them. There are more Eräjormas out there. Will they too be asked to rename their "in-the-wilderness-name" to something less offensive?

It's not an easy case, I know that. Eräjorma was aggressive, behaving like a dick, and really asked for some sort of harsh response from Blizzard. But in my opinion this reaction was not appropriate. It wasn't related to the issue at all. It was nothing but a demonstration of power and that's why I think it was wrong.

We've advised Eräjorma to write to the e-mail address where you can complaint about GMs. I hope it won't be in vane, but I'm afraid that the night when we saw Shadowmourne forged in front of our eyes was the last time we saw the weapon as well as its wearer.

I just checked in the armory. Eräjorma as we know him doesn't exist anymore. He's already appearing as "Pirath". At the whims of an angry GM.

The whole story makes me very sad.

Edit: The story didn't end there. Finally a senior GM stepped in, admitted that the angry GM had been wrong in changing Eräjorma's name and acted against Blizzard's policy. Eräjorma got his name back and an apology. Here's a post about how it ended.

Shadowmourne: a welfare legendary or a feat of strength?

It’s the twilight of Wrath, and many players are gone fishing or at least playing other games. But there are still a few stubborn players around who refuse to give up. They call themselves Adrenaline.

We haven’t been able to fill a 25 man raid for ages. But whenever we've managed to assemble a group of decent size - about 20 people - sometimes less, sometimes more, depending on how many out-of-guild-game friends we've persuaded to join us for the night - we've headed back for ICC 25 man. We had some unfinished business there.

The final grind

It wasn't about loot - most of the stuff that drops there these days is sharded anyway. It wasn't about doing achievements or hardmodes – with a few exceptions they're out of reach with a severely decimated group.

No, this was grind and nothing else. A collective one. For weeks we have been grinding the missing shards for our first - and most likely only – Shadowmourne. And finally, this very night, our grumpy ret paladin could complete the weapon of his dreams, an axe to match his temper perfectly. When he reached the end of the questline that takes you to the weapon, I think the guild was just as happy as he was.

Grinding can has a certain charm, as Tamarind described in a beautiful post a little while ago. But eventually it starts to get at you. As we watched the little scene before the weapon finally was handed over, we let out a sigh of relief. Done. At last. The weapon was ours as much as our paladin's. Theoretically he could of course leave the guild, taking it with him. But in reality - it just won't happen, with less than that Adrenaline will stop raiding. Which I don't think we will anytime soon. As long as Adrenaline is around there will be a Shadowmourne in it.

I tried to find some statistics on exactly how common itis, but I failed. However I stumbled upon some forum threads, and from those you sould see that some players think that this weapon isn’t quite as shiny as other legendaries.

“The most welfare legendary ever”, wrote someone, arguing that it only takes gold to get the 25 saronites you need as a starter, and that the hardest part is to convince your guild to give the shards to you.

Well, he may say so and I suppose it depends on from where you’re coming. If you’re in a huge guild with multiple raid groups, which never fails to clear ICC every week, it's probably rather trivial than challenging. And if you're a dedicated pugger maybe you can get it fairly easy these days too, especially with the ICC buff at 30 percent. But to complete it within a small guild such as ours - that's huge.

It symbolizes endurance and resilience, the ability to survive and continue, even in rough times. It symbolizes that we stick to promises and commitments. We are in this for the longterm.

A legendary achievement

I don’t know how much this weapon actually will be used before it will be replaced for something else in Cataclysm. And I don’t care, because that's not the point.

This is actually one of the very few moments when I could wish for a guild hall where we could hang up this axe as a trophy on display, once it has served out as a weapon. (No, this doesn’t mean that I’ve changed my mind about player and guild houses. I can see that some players wish for it but I don’t think it’s important enough for Blizzard to drop everything else they’re doing, putting all their resources into that. It’s just a temporary wish, OK?)

We don’t yet know exactly what the guild achievements will look like in Cataclysm. At Blizzcon last year they showed a few examples, of which one was “We are legendary”. But for that achievement you were supposed to create not just one legendary, but TEN.

Ugh. That sounds like a long term project, to say the least. I thought we were pretty outstanding, just finishing our second one (we did the Ulduar mace previously). But again: we’re all coming from different places, facing different challenges.

For some players Shadowmourne was a welfare legendary, too easily acquired to deserve the label. Maybe they're right in their universe. But honestly - I don't care.

Because for Adrenaline it was nothing less than a feat of strength.

Cheers for Eräjorma! And cheers for us!

How to Make an Unforgettable Guild Anniversary - Take 2

Finally the day was here, the day that we had looked forward to for weeks, not the least after watching the trailer our beloved GM had posted on our forums as a teaser.

It was Sunday the 6th of June, the National Day of Sweden, but also the day for the Second Anniversary of Adrenaline. And we were excited!

After the success from last year (related here at the inn), the expectations for this event were all time high, so high that I couldn’t help feel a little bit sorry for the officers as we assembled. They had made themselves a disservice by putting the bar at a ridiculous level. How could they possibly match the amazing scavenger hunt from 2009, where they combined superb role playing with rhymed riddles and perfectly home crafted quests? Surely this must have been a once-in-the-lifetime-of-a-guild event!

I should have known. I didn’t think it was possible, but this anniversary was just as good, as the one before. Or even better. We may not subscribe for the #1 spot on the server progression chart, but no one beats Adrenaline on arranging high quality guild events. No one.

As some of our newer recruits said after the night – amazed at what they just had gone through – this was the most fun night they ever had experienced in five years of WoW playing.

And just like after our first anniversary, I’m happy to share the concept, in the hope that it might inspire other guilds to come up with fun guild events that aren’t about raiding.

For Adrenaline this night came real thanks to our guild birthday, but you don’t need such an excuse to arrange an event like this. You could as well do it just to get your energy buck, taking a break from the raiding lull, doing something that makes you gaming face crack up with a smile after endless wiping on LK or perhaps weeks of cancels due to lack of interest.

But enough of pre-talk! Let’s head where it all began: at the top floor circle of The Temple of Storms in Stormpeaks.

The start
The first thing that happened this night was that we were divided into teams. The officers handed out wrapped packages and at a given moment we opened them and found shirts in different colors inside. The teams were formed after the color of the shirts, with three players in each. We were told to always wear them so they could be easily spotted.

We were presented the basic idea of the night: to compete in different areas, collecting points for our team. Towards the end of the night the points would be added and a winning team would be appointed.

1.The Gnome escort
Our first task was to go to Dalaran and seek out a gnome who was supposed to wear a shirt with the same colour as the team. Ours, a level 5 warlock, was hiding up in the Kirin Tor building. She did some role playing as we found her and made it clear that she was in danger, needed help and was heading to Alextrasza. Then she took off in a hurry, and we followed her as close as we could, down into Underbelly, and before we could stop her, she panicked and threw herself out through the sewer tunnel, falling to a certain death in Crystalsong. She was more irresponsible, unpredictable and whimsical than any escort quest NPC I’ve seen, more prone to be unlucky than Corky, and even though we didn’t quite figure what this was about, we ran after, in an urge to protect her.

This turned out to be an escort mission going through Crystalsong via the tunnel to Dragonblight, ending in the Wyrmrest temple. But the true nature of the competition – to keep the gnome alive and arrive at the destination as soon as possible – didn’t dawn upon our team until after we were done. I blame the gnome for this. She confused us with role playing. Her complaints about being cold and hungry gave us the idea to make up not one but three camp fires, and being the kindhearted mage I am, I started to conjure level appropriate drink and food. I was just about to hearth to get her some milk, which she said that she’d rather like than water, when she suddenly changed her mind, suggesting that we should move on. But the race was already lost. Oh well, the moral victory was ours!

2. The Quiz
Before moving on the next assembling point, at A’dal in Shattrath, we were handed a letter, pointing us towards a quiz. We were asked to answer 25 questions during the course of the night, taking advantage of natural breaks in other missions, when we were waiting for our turn to do something or traveling from one point to another. The answers should be posted to an officer before we head of for our final mission of the night.

The questionnaire was extensive, but that was pretty much expected, since it was a teacher who had put it together. Some of the questions referred to people and happenings within the guild, while others required thorough knowledge about bosses, places and lore in WoW.

The Adrenaline related questions are of course very internal, but the WoW questions aren’t, so I'll link the quiz for anyone who'd like to try it for yourself or use it as a source of inspiration. (Cheaters can look here for the correct answers.)

3. Arena time!
Now we were told to head to our next destination: the Nagrand Arena. This competition consisted of a 3v3 PvP match where each team faced a group of three officers, decided by random rolls. The teams who were waiting for their turn in the ring could either sit in the gallery, watching the ongoing matches, or take the opportunity to spend time working on the questionnaire.

The more officers your team managed to kill and the fewer deaths you had in your own team as the match was over, the more points did you gain.

As it turned out, the member ranked players of Adrenaline were slightly better at PvPing than the officers, which doesn’t mean that we were particularly good. I guess we’re a PvE guild for a reason. Nevertheless it was very enjoyable - especially the moment where I made our GM look literally sheepish for a few seconds. The view made me chuckle maliciously. Maybe PvP isn’t such a bad idea after all?

4. The Manhunt
Next up was a manhunt. We were directed to check out a Wanted poster concerning a certain villain we were supposed to track. Each group was assigned to a separate vent channel, where we had an officer available who would answer up to 20 questions with a yes or a no, helping us to figure out where to look for this blood elf.

In the end it turned out that it was one of our officers, hiding in Hammerfall with his horde blood elf character. The team that got to him first and killed him got most points, but others who found him were awarded as well, with point deduction depending on how many questions you had to use to get there. Just please don’t ask me how my team made in this part. Let’s pretend it didn’t happen and move on to the next activity:

5. Hide & Seek
This time we assembled outside the gates of Stormwind. The rules were simple. We all got three minutes to hide anywhere in the town. After those three minutes had passed we weren’t allowed to move at all. We were also instructed not to use stealth or invisibility alike abilities. After the set time had elapsed, the officers would come and look for us. Those were also on a timer of a few minutes, and for every player who wasn’t found within the time limit, the team would be awarded points.

Needless to say the druids had a blast, as they took a long bath in the channels. For anyone else who would like to try this, I’d suggest banning underwater breathing along with stealthing. For my own part I ran straight to one of my favorite inns, down into the cellar and sneaked into a little spot behind a huge barrel. I almost got away with it, but ten seconds before the time ran out, I was spotted, no doubt thanks to my pigtails. Oh well. There was no time to get sulky over this, because it was time for our final challenge:

6. The splatter contest
Once again we were gathered in Stormpeaks in the tower where we had started the night. Time had come to the moment when we would see our deputy GM committing suicide, jumping off the top in front of our eyes. Our task was to at a given signal do the same. Without using any helps such as slow fall, we should try to kill ourselves and land as close as possible to the officer corpse. Points were given to the teams that came closest.

The happy end
Finally we met up in the Park area of Stormwind and while our officers finished their work correcting the quizzes and counting the assembled points, the rest of us amused ourselves in the fountain. An abundance of awards, such as rare pets, were handed out to the overall top team, but also to the winners of each competition and to players who deserved special mentioning thanks to particularly good (or bad) performance over the night.

Then there was an appropriate fiest, with fireworks, drinks, cakes, dancing, screenshotting, cat dancing, video making and whatever you could think of.

And so ended the magnificent, unforgettable two year anniversary of Adrenaline, which at the same time was a worthy farewell to our GM and deputy GM, who are about to leave the game.

Player created content
Once again I had been reminded about that while new challenging raid encounters are cool and fun, there’s nothing, absolutely nothing in the game that can compete with high quality content created by the players themselves.

It’s such a pity that so few ever will experience it. Most players will never know that there is a world beyond the morons and slackers, the facerolling and mindless repetition.

There's still magic in the game. But you have to look for it, since it's hidden in beautiful enclaves such as Adrenaline.

To all of you who think: "Id' like to do something like that", I want to say: go out and look for it! We may be outstanding, but I know for sure that we're not the only guild that is doing those kind of things. And if you don't find it on your server, make it happen in your own guild!

I wonder what our three year anniversary will be like. Extraordinary, I dare say. Our GM:s are stepping down? The hell they are! I bet they're just taking the year off to ensure that they'll get all the time they need to plan for next year's event.

Why Tanks Have the Best View in the Game and other Summertime Musings

It’s an established truth that tanks have the most boring view in the game. I’ll quote the grumpy but worth-a-read blogger The Gray Place, who wrote a why-tanking-is-boring post a couple of days ago.

“When I was tanking I never even got to see any artwork in the actual instances. I’d always have this huge boss’s ankles in my face or if I was lucky his crotch.”

Talking about grumpy – have you noticed that all good tanks have a bit of grumpiness in them. It’s like a natural law. Maybe that’s why I so often end up in the roll of a victim whenever I try tanking on my baby druid, being yelled at with an impatient “go-go-go”. I’m probably just not grumpy enough to get some respect. WTB grumpiness.

And why am I suddenly talking about the benefits of being grumpy? Well, as you see this is another Friday night post, where I give myself the freedom to jump even more freely in my thoughts than normally. I blame the bartender. She must have poured something strong in my glass. Oh, wait, I’m the bartender…

The best view
Anyway. Back on topic: I was talking about the view from a tank perspective.

Regardless of all the feet, legs, crouches and wall-like surfaces a tank will put his eyes on,, I would say that it isn’t entirely true that their view always is the worst. As a matter of fact they get to see a lot of stuff that a squishy dps class will never see. In fact there are moments when they even get the best view in the game.

I realized this as I finally came around to make a nostalgic run through Karazhan this week as we called the main raid for the night a bit earlier than planned. It must have been almost 2 years since the last time I ran Karazhan. And maybe that was about how long time I needed to recover from the overdose I got back in time in the days of badge farming.

Now the disgust had suddenly been replaced with longing, expectations and nostalgia, and the return to the old castle was even more enjoyable than I had imagined as I took initiative to the run.

Even if we flew through the instance, aoe:ing all the trash and killing the bosses in a matter of seconds, I also managed to take some time to just look around and actually see the instance, paying attention to the details, like all the paintings on the walls, the sculptures, the books on the floor, the flights of stairs going in all directions. Especially in comparison to Wrath instances like ToC, Karazhan was absolutely amazing and stunningly beautiful in it’s design.

So what has this got to do with the tank view? Well, for the first time I was able to see some of those places the way that our tanks always saw it. Do you remember the hall with all the dancers that you did on your way to Monroe? I never saw it until now.. I spent all my time staring into those stairs, waiting for the tanks to come running back with a bunch of hostile dancers to aoe down. But I never saw anything of the dance activity.

And suddenly I understood how privileged tanks are, always arriving first to a spot, always facing the bosses eye to eye without any other player disturbing the view (apart from sneaky rogues, but they’re almost invisible anyway.)

By always going in the front, you sometimes get to see stuff that no one else will see. Another example from Karazhan is the room where Curator stands. As a squishy mage I always waited patiently for the tank to go into the hall of the Curator, grab one of those elementals and their electrical fish and bring it out to me. I never saw the view of an entire hall full of elementals – not until this run, two years later.

Summertime musings
It’s the end of the week and how has it been? Well, I think I could say that it’s been a week of lightness and sadness at the same time. I suppose it’s a little bit like a school class going for their summer vacation, knowing that a lot of your classmates won’t be there when school starts again in the end of August. There will be a school class, alright, but it won’t be exactly the same as it was.

We’re a little gentler than normally, a little more lighthearted (not that we normally are that horribly harsh, but the atmosphere is definitely a little bit extra soft). The sun is low on the horizon, the shadows are getting longer and the light is warm, gentle and a bit tired. As we had a horrible wipe on Sindragosa due to some really silly mistakes this Thursday run, there wasn’t the slightest sign of annoyance in the air. We’re a family about to change and we want to enjoy our last hours together as much as possible.

It’s summertime. And sure I can cry for some new content, but at the same time it’s also kind of relaxing to let go of a little of my worst progression ambitions. Don’t misunderstand me – raiding is still fun. But if it doesn’t happen, I’m just as happy merrily exploring and getting lost in Maraudon with a friend, as I did the other night.

The living is easy. And in my garden, the blackbird is calling on me to get outside and just enjoy the out-of Azeroth life. Cataclysm can wait a while longer. I don’t mind.

Cheers all! May you get a lovely weekend!

The Call from The Grey Havens

Sometimes I feel like crying. Doesn’t everyone? It’s like breathing, sleeping, eating, drinking and getting a physical hug once in a while. A basic human need, I suppose.

We all have our methods to release our gathered tears. I have one that never fails me, namely to read the final chapter of The Return of the King, you know the one with the final breakup and departure, where Frodo heads off with the ships from the Grey Havens and Sam goes back to his family.

That chapter is pure sadness to me and any happy family awaiting Sam can't change that. I’m not joking, even when I merely think about the scene as I write this post, I get goose skin and tears well up in my eyes. I’ve read it tenths of times, but the words never fade away. They are keys that give me access to areas of my mind that I normally keep safely sealed.

Sometimes I feel like crying. Today is one of those days. You're wondering why? Because they’re going to the ships. They’re sailing away and there's nothing I can do about it.

The Balrog strikes again
Earlier this week I wrote about my furious fight against the Time-To-Quit-WoW Balrog. It turned out that he was a worthy opponent, tougher than I could have imagined and my struggles were futile. You see: now he has snatched our beloved guild master and raid leader.

Yesterday the ugly bald gnome (currently disguised as a night elf just so to make him easier to spot in the raid, but we all know where he's true identity is) declared that he's leaving the game within a couple of weeks, and so is our deputy GM. As for so many other players there are two simple reasons for this; the game doesn't hold its grip on them anymore and they need to put more time and effort into progressing in their real lives.

I know what you think and I hear what you say. Those things happen. All the time, to every guild, it’s more a matter of “when” than “if”. And by the way it’s “just a game”, right? Smart goblins don’t allow themselves to be attached to anything but gold, because everything else will vanish sooner or later – epic gear as well as people. Getting emo about the people in your guild is a bad investment. Don't trust anyone but yourself.

But I’m not a goblin. I’m a gnome and my skin is soft and thin and my heart is warm and throbbing and I can't stand to see them embark on that journey. So I cry.

The scary bold gnome
If you've followed my writings over the last couple of years, you've probably guessed that I've been privileged; I've raided under the command of a guild master with extraordinary qualities. Stumps.

To be honest he scared the hell out of me to begin with, having a slightly harsh, strict appearance at vent. He was demanding and disciplined and this was pretty shocking to someone with such a short raiding record as me. But he took a chance on me, and he never gave up about my potential to make better, even though I suspect that there was times when he tore his hair, wondering if Larísa ever would learn to move out of fire or cast while moving. After doing some 115 encounters under his leadership I don't fear him anymore, just admire and love him.

You see, Stumps had that sweet balance that it takes to lead a successful raiding team. He was the guy who took the unpleasant man-to-man talks that comes with the position and never hesitated to kick a player from the guild even mid raid if it was necessary. But under the rough surface he had a warm heart and fantastic sense of humour, which he generously showed through some bad wipe nights. I suspect that was what kept him sane while holding a position equivalent of fighting Yogg-Saron, as Tamarind put it.

For being such a youngster - somewhere in his mid 20s - he remarkably good, probably out of talent, for he didn't have any formal leadership training. And why am I talking about Stumps as if he was dead by the way?

I suppose he will be soon. Sort of. “Friend removed because the character no longer exists. Player not found.” He’ll be gone with the ships.

Now what?
So now what? What will happen to Adrenaline? Being who they are, Stumps and Sylvara wouldn’t desert us without working out a solid plan and making sure that they'll turning over the guild in good hands. The remaining four officers will now take the charge and run the guild as a team. And I'm sure they'll do just fine.

Following the plan presented to us, I think we've got a chance to keep the guild going quite strong, until Cataclysm arrives, although we may not do as many 25 man raids as we used to. I just hope there will be enough of them for our Shadowmourne wearer to finish his weapon. He has yet some 35 frost shards to collect before he can complete it with an LK kill.

I don’t expect to see a huge exodus, but it might happen that a couple of players decide to move on to one of the more progressed guilds on the server. Everyone is recruiting these days. Other guild members will probably take a longer summer break to reload their appetite for raiding. Under normal circumstances, you couldn't expect to have a raid spot waiting for you if you go on a long break and want to pick up raiding later on. But in the current situation, they've decided that anyone who wants to can stop raiding now and yet come back for Cataclysm. And I think this is a wise call. We're in this for the long run.

Everyone in the guild has been asked to think about the changes and then inform the officers about our intentions. In case the raid squad will shrink too badly, we'll switch over to 10 man hardmode raiding. And to me that’s actually just fine. Even if I love the bigger format, I can enjoy the smaller raids for what they are. As long as we keep raiding in an Adrenaline manner, which means a serious and focused approach and a sense of team work, I will remain a happy raider.

The rise of the phoenix
Every guild has a life cycle. These are days of turbulence, but we'll get through them and once we're on the other side we can start to build the new Adrenaline.

It will be a bit different, since the bold gnome won’t be there to tell us off when we need it or give us a pat on the shoulder when that’s what we lack. But on the other hand, this will give room for our new leaders to step out from the shadows and show what they're capable of.

As one of my guild friends remarked, as we tried to grasp the situation – it will be like the phoenix reborn from the ashes. A new start. I think Cataclysm will be a cataclysm for us in a double sense.

But all of that is in the future. Right now, as I see our friends heading for the Grey Havens, I have to cry a little bit.

I couldn’t wish for a better place to let my tears fall then here at the inn. The soft light from the fire shields me from anything that can lure in the darkness outside. I'm surrounded by the murmuring voices from blogging and reading friends from all over the world.

Thank you all for hanging around here, listening to the sad rants of a very sentimental little pink pigtailed gnome! In case there won't be any Friday post, you know the reason. I'm just lingering a bit here in my armchair, contemplating the state of the guild as well as WoW in general.

"Well, here at last, dear friends, on the shores of the Sea comes the end of our fellowship in Middle-earth. Go in peace! I will not say: do not weep; for not all tears are an evil".

Don't mistake my tears for despair. When I'm done crying I'll pull myself together and start looking forward to whatever adventures that may await Adrenaline 2.0.

You Shall Not Pass!

The mighty Time-To-Quit-WoW Balrog keeps snatching players from our guild and raiding team. The last couple of weeks we've seen one or two leaving every week, each one taking a fond farewell at our forums.

They've all had every so good reasons for their leaving. Either they have got new priorities in life, a job situation that doesn’t permit raiding, or they’ve simply lost the interest for WoW as such. It’s never about us. It’s always about them. And it always ends in a lyrical Declaration of Love to our guild and its leadership:

“The past year in Adrenaline has been without a doubt the best in this game. I have seen all end-game stuff I wanted to see, I have met great people and I have been able to play this game on a level I never thought possible. The guild has been most of the reason why I have been in here for so long, without u guys I would have lost interest quite a while ago.”

”Adrenaline is doubtless the best-led guild I've ever seen….”

Of course the farewells are sad and sometimes even heartbreaking. I really hate to see people that I’ve been spending so much time suddenly be gone, just like that. At the same time the reads are somehow encouraging since they remind us of what a fantastic guild we are. We’ve got good reasons to be proud and grateful about what we have.

But being a “the best guild ever” isn’t enough. You need 25 people online for your raid, that’s the simple fact. And this time must be about the worst possible in the lifetime of an expansion for recruiting.

I feel truly, truly sorry for our guild leaders. They’ve put so much effort into the guild over the two years I've been in it and I wish there could come a time when they could just relax a bit for a while, enjoying the community, being certain that there will be more than enough players for the next raid. They don't deserve this hassle, which has nothing to do with their own shortcomings.

If you ask me, it's all about Blizzard being too slow in putting out new content. It's no wonder that WoW will be downranked compared to other activities, when you've been stuck doing the same instance over and over again, three times a week, for almost six months.

On a brighter side: it’s not like we’ve been cancelling raids. So far we’re actually doing fine, still working on and conquering the hardmodes of ICC. But I can’t remember the last time I was benched for a raid and that’s somewhat worrying. I’d much rather see a healthy surplus of players.

I know we’re not alone. I know that this is right now on every realm there is. Players are leaving every day, leaving empty spots in their guilds. What you can do is to stick together, keep your raids going and your spirits high even if the margins are slim. Hopefully some other guild on your realm will give up, which will mean that some more raiders will become available and go guild shopping. It isn't pretty, but the fact is that guilds are a bit of scavengers. We feed on the leftovers from our dying neighbours.

We can only hope that Blizzard will get out Ruby Sanctum RSN (yet another expression from the science fiction fanzine community, meaning “really soon now”), which might give a well needed – if shortlived - injection to the game, making people prolong or even reactivate their subscriptions.

I think it’s a little bit too early to give up raiding in Wrath, putting down the weapons, especially since we don’t yet know the release date of Cataclysm. We have a bunch of goals that still remain, deeds to accomplish in company with others who still have the desire to raid and progress in Wrath.

I wish there was something I could do to help. I wish I had some real life WoW playing friends or relatives I could snatch from other guilds. I wouldn’t hesitate a second to headhunt (a nicer word for poaching) if I had some potential candidate. But I don’t. All I can do is to once again mention our existence and recruitment here at the inn, in the hope to get the word out here in Europe.

Please come and join us! Come on your own or why not bring your 10-man guild with you if you’ve decided that you’d like to see something bigger. This is an excellent opportunity to make sure that you are prepared for Cataclysm, already being in a good guild. We’ve got room! What we can offer is some really good raiding. In case I haven’t told you. If you're quick about it you might join us in our upcoming 2-year anniversary event, how about that?

And to you, Mr Balrog, I have only one thing to say:

You shall not pass!

I'm not entirely sure he'll listen to me or to anyone else. But at least we have to give it a try.

Gearscore is The Price You Pay for Swinging and Raiding Makes me Social

This is going to be yet one of those posts that I throw myself into towards the end of the week, letting my thoughts wonder and my tongue run away at the same speed as I’m filling your after-work pints.

Tonight I’m even more unfocused than usual, since I spent all I had of concentration abilities on our attempts on Lady Deathwhisper hardmode last night. Oh dear, that fight would end up way high on my difficulty ranking list! I’m still mentally exhausted and my gaming face has gone fishing. So expect some very long and very casual Friday night ramblings here, about stuff I’ve come to think of the past week as I’ve been cruising the Blogosphere.

Gearscore – again
First yet another take on Gearscore. Professor Beej wrote an angry rant on the topic, where he declared that he was ready to quit the game over this addon and the elitist view it represents. The system is superficial and it excludes players from pugged raid groups for questionable or even unfair reasons.

Well, I’m not the biggest fan of Gearscore myself, and I’ve certainly raged about it in a post when a guildie of mine couldn’t get into a VoA pug because of it. But reading this I also thought to myself: TANSTAAFL.

Let’s start form another angle.

I’ve been married for 24 years this summer. Crazy, isn’t it? And while it isn’t roses and heaven all the time, it adds stability to my life. I’m a restless spirit, but this keeps me grounded. I don’t chase around at night clubs, looking for a one-night stand or THE guy who never will appear but in your fantasies. I don’t have to compete on a remorseless market, and even if it’s certainly appreciated if I dress up sometimes, I know that it’s OK to hang around, free from make-up, in clothes that are more comfortable then sexy. We’ve been in this for the long run; I’ve never ever been measured by the real life equivalence of Gearscore and I know I bring far more to the table than just my looks.

On the other hand I pay a price for this. If you’re married you have loyalties and commitments. I don’t enjoy endless freedom and I can’t do whatever I want to whenever I want to do it on my own conditions.

Translated into WoW terms: if you are going steady - if you’re raiding with a decent guild, regardless of progression level - you can be pretty certain that they won’t let Gearscore make the decision for them as they set up the raid team for the night. They won’t judge you only by your looks since they know your capacity and how you can contribute – be it with great dps or just for being an awesome entertainer who will make the raid more fun and interesting. You have bonds of trust, formed by previous experiences, your history together.

However: going steady has a price too: you can’t raid exactly when you want to, whenever the lust for it comes up. There will be occasions when you want to raid but can’t since there isn’t anyone scheduled or there are more players than spots available. As in any other relationship there will also be ups and downs – sometimes you might get a bit annoyed and fed up with some of your guildies – you might even quarrel! It’s a part of the deal. You’re not on honeymoon every day.

I can totally understand players who for various reasons stay uncommitted, pugging raids whenever they feel like it. Free to come, free to leave if it turns out to be less rewarding and entertaining than expected.

It’s not my cup of tea – it’s too shallow, lonely and lacks the sense of teamwork and brotherhood that I appreciate so much. But I can see that it works for some. However: this lifestyle has a price too. You may not risk catching unpleasant diseases, but you will be judged just as quickly as you’re judged on the dance floor. Someone tosses a glance at you. Is she hot or isn’t she? Is her Gearscore fine or not? Accept or dismiss. If you’re not one of the hottest chicks on the floor this is painful. But if you feel this way, maybe swinging just isn’t for you?

I’ve seen people crying for bans on Gearscore, but I honestly don’t see how that would make any difference. It’s not about the addon. It’s about the nature of short-term respectively long-term relations. If you want to enjoy freedom there's a price for it.

Raiding guilds –tyrants or social clubs?
This brings me over to a couple of somehow related posts we also saw. It seems as if there are a lot of people these days who want to be in a guild but rather raid with people outside of it. Spinksville wrote a post where she expressed her concerns that the incentives in Cataclysm to raid within the frames of a guild will be so strong that players will be tossed into “guild tyranny”. She wanted the game to better support guilds as social circles where you can see your friends, while you raid with groups outside of it.

Tobold is on the same line in his post about the perfect MMORGP raiding:

"Raiding with your guild should be possible, but not be the major function of a guild. A random raid finder with random raid bosses provides a better challenge, and a better measure of “skill”, than learning a tactic from a YouTube video and then practicing the steps until the boss goes down.”

He develops this a bit further in a comment:

“I think that guilds *should* be social spaces, for playing and hanging out with your mates and other people you share common interests and beliefs with. And in the current WoW model the guild function of being a gatekeeper to raid content gets in the way of the social functions of the guild. There is guild drama over loot and raid spots, and people quit guilds to join another guild only because that other guild is more advanced in the raid circuit.

I believe that if raiding can viably be done by *either* guilds or PUGs, there is less organizational pressure on guilds, and they would be able to perform their social functions better.”

If I understand Spinksville and Tobold right they like to see guilds that are formed out of friendship. And if this social group wants to raid they may do that. But it’s not the reason why the guild is there. Friendship comes first. Raiding comes next and can be done on your own as well as questing is.

Raiding creates friendship
Normally I tend to agree with most of the posts by Tobold and Spinksville, but in this case I have a slightly different view.

It probably has to do with perspective. If you entered the game with a bunch of real life friends - or if you came into it very early, getting to know people as you were levelling up in vanilla, sticking together every since, I suppose that the game is centred around the friendship you already have.

But if you’re late to the party, not the most socially talented person and slightly “off” due to age, sex or whatever (yeah, I’m talking about me) – it’s not that easy. How do you approach and make your way into a set circle of friends if you don’t have anything more in common than the fact that you like to play WoW?

If you want people to really connect you need more than just a moderated game chat channel. Doing things together is what forges a sense of comradeship or even friendship.

This is why I’m convinced that I would end up way lonely in a non-raiding guild than I am in a raiding guild. Our raids may be silent, but in the silence there’s a lot of bonding going on. As raiders we wipe together, we fight together, we fail together, we laugh together at our shortcomings and occasionally we succeed together. And we give each other a ton of honest feedback, which is the most solid way there is to get to get closer to other people.

Open for outsiders
As opposed to informal raid groups consisting of players from different guilds, the raiding guild is also visible for people outside of it. When spots open up and a raiding guild is recruiting, you have the chance to apply, regardless of if you know someone in the group or not. I don’t disagree that guilds have a role as gate-keepers, but this gate is actually way easier to break into than a circle of friends is.

Being the shy geek I am, I’m really happy if Blizzard keeps giving incentives for players to run guilds and do most of the raiding within those boundaries. I welcome a random raid pugging tool, but I don’t want it to be so good that it overtakes the role of the guilds.

Tobold’s ideal game would have a strong emphasis on pugging, where not only the groups but also the bosses were random. It’s definitely not a game I would like to play.

Being in a guild that raids gives so much more than just loot and achievements. It gives me the chance to feel like a valued team member, growing together as we learn and progress through the raid instances.

But now it’s about time that I shut up and bring out the Friday toast. Raiders and non-raiders, guilded and un-guilded, socials or shy geeks – hopefully there will be something for everyone to enjoy in Cataclysm, regardless of preferences.

Cheers!