Taking One’s Time, and Taking One’s Lumps

What a concept!

We had an interesting discussion in guild chat last night. Caraway, our GM, is a pally tank, and was raging about pugs wanting to rush through the content, and wanting the tank to know every fight going in. One of the other members chimed in, and noted that this is pretty much how WoW is played. Before you tackle content, you read up on it, make sure you’re geared, gemmed, enchanted appropriately, etc.

Caraway made a couple very good points last night. One sounded very familiar. Blizzard worked on Cataclysm for over two years. Why does everyone try to finish it as fast as possible? Hmmm…. I’m fairly certain I heard similar rumblings from a mage that shall remain nameless, during Wrath.

The other, and more telling, point Caraway made, was that somewhere, sometime, someone went through this content without the benefit of guides, advice, perfectly tuned gear and specs, etc. Does that somehow mean that they’re better, smarter, or more capable than we? I really doubt most of us would say “well, yeah! They’re WoW gods!” The fact of the matter is, they were lucky enough to get into beta, and have a crack at it. Or, on the Live realms, chances are their guild had a commitment to be the first, and they tackled it blind.

One of our other members chimed in with some valid points. It’s very hard to find people who are willing to tackle content that way. Most people are caught up in the “NEED MOAR GEER!” mindset. And further, they look upon anyone who doesn’t know the fights as a noob.

Um, no. All it means is they don’t know the fight. They may know how to play their class perfectly well. Which Caraway proved in a pug last night by turning off chat bubbles, switching to the combat log, and tanking Blackrock Caverns, successfully, without any prior prep.

Caraway and I work together, and we started talking about last night’s chat, and he came up with an idea that I quickly band-wagoned on. Moonlight Requiem is the most casual of guilds. Basically, you have people to talk to on guild-chat, and we try help each other as we can, but no one really makes a point of helping someone level, or whatever. When one of our members was getting ganked in Hyjal, I dropped what I was doing and went to help. those of us that know each other outside the game will run together somewhat. Things are pretty loose, though. Which, given my own distaste for pugs, has been a bit of a drag.

However, that may be about to change. Caraway announced to me this morning that we’re forming our own Explorer’s League, within the guild. He’s completely committed to people doing their own thing, and keeping things casual, but last night reinforced the problem with the prevailing view in WoW, and this is how we hope to resolve it in our little corner of Azeroth.

The Explorer’s League is going to be for those players who don’t want to rush through content as fast as possible, as painlessly as possible. We’re not excluding anyone; they’re welcome to run with us. Just don’t tell us how to play. Our devil’s advocate made a good point last night: “So, what if I know the fight? What, am I supposed to pretend I don’t?” Nope. Play your toon. Just don’t spoil it for the rest of us.

See, what get’s lost in the heat of discussion is a simple fact of human evolution. If someone constantly solves your problems for you, you never learn to solve problems yourself. As a parent, I’ve spent my last fifteen-plus years letting my kids go through unpleasant experiences that I might have spared them. It’s hard, especially as a parent. But that’s the only way they really learn. You can tell someone not to stand in the fire. But until they stand in it for themselves, and die, sometimes it just doesn’t sink in.

It’s an experiment. I’m optimistic that it will be a productive one.

My Butt Is Numb

Ah, Sunday night. Relaxing at the computer, winding down before falling into bed to get some shuteye before the workweek starts… well, at least, I’m at the computer. In this case, I’m trying to wind down, take the edge off, and let the remnants of repeated adrenalin rushes fade out. It were A Good Day.

Start at the beginning… with Saturday. I got to sleep in. For me, that means getting up after 7AM. After 30-odd years of getting up between 3:30 and 6:30 AM, it’s rare that I get past 6:30. Got up, logged on – and got hit with a splitting allergy headache. Screw earthquakes and falling into the ocean… this weekend, the SoCal winds decided to try and blow things into the ocean. Better yet, my daughter’s softball team had a doubleheader. Oh, joy of joys. Don’t get me wrong, I love watching her play. But…. it’s Rec ball. That means cliques, stacked teams, a season that starts in February with maybe three practices as a team,  and players that don’t want to be there but are because Mom and Dad think that they should be.  Or what’s worse, Mom and Dad  decide that soccer, homework, and who knows what else aren’t enough to keep their child occupied. At least one girl plays two other sports. She’s a good little player, but she gets beat up playing soccer, beat up playing softball, and then beats herself up when she doesn’t make the play. Sad, sad.

Blase’-ness is Relative

So, with schedules in disarray, and the sanity meter at work pegged well into “Complete And Utterly Crazed”, I’ve been making a point to try and get my random heroics out of the way before I go to work in the morning. Started my day yesterday with a little nibble of Pit of Saron, and today with a bit of Drak’ Theron Keep.

Ok, put the phraseology in that last sentence down to “writing style”. Now stop, back up, and pull it out of that category, and look at it. Blase’. That’s how I feel about heroics, at least up to Pit of Saron.  Drak is strictly farm, although the bear tank this morning made it interesting by sprinting through the entire instance. The time was when I would have been frantically grabbing mana on the run, and trying to keep up, to make sure my DPS was up to snuff. This morning? Meh. I was toasting bagles, smearing them with peanut butter and apple butter, and munching away, while dropping flame strikes on the mobs, via mouseclicks, not keybinds. DPS? Meh. They want DPS, slow down and let me actually get in on the fight. I was banging Skada on the boss fights, so no worries, and my gear score is such that if someone calls me out, I don’t feel I have to defend anything.

On Guilds, Human Beings, and Drama

Note: Just to put this in context, I am NOT a raider. I go on raids, do the best DPS I can at the target the raid leader indicates, or failing that, what my fellow mages are shooting at. I try to get out of the fire as fast as I can. That’s about the extent of it.

That said, I spent 6 years as a non-com in the military, and a good portion of the 13 years since dealing with and managing people. I’ve been to schools on leadership, management, project management, and have an avid interest in history. As any true historian will tell you, history is really nothing more than studying human nature, and patterns of humanity. I spent years living in close confines with other people for months at a time, and I came out of it without any lasting physical damage. Yes, I tease, I play, I bullshit, but in this, I am absolutely serious. When it comes to dealing with groups of people, I know just a bit what I’m talking about.

I don’t think anyone in any MMO, can hear the word “Guild”, and not have the word “drama” flash through their head. It’s the nature of the beast. In dealing with a guild, you are dealing with a collective of human beings, of varying intelligence, patience, generosity, etc. etc. etc. Insert trait here. Believe it or not, it all matters, because the variance in different traits creates differences. Like two pieces of metal that are supposed to mesh smoothly, differences create friction.

Understand, you cannot have a guild without drama. It involves human beings, and human beings thrive on a certain amount of drama. Some like to observe it, some like to be in the middle of it. The trick is to catch the drama early, or failing that, have mechanisms in place that prevent you from personally having to make decisions in crisis. Ideally, a GM should not have to “make a tough decision.” The rules of the guild should already be clear, and in place, and the proper response already outlined. Don’t make the mistake of thinking your dealing with adults. You are dealing with human beings, and they react to the same thing in many different ways, some of which will seem absolutely childish to you or I. The average WoW player will tell you “I pay my WoW bill, I’ll play how I like!” That’s fine. Just do it within the rules of the guild.

Shattered Illusions II

So, geez… apparently I went too far yesterday… or more likely, not far enough. People actually took that post seriously. Normally, I’d put that down to them not knowing me, but even RG missed the intent.

Normally, I’d just duck my head, apologize to the principals, and move on, but I’m acutely aware of how someone’s reputation can be affected by even something as insignificant as my little blog. So, here’s the less embellished version of Friday nights events.

Kalyon whispered me, and asked if I wanted to do OS. Of course, I accepted. We swung by Naxx, taking advantage of the fact we were in a raid to get in, pitied a fool, and headed back to OS.

We had a couple wipes, and what I said yesterday was true. No one pointed any fingers at anyone, except themselves. Apathy members, being who they are, might wonder why I always stress that. It’s something that all too rare in pugs, and even in guilds raids, and I can’t say enough about how refreshing it is.

So after a couple practice runs, Sartharion went down, and yours truly wound up with the drake. And the loudest comment I got was “Lajos, take it outside, I want to see it.” Yes, Lore, very laughingly, said he figured Apathy would get another writeup. I refer back to the cliche’ I mentioned yesterday. Does a druid take a dump in Moonglade? Gnomer has made noises to the effect that it’s rare you have something pleasant to write about that’s is interesting to read. I’m not going to miss the chance.

The rest of the evening happened pretty much as I described yesterday, but, no, Lore was nothing but patient, laid back, and a joy to run with. The healer I mentioned was every bit as awesome as I said, and will be the subject of tomorrow’s post.

Take a Deep Breath

Back pain sucks. But back pain wasn’t why I called in sick on Monday. Naw, that was because of the marathon coughing fits, lack of sleep, etc.

So, after going back to bed, getting a few hours of sleep, I got on WoW. Loving the new solid state drive that I have Windows and my important programs running from. “Important” being a euphamism for “World  of Warcraft”. Definitely a noticeable difference.

So, I logged in, and continued my mat-farming for Jeeves. Uggg… all that mining. No wonder my back is killing me. But now I’m only a few titansteel bars, and a couple king’s amber away from constructing my “gentleman’s gentleman”. Which, given recent patterns, may be a really good thing. Sure, our guild runs up repair bills rivaling the gross national product of a small third-world country, but that’s to be expected. Most people I’ve come into contact with on Heroics seem afraid of repair bills; “Oh, I want to run heroics and raids and not get my armor scratched!”. Even Kalyon has expressed reluctance along those lines. Meh, plebe. My attitude is, if you’re worried about repair bills, find another line of work. If you wanna play with the big dogs, be ready to piss in the high weeds! If you ain’t wipin’, you’re not challenging yourself. I think that’s really why Kaly doesn’t like to tank.

But even I had to be impressed by Apathy.When it comes to wipes and repair bills, they don’t seem too worried about it.