Thursday, October 29, 2009

Tale Forty One: Guild Recruiting/Applying

All is quite on the Druid Front.

I just wanted to make a quick post, touching on guild recruitment and applying to guilds.

When you see an 'ad' in trade channel that looks something like this:

The Make Believe Guild is recruiting dedicated DPS! We raid x times a week and are currently focusing on ToC and Ulduar. Our raid times are X-Xpm. For more information, send me a tell or visit our website @ whateverourwebsiteis.com

You have to ask these questions:

-Do the raid times work for me?

-Can I make most of the raids?

-Am I geared for the content they are on?

I quickly want to touch up on the last point. Lately, while we've been recruiting, we've had a couple of people whisper us who are interested. However, once looking at their armory, we cringe. When applying to a Uld/ToC guild, greens and blues -with a HH ring- is not the best impression. It tells us that you just dinged 80 or just haven't bothered pugging a Naxx or heroics... you can now gear up faster thanks to the badge system. A guild who is still working on Uld/ToC does not want to carry you.

Once you have answered the three questions above, and all of the answers are yes, you should check out the site (if they provided one). Do you like what you see? Is it easy on the eyes? How do the forums look?

If you're satisfied with the site, time to whisper the recruiting officer! Remember, this is what you can call your 'job interview'. This is where you can ask as many questions as you can about the guild. ie: whats the age range? Is the guild chat casual or full of hardcores? Does the guild offer repairs or no? Whats the policy of the guild bank? Whats the guild ranks? Is there a trial period?

Any questions about the raids, and guild that you have, the officer will most likely answer. Just like in a job interview, you have to feel somewhat comfortable too. Whenever Mr. Littlebark is recruiting, he asks a silly question first (ie: what are you wearing?) This can go either way, and we get to see what kind of person you are. Our guild likes to joke around alot, so it can be an eye opener for us.

Hope this helps whenever you're looking for a guild. Happy gaming!

Thursday, October 22, 2009

Tale Forty: Burnt Out

No, not me. Mr Littlebark, who has been playing the game much longer than I, told me today that he would probably stop playing the game. He doesn't find anything to do now, he'll just run around in circles in Dalaran and realize he's been doing that for 10 minutes straight.

What happens though, when I am still very much playing the game?

He's our Guild Master, he's amazing at leading raids and he reads up on fights. He's good at his class, at all the spec and he made this guild for me, really. So I could raid even though I have a weird work schedule.

Has anyone else had partners that just stop playing WoW? What should I say/do?

/sigh

Friday, October 16, 2009

Tale Thirty Nine: A trip down memory lane.

I know everyone is focusing on the Tier 10 bonus sets and Icecrown Citadel and stuff.

But tonight, I don't want to do that. So if that's what you're here for, sorry.
Tonight, I'm taking a trip down memory lane. With screenshots.

Ah... the Lords of Ancient Sin's dance party. I don't know how they began, or who began them. But that night after a raid, it was fun just hanging out in Dalaran, getting drunk and dancing the night away.

Grimmstone being made Guild Master. Most of us thought it was a joke. Our jaws dropped when we realized it wasn't. So far, he's doing a great job.

Me logging in after coming back from the death of my grandmother. I was lucky enough to have such supportive guildmates.

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Tale Thirty Eight: Owned

WE GOT ANUB'ARAK DOWN!

After Hours went in: one shot Faction Champions, two shot the Val'kyr Twins (we wiped the first time due to us being silly and getting the special abilities mixed up) and two shot Anub.

Yeah yeah. You guys probably don't care. Hell, most of you are working on hardmodes and what not.

But, we're a small guild. And most of our raiders have never seen the content we're working on. It's all new to them, and our dpsers are not LEET and pumping out 5k. I think our highest is doing 3k.

Our guys are just amazing, I suppose. We had two healers for the whole thing -Mr. Littlebark's Shammy and myself - and it was crazy and so much fun. Our dps listened to our 20 minute monotone explanation and they did it brilliantly.

Guys, so proud of you.

Now, let's get Algalon down, aye?

Saturday, October 10, 2009

Tale Thirty Seven: LF Porn, I mean, PuG

So.

Um, I'm a little traumatized.

I was in a ToC25 PuG... and there was a girl on Vent. A very very talkative girl.

Who soon began to talk about Jello, a bath tub and swallowing balls.

O.O

Her boyfriend was in the raid, of course. But she was flirting -interacting?- with another guy.

Mr. Littlebark and I soon came to the conclusion that she sounded like one of those girls that need attention.

"Are we ready yet? 'Cause like, I'm totally getting bored. And I feel like I'm talking too much."

"Well, you are." I snapped, thinking about muting her.

"I feel like punching her in the face," said my usually non-violent fiancee.

And all of this, before we got started.

All in all, her voice sounded like one of those bad porn flicks. Maybe it's just me, but I try to keep my voice low and 'professional' in any PuG or with my Guild. I don't like girls who squeal or have high pitched voices or talk and talk and talk. So I keep my voice as minimal and as normal as I can.

It was an amusing PuG, I suppose. Plus, I got an upgrade! Boots of the Unrelenting Storm! And y T9 shoulders!

So gear, plus that little erm... "show" that fellow raider put on = a decent PuG.

Happy Gaming!

-LB

Thursday, October 8, 2009

Tale Thirty Six: If you need to be cheered up....

... just go to World of Warcraft, eh?

Honestly, I loved Kelly's comic. They are about a passive and caring druid named Cadistra and a erm... quirky and brave paladin named Kissless. And they're Horde. No one barely ever does a Horde Female Tauren Druid. Hardly any one plays them! Why is that? Well, because from behind, they look like slightly smaller Tauren Males. Or at least that's what I've been told.

Anywho, being an Ex-Hordie myself, I have totally embraced these comics.

Oh, and another quirk... she's Canadian. Just like me! I totally got all her 'Canadian based comics' and had me LOL'ing in RL.

She's been around for awhile, so I'm a bit late to join the party. However, Kelly does deserve a mention, so go! Go check them out and let me know what you think.

/wave

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

Tale Thirty Five: When A guildmate turns his back on you

Keeva over at Tree Bark Jacket made a really interesting post on a certain member in a guild run.

Like I said in her comment section, I’m glad I’m not the only one going through this.

When I transferred Littlebark to Alliance, I did it with the sole purpose of being to play her in a late night guild that Mr. Littlebark, myself and a couple of friends/family were starting up. We’re not L33T or anything, just people enjoying the game we love whilst having a fun time.

Of course, the four of us can’t solo Ulduar so we recruited and found some pretty amazing people in the form of a hunter, a boomkin, a holy priest, a DK, a rogue, two pally tanks and a mage. All of us work together as a team, and only lately have we had a bad week in terms of raiding.

Anywho, the mage has been an officer since day one. Mr. Littlebark and myself hold up most of the load, but we still needed someone who would sell the BoE’s from runs, help us control the Ep/Gp, etc. The Mage was amazing at doing this and he was a great officer. Sure, he was a little late to runs and recently he stopped showing up. It severed our raids and we’ve had to call them due to lack of DPS.

The last time he showed up to a raid was 2 weeks ago. We handed him a BoE to sell and when in a week I checked the bank and didn’t see him deposit anything, it struck me as odd. Mr. Littlebark said ‘maybe he still hasn’t been able to sell it yet’.

On Sunday, said Mage /gquit the guild and must have transferred to another server or gotten a name change. Because we have not seen hide nor hair from him.

It hurt the guild morale. And what hurt us the most was that we did not get the BoE back, he took about 200 relic of Ulduar –which we use to help alts power level their rep with Hodir or we sell them – and a couple scroll of enchants. We did not see him as that kind of person.

To you bigger guilds out there, that is not a lot. But we’re a ten man family style guild. When you are accepted into the guild, you get these benefits:

- Free enchants for Ulduar/ToC or tier gear
- Free Flasks (Pure Mojo/Stoneblood/etc)
- Fish Feasts
- Guild bank repairs on raid nights
- Mr. Littlebark and myself always willing to help improve a dps/healer/tank since we have played every single class in the game
- A casual feel in the guild

So, as you can see, that’s a lot of things being donated to the bank, and usually by one or two people. We ask that any greens in a run be donated to the gbank so we can disenchant them for the free enchants people will get later. Lately I’ve asked guildies to donate Frost Lotus as well, since they don’t seem to drop for me when I farm. I’m Elixer specced, so on a good night, I get a proc of 4, four times in a row. The Fish Feasts are provided by the hunter and myself, since that’s something we both enjoy to do. But as for the bank repairs…

Where does the money for that come from?

As I’ve stated, BoE’s from runs. Sadly, those don’t go for a lot though (holy pally bracers that dropped were going for about 300g). I’m an Alchemist, so of course, I sell my transmutes for the gbank. We have a generous guildie who donates once in awhile. With all of that, we only have around 2k in the guild bank.

During a raid night, we use up around anywhere from 300-700g (yes, we wipe a lot).

Which is why when I went to grab the relics of Ulduar from the gbank to sell them -200 relics are going for 500g!- I was floored when I saw that The Mage had taken them out 3 hours prior and not deposited anything back to us.

The scroll of enchants, we think he justifies with ‘I’m the one that enchanted them in the first place’. That doesn’t matter, since the guild as a whole provided the mats, via surrendering the greens from runs.
As for the BoE that he never deposited the gold from…*sad sigh*

Of course, I was appointed with the task of talking to GM. This feels slightly like Déjà vu, seeing as this happened to me on my Horde guild as well –however in that case, the toon had been hacked. This guild mate, he just left.

And it’s not like he left on a bad note, either. Last we spoke to him, we we’re all happy about single shotting Thorim and Hodir for the first time as a guild. He was a great dude, and he brought a certain charisma to the group. And of course, his mana strudels.

So we lost a guild mate and a couple hundred gold. Honestly, we’re more bummed about loosing the guild mate.

However, if you ask some guild mates, they will tell you ‘screw him.’

Well, we’re not all saints you know!

Thursday, October 1, 2009

Tale Thirty Four: Playing With the Big Boys

What I love about Wrath:

You get to interact with major characters.


Oh yeah. LB playing with the Big Boys.
WTB Armor Upgrade for Thrall. PST.

Tale Thirty Three: When Raid Leading Goes Bad

I learned a very important lesson today.

Loot rules are there for a reason.

Mr. Littlebark had a business thing tonight and our other Officer has dropped from the face of the world (of Warcraft). So it was up to yours truly to lead the raid. We use the Ep/Gp loot system in After Hours, and its usually Mr LB and the other Officer that control that. I have no idea what they do make the mod work. By the time I got home, I helped a guildie with her respec, got the Flasks, Fish Feasts and Mana Pots ready and by the time I was ready, it was already time to raid.

I hadn't had time to read up on the Ep/Gp thing. So I told everyone that we'd just be doing /roll for tonight and Mr LB and the other Officer could sort it out later.

However, whilst I stupidly did that, little did I know that to one guild, I would be basically slapping him in the face and giving the loot to and alt rather than to him. Said guildie didn't roll on the item, he didn't tell me about it until after the raid.

But it is still my fault.

Here's why:

1) Loot Rules are there to avoid drama. When you have a looting system, people are happy. If we had used Ep/Gp, that guildie would have gotten the trinket. He had the highest amount of points, he donates more to the bank and he's always early. Always! He's one of our finest people. And because of me, he almost quit the guild.

2) I feel like I let him down. I couldn't get the trinket back to him, because by the time he told me, 2 hours had gone by. He refused to let me open a ticket on his behalf. I feel like utter crap because of my leadership, someone had been kicked in the teeth.

I talked it through with the guildie. Like I've said, he's one of the best we have. I remember every recruit story, and I remember his clearly. I have nothing but good memories of him. He gives 110% to the guild. Hell, he even let us know -by INGAME MAIL!- that he wasn't going to be able to be at a raid because of RL. Hell, most people in the guild just don't show up. I have family in that guild and they never tell me if they'll be there or not.

Anyways, guildie. If you read this, I'm sorry. You're one of our best. I'm proud to have you in our guild.

~LB