Forged Alliance

greetings. in an effort to organize raid groups more effectively, i would like to get a sense of everyone's personal raid goals. i think in order for a raid to be successful, it needs to be composed of people with the same mindset and similar goals as far as what they are looking for out of the game. what those goals are can vary a lot, but it doesn't really matter what they are as long as everyone is having fun. that said, having people with different mindsets and goals in the same group generally just leads to frustration for all involved, which is something that i would like to avoid as much as possible.

there are four general mindsets as far as raiding goes in wow:
1. hardcore server progression
2. semi-hardcore / heroic mode progression
3. normal mode progression
4. "casual" raiding whenever convenient

for this experiment i am mostly concerned with #2 and #3, as #1 isn't something the guild is focused on, and i think #4 is hopefully accommodated with alt raids. for our purposes, #2 means we get as far as we can through heroic mode before the next content patch arrives, and #3 means normal mode is cleared / farmed without worrying about heroic mode.

there is a invite on the guild calendar for monday, december 5th, and it would be greatly appreciated if people can respond (on one character only) as follows:
use "sign up / accept" on the invite if you would like to be in a raid group that is focused on heroic mode progression.
use "tentative" on the invite if you would like to be in a raid group that is focused on normal mode progression.
do not respond if you consider yourself to be a "casual" raider and aren't looking for a consistent spot in any of the main groups.

your response will influence how groups are formed, so please answer honestly. your response should not be based on your current rank, group, gear, or raid experience, anyone is welcome to express their preference for whatever raiding style they are looking for. however, if you sign up for a progression raid spot, you are declaring that you are dedicated to ensuring that you and your character are properly prepared for a heroic progression focused raid. likewise, if you sign up for a normal mode progression raid, you are declaring that you will be prepared for normal mode raiding. every single person in a raid is important regardless of what the group is working on. there hasn't been much room to carry people so far in cataclysm, and i see no reason to expect that will change anytime soon.

if you have any questions or comments, please let me know.
thanks!

edit / update:
the results are in and for the record are as follows:
heroic progression raids:
Aezelkvalae (dps)
Arnold (tank / dps)
Asurans (healer / dps)
Benvolo (dps)
Crushér (dps)
Deadlyldy (dps)
Diartemis (dps)
Galann (dps)
Idravenl (dps)
Inori (healer / dps)
Judecca (dps)
Mahatma (dps)
Papirico (dps)
Phaul (tank)
Shaklin (tank / dps)
Sxycoree (healer)
Thinkmage (dps)
Tsuni (healer)
Vannhellsing (tank / dps)
Virou (healer)
Waterdrop (healer)

total: 21
tanks: 4 healers: 6 dps: 11

normal progression raids:
Aokija (dps)
Belaurassa (healer) / Rathrbdrinkn (dps)
Fionia (dps)
Fröstbïtê (dps)
Ildiko (tank)
Jubeichan (tank / dps)
Kroins (dps / tank)
Roskoe (dps / tank)
Stage (dps)
Wirhelmina (healer / tank)

total: 10
tanks: 2 healers: 2 dps: 6

the roles are guesses and may or may not be correct, but based on this it looks like we should have enough to fill out the groups, probably with the assistance of alts for now. i think the group rosters will probably need to shift a bit, as g2 is still generally overfull and g4 has a couple open spots, but hopefully we can sort that out within the next week or two. i expect the groups to progress at pretty much the same rate, so while you should feel free to sign up for whichever group fits your schedule best and / or you want to raid with, there isn't any way g2 can accommodate everyone.

also, for those that didn't respond, the raider rank event has returned for next week, slightly modified from the previous version. there isn't enough space to type everything in the invite itself, but more info can be found in the ranks thread. this event will continue every week for those interested in being promoted to raider and joining one of the main groups.

You need to spam the shit out of this forum link so that all the people in the guild can come read the directions.

draven wrote:your response will influence how groups are formed

In other words, this is the Forged Alliance 4.3 draft. Your 40% passer accuracy isn't gonna cut it in the heroic raid Mr. Tebow.

I think we should have a combine.

-HP

By the way Jeff, don't call the new rank 'Veteran Raider'. Call it 'Heroic Raider' or something. It has nothing to do with past raiding history; all that matters is if that person is someone nine other heroic raiders want to show up for the tenth spot on heroic Deathwing.

-HP

Inori wrote: In other words, this is the Forged Alliance 4.3 draft. Your 40% passer accuracy isn't gonna cut it in the heroic raid Mr. Tebow.

you mean five minutes of brilliance doesn't make up for 55 minutes of failure?!?!

Inori wrote:By the way Jeff, don't call the new rank 'Veteran Raider'. Call it 'Heroic Raider' or something. It has nothing to do with past raiding history; all that matters is if that person is someone nine other heroic raiders want to show up for the tenth spot on heroic Deathwing.

-HP

that 's a good point

I would be committed to #2 but would be content with #3.

....and this is me doing the Tebow after a deathwing kill _--O;'

Really, deep down inside, I want #1. However, #2 is more realistic for my raiding life and I know that it is what we'd be aiming for.

Really I just want a group with people who are investing the time to improve their character and play to put them realistically in the #2 category.

Aezelkvalae wrote:Really, deep down inside, I want #1. However, #2 is more realistic for my raiding life and I know that it is what we'd be aiming for.

This.

Although, I have to say, it'd be great if we end up being server competitive while being semi-hardcore. I think it's possible to be in the top server guilds while only raiding 2 nights a week.

first, please make sure to put your response on the calendar event, as it will be easier to track there than here.
second, if there are enough people who are interested in #1, we might as well try to put together a group and go for it. i personally will not be able to participate because i don't have time for such things these days, but that certainly gets back to benvolo's post from a while ago. i intend to continue with g2 and keep things pretty much the same, although i expect to get through normal mode a bit more quickly since we should outgear it a bit at this point. as i said, my goal for 4.3 is to get everyone into the type of group they want to be in, whatever the focus may be, so if there is enough interest for a #1 type group and we recruit, there isn't any reason why we can't create three different groups, one each focused on 1, 2, and 3, and still run an alt raid as well.

draven wrote: i personally will not be able to participate because i don't have time for such things these days,

Mmm don't get me wrong, I'm not pushing hard for a #1 type group. You just never quite get the taste of that out of your mouth once you've done it for better or worse. Also, there was a guild called Seriously Casual that has stopped raiding but for a LONG time they held a spot on the world top 50 list only raiding two nights a week for three hours each. They just made extremely effective use of time.

I don't even remotely have time to start going 5 nights a week again, and I suspect you would have a hard time finding 10 people in the guild that do.

Aezelkvalae wrote: Mmm don't get me wrong, I'm not pushing hard for a #1 type group. You just never quite get the taste of that out of your mouth once you've done it for better or worse. Also, there was a guild called Seriously Casual that has stopped raiding but for a LONG time they held a spot on the world top 50 list only raiding two nights a week for three hours each. They just made extremely effective use of time.

just because they're only raiding 6 hours a week doesn't mean that they're not spending a lot of time researching and going through combat logs. at times in firelands i would spend just as much time, if not more, doing that sort of stuff as i did raiding. in a #1 type group, i would expect everyone to do that.

I like the group Im In,and the people that are in it,I would definitely commit my self to # 2..and #1 if that group is ever formed..

first post updated with results

the guild notes have been updated to reflect each raider's preference for raiding based on the survey. each main character should now have a [h] or [n] next to their name, [h] denoting interest in one of the heroic progression groups and [n] denoting interest in the normal progression group.

this is mainly an attempt to keep things organized without having to mess with the ranks again. it's entirely possible that i screwed something up while tagging everyone, and if so please let an officer know. you may also sign up for the raider rank event as described here in promotions section to express your preference for raid type.

raid leaders should be able to use these tags to better keep track of invites and raid rosters, at least in theory. we'll see how it works out and see if they are actually useful and / or if we need to adjust them, but the more i think about it, just creating another rank probably makes more sense.