3.71. The Edge Case

Si Team (with help from Sixfold) ends The
Lich King's reign in 10-Man mode, earning
"Fall of the Lich King (10 Player)",
Icecrown Citadel

Fifty Shades of Red

The Lich King struck Mature with Frostmourne, and the pale blood elf reeled from the blow. Will of the Necropolis proc'd, granting Sixfold a window to load up another round of HoTs. Blain called out a warning: prepare to move. We'd survived the Val'kyr dragging players off the edge to be dropped to their death by racing to the center of the platform; moments later, our safe zone became a death trap as The Lich King blasted us with Remorseless Winter. Exhausted, I commanded my digital death knight to pull freshly ripped Raging Spirits toward me before they dealt fatal blows to players less armored. Blain called for cooldowns to ensure a clean transition into the final phase, and it was upon us.

Sir Klocker and I balanced the weight of Frostmourne between our respective toons, trading at the application of Soul Reaper. The six remaining damage dealers unleashed hell into Arthas, his blows softened by bubbles of protective energy twisting outward from Neps' Hammer of Ancient Kings. Arthas' health slowly diminished, until at last, a final blast from his icy hands annihilated us in a single shot.

"Aw. Game over, everyone. Pack up your shit."

Klocker did his best impression of The Price is Right's fail-horn. The raid continued to joke and congratulate each other, as if nothing had happened. For such a clean execution, the raid was surprisingly chipper about this wipe.

The "wipe" was only an illusion.

Like clockwork, Fordring broke free, smashed Frostmourne and released King Terenas II who mass resurrected the 10 of us, and we gave Arthas what for. "Fall of the Lich King (10 Player)" flashed up on our screens, as Si Team officially wrapped their clear of Icecrown Citadel.

"Thank you to Eh Team for loaning us Sixfold today," I typed into guild chat. The formality was merely a show of respect to any guild members present and paying attention to the scrolling green words in the lower-left. In actuality, Eh Team was filling spots of their own as needed, following Crasian's second exit and Bulwinkul's vacation still in progress. As a good guild does, we worked to help each other fill spots as needed, a weekly ritual that grew out of our mutual needs as a result of the expansion nearing its end-of-life. It'd been a long time since any 10-Man team had been charged with poaching from one another. But before I could officially stick a fork in this particular issue, the dead horse would be flogged one final time.

---

When Sir Klocker returned to the officer pool, his first order of business was to bring to light issues that had been bothering him for some time. First on his list was a re-addressing of the loot situation, a path I had already begun to tread down. A dialogue unfurled, and I'd done some initial investigation into potential solutions for the next expansion. They needed polish, but at least ideas were flowing with enough inertia that I could douse folks like Cheeseus and Blain with them, gaining feedback and refining. Shortly after the loot conversation kicked off, Klocker pushed for the next item he felt was important.

There came an open discussion among the officer core to re-investigate the possibility of promoting Ben to Elite. Both he and Neps felt strongly that Ben had more than proven himself in the heat of battle, pointing out that his drunken tirades in Ventrilo had diminished significantly since the early days. Out in the field, Ben was far more than what the "Raider" rank asked of him, dominating meters and prioritizing the 25-Man progression raid's schedule over all else. Sir Klocker argued that it "didn't seem right" that Ben remain relegated to Raider. Had he not proven himself consistent and reliable for a long enough period of time? I couldn't argue with the sentiment. If anything, I was the most directly affected by Ben's increasing accountability. His willingness to improve translated into a much lighter load on my plate. It would be a shame to forget that he'd grown from a player that that lived by his own rules and schedule...to the type of raider that would text me multiple times before a raid:

"Hey man, I’m gonna be five minutes late, hold my spot!"

"I'm just turning the corner now, I’m almost there!"

"Man, I'll be at the computer in like one minute!"

Better too much communication than not enough.

But as much as I wanted to give him the promotion, to give him that positive reinforcement for a job well done, something held me back from converting him into an Elite. As much improvement as Ben had demonstrated, the red flags still flew in my face...and my inner voice spoke. You will regret this decision. People don't change. Think it through. But he had changed! Why was this situation so unique, why was it any different than any other player I'd dealt with? It was entirely possible that those red flags Ben had flown in my face warranted a second look. After all, I'd come to the realization that not all people issues were black and white, but rather a million different shades of gray. Perhaps those flags weren't all as blood red as I imagined them to be.

The Halo Effect

I decided long ago that Ben was worth the effort, and wouldn't let it go. I let the officer core know I had something in the works to address the edge case -- this amorphous zone Ben floated between. Overqualified for a Raider, yet still unable to fulfill the prerequisites demanded of an Elite, Ben was something else entirely. I was committed to finding a way to acknowledge Ben's efforts, both in the short term and in the long. Quite a few players wondered why I even bothered putting effort into Ben; they had already written him off as immature, annoying, and not worth their time. Ironically, this was exactly the reason I bothered...because I hadn't made up my mind. Most perplexing was that every time I felt like I was about to come to a conclusion...I couldn't.

My hesitancy was more than likely a result of those earliest memories I formed of Ben; nights in which his perceptions of game mechanics filled our raid channel. His confidence walked the fine line between expertise and arrogance, dipping back and forth with just enough inconsistency to leave me guessing. Was it actual insight? Or an inflated ego borne out of PvP dominance -- an affliction plaguing more players than just Ben. Unfortunately, I lumped my judgments together: that "Halo" effect that causes us to focus in on one attribute, then apply it across the board when assessing the complete package.

Folks like Dalans weren't so easily convinced in observance of ego-fueled claims, "He'll never be a raider."

"Who? Ben?"

"He just spewed a bunch of nonsense about threat and aggro."

I'd fall into the trap, throwing in my own judgments, "How did we ever make it without the guy? Tell Ben that's why we never made any progress in The Burning Crusade. Oh, wait a second, WE TOTALLY DID!"

"Yeah, that won't work on Ben, he'll just laugh it off."

"It's all a big joke to him, isn't it?" I added, "Just like his life."

I had a lot to learn about judging character back then. Fortunately, I had people to guide me down the right path. People I previously thought incapable of caring about personnel issues. People like Blain, "His life is nothing to joke about."

"Why are you defending him?"

"His knowledge of the game has nothing to do with his knowledge of life."

My original read of Blain was no better than that of Ben's, in hindsight. Just because Blain's style was less communicative than Ater's didn't mean he lacked the ability to understand people. And as for Ben, he was still growing up in the guild, gaining life lessons at a completely different rate than the rest of us. Ego aside, his actions demonstrated he knew what he was doing, even if he couldn't articulate it. Just as he would learn this over time, I would also learn over time about how the halo effect had a grip on me, and how it would take calm objectivity and rational thinking to keep from falling into that trap. It meant not jumping to conclusions, especially after Ben had progressed so far.

Ben and Fred stand guard while Mature defeats
any challengers that stand in the way of the
"Gurubashi Arena Grand Master" achievement,
Stranglethorn Vale

Inner Demons

Learning to listen to my gut was one of the most difficult obstacles to overcome. Time and again I struggled with those "hunches", that inner voice that screamed out warnings, that I was one step away from making a huge mistake. I justified ignoring it with my inexperience, contending that "my gut" wasn't a hard-and-fast rule I could point to when defining the expectations of the guild. If great leaders disagree on the many ways you can effectively manage people, one belief system that seems to be shared by nearly all: trust your instincts. If something doesn't feel right, don't do it. This formed the basis for my entire Red Flags post, and subsequent integration into our standard operating procedure. If you do or say something that rubs me the wrong way, it's going to hurt your chances in moving up. To clarify, I offered a multitude of examples, and felt strongly it would paint a clear picture for the guild moving forward.

Yet whenever the situation involved Ben, I questioned my gut the most, wrestling with an inner dialogue to understand why Ben continued to fall into limbo. People don’t change. But they can if they want to! Do you really think he wants to? Actions speak volumes. His actions have spoken, he's absent again tonight, off to "buy diapers"...something he should have done well before raid time. True, but he is taking care of his kid! Kids come before a video game! It's only an excuse for not planning ahead. People make mistakes. Think of how many times he's offered help to guildies, training Bulwinkul on Boomkin, helping stand guard while a Guild Leader that sucks at PvP wraps up a PvP achievement. His heart is in the right place, he just needs to practice his planning and communication...these are things that are fixable.

The problem was that my gut pointed out all the things that should be cause for concern, but it was still up to me to decide what was a simple mistake that could be fixed, and what was the result of having no heart in the first place.

---

"I guess Si Team run is cancelled this week!" Blain shot over a whisper. He seemed more irritated than normal.

"What's going on?"

"Yeah, Ben went and got himself locked to an Eh Team run this week."

This is a surprise? Grumbling and disgusted tones followed as I joined into Vent to listen.

"Should've known this was gonna happen. Hooray for Ben!"

"Hold up, let's not jump to conclusions here, let me talk to him." I alt-tabbed to the Vent server, scanning the groups, and finding Ben's name nestled in the "Eh Team" room. I yanked him out and into the officer channel.

"So what's the deal, here?"

He rolled right into it, as if he'd prepared for this exact moment, "Ok, so, I thought that Blain had told us that the Si Team run was cancelled this week. So, when Eh Team was asking for a filler, I offered up. Blain wasn't even online at the time."

"So you had no opportunity to check with Blain to confirm this?"

"Nah, I mean, I don't have access to those officer notes, so I don't know what his phone number is."

"But more importantly, you didn't think to check with anyone online that could get you his number?"

"That's what I'm saying, I didn't think I needed to because I thought that Blain had already called it off!"

Standard miscommunication. No actual ill-intent.

"Alright, we'll see what we can do to maybe get a fill from somewhere else, but you do realize this puts us in an awkward position, right? Eh Team being what it is, and all."

"I swear, Hanzo...totally didn't think this would be an issue."

"I think it's probably best you let Blain and the rest of the team know this was a mistake on your part, an apology would probably work wonders to help fix this. And in the future, you have got to touch base with Blain first. Before doing anything that would lock you to Eh Team's run."

I heard the clicking of keys as Ben opened up the mic to speak, but was interrupted by a wave of trash begging for his Mind Sear. "Yep, got it. I will totally tell them."

There was no need to vilify Ben over this issue. This was a Red Flag that didn't need to reset expectations -- it was merely a speed bump on the road to getting Ben where I needed him to be. I kept my gut at bay, and hopped back into Si Team's vent channel, "Simple mistake. It's really not a big deal, just a miscommunication."

"Oh, yeah, no, I wasn't really upset. I was just pointing out how amusing it was," Blain answered.

So much context lost over whispers and tells, I thought. Some things really need to be said face-to-face, or at the very least, over Vent.

3.70. The Perfect Loot System

Drecca is the lone survivor of a heroic Rotface kill,
Icecrown Citadel

What Makes the Raid Go 'Round

Heroic work began in earnest immediately following the Lich King's defeat at the start of April. Drecca continued to make a name for himself by being the sole survivor of a desperately close attempt on heroic Rotface, and the screams that filled Vent poured the concrete around his ankles -- he was one of us now, and there was no turning back. By this point, Drecca was not only charging head-first into heroic bosses for the 25-Man progression team, but was assisting Mangetsu with the Alt-25 with increasing frequency. As our roster grew, fewer spots were available in progression, so the Alt-25 continued to garner interest from both guildy and stranger alike. The good news was that both Mangetsu and Drecca felt strongly about keeping standards high in the Alt-25, and this trickled down in the form of a strict set of rules to be followed as described on the forums. It was nice to see guildies finally taking pride in their play, and the result was a surprisingly successful 2nd 25-Man team.

When Mangetsu picked up the Alt-25, GDKP was the loot system first discussed, the reasoning being that non-guildies could be persuaded to help out. The concept of pouring gold into a pot to reserve a spot in the lineup worked surprisingly well, and if players hoped to see any of that money back, they were forced to stay throughout the duration of the raid. We knew nothing about non-guildies, hadn't vetted them, and couldn't vouch for the presence of any integrity or reliability -- the promise of a "damage deposit" was a convenient method of due diligence. But the success of the Alt-25 grew to such a level that it was eventually staffed by all DoDers, and GDKP gave way to a simpler solution: Need Before Greed rolls, with one Need per night. As soon as you "Needed" on an item (and won), that was it -- you were relegated to Greeds for the duration of the run. I wasn't particularly fond of NBG, due to the randomness of the roll and the fact that it had no memory; players who had raided since forever could lose to the newbie of the week. But, it wasn't the loot system that the 25-Man used, and I was fine with Mang using it in Alt-25; if anything, the DKP system of the 25-Man progression team acted as a carrot for those driven to get out of Alt-25 and to one day be a part of the guild's historic first boss kills.

As sound as our progression team's loot system was, there were still problems creeping up. The first-round bidding system I developed as as a perk for the Elite rank had backfired a number of times already. The last time it bit me in the ass was when an "alt" or "off-spec" bid ended up winning an item, denying it from a player who was bidding for their own main spec. At the start of 3.3, I amended the system to allow players to categorize their bids by adding "off" (eg. 20 DKP off), and any off-spec bids would be cast aside if even one main spec bid was on the table. But that wasn't the end of the problems for our loot system -- very quickly into ICC heroics, more loopholes were becoming evident.

"Crimson Acolyte"
Artwork by Nancy Cho

Loot Fears Float

Players like Deathonwings the shaman had no main spec. Each week, players like Wings flipped back and forth from Elemental to Restoration, an incredibly helpful type of player for a roster in a guild like ours, as they could fill a variety of needs at any given moment. We called these players "floaters", floating from spec to spec as the guild needed them to. As expected, some floaters were good enough to qualify -- and eventually arrive at -- the distinguished rank of Elite. Once Elite, Wings fully expected to start 1st-rounding bids on some of the most top notch items falling off heroic ICC bosses. But...for what spec? Was it fair for Wings to 1st-round items that were Elemental and Restoration? Of course not! But the alternative was to forfeit his ability to 1st-round...which was one of the primary reasons guildies pushed for the Elite rank in the first place. Floating as a reflection of roster need should not have come with a penalty...but it did.

Another type of floater caused me great concern as well, but these players had more selfish intent behind their decision to change specs. These were the players who had simply grown listless, requesting a change to help alleviate the doldrum now apparently baked into their everyday raid life. I'd suffered this first hand, so tried to keep perspective when players came to me about expressing their need to switch to a role that was more exciting. And I had no problem with purposeful role switches...until it came time for them to leverage their 1st round bidding rights as an Elite. I became painfully aware of this loophole when it affected me directly: the night Omaric attempted to bid 1st round on a freshly dropped heroic Deathbringer's Will -- a trinket long sought by pure DPS classes that had been waiting patiently. I wasn't particularly happy with Omaric's decision to seek the trinket before other non-floaters had their shot...but there was nothing in the rule book that said he couldn't. My recently promoted 2nd-in-command, Sir Klocker, confirmed the issue in a forum topic expressing current concerns...and it had been going on longer than I cared to admit.

There was no such thing as the perfect loot system, but I often daydreamed about what that might look like. I theorized that it would be a DKP system that weighted your earnings based on the role that you played. In this alternate reality, a player would keep four pools, separated by role: melee, ranged, healing, and tank. As raiders toppled bosses, logs were generated and uploaded to sites like World of Logs, and a breakdown of their contributions would appear there. In my mind's eye, I foresaw a report that read like so:

Tank / Melee / Ranged / Heals
-----
Bretthew: 98/2/0/0
Mangetsu: 0/0/100/0
Wfredlund: 0/12/0/88
Mature: 48/52/0/0
Gunsmokeco: 0/0/0/100
Deathonwings: 0/0/76/24

If such a magical tool existed, breaking down an individual player's contributions, bids on specific types of loot would be far easier to manage. If Wings saw an exceptional elemental staff, he'd know that he'd have 76 DKP to bid on it...1st round, if he so chose. Likewise, those who took to a new role out of boredom would be free from facing the wrath of the fellow guildmates as being deceptively evil with their 1st-round bids. A player freshly floating from tank to melee, for example, would have no melee DKP accrued at that point, and would have to work towards it from scratch. If such a loot system could be, no player in my guild -- regardless of rank or contribution -- could argue it was unfair: players bid exactly what they earned, and their earnings were exact reflections of level of contribution.

It was a wonderful make-believe system. The problem with it was primarily the 'make-believe' part. Could I build it, I wondered, perhaps as a plugin to eqDKP, or maybe even reach out to the owners / administrators of World of Logs. Maybe there was a set of rules we could come up with to determine how to break that analysis down, displaying it in subsequent reports. But it ate away at me. This is too complicated, too much to administrate. There's no guarantee the people at World of Logs will ever get on board with this craziness. Keep it simple and compartmentalized within DoD. So, back to the drawing board I went.

Contributions vs. Consistency

A sample of Hanzo's notes during one
of several attempts to theory out a
better loot system for DoD

"I've been pouring a lot of energy into a theoretical new system I've come up with. And I need it picked apart. Can I forward you my scribblings?"

"Sounds good."

I flipped over to Google Documents, and shared various drafts of my high level concepts over to Cheeseus. The loot system centered around an emergent behavior of players wishing to fill multiple roles, "floaters", and how they would be handled fairly when going up against players uninterested or unwilling to do so. My initial idea was to split DKP into four pools, then using a custom tool to analyze raid reports would subdivide the player's earnings appropriately, weighted by the percentage of contribution per role. A player that tanked 100% of the raid, therefore, would receive 100% of their DKP in the tank pool, and would only ever be able to use that pool to bid on tanking items. But there were problems with the concept from a practical standpoint.

Administratively, four pools were too much to track and too confusing for the player. Furthermore, no such "custom tool" existed to perform the calculation telling me that Drecca and Bretthew had both earned 100% of their pool as a tank, while Deathonwings had earned a 50/50 split of ranged DKP and healing DKP. Most importantly, what would stop greedy players from simply switching to whatever role they felt like playing, just to scoop up loot? After having earned a healthy amount of DKP in two pools, selfish players were free to "go to town" on whatever dropped, not caring for a moment what was being denied to the rest of the roster. It was a self-serving mentality that harmed the non-floaters in the long term.

My second pass felt much closer to the mark. I had to shift my mentality from rewarding your contributions to rewarding your consistency. If people were going to switch at the drop of a hat, I was fine with it, but the switch needed to come at a cost, which meant losing the right to 1st round bid (if they were Elite). Over time, they could earn the right again, a concept I sketched into my notes as a yellow bar growing into a green one. Hence, consistent players in a particular role were green, while floaters remained a neutral yellow. Both had upsides. Green players earned the right to 1st-round bid, and yellow players would never have to bid off-spec on anything -- to a floater, all loot would be main spec.

Cheeseus got straight to the point.

"Overall, I really don't like the way this reads. So you're saying that if Dalans decides to come back and fill his old role of tanking, that Mature...who was tanking in his absence...now has to pay the penalty of switching back to DPS? Sorry Dalans, You're an asset to the organization, but you're not worth the 458 DKP I’m going to lose as a result of your return."

His comments continued to flow in.

"The 1st round bit seems very counterintuitive. Why would an Elite, who has proven himself as quite capable of doing whatever is needed, want to remain neutral in bidding? They're just like everyone else now, except with more responsibilities."

I took that as the "no off-spec bids" perk wasn't enough of a game changer.

"A non-elite can main bid on any role they're neutral to, any role they're switching amongst."

"So why would they want to go green? Alternately, why would you, Hanzo, want to let an up-and-coming DPS Death Knight...bid on tanking gear? And your most capable people, who would only benefit from being green, couldn't be used for any other role.”

Cheeseus continued to poke holes into my theoretical loot system until it looked like a used kitchen sponge.

"I know people wouldn't want to be neutral. The point is...they are now. This is how Deathonwings, Omaric, etc...are treated today. I don't want to have to go to them and say 'I need you to pick a role and stick with it, because it's not fair to the others.' I want a system in place where I can say, 'Do what you want, and what you do defines what you get.' In my eyes, that is the path of least resistance and gives them the greatest freedom."

Cheeseus remained unconvinced, "Right, but why should a potential Elite...who is giving up his rank...be punished further? They already can't raid consistently, am I right? They should be motivated to raid and excel, not threatened with a loss of perks if they are unable to keep it up."

"Because Elites that have done that to me already don't care!! 'Hey I got everything I needed, I'm off to go skiing! Oh, hey, remember me? I'm back now, I just broke my legs in a skiing accident...remember I used to be an Elite?? I can still 1st-round shit, right' No! There needs to be some repercussions to coming and going as you please!"

Cheeseus loosened his stance, "OK, I'll rethink that a bit more. But overall I still think that something is missing, this needs a bunch of work. Personally, I still think you should go loot council, but that's just because I'm pro-communism ideology. It fits the raid mentality well, everyone contributes, everybody gets a slice of the pie."

I glared back at the instant messenger window with narrowed eyes.

"I'll never go loot council in DoD. Ever. Too easy to manipulate by those in power. Too easily corruptible."

"Oh, I know. It would never work, just as communism would never work in the real world, but if you look at it on paper, isn't it an excellent idea?"

It would be...if we were all the bestest of buddies in real life. If we had to face one another the next day at work, have to deal with the fallout of making a horrible decision the night before. To be made to feel guilty about being selfish and dishonest, and to have that paraded around the office until we learned our lesson. Be excluded from social gatherings, to not have our phones calls answered or our emails replied to when we decided to take whatever the hell we wanted off of bosses. Yeah...then loot council would be fantastic.

How wonderfully simple World of Warcraft guild leadership would be if people could be held accountable for their actions.

3.68. Fall

One of many opinions on Ensidia's exploiting
The Lich King encounter (source: Allakhazam)

Apples to Oranges

Weeks before Descendants of Draenor began to scratch the surface of the final encounter in Icecrown Citadel, it was common knowledge that The Lich King had already been defeated. The victor? Blood Legion...but the recognition they received was muted, for it was the 10-Man version they had scored a world-first of -- something other hardcore raiding guilds paid little attention to. Guilds clamoring for a world-first title were instead pouring their effort into a 25-Man defeat. Two days after Blood Legion's 10-Man clear, the European guild Paragon wrapped up the 25-Man version, and went on to defeat Ensidia by clinching the world first 25-Man heroic clear, even though Ensidia had wasted Arthas first. Details leaked out about Ensidia's dubious strategy, forcing Blizzard to strip them of their title. While the WoW media was busy covering the drama between Ensidia and Blizzard, debate raged further on where the line should be drawn between "clever use of game mechanics" and "full-on exploit". All eyes and attention were on them, and Blood Legion's "world first" quickly fell out of the limelight.

Granted, only nine guilds in the world had defeated the Lich King in 25-Man heroic by this point -- Arthas was far from what even the seasoned raider would call "trivial". One thing was certain: WoW Progress's landing page, listing the world-first guilds who had put Arthas in his place was a short list, and one in which our resident server's celebrity guild was nowhere to be seen. A viewer had to click deeper into WoW Progress or GuildOx to determine what 10-Man standings existed. It was quite clear that the attention was focused squarely on 25. Players certainly cared about 10s, but the weight they held from a competitive standpoint still had little credibility. This argument was further backed by Blood Legion's continuing delay to wrap up their own 25-Man heroic kill of Lich King. The difference between Paragon's kill and Blood Legion's eventual one wasn't a matter of hours or even days...it was weeks.

It was pointless to compare the 10 to the 25. But that didn't stop players from doing it.

Time and time again, each boss encounter was defeated first and foremost in its 10-Man iteration, sometimes well before its big brother, and was easily explained. Blizzard never intended for 10s to be a challenge; at one point during Wrath, they even debated leaving the 10-Man heroic mode completely out. Yet in the face of the 10-Man being a non-factor, complaints persisted:

"10's are more difficult!"

"There's less room for error!"

"They need to be nerfed!"

So the nerfs continued to flood in. Marrowgar became less touchy between transitions. Saurfang refrained from casting Blood Nova on Mark of the Fallen Champion targets. Sindragosa's instability debuff was decreased in potency. Changes to Festergut. Changes to Rotface. Changes. Changes. Changes, so that players' concerns were sated. No member of Descendants of Draenor ever voiced such a concern throughout our entire career in Wrath of the Lich King. Because there was no need to. There was no concern.

Raiding in Wrath of the Lich King had finally reached the right balance. We were proof.

Many of us had first-hand experience with the raids of yore, and the pains and struggles of those days were still fresh in our memories. Our greatest struggles thus far, bosses like Blood Queen Lana'thel, Professor Putricide, Algalon, Yogg-Saron, these bosses didn't hold a candle to the likes of Illidan, Kael'thas Sunstrider, and Lady Vashj. And these bosses weren't even the worst of The Burning Crusade! Cheeseus shared horror stories of the nightmares in Sunwell Plateau, an instance that would've chewed up and spit out so many of these entitled players. But from our own perspective, so many lost weeks on bosses like Magtheridon made Yogg-Saron look like a child's plaything. Boo hoo, it took you an entire weekend to kill one boss? Try months of work on one boss...then we'll talk. But therein lay the problem. It was taking guilds months of work...it just happened to be on bosses that didn't require it.

I'd scan blog posts from guilds throughout that final year of WotLK, chock full of frustrated guild leaders. Months of work wasted on bosses like....Freya?? Sartharion?? It was true. While Descendants of Draenor buckled in to begin work on our first kill of 25-Man Lich King (normal!), there were still guilds that hadn't yet completed Naxxramas.

Even though I felt confident that Blizzard had reached exactly the right balance in Wrath, the overwhelming majority continued to prove me wrong.

The 25-Man Progression Team poses next to
The Lich King at the start of the encounter,
Icecrown Citadel

Defiled

The Lich King was a three phase fight, connected by two transitions. Arthas brought forminable techniques to the table, so the only way to master them was practice, practice, practice. We began the weekend of March 5th-7th, which primarily consisted of refining our handling of his phase one abilities. Drecca fastened the Lich King in place while Bretthew distracted the swarming army of undead drudge ghouls and shambling horrors clawing their way out of the frozen earth beneath us. DPS wound up slow and steady, taking care to not deploy any area-of-effect abilities that might cause Bretthew's adds to run rampant. Their positioning away from Arthas' was important: at various intervals, a player would become afflicted with Necrotic Plague. While ticking away precious health, healers instinctively wanted to cleanse the disease away, but had to stay their hand. Decursing Necrotic Plague caused the disease to not dissipate, but rather, leap from its target to the next closest. This meant players afflicted with the Plague needed to run quickly from their group, and stand near Bretthew's adds. Then, and only then, could the plague be safely decursed, as it lept from our raid to the undead monstrosities themselves. Turning the Lich King's Necrotic Plague back upon his own undead army was the primary focus of phase one...that, and dealing with blasts of Infest -- shadow damage that not only ate away massive chunks of health, but continued to do so until targeted players had their health topped back off to full. When Arthas' health dropped to 70%, the first transition began.

The Lich King charged to the center of his icy platform, sending out a steady barrage of Remorseless Winter, a constant stream of biting snow that would quickly kill any player in close proximity. Winter had a radius that stretched so far, the raid was forced to the very edges of his platform, our heels inches away from chunks of ice breaking off -- every transition, we risked losing our footing and plummeting to an early death. During this transition, Remorseless Winter was not the only thing that raged. Raging Spirits would spawn, needing to be picked up by tanks quickly, as their tendency was to one-shot whatever they faced. Tanks needed to move quickly in positioning them as to not cause additional strain to the healers, while DPS burned the spirits away as fast as possible. On top of all of this, Ice Spheres would appear from the Lich King, slowly heading towards our position along the jagged edge of that platform. Casters needed to turn their attention to the Spheres quickly; if left alone, they would cause an explosion of enough force to knock handfuls of players clear off the mountain's top. By the end of the first weekend of work, phase one and its subsequent transition was safely behind us.

Mastering phase two, along with its transition, took us well into the third week of March -- its learning curve bent sharply thanks to Defile. A disgusting blackness broiled and bubbled in an enormous circular area beneath unsuspecting players, and it took the concept of "standing in the fire" to a horrific new level. Not only would players standing in Defile suffer enough shadow damage to kill them in mere seconds, the physical act of standing in Defile caused it to grow uncontrollably. This meant that the weakest links in the roster -- the ones with the slowest reflexes -- most certainly held the power to transform an otherwise typical raid encounter into a linchpin. All it took was one wrong person to stand one moment too long in Defile, and a manageable disc of black death transformed into an oozing monstrosity that blanketed the entire platform, devouring us in the process. Defile was relentless and suffered no fools. It was devastatingly swift and turned many of our excellent attempts into instant failures. By all measures, Defile was the mouthbreather's worst nightmare. In order to turn the tables on Defile, we would have to leverage the power of a very special kind of healer.

Arthas annihilates the 25-Man Progression team
during an attempt on The Lich King,
Icecrown Citadel

Disciplinary Action

After scouring reports from World of Logs, one thing became imminently clear: Discipline Priests were becoming the rockstars of the Lich King fight, as their unconventional "bubbling" of players absorbed precious milliseconds of damage at the start of each Defile. Theoretically, lightning fast disc priests could bubble players targeted for Defile, granting those victims a window to escape before the thick black mass multiplied across Arthas' platform. Until this point, we ran with one and only discipline priest: the infamous Neps. This newly uncovered information, however, made a solid case for Lexxii to drop from Holy and adopt a bubbling spec as well. She did so, and as expected, the 25-Man progression team was defiled a little less with each attempt. In learning about the absorbs, we identified other abilities that gave us "room to move" within Defile; I myself was able to pop Anti-Magic Shell to help stave off the blackness.

Soul Reaper forced the tanks to hand Arthas off to one another throughout these phase two attempts, but it was a trivial mechanic to deal with. Far more menacing (other than Defile) was the Val'kyr that the Lich King commanded, plucking various players from the platform and slowly carrying them over the edge of the platform to be dropped helplessly to their doom. The 25-Man progression team prepared for this by prioritizing their positions as close to the center of the platform as possible. This gave us the largest window to burn holes through the Val'kyr before they dropped members of our roster over the edge. Work continued in this manner, coordinating the right positions for tanks to hand the boss off to one another, defile targets racing away from the group, and a sychronized collapse to the center before Val'kyr spawned. From there, it was on to second transition...which was more of the first, save for less room being available near the edges of the platform. Again, Raging Spirits needed to be controlled and burned, while Ice Spheres slowly crept up on us, ready to blast players off the edge if not burned down in time.

After a month and a day of work, the chaos of the Lich King was nearing completion. Phase three pushed the entire raid to its limits. Arthas still leveraged Soul Reaper on the tanks, and he continued to Defile the progression team. Additionally, Vile Spirits were added to the mix: slow moving ghostly apparitions that carried an explosive area-of-effect with them. Vile Spirits were subject to snare effects, so while Drecca and Bretthew maneuvered Arthas around the far edges of the platform, Jemb and Bullshark would ice-trap the center, allowing the AoE frenzy to unleash hell. Ben's Mind Sear, Hellspectral's Howling Blast and Mangetsu's Seed of Corruption quickly turned the Vile Spirit packs into fireworks, detonating safely away from melee perched along the edge. But Arthas still had one more trick up his sleeve.

  

The final moments of Descendants of Draenor's
first kill of The Lich King in 25-Man,
Icecrown Citadel

Eve of the Soul Harvest

In one swift motion of his hand, Arthas reached out into the air and grasped nothing, squeezing an invisible neck tightly. I lost control of my death knight, as Mature was lifted up off the ground, choking, and in an instant, I was transported inside the very essence of the runeblade Frostmourne. In this alternate dimension, the ghostly image of Arthas' slain father, King Terenes was locked in eternal combat with a Spirit Warden. This was Arthas' last attempt to defeat us, dividing and conquering through Harvest Soul. I stood alone, separated from the raid, which continued to battle The Lich King on the outside world, and so rushed to Terenes' aid. Mature swung Shadow's Edge, layering the Spirit Warden up with diseases, pummeling him with Scourge Strike, and I watched, waiting for Soul Rip. There. The Warden began channeling a devastating spell, draining King Terenes' spiritual essence; instantly, I fired off a Mind Freeze, and Mature stopped the Spirit Warden's channeling, saving the ghost of Arthas' father. Together, we turned back to the Warden and tore him apart.

In a flash, I was back outside. In the center the platform.

"Move, move! Get out of the center, Spirits spawning!"

The melee and tanks were far off to the edge of the platform, well away from me. I dashed towards The Lich King and resumed the fight, while Mangetsu's Seeds of Corruption flew past Mature's shoulders, igniting the Spirits behind me. Arthas' health was nearing the 10% mark. Like the flash of a supernova, the raid was instantly obliterated. All twenty-five members of the progression raid team lay dead at Arthas' feet as he laughed, preparing to raise us as his own undead army. It was at this moment that Tirion Fordring, who had been frozen solid through the duration of every attempt, finally freed himself with a single blast of holy light, an explosion which shattered Frostmourne in the process. The souls of every man, woman and child that Arthas had desecrated were freed, now enveloping him, trapping him...becoming his own prison. Fordring refused to stand down. Determined to end Arthas' reign, King Terenas II's spirit manifested long enough to cast a spell of Mass Resurrection, and the 25-Man progression team was instantly restored to life, emptying every last attack into what remained of The Lich King.

---

Descendants of Draenor stood triumphant that day, snapping up our first kill shots as Arthas lay dead at our feet. The once noble paladin, long a slave to his cursed runeblade, was finally put out of his misery on April 11th, 2010. A story that had stretched as far back as 2002 had finally come to an end. But although Arthas' story had concluded, there was still some story left to tell about Descendants of Draenor before turning to the final chapter in our history. As Wrath of the Lich King waned, DoD would dive deep into heroics, drama would continue to unfold between both old and new guildy alike, and a veteran of the guild would make a startling revelation that would shift the course of the guild once more. But before any of these events transpired, Blizzard would do us the honor of kicking things off by revealing their plans for Cataclysm -- plans that can be more accurately described as Blizzard's Third Mistake.

Descendants of Draenor pose for their
first kill shot of The Lich King,
Icecrown Citadel

3.66. Securing the Caterpillar Drive

"Icecrown"
Artwork by d1eSELxxxx

Betrayal of Pathetic Magic

Valithria Dreamwalker was already on the back burner by the time we rolled into March. The unique mechanic of healing a boss to full, rather than DPSing it to 0, was not something that troubled our progression team. DPS split into groups and moved through the trash with ease, while our healers sailed through globes, gaining stacks of healing power to pour life back into the enslaved green dragon. The encounter was trivial enough that our team had completed it even before claiming a kill of Blood Queen Lana'thel. But now that the vampire was behind us, the pressure was once again on Omaric and Bretthew to push us further into the Frostwing Halls. It was high up the icy tower, flying a pattern far out across an exposed platform, where we caught our first glimpse of Sindragosa, bane of all WoW login screens. Sindy's scripted flight, landing, and subsequent roar graced our game clients upon launch throughout Wrath of the Lich King; it was this very script that led the massive player base to whine about Deathwing's equivalent screen on the Cataclysm login screen. It never bothered me; I have no problems with internet dragons. But, the loudest cries are the often the most heard, and Deathwing's roar would ultimately be toned down...thanks in part to Sindragosa.

Truly a bikeshed moment, if there ever was one.

The 25-Man progression team cared little about Sindy's noises. The focus, instead, was centered squarely on defeating the frostwrym. Grouping up during phase 1 for DPS was first and foremost, being mindful of Permeating Chill stacks as the encounter unfolded. Too much Permeating Chill meant a player needed to slow down (or even stop) their DPS to let the stacks drop, lest the healers be overwhelmed by exponential amounts of cold damage. Meanwhile, both healers and ranged needed to keep an eye on Unchained Magic, doing similar damage to those casters who mindlessly spammed abilities. When Sindragosa executed her Icy Grip, all players were pulled inches from her gaping maw, a dangerous position for anyone but the tank. This ability warned of the impending Blistering Cold damage that would destroy any player remaining in said vulnerable position. From there, it was on to phase 2, wherein the great bone dragon took flight, marking targets with a Frost Beacon. Similar in execution to Sapphiron, beaconed players were transformed into a solid block of ice. While encased in the ice, players coughed and choked as their air supply ran out -- it was up to the raid to break them out before they asphyxiated. Five players were encased in ice simultaneously, but more important was their positioning; if one non-beaconed player happened to stand too close, they too would be entombed, likely chaining to other unsuspecting players. It was a chaotic madhouse of running, positioning, breaking living ice cubes apart, and...if time allowed...focusing damage on Sindragosa until the final phase.

In her last 35% of health, Sindy applied a debuff to all players in line-of-sight: Mystic Buffet, a stacking debuff causing players to take more magical damage with each grueling second. However, she continued to entomb players, the breaking of which now had to be measured carefully. Take too long to break a player out of a block of ice, and they would fall over dead from a lack of oxygen. Burn too soon, however, and players were provided no protection to drop their Mystic Debuff stacks -- a dependency vitally important to the to tanks. Phase one and two were easy to master. Phase three consistently fell apart. It would be more than a single night of work before we saw loot fall off of this ex-blue dragonflight.

Mature is frozen solid into a tomb of ice
during an attempt on Sindragosa,
Icecrown Citadel

Coming to Montana

It was clear that Si Team's 10-Man strategy was not going to fly in 25-Man. Three days after The Eh Team dropped Arthas to his knees, Si Team managed to complete The Frozen Halls by securing a kill of Sindragosa. My positioning as a tank for Si Team had us right on the steps leading to her outdoor domain. Blain's reasoning was straightforward: two frost beacons were easier to coordinate as opposed to five. Amusing still was the alleged change in the 25-Man heroic version, in which the number of frost tombs was bumped to six. The 10-Man heroic change to Frost Beacon? None. It remained defiantly at two in both normal and heroic. We saw more and more of this, that simply scaling damage, healing, and hit points wasn't quite enough to retain parity between 10 and 25. Some mechanics just wouldn't translate if grown/shrunk appropriately. The 25-Man's initial work on Sindragosa felt smooth compared to Blood Queen Lana'thel. Before the frostwrym would collapse in defeat, however, more roster changes were headed our way. And this time, it would be the enemy that fed us the missing pieces of the puzzle.

On the Alliance side of things, a guild going by the name of Final Hour had been keeping up with us, progression-wise...a bit further, in fact. While we continued to chip away at Sindragosa's ice, Final Hour claimed their 25-Man kill of the bone dragon. Meanwhile, we were oblivious to what was going on behind the scenes: leadership was fracturing, egos clashed with ideologies and before long, Final Hour was a guild divided. They cast out a handful of their players, focusing on a "new" approach to raiding; a scenario which sounded all-too familiar. The largest chunk of rats scurried off the sinking ship to form Eidolon, but this new guild would concern themselves more with PvP in the long run. That left a handful of outcasts -- whose primary interests focused on slaying The Lich King -- with two choices. These guildless players could scatter like insects and hope to find a host among the already well-established Alliance raiding guilds on Deathwing-US. There was another option: defect -- leave behind their obligations to the shallow, two-faced faction that proselytized honor and justice, while blindly clinging to age-old biases, making way for murder, hatred and treason. The "prettier" races in WoW were warned no less than three times by Medivh of their impending doom at the hands of the Burning Legion, yet brushed him away in ignorant pride.

Self-righteous Alliance players favoring aesthetics conveniently forget that part of their faction's history.

For two ex-Final Hour players, no honor bound them to their faction; they sought asylum in whichever guild could provide safe haven -- a guild that would not only take them in, but provide them with a Lich King killing environment. The negotiations to defect began immediately. A shared application from the pair arrived in my inbox that first week of March. Like Drecca's before them, it showed that there were still competent players left in the pool. There it is again. Effort. I read through the document, reviewing each and every boss kill ever executed by the pair. Full clear of Ulduar (including Algalon), Trial of the Grand Crusader, Professor Putricide, Blood Queen Lana'thel. Then my eye caught their most recent boss kill, making me sit up straight in my chair: Sindragosa. This was the joint application of Lexxii and Bullshark, and I needed to move quickly for fear of losing them to a competing Horde guild. The pair could just as easily deliver the guts of the Red October to some other no-name guild capable of providing a home before we could. Time was of the essence. I shot off a reply, interviewed them in Vent, and expedited the two defectors into the rotations.

15 of the 25 progression raiders remain alive as
Sindragosa collapses, earning the guild
"The Frostwing Halls (25 Player)",
Icecrown Citadel

And Then There Was One

Like the previous new recruit Drecca, Lexxii and Bullshark required no vetting. As expected from their history with Final Hour, they immediately hit the ground running in Icecrown Citadel. Bullshark's hunter deeps shot up to the top of Recount; the gauntlet had been thrown down, and horde loyalist Jemb was determined to not let this Alliance turncoat show him up. As we cleared our way through the instance, Lexxii revealed trade secrets, both in /dodhealers and in Vent. Vent, no less! Finally, a female raider who wasn't afraid to speak in Vent. It was a luxury we hadn't enjoyed since Breginna's retirement at the end of The Burning Crusade. And to be honest, it was refreshing to hear a gal join in the conversation, which had long been a testosterone-laden sausage fest. Some of our female players had reasons why they chose not to speak over VoiP, and I respected their decisions -- but come raid time, we had a mission to accomplish, and that meant pushing baggage aside. It was nice to see that no baggage came attached with these former members of the Alliance.

Back at Sindragosa, the great frostwyrm felt a new level of wrath levied upon its skeletal frame. As predicted, the pair's first-hand knowledge of the encounter drew us ever closer to a kill. Still, Sindy would not go down without a fight. The great bone dragon continued to wreak havoc on the raid during the final phase, when all hell broke loose. Beaconed players yelled to one another to move, lest their frost tomb's be chained uncontrollably across the group. Some were broken out too quickly, and Mystic Buffet stacked until afflicted raiders collapsed from the cold. Others were commanded to sacrifice themselves, choking to death in blocks of ice, giving their lives for those who couldn't...without causing a wipe. But as the great dragon writhed and thrashed about on the steps of the Frost Queen's lair, players continued to fall over dead. Battle resurrections were called out, while angelic spirits of redemption bathed the chaos in light before their final moments expired. And in a final defiant screech, the bone dragon thrashed no more. Sindragosa was dead, and DoD stood victorious. The date was March 7th, 2010. All bosses in Icecrown Citadel had been defeated.

All but one.

---

Bulwinkul's time away felt like less of a burden, now with Lexxii and Bullshark firmly planted in the roster. Their contributions poured out of World of Logs like fine artwork, their positions nestled squarely near the top of their respective roles. A trend was definitely starting to emerge. We were attracting top talent, players that cared about effort as much as I did. And as long as we continued to do so, I would be free to give players like Bulwinkul and Crasian extended periods of vacation, without worry or fear that progression would grind to a halt in their absence.

The pains of bending to the whim of my roster, circa The Burning Crusade, were now ancient history, wounds that were fully healed. By being in control of my players, no one individual could hold anything over my head, make any demands that I was being unfair, not rotating them in enough, coming across like some kind of dictator. If they didn't like what was going on in Descendants of Draenor, they could leave, and I wished them the best of luck in trying to find something better. Yes, I did have rules, and I expected them to be followed, but I staked my bet that I ran a far more open ship than some of the competing hardcore guilds. The bet was paying off. Players were proving to me that the hardcore mentality wasn't something absolutely necessary for success. Players needn't bear the weight of unrealistic raiding schedules and oppressive, egotistical children at the helm...just to experience competitive endgame raiding. On the contrary, players were clearly demonstrating that our environment was viable, and one they could find enjoyable.

It was too bad, then, that Blizzard continued to glorify the very worst aspects of raiding...

3.64. The Master

"Blood Queen"
Artwork by Nooblar

A Clever Use of Game Mechanics

"Klocker, where are you?"

"I'm coming over to you!"

"No, stay there, I'm coming to you!"

"Ben, wait, stop...stop moving!!"

"Shit shit shit shit, stop running away from me!"

"I'm coming to you!"

"Beams, shit! Don't move, I'm going this way!"

"Which, left?"

"USE COMPASS DIRECTIONS!"

"Fuck. Can't reach him.....aaaand I'm mind controlled."

This was the living nightmare of Blood Queen Lana'thel.

Nearly every encounter in the collective set of raids making up Wrath's PvE content posed no trouble in their "normal" difficulty. Naxxramas was cleared in a weekend, Ulduar, several months before beginning the heroic modes, and the Tournament of Champions was quickly trivialized by Descendants of Draenor.

This San'layn was a veritable pain in the ass, by comparison.

Several weeks of work had produced no change; theories were varied as to where to lay the blame. A widely adopted strategy circulated on the forums advocating the intentional killing of a player near the start, "tricking" the encounter into behaving as though 26 players were present. Wiping near the 5% and 4% mark before succumbing to the Queen was all-too-common, so extending the life of the raid by one player was a likely solution. That strategy didn't sit well with me. Something wasn't quite right when part of the strategy called for a kill/soulstone near the start; a strategy more likely to be adopted near the end of the fight, as it was with Leotheras the Blind years before. We weren't being clever by using that approach, more likely, we were pushing the boundaries of what was exploitative. The fine line had yet to be drawn by the all-seeing eye, but by the end of January, Blizzard caught wind of the strategy and nerfed the encounter. She still wasn't dying, so the validity of the strat was moot -- it fell to the cutting room floor.

We stuck to the delayed bite strategy: the first person Lana'thel sunk her teeth into would wait until the absolute last possible moment before biting another victim. Jungard became the prime candidate to employ this strategy. Though nothing was confirmed, suspicion surrounded the Queen's bite selection mechanics -- of which many roads lead back to players with the highest threat at the start. Sometimes a few rogues liked to test their luck and push to beat Jungard, and even Ben showed the warrior up from time to time. But for the most part, Jungard cleaved a path of indiscriminate justice as he shot to the top of Recount and stayed there. This tendency automatically volunteered him for setting us off with our initial delay, and the gap to the Queen's defeat narrowed.

As wipes continued to obstruct the raid artery, our attention shifted to the biters and their imminent victims. All too often, chaos ensued when people needed to find a target to bite. Eacavissi was the first to propose the change:

"After the raid tonight I thought a bit about how I'd make this mindless fight even more mindless. What I propose is to shift the burden of finding biting targets from the biters to the bitees. That is, each DPS would know beforehand when and by whom they are being bitten, and then run to said person like a twilight-fan-girl for their biting convenience. The point of this is to maximize vampire DPS time, limit the amount of shit that has to go over Vent, and to protect against bad luck. Using this stratagem would also allow us to arrange positions to minimize running."

Immediately, Blain pounced on this idea. He tasked me with writing an add-on that would let him view a list of members in the raid, micromanaging biters and bitees with greater efficiency. Half-way through putting it together, an official add-on emerged which claimed to do the same thing. Validation. At least we were on the right track. At Jungard's behest, Blain took charge of employing the add-on and processed those priority lists. Bite targets gained clarity. The gap narrowed still.

Positioning around the ring was next, as Omaric and Bretthew took turns, painstakingly assigning each ranged player around the circumference of a pattern in the center of the room. This ensured that players linked with Pact of the Darkfallen had a safe point to collapse into. Her defeat drew closer...

...but the Queen would not acquiesce. And we were out of attempts for the week. But not by schedule...by design.

We continued to come in just under the damage requirements. Was it the difference of one strong damage dealer? I eyed Ikey, Omaric's druid, as the likely candidate. He already wanted to drop to DPS, but of all the skill that existed in the roster, no one single professionally-geared, expertly-played tank existed to replace him.

Yet.

DoD earns a rare server 1st with their completion
of "Flu Shot Shortage (25 Player)",
Icecrown Citadel

Shining Protector

"Gimme a sec to pull up your app, here" I spoke into the mic, alt-tabbing from Ventrilo to Gmail.

"No problem," came the digital reply. I detected a hint of an accent, possibly French, but couldn't be sure. I made a mental note to zero in on it as the conversation continued.

"So, it says here you are a Prot Pally. Preferred class to tank with?"

"Absolutely. Pretty much has the widest set of tools available. Death Knights...ehh...may be a bit more powerful overall, but it's cheap. Cheap way to play. With paladins, you think about what you have to do, rather than pressing buttons at random to win."

He spoke in quick bursts, punctuated by momentary pauses of contemplation.

"Some people think Ardent Defender was an implicit I-win button, until the nerf. You're not concerned?"

"Not at all; that's a perfect example, actually. Reduced damage below 35% was too much of a margin. I find it hard to believe any paladins were dying with that amount of a buffer. Granted, if they're consistently below 30% health, the problem is the healers, not the paladin. But no, I'm not concerned with the change. It's not as potent as Will of the Necropolis, but I suppose they justify the change with the fact that DKs are exploding in heroics."

I continued on with the line of questioning.

"How'd you find out about us anyway?"

"Been pugging with some of the people in DoD, they encouraged me to apply. Honestly, the top-down structure of a guild isn't something that interests me. I prefer playing with people, not a system. But they were pretty obstinate about how 'things are different in DoD', so after a bit of reading on you guys, perhaps it's time for a change. Not a huge fan of your raid schedule, but it's less ridiculous than some of these other raiding guilds on the server."

I flipped over to his character sheet on the armory and looked through all the various pieces of gear. Each slot bore a piece of armor immaculate and polished. Every tanking enchant was dead on, every gem was correct, at least from my limited exposure to the areas of protection paladins. I pulled up Bretthew's armory to compare -- everything about the guy's setup was in alignment. I started reading off what I saw into the microphone.

"Hit capped, expertise soft capped..."

"I've never really had a problem with threat generation. Paladins are already way overboard in that department, anyway. The bottom line is players don't pull bosses of me. If a tank lets that happen, they're pretty much a lost cause by that point."

The image of Eacavissi flashed into my mind, pulling such extraordinary numbers that even Ater struggled occasionally to control bosses. That was also a different era, don't forget that part.

"You think you can handle heroically geared warlocks that like to mismange their threat? We've got a couple of folks that like to push the envelope."

There wasn't even a hint of skepticism, "There won't be any issue."

I shifted the conversation to something a little more topical, "What's your take on the Blood Queen fight?"

"Easy fight. Even easier than Putricide, really. Get your positioning straight at the start, delay the first bite...shouldn't be any issues after that. Hopefully players pay attention to shroud and pact. Then yeah, it's not difficult. Your typical hard enrage fight."

The more he spoke, the more the accent began to geolocate him.

"You're Canadian, aren't you?"

He remained silent.

"It's OK, you're in good hands. Guild leader was born and raised there. Just doing my part to keep the Yankees in check."

"Someone needs to."

I laughed. "Yeah. It certainly seems that way sometimes..."

I couldn't believe my luck. How often does an applicant come along that is well spoken, understands the finer mechanics of the current content, has in-depth knowledge of their own class, as well as others that share the role, and carries with them of air of unwavering confidence? All this, and a fellow Canadian. It was as if I had asked the Gods themselves for the perfect applicant.

"How soon can you start? Are you locked to ICC this week or can we put you in for Friday?"

"I can start this Friday."

"Perfect! Alright, well...I think we're done here. This could be the start of some really great stuff, and I think you'll like it here in DoD."

"Thanks, can I grab that invite now?"

"Absolutely."

I alt-tabbed over to World of Warcraft, typed out the commands to invite, and hit the Enter key with the satisfaction of knowing another issue had finally been resolved. On my screen, the guild message flashed up for all to see:

Drecca has joined the guild.

The 25-Man progression team defeats Blood Queen
Lana'thel, earning them "The Crimson Hall (25 Player)",
Icecrown Citadel

Happy Valentine's Day

A few days before our third week attempting Blood Queen Lana'thel, Blizzard nerfed Icecrown Citadel again. Notable bosses like Professor Putricide, Blood Queen Lana'thel, Sindragosa, and even The Lich King himself had all been limited attempt bosses in normal mode. This Algalon-style of limited attempts hearkened back much further than the Celestial Planetarium. Vaelastrasz the Corrupt, second boss of Blackwing Lair, once bore a limited attempt restriction when he first set foot in Azeroth. It was the sort of despised mechanic leading players to seek inventive ways of solving raid boss problems, that "clever usage of game mechanics." Back then, it was sending the 40-Man raid deep into UBRS to extract a fire resistance buff off an obscure mind-controlled NPC. Clever, yes. Practical...hardly. No sane person would put up with that. Limited attempts, therefore, were to be deployed judiciously.

...such as in the case of these certain normal mode bosses, artificially dragging out the life (and interest) of Icecrown Citadel.

It wasn't a secret to those who had an eye for it. Cataclysm was still a ways off, and interest needed to be stretched out as long as it could while Blizzard wrapped up work on the next expansion. As a result, the gating unlocks and the raid-wide buffs went hand-in-hand with the limited attempts on certain bosses. I understood it, but normal modes felt a bit severe. Eventually, Blizzard came around and agreed, and the limited attempt restriction was lifted on normal modes, to return again come heroic time. Once again, my suspicions on Blizzard's new raid design were confirmed. Normal mode was meant for one-and-all, and should not bar accessibility...

...which raised the all-important question: what was our excuse for staring at an undefeated Blood Queen for the third week in a row?

"Keep your eye on the new tank tonight," I whispered over to Blain, "gonna want to hear your opinion of him at the end."

Most new recruits needed to be vetted before setting foot in our raids; watching how they behaved in a heroic 5-Man was often the litmus test. This was unnecessary with Drecca. Upon entry to his first DoD 25-Man raid, he was flasked, buffed, and with gear polished, was pulling without delay. One of the first whispers came from Omaric, now free to shapeshift into kitty form and join the DPS.

"Where'd you get this guy? His gear is top notch."

"Just pulled him out of the pile of apps! He's the one that set you free, chief."

The healers were next, quietly making observations in the super not-so-secret /dodhealers chat channel:

[4. dodhealers] Klockerr says: A new tank that knows how to use cooldowns? What is this trickery?

[4. dodhealers] Neps says: I think we should leave Bretthew behind from now on.

[4. dodhealers] Gunsmokeco says: Easy to keep him topped off. Nice to have a master player for a change.

[4. dodhealers] Drecca says: Thanks. :)

I glanced down at the chat and smiled. Our healers hadn't even realized Drecca joined their channel to listen in, making certain he knew exactly what and how they were coordinating. He took the ball and ran with it; he didn't need to be told what to do. Drecca knew and lead accordingly. When it came time to go through the motions on the Blood Queen, Drecca contributed to strategy adjustments and coordinated raid-wide cooldowns with Bretthew. Each attempt brought even more polish to our existing work.

As the clock neared 5:00pm, it appeared that our current attempt looked to be the best one yet. The raid poured every last inch of damage into Lana'thel that they could wring out, and all 25 players were alive as her health wound down into the final percentages. Eight of the top ten damage dealers were pushing 10k DPS; Jungard himself was about to break 15k. But the enrage time encroached, and as hit points remained in her pool, the Queen fell into a berserker rage.

"Don't have Divine Shield yet...Ardent Defender's out."

"Sac now!!"

"I got it, I got it, I got it..."

Fred the holy paladin stepped in and took one for the team, popping Divine Sacrifice following a Divine Shield, granting the raid a few precious seconds to continue to pour their remaining damage into Lana'thel. The 30% raid-wide reduced damage gave our strongest healers a small enough buffer to pour every last ounce of healing into the tanks as they withstood devastating strikes from an enraged boss. As Fred's Divine Shield expired, he crumpled to the floor, just as Blood Queen Lana'thel breathed her final breath.

At 4:45pm on Valentine's Day of 2010, DoD completed its first clear of The Crimson Hall, putting us at 3/4ths of the way through Icecrown Citadel. Two obstacles were behind us. I now had Drecca, a solid, professionally-played pally tank to alleviate Omaric's duties, and the Blood Queen no longer held dominance over us.

"What do you think of this new tank?" I whispered over to Blain.

"I like him. He's good."

The recruitment was a win. I looked forward to see what impact Drecca would have on the guild in the months to come.

3.62. Diplomacy for Dummies

The 25-Man defeats Profession Putricide,
earning "The Plagueworks (25 Player)",
Icecrown Citadel

The Politics of Raiding

The third wing of ICC was now open for service, and although the 25-Man progression team plowed through the The Blood Prince Council without batting an eye, we came to a dead stop at Blood Queen Lan'athel. Attempt after attempt went into the vampiric blood elf, her wings spread wide as she feasted on each player of the raid, injecting them with their own insatiable blood lust. A discussion on what needed to change was dominating the guild forums, but theories varied. Notably, Jungard had been in talks with Blain about the possibility of pushing out the first bite in order for the raid to gain precious seconds near the end. Additionally, Blain offered to assist Jungard (and in turn, Omaric and Bretthew) in handling bite assignments -- a degree of micromanagement Blain was famous for. On the surface, Omaric and Bretthew seemed to welcome the help; behind the scenes, I remained suspicious of their sincerity. The 25-Man was their show now, and to have the old raid leader resume old habits...even unofficially...must have rubbed them the wrong way. Omaric, in particular, was the one I was concerned about. Known for his habitual back-seat raid leading during Cheeseus' reign, Blain's reach must have felt a bit overextended. But, Blood Queen remained undefeated, and I'm certain this was part of the reason Omaric took Blain's help, rather than reject it.

Shadowfrost Shards continued to be sent to my bags, but little else; I kept mum while the majority of upgrades went to the Elite, and what table scraps remained began to show up on the character sheets of the Raiders. The lack of shinies contributed to my funk; the loss of one of my longest running guild members and officers, Dalans, hung heavy. It wasn't long before I expanded to fill the vacuum left in his absence. Without his ever present strong-arm tactics ensuring guildies played by the rules and kept their whining to a minimum, the need to perform those duties on my own took root. I grew less tolerant of mistakes, expected more from people, and was less inclined to meet the needs of the Raider over the Elite. Complaints that they weren't seeing as frequent of loot upgrades as expected were met with little sympathy from me. My inner voice took command, repeating to them the tenets of the guild's philosophy:

The "Raider" rank enjoys more flexibility than the "Elite"; that's why they get 1st round bidding rights. That's their perk. Your perk is that you get to come and go as you please. You don't get to have the cake and eat it, too. If you want more loot, give me greater commitment, just as the Elite have. End of story.

The Raiders weren't the only ones on the receiving end. I grew increasingly distasteful of Omaric and Bretthew's "loosey goosey" leadership style, one rife with chatting and jokes, making light of mistakes that were our downfall in an earlier expansion. Where once I approved of their fun-loving, playful atmosphere, I now sat and stared it down with stilted eyes. After calling them out several times on their lack of focus, they dug their heels in and expressed their dissatisfaction with my handling of their promotion, pointing out that I had yet to officially acknowledge them as DoD's new 25-Man raid leaders. Those who walked the hallowed halls before them, Cheeseus and Blain, had been paraded down the red carpet like kings returned from a holy war, now ready to lead our people to victory. Yet no forum post existed in Omaric or Bretthew's name. I told them it was an oversight. In reality, it went much deeper. They hadn't yet won me over. Yes, they were doing the job, achievements were being knocked out, progress was being made -- but they hadn't persuaded me of their leadership.

I wasn't yet in a position to make that fact known. While I certainly had control over the roster, options in the leadership department were still minimal at best. And a charge like that would be far too damning to players driven by their emotions. Between the former back seat raid leader and the paladin who concocted a story to hide the truth behind a temper tantrum, this situation clearly required finesse. I agreed with them on the finer points of their argument. You're absolutely right. I haven't acknowledged your efforts. It needs to be done. And I wrote the post marking them as the officially sanctioned raid leaders of DoD, supplying a bulleted list of all of the accomplishments they cleaned off our plate. The negotiation had silently begun. The next time we'd speak, it would be me with a list of demands.

That was the plan, at least.

The Blood Council fails to deliver 25k damage to any
player, earning DoD "The Orb Whisperer (25 Player)",
Icecrown Citadel

Hell Freezes Over

One evening, as we cleared our way toward Festergut and Rotface, Hellspectral had become noticeably louder in Vent. An hour earlier, I began to pick up on hints that something wasn't right. Normally quiet during the boss fight, Hellspectral was feeding off of Ben in Vent. The shadow priest's insane numbers went hand-in-hand with deafening screams that pissed off anyone wearing a half decent set of headphones. And in staying true to his PvP roots, this behavior was generally followed by any number of trash-talking insults toward guildies who managed to meet or exceed his "contributions" -- that playful way that PvPers expressed admiration in the same way the common man would express disgust. On this particular evening, Hellspectral took it upon himself to do just that, not only matching Ben's entry in Recount, but his volume in Ventrilo as well. Without Dalans' itchy trigger finger to mute him, Ben and Hells competed uninhibited in damage and in decibels.

Things went south when Saurfang fell over dead.

In those next moments of transitioning through Saurfang's doorway, down the hallways guarded by icy traps, Hellspectral continued on his tirade as if drunk from a night on the town. This behavior came to a head when we arrived at the entryway forking to Putricide and his two pet abominations, Stinky and Precious, guarding their respective masters.

"I've had enough of this! Imma take a nap," Hellspectral announced. An awkward silence fell over vent, as everyone knew exactly what my stance was regarding leaving a raid early: zero tolerance, followed by instant, permanent removal from the guild. They waited to see if the death knight would hearth and log out -- he did neither. Instead, his virtual self stood motionless, staring at one of the walls of the citadel's chambers. Reality set in. He wasn't behaving as if he were drunk...

..he was drunk.

"Are you fucking serious?" I, at last, broke the silence.

"Is he gone?"

"I think he's passed out."

Rage and fury began to paint my screen red, as I alt-tabbed to the desktop, dragged Hellspectral into a separate Vent channel, proceeding to scream at the top of my lungs in an attempt to "wake him up". There was no response. I was stunned. Never in the history of my guild had any of the core raid team ever passed out drunk in the middle of a run. Moments later, Blain joined the channel.

"I can't fucking believe he's doing this. What is going through his mind? I'm one step away from kicking him. This is totally unacceptable behavior."

And then, Blain did something that completely caught me off guard.

"I've got this. Let me handle it. Head on back to the raid channel. I'll take care of it."

Mature completes the Ashen Verdict reputation grind,
Icecrown Citadel

Mischief Managed

Blain? Mediating? Never in the history of the guild had Blain ever shown any interest in dealing with people issues. His leadership style had forever been "My Way or the Highway", a style I adopted in some form or another. If it had been any other day, or any other guildy...if a cord was about to be cut, Blain would've been the first to offer to hold the scissors. Why was he doing this thing that was so unconventional of him?

I didn't know how to respond, so in my stupor, I simply spoke back into the mic the first thing that came to mind...

"Thank you...for doing that."

I returned to the raid channel joining a conversation already in progress. Players were joking about placing bets about how fast Hellspectral would be unguilded. 

"Ok, everyone...settle down. The issue is being handled. Let's continue." The raid smartened up, and quickly resumed the process of pulling trash...albeit a bit quieter and more focused than before. Blain soon joined us in the channel as well. We made it through the rest of the raid that evening, sans Hellspectral, and at some point during that night, Blain typed a whisper over to me,

"You'll be hearing from him at some point in the near future."

I thanked him again for the intervention, but was still no less shocked that he performed it.

---

Right on schedule, Hellspectral contacted me a few days later, after sobering up and mustering the courage to face whatever wrath I had planned for him. He apologized profusely for his behavior, stating that he had let it get out of control, taking full responsibility -- he never once blamed anyone but himself. I admired his honesty and courage in finally stepping up; I was willing to work with players who accepted their shortcomings and made moves to solve them...since I had no shortage of similar faults. If I put the effort into improving, so could they, I thought it was a fair expectation to levy on my roster...

...but I couldn't help but wonder if I was going soft. Should I have given him the permanent boot? How many chances should a player get to prove themselves before the dreaded double-standard sets in?