Thursday 26 November 2009

Defining your guild?

Social Guild! Raiding Guild! Casual Guild!
You can see the guild recruitment channel in towns, many folk advertising raiding guilds. Some maybe hard core, some just raiding when they can raid, even if thats every day. Then theres the Hard-Core raiding guilds which,...really dont seem to advertise much anyway, the progressive raiding guilds, Casual raiding guilds, and then theres the social friendly guild. Pretty clear cut isnt it? or is it?
Taking my own experience of running TDD, i think (and quietly hope) that i have seen all manner of player types come, go and stay. We naturally keep those people who wish to stay, and those that leave, leave peacefully or, somewhat with a little drama to make their point. And i cant remember kicking someone of of TDD for a good year +! And while we maintain a reputation of a good friendly well run guild, i wonder sometimes how...

By the nature of word of mouth, TDD is a social guild, however, we do raid with the pupose of progressive raiding, and theres nothing casual about the focus of our raiding, only our attitude towards wipes, and mistakes. We pick up our feet, advise, and try again. The guild is structured and organised enough to use the gold anvil, financed by the Raid Bank and Guild Bank plus dontations from guild members to have debt free repair bills. We are also labelled a casual raiding guild also, along with "end-game raiding".
Week by week, we work with and along side new members (new to raiding sometimes) and develope these players into confident raiders. It takes time, some find that difficult to cope with, when they see the potential of the talent of the over-all guild, and wonder why Ulduar isnt cleared yet. And that largely comes down to every individual members goals, where do they want to be?


My thoughts, as a GM is where do i want my guild to be together, and how happy are they as a collective raiding team working with each other. Socially, there could be problems, and that is the blight of every GM's guild. How do you sort out the social, from the raiding? You cant really, the two come hand in hand, you either like someone or you dont. And then communication of your raid breaks down into them and us!
The trouble i have found with TDD, is not screening enough, or willing to step on action of players you instinctively know, will move on to a more harder core of raiding. This is probably something i need to get back into personally and take over, however the trouble is defining the guild outline of Social, progressive raiding stance, how do you advetise a guild like that ...or do you need to if it already has a reputation?
TDD does have the potential, however, individual members, dont have the same time as dedicated raiders. We have famillies that work, students that study, parents with young babies, and teenagers in their finishing years at school. ....Maybe i should hold a competition for the best Social Progressive Raiding Guild slogan?
I personally have got into an arguement over ventillo as to whether TDD was a hard-core raiding guild. Again, mention of the ability of players within our guild. But take into account that individuals background and previous guilds, shows they where pushing to thier own expectation of what TDD *could be* for their own aims, which isnt a bad thing, if the rest of the guild was able to meet those expectations, but they cant..for RL reasons and commitments. It's at that point you have to consider is this relationship the right one? between the established Guild and the Experienced Individual? There are some months where the guild will *click* in raids and steam through everything without any hiccups, and at those points folk see *potential* to do something more, and push for it. I guess at the heart of things, we do things in..moderation, to balance real-life and gaming hand in hand.

And thats what TDD is good at. And i guess, the biggest advertisement TDD has, its achievements, in relation to other guilds out there on our server

Greatly Improved - The respec

Well that was certainly an improvement, although it was only a 5 man Daily Dungeon and Heroic Daily run, there was allot more AE control. And my health bar hardly moved at all.
So the confidence is back, and my mana starvation has now gone, thanks to the respec. I have an Ulduar raid tonight, so hopefully these changes and glyph changes will see a real difference.
I cant wait for Onyxia on Monday either, as im sure the changes will make a great improvement on whelp control.

I had to wipe out my remix ui, i began to hate it, but took what i did like about it with me. And customised my own personal one. Which is much much less cluttered, and im able to see alot more multiple trash easier. I'll upload a screen shot later. For now, its time to test out the respc in raids this weekend.

Wednesday 25 November 2009

Refining the Tree

Respec Talent Update
While having a read through EJ, i felt i needed to catch up on some talent abilities and read up their explinations. Seems i had over looked a few things from my original spec, which was put together very quickly when i turned 80. Old Spec

Gearwise, i am happy, bang in the middle of what i was aiming for, not too high, and just right for 10 man raiding. Although i may jump into the occasional 25 pug on the weekend too, and chance my luck. Looks like i could use some more hit rating, and a re-think on my rotations aswell.

[Hammer of the Righteous] (HotR): Excellent threat against up to 3 mobs at a low mana cost, or 4 with the [Glyph of Hammer of the Righteous]. Damage per target is not as high as ShR, but total damage against 3 targets is greater than ShR damage. Do you know what?...2 weeks back playing, and i dont think this ability is even on my action bar!!

Glyphs.
Hammer of the Righteous
Divine Plea
Righteous Defence

Some work to do tonight i feel...

Thursday 19 November 2009

Macro Collection

http://www.wowwiki.com/Useful_macros_for_paladins
#showtooltip
/castsequence reset=2 Holy Shield, Sacred Shield

Hand of Protection (HoP) Macro
I use this a lot on my squishies – they love it because most paladins don’t use it, unfortunately.
BoP Aggroing Party Member This BoPs your current targets target (i.e. use it if a party member pulls aggro from the tank on your current target). If you are not partied it will BoP yourself. Pressing it again will cancel the BoP if cast on you (get rid of the BoP on yourself to resume DPS or if the BoP was accidental).

#showtooltip Hand of Protection
/cancelaura Hand of Protection
/cast [nogroup,target=player][target=targettarget,party] Hand of Protection
/raid %T is protected!

Tanking
Divine Shield This Macro will allow a tank to cast Divine Shield and remove it in two clicks. This will allow a tank to remove all debuffs, DoTs, fears, and other harmful spells and then remove the shield so you can pick up aggro. This can also be used with blessing of protection and Divine Protection.

/cancelaura Divine Shield
/cast Divine Shield

Increased Max Camera Distance
You can see more so it’ll help you increase your situational awareness!

/console cameradistancemaxfactor 50

Holy
Holy Macros Holy Shock + Divine Favor
#showtooltip Holy Shock
/console Sound_EnableSFX 0
/use Divine Favor
/console Sound_EnableSFX 1
/script UIErrorsFrame:Clear()
/cast Holy Shock

Improved Cleanse, Holy Light, Flash of Light Simple macro to
Cleanse/Holy Light/Flash Light the mouseover or your target or your target's target, press alt/shift/ctrl to do the action yourself directly:

#showtooltip
/cast [mod,target=player][target=mouseover,help,nodead]
[help,nodead][nogroup,target=player][target=targettarget,help,nodead]Cleanse
#showtooltip
/cast [mod,target=player][target=mouseover,help,nodead]
[help,nodead][nogroup,target=player][target=targettarget,help,nodead]Holy Light
#showtooltip
/cast [mod,target=player][target=mouseover,help,nodead]
[help,nodead][nogroup,target=player][target=targettarget,help,nodead]Flash of Light

Redemption
Resurrect your target and warn the group. The macro will not warn if the target is hostile/not dead.

#showtooltip Redemption
/cast Redemption
/stopmacro [nohelp][nodead]
/p Resurrecting %t.

Normal mount else Flying mount with Crusader's Aura Macro
#showtooltip
/castsequence [nomounted, noflyable] !Crusader Aura, Summon Charger
/castsequence [nomounted, flyable] !Crusader Aura, Flying Mount
/cast [mounted] !Devotion Aura
/dismount
/dismount

Monday 16 November 2009

Re-inspired

I returned to wow after a month or so offline, it was a break i needed for sure.
I was aware of the issues going on in the guild durin my time off, and just before. Things had to run their course, people, players, interests and motivation etc. Somethings work, some dont, and the quicker people accept those idolologies the better, and we can all move on and continue as before.
My return to wow see's me bring back the paladin tank, only this time to see warcraft trhough to its end. I managed to grapple the gear system eventually after all my own confusion of wtf do i do now to get any kind of gear upgrade, to oh...badges and triumph badges.
Ofc i knew this before, but having my partner Leni on the same page helps my own game time and enjoyment more, in having an actual lifestyle again in playing warcraft as a couple rather than an estranged silent living room with us both doing different things. Brings that sense of family, and team back into my own game time, and hopefully for Leni too.
My main drive is to clear Ulduar once and for all. And drag everyone into heroics to get their badge gear. The raiding is for pure achievement, not gear, as i doubt their is anything of real importance in there worth getting for myself, although some might think they still need this and that badges are probably the most reliable source of any gear upgrade.

So whats left, Ulduar, Onxyia and then Totc 10? and the expected patch of ICC? best we get our butts motivated for a new challenge then.

I think i managed to fix my wow freezing up on me now and then, i removed a GB of ram, lets see how we go