Project Lore

When it comes to joining in the Heroic Raid runs, it's usually best to make sure you have a comfortable two 10 man raid groups and make sure they're geared/read up on tactics and such.

Although, progressing like that you'd have to expect wipes. You'll feel that much prouder of yourself and your guildmates that, despite all the wipes, they all stuck through it together and downed that single encounter or boss.

Naxx 25 may be "too easy to pug", but I like it just the way it is. If it were to be changed, then it would be showing bias against players -- such as myself -- who have no choice but to pug it. And if there's people complaining that something is too easy, then they're spoiled. Wanna make something harder for yourself? Put your own twist on something instead of whining, as you will get no sympathy from me.

(Btw, my guild is almost completely undergeared for even Naxx 10. So it is because I've been able to pug that I managed to get geared for Ulduar 10.)

I take my hat off to anyone who takes the guys who are under geared and don't have the experience i mean where are they going to get it now hardly anyone does the low level raids anymore and they can only get so much kit from raids, yeah granted for the die hard of us out there who try to smash in all the heroics to get all the badges i say fair play but what about those guys and gals that don't have the chance to get the badges to get that imba t7.5 kit. or just been refused to come as your kit just isn't good enough even though you have spent every waking hour trying your hardest to get as good a kit as you can.
i left a guild because of that simple fact they wouldn't give the underdog the chance to get the kit or the xp of raiding, is this what it has come to hiding in the corner with our "click" of mates not taking the noob under your wing to show him the way it can be done or the way it should be done.
is it the guys at the end of the raid that come away want to join your guild because they couldn't play because they couldn't see the screen as they were laughing to much or is it really all about the kit?
i for one would rather get the stitch from laughing and kitting out some new guy than kick some guy for not being up to scratch.
maybe it's me maybe it's not but is this not what the game is about...

Very nice post

Our guild too had to PUG 25 man naxx starting out because we didn't have the numbers to get it going on our own. Eventually we grew in both numbers and experience and gear and regularly run both 10's and 25's (though we haven't yet cleared 25 man cause we need to get our priests some MC experience now).

In a side note though, my question, and a topic I believe would be great to have covered by any of the PL bloggers, is about your new raiders. You said "I just hope that our morale stays high and these new members stick around for the long run," and I'm curious what kind of precautions you guys take when it comes to probation periods/loot rules/protecting the guild from people that are there to loot and leave.

While it may be a topic that you all may not want to cover as it could turn into a "well that's how the PL guys said to do it" fest, but I really am curious. Coming from a similar standpoint where we were smallish prior to wrath and then exploding onto the raid scene with a dramatic increase in our numbers, we have been used by some as a way to gear up and basically fill in their apps to the servers heavy hitting raid guilds gear-wise. In TBC we were used the same way and ended up never truly getting into 25 man raids and it seemed to continue in wrath. So to put an end to this, we implemented probation periods and restricting the looting rules when previously we were a relaxed group of people who just liked to go raid and whoever got what was cool, but as our loot/time seemed to sprout wings and fly away it started frustrating people.

So I suggest a blog by someone on PL to cover something like this (I think you would be a fine person to write said blog as it seems you are probably about to go through the same thing we did).

yea agree all the hardcore raiders out there saying its too easy... they got uldar comnig out with bosses that have hard modes. not ot mention they will probably throw out a few mroe raids in up coming months/years (2.4 might be arthas like sunwell just not that hard =P) so the fact that they are letting ppl who can't afford the time and commitment to go hardcore to taste some of that raid feeling i applaude blizz for this they just shortened the gap between casual and hardcore

Well first off I'll admit not a fan of raiding, actually not a big fan on doing instances in general, but it's where the good gear is. Just like TBC you need those emblems for epic gear in Dalaran just like you needed badges in TBC for the epic gear in Shatt. you also ned to run them to farm frozen orbs for about 90% of the professions in game which I personally think sux. The orbs should also be drops in places like Icecrown or The Storm Peaks, and not a requirement for you to run instances to get them or the emblems to purchase them in Dalaran. After all the professions are standard / casual game stuff not for the hardcore gamer.

IMO most hardcore gamers do just that run instance after instance till they master it then they complain how easy it was to master it and rack it up to Blizzards failure to make the new content harder or even equal to the content that was currently available prior to the expansion or patch. I just hope when Uldaar comes out it's a medium difficulty instance. Yes be harder then Naxx but not to hard that most can't do it.

IMO if it is to hard that most can't do it it'll be like TBC was prior to the expansion with about 60% of the people waiting till the next expansion comes out with an increase to the level cap before they attempt to run the hard instances of the prior expansion. example on my realm most people would not ever attempt to run The Eye or Onx as these were beyond Kara and most people on my realm couldn't clear Kara prior to the expansion. I wish though they would make the current in game instances also be progressive instances so if you are at the level cap that the lower level instances were revisitable with a stage geared to the players level. Kinda like AV is as you enter it the NPC's in the area are your level and not 20 levels below you or more so it's a cake walk, also with level oriented gear drops to match. As I said AV being an example at level 51 to 60 the NPC's were at the level of the majorities of the players in the raid same for the 61 to 70 bracket and the 71 to 80's bracket as well the NPC's level increased so it wasn't a cake walk through the content it was actually a challenge to complete the different objectives of the event to win.

This can easily be implemented into instances and raids as well as current lower level instances. this IMO would give these hardcore players something to do with their time then to sit on the forums complaining about how easy the game is or complaining that it's taking to long to get new content to run so they can breeze through it next and then QQ the forums as to how easy the new content just released was and want more HARDer content.

well enough ranting. Just food for thought

LOL! You wiped on 25 Naxx? I'm sorry, but that's kind of sad. The first 80 raid I did was a completely non-guild, every member a pug 25 Naxx, and it was demolished with a full clear in 4 and half hours.

Well, you were obviously dragged through by some guys massively overgeared for it. The gear for Naxx25 comes from Naxx10.

If you want to get your gear up to raiding standards:
Get the craftable gear your friends have cheap access to that is useful to you (may mean a pally/shammie healer maybe wearing some cloth with high SP or something to start with - don't worry about that).
Know the fights - watch videos, read guides - our guild uses www.tankspot.com 's Project Marmot.
PUG both versions of VoA after a Wintergrasp battle or two (as soon after the raid reset as possible to minimise the chance of idiots saving you to an empty raid) every week. Very easy.
OS10 with trusted friends/guild mates. 3 quite quick badges even if you can't do the final boss.
Heroics whenever possible. Check the final boss' loot to find which one has your Epic item, group with a few people who need to kill that same boss (but for different items).
Spend your Emblems on gear! Emblems are no good sitting on your currency tab. Decide what's the cheapest upgrade and save for it.
Within a week (maybe 2) you'll have the smattering of epics required for Naxx10.

To Niohaggor,

Was every1 in the PuG geared? If so then STFU. As iTZKooPa stated, the Raid was under geared therefore leading to wipes.

The guild I am in attempted the same thing on Naxx 10, for the sake of jist tryin, with the same fate. Granted about half the raid had been in numerous times, it was mainly for those of us who didn't have the gear to git a taste and find out what we needed to work on.

when my guild first started we had about 15 core players not and we just ran with those 15 people in 25m naxx with 10 pugs we did that for about a month and when we started downing KT alot of people join the guild so we could run our own guilds runs which has now formed into a 3 drake guild

who woulda thought

@Niohaggor

Wow, you are so right. First time I went in I was by myself multiboxing with 25 accounts. I tanked, healed, dps'ed everything myself. I need to take a break for a bit so I fed my cat a six pack of Red Bull ground up with a pound of coffee. I then threw him on my keyboards and walked away. I can back 30 minutes later and the Plague wing was cleared and the cat had also done my laundry.

TLDR version: You're a tool.

Let us all bow down to the mighty Niohaggor and all the rest of his ilk. NOT! It is that type of pathetic arrogance that alienates people from the game. Grow up and check yourself.

I applaud any player or guild that takes undergeared or inexperienced players and TEACHES them how to play better. We all know that the Niohaggors of this world were once noobs too, so it makes their smugness and arrogance all the more distasteful. Thankfully, they are in the minority.

Care to duel Mr. Niohaggor? Do you feel lucky punk? Well do ya?

meh

Lol at drstealth.
I'm kind of in the same boat, where I am serious about wanting to do raid content, but my schedule doesn't allow me to raid that often. The other problem is I love my guild but we don't have nearly enough core players to do guild raids. Pugs are the only way I can do it, and even so time constraints have made it so I haven't yet downed all the possible content yet. Maly and Kel are the last two bosses I need, and one of these days they're mine...

Kudos to Apoxz !!

Sorry to hear that this happened, but I know how it feels. My guild has downed 10 man Naxx, but we're having some troubles with 25 man naxx. We ALWAYS pug, and we haven't cleared it past Thaddius with pugs (everything but him, Saph, and KT are down). I have left the guild before and joined a much 'better' one that was more hardcore, but they were quite rude and refused to let my friend who had recently dinged 80 into the guild. I /gquit the second day and came running back to my old guild.

It seems like the higher up guilds out there aren't too eager to help the lowbies and the newer players out. /shrug. That's too bad. I'd love to find (and no disrespect to my guild) a guild that can do hardcore raiding but still be nice and loose people.

Great read, though. :D

There seem to be a lot of guild out there that say "We aren't big enough to raid..." How about forming an alliance of 2 or 3 guilds (a Community if you will :D )? Set up a chat channel for the players that want to raid to communicate. Doesn't need to be that formal, just decide on a day or days to go and pick the instance ("This Thursday OS25 - 20:00"). It's how we started and we cleared Naxx25 in one evening for the first time just the other day. Pug any holes in the group and encourage the guldless pugees to join one of your guilds.

Our guild is in a similar boat. We can get to Thaddius most weeks, but he serves us our walking papers with no mercy whatsoever. We can fill most of the slots, but have to get a few pugs to fill it up.

Now... before I make myself look like a jerk... I will point out that I go out of my way to help people gear up and learn how to raid. I gleefully go on 10 man Naxx runs even though there is little in there for me because you need some ringers in there so the noobs can get gear. I stop what I'm doing to put enchants on people's gear, and try to do my best in my capacity as Priest Captain for my guild.

The problem 'casual' guilds have isn't that the noobs don't have gear, it's that so many of them have no competitive spirit. They just want the gear, and get no joy or satisfaction from the process of earning it.

This, I believe... is why serious guilds don't want people they have to train, they want people that will train themselves through research and hard work..

Going on a raid isn't a relaxing Picnic, it's a competitive sports event pitting your team against the instance's scripted opponents. You want people on your team that want to do well just for the sake of the spirit of competition, not people that just want the prize.

In that auspice, the difference between 'serious' and 'casual' guilds SHOULD be in the minimum requirements needed to join the raid team, sort of like the difference between a Professional Baseball team and it's Farm counterpart. The difference between the two is the level of competition and skill.

Just incase anyone reads this...

We went back the next day and downed 2 wings 1shotting most of the bosses. The difference was preparation and we took more guild mates and less pugs.