So Much Raiding, So Little Time
Posted by 
Bastosa on Wednesday, May 20, 2009 - 23 Comments Tags: 10 man, 25 man, 3.1, Ulduar, bastosa, content, end game, raiding, time management
Bastosa on Wednesday, May 20, 2009 - 23 Comments Tags: 10 man, 25 man, 3.1, Ulduar, bastosa, content, end game, raiding, time management 
While I've always considered myself a strong raider, I've always done my best to keep a handle on the amount of time I dedicate to the game. It is after all, just a game, and it is very important to not spend too much time playing.That being said I am a total completionist, and I'll admit, a bit of an addict when it comes to this game we all know and love. This is why I am beginning to struggle with the new content patch. I know in a matter of months I will likely be QQing about the lack of content available... but for right now, I am overwhelmed!
A big part of my problem is I can't decide if I would rather do 10-man progression or 25-man progression. So I do what any good WoW fanatic would do, and try and do both, which in my guild equals out to about 6 nights a week of raiding.
That is a pretty large jump up from what I am used to, and the first few weeks I tried to make that happen it started taking a toll on me.
Now don't get me wrong, I am not some helpless junkie that can't get a grip on his time... I can quit anytime I want to :) ! But the fact is I want to see both versions of Yogg go down, and there are plenty of loot upgrades for me in both versions on the instance.
Fact is I am just stuck in that rare window of new content where 10-mans are still important to farm, and 25-mans still need work to progress. Eventually I know that I will completely outgear 10-mans and have no reason to go back, but I fear the hard modes will extend that window further than it usually gets extended.
At this point it is clear to me I am going to have to start making some choices. What is important now, and furthermore where am I having the most fun? 10s or 25s? I realize I can't do it all no matter how bad I want to!
How are you other raiders doing in this department? Are you accomplishing everything you want to? Or do you find yourself in the same place where there are not enough hours in the day (or at least enough gaming hours)?
I'd be curious to know your choice, because it is time for me to make mine!
Reader Comments (23)
i know. im tryign to do naxx( just got good gear for it) and theres so little time to do it. as you said, " so much raiding , so little time"
I love to raid, it's my favourite thing to do. But I just can't seem to find a good guild :S It's really annoying because I want to raid.
Do 10 man Ulduar whilst it's still a challenge.
As when you gear from 10 man Ulduar, 25 man will still be a challenge.
More fun and less sitting there bored out your skull as you're one shotting bosses in all your 25 man loot.
Just my opinion. =]
@Vag; what continent/realm/faction you on and you may happen to find someone post in the comments that could adopt you. :P
Hey Guys... Lose the ESPN ad from EyeWonder. It's covering the left half of all the content on this page!
Stuck between 10 mans where the drops are basically almost always sidegrades, and 25 mans where you end up taking 3 people who are not serious enough to concentrate; and stand in the fire. 25-3 = 22 people, which is a fail in Ulduar 25 man.
Frustrated too! When I find a solution that does not involve a machete, a drop sheet, packing tape, acid, and a batch tub; I'll let you know.
@Sean: You're right!
I play a Holy/Ret Human Paladin on the realm Outland-EU.
But that's a bit off-topic I guess.
But yeah, I play all day (Yes, I'm quite the nerd! :P) But I am not a member of a raiding guild. I am in fact a really good player but how am I supposed to show that to people? They look at my gear and invite me if they think it's good enough..I have some heroic epics and T7 chest/gloves. And some heroic blues. With that gear I can easily join a naxx10 guild but every naxx10 guild i've been in disband within a week! And I do not know people in any of the server's big guilds so what can I really do?
about the hard mode stuff.......why did they EVER make it......why couldnt the boses just be HARD IN THE FIRST PLACE.......killing them a differnt way in my opinion is just retarded
I can barly find time to raid AT ALL...the summer can't come soon enough
well i just puged my first 25 ulduar tonight...
;(
epic fail...i do have the time to raid, but i end up getting bored with farming and raiding after about a week.
@Vag
What you can do is find Naxx 25 pugs to play in which aren't hard to find. That way you can begin getting Valor badges and 25 man gear. Be sure to find some way to run VoA every week for your chance at S5/S6 T7/T8 gear. With how many resources are available, everyone has a chance to "gear" themselves out, regardless of guild status. These days, the only thing a (decent) guild is good for is seeing the later content sooner.
@Vayder
Yeah, Ulduar 25 pugs so far only can down a few bosses, if that. I see Trade spammed day in and day out for FL runs since he's super easy. In reality a group of moderately geared people with IQs above 75 should be able to at least do FL/Razor/XT-002, as well as IC if they can get past the trash! :D
Yeah, trying to choose between content is difficult. Being the competitive guy I am, I always tend to choose the difficult route. With any luck I'll be joining a guild beginning Hard Modes this week after clearing Ulduar last week.
I had cleared Naxx25 before Naxx10 was done, I have always raided ever since TBC and I LOVE IT! The thrill of downing bosses is just exciting and hearing your team go wild as you get your first time kill is a cool feeling. I prefer 25mans but i still got love for 10mans cos there is less to go wrong and more chance for loot!
Imo Bast i think you should possibly try doing 10mans one week and then 25mans another week unless your called upon.
LOL Ulduar PuGs exist?! Not on my server they don't. I've (finally) just joined a raiding guild, but we're working on the 10mans before we group up to try the 25mans.
I feel your pain, I just recently hit 80 on my shaman so I've been running nearly -everything- to get her geared, this includes both flavors of raid instance.
Now that I've been promotoed to raider (yay!) It's Ulduar 25 four nights a week (we're on Yogg :<) Ulduar 10 one night, Naxx 25 one night, and then OS/Naxx 10 on Sundays if people need it.
7 days a week is rough, but I eat it all up. <3
My husband and I perform a highwire balancing act all the time when it comes to WoW. We have two children who obviously require (and deserve <3) a big chunk of our attention, but both of us are raiders.
The problem with being a dedicated raider is not just that you're expected to show up, but that you're supposed to show up prepared, which means somewhere in there you also need to do dailies to get gold for repairs, gems, enchants, consumables, or in my case, herb the heck out of some Sholazar and Storm Peaks for the herbs and lotuses to make flasks.
We've worked it out so that our raids are usually after our kids bedtimes (that wasn't hard; they were both with in 30 minutes of going to bed at 8 anyway) and we capitalize on our offtimes, making sure that we spend family time on Saturdays and Sundays when he's not working.
We raid Sun-Wed, and then Ulduar 10 on offnights; in my 10-man group, that's Fri-Sat. Thursday nights are devoted to he and I sitting down away from the computer and having real, undisturbed couple time (and no, I don't actually have to force him to do that. lol).
During the day I have more time when the kids are playing and napping, so I do my farming then, and he and I share a lot of our raiding mats so that both of us can walk away more. We're not rolling in gold, but between the two of us, we have more than enough for everything we need.
TL;DR: I feel ya, bro.
outland-EU horde side here, we pug everything, even Sunwell when it came out.
Last week i joined a pug and we downed general vezax and prolly would have killed yogg if 2 douchebags werent bitching that they were "tired" and wanted to finish it the next day, needless to say no one showed up ofc
What I would do in Bastosa's situation is just work on 10 man for now, I know you probably have the people for 25's but stick with me on this. The fights in Ulduar are simply not simple, this is not Naxx where you can lolfaceroll through the whole raid. If you have cleared and farmed all previous content and not a whole lot of people need the gear, then starting out in 10 man Ulduar would be my choice.
The simple reason why is that learning it and figuring out strategies for 10 people is less stressful than figuring it out, relaying it and executing it with 25. Take your "top raiders" or more importantly, people that will take an encounter and learn from it, adapt, suggest new strategies, point something out that may have been over looked, and most important of all, able to relay that to other people doing the same job in future 10's and 25's. We had started out with this mindset in our guild and yeah there were a few butt hurt people that didn't go on our first romp through Ulduar, but when you get around to farming and progressing through new content they won't be complaining quite so much when they get a shiny new piece of T8.
It may take longer to do things this way but with the blur in content and gear between old 25's new 10's, 10 hard modes, 25 easy modes and then 25 hard modes, I feel the best option is learn in 10's and apply to 25's.
I love to raid (been doing MC/ZG/AQ20/40 on my warrior since pre BC) Got a slow start in TBC but eventually saw Everything cept the T6 Raids on both my rogue and warrior. And now my paladin is in almost full 10 man epics and my rogue is almost all 25 man epics. Sadly, i can never find time to pug a full naxx run (i did once but it went so late i realized i had been up for 26 hours) I know plenty of people who are high up in Ulduar raiding guilds but their raid schedules are far different than mine. With my prot warrior at 79 i want to start raiding alot more than i already am... however it seems almost 2x as hard to find a 10 man Naxx group now than it did to find a 25 man Naxx group 1 month ago.
Raiding is why I play this game. The challenge and excitement is like a drug to me. I still remember my first Thaddius 25 kill, I had wiped on him close to 30 times. After our group downed him I did not stop shaking for the next 5 minutes. I had so much adrenaline pumping through my veins. Good thing we had Saph. next, you can have half a brain and still win that fight.
I agree with the people that have family obligations and responsibilities to handle. I'm married and have my first child on the way. I know changes will be happening for me too. It's tough balancing the gaming part of life with the actual part of life. With WoW being a potentially very communicative game it fulfills a social need within us as well as the totally fun part and to see a boss go down is a major accomplishment like completing a building project around the yard or something (if that's your hobby). I do find it difficult to be able to find a decent raiding group for the reasons that I pretty much play only late @ night with limited time because I also have a job that I need to be coherent for the next day. :) I belong to a really fun guild with a bunch of RL friends, but I miss out a lot on the actual guild runs/progressions because of my RL commitments, I do manage to get into other raids with other late night guilds for which I'm grateful.
I wonder what it would be like to be able to play for the majority of my day or even get paid to do it? Most I've ever played in one stretch has been 11 hours. I was leveling I think at the time.
One very cool about raiding with a good group, the time just flies by.
Just want to give a special shout out and thanks to my guild Anarchy and my late night raiding friends in Mojache Vice, all you guys are great fun to be with!!
Helmarn
Orc Warlock
Anarchy
US-The Venture Co.
Ugh.. raiding is such an issue for me..
I mean, I love it.. I Crave It! But when I got to 72 in my hunter, I just found them so monotonous, I made a DK and levelled it to 80.. I love them!!! But...
No one want's a DK for raids.. there's too many, so the rare occasion I get in one.. and a drop comes.. I come 2nd!! It's just a major pain!
At the moment, I'm levelling my mage as quickly as possible.. coz everyone loves a Range DPS!
Then they will want me!
But DK's just never get into any raids :(
So, i tryed the same thing as you i was in a guild before the patch that could down 3d-os and maly and naxx in two nights but when we hit Ulduar we were raiding 5 nights a week doing 25 man progress and i tryed that and like you said i got burnt out and really i don't know how some people can do it but, now i've gone to casual playing just helping some friends through 10-naxx but i totally agree with you on this subject
Twilight Vanquisher Talmer
Gnome Rogue
Shattered Hand US