Project Lore

It seems like a most appropriate time to reveal to all my first experience with quality guild drama.  You see the guild I've been running with since Warriors of Faith went in to administration mode died over the weekend.  It wasn't until yesterday that I managed to get one side of the story.  According to my informant, the former GM was fed up with the guild, snagged all sorts of materials and gold and gquit.  Your basic ninja scenario. Instead of flocking to some random guild I've decided to split my chances between my characters.  Solidsamm will be joining the guild that a large portion of Smooth Criminal's officers and members have moved to.  Solidsagart has already moved to a guild run by a friend from the "good ole days" of WoW.  She'll reside there for the foreseeable future, gearing up and possibly even raiding with them. Hot on the heels of the collapse of Smooth Criminals, I bring to you a tale of woe, back room deals and intrigue. Since the abandonment of 40-man content I've always felt that guilds have become a far more fleeting endeavor.  The social aspects haven't changed, but the difficulty of finding 40 competent people, and the more challenging raid content in general, lead to guilds and members remaining together longer.  Knowing those facts, you can imagine my old guild's shock and dismay when word came out that a few core members were thinking about forming their own crew.  A rumor of that caliber, which happened to involve three officers and the main tank, crushes moral, to say the least.  An even worse case, it could easily fracture a guild. Not the stuff of legends; a simple exodus of the executives you say?  Here's the kicker, the rumor started during the second All That Remains party.  As it spread like wildfire through the 30 or so people roaming my apartment the situation went completely nuts.  It became an elaborate game of telephone mixed with the too many cooks in the kitchen issue.  Everyone heard different things, tried to interject their opinions and create a plan of attack.  Personal feelings were used as facts, and players with conflicts of interest started writing guild policy.  It was a mess. Oh, the second kicker (would that be the placement kicker?), this all went down while the people in question were in transit to their domiciles from the party.  A party where they spent a weekend hanging out and having fun like everyone else.  Didn't matter, they were unceremoniously kicked before being confronted.  I bet they were surprised when they logged in! In the end the guild lost a few members, but ATR remained as the premiere guild on Matheridon-US.  The members were kicked, their new guild dreams died shortly after, and they joined another guild.  With the help of our ousted members the other guild became the #2 guild on the server, even grabbing server first kills for a good stretch of time. Friendships were tested, the guild hit a wall in raiding as it recovered, but worst of all feelings were hurt.  All because of a stupid rumor's ability to take on a life of its own, and cause once level-headed people to act on impulse instead of logic.  It pains me to even discuss the stupidity at how the whole debacle was handled.  At least everyone lived... What's the craziest bit of guild drama you've ever been tied up in?

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"If you reach 80 before I do, I will pull out my hair." Not the smartest thing to say to your competitive friends. Especially not with witnesses online. But it started off innocently enough. A couple weeks ago, I was enjoying a nice evening of playing WoW and chatting it up over Teamspeak with the RL friends in my small guild. I was commenting on how quickly a couple of my friends have been leveling. The guild leader's alt and one of my friends who is new to WoW had been playing together and already reached level 60, in the same amount of time that it took me to go from 60 to 70. But I'm not the fastest leveler by any means. I like to take my time enjoying the lore and quests, I get distracted in-game pretty easily by non-xp-driven tasks and to top it off, I just don't play quite as much as my buddies. They've been bugging me for a while about my not-so-hasty leveling process. Sure, the comments always are friendly, but I know they really do want me to get to 80 fast ("We want to start on those 10-mans, Pixie, hurry up already!"). So, I started to pick up the pace a bit in Northrend. And by the time I reached level 76 a couple of weeks ago, they were at level 70. Not too bad on my end. So when one of them commented that they would reach level 80 before me, I was feeling a little over-confident. And in a weak moment of expressing my frustration at their seemingly limitless play time, I said it. "If you reach 80 before I do, I will pull out my hair." As soon as they started asking how I would look bald, I knew that they wouldn't back down. Although I hadn't REALLY meant it seriously, it didn't matter. If I take it back, I lose. So I logged off that night determined to make it happen. Then life took over, and I didn't log in for two weeks. Every day that life kept me away from WoW, I dreaded more and more the thought of logging in and realizing that I had lost. Then, last weekend I finally got some free time back again. The first thing I do upon logging in? Pull up the guild window and look at everyone's levels. Turns out, RL kicked in for them, too. Or maybe just summer. Because they're only level 72. /Cheer! Now I have to get busy! Whether they start seriously or not, there's plenty of friendly in-game bets that add another aspect to gameplay. You could make it a race to complete quests under a certain amount of time, or time how long it takes for each of you to reach a certain level, or you could compete to get specific achievements before the other. What are your stories of wagers or competitions you've had in-game? Did you come out on top, or lose?

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No, it isn't the name of the latest Legendary item to appear in Azeroth, although it certainly possess that kind of power.  Summer, with all of its sunshine, growth, and activities, may not be in Azeroth directly, but the season is a force to be reckoned with nonetheless.  With school over for most kids, nearly every human being is going to want to enjoy their few months of sunshine.  Me?  Well I turn in to a freckled lobster when those rays lick my skin, so I do my best to avoid the giant ball of fusion. Here's the rub, my guild isn't full of pale Irish people who's only natural UV defense is to catch a tan through a screen.  Due to this pesky little "evolutionary" trait I have found summer to be an incredibly boring period inside World of Warcraft, at best.  At worst, it's nearly caused my (two times former) guild to collapse, twice, and my former guild to all but disappear from the WoW.  Now I am fearing if my current guild will have a similar fate. Looking back, it seems like previous summers were set up to be a disappointment.  By the time kids left school the most recent content was incredibly stale.  To boot there was nothing on the immediate horizon, a dangerous pairing of inactivity and zero hype.  I would never think that Blizzard would plan such a thing on purpose, after all, letting people escape the game for too long is dangerous, but the early days of WoW were marred with inconsistent content development that caused these unfortunate coincidences. Fast forward to June 2009 and it looks like we might be safe.  First and foremost, Ulduar is still fresh to nearly the entire playerbase - especially Chinese players, a group that hasn't even received Wrath yet!  Backing up, or filling out if you prefer, the new raid content is the excitement around Patch 3.2.  We already know some basics, and major changes, have an inkling of the upcoming Battleground and have been teased with massive additions to the Argent Tournament grounds.  As guilds begin to put Ulduar on farm (I don't see this happening for at least another month) players will increasingly turn to waiting for the next big thing.  But the hype can only hold onto us for so long.  I think Blizzard timed Ulduar correctly, whether by coincidence, or on purpose, who knows, but here's to hoping Ulduar stays fresh for the summer.  If not, then let's hope that Patch v3.2 comes out in a timely fashion. Has your guild been destroyed or nearly so by a past summer?  Do any of the GMs, officers or raid leaders have any tips to keeping things running during these lax months?  The second time All That Remains almost failed we rolled the bored players into PvP groups and tore apart Magtheridon's horde for a solid month.  The mass genocide of five races held us over till the end of the summer.  Twas an interesting way to save a hardcore PvE guild to say the least. We'll see how things play out, but I am looking forward to spending a portion of my lazy summer days in Azeroth.  I just hope there will be others to play with.

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Up until the past couple of months, I always stuck with Horde characters. Sure, I've tried out Alliance here and there, but never found them quite as intriguing. I'm sure the fact that my RL friends I play with are all Horde also plays a role. But now that I've been true to the Horde since the WotLK release, I decided to try out an Ally once again. And the fact that I wanted to roll a character on the Executus server so I could play in the Alliance Project Lore fan guild gave me a good push. I know my way around gameplay pretty well, and I expected a refreshing change of pace when I rolled a draenei hunter. But as I've been leveling with her, I've been surprised by how much it has changed my perception of the game by adding to it. Obviously, Alliance is a new faction, and draenei a new race for me. And therefore, it's a new starting area to learn my way around. Pixie is my first hunter character (but thankfully I have a little guidance on how not to be a huntard). I've tamed my first combat pet, Artemis, and started training fishing and cooking for the first time to support his dietary needs. I picked up a couple of professions I've never leveled before - herbalism and alchemy -  just to keep the excitement going. And the friendly group of players in the guild that I'm new to have done a good job of making me feel welcome. So how has all this affected gameplay? Well, there have been a couple of funny moments. Like the first few times I came back from questing and initially thought it was weird that I was walking into a group of Draenei and not getting attacked. Then, realizing I'm one of them now. Also, the first couple of quests to kill Bloodelf spies or other Hordies tore at my heart a little. My Locomomo started out just like them! And now that I've pointed out differences in how we speak in vent, I owe my guildies some props. I've gotten a lot of help learning my way around the Alliance areas that up until now, I've only ever heard of and never fully experienced. And, I learned how to cluck at a chicken until it laid an egg that I now have for a pet. That confirmed my suspicions that indeed each faction has a few surprises up their sleeves. So all this new stuff makes it almost like I'm playing for the first time again. But at least I know the basics and lingo to help get me through. And it's making clear to me just how wide the world of warcraft can be, if you choose to utilize all it has to offer. One aspect that I'm looking forward to seeing in action will come once I leave the starting area. This is my first time on a PvP server. Have mercy! Has anyone else had a similar experience when starting up a new character?  And how long did it take you to get into the groove and past the feelings of awe that come along with the unknown?

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The Spreading Taint, often referred to as Taint for short, is a well-known GLBT-friendly (gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender) guild on the Proudmoore server.  They have been featured in many publications, both WoW and GLBT related, for their success is many areas. I recently had the privilege of speaking to the guild leader, Kyan, about life in <Taint>. Thanks for talking to us about The Spreading Taint, known more commonly as Taint. Can you introduce yourselves and give us a brief introduction to Taint? I'm Kyan (real name - Jason). I am the guild leader of the Taint family of guilds. Our guild was established on Proudmoore the day that World of Warcraft launched. Taint started as a very small group of friends from the west coast who came together to create an environment to give gay gamers a harassment-free gaming environment and a place that people could come together for social networking. Since then, we have grown from a tiny group of friends to a guild of nearly 3,000 characters, and are currently the second largest guild in World of Warcraft. The Spreading Taint is made up of several guilds. Can you explain the purpose of each of these guilds and why the spreading taint does not use one guild? There are a few reasons why we have split up the guild. First, there is a problem with the guild interface in the game. Once a guild reaches 500 players, newly added players will no longer show up on the guild tab on the social pane. Therefore, you are not able to easily promote, demote, set notes, etc., for any of those new players. Once guild banks were added to the game, we decided to work toward dividing the guilds up according to player level. Each guild bank is designed to provide gear, recipes, crafting materials, and quest items that are appropriate to that level of the game. As we expanded, we added two raiding guilds and a PvP guild. They are able to maintain their own guild banks to store the items needed for their day to day activities. How close are each of the guilds? Are the guilds even considered significantly distinct? We are all one big happy family. All of the guilds are connected in one guild chat via a chat mod that we use, so when you are chatting with other players in game, you could be talking to someone in any of the nine guilds that we currently have. Proudmoore has a reputation for being friendly to GLBT players. Do you feel that Taint has significantly improved Proudmoore's reputation and attracted new GLBT players? I do believe we have. We have many people that transfer to Proudmoore from other servers who hear about how friendly the environment is on this server. Many of the new members we get are transfers from other servers who have heard about us or found our guild through web searches. We also get many first time WoW players that join who were told about our guild by our members. While I would like to think that Taint has played a major role in making Proudmoore a friendly environment to GLBT gamers, I also need to give a nod to all of the other GLBT guilds, both horde and alliance, who make this server a wonderful place to play. How is playing on Proudmoore different from playing on other servers? Do you hear less homophobic comments like "that was gay" after a wipe? I do believe that Proudmoore is more accepting of GLBT players than other servers. I believe that this is a result of our visibility. Just about any time that a pick-up-group gets together for a raid or instance, you are likely to find a Taint member somewhere in the mix. Other players soon realize that we are gamers, just like them, and can play as well, or often better than alot of the other players out there. Why do players choose to join Taint? What benefits are there to being a member of an GLBT friendly guild? To many people, Taint is like a second family. There are always people on, 24x7. The nature of the guild, being what it is, provides an atmosphere where people can chat socially, ask for personal advice, and just feel at home. <Taint Invaders> recently got the server first clear of Ulduar 10 and many other server and horde first boss kills in Ulduar 10 and 25 man. Can you talk a little bit about Taint Invaders? To what level are members of <Taint Invaders> independent of Taint and to what level are they still members of Taint? <Taint Invaders> is our progression-focused raiding guild. We decided to set up a separate guild for the raiding teams to provide their own guild bank space and customized raid ranks. Though we have a different tag above our heads, we are definitely fully integrated with the other Taint guilds. We share the same guild chat, website forums, and run instances and raids with each other. <Taint Invaders> recently got a complaint from a player stating the guild name was offensive and a GM required a name change. You were able to retain the name after a petition. Can you comment on what kinds of harassment Taint receives from players and what Blizzard's relationship with Taint and other GLBT friendly guilds has been like? This is not the first time that we have been confronted with a guild name change. While we generally do not have a problem on Proudmoore, we do occasionally have people that for whatever reason, decide to try and target us with a report of an offensive guild name, and many times, the GM handling their ticket initially sides with them, based on the way they worded their complaint. While this has been frustrating for our guild, we have often managed to get this decision reversed. In this most recent incident, we actually had a very quick and helpful response from Blizzard, and were able to get the name restored, thus, saving our progression rankings on websites that track raid progress and achievements. As far as Blizzard's position on GLBT guilds, I feel that they have taken a neutral position now, which is just fine by me. There was an incident early on with a GLBT guild that was disbanded due to the nature of their membership, and the backlash that Blizzard got was a wake-up call for them. Treating us, and any other GLBT guild out there, with equal respect and consideration as other guilds, is all that we ask, and they have delivered on that. Proudmoore is a PvE server. Can you tell us about <War Taint> (my guild!) and how it came about? <War Taint> is our 9th, and most recent guild. We have quite a few members who enjoy the PvP aspect of the game, and spend a great deal of their time participating in battlegrounds, arena, or world PvP. Following the successful introduction of our two PvE raid guilds, some of the officers and members started seeing the potential benefits of having a more organized structure to the PvP side of the game. Establishing this guild allows us to more easily post in-game calendar invites to upcoming events for those who are interested, as well as the ability to maintain a separate guild bank dedicated to PvP materials. We have seen many dead alliance leaders and war bears as a result! Do you feel that Taint attracts more casual players? Is there a population of hardcore players in Taint? The majority of our nearly 3,000 toons are casual. Most people log on to quest, do dailies, PvP, hang out in guild chat, or do whatever it is that they enjoy doing. Our hardcore raiding members, while extremely successful, actually make up a small percentage of the guild as a whole. What are the demographics of Taint like? Males, females, GLBT, etc? I do not have exact numbers, but I'd guess that about 90% are male, and about 90% are GLBT. Is there an age restriction for guild membership and why? Yes, we have a strict 18+ rule. This is in place because we generally do not monitor or censor guild chat, and therefore, it can get a bit racy at times. As such, it is not an appropriate environment for minors. Can you tell us about Taint RL meetups? We have real-life meet-ups around the country all the time. Most often, they are local meet-ups organized by the members themselves in the major cities, usually held at a bar or nightclub for an evening. Once a year, we put together an annual Taint get-together, where we invite anyone who is willing and able to make the trip to join us. Last year, we rented a famous house in Las Vegas for the weekend. This year, we will be invading New Orleans during Southern Decadence. What is Taint's guild chat like? Is it WoW-oriented or more GLBT-culture oriented? Taint guild chat is "like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're gonna to get." It can go from talking about class/spec theory crafting to someone talking about what they did with someone they met at the club last night. Where can players learn more about joining Taint? Anyone interested in Taint can visit our website at http://taint.rtgc.org to find out more information. Thanks for your time! No problem!

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After a Tuesday full of wiping, I was looking forward to grinding out some reputation and tackling a new Heroic on Wednesday.  The last thing I really wanted for the Heroic Wednesday session was a repeat performance.  I may enjoy the hardships due to the end results, but success is plenty fun too.  It so happened that Gundrak - a rather easy Heroic - was the Daily, so I wasn't worried that the group comprised two newer members.  I am sure you have guessed by now that things didn't go as planned. Slad'ran brought us down without much of a hassle. Looking at the Recount data it was painfully obvious what the problem was.  The DPS-specced Death Knight couldn't perform, with less damage dealt than the tank, who was also new.  The freed DK's collection of green and blue quest gear was the obvious culprit. We could have pulled through the issue - Slad'ran wiped us at ~10% HP the second time -  but at a lousy 800-900 DPS, it hardly seemed like a good idea to struggle.  After all, the later bosses pose a much greater threat, and who wants to spend a few hours in one heroic?  We didn't abandon our new Death Knight friend for some other Heroic ready member, we kept it real.  As a group we decided to move our endeavor to another instance so he could gear up for next week's heroic night.  After all, this is what a guild is supposed to do, help its members.  And yet, the new guy seemed a bit shocked that we would run him through a non-Heroic when they offered the rest of us "nothing." Apoxz noted in a comment the other day that it is incredibly difficult to find a group for a none-Heroic instance.  I completely agree with the statement, but have you guys found it difficult to even get your guildies to help you out with such things?  I won't, without fail, help someone, but if I have the time I am more than happy to lend a helping hand for the betterment of the guild.  Has this bit of comradely disappeared with all the PUGing that is going on?  Or am I jumping to conclusions based on a bit of anecdotal evidence? By the time I had to leave, the former green DK had two new blue items of far superior quality.  Therefore, the time I spent in your basic dungeon was well spent.  Oh, and I guess you could say my acceptance of the move to a non-Heroic wasn't all altruistic.  SolidSamm scored himself a bit of Kirin Tor reputation from his Champion's tabard, and caught his first glimpse inside Ulduar and the Halls of Lightning. When was the last time you lent a helping hand to a guildie that you didn't already have a rapport with?  Wondering how last night's 25-man Naxxramas went?  Two words for ya, much smoother.  One-shotted Grand Widow and Maexxna, some bad pulls on Instructor, but that happens.

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When I said that SolidSamm's guild "canceled raiding for the foreseeable future" I knew it wasn't going to last long.  For starters, the GM has been a big PvEer since EverQuest, and many of the officers and other members have been with him since then.  Two of the members outside of that group are formerly from a hardcore guild - where they met the current GM - who still take the game very seriously, but can no longer dedicate the same amount of time.  Thus, they never lost their itch to dominate content, just the time required to do so.  Lastly, the Heroic Wednesday event that I initiated has been quite a success in its short life, with numerous dungeons being run on the formerly inactive day.  The indications were obvious that the Warriors were ready to head back into Naxxramas, so we gathered up the troops and dominated Kel'Thuzad's stronghold in record time. Actually, that is a lie.  We failed.  Epically.  The Warriors of Faith wiped for hours, downing a single boss - Anub'Rekan - over the course of a night.  Yes, yes, it certainly sounds pathetic but the repair bills are forgiven because we attempted to move up to the big leagues, Heroic Naxxramas.  Hey, even Ghostcrawler said 25-man Naxx is "too easy to pug", we just wanted to test out his statements. Our little guild barely has enough raiding ready level 80s in its entirety to fill a full raid, so we had to flesh out the ranks with non-guilded friends and a handful of random players.  Where does the blame for the collection of graveyard runs go?  On everyone.  We allowed pugged players with terrible gear and little knowledge in the raid, we had our own members with inadequate gear, and we even failed to research the subtle differences in 10-man, 25-man and 40-man encounters.  I ended the night with something along the lines of a 110 gold repair bill. Am I upset, annoyed or angry at our failures?  Not at all, we tried something a bit different and difficulties are to be expected.  Heck, there is actually an upside to what didn't go down.  A few of the PUGs joined the guild and have already begun to gear their toons at last night's Heroic Wednesday run.  How those went?  Well, that is a story for another day.  I just hope that our morale stays high and these new members stick around for the long run.  After all, if tonight's second attempt at Heroic Naxxramas doesn't go a bit better, members may just disappear until Ulduar.  But I don't believe our core members expect instant gratification or to be carried through. As masochistic as this may sound, I absolutely love these times in a guild.  Despite the numerous setbacks we are sure to face, they help weed out the weak players or those who are just in it for the good times (read free loot).  They push players to the edge, getting them to eek out every bit of DPS, mana or threat-per-second their class can muster.  They breed competition, creativity, interesting discussions and strategies.  From these difficult times comes good, long-lasting members and friends.  And when there's finally that taste of success, it becomes that much sweeter.  It's the digital equivalent of being in the trenches - just without the trench foot, machine guns, mustard gas, shell shock and death.  See, just like it.

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Project Lore serves as a ground for people to learn, live and love everything Warcraft but recently myself and the guild I reside in have come to a crossroad. When is content under "farm" status and what does that mean for your guild? As of late, the guild I am in has swelled to the biggest it has been for a long time and it's given us some great opportunities. We can have more than one Naxx 25 man run, which is a great thing for us. We've seen people who we didn't know anything turn into great raiders who could be counted upon. We've been able to get people into raids they would never see otherwise. Those are all things that, as a guild, you hope for. We get to help the casual raider really get to feel like they're getting their moneys worth out of a game, and makes everyone much more of a happy group. This brings unity, but will inevitably hit a difficult wall and will be jarring for people who aren't used to the wiping that Burning Crusade used to bring. What happens on the flipside? People have become dramatic, myself included, with the future of what will happen under new content. Four rogues, under current circumstances, have no place in a raid. We'll probably be able to bring two at most because of how much other top heavy survivable DPS classes are useful to a raid. Ret paladins bring kings, shamans bring totems, warriors bring battle shout to any respectable raid. Do you, can you cut the people who are your friends to see the betterment of your guild? Will people who think they are working hard realize that they just aren't as good as some who put in less effort? Furthermore, what does Farm status mean for your guild? Does it absolve a normal loot system, does it change the award system? How does your guild clearly define what furthers your guild in the content being as easy as it is at the moment? I'm having the problem deciding when something is on farm so clearly, does it change the loot system or who attends raids? How does one draw the line? In what is classified as a casual guild, can you be the person who cuts those who can't carry their own weight but are the life of the raid? I'm hoping you fans can come through in the comments and really bring clear how some guilds do it, because honestly I've never been in a content cleared situation such as this.

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It's always best to know where you're going before you get there. It's true in life and it's true in WoW. There may never be everything you want in a game such as WoW, like better spells or dual-wielding mages, but there are a few things you can do in game and what ever those things may be, you have to have it as a goal to go fo it. For example, when you started playing WoW, it was probably all about leveling. This included quest, killing innocent pigs or wolves or bats, and hearing that now addictive level ding. Next it was probably get to level ten so you can get talent points. Put a few here, some more there as you level and then whoop arse. Next it was probably to get to level 30 (or 40 for all the 'old school players - Heeeyyy) so you could get a wonderful new mount to run around on. Then at 60, the epic mount. Then at 70, the flying mount and epic flying mount. Then 80, then instances, then badge loot, then raids, then.... So there's a lot of little goals along the way that really help you get to your next goal or one of your bigger goals. For me, my most recent goal was getting a new title, that of Twilight Vanquisher. Yes there have been a few things that got in my way - RL work, people drama, and one big guild drama that resulted in me /gquitting on principle. Too bad a few loud dishonorable people screwed it up for everyone. Then there was the drama of getting a new guild - applying, asking around, looking up guilds on websites looking for any clues that a top guilds on my server that needed FFB mages. And when I got into a guild, I had to prove my worth again by raiding and kicking butt again on the DPS charts, learning how the new-to-me main tank was holding aggro and making sure I was helping the new guild as best as I could. Then I had to get invited to the OS3 raid and then, after flasks and flasks and enough fish feasts to fill up Sholazar basin, we downed those drakes and got a nice little bag for me to boot. So that goal took focus and planning and determination. It took the right bunch of people and their focus after so many wipes, bad waves and random flame strikes. And - I knew what I wanted and I got it. In RL it's just the same. You need focus and planning and determination to accomplish your goals, whatever they may be. If you want to learn to play the piano, then focus, plan, persevere. If you want to ride a bike, same. If you want anything at all, you have to do the same. So what have been your goals in game and in RL that you set forth and accomplished? How did you do it? And what did you do when you thought you couldn't but still wanted it anyway? Because whatever that may be, those same skills that you used to get it will help you get anything you want in WoW or RL.

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Have you ever been in a group or pug that you thought was going in one direction and went the complete opposite? I mean, you thought you were going to do The Violet Hold so you could finally get the chance to complete Lockdown to get one step closer to your new Red Proto-Drake, but 10 minutes into summoning they decide that Utgarde Keep is easier to do for badges because the tank isn't defense capped just yet. This sort of indecision, lack of focus and disregard to certain members almost guarantees that I will leave the group immediately and go do dailies. And I have found out that doing just that is perfectly fine no matter what anyone one spams at you in chat. Let's face it, in WoW there are a few people, regardless of actual age, that are... well.. how should I say this... big cry babies who piss and moan when they do not get their way. That's fine by me. They can go their own way and I can go mine. I truly do not care if someone spams me that I am a traitor for leaving a pug or that I was now put on some list by them because I didn't finish a Heroic when everyone in that pug knew the tank couldn't hold aggro in a two-ton bucket. That is what /ignore is for. And the same thing goes for some guilds I have been in. Years ago, I was in a guild that felt that every member had to help every other member, not on a voluntary basis or when available, but right now, no matter what it was that had to be done by whichever member. Around the same time, I saw a guild advertising on their web site that in order to move up the ranks, you had to drop whatever your were doing at a moments notice while soloing to come the the aid of a guildie even if it was just the GM's lowbie alt that couldn't down Hogger. Now for some that is fine, and if that's you or someone you know or even if that's your guild now, great. You go your way I'll go mine. I have no animosity toward you not should you have any against me. It's just what you do or want me to do is not something I want to do or a way that I want to play. Everyone has a right to play the game how that want in the way they want at whatever time or frequency that they want. As for me, I will go my own way, and as far as being in a guild, if that includes hanging out with mature respectful people taking down end-game content on a daily basis, I'm in. And as you probably guessed, in RL you can go your own way too. If you want to be a florist, flautist, or philanthropist, be me guest. Better yet, be your own guest. It is your life - don't make a pug out of it. Go your own way and find people who are cool and hang with them. And always, /ignore those QQ peeps who want to pee on your parade. What do they know? So if you've ever gone your own way and it worked out better than you ever imagined, let us know. Your story can help others, and maybe you'll help give someone the confidence to go their own way. Thanks and have fun.

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