Many commenters did not understand why I pay for a raid spot, while I could simply apply to a raid guild.There is much truth in the "I raid by my terms" part. I can make 5K G faster than I could attend to 3 raids/week. Every topguild have attendance policy and my schedule does not allow that. After all repetitive raiding is not fun for me, it's work. I'd rather work the AH.
But the main point is the road to the guild. Good guilds afraid of one thing: M&S invading them, leeching on gear, but above all: demotivate the members. When one applies to a guild, he has to prove that he is not an M&S. Initiation periods could solve the problem, but if many applies, dozens of people would need spots for at least one raid, and only 1-2 would be accepted. The other 9-10 would be not only boosted, but forcing 9-10 guildmembers to sit out and the others to suck because of them.
So guilds have some screening method. An application form can filter out complete retards:
Why do you want to join our guild? Cos u raid good so I can get epixx :DDD
Why should we take you? Cos I'm imba :DDDDDDDDD I can pwn anyone in duel! :DDDD
But not complete morons are capable to form sentences, or at least copy-and-paste and also capable to behave themselves for a single initiation raid.
So some kind of previous performance information is needed. The guilds cannot really ask old guildmates as the applicant left them, so they hate him.
All they can work from is gear and achievements. If you were capable to get gear, complete Sarth+3, you are good to go for Ulduar (or at least well deserve a chance).
But how can you get achievement or gear without a good guild? You can get starter gear alone, but later you need a raid group. Since all good raid groups need gear or achievement to prove that you are not M&S, you can only join a "ferindly social guld" where damaging below the tank is common. Of course you can reach some goals there. I managed to PuG whole Naxx, but it was long and painful.
As soon as you have enough gear/achievements to apply to the next phase you do it. But the next guild is still friendly social, just with less M&S. So instead of sucking on arachnid quarter, you can suck on Kel'Thuzad. And you boost and suck, and farm lot of 5-mans for badge gear and money for crafted gear.
Then you can apply to a 10-man Ulduar trying guild what will take you. And you can suck with them on XT.
With the Naxx25 gear and Ulduar 10 achievements you have a shot with an Ulduar25 doing guild.
That's what I've bypassed by paying. Actually I see no other way to bypass it. You are just one out of the 100 who wants to join a topguild, so you have to prove yourself to them. On the other hand if you pay them, they can try you out risk-free:
So if you have gold do the following: apply to the targeted topguild and write: "I pay 2000G for a chance. Take me to one raid, if you like me, invite me, if you don't, you take the money as compensation." This is a win-win: they are insured against the risk of another night wasted because of some moron, you get your chance. And even if you are not taken, you get some raiding experience + achievements.
Important note: Some people are claiming that M&S hordes are only in PuG-s. However all of them have some guild tag. Just because your guild is capable of raiding, it does not mean that most guilds are any different than those terrible PuGs. We are talking about the very same people here.
OK then, I explained why did I pay for a chance. But after I proved myself, why do I keep on paying (assuming they are satisfied by my performance and not just say it)?
Because I can do nothing else with my money.
I don't want to buy useless mounts or other vanity. So what can I do after the gold cap? And what can someone do if he has lot of money IRL? I think the answer is not wasting on vanity or giving it to the poor (I'd rather burn it), but supporting great achivements, help the progress of the mankind. If I'd be an IRL billioner, I'd donate space agencies, research facilities, education and so on. I'm not billioner - yet. In WoW I am, so I support a well progressing raiding guild.
All they can work from is gear and achievements. If you were capable to get gear, complete Sarth+3, you are good to go for Ulduar (or at least well deserve a chance).
But how can you get achievement or gear without a good guild? You can get starter gear alone, but later you need a raid group. Since all good raid groups need gear or achievement to prove that you are not M&S, you can only join a "ferindly social guld" where damaging below the tank is common. Of course you can reach some goals there. I managed to PuG whole Naxx, but it was long and painful.
As soon as you have enough gear/achievements to apply to the next phase you do it. But the next guild is still friendly social, just with less M&S. So instead of sucking on arachnid quarter, you can suck on Kel'Thuzad. And you boost and suck, and farm lot of 5-mans for badge gear and money for crafted gear.
Then you can apply to a 10-man Ulduar trying guild what will take you. And you can suck with them on XT.
With the Naxx25 gear and Ulduar 10 achievements you have a shot with an Ulduar25 doing guild.
That's what I've bypassed by paying. Actually I see no other way to bypass it. You are just one out of the 100 who wants to join a topguild, so you have to prove yourself to them. On the other hand if you pay them, they can try you out risk-free:
- If you are good, they got a new member
- If you are useless, their suffering because of you is overcompensated by your payment.
So if you have gold do the following: apply to the targeted topguild and write: "I pay 2000G for a chance. Take me to one raid, if you like me, invite me, if you don't, you take the money as compensation." This is a win-win: they are insured against the risk of another night wasted because of some moron, you get your chance. And even if you are not taken, you get some raiding experience + achievements.
Important note: Some people are claiming that M&S hordes are only in PuG-s. However all of them have some guild tag. Just because your guild is capable of raiding, it does not mean that most guilds are any different than those terrible PuGs. We are talking about the very same people here.
OK then, I explained why did I pay for a chance. But after I proved myself, why do I keep on paying (assuming they are satisfied by my performance and not just say it)?
Because I can do nothing else with my money.
I don't want to buy useless mounts or other vanity. So what can I do after the gold cap? And what can someone do if he has lot of money IRL? I think the answer is not wasting on vanity or giving it to the poor (I'd rather burn it), but supporting great achivements, help the progress of the mankind. If I'd be an IRL billioner, I'd donate space agencies, research facilities, education and so on. I'm not billioner - yet. In WoW I am, so I support a well progressing raiding guild.
17 comments:
You are wrong about the need for good gear to get into a good guild.
If you have a well-written application, have the correct spec, and gem and enchant correctly, 9 times out of 10 you're worth giving a trial to.
Gearing people up is easy. Very few guilds will turn you down on gear alone, and those guilds that do generally have the luxury of tons of applications.
But for some reason, getting people with the above qualifications seems to be a lot harder than it should be.
@Rohan
That really depends on where you are on the progression line for the current expansion. If someone would apply for us in the end of TBC when it was Sunwell progessing while having t4 we would deny the applicant, no matter if the specc was great, gemming was perfect, fully enchanted etc.
In the beginning of an expansion there still isnt a huge difference in gear levels and as you say, it goes fast to gear up the first gear level. The difference of having a char in full naxx25 BiS gear and a char with full Ulduar25 BiS gear is around a 5-8% stat increase. That might not sound that much, but it really makes a difference.
We then comes to the arguement that gear does not matter, only skill. While this is true (we cleared BWL in a blue geared raid with 5 Onyxia cloaks) there is also the fact that you might not want to make it harder than you have to? If you have an applicant thats fully heroic geared and one thats BiS naxx25 and some Ulduar 25 there is a fairly good chance they both have the perfect gemming, enchanting, professions etc.
@Gevlon
Professions is also great to look at now a days since there are some professions you should have for raiding and gathering professions are not one of them. Those with gathering professions mostly answers "But how should I then pay for my repairs" if you ask them why they have a gathering profession. This is the guy who will later say in /r "LOLOL UPS Im outa cash, can I burrow 50g???"
What most guilds with a high ratio of M&S does wrong is that they recruit on "Friend" basis rather than skilled basis. "But this guy is so friendly so we can probably teach him how to do everything properly".
While you might be able to, you just pulled down your guild a pinhole or 2 to become a guild that teaches players the game and then sends them to the next and better guild when they are geared up.
/Astmathic of WW
Funnily enough, we did recruit T4 geared people for Black Temple (hunter, druid) and used a T4 geared alt shaman for Sunwell. Granted, those were special cases, because we really didn't have any applicants with better gear and equal skills. The gear issue was resolved quickly, though. The rest of the guild already had most of the drops they wanted, so the new applicants got most of the drops and proved to be well worthy of the investment.
What does M&S mean?
Instead of paying them 5k a week I think you should become their banker and just support them entirely. This way you're more of a teammate and less of a customer.
Just my two copper lol :)
Also, JMTC forums are back up, though the 1000+ posts were lost :(
http://20kleveling.com/JMTCforum/index.php
2000 gold isn't alot of money. I'm not a great goblin, so I still farm herbs, minerals, and food from fish pools. I can make 1k gold a day in about 3 hours. Its not much compared to some of the people on this site, but if I can do that, then I'm sure M&S can make 2k gold easily too. My point is that if someone wanted to pay for a raid spot, I would assume 10k gold minimum. maybe even 15k. After gold flows more freely in Woltk
*I pay 2000G for a chance. This is a win-win: they are insured against the risk of another night wasted because of some moron, you get your chance.*
Because getting 80g a person is worth having a wasted night. Not really. I could spend those three hours making a few thousand gold.
@Rohan
You do need good gear. If you apply for an Ulduar level guild, you have to be in Naxx 25 gear. They can't be arsed to gear you up in Naxx gear. It would take too long before you can be useful. You're a burden on your guild as long as you do not have that gear.
Although the removed key requirements sure helps. You no longer have to drag your new recruits through two previous instances just to get them keyed. No wonder guilds only wanted keyed members.
In the end it all comes to the number people a top guild can choose from. If you are wearing blues and they can get a good member wearing epics, they'd be foolish not to take the second one. He's more experienced too since he did the last instances. If you don't have a lot of choice (shamans in TBC as has been mentioned) then yes, you can lower your expectations of new members.
"giving it to the poor (I'd rather burn it)"
Classic :)
@Markco: This 5000G/week is a fix thing, that we agreed on. Everyone knows what to expect.
@Carra: I meant 2000G on the top of a proper application, as good gear as his position let him, properly enchanted, gemmed and so on.
I think this was the right thing to do Gev. In my book, anything that re-kindles interest in WoW, at a time when many guilds are folding and content is being 'farmed' 1 week after it opens is a good thing.
can anyone tell me what MnS means? I'm really confused
Morons and Slackers - its on Gevlon's first page.
I understand what you paid for. You want to play the best with the best, and can't do that casually.
I like my casual guild that raids. This also gives me the opportunity to raid less frequently if I want, though I usually heal both of our weekly raids.
This also gives me the opportunity to not play with "M&S". Contrary to the impression one might get from some of your posts, a family guild can be people who know the fights, come prepared, often former hardcore raiders who want to play more casually now.
What I don't have the opportunity to do is see all of Ulduar soon. But I can have a group that plays well in Naxx-10 and is slowly starting Ulduar-10, 2 bosses down. For me, it doesn't matter which raid instance it is - it's the same game, and we will get through Ulduar. To me, if it's tanks holding threat, healers keeping people alive, dps pulling their weight, everyone ready with consumables and strategies, and staying out of the fire - I have that for free in a casual social guild.
But if you want hardcore without all that time raiding, sounds like you got a good deal.
"I think the answer is not wasting on vanity or giving it to the poor (I'd rather burn it)"
as would I. Always an interesting read here, comrade.
Two weeks ago, my priest was part of a naxx-run. He was the only random player, the rest was of one guild and the other healer had the Sarth3D Title (10men Version). After two hours I left when we finally finished the spider quarter and idled for 20 minutes because we had to replace one DPS.
The last week I tried again with a PUG from different guilds and two friends. We burned the place in little over two hours with two wipes (I accounted for one wipe because I had to go afk just before Loatheb when my son woke up).
There are too much M&S with a guild tag and an impressive title. If you are good, you know the few good men by name. If you don't know them, well then you are not worthy enough ;)
Good points, the best being :
"I think the answer is not wasting on vanity or giving it to the poor (I'd rather burn it)"
Nice post as always.
This is a post that kind of struck home.
I just got back in the game. I want to raid at a hardcore level, like I was in BC. So I'm struck with a dilemma - how to gear up to their standards?
I decided to endure the PuG ghetto until I'm kitted out in full or near to full Naxx25 epics. If I were in a guild, discovered it to be full of M&S, and decided to leave, that's one thing. Purposely joining a guild so I can take their loot and then tell them to eat my dust is another thing. Knowingly setting yourself up to stab people in the back is not the goblin way.
Or, at least, it's not my way.
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