Guild Rules Update

[Poisonenvy]

It has come to my attention that a "rule" that we had been applying, which we assumed was obvious and not actually worth having down in words, with respect to those who are eligible to raid with us, is not actually stated anywhere and we've had a few discussions over the last few months with guild members who weren't aware/weren't happy when "alts" from guild members who also had raiding characters with other guilds, joined our raids.

To be clear .. ANY Dark Wolves guild member - any character of any rank - is eligible and welcome to sign up for ANY events in the calendar, as long as they fulfil the requirements.

This includes those who have no characters anywhere else at all - they're all with us .. right down to members who may only have one character with us and they raid with all of their others in multiple other guilds.  This also includes those who switched which character they preferred to play and those who have switched guilds with one or more characters (raiders or not .. joining or leaving).

To clarify this further ... ANY character that has joined an event or raid with the guild, regardless of whether it is an alt or a "main", whether or not the "owner" of the character has other raiding characters with other guilds, has the same rights to join guild raids, and for loot as any other character in the guild.  Every character reflects a person sat in front of their computer, making an effort to join with us in a group event - irrespective of what perceived status that character they're playing on may have within the guild - it is still one person contributing to the raid.  Of course we do personal loot anyway .. so this should not cause any problems .. but I know that it has in the past as people start perceiving loot that someone has kindly donated to the raid as somehow more "their" loot than someone elses, due to rank, character status or whether or not others have characters with other guilds.

I've also heard the occasional story about people being made to feel uncomfortable or not welcome in our guild raids, or even guild, due to the above.  Please do not.  Please be aware of our guild rules, our main and primarily one being "be nice" and apply them equally.  If you don't understand a guild rule, please ask.  If you don't agree with a guild rule, feel free to discuss it with us - occasionally there is a potential to change or tweak a rule if it has become outdated or obsolete, but sometimes there is a good reason for the rule being there, at which point we can explain that to you.

I have therefore amended this paragraph in the guild rules (text in bold is the addition):

The basics are that we regularly organise current level raiding for guild members.  There is no restriction on who can attend based on rank or past experience, although there will usually be a restricton based on gear level and potential output.  This will vary depending on the particular event requirements.  We have no restrictions about raiding with alts.  As long as the character is in our guild and fulfils requirements, it is eligible to sign up for raids.  This includes alts, mains and characters belonging to people who also have other characters (raiders or otherwise) in other guilds, irrespective of rank.

If you understand the guild rules but don't agree with them, and have discussed that with us and the outcome is not to your liking .. then I'm sure there are other guilds out there that have rules you're happier with.

If you wish to discuss this, please feel free to reply below or contact me direct.

 

[Poisonenvy]

To play Devils Advocate for a moment .. if we DID apply a rule that stated you were not allowed to raid with us if you raided elsewhere - how would you even police that?  You'd basically have to trust that when someone said they didn't raid elsewhere, that was true, or you'd have spend huge amounts of time trying to track down other characters of guild members.  Inevitably it would lead to people lying in order to raid with us, and drama if/when they were found out.  It would also lead to bad feeling as those who had been honest were banned from raiding with us.

It would encourage those who wanted to try more hardcore raiding, to leave with all of their raiders, as why keep them here if they're not allowed to raid with their guild mates?

And where do you end .. is raiding with another character in another guild not allowed, but raiding with a character from our guild, with another guild, allowed?  How about raiding with a character, in guild or not, with pug groups, or pug groups made up primarly of one guild?  What happens if you took a raiding character out in order to help a friends guild raid - is that allowed?  Would there have to be some sort of scale - if you're doing harder raids with another guild you can't raid with us, but if you're doing easier raids with another guild you can?

Basically it would be really nice if, when something like this crops up, people consider the alternatives.  It's easy to say "I object to it happening this way" .. but a lot harder to say "this way would be better ...".  It would also be nice for people to remember that the rules apply to everyone - you can't say "I object to X member doing that" but "oh I don't mind Y member doing it".

[Laroniaa]

How do we feel about people signing with alts for current Antorus raids? I have no issue with people signing with alts if they can 'carry their weight' so to say, but I'm not going to be happy if I put in a lot of effort and someone signs as a 915 char (technically having required item level) when they have a much stronger character available. Very much more so when it hampers our progress.

[Daenarian]

I think any character which carries their weight should be allowed in our raids. Main or alt doesn't matter als long as you don't expect to be carried around by your teammates. For me it doesn't matter at all if people raid with pugs or other guilds, if raid times are not convenient or, like me, you work irregular shifts, you might need to find a pug every now and then. 

Most important for me is that when you sign, you are prepared and doing your best. Only bring an alt who is not as good as your main when we've started clearing bosses more easily. That way we can keep a steady progress going for a while. 

If we would have to forbid people to raid with other guilds or pugs... I'm out first. XD I have already joined another guild's run once and pug sometimes. I also think we'd need to get more raids going so that everyone can join in once a week at least and you might have to make two sets of raids, one for serious progression tries and one for casual/alts (who are not as good as mains). How you'd go about checking if people are only raiding with us... no clue. 

But we are not that kind of guild imo. I love raiding, but if we are going to need rules like that, the casual part will quickly dissappear and that would be a shame. 

I think the rules and feeling we have going now, is actually a very good combo. Be prepared, be serious with your character while raiding and have fun on teamspeak while we are at it :)

 

[Daenarian]

Love how we just basically said the same thing about alts XD

hadn't read you reply before I posted mine

[Laroniaa]

Lol indeed, well I guess that makes us a good couple! (Everybody get your buckets out.. :p)

As for people raiding in other guilds/pugs, I don't really care to be honest. There was some issue with people 'gearing up in our raids and then moving alts over' but to be honest there's PUGs clearing stuff quicker and better than we do, no offense to anyone of course, but raiding with us purely for gear is not a good investment. Besides, if you get loot it's yours to take, you also put in effort and thus are entitled to the loot.

[Poisonenvy]

I'm not aware of anyone ever (at least over the last few years) "gearing alts to move to another guild" - and as you said, that would certainly not be a good way to spend that time.  In the vast majority of cases, if people have a character in another guild for more serious raiding ... that guild will also have alt/gearing runs which no doubt would be a quicker and more efficient way of gearing up.

Having said that .. if someone wants to do that .. I'm not going to object.  As mentioned REGULARLY - we do personal loot.  Every piece of loot that drops for someone is theirs.  No-one elses.  If someone is kind enough to donate some loot, then everyone that attends the raid should have the same chance to roll for that DONATED loot.  If this becomes an issue, it is easily solved by simply no longer allowing donations of loot. 

As far as alts running in raids .. again you have to look at both sides.  We are a casual raiding guild.  We have no set team.  One raid we may have 8+ main healers sign up, the next only 3.  The best way to deal with that, for us, is to ensure we have enough flexibility to plug the gaps and allow as many as possible to raid.  Which means some people may need/want to level up alts in a different role.  Having said that .. I'd not be particularly impressed if someone wanted to bring an alt on a progression run, when they have a better character for the same role (obviously there may be some exceptions .. say if someone had two tanks and one of them was better gear, but the other had an ability that was useful for a fight).  We don't have a rule against it .. and quite frankly if I'm going to have to make a rule for everything that seems common sense, I'd never stop adding to the rules.  Then even fewer would read them :p

The only time we have ever said to anyone that they shouldn't raid with us, despite them meeting the ilevel requirements, is if we find we're struggling on a boss purely on output/ability (dps, hps, being dead A LOT (especially from the start), having problems with mitigation, etc).

I see no problem whatsoever with someone coming along to raid with us if they fulfil the minimum requirements, they are prepared, they do their best and show a willingness to learn, even if their output it low.  As we've explained previously, different people take different lengths of time to learn fights.  People tend to underperform until they "get" the fight and it's tactics.  Sometimes someone's performance can seem under-par because they've been given a specific role that involves them being unable to carry out their normal abilities. Sometimes someone's performance can seem under par because they "get" that standing in fire, even if your healers are awesome and keep you healed, is not really what you should be doing, just to keep your output up.

I'd much rather someone did fairly low dps and stayed alived and took as little damage as possible, rather than topped the meters but meant the healers were out of mana after a few minutes and then died.

Another one of our requirements is honesty .. especially with oneself.  People should be able to assess for themselves what is, and is not, appropriate for a particular event.  We shouldn't have to play "mom" and tell people what to do.  Equally, if someone is underforming and it is affecting our ability to progress, then they should be able to self assess that .. work out if it's something they can deal with there and then, or if they need to leave and come back another time.

I would like to point out, however, that all of this has been discussed previously .. as far as I'm aware everyone understands it and those who don't agree with it have moved on.

My point of the original post was to make it clear that we have no rule against any members who are in the guild signing up for events (any events) assuming they fulfil the event requirements.  It doesn't matter what rank they are, how many alts they have, whether they have characters in other guilds or don't raid exclusively (or even regularly) with us.  We have no intention of making it a rule.  Yes .. some raids we'd expect more well geared characters to be selected over the lower geared characters .. but that wasn't the point I was trying to make.  Those people who have a choice of which character to take wasn't the issue.  The issue was that we've had some people object to guild members who have characters in other guilds, who may well raid with other guilds, also raiding with us.  On ANY guild character.  Which is unfair and not in line with our guild ethos.

Apologies that I didn't convey the message clearly.

[YefoAkira(Kubrat)]

Kubrat is my strongest character (although not longer on the top bracket of iLevel as I am not playing that much) but don't want to dps with him. I dislike the Fury rotation,  and can barely stand Arms (the rotation with FR was atrocious). I was lucky that just when I was ready to not go to raids if I was dpsing is when just Shezbeth and I remained as tanks. After trying different things, "Elementary, Dear Asmundr" is the one dps is that interesting enough (enhancement is good for soloing, but I nearly hang myself the other day in the raid). Effort will be put to try to get both of them at higher iLevel.

We have had before people barely doing dps about the tank (me included). And I have never minded enough. I love how the guild does raids and the current set of rules. Go Wolves!!!

[Laroniaa]

Poisonenvy wrote:

 

My point of the original post was to make it clear that we have no rule against any members who are in the guild signing up for events (any events) assuming they fulfil the event requirements.  It doesn't matter what rank they are, how many alts they have, whether they have characters in other guilds or don't raid exclusively (or even regularly) with us.  We have no intention of making it a rule.  Yes .. some raids we'd expect more well geared characters to be selected over the lower geared characters .. but that wasn't the point I was trying to make.  Those people who have a choice of which character to take wasn't the issue.  The issue was that we've had some people object to guild members who have characters in other guilds, who may well raid with other guilds, also raiding with us.  On ANY guild character.  Which is unfair and not in line with our guild ethos.

Apologies that I didn't convey the message clearly.

 I only raised the topic since technically you can take your worst geared character even if you have better characters as long as they have the requirement. If your best char is barely scraping the requirements then it's fair game we take that char, the raider in me will cry a bit but hey nothing against the guild rules and I will fully accept that. But special circumstances aside, it's good to know that for progression raiding people are more or less encouraged to be on their mains! I guess that comes naturally for most of us, but since there were instances with alts signed for tonights raid for example I wanted to get some info about where we stand with that :).

[PhuzaZA]

hahahaha, my alt does more dps then my main :P

and yeah, i agree with most. I just don't see the rush to be honest. I mean, people were asking when we're starting heroic, we have about a year on this raid, burn out is real. We will have plenty of runs for mains, alts, alt alts. To be honest, if i could slow our progress down, i would, 6 bosses on the first night.. I know we're overgeared, but come on :p

That's also why i'm not to fussed about the at minimum ilvl people signing, as a raid group, we're overgeared. and mechanics don't seem to hurt as much as per our 6 boss cake walk.

 

 

[Poisonenvy]

From what I recall, @Laronia, alts were signed up due to role restrictions.  Some would prefer to heal, but there were no healer spots available.  One would have preferred to tank, but we already had tanks signed up and accepted.  If there's someone coming on their role, and they have another character that would be better suited to that role, then in an ideal world, they shouldn't be.  But until we get to the point where we can point to that as a reason why we can't kill a boss ..  it should make no difference.  We always adhere to the policy that, unless there's a good reason not to, we'd encourage people to play in the role and with the character/class they prefer.  People play better, and for longer, if they're enjoying it.  If they fall out of love with a particular class then it's fine by me to bring a different class, as long as it fulfils the requirements of the raid.  We're not going to go down the road of making people pick a "main" and stick with it for the duration of a raid tier.  That, again, is hardcore raiding guild territory, which we are not.

Still off topic though, which wasn't relating to *which* characters you should be allowed to take, but if certain people were allowed to take *any* ;-)

 

*Edit - in fact I've just been and checked, and other than Powerhealing who accidentally signed on his level 75 warlock (pretty sure he's not coming with that character!) ... I can't actually see anyone else taking "alts" in the way you mean it, I assume - ie, characters in that role that aren't as good as other characters they could take in that role?  Could you let me know which ones they are, then I'd have a better idea what we're talking about.

[Liengfield]

I dont have any issue with people raiding with us and doing their part. any... 
I am starting to have a problem with people that still show up unenchanted or ungemmed or without flasks (aint talking about food since the guild provide all the feasts we can eat but even when we were short we had lots of people that didn't even have a freaking 300 food on them) etc.
PVE is easy as hell nowdays and the guild compared to wod (the time I joined) is 10x much better on it now, but it still needs those minor tasks to be done... enchant and gem your gear and bring consumables... so to the other guildmates that you put the minimal effort to raid with them. 

on the subject of alts raiding on progress raids I think depends on the alts...
For example I cant categorize cringer as an alt since he has raided more times than niknax in legion :P
but I get what laronia says and kinda agree. If its progress raiding bring your best char onboard... 

Lieng out.

p.s. Jordan Ftw :) 

[Poisonenvy]

Liengfield wrote:

p.s. Jordan Ftw :) 

 Jordan is a case in point, and actually on-topic.  Not that anyone has complained about him .. quite the contrary.  Because he raids elsewhere at a higher level, he brings us back all the juicy tactics and helps out when he can.  Which completely proves why people in our guild who have raiding characters elsewhere should be viewed as a benefit, not a detriment.

However, when I was receiving the complaints about this subject (ie, members with characters in raiding guilds also raiding with us), he (and others like him) had not even been considered.  It was like there should be a specific rule only for certain specific people (like, for example, Avardus - although he's not the only one being referred to), and others "didn't count".

And it cropped up again with relation to another member, so I did think it was about time to clarify that point in the rules.

Off-topic .. I do agree (and bang on about it *constantly* that raid members should be fully enchanted, gemmed blah blah blah because I'm really preaching to the choir because we all know it and the majority of us do it).  The two main reasons people aren't fully enchanted, gemmed, etc are (1) they forgot - they're normally well organised but they got sidetracked or got new gear and forgot about it; or (2) they're fairly new to raiding with us and obviously have not yet been "reminded" enough yet :p

[YefoAkira(Kubrat)]

Jordan FTW and the safe spot on Fallen Avatar ;-)

[Poisonenvy]

haha indeed!  That and the four corners method on Harjatan :p