I have been a big fan of these forums, I always find a ton of helpful information and guidance, and I am hoping that perhaps I can find some sage advice regarding a few problems my guild has been having. I am the healer leader in a semi-serious guild. I give out every assignment of every raid, down to the last HoT that will be cast on the lowliest dps. I post strats, work with healers that are struggling to keep up with the pack, and have built a very strong and talented core of healers for my guild.

My issues are many, but I really just need advice on a few. I was chosen as the recipient of the Val'anyr. I dutifully raided and collected the fragments (many weeks being completely emptyhanded). I helped with strats for the bosses, and I stayed positive in the face of wipes. We finally downed Yogg in October. Yes, October. I'm proud we did it, but a lot of the issues of the late downing date was that the officers put it off, and would call raids early after 1 or 2 goes at Yogg.
Immediately after we downed Yogg, the officers decided that we needed to work on Yogg with three keepers so we could be done with Ulduar for good. However, this was not the case. We went into ulduar fresh off our first Yogg kill and it was decided that we would work on the hardmodes we had not completed and just keep extending Ulduar. Sure enough, attendance for those raids dropped off and we had a few nights we couldn't even clear regular mode Ulduar bosses. When we finally cleared to Yogg, we tried three keepers 2 times before calling it because tempers of the officers were flaring and they were clearly not interested in leading the raid. A month later as an afterthought we went back in and spent 2 hours on the fight, with Mimiron down (I recommended Hodir as the keeper left out), and the tentacles just absolutely decimated us.

Fast forward to now. I am still maceless. I don't want to have to pay another guild to run me through, I know my guild can do the fight, and frankly at this point with ICC out, the cost has doubled for a Yogg run with 3 keepers. I guess my frustration is just coming to a head. I have tried putting together the 25 strongest players to knock out Ulduar and get it done, but the resistance of the officers can be a hard obstacle to overcome.

My second big issue is that I have built a core healer group that is really great at working together, and very focused on the synergy of raid healing. However, ICC came out and the people who had been so "burnt out" have come back and for some reason this is hailed as the second coming of WoW Jesus, and they are taking raid spots away from the faithful healers who didn't leave the game when they got the gear they wanted. I have been sitting out of raids in order for the healers to get spots, and this causes an enormous amount of issues, because it grates on my nerves and it leaves the healers without a leader.

I'm sorry for this incredibly long wall of text, but I guess it boils down to....how do you overcome officers that won't listen to a class leader? How do I motivate people to run old content so my guild can have a legendary to brag about? I know this comes across as selfish, but putting in the months and months it took to get the fragments into consideration, it's unendingly frustrating for me to see the quest item languishing in my bags and thinking...If only....

Any advice/thoughts/heck, at this point even flaming...is much appreciated!

The biggest reason people should want Valan'yar in their guild is that its a massive healing boost. Stats would probably be your first point of call for convincing people. Beyond that it all depends on what motivates your raiders. A "We raid to see the content" group isn't going to want to wipe on a boss all night.

If they're going to listen they would have already.

My suggestions would be one of the following:

1). Learn better leadership skills (I hear jedi mind tricks are cool).
2). Bite the bullet and pay to be taken.

No one really wants to go back for one person, sorry to say!

1) Join another guild - That guild sounds like it sucks. You're one of the harder working members and people don't have the decency to help you create an item which will help the entire guild. More importantly your officers suck. They can't keep their guild in order and are bowing to public, and possibly private, pressure when it comes to invites and raid destinations. Sometimes the officers of a guild need to do things which are unpopular but right. If you lose members because they don't want to do what is right for the guild, that isn't actually a loss. It's getting rid of a selfish player.

2) Healer Strike - ICC requires healers. You're the healing leader. If you have the support of your other healers then you need to organize a sit down of an ICC raid, or threaten it on the forums. If the officers are going to react to people's complaints and only do the easy things, then you make ICC impossible to run. People will bitch and moan and you'll force the leadership's hand.

3) Pay another guild - How much does this cost? I'd pay a lot for the mace. A better idea would be to make the GUILD pay for this run with another group. If they refuse to help you finish your mace (when you're so close), and they're the ones standing to benefit from it, then they should contribute. Obviously this is the biggest cop-out, crappy, solution of the bunch because you're allowing your guild (and its casual / selfish players) to push you and your officers around, while at the same time all of those people will benefit once you have the mace.

4) Seriously, quit that stupid guild - Why, why why would you want to be in this guild? WoW is a game. If you can't enjoy and trust the people that you play with, then why play? If you have friends in the guild, take them with you. There are tons of guilds out there which can better match your needs. Tons. Your guild is going to fall apart, or achieve very little, because it panders to people that obviously don't care about the guild, progression, or the other members.


There is a lot to be said for achieving things in this game when the deck is stacked against you. Killing Yogg in October is nothing to be ashamed of. I've been in situations before where killing a boss that was no longer progression content meant a lot to my group, and really it should. But that was with people that I knew cared about each other and progressing (even if we were a bit behind the pace). From what you describe, this is NOT your group. Your problems don't stem from people showing up every night and trying their best but struggling. Your guild's problems stem from the spinelessness and ineffectiveness of your leadership.

Get out.


*Edit*

I'm a guild/raid leader and I do recruitment for my guild. I'll tell you, when I see the word "Val'anyr" in the title of a thread on the alliance/horde recruitment forums, I always read it, regardless of whether we're actively seeking that class. You will have no trouble finding a guild that is a better match for you.

We all get WoW bored from time to time. It's inevitable, especially between patches. When all of a sudden people start coming out of the woodwork when a new patch comes out, though, it seriously bothers me. These folks should be given back seat to the dedicated people who stuck it out. Those kids stuck it through thick and thin and deserve priority.

Nothing irks me more than a fair weather raider. I remember back in the BWL days when certain raid members would magically log in when a specific boss (that had loot they wanted) was up. Nerd loathing is probably the appropriate term I had for these folks. I hated that behavior with a passion.

Then I /gquit. The funny thing is that said guild was second ranked in the server in the vanilla days, but is now ranked below my relatively casual guild. Gee, I wonder why. Perhaps when you treat other people as vehicles for your own personal gain, eventually they catch on and it doesn't work out too well. At least that's my theory. Said guild (Onibatsu, Dunemaul) is a case study in how NOT to run a guild.

Yeah, fair weather wow players are annoying, doubly so now because I give up my raid spot so one of them can get in and get gear. I had talked to my guild leader about it and was assured they wouldn't get spots over the faithful raiders, but lo and behold, they have been given their spots back like they weren't gone for all of ToC.

I want to thank everyone, especially Matron (I was kind of nerdily tickled you responded, cause I read your blog, so you gave me a good nerd smile that my day kind of needed). I'm quietly looking for options guild-wise, and going to just keep having fun in WoW in my current guild until I can find a nice, decent, fair guild to join that might actually appreciate me.

I'm a sucker for guild leadership topics!

Good luck with your search. If need help finding a guild or applying I can try and help.

I'm in the search for a guild currently with a friend of mine (a warlock) and have literally looked at the web page of every PST horde guild through S in the server list (so far) that has killed at least beasts in ToGC 25. It's amazing how different guilds are. I recommend your officers consider the wise words of a well-progressed guild TYS as posted on their Public access forum:

http://www.thinksyousuck.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=845

It's probably worth paying for the mace - but I'd want to take it elsewhere after all that - if I couldn't come to some kind of reasonable agreement with the guild about who would make the payment.


Leading a guild is hard. WOTLK has made it harder. My guild lost 3 officers in July (and probably 6 core players with them). The former GM and me and 2 others stepped up to try to lead it - but by then it had already slid a lot and was really impossible to recover from without having more time than any of us did have. We experienced the complete lack of interest from raiders in pursuing Ulduar content. We had cleared ToC, we couldn't even get through Phase 1 of NRB in TOGC and had no HM experience in 25-man. We tried going back to get it - that experience we missed when we didn't raid for a month. No one would show up to those raids. As a leader, there is really not much I can do about that. Old content is old. ADD 23 year olds don't like old content.

As a leader, my screen when organizing a raid or during a raid is complete and utter chaos. I had to get a mod to keep track of whispers. I would have 15 whispers of people complaining about this or that - I want to do this, so-and-so is doing that, X doesn't have a flask on, my toe hurts and I'm not sure I can come to this raid with these retards, do you think 25 people will show up?, do I need to have an enchant on these boots, what will my healing assignment be for the first boss, where are we going, where are we going, where are we going, Y tanks threat is ass, so you told me to heal Y but I really like healing N better so I'm just going to do that OK?. Given that I never wanted to lead anything, despise that I don't have time to keep up with paladin healing, or watch 15 videos of the fight anymore because I'm keeping track of attendance, recruiting, figuring out who to replace, trying to figure out what we can do to fix the mess - I find all the constant demands and complaints and whining demoralizing and distressing. I don't even want to log on at all.

Without discussing it with the officers, there is no real way to know what's going on. You're one of probably 30 voices complaining about something - where everyone is complaining about something different.

Our guild made the decision last week to stop raiding 25-man content and everyone is taking their mains elsewhere - or mostly everyone. If your guild leaders were smart, they'd tell the returning players to sit on the bench since there's only space for reliable raiders and they can wait until they prove themselves reliable. If your guild leaders are lucky, they still have people that want to raid SOMETHING in this WoW world where too many have been spoiled by the easy content. It's probable that they're trying not to antagonize the 20+ people who would rather quit WoW than step into Ulduar again, rather than to apease you and achieve a nice thing for the guild.

It really is a balancing act. Just as Auriane said, what can the RLer do if no one wants to go? Should your fellow guildies want to do you a solid and dedicate a night to get back in there so you can get that great achievement? Of course. But if if the RLer polls everyone and there is very little interest he can't make them go.

I would post something on your guild forums about how much it means to you and go from there. If you get posts like "Well, er, I just can't bear to go back there, sorry" or no replies at all you have your answer.

Then you have to decide if this is a deal breaker. The grass isn't always greener and it is tough to find a good guild that fits. One that has people you like that progress at your pace.

I went to a 10 man raiding guild because of this type of stuff. We have been going strong for seven months now and not had one once of drama. I just enjoy the game more with 12-15 people that I like. It is almost impossible to find 30 people that are not asshats and have the same raiding commitment.

The raid leader hasn't asked anyone. I'm the one that has to try and get the people together on an off night. I tried all week with begging, pleading, offering to give away thousands of gold, and I got 9 people signed up out of lot more than that invited. Lots of tentatives, though, so maybe if I keep a positive attitude I could be surprised tonight.

And Matron, I will definitely let you know if I need the help. The biggest problem with finding a new guild is that while I might have a legendary waiting to be made, I also have a husband I want to play with and I won't go if he can't get in as well, although he has a few different geared characters he could offer a guild.

I don't want the mace to be my deal breaker. It makes me feel petty and selfish that it's so important to me, but on the other hand---we spent 2 months in ulduar just finishing up fragment collecting. I've started stashing my gold, and if it comes to it I'll just pay. Unfortunately, the amount of gold it is now going to cost has gone up...considerably. Pretty much triple the number you guess, then add 10-15k.

The problem with our guild is severe officer apathy. I'm technically not an officer, I'm only a class leader, except I happen to lead shamans, druids, priests, and paladins. That means I have to know every class cooldown, every class role, and everything a healer can bring to the table to assist a raid. I have been belittled in the healing channel by officers that are healers, they challenge my assignments and will outright NOT heal their assignments because at this point, 15 of us are expected to carry 10 through content. And well, I'm tired of carrying. I'm tired of caring, and I'm tired of logging into a game I used to love with dread knotting up my stomach.

Sounds like there is more going on than just getting the mace done.
A wise mage once told me when it comes to getting the raiding cart up "the big hill" that there are:
1) those pulling the cart up the hill,
2) those who are sitting in the cart, often telling those pulling to pull harder/faster,
3) those putting rocks in the way.

If officership is allowing those in 2 or 3 to get away with it or are themselves part of the problem then the guild has some real systemic issues so unless a "house cleaning" is in the offing then you may have to move on.

This part confuses me, you are not an officer you are a healing lead, however people are not following assignments for healing. If i were you i would get those officers that are not following assignments, and get them to do the healing lead role (as your input does not appear welcomed, and is being undermined). You are suffering from classic healing lead burn out, which is making you frustrated and not finding time to enjoy yourself in game. The healing officers do not appreciate the input you provide, I will echo what previous people have also said and it maybe time to step down from the healing lead role, or look to change guilds where you are just a healer with none of the pressures (apart from to perform)

The officers just happen to be healers, they actually aren't "healing leaders" in any sense of the word. They are officers because...well I'm not really sure. They refuse to do assignments (in the case that I am not in the raid, the exact words they say when asked what the assignments are is "heal sh*t". I personally enjoy doing assignments, and frankly the officers haven't been an issue until a few weeks ago (in regards to the healing assignments and attitude). I'm not burnt out from leading my healers, because with the exception of the two officers, they are a great bunch and we have a lot of fun in our little healing channel during raids.

I guess I just really wished there was something I could do to fix my guild, because I like a lot of the people in it, and am frustrated beyond belief.

Officers who are just officers with no reason why they are there, are detrimental to any .
guild.

It may be time for the GM to do a reshuffle of officers, getting officers that want to put in the extra work and have the same vision for the guild will work wonders.

In the case of my guild we had an officer that did as a person was absolutely fine but come raids his skills lacked, and content came to a stand still, yes we had some new members join for raids but wiping on content like onyxia caused frustration,

Said officer has now left the guild and progression and clearing of content has started occuring again, the officer in question was benched a couple of times (which annoyed them and led them to being extremely negative in raids they did attend)

If you have enough healers to be able to "bench" the officers in question you may find with them out of the raid moral will lift within the raid and your chances of succeeding improve.

If all else fails if you transfer to Scarlet Crusade I'll get you a 3 lights run, then you can transfer back.

Good luck.

Wow Matron! That is a really, really kind offer. It's nice to know that I have that option if it comes down to it.

I'd 100% just ask the guild for 10k or so to buy a run from someone.

My guild has done that (i.e. completed another guild's legendary) and it worked out fine. Actually we wiped a couple times and felt embarrased.

It's hard for them to know how incredible those shields are till they actually see it. We actually have 3 Val'anyrs in our roster right now (we made our first, one transferred in, and the aforementioned pay run ended up transferring in as well). Send them some numbers on how the weapon can help the raid and if they say "yeah but..." just remind them that you've got the shards sitting in your bags and there's no reason it shouldn't already be a mace.

There's only 1 guild on my server that is capable of running people through yogg with 3 or less keepers, and they charge far more than 10k. Even if the guild covered half of the price, it would still be obscene, even for a legendary.

Wow that's brutal. We were the second guild on our server to do yogg+3 and took the offer of 10k graciously.

I'd be disppointed if your guild wouldn't foot the whole bill though, since theyre not even willing to try and help you themselves.

Yeah, it sucks because when I first spoke the guild about perhaps paying for a run through yogg, the price was 20k. Not so bad, right? It's now at LEAST 60k. While I don't fault them for raising the price (it's outdated content, etc.) I just don't have enough hours in my day to even contemplate amassing that kind of gold. And as much as I want my mace, I would NEVER ask my guild to cover that kind of amount, when for free we could go in there and actually down it ourselves. Just being able to post this and get the frustration out in a neutral place has assuaged my feelings about the situation. But you can bet when I finally do get that sucker, I'm gonna be SOOOO unendingly tickled.