The Third Option

edited June 2006 in WoW: General

Comments

  • edited December 1969
    Firstly, welcome back Vrag!

    OK, what I really like about us, as a guild, is our stick-togetheredness. Plus, in general, we really know that our relationships and fun together are the most important part of this game.

    Drama sucks.

    Now there are some Clan Plaid members who are not yet at that point of caring about the "End Game" raids and so forth. That's cool. But I get the feeling that there are a lot of people in #CP# who want to experience some of that endgame content.

    As Carch so eloquently put it last night, I don't want it to become a job. A chore. So joining "hardcore" raiding guilds like Immortalis Arma which require raid attendence and blah blah blah isn't an option. It's not that I'm married to my Clan Plaid tag, I am married to our culture. We have never pretended to be hard core. We never will be. I don't think we should be.

    From our recent posts, it seems we've had two options emerge.

    1. Join Deus Ex and try to carve out another guild in our image.

    I've posted in another thread as to why I think this is a bad/dumb idea. I won't get into details.

    2. Join blighted on their raids.

    I'm totally ok with this. I posted on another thread why, I won't get into details. :)

    But there is a third option:

    3.

    http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?ForumName=wow-realm-uldaman&ThreadID=2081

    Now, I haven't talked with Inaya or the rest of the guild, but I know from running raids with them (and Kalli I'm sure will back me up on this) that they are a bunch of fine mature folks, with a guild culture remarkably similar to our own.

    They don't *require* people to raid. They don't pressure people. They let people have a life.


    I, myself, am quite attached to what I've achieved with Xetasi. But I'm not married to her. What's important to me in this game are my friends, new and old. And fun. Fun to me is being able to have a relaxed flexible schedule, but yet always have something/someone around to do something with.

    I know most of you feel the same. This is why I'm bringing up the "third option" to those of us who want to see what the raid encounters are like, but don't want the drama/chore of the "hardcore" guilds.

    Now, if we chose to reroll for the fourth time... :D

    We have two sub-options. Keep our name, be in a separate guild, but form a tight alliance with Numinous with (hopefully) joint raiding and all that good stuff. (I haven't talked with them about it, but I know they had similar arrangements on Staghelm)

    Or outright join them! Let someone else do the work of recruiting. It is pretty clear to me we don't have the inclination to bother with that business. :) Maybe we could petition for a rank name that included "Plaid" in it, just to show our heritage. :)

    OK, I haven't decided if this is a great idea or not, but I'm just throwing it out for discussion. If even a tiny minority of active players are against this idea, so am I.

    However the possibility remains that this would be the best idea for those of us a bit burned out from all the politics and such on our current server. I have a lot of faith in this bunch of folks...
  • edited December 1969
    Ok. so I'm a new plaidie as compared to all of you. And you all have seen me flip-flop in and out of CP as a guild in my time on Staghelm. Simple reason I would like to see endgame content.

    Now, this is not the *why* of why I play WoW. I play for a fun stress relief from the fgrind of real life.

    We have formed an alliance with blighted and I enjoy this idea. I also enjoy the idea of seeing if we can from a tight alliance or Plaid rank in Numinous on Uldamna (though I don't like the guild name). I think CP on Staghelm has gotten to the point though where we either grin and bear the fact that CP will only raid as being the "outsiders" per-say in a different guild. We do not recruit. We never have. Garu is the only person I can think of. of the 100+ people in CP, about 80 of them are Alts or non-existents.

    I am excited about raiding with Blighted, I have signed up for their next 5 raids. They are good people from what I have seen so far. I love Vragak. He is my first 60, and I am proud of what gear and stuff he has. That does not mean i am not willing to move to Uldaman Sever.

    I will go with what others go for. But I think that moving to this new server and (maybe) getting a plaid rank in Nuinous will be good for all of us. We will still be Plaid, and we will have the same attitude in guild. But we will have more friends. and the possibilty of raiding.

    ~Vragak
  • edited December 1969
    Staghelm stats
    Uldaman stats

    I don't think this is a simple choice for most people, and I think it's silly to hope that one of the three options (the poll has five?) will make everyone happy. Just remember if we reroll, we'll lose people. If we don't, we'll still lose people. It's a game, but drama happens and people (god knows this includes me) invest way way too much time and emotion into this one in particular. New people will play with us and join us on either server. People will leave unexpectedly on either server. CP will go on just fine even if most of us stop playing, or half of us are on a different server or in a different guild in-game. Do what you want to do to get your $15/month of fun, and don't demand everyone else play the game the way you do.

    -some solid people from sicarri are now on uldaman, possibly enough to do some serious raiding once everyone's leveled up
    -some solid people from sicarri are still very active on staghelm, and more than willing to raid with us still
    -leveling up along with a bunch of friends is much more fun than leveling up to catch up to friends
    -leveling up at all is painful for some people and the idea of doing it again may not be worth it
    -switching to alliance chars would add some variety that could make things interesting for many of us
    -switching to alliance chars would be unpleasant for some that have done it before and prefer horde
    -uldaman is newer, lower population, and less laggy(?)
    -uldaman is growing faster and may become even more laggy than staghelm
    -the population of uldaman is mostly low levels, putting us on a somewhat more equal footing for purposes of pvp
    -the population of uldaman is mostly low levels, meaning fiercer competition for the items that drop
    -raids have some of the most challenging, interesting, and impressive content in WoW
    -raids are repetitive and demand multi-hour blocks of time, twitchy reflexes and several add-ons

    I will almost certainly be rolling an alliance character or two on Uldaman. I would like to see the major alliance cities and early content, probably on my own for now. I will also certainly be staying on Staghelm for the time being. Where I end up spending most of my time will depend on how much I enjoy each server. While I did find the grind to level 60 unpleasant, it may have been because everyone else was already there and I wanted to rush to catch up. I don't have any strong desire to do it again, and yet I enjoy playing my alts as well.

    I would like to see the truly high-end raid content, but would not like to be forced to play 4 hours a day 5 days a week to do so. I think I can do this on either Staghelm or Uldaman.

    I would like to play with my CP friends in a cooperative, casual environment in groups smaller than 40 people. I think I can do this on either Staghelm or Uldaman.

    If you can't tell, I can see lots of good and bad for any of these choices. My own personal priorities are figuring out how I can get regular but limited raiding in during the hours I prefer (later than most people) and trying to keep the game from destroying my life. I am in no hurry to pick a server and will probably still be evaluating both choices in a month. I look forward to hearing everyone else's thoughts and getting some quality game time in with everyone. The CP roster has been picking up a lot lately and I have to say I like it. :)
  • edited December 1969
    This is going to sound negative I think and I dont intend it to be.

    I really wanted to come back because I missed you all, and that should have been in the forefront of my mind when I started getting delusions of diplomacy dancing in my head. I sure hemmed and hawed about it enough before pulling the trigger on coming back to WoW. I'll never have the time I used to, but frankly, it was the company I missed. And I gotta tell you, I'm really starting to whig out over the loss of Gizmo. We need to pick that up again.

    Ive done way too much alliance to do it again to 60. I'll just stay on Staghelm and hang with my #CP# crew and friends. If I dont raid often, fine, there's plenty of 20-man content around. I dont have the time nor the resources to level another character to 60. I see potential for me to return and play on Staghelm with my 60 priest that has reasonable good gear to start raiding. I don't see it starting from scratch.

    I suppose it wouldnt hurt to have 'downtime' characters on Uldaman. That's a pretty interesting idea....but it would lead to us moving there ultimately I wager.

    If we did that, I probably couldnt follow. I'm going to be brutally honest. At some points in time during our clan's evolution, one man's 'relaxed' schedule was another man's 'on all the time'. I wont point fingers as I was, at times, as guilty as the next man, but you get my point. I'm just worried of a repeat affair of several of us at level 10 while you or someone else is out there in the mid-30s with a smile and wink and a pat on our widdle heads. :) No one was ever left behind, and I dont think that will ever happen, but I'm just afraid there may be a gap again, and I dont have the gas left in the tank to follow my Plaidies into the breach one more time.

    In fact, now that we're all close to 60, we've finally equalized a bit. Now we really CAN be together, without the hurried notion of catching up. This is our most important time, and no matter the hardship, we should cherish it.

    No, I admit my mistake, though I'm glad it created some discourse on this board again. I think we're fine on Staghelm with our alliance with Blighted and others. I will, however, go whereever plaid goes. You guys are my family.

    That being said, let me tell you that from what I've learned of Deus Ex they would be possibly receptive to possible absorbtion into plaid. Something to consider if you wanna contact their leadership.

    Also keep in mind that Blizzard will soon be offering server leaps over the summer, from what I hear in rumors. So in theory, we could leave Staghelm with our characters intact if this is true.

    And as a parting shot about not making this a job, Chief, back before I left you did a fairly good impersonation of it being one. A fun job, but a job nonetheless. It was hell to pry you away from Battlegrounds or some instances sometimes =). I'm glad to see you out and about amidst all of us again.

    All in all, I'm just glad to be back. And I promise I'll be around more often, except for that summer conference on 11-13 of June I have to go to. I miss grouping with Plaid. If you guys are going to do a raid, even if it is Baron, please post it in the proper forum. I'd like to attend, as would Vrag I wager.
  • edited December 1969
    Very well put!
    The CP roster has been picking up a lot lately and I have to say I like it. :)

    Yeah, that's great.
  • edited December 1969
    I'm with Deac. Griding to 60 solo was a bit of a chore, but I did it because I saw all the fun you highbies were having.

    Now I'm 60, there's a bunch of us that are, and we have an instance run pretty much every night. We can do anything up through UBRS in guild no problem. For bigger stuff, it seems like the folks who want to do raids have no trouble getting in with whoever the friendly raiding guild of the moment happens to be, Sicarri, CoE, Blighted, whoever. I think we have a pretty sweet deal going :)

    That said, I've never done alliance, and I'm in this to play with CP, so if the group wants to move to Uld, I'd be ok with it.

    -Mori
  • edited December 1969
    I play alliance on Llane (rogue, 70+ days played) and horde on Staghelm. Horde is SO much better in my opinion. More mature and friendly people, in my opinion, shorter queue times for the battlegrounds, better communication amongst players.

    I don't know if I have it in me to reroll and level a character to 60. I'd probably come along if you guys move but I wouldn't be able to play enough to keep up with everyone. Look how long it took Yee to make it to 60!

    We have a bunch of CP 60s now and things seem pretty fun to me on Staghelm with our various alliances.
  • edited December 1969
    I agree w/Mori. Things are picking up, we have the "in" with Blighted and can raid with them if needed, but keep our CP culture going. I love my lock too, and don't want to re-roll anywhere.
  • edited December 1969
    Boo! Just checkin' in from the other end of WoW (that'd be Whisperwind, Alliance side) and saw this post. Figured I'd just plop down some of the things the guild I'm in -- Reservoir Dogcows -- has been thru, since this seems oh, so familiar.

    Alliances can work; we had a good run of a couple of months where we were in an alliance with 2, 3 other guilds. After awhile it was down to two other guilds, which was also good; made good friends among both, and still keep in touch.

    The most critical thing to an alliance -- guild cultures and the leaders have got to mesh, and mesh well. Without that, things can get messy. Fast. Been thru that one, too.

    Heh. If I weren't so deeply involved in my guild (somehow, I became the Raid Leader there -- seems to work ok), and so heavily invested in my characters there, I'd seriously consider moving over here. I'll keep in touch, though. :)
  • edited December 1969
    The most critical thing to an alliance -- guild cultures and the leaders have got to mesh, and mesh well. Without that, things can get messy. Fast. Been thru that one, too.

    I was skeptical at first, since I didn't have that much experience with blighted. But some key members of a previous guild we were raiding with joined them and after a couple raids I realized these guys were at least as mature and laid back as the previous guys... if not more so.

    So yeah, they mesh well with our "no pressure here" and "don't be a pinhead" culture.
    Heh. If I weren't so deeply involved in my guild (somehow, I became the Raid Leader there -- seems to work ok), and so heavily invested in my characters there, I'd seriously consider moving over here. I'll keep in touch, though. :)

    Good to hear from yas. I understand your position, but come on... you need to see what it's like on the side of the true Heroes of Warcraft. Make an alt, play with us a couple nights a week. Powerlevel up and give us your raiding experience! :D

    For the Horde!
  • edited December 1969
    ... if not more so.

    I'm starting to firmly believe it's defintely more so.
  • edited December 1969
    I think its great that so many CP are 60 now. I wish this had happened a few months earlier because I dont have the free time to enjoy WoW that I used to.

    For that reason I would prefer to stick with Staghelm at least for now. I know there is a desire to jump to a server while it is fresh. I suggest we defer this until the expansion comes out. It may be enjoyable to put together a Blood Elf only CP guild on a new server or something along those lines.

    Anyways I enjoy hanging with everyone and will try and be better about letting everyone know when I have free time to instance.

    Cull
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