Iron Edge Vision going into SL

[Rash]

Iron Edge vision going into Shadowlands

I wanted to ramble on the forums a little about what Iron Edge should look like going into SL. This isn’t really a necessary read for everyone, but it is a set of ideas that I want to promote for all activities that we have in IE. My focus will mostly be on raiding, because let’s be honest, that’s what we’re all still here for.

So why this wall of text?

The reason why I wanted to bring this up now is because I feel that WoW has reached a new stage of the transformation into a complete Game of Numbers. There have been events similar to this in the past. What comes to mind in no particular order: the introduction of Gear Score (officially sanctioned now under Average Item Level), World of Logs, Warcraftlogs, Raider IO, Ask Mr. Robot, LFG in its current state, Ahead of the Curve and Cutting Edge requirements and loosely related – boosting communities and all the degeneracy involved with it.

Let me make something very clear before I go any further – Neither I, nor the other officers, nor really anyone with a functioning brain in their head, is disputing the necessity of objective and empiric performance measuring. But I think we need to go back to where we were, and to that end, restate what we exactly are and what we should strive for as a guild, and let this attitude permeate throughout everything we do in-, around- and about WoW. Not only because it helps us find the right recruits in the future, but also because I have noticed there’s a gap in the players we have in the guild.
 
Bluntly put, there are members in the guild who are down and dirty, right in the middle of this culture – and there are members in this guild who are completely oblivious, hidden safely within the walls of the culture of Iron Edge (the one I am attempting to preserve right now).

In terms of recruitment, those who have been involved with recruitment have seen a spike in people who are no longer willing to submit applications and no longer willing to even read the requirements. Many of these people simply go to WoWprogress, sort by guilds who are casual and their boss kills, join the discord, link their logs - and expect to be invited. Let me show you a not-too-recent example:

Now that chatlog was not exactly my proudest moment, I was being particularly blunt that day because I was getting fucking tired of this attitude. But what happened next was a very revealing moment for me:

To the more recent members that have joined us, this might look like a totally normal and average exchange. He literally opens with his logs, then goes on to blurt out a bunch of accomplishments that really mean nothing and then expects the invite. But to someone like me, who hasn’t applied to a guild in over 12 years, it was not obvious at all. It was this moment that made me realize that it’s not just testosterone-fueled-manchildren who need to prove their worth every moment of every day because their fathers didn’t love them – it’s misguided guilds who also bear the burden of causing this problem - perhaps more than anyone else.

Hopefully I’ve been able to clearly express what I think the problem is, now let me move on to what I think the solution would be.

The vision

Honestly, I don't think I need to explicitly state what kind of players we’re looking for and what kind attitude we want to foster within Iron Edge – I think you all already know it as much as I do. But this time, for the first time, I am going to make it explicit. I’ve come up with a list of situations that players may be confronted by – inside and outside of IE – and how I would like to see everyone behave.

This is that list:

• On a spreading out mechanic, are you the player that runs away the furthest, so that others have an easier time spreading?
• When an add spawns, are you already in position to DPS it, because it has to die as soon as possible?
• Do you go out of your way to avoid taking damage, even at the cost of DPS?
• Do you aggressively switch targets, even if it costs DPS?
• Are you the player who single target spam heals vulnerable targets, even if AoE healing is more effective and on that same note:
• Do you single target the right target, even though AOEing would be more beneficial to your personal HPS or DPS
• Are you happy when a difficult mechanic targets you, or when an officer assigns it to you, because that would mean that you could ensure that it would get done correctly?
• Do you look to yourself, instead of to others, what you can do to stop wipes from happening?
• Are you the change that you want to see in the raid?

As stated before, we’re not disputing the necessity of good numbers, but in terms of priority, this should be it:

• What are you doing damage to?
• When are you doing damage to it?
• How much damage are you doing to it

When recruiting players – as well as fostering a happy raid environment – this is the priority of quality that we’re looking for in players:

• Players who are fun to play with and bring out the best in all of us, not just in terms of performance. They bring more than just their WoW character, they bring their personality as well.
• Players who prioritize mechanics and do proper execution of those mechanics
• Players who have the numbers to back it all up

While I always encourage discussion and debate and expose us to views we had not considered before, many of these points are absolute and beyond debate for me. There is no doubt in my mind that Iron Edge can live up to this, but if it doesn’t want to live up to it – I am not the one who should be running it.

In conclusion

The thought I would like to end on, which to me is self-evident, but to many others might not be:

Bosses do not die because 20 people did a lot of damage, bosses die because 20 people did the dance right. A player who is articulate, funny and interesting to play with, is almost always good enough to be a top tier raider in our guild. This has always been the recipe that has lead to our longevity and success - and I expect it to continue to be in SL.

Thanks for reading my rambling.

- Rash

[mortos]

Good Read
and agree whole heartily.

[Tyssar]

Since we are talking about this Rash I wanted to ask you  how can I apply to become a supreme leader, officer, general, president, dictator, commander, etc. of
every Italian hunters here in the guild. You can check my logs here. Let me know what you think.

Joking aside I strongly agree with everything you wrote up here, logs are useful for various reasons, you can see what mistakes the raid do and if you can analyze them they help players to improve themselves but sadly they also indirectly encourage those players to do something stupid in alot of situations while they try to get that orange number on warcraftlogs.
The most important thing (at least for me) is to have fun while we do what we like, bosses always go down sooner or later and if someone doesn't get a nice log because he/she had to do something to actually kill the boss who cares? We will have plenty occasions to improve our self week after week.

[Skinkelinke]

Great post Rash and I totally agree!

Only small thing (knowing that below probably is mostly directed towards the main raiders) I don't agree on is the below comment:

My focus will mostly be on raiding, because let’s be honest, that’s what we’re all still here for.

Most of us real oldies have the social part as the clear number one and we appreciate a main raider who is communicative, collabartive in guild chat etc. Personally I also appreciate when we bring in players that are not only raidlogging.

One thing that was great with BfA was the dungeons and mythic+, not only from a gaming perspective but also from a community perspective. This is something that really makes players from different parts of the guild (weekend, main, tot and social) play together. Out of a skill perspective I think it's even more important in m+ to be the type of player you describe since you can't hide behind other players. My focus going in to Shadowlands will be 1)social 2)mythic+ 3)raiding. I do think we as a guild can do alot more with the m+ part. The last attempt was layed out as a "I want to see us in the MDI:s" kinda thing and then everyone went on as usual. I think we as a guild should drive m+ as a chance to strengthen our community outside of the normal raidgroups. That could mean both pushing keys doing social/alt runs.

[saxonatic]

CLAPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP

[Gaeios(Graxlos)]

I approve this message

[Vox]

Wait... This guy clearly didn't read the form at all then, because there's tons of room to put in every little detail you'd want, in game and out of the game. Oh well, better off without.

And of course... Good read, Rash 

[Veiny]

This thread makes me super happy I applied to this guild
Super hyped to raid with you guys in shadowlands, an excellent read and couldn't agree more

[Ranesh]

As a newly recruited guildmember and trialist it makes me happy to see the guild has set these priorities. It's often easy to judge someone solely based on their score on the damage meter whilst ignoring their behaviour during the encounter and on Discord. It reminds me of a time in my old guild during WoD where we had a Warlock who was always 10 points ahead on the damage meter, but failed mechanics more than once leading to a wipe and then raging in the teamchat; yet the GM thought he was crucial in defeating the boss. Personally, I can always appreciate fighting a boss for a minute longer, making sure we are doing it correctly, than fighting him a minute shorter and barely squeezing out a victory through tears, frustrations and with half the raid dead. Reading this thread makes me confident in my choice of applying as a raider to this guild.

Kindly,