Turn and face the strange changes!

Our guild leader has made a few changes to the rules. Some people have complained. Others have offered constructive criticism with solutions. Personally, I don’t care either way because like the price of gas, it’s out of my control. My perspective is that I’m part of this guild, and my guild leader does listen to what members say, contrary to public opinion, but inevitably, what he finally chooses is what we follow. If I’m not happy, I know where the door is.

First, we now have DKP. There are many opinions out there on this particular loot system, but free rolls in twenty-five mans was just not working for us. Neither was loot council. Human nature gets in the way on that one, and it’s hard to be objective when friendships are involved. When multiple people are on a loot council and always group together, it looks bad when they choose someone from their clique as the receiver of loot. They may not have intentionally done this, but appearances need to be factored into the equation. That kind of stuff can be divisive.

The one benefit of using DKP has been the ability to reward the players at the instance with bonus punctuality DKP. It is amazing how much this has attributed to us starting raids on time. Before, people would PvP then request a summon. Or they would decide to do all their last minute shopping (pots, reagents, food, etc.) then need a summon.

Now that others could outbid them because they have more DKP from being on time, people are taking start times seriously. Don’t even get me started on the extrinsic motivation of this as opposed to the basic respect for the other 24 members of the raid that should have intrinsically motivated people in the first place. All I will say is DKP has nipped this goofing off in the bud.

Second, Karazhan is no longer listed on our group calendar. Some people have been pretty vocal about this. However, we have Kara on farm. It’s getting to the point where more than 75% of what drops in Kara is being disenchanted, and the mats go to the guild bank for enchants. Last night, my pal, Pallybarry, received almost an entire tanking set for his paladin because no one needed it; he’s a holy paladin.

We still do Kara, but it’s not going to be on the weeknight schedule for raiding. Instead, it’s going to be on the fly when ten people are online. Considering that some nights we couldn’t get ten people in Karazhan, we’ve come a long way.

The last change is that our group calendar no longer has specific locations listed on raid nights. Instead, the calendar has blocks of time (7:00 - 10:30 or 7:00 - 11:00) shown as Raid Night. Too many people would show up for Gruul’s, get him down in an hour, then log offline. Our newest main tank (a real female paladin who knows her stuff) suggested making people commit to the time not the instance. That way, people know that if we down Gruul’s, we’ll move to Tempest Keep and work on Void Reaver.

This brings me to this past Tuesday’s raid. I was a tad too sick to update this in a timely manner. We managed to take down Gruul in record time. Then we followed this up with a one-shot of Mr. Void Reaver. Considering that three weeks ago, we were idiots with this fight, this is a major accomplishment.

Gruul was kind enough to give up Cowl of Nature’s Breath again. He also dropped Guantlets of the Dragonslayer, Leggings of the Fallen Defender, and Leggings of the Fallen Hero.

Void Reaver dropped Wristguards of Determination, Pauldrons of the Vanquished Hero, and Pauldrons of the Vanquished Defender.

Unfortunately, my DKP is lacking simply because I was too sick to raid the last few weeks, but it’s all good. If we can manage this weekly, eventually I’ll get gear.