Getting Into Raid PUGs

First off, Happy Thanksgiving to those of you in the United States. For everyone else, you're totally missing out on a 4-day weekend. You should petition your governments to invent some sort of holiday to get you out of work. You could even throw in a bit of irony and create "Thankfullyhealthy Day" and eat Brussels Sprouts all day instead of the artery-clogging feast we American's indulge in.

But this post isn't about Thanksgiving, thankfully. It's about getting into Raid PUGs. I've noticed an attempt lately by many people to tighten the requirements. All sorts of things get tagged onto LFG spams to discourage the under-qualified:

"LFG ToC 25 - Pst with class/spec & Achievement. MUST have Achievement."
"LFG ToC 10 - Need DPS. MUST DO 4K+ We WILL check gear!"
etc.

I've even seen gear-checks on For The Horde raids. Previously the only requirement I've seen on For The Horde was a pulse and a rusty dagger. "You're level 10? OK - we have a special assignment for you. Run in the front gate and see how many allies are in there. Tell us if there's a bunch."

People seem to be clamping down on the under-geared, I guess in an attempt to reduce the inevitable fail. But ultimately, until Blizz or an addon creates a some sort of standardized quality measure*, I don't see the payoff on adding all of the requirements. *(Gear score doesn't define a player's level well enough, in my opinion, and it's not something that can easily be viewed in game - making it impractical for quickly accepting / denying PUG requests)

For the people requiring the applicant to PST the Achievement, all you're doing is determining if someone has been through the content at least once previously. Maybe they got carried. Mortigan certainly got carried through ToC 25, and now that I have the achieve, I can PST Morty into just about any future Toc 25 PUG. Luckily, I've run ToC 10 enough times now - and failed enough times - that the repetition has given me enough familiarity to not be worthless on future attempts. But all being said, I don't think the Achievement is worth as much as people would like it to be.

And as a DPS, I often get asked things like "Can you do 5K DPS?" which must be the most pointless question I've ever heard. DPS is absolutely relevant to what it is you're attacking. Against Onyxia Whelps Mortigan puts out some crazy DPS - often upping his numbers to 7K or more. Same with Naxx spiders. But one boss? Morty's DPS will drop significantly, but still vary widely depending on the boss. On Patchwerk Morty will do 5K+. On a boss where he's being sheeped and stunned the whole time, expect much less. Like the disclaimer on many products, "Actual results may vary."

My two cents for measuring DPS: it should be calculated on a training dummy, using only your own buffs (feasts and flasks ok) measured over a specific period of time - such as until your mana runs out without tapping for me. I'll leave it to the Elitist Jerks to sort it all out though, and hopefully someone will tell me what they decide.

For now, my request is this: If you've been spamming and crying for people to join your Raid PUG for more than 15 minutes, please drop all the crap about strict requirements and start filling some slots. Everyone needs a chance. Someone gave you a chance, so pay it forward and be nice to someone else. They'll be thankful you did.

Mortigan's Level 1 Human Female Warrior

I had planned on this post being a long one, detailing in hilarious glory the story of Mortigan's real-life counterpart (i.e. Me) living through what could possibly be the biggest event in my life: the birth of my daughter. That's right, Mortigan now has a Level 1 Human Female Warrior, weighing in at 7lbs 12ozs (wearing cloth like her dad, of course), and 20 1/2 inches tall (my European readers will have to convert these measurements to the metric system, I guess. I'm horrible with math!) But reality is that I only have a few minutes here at the house, then I have to get back to the hospital and try to get her to take a bottle. (I tried breastfeeding, but being a man, it didn't work out so well.) So instead of a long post, I hope this will suffice for now.

There probably will not be many posts this week. My apologies in advance. On top of the whole new baby thing, it's also the week of Thanksgiving (or "Judgement Day" as the turkeys and pigs call it). My parents are driving up. Mayhem will ensue. So not much entertainment coming from ol' Morty. Sorry. I'll try to get 1 or 2 posts up - we'll just see how it goes.

I do promise to pick things back up as quickly as possible. For now, you can stare at the picture below. It's pretty much all I stared at all day yesterday.



Oh, one quick story before I go - after my baby was born, the doctor asked me if I wanted to cut the cord, to which I replied, "Sorry, but I'm not on my Insurance Company's Network List. For me to do it, the cost would be OUTRAGEOUS!"

Mortigan the Father

Breaking All Of My Rules

A few rules I established for myself when creating this blog was to:

1. Only write game-related posts
2. Make it funny
3. Not write a post that only exists to clarify what I was trying to say in a previous post
4. Not write "e-mail" style posts that are basically direct messages to my readers
5. Never post Real Life Pictures

I violated Rule #1 a bit in my last post when talking about Ulrich and Chris. But I thought those stories (all 100% true) would be quite entertaining and had a direct tie to what I was trying to say about how the Raid Guild made me feel, so I didn't sweat it too much. (And you smart readers will also likely point out that I'm violating Rule #1 right now, too. Touche!)

These last few posts have also been more serious, violating Rule #2. I tried to lessen that with the true story of Ulrich breaking the wrong person's legs - which was a horrible thing - but at the same time EXTREMELY funny. I've always day-dreamed about the conversation that must've taken place between those roommates after it happened: "THIS IS YOUR FAULT! YOU ARE THE WORST ROOMMATE EVER! LOOK AT MY LEGS - I HATE YOU!!!" And for those of you who don't find it funny at all, and think I'm mean for laughing, you can sleep easier knowing that Ulrich had to pay a large amount of money for medical bills and restitution.

And now I'll violate Rule #3 by replying to the Anonymous daily reader of my blog who said "the only thing that makes me sad is that ulrich in your story is german. we're not all ulrichs or adolfs..."
When thinking of a pseudonym for him, I wondered if some of my German readers might take offense. But the story is absolutely true. Ulrich IS German, and his real name is VERY German - like an Ulrich or Adolf - but at the same time is very uncommon in this part of the United States. If I'd used his real name, there is a good chance that someone in my area might actually know the exact person I'm talking about. But I wanted a name that had the same strong German feel of his real name, so I went with Ulrich. I was not trying to make any stereotypes of the German people... unless you want to count his love for vintage VWs stereotypical.

And of course this post walks all over Rule #4. So while I'm doing it, I'll explain a few things. Most of my posts are admittedly written at work. The workload at my job fluctuates greatly - one minute I'm extremely busy, the next I'm just waiting for something to come along. It is during those lulls that I write. Unfortunately, game-related websites are blocked at work. I can access the Dashboard to uploads posts for you guys, but I can't visit my actual site and post replies. Replies have to be done from home, and I currently have little time to spare, for reasons that I expect to explain on Monday. (Monday's post will be a HUGE violation of Rules #1, #2, and #4 - and will be a big enough event that I'll even post some RL pics and break Rule #5). So I greatly value and read all replies to my posts, and I apologize if you were hoping for a direct reply and didn't get one. Feel free to Twitter me @Mortigan if you want to talk. Work hasn't blocked Twitter yet.

And one last very important note - Thank you for reading my blog! I'm always amazed when I check my page statistics and see people from all over the world stopping by. I was going to post "Thank you!" in every possible language until I found a website with "Thank you!" written in close to 500 languages and realized how hard it would be to find all those special characters... so hopefully saying it in English will be sufficient.

Thanks again!
Mortigan the Rule-breaker

Leveling Dentistry

An Ally I know via Twitter - Aggrojunkie - has been complaining about a tooth problem.  Being the good Hordie that I am, I offered to drill it myself (I have a Dremel tool) or extract it (I own pliers, too).  He seemed to question my ability at dentistry, to which I responded that I've been leveling it up, and currently have Dentistry at 178.  A few more points and I can start doing Thorium Crowns.  He seemed a little skeptical still, so I introduced him to one of my very satisfied customers:

If anyone else needs an appointment, I'm available! Come find me in UC.  I use the barber chair.  Only 50 gold per tooth extracted!

The Price Is Too High

I accidentally became friends with some very dangerous individuals back in the '90s.  They were Porsche-driving, mansion-owning drug runners who made most of their deals from the deck of their yacht.  They were fiercely loyal as friends, but highly volatile to be around.  A couple quick illustrations before I get into how this ties to World of Warcraft:

One of these guys - let's call him Ulrich - was an a German of unassuming appearance, gifted with an amazing charisma, and cursed with a penchant for violence.  Ulrich had a girlfriend. A very pretty girlfriend.  And one day, Ulrich found out that she's cheating.  So he learns where the guy lives, then gets a lead pipe about 2 feet long and drives over to the guy's house.  He holds the lead pipe behind his back (the way a man might hide flowers before presenting them), walks up to the door, and rings the doorbell.  Guy opens the door and says, "Hi, can I help you?" To which Ulrich responds by cracking him in the leg with the pipe.  The guy falls down and Ulrich cracks him in the other leg.  Breaks both his legs.  Turns out it was the guy's roommate.  Right house, wrong person.

Ulrich often hung around a steroid-popping fight-seeking meathead of a guy - let's call him Chris (because that's his name).  I was having drinks with them and got myself somewhat drunk.  We left the bar and I climbed into the back of the fully-restored Volkswagen 21-window Microbus that Ulrich was driving.  (I mentioned he was German, right?)  Anyway, as we're headed down the road, Chris spots a parked car that he recognizes, belonging to someone he didn't like, apparently. "STOP THE CAR!" he yells, then jumps out and head-butts the windshield, completely shattering it.  Then he jumps back in and yells, "GOGOGO!" And we took off.  I couldn't believe what I'd just seen.  Ulrich was amazed as well, but for different reasons. "Did you just smash that windshield with your head?" Ulrich asks.  The conversation then evolves into how well-designed your head is for smashing things, as long as you do it properly. And what followed was an hour spent driving around town, while the two of them took turns randomly smashing windshields with their heads.  I faked severe nausea as an excuse not to participate myself.  They must've broken 20 to 30 windshields.  I was in way over my head.  They seemed to be really having a good time, but for me it was the worst. I wanted to vomit, but not from the liquor.  All I could think is "We're all going to jail."  And I was thankful when I was finally safe in my own bed, rather than getting finger-printed and my photos taken downtown.

And now to the point of things.  I'd written yesterday in my "Price of Success" post about going from a guild that felt like family to one that really doesn't care anything at all about you - only that you can deal major pwnage.  All day yesterday after writing the post I kept thinking about the new guild, and whether I wanted to stay in it.  It reminded me much of Ulrich and Chris.  I'd accidentally found some new guildies that could deliver the goods when it came to completing content and gearing up, but the absolute nastiness and sarcasm I'd experienced from them left me with the same desire to vomit and the same sense of being in way over my head.  But I had decided to give them more time.  Maybe I just wasn't used to their humor.

So last night I logged in at the appropriate moment to join the ToC 10 team I'd signed up for.  No one spoke when I logged in.  So I just waited to see what would happen.  Time ticked by. Nothing was said in guild chat.  I guess the "GUILD MESSAGE OF THE DAY: Guild chat should be reserved for communicating important information" kept people's fingers away from their keyboards.  Finally, some brave soul - perhaps so new to the guild that he hadn't learned how wrong it is to ask a question - asks, "So when will the group invites start?"

Dead silence.

Except for Trade Chat.  Which is absolutely going NUTS with awesome LFMs:
"LFM - Need 2 DPS for Ony 10 then gtg!"
"LFM - Fresh Naxx 25 Starting, need DPS - PST with class/spec"
"LFM - Need DPS and Heals for ToC 10"

And on and on.  I'd never seen such a wonderful buffet of invitations. I was starting to break out into a cold sweat.  I wanted Naxx 25 for the Dying Curse trinket. I wanted Ony 10 for the sword. I wanted ToC 10 for... well, just because. But I'd signed up to run ToC 10 with my new guild, so I didn't try to join any of the wonderful PUG opportunities sprouting up like weeds on my lawn.

I went over to the nearest mailbox to hopefully collect auction gold, and found a very rare thing indeed: an email to me.  It was from the tank in my old friendly guild. "Check this out - I hope you're interested," it read, and gave me a link to the website of a guild I'd never heard of.  "Must be his new guild." I thought.

Finally, just as that new member's question of "So when will the group invites start?" was about to roll off the chat screen, an answer finally came.

"NEVER."

A perfect reply.  Fits exactly into the guild's policy of never answering any question in a helpful, friendly manner.  Sarcasm and nastiness are the only options.

This is a different Horde from the one I know.  This is the Horde that the Alliance hates.  And truth be told, if all of the Horde was like this, I'd faction change Morty into a Human. Better to be a Larvae-stage Undead than a member of that kind of crap.

And still no invites had come for the ToC 10 group I signed up for.  But Morty keeps his promises, so I waited.

And then my old buddy - the tank that sent me the email - sent a PST. 

"Can you join us for ToC 10? We're on Faction Champions right now."

I really wanted to join him.  He's good cow.  His wife, the healer, keeps me alive.  But I'd made a promise.  I had signed up with my guild to do ToC 10 with them.  I had to keep that promise, so I replied, "I'm signed up to run ToC 10 with my guild, but I'd rather do it with you guys."  It seemed like a kind way to say no.

But he responds, "AWESOME!" and sends me the invite.  I laughed to myself, thinking, "I guess what I wrote CAN be interpreted that way." And I clicked ACCEPT, and was immediately summoned.

I never heard a word from my new guild.  No invites failed.  No PSTs.  Between wipes on the wonder-twin Valkries, I left my new guild of nastiness and said in RAID: "I seem to be without a guild at the moment."

"We can FIX that!" came the reply, immediately followed by a guild invite which I readily accepted.  I clicked "show offline members" which revealed a roster with only 6 people or so on it.  The ToC 10 I was in was largely a PUG, and for good reason.

We wiped a good number of times, and never got Anub'arak down. We're going to pick it back up today to see if we can finish it.*  Part of me knew that the guild I'd just left would've 1-shot it without question.  But I realized I'd rather wipe continuously with friends than succeed as a nobody in an evil Horde.  Win or lose, I'm comfortable once again.

"So Judas threw the money into the temple and left..."

Mortigan the Relieved

* UPDATE: After 3 wipes, we downed Anub'aruk tonight.  Almost everyone from last night's PUG showed up.

The Price Of Success

My previous post, "The Lonely Lives Of Raid Bosses", was based largely on the realization that I had never completed any of the "long" raids: Naxxramas, Ulduar, or Trial of the Crusader.  It seems that every group I've been in for those (both PUG or Guild) just couldn't make it all the way through.  Often the group simply wasn't strong enough. A weak link somewhere would inevitably lead us to failure.  We'd get through 3 or 4 bosses, then wipe a few times, and as we begin to wipe, people would leave. And in those rare times when we WERE strong enough, people would just get tired after a few hours, and we'd all agree to "pick it back up tomorrow".  Which of course never happened.

Blizzard is an easy target to blame, since they're responsible for creating such long instances to begin with.  If it were possible to obtain keys to new sections that could be used later (much like Malygos in Eye of Eternity), it would make these instances much more achievable.  For example, I've never downed Freya - largely because it takes quite a while to even get to her (with most of my PUGs never staying together long enough to reach her), but the infrequency of fighting Freya means less knowledge and experience of how to do it right.  If we had keys where we could jump straight to Freya at the start of a new week, people would learn what to do and she'd go down just as easily as Razorscale or XT.  But ultimately, when it comes to placing blame for incomplete instances, it really rests on us players.  Almost all guilds I've been in (and certainly all PUGs) are simply not coordinated well enough to focus on content completion.  Maybe they've already done it and I'm just late to the game.  Maybe they already have the loot they want, and simply don't care to put in the effort to slog all the way through.  I don't know.  But I find that I've done plenty of the early bosses, and few of the later bosses.  Hence my previous post.

Things are different in the new guild.  As I've mentioned before, I went from a small guild that focused  as much on our friendships as game content to a guild that seems to be all about raid pwnage.  The new guild is large and extremely well geared.  People know the fights.  Seeing them in action is like watching a sausage grinder - whatever meat gets in the way comes out hamburger on the other side.  I witnessed this in all its glory and splendor last night.  Just to get warmed up, we 1-shot Onyxia 25.  We got through ToC 25 with only one wipe on Anub'arak. Everything else in there was 1-shot as well.  I picked up a Trophy of the Crusade and a ton of Triumph Emblems.  It was thrilling - and humbling. I was middle to low-middle on DPS all the way through.  It didn't matter if I was doing 3K or 5K, others were doing more.  And that can be expected I guess when a rather new-to-raiding toon like Mortigan joins a major raid guild.  But success does seem to come with a price.

The warmth and kindness I'd experienced in my old small guild seems to be absent from this one.  With the old guild, there were always sincere greetings anytime a member logged on, and plenty of friendly, thoughtful chat - often on a personal level: "How's your wife? Is she feeling better?" It felt like family.

The new guild isn't family.  It's military.  It's business.  Just show up, be ready to play, and do it right.  Don't ask stupid questions... stupid questions like "How are the invites for raids done?" which an old buddy also new to this guild asked last night.  The replies, which I quickly blocked from my mind (but should have retained for blogging purposes), were nasty and sarcastic. I whispered to him about my concerns - raid success vs. attitude.  Though our conversation that followed, we basically agreed that we should give the guild time.  Maybe they're just joking around and we aren't used to this type of humor/abuse.  Maybe we'll get numb to it and not care.  Right now I care.  Right now I debate whether it's worth weathering the crude, often vulgar guild chat in order to be in a successful raid guild.  Can I be bought with a Trophy of the Crusade and a pile of Triumph Emblems? Apparently so - at least for now.  I guess we'll see how well this Judas likes his silver.

Mortigan the Mercenary

The Lonely Lives of End Bosses

Every Monday, in the early morning hours, long after the denizens of Azeroth are asleep in their inns, three lonely creatures huddle around a table in the far corner of a nameless tavern.  Heavy enchantments protect them from being noticed.  A Charm spell keeps the bartender's mouth shut and the drinks flowing.  It's been another long, sad week, and these three are in dire need of each other's company.

"So, Yogg, what's new? Anything?" Kel'Thuzad asks.

"No," sighs Yogg-Saron.  "Nobody - and I mean NOBODY - has come to see me in a month.  Flame Leviathan is always having parties though - the dang BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! from his room never stops.  Ignis keeps a few Allies on the Barbie, and XT is always squealing about his new toys, but me? I get nothing."

Anub'arak nods knowingly at Yogg. "And Freya? How's that coming?"

"Oh, we have tea occasionally." Replies Yogg. "But no spark really. She's always stoned out of her mind on those dang mushrooms, anyway. Intelligent conversation is OUT. I'm getting nowhere."

"I feel you." Replies Anub, and takes a long drink of his beer.

"What about you, Anub? I hear your house is party central these days." Kel asks.

"Oh, sure, sure. Party day and night - for Gormac and the Worms! Me? Not so much."

"That's the same problem I've been having." replies Kel. "Don't say anything, guys, but I've been thinking about laying off some people."

"Really? Is it that bad?" Anub asks.

"Yeah. That bad." Says Kel. "I'm thinking about getting rid of the whole Military Quarter.  There's just not enough work for them.  People show up, sure.  But they hang out with the Spiders and Constructs, then leave. I'm scaling back. Just not sure how to break it to them."

"And surely General Vezax knows it's about time to retire, too." Says Anub.

"Yeah, he's got that little place picked out in Westfall, but I think it's really going to crush his spirit to go back to farming now.  He thinks he still has a few more good years in him." Responds Yogg.

This is conversation that gets repeated every Monday night.  It's a desperate loneliness that drives these three together.  No one else understand their unique plight.  Except one, maybe...

"You invited Arthas again, right?" Asks Yogg.

"Yeah, but you know how he is." Responds Kel. "He's got all those guest-appearances to do. Poor guy. If I was him, I'd just fire Sorrowgrave and throw some extra constructs in there or something. Transforming Sorrowgrave 400 times a day is WAY too much work for one man."

Anub's eyes start to glitter:  "You know, one night when he's not so busy, we should all get together, pop into Dalaran and just BUTCHER them all! Wouldn't that be AWESOME?! We could ROCK THAT PLACE!!!"

"Sure, sure." Respond Yogg and Kel. "We always talk about it, but it never happens. And you know why?  Do you know how many complaints we'd get?  The rules were very clear: We can party it up all we want, BUT ONLY AT OUR OWN HOUSES.  Anywhere else, and it's OVER.  Blizz was very clear on the matter."

They all let out a long, slow sigh.

And so the three return to their beers, and drink in silence for the remainder of the night.  And just before the servers reset, three lonely shapes make their way back home through the trackless snow.