The Burning Crusade -- you vs. your guild
by Paul Sherrard 
Dec 22nd 2006 at 12:16PM
New races, new (to your chosen faction) classes, 10 more levels. That's the short-form of what The Burning Crusade is going to deliver to us, come January 16th. Many guilds are focusing on the push to 70 and refining strategies for 25-man raiding. Many players are understandably eager to try out the new races and classes available to their chosen faction. Can these two goals mesh, or are we going to see a shift in the player-guild dynamic?
My earliest guild wasn't started to beat endgame content. It was there for a group of people who enjoyed playing in each other's company and so that these people would have an easily accessible pool of resources for leveling and grinding up to 60. When we hit 60, the usual drama set in, as not everyone hit the level cap at the same time. Some people got bored or frustrated with the lack of progression at 60 and went off to look for raiding guilds. Others were happy just hanging out with friends, and still others were a bit upset that they were left behind and were feeling pressured to level to 60 so the guild could progress together.
Now that the expansion is going to be upon us, I see the potential for the same type of splits amongst guild memberships. Some are going to want to power level to 70 to get back on the raiding wagon, while others will start fresh new characters that they hope to one day get to level 70. Then there are those people who want to savor the new content and while do a bit of leveling and a bit of playing around with the new low-level content.
There have been discussions in the guilds I'm in. There's still 40-man content to be beaten, but could we do it better with a few shaman along? Who gets one of the coveted 25-man spots, and will we reserve spaces for those leveling up Draenei? Will the guilds even survive the expansion, or are people being lured to the opposite faction or the idea of changing your main character to a new class? These questions have come up a lot, and I'm not sure there are solid answers yet. A guild has to have goals, but it has to have membership that works towards those goals. With so many options in The Burning Crusade, I have to be concerned as to how the people I play with want to proceed.
Where do you sit? Have you thought about what you want vs. the goals of your guild? Has there already been discussion in your guild about what to do when the expansion is released? I'm curious to know if guilds still see the endgame as the real game, or if there's an appreciation for the new content as a whole. Sound off below.
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Virtual selves, Guilds, Expansions, Raiding
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
kerni Dec 22nd 2006 12:33PM
"New races, new classes..."
What new classes?
Donner Dec 22nd 2006 12:33PM
Well I have a feeling my guild will be just fine after all weve been during EQ 9 years and going strong.
Crimson Alliance!
Oh our guild Brithday day is Christmas Eve.
Paul Sherrard Dec 22nd 2006 12:44PM
Kerni - I was referring to the fact that horde and alliance get a class that was unavailable to them prior to the expansion. Paladins are new to the horde and shaman are new to the alliance.
Tim Engelbart Dec 22nd 2006 1:04PM
There is always bound to be a drama in guilds, so a little more because of TBC's release isn't going to make a big impact on the Wow-society.
hamsammich Dec 22nd 2006 1:55PM
I think maybe some minor ripples will be apparent in our guild, but overall, we'll prosper and take on the higher raid instances just like we do now.
Having said that, however, I can attest to some current "differences" that might cause some strife. There are two camps of people in our guild, and, with any other guild I've been a part of.
The one camp believes that if you're not already level 60 and not raiding, they don't have time for you. The other group are the lower level players, or even alts of those who already have one or more raiding 60 characters, who need help leveling their shiny, new alt/character to be ABLE to raid with the big boys, but can't get any help to do so.
Not sure how that will all unfold...
Prauche Dec 22nd 2006 1:10PM
The problem I think most people have with the statement "new classes" is that if you REALLY wanted to play a Shaman or a Pally, you've done it. Faction wouldn't stop someone who truly wanted to play a class. Therefore, there are no new classes in TBC.
Noroth Dec 22nd 2006 1:11PM
Back when I first started playing WoW 2 years ago, 5 friends and I all started together on the Horde. Since then 2 of them left, one went Gnome on us, and I just finished helping getting the last up to 60 earlier today. That last one and I will be starting new Draenei characters on the server with our Gnome friend and sort of reliving a small amount of what fun we had back when we first started playing, now using our previous mains as alts.
Overall I think out of the player inclined to make alts and level up new characters, and this is from just a moderate amount of time in the beta, that many Horde players will be rolling Draenei and many Alliance players Blood Elves. The general style or feel of those races is more to the other faction, no matter how much their lore says otherwise. Of course, in the more hardcore guilds you'll have members making alts of the new races within their normal faction in order to get new classes into their raides and open up new strategies.
Bunkai Dec 22nd 2006 1:10PM
Our guild started as a small group of friends that migrated from another server because of guild raiding politics. We formed up with the specific goal of being a PvP guild (PvP server) and all happily leveled to 60 together. We didn't all get there at the same time, but we did all get there.
Along the way, our guild grew naturally as we formed bonds with other PvPers and eventually we spawned some HWLs. After a few months of PvPing, we decided that it was time to try our hand at raid content, and went from doing no raids at all to downing Hakkar in just under 3 weeks.
We've added new members for the raiding and have continued to add members for PvP. There has been a small amount of drama at times, and members have come and gone for their own reasons. I think that there will always be some amount of turnover because you can't please everyone all the time, but the one thing that I'm sure of, is that the group that we call "The Core" will always be together as long as we're playing WoW.
p.s. We are all planning on leveling our current mains to 70 AND rolling new toons to experience all the new lowbie content.
It's a game, and everything we do is in the name of fun, not in the name of loot and/or reaching the max level. Those are just the added bonuses of playing the game well.
AcidCat Dec 22nd 2006 1:29PM
One of the benefits of being a player who doesn't raid, is that I'm in guilds that are not raid-focused. It's night and day between this attitude and and endgame raiding guild. There's no expectations, no competition for raid spots, no speccing a certain way to fit in - basically you play the game exactly how you want to - I can PvP when I want, level an alt when I want, or just hang out and RP when I want - and that's what everyone else does too.
Frankly, I can't imagine playing any other way.
John Dec 23rd 2006 11:07AM
"5. The problem I think most people have with the statement "new classes" is that if you REALLY wanted to play a Shaman or a Pally, you've done it. Faction wouldn't stop someone who truly wanted to play a class. Therefore, there are no new classes in TBC.
Posted at 1:09PM on Dec 22nd 2006 by Prauche"
Actually I am a old time AD&D player I have always played Paladins and haven't rolled one in WoW due to the faction. I will not play a human or stinky dwarf so Pallys have been unattainable. Can't wait for BC so I can roll a BE Pally.
Tibbsy Dec 22nd 2006 10:21PM
I was talking to a friend of mine who has been happily playing a full resto druid for a while now. He was just let go from his guild (or rather, both parties agreed that it was better for him to leave) because he couldn't commit to the raiding schedule. You know, he has a life. He didn't want to be expected to show up Friday nights, Saturday nights and all of Sunday. To me, he represents the vast majority of players - we play casually. He remarked, "I just want to run a high-level instance now and then - like Stratholme or Scholo. What's wrong with that?"
We were talking about what we would be doing when the expansion came out, and we both agreed that we enjoyed leveling characters as much as, or even more than, being 60. Don't get me wrong! I love seeing new content, and I love the challenge and thrill of being in a group and accomplishing more than the sum of the parts ever could. I've been doing the Tier 0.5 quest chain, and when my friends and I accomplished the 45 min Baron run (all of us are in pre-raid gear) it defeinitely felt good! But I also love the fact that I can play by my own schedule with friends that play by their own, occasionally run an instance, and schedule stuff when we want to. And I also really like the feeling of getting those low-level greens and being like "zomg phat lewtz!" as opposed to seeing blues and even epics drop and saying "not good enough for me to pay DKP for ..."
I've played Alliance and only Alliance since I started. I'm very excited to be leveling from the other side. I'll still come back and level my 60s of course. I'm just in no rush for it.
Bodah Dec 22nd 2006 3:01PM
I think our guild's going to have it better. We're an end-game guild, but have trouble filling out 40-mans out of our own members. With the reduced size of raids, we'll be able to do them without asking for help.
Ralex Dec 22nd 2006 5:18PM
I think there will be a number of guilds in the same situation as #10's. They didn't quite have enough regular players to field 40, but 25 shouldn't be a problem.
Our guild can regularly field 40, has downed 7 of the Naxx bosses, and will likely end up shrinking a bit a while into BC.
Paul, don't kid yourself, the current 40 man instances become tourist destinations only, ala California gold rush towns, on BC release. No one will go there again except for the occasional "how few of us does it take to kill Rag" experiments.
And at BC release there is only 1 Onyxia like encounter that takes 25 as far as I know [Magtherion?]. Kharazan, the "end game" at BC release is a 10 man instance with a 1 week reset timer. Until more instances get released, there really won't even be a whole lot of "25 man" time to put in.
Yendi Dec 22nd 2006 9:13PM
Well on my server BC has been screwing us up for months now. Who wants to goto BWL etc when if you wait a bit there will be greens with better stats ripe for the picking. My now defunct MC/ZG/AQ20 guild couldn't get enough people to stick it out and progress through BWL because of that attitude and a bunch of my friends in 2 different Nax guilds say they're having the same probs. I finally got to see Nef in person this week because one of those guilds had to pug the last bit of BWL.
This game is good in large part because of the social aspects of guilds and progressing together, it makes it a team sport like Baseball and all the friends and beer that go with that :). Blizz has really messed that part up for a lot of us.
I hope things settle out OK and the new content is worth it.
Avonturier Dec 23rd 2006 4:49AM
Besides those who'll want to level 60-70 and the ones who'll want to play Dranei/Bloodelf, there's a third group; the people (like me) who aren't going to buy the expansion. I will keep playing WoW, but I might consider moving to a non-BC guild.
hinu Dec 24th 2006 8:29PM
The guild I'm in suffered from having a few level 60s (who power levelled) with nothing to do, while waiting for the remaining casual members to level up and get to 60. Mind you, this was because back then, the server just started up.
Yes, we're a casual guild and people actually don't mind playing aspects of the game that does not involve raiding. Such as PvP, dueling outside Orgrimmar, farming some higher level instances. Even when we had enough level 60s for raiding, our raid schedule is somewhat casual and everyone is happy because we get loot and get to keep our family lives intact.
I believe that when people start putting loot first before friendship with your guildies, things will always be rocky.