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by Elizabeth Wachowski 
Aug 20th 2007 at 3:00PM
Long, long ago, when dinosaurs roamed Azeroth and barely anyone I knew had their epic mount, we used to argue about what would happen if the tiger mount dropped in ZG. This was back when the epic mounts themselves were the expensive part, not the training. There were two different schools of thought on the subject. There were some who thought that people without an epic mount should get first dibs, as it would essentially be only a cosmetic upgrade for people who had their epics. The other people thought that epic mount-holders shouldn't be prevented from rolling on a rare, awesome thing just because they had taken the time to farm for their epic. This argument largely died when the cost of mount training became the expensive thing. Or did it?
Recently, a guild on my server killed Kael'thas and received the Ashes of Al'ar, also known as the phoenix mount. The guild leader/master looter linked all the loot, said that they would discuss the phoenix mount later ... and after the rest of the loot was handed out, proceeded to masterloot it to himself. A few officers of the guild defended his actions by saying that some officers had encouraged him to take it, which somewhat neglects the fact that this guild runs on DKP instead of officer loot, and that running a guild is a tough job that deserves some extra recognition.
This has prompted a spirited discussion about what to do when ultra-rare mounts drop. There seems to be five options here: masterlooting it to yourself, having everyone roll, having everyone with 300 skill roll, bidding DKP, or having everyone with 300 skill bid DKP. Most people I've talked to seem to think that masterlooting it to yourself is a cheap option, but are undecided as to whether you should have to have 300 riding skill to roll.
Personally, I think that this would be an excellent opportunity to use a bidding DKP system, even if you have fixed DKP values (like my guild does) because it's hard to assign worth to a cosmetic upgrade. That way, people who really, really want a phoenix mount can blow all their DKP to get it. What do you think guilds should do about rare mount drops? Is it really a ninja if the masterlooter takes something? Should guild/raid leaders get some sort of bonus when it comes to loot distribution?
Edited to add: Uxorious and Chad are not the same person.The GM of this guild is a good person, and I personally do not believe he's a "ninja" in the classic definition, of maliciously taking an item. Officers from the guild in question have said in the comments that they were unprepared for the mount to drop and, in the confusion, they encouraged the leader to take it.
Reader Comments (Page 3 of 6)
Zor Aug 20th 2007 4:50PM
WoW....guilds like this make pugs look great.
although.....Anger would not have appeared.
more like getting even is my cup of tea.
'hey GL, can i borrow some money for MY mount now?'
next day
/gquit
Stephen Aug 20th 2007 4:52PM
I have served as an officer in a guild in the past and personally I think the biggest mistake that you guys made was not having any transparancy in your decision making process. I think it is ok that the GM got it (make sense to me) and you are right that running a guild is a thankless job, but #1 you should have said flat-out, in advance, that "if this drops, he gets it" or (since it was already too late for that) #2 just say in the raid channel "the officers think that the GM should have it, what does everybody think? Should we give it to him or just have a roll-off?" and call for a raid vote. You may have been surprised at how many people would have gone along with it.
chad Aug 20th 2007 5:11PM
@38 interesting idea. had we thought of it, we might have done that. our mt is a badass and never bitches. that would have been fitting. next one, maybe =D
@40 fair point. The *only* problem with that approach (what we tried to avoid) was the voice of the dissent causing us to waste 30 minutes debating. I think there would have been about 3 people that would fight for quite a while. There should have been a written policy, one way or the other, and for that we're all quite sad/mad-at-ourselves and have all apologized in our private guild forum.
@critics Meh. It's a well-run guild with good loot rules, good raid-invite rules, well thought out policies that we stick to. We dropped the ball a little on this one, but we all feel we made the right choice given circumstances. Like I said, keep the hate flowing, I don't mind. In guild, only 2 people are even a little miffed. I don't think they'll quit, though I'd hate to see it if they do. Everyone else supports the decision. So w/e. I guess enjoy your "mature" guilds. I'll go back to enjoying my "immature" one.
Shippy Aug 20th 2007 5:21PM
@41 of course *you* will because you're an officer. duh.
The circumstances? the circumstances was a "epeen" loot dropped and you decided to keep it with your friends, not all the people that helped you get it.
it was 845 at night.. not 443am...and the loot was about to disappear...
I'm glad your backtracking a little at least.
I'm going to start a guild the loot rules are "officers get what they want, everyone else can DKP things officers don't want" want to join if you can't be an officer?
-
Earie Aug 20th 2007 5:29PM
We actually had a pheonix mount drop about 2 weeks ago for my guild and unfortunately the guildleader wasn't in the raid at the time (one of the few times he wasn't ;_;) so the way we had done it at the time was just let everyone with the 300 riding skill roll. Of course this turned out rather badly and the person who won still was charged a set amount of DKP but if the mount does drop again for us, that's not how it's going to be given out again. lol I had some pathetic 30 something roll too. Boo.
Dyvina Aug 20th 2007 5:35PM
This guild's officers are a bunch of epeen ninjas...anyone who raids FOR them will only ever see table scraps. Get out while you can. I'd be embarrassed if I was that GM...if he truely didnt want it then he should delete it now and prove it to his guild after he screwed them.
Drain Aug 20th 2007 5:39PM
This one is for all of you mother fuckers whining, "I'd /gquit."
In MC I saw 3 Hands of Rag come into our guild's possesion and I saw 3 Hands of Rag stab us in the back and piss on our guild's name. Our GL was a priest so he couldn't use the hammer and our MTs never had enough DKP after buying their armor and tank weapons. we used DKP to be "fair" so DPS warriors and a shaman always got this weapon. I summoned one shaman to the bottom of Hyjal and said, "Hard to swim with that hammer huh?"
Our GL was a selfless man who always defaulted loot to other people. He never got any unique items as a token of thanks for putting up with our ENDLESS drama, updating DKP, leading raids, admining the forum, paying for vent, paying domain fees, scheduling raids, training officers, etc...
So you all can take your self righteous "fairness" and shove it right up your asses. I WISH we could have given our GL SOMETHING half as cool as this to say thanks to him. If I could do it over again, I'd have deleted those hammers the second they dropped.
Thanks for all the hard work Gamover, you were awesome.
TotalBiscuit Aug 20th 2007 5:52PM
@44 - And what incredible insight are you using to make that kind of judgment? I see people bawl their eyes out about just how 'elitist' 'loot-hungry' 'no-life' etc etc ad infinitum raiding guilds are, but if posters like Dyvina are the one's making the criticisms then I don't think raiders have anything to worry about. Any guild that kills Al'Ar is in the top 5% of raiders (source : wowjutsu.com) and a lot of you really do NOT know what it's like to raid at that level, nor the guild dynamics surrounding this kind of thing.
If anything, the fact that none of chad's guild-members have quit demonstrates that they are mature enough to get past what is effectively, nothing more than a pretty accessory, and get back to the task at hand, which is beating new encounters and getting loot that actually matters.
So can you leave the Righteous Indignation to Bucky'O'Hare and maybe spend some time trying to get to that level yourselves, rather than bitching about an officer's council decision about a mount most of you will never progress far enough to see? Geez.. some of you lot remind me of celebrity opinion columnists..
TB.
travipoo Aug 20th 2007 6:00PM
HE is a Ninja Plain and simple as IMO are the officers everyone there should have known what was going on but the officers and GM I guess feel there Guild mates contributions to raids are meaningless and don't even deserve to know what is going on and if that is how your guild operates your regime of dictators should be Overthrown!!!!!!
Jackson Aug 20th 2007 6:40PM
I am glad the guild leader was given the epic mount. It is a good advertisement for the guild. It's a small token of appreciation for the leader.
I laugh at all the dopes and know-nothings who whine and bitch, "I would have /gquit," or "ninja" or "epeen whores." You know nothing about running a raiding guild, especially one that is at the top of its game. These are the same players who contribute nothing to a raid, other than hitting the "login" button and waiting for their summon to the instance -- yet expect first dibs on everything that drops. You can just smell the jealousy of these haters as they drop their hypcritical "epeen whore" comments. I say to each one of you: you'll never see that mount, or anything comparable. Competent guilds don't want you. Dedicated guild leaders don't want you. Quit the game, because no one cares if you do.
Leading a guild of raiders is a thankless job. Stressful. Most people don't want to do it. Just keeping on top of your /whisper channel with myriad whiny players is a job unto itself. A job you know nothing about. Nothing.
This was the right decision. Better that the mount went to the guildleader than some raiding noob who got lucky with a high /roll. A few whiners don't like it? Too damn bad. Quit the guild, quit the game, cast your aspersions. No one cares.
Congratulations guild leader.
exit stencil Aug 20th 2007 6:49PM
only one fair way to distribute rare mounts. /roll 25.
Dabura Aug 20th 2007 7:14PM
@48 I somehow think u wont see the mount either, since u sound like some pre-kara noob who gets a boner just looking at loot like this u fucking nub, and to all those who said the mount drops of Al'ar learn to fucking read the article even says its drops off KAEL'THAS.
klink-o Aug 20th 2007 7:56PM
There is no I in team, and that's exactly what this is.
rick gregory Aug 20th 2007 8:04PM
Chad,
Depends on what the rest of the raid felt. But having the officers go private and talk about this was a mistake and you know it. You don't need to involve the whole guild, but you SHOULD have involved the raid. You could easily have said "hey, we talked among ourselves and feel that the GL should get the mount for getting us here." If the GL was well liked and deserved it, most would agree . But the GL doesn't deserve the rare drop just because he's nice or because he's the GL. He MAY deserve it for all of the work he's done... but going behind people's back in a private channel when EVERYONE there helped down the boss isn't a good idea.
Replex Aug 20th 2007 8:06PM
If you are in a DKP guild, it should have been rolled on. Would have been a gquit on the spot for me, everyone lays down their own gold and money for flasks, pots and repair bills to down a boss. Should have been no bias, it is a raid effor to down the boss, not the effort of a few.
Ingaverson Aug 21st 2007 9:58AM
Got a good story here.
So we're preparing for kara and have too many tanks and not enough healers. Our prot pala tank suggests he could log onto his brothers priest account (usually our main healer) just for this one run. Go for it, we say looking forward to the shackles and super healing.
So off we go and for the first time when we kill Attumen the Midnight mount drops. As raid lead and ML I felt the only fair thing to do was ask everyone to roll. Needless to say the priest won with a 100 :)
His brother was rather happy to say the least.
Kryptonls Aug 20th 2007 10:45PM
@24:
" Oh sure, the GM probably could come up with a few different reasons as to why he "deserved" it. Lame excuses like, "GM is a difficult job," but come on. It's not that difficult. It's definitely not difficult enough to warrant being a jerk and stealing loot from your guidmates. He simply wanted a cool drop and took it. Like the ninja that he is. "
That is a lie and you know it. Please, go and create a new guild on your realm, and if you've not downed Kael and Illidan by next weekend, then you've failed the task. Being a GM is damn hard, so using this as an excuse to 'support' your view on this subject is pathetic.
@31: If that's what the Officers decided then well done GM and he therefore deserved it. Had there been no discussion at all or some sort of outcry in /ra then you'd know something was wrong. I reckon that 90%+ present in that raid would have supported this move. Congrats to him, again ;)
RJ Aug 21st 2007 10:00AM
It was Master Looted with 0 discussion with the GUILD. Chatting amongst officers is a cheap thing to do. There is a time and place to speak privately in O-Chat. That wasn't one of them in my opinion. I would have quit right there. It's cool it dropped but I say everyone worked to get to that point and they all deserved a chance at it. Grats on the drop. I won't call him a ninja, but all the officers should have left Officer areas and included the whole guild in it. That is what irks me with a lot of guilds.
Jabouty Aug 21st 2007 12:33AM
Forgive me.
I suddenly felt a disturbance in the force. As if close to two dozen people suddenly cried out and /gquit together...
Elizabeth Wachowski Aug 21st 2007 12:50AM
Chad, I know your guild leader is a good person, and rest assured I'm not personally attacking him, nor do I consider this a "ninja" -- more of an unfortunate spur-of-the-moment loot decision. Except for the title, which I mostly did for the pun factor. I merely thought the situation surrounding this would lead to a good discussion, as it did with the Al'ar/SC/Vendetta thing a few months ago. If nothing else, the recent guild drama on our server has certainly brought up some interesting issues.