Breakfast Topic: The great Kara divide
by Dan O'Halloran 
Feb 2nd 2008 at 8:00AM
Blogger Amava is having a bit of a crisis in his guild. They have just hit Karazhan and the question of who gets in on the 10-man team and who sits out destined to spend the evening begging for a pick up group in Shatt has caused much drama. Amava knows that they have to recruit more healers to make multiple Kara teams, but that will take time. Until then, the core group will have to learn the raid, then rotate in others.
But who gets in on the rotation? As Amava put it "simply possessing the Master's Key does not mean you are ready." Standards have to be set, but they, of course, fall only on dps as healers and tanks are going to get in on every run, more or less.
Has you guild hit this split? How did they handle it to keep everyone happy, but not coddle the inept? Is Amava's solution the best? Gear checks FTW?
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Breakfast Topics, Raiding
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
medelina Feb 2nd 2008 8:19AM
What's the date today?
Dmoki Feb 2nd 2008 8:20AM
We currently have two Kara groups and are having to create a third, currently alot of people who would be in group c are leaving because there not getting a spot. We try to rotate the groups around but this often leads to problems with other people getting left out, we also cant really start 25 mans until we get a third group so were pretty much at a standstill in terms of progression because we cant get passed Kara and the first two ZA bosses.
Tridus Feb 2nd 2008 8:21AM
We didn't have a "kara team." Our goal was to get everybody in at some point, so if you met the gear standards and didn't go one week, you would have priority to go the next.
Sure it slows progress a bit, but people not having fun and leaving slows it down even more.
Dipstick Feb 2nd 2008 8:33AM
Ok, so you make 2 groups, from between 20-30 people.
1st raid is great. Group clears to Curator, Group 2 clears to Aran.
2nd night, group 1 continues to clear the instance. However random person x from group 2 is unable to make it the second night. Random person x also happens to be the raidleader/maintank/mainhealer. Group 2 can't raid. People from group 1 can't join because they're locked to their instance. Group 2 whines. Drama ensues.
10 man raids are great, don't get me wrong, but they really mess up guild organisation. I'm glad they're making Naxx the 'entry level' instance along with possibly some other 10 man instances in WotLK.
theRaptor Feb 2nd 2008 8:51AM
10 mans got put in because people whined that the real reason they failed at wow was because it was too hard to get 40 (or even 20) people together. When they make a 25 man "entry level" raid in WotLK these same people will whine that it is too hard to get 25 people together. They need to make 10 mans completely separate from the raid progression or just remove them all together (or maybe make a new UBRS, a 10 man without a raid timer).
Personally I think people that display less organizational capacity then the average football club should just stick to five mans. You aren't going to beat SSC and TK if you can't resolve this issue anyway.
George M. Feb 2nd 2008 10:08AM
Not true. 10-man raiding is essential for PvE Progression. There is no slacking in 10 man raids. Every person is accountable. A retuning of the trash-mob in SSC may make 25-man raiding more enjoyable not easier.
dan Feb 2nd 2008 12:57PM
Blizz should make two raiding paths:
* 10 man (casual) and (20)25 man (hardcore)
* Each path should have it's own progression
* Each path should get it's instances released at the same time not this afterthought bs like za and zg have been
* Conceptually they could have linked but different storylines so the 10man raids at least seem to have some impact and relevancy to the overall storyline (the larger raid fights the uber boss while the smaller raid fights some key underling, weakens the defenses, something)
theRaptor Feb 2nd 2008 6:27PM
@ 6
Well obviously they aren't essential as they barely existed pre-BC. My guild has done kara with only two healers, and has also eight manned all the bosses (normally the top three DPSers are doing nearly all the damage). So slack certainly exists.
Snailking Feb 2nd 2008 8:36AM
I quit my guild because the "in club" went to kara even though I was the only priest on at the time. I don't expect a spot every day, but they needed a healer, I was the only priest, and they'd rather get a shaman or something from their "inner circle". I thought "well why am I in this guild, then?" Life's to short to screw around with ppl like that.
Matt Feb 2nd 2008 8:40AM
The guild i am in has 2 kara groups, signup is done on forums and its pretty much first come first serve. From experience i have found that youll get the odd person who leaves early or doesn't turn up, in which case someone else from the guild fills in - works quite well
dan Feb 2nd 2008 12:57PM
First come, first served within reason I hope. Gear standards and class balance have to factor otherwise you're simply inviting people into a wipefest and that's just gonna make other drama for you.
Mats Feb 2nd 2008 8:44AM
If you can only fill 1 or 2 teams, the people who are going to make most progress should fill those teams (team 1 before team 2)
When progress has been made, rotate around he people so that expertise can flow into the other groups as well. Also, gear does not mean you are ready. You can be 70, have lots of quest gear, and some arena epics, and still not out dps the tank. If this is the case, that person should be told to ask for help in upping his DPS, and not be allowed back in untill he can prove that he knows what he is doing.
Bloodchills Feb 2nd 2008 8:49AM
A guild I was in a while ago had this issue. They had two Kara teams, and one was moderately experienced and the other was totally inexperienced.
The experienced team took all of the best players and the inexperienced team lacked the direction to get the job done. It's always better to split the best players among the newest players so that some level of competence exists in both teams and not just one.
I remember wiping on Curator for a week, and the mood of the guild was that we would keep wiping until we all understood the fight better, but that wasn't possible due to the lack of knowledgeable direction.
So one night this other guild invited me to their Kara, and we cleared the whole thing.
The barriers in World of Warcraft exist only if you are insane and actually enjoy repeating the same failure. Just think of a sane solution, and things will loosen up. If your guildmaster doesn't understand the way that raids should work, other guilds exist.
Bloodchills Feb 2nd 2008 8:53AM
Just to make this clear, the core team would consist of about 25 of the guilds best players. They would each save to the instance doing a boss, and then sub out.
The other team consisted of about 20 of the worst possible players. I was part of that team and could not help the others to improve because many of them would not listen, and not being an officer I didn't have the right to voice an opinion about strats.
My point is, don't let loyalty blind you. This is a game that is supposed to be fun, yet unlike other games and other organized sports -- you can actually pick which team you sign up with if you play your cards right.
Look at the guilds progression. Even uber guilds have alt kara runs, so who knows, even at this point you could be geared fairly quickly in the right guild and maybe even get into the Black Temple sometime in 2008.
Lucas Feb 2nd 2008 8:58AM
Lol@karagearchecks.
People who whine about getting in should be grinding PvP for weapons and vindicator gear, and then sunwell when it comes out. By doing this my gear is almost at a level where I can completely skip Karazhan.
Lucas Feb 2nd 2008 9:03AM
Woops forgot something.
In addition Kara can be done with mid sixties blues if you choose them properly.
Matt Feb 2nd 2008 9:01AM
This Karazhan, it is serious business, yes?
Lucas Feb 2nd 2008 9:08AM
No
Foxfyr Feb 2nd 2008 9:28AM
@12 and 14
These statements are only true if you have stronger, smarter, and more generous players to drag you through.
Finnicks Feb 2nd 2008 1:54PM
People on this site really need to learn that using "@#" to reply to a comment doesn't work anymore, because as soon as someone does an actual reply to an earlier comment the numbers will be offset and your number reference will be WRONG.