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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsOfficers' Quarters: Critical mass
by Scott Andrews 
Jul 27th 2009 at 11:00AM
Every Monday Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership.How many members should your raiding guild have? It's a simple question with a complex answer. This week, one reader wonders whether his guild simply has too many people.
Hi, Scott.
I'd like to first mention that I'm a big fan of your column, Officers' Quarters. Rock on! And today, I'd like to ask you for advice on the problem that my guild is facing.
I'm a member of a raiding guild, one that hovers just below the best guilds of our realm. We have cleared 10man Ulduar, and I was lucky enough be there as I'm a member of our 10man progression team, which is now doing hard modes. Our 25man . . . well, thats where the problem comes in. Back in May, we didn't have enough strong players to really progress past antechamber. Then things started coming up for our raiders -- we couldn't do a 25man guild run for whole 3 weeks in May-June due to lack of people!
So our officers aggressively recruited people, some of them geared members of a reputable guild that recently went down and some of them friends transferred in from other servers, and our new recruits recommended us with their friends who were also exceptional players. After 3 weeks of no 25man progression, we found ourselves with just under 40 people online for our raid night.
Of 40 confident individuals officers selected 25, and on that night we made amazing progression. Some original guild members voiced concern as they felt that we have way too many raiders and there was bound to be problem arising around raid spots, but officers said the more raiders we have at our disposal, the better.
We started making very fast progression through 25man Ulduar, but at the same time raiders (both old and new) started to leave the guild. Some left and formed a 10man raiding guild of their own, some left and joined guilds that have 25man Yogg on farm, some joined guild that are still working on siege of Ulduar. But there are still too many people as officers accepted more raiders into the guild -- we had 45 people online for our raid today, and when the officer announced that selection of 25 people was over, a lot of angry messages filled the guild chat channel.
A lot of people are angry, and we can see the divide among those that get chosen every week and those that stay on waiting list for 4 hours every night. If this continues, I dare say that we'll have half the guild break up and form another one. What should our officers do?
--S
Thanks for writing, S. It's amazing that your guild is able to recruit so many people. The complaint I'm hearing from most officers is that there just aren't enough competent people to recruit these days. I guess all those players are on your server!
The question, however, is not how you're able to recruit so many, but should you? I don't think "the more, the merrier" is necessarily true for a raiding guild. The problem is this: You can only keep so many players happy at one time.
It's an issue that nearly all officers have to deal with. You want enough people to fill your raid slots for every scheduled run without spending too much effort to scrounge up enough players. But once those people stop showing up, because of school or family or summer, you have no choice but to replace them. You recruit so that you can fill the slots again. Then those people come back and want their raid slot.
It's a problem for nonofficers, too, because ideally you should be able to take a few weeks to sort out some real-life situations without losing your slot. If your guild recruits too aggressively, like S's guild, then you become paranoid that any absence will mean you never get to raid again. That's not a great situation, either.
Raiding guilds have a critical mass. In science, a "critical mass" is the minimum amount of material needed to maintain a nuclear reaction. For a nuclear bomb, if you don't have enough mass, you won't be able to start the reaction. Likewise, with too few players, you won't be able to raid.
But if you have too much mass, the bomb detonates before you want it to. In the case of S's guild, the critical mass has been exceeded. You've got a sustained chain reaction -- you're raiding every night -- but the bomb seems to be blowing up in everyone's face. As a result, a lot of unhappy people are leaving the guild.
The critical mass for a raiding guild depends on a number of factors.
- How often does your guild raid?
- How many players come to just about every raid?
- How many players come to 50% of the raids or less?
- How many players will need to take long or frequent breaks from WoW due to real-life commitments?
- How many players need to be carried by other players in order for the raid to make progress?
If you have too many people, those same players are probably going to be on the short list of players who don't get taken to raids. As a result, they may become disgruntled and leave the guild.
Either way, the officers have to guide the guild toward that critical mass. For this particular guild, the officers seem hellbent on recruiting at any cost. It makes their lives easier, because they can handpick the cream of the crop every night. They never have to worry about whether a raid will happen. And their raids will be tremendously successful, which often leads to better recruiting. They may eventually realize that the drama they're causing isn't worth the convenience. Or they may just be trying to filter out the very best players and let the rest quit.
It's hard to say what their game plan is at this point. So the best thing you can do is to have a talk with them about it. Ask what their plans are for the guild moving forward. If you're concerned about your own slot, ask whether you will be taken to future raids. If you don't like the answers, as a nonofficer, the only thing you can do is start looking for another guild.
If your officers wanted my advice (and I assume they don't, since it's you asking and not them), I'd start filling slots with the people who are both good players and loyal guild members, even if they're not quite as good as some of the new recruits. You may lose some recruits if you do this. But as long as you've still got a critical mass of players, your remaining players will be happier and you'll deal with less drama on your raid nights.
New recruits may be gung-ho at first, but they have no history with your guild. They may jump ship at the first sign of difficulty. For them, it's easy come, easy go.
The people who have been with you for a long time have more at stake, and they're more likely to have your back when the chips are down, as long as you treat them with respect. It's easier to maintain a critical mass with players you can count on.
/salute
Send Scott your guild-related questions, conundrums, ideas, and suggestions at scott.andrews@weblogsinc.com. You may find your question the subject of next week's Officers' Quarters!Filed under: Officers' Quarters (Guild Leadership)
Reader Comments (Page 4 of 4)
KillerKarl Jul 27th 2009 1:24PM
The only problem I would ever have at being on standby and not in the raid is if one doesn't earn the same dkp for the night. Having 45+ people ready to raid is really great. I can roll up a big one and go do some farming, work on an alt, read a book or clean the house while I sit in standby. Some nights you just don't feel like raiding and having that many to choose from doesn't make you feel as guilty if you take the night off.
Yeshe Jul 27th 2009 1:27PM
Seems like a simple resolution to over-recruiting: start a second raid and have at it.
obarthelemy Jul 27th 2009 1:35PM
Also, it's not so much how many people you have, but also what you do with them:
- do you organize a grouping rotation, same as you surely have some system to organize looting ? Some guilds make sure everyone gets to raid over the course of a week, some guilds focus on their most valued players, some guilds reserve seats for officers, some officers give up their seats more often than not...
- do you have a raid inscription/validation system ? Knowing in advance who is up for raiding, and who actually got a seat, greatly lowers stress level.
- do you organize an alternative raid, maybe with alts, for 'rejects' ? Naxx-25, Uldu-10 are still popular destinations.
ambermist Jul 27th 2009 2:13PM
I think the most important feature has been repeated again and again: there needs to be some kind of pre-organized understanding of who gets priority in raids.
We used to do this with a sign-up system on the forums, but we had a lot of people stop remembering to do this when it came to Naxx, so we let it go. It was a nightmare for the officers until they decided to do a ranking system based on priority.
Our core raiders--the 4-night-a-weekers who you can usually count on being there and killing bosses because they always have--were given the rank "Raider." (This number was only a little over 25; maybe 35) Before this happened, it was explained on our forums and the proposed raider list was provided. Other active members, 2-night-a-weekers or people who can't commit but are reliable replacements when we're missing some are "Members." People who don't raid anymore, are long-time but mostly inactive members, or others somewhere in that realm have a different rank. We're a very loyal guild, so long-term members aren't likely to get kicked if they decide to stop playing to spend more time with their kids, etc.
This way, at 7:45 (when our invites start), the officers can look at the online list and know exactly who to pick from. Raiders get top priority, and then members and initiates fill in (dependent upon the desired raid comp). There's no question where people stand; everyone knows this is how it goes. Also, if you are one of the "Raiders," you are expected to be online, ready, and available; if you are unable to do so, you are expected to post on the forum or at least whisper an officer. Our GM gets cranky when raiders aren't online and no one knows why. Actually, he gets cranky a lot, but that's why we
ambermist Jul 27th 2009 2:16PM
Ha, there's a character limit. "That's why we heart him" is what I finished that with.
Do run 2 10-mans; i wouldn't recommend a second 25-man Ulduar because then you run the risk of 4 people not showing up in one group and 5 not showing up in the other and neither group being able to run because everyone else is saved.
Whatever the case, good luck. They'll either figure out a way to smooth the ruffled feathers (expect more people to leave; can't make everyone happy) or they won't. Keep your head down and keep testing the waters; being in the middle of explosive guild drama can be pretty messy.
Kanst Jul 27th 2009 2:29PM
Our guild does the exact same thing with ranks. We raid 5 days a week and have 3 ranks, these ranks play a lot of roles in the guild.
Raider are the people who make 80% or more raids
Members make between 60-80%
and Show up Moar make less then 60%
If a member drops below 40% for more then 2 weeks they are dropped to casual and have to re-apply
With these ranks comes incentives on loot, raiders gain a 10% edge on their priority, and show up moar get last priority along with apps. This way our members strive hard to make raider and most of our core attain it.
But IMO it all comes down to balancing. For example we went quick last week, we had just Yogg alive on our last raid night, so we pulled in our #3 tank. This tank is useful for fights where the other tanks arent around or for 3 tank fights, but he hadn't gotten to tank Yogg yet, so we brough him in and dealt with some learning pains. But we had all night. Those are the kind of things you have to do if you wanna keep 40 raiders happy, its all about time in instance. If there time on standby starts getting a lot higher then their time in instance they wont be happy. I know from experience I was one of the undergeared people in my previous guild and spent many nights sitting outside sunwell for 4 hours just hoping they would call my name on vent.
Kanst Jul 27th 2009 2:24PM
I am an officer in a mildly-hardcore 25 man raiding guild. I have a little advice for anyone facing this problem. IMHO the worst thing ever is a cancelled raid due to attendance, id rather have 100 people whining about not getting in then cancelling the raid, however once you dont have to worry about cancelled raids there is definitely an ideal number of raiders.
Our guild runs right around 40 raiding toons, that is 40 people geared enough to come into ulduar, most nights we have around 35 of them online. The key to balancing is identifying farm and progression. The group we take in on thursday for hard modes and the group we take in on tuesday for the siege are not that similar.
Razorscale, Ignis, FL hard mode, Kolo, Auriaya are all fairly easy fights. It is very very infrequent that our guild wipes on these. As such we bring in all the bench for them. The officers know the bottom tier of members and these guys may not get to see hard mode thorim every week but we make sure we get em in for 4 bosses or so. Sure it takes a little longer to do the subs but people end up happier.
ackthbbft Jul 27th 2009 2:24PM
My guild offers "reservists" DKP, EP, Merit, or whatever you want to call it, so long as they are online and available to fill in a spot when it opens, even if they are never called to do so. This way, if a raid is full, the "bad feelings" aren't as bad as they would be if they were getting completely screwed out of raiding.
Granted, only raiders who are at the boss kills can get loot.
dumasti Jul 27th 2009 2:32PM
After reading this entire thread, one word came to mind; I was taken back in time ,like an '82 DeLorean, thinking about the days of D2.
Mercanaries.
I'd love to see something of the sort implemented for raids. I think it would be a novel idea, but the mechanics might be a bit much for WoW. How much would they cost? How long would they last? What classes are available? Who do they follow? Can they be ressed? What gear-level would they be equivalent to? Etc...
But still, It would be cool and a nice way to fill in those occasional missing spots.
~Fatamorgana
Eisengel Jul 27th 2009 8:21PM
I liked that idea too, but someone (on this site as I recall) said that that was done in some other MMO.... I don't recall which one... Everquest maybe? At any rate, they said what happened was that people would roll only DPS classes, and got the game bots to be healers, causing most healers to disappear. Given the lack of any type of progression in WoW that doesn't in some way involve gear (i.e. instances, quests, raids, battlegrounds, arena) the players are understandably gear-focused, and can get pretty mercenary about obtaining it. I think we'd see the same thing happen in a heartbeat if WoW had hireable heal-bots, DPS-bots and tank-bots.
Verduran Jul 27th 2009 5:59PM
I'll have to agree with the poster, 45 ppl out of a 25 raid is massively, overly recruited, especially if there are unevenness between players with different roles (say, if there are 9 out of 7 healing slot, vs 25 out of 15 dps slots, 4 out of 3 tank slots, most of the dpsers will get their night off much more often then the other classes).
I have been to quite a few different guilds, including guilds from other game (EQ), so far my experience is that a dkp system (or the like) is essential in making most of the guilds successful (notice that I said MOST),rolling or leader merit systems just wouldn't do the trick as well. But there are things to be aware of to make the dkp system to be successful.
1. Set up a roster for the raids if you can, the in game calender is an excellent tool in this, even with 45 members to pick from, there will always be nights people not showing up, and you don't want it to be on the night when a critical role if missing (off-spec chars are generally not as well-geared), Be sure to punish those that were scheduled to show up but didn't (or award those that did, whichever better), this should ensure that you get to raid smoothly most of the nights.
2. Include a few unscheduled people into the raid when it starts, it doesn't have to be a lot, maybe one of each roles, they should have to stay in the raid (so they can't get group outside) and be available if anyone had to bail or went LD for a long period (admit it, this always happen). Be sure to award them with dkp, provided that they didn't leave earlier than those they were supposed to replace for. To keep them from bored to death, you could swap them in during some fights provided that those being swapped out agree so (free dkp for less work ftw!),
3. Always, and I mean it, always encourage players to get offspec pieces before turning items into crystals, a lot of the hardmodes require specific specs or classes (for example, you will probably need less than 7 healers in Hodir hardmode), it can be in the form of a discount (like half the original price), but never ever make them free or have priority over main specs.
4. Set up rules ahead of raiding, and stick to them (at least during the same lockout before improvising). Discipline is crucial for the guild to remain functional.
Having gone through the destruction and rebuilding of at least 3 guilds, my experience is never keep the roster too tight, my previous guild used to be one of the top guild on the server (downed Kil`jaeden first on horde), however, they reduced the progressing roster to around 33 people when ulduar came out, then players start leaving and the regulars before 3.1 refused to join back, and the progression stops after downing yogg+4 (since we have only 21-23 players most of the night). A few of the raiders (including me) eventually got bored raiding with 21 people for a few weeks (and repeatedly wiping on thorium normal mode) that we either left for another guild, or left the game entirely. My current guild is now working on hard modes, downed General HM for the first time last week (who dropped Voldrethar, Dark Blade of Oblivion with me being the seed!) and have been wiping on firefighter for the first time last night (and got to P3 so far), We have a dkp and roster system as I suggested above, and I have to say I'm very satisfy with the guild switching.
Just be nice with your raiders, you'll get through this, GL to you guys~
Jay Jul 28th 2009 11:19AM
"... especially if there are unevenness between players with different roles (say, if there are 9 out of 7 healing slot, vs 25 out of 15 dps slots, 4 out of 3 tank slots, most of the dpsers will get their night off much more often then the other classes)...."
With the shortage of tanks/heals, maybe those standby-dps who are eager to raid could work on tank\heal offspec/alts to increase their chances of getting a raid spot?
I know not everyone likes the responsibility of healing or tanking, but is it really that much worse than sitting in a standby list for hours?
Stout Jul 27th 2009 6:46PM
Blizzard needs to make the gear between 10 and 25man “identical” and stop treating 10man guilds like they're simply a stepping stone. Of course most players are interested in 25man raids and not 10man, have you seen the difference in gear? It's amazing, especially in core roles like tank and healer.
Making the gear the same makes it no boggy if you don't get into the 25man group. I personally don't raid much for the gear but in a game that is so gear-centric, there should be no difference in the gear.
SmokeTheBear Jul 27th 2009 7:17PM
"If you don't have enough people, those who would answer "yes" to the last three questions will require additional members to balance their absences or deficiencies."
If people are answering "yes" to questions that start with "How many" I don't think I want them raiding with me at all.
Servietrix Jul 27th 2009 7:59PM
Well Considering that they have 20 extra people,
wouldn't it be smarter to slow down the "progression" of the 25 man run, by swapping out maybe 5-6 players with a couple of lesser experienced player, then get those 6 to split up and start running the others through 10 man raids to get them; 1 geared, and 2 experienced in the same fights.
once you start doing that, after a month or so, you will have 45 really geared and experienced players, and if you then recruit a few more people you will have TWO 25 man raid teams, and no doubt by that stage have the raids on farm.
it just takes a little "maturity" mainly from the officers to sacrifice their spot in the 25 man raid to then lead the 10 mans. and if they "think" that they are THAT good then they should be able to lead the 10 mans successfully.
if people are patient then good things will come. if you have good leaders.
if you don't. go somewhere else.
we had a new recruit /gquit our guild the other day. we were taking "newer" people through 10man Naxx and he cried that he couldn't come. the funny thing was, he was told he couldn't come because he was already saved to the instance in another pug he was in! idiot.
so its a balance between good leadership and good guildies. nurture your new guildies... but always look after your loyal ones. That can also mean by giving the Loyal guildies more responsibility like running the new recruits through instances. they will feel more important and loved.
these issues can be solved. it will be balanced by people leaving because they think the "world" of warcraft revolves around them; and better leadership from the officers/GM.
good luck to you S.
Farproc Jul 28th 2009 4:32AM
If you have that many raiders on...
why not just organize a 2nd raid?
Assuming you have some contacts in other raiding guilds you can probably pick up some pugs to fill out to 25 competent raiders.
The guild im in is quite casual, and mostly aims at 10man content. If there is an oversubscription to a raid we try to organize either heroics for the lesser geared, or a 2nd 10man.
The B-team normally sees more wipes, and doesn't progress as much, but theyre still getting tokens, downing bosses, and getting experience.
Thera Jul 28th 2009 6:16PM
One thing his guild needs to do is use the in-game calendar or an addon for the raid invites. Officers pick 25 people to attend the raid from those who have signed and then leave a few guys for standby. Then the people who have been chosen and the people set on standby will show up when it's time for the invites and then build a raidgroup from that group of people. Those who signed but didn't get the raidspots will have a priority for the next raid if they happen to sign. That way people who don't get the raidspots can't complain as long as there is a fair rotation and everyone who wants to raid will get to do so. Some will feel that they don't get to raid as much as they'd like and they will go looking for another guilds and that just helps your guild.
New guilds often end up doing mass invites and then taking a long time sorting out the good and the bad players. It's a phase in a guilds development. Many guilds also fall apart because of the drama caused by situations like these.
I myself am a new member on two different guilds which ended up having to recruit new people during the summer. Neither of the guilds did excessive recruiting and they're both holding up pretty fine. One has suffered from a bad lack of raids during the summer and I've still to see how things will turn out now that the holidays are almost over. The other has been pretty active even though we've only been able to fill two raids out of three each week. That has left many of the new members without any proper experience to the latter bosses in Ulduar which is a shame.