Drama Mamas: Don't let others control your fun
by Robin Torres 
Oct 14th 2009 at 2:00PM
Dodge the drama and become that player everyone wants in their group with the Drama Mamas. Lisa Poisso and Robin Torres are real-life mamas and experienced WoW players -- and just as we don't want our precious babies to be the ones kicking and wailing on the floor of checkout lane next to the candy, neither do we want you to become known as That Guy on your server. We're taking your questions at DramaMamas (at) WoW (dot) com.
The great thing about playing massively multiplayer games is all of the wonderful people you get to meet and hang out with, no matter your respective locations. And the bad thing is all of the inconsiderate people who forget that you're a real person with other things to do than be his/her playmate on his/her schedule. This week, we talk about taking control of your fun.
Should a small group boot?
Dear Drama Mamas: You probably don't often hear about situations like mine. I'm a member in a very small casual guild. To give you some indication of just how small, we JUST cleared Blackwing Lair (only a couple years behind the curve.) We can't even run any 10-mans because we don't have 10 men!
Our guild started almost as a non-guild. We all went to college together, and started playing together, using the guild essentially as a dedicated group chat channel. After a few months, one of us veterans invited a co-worker of his to join and play with us. This new guy (we'll call him Charlie) showed up with a Death Knight and things were fine. Only one of us knows him at all, but we didn't really mind.
However, over the past few months, Charlie has grown more and more obnoxious and less and less useful in our
5-man dungeon crawls. If there are more than 3 of us online (including Charlie) he pesters us to run instances with him non-stop, demanding we call other guild members to log on and help, or if they can't be reached, insisting that "we can do it without them." (Because an unholy death knight, a frost mage, and a BM hunter make SO well-balanced a team, after all.) He often breaks crowd control and puts himself in dangerous situations and his contribution is almost negligible.On occasion, after Charlie does something particularly stupid, we'll try to gently make a comment about it, and he usually retorts that we're being unnecessarily mean to him because we're jerks. Charlie isn't destroying our guild, but he's annoying the pants off of all but one of us (our Guild Master is a very friendly and outgoing, "let's all be nice to each other" type of guy.) Beyond being bluntly honest and saying "We all have other stuff we want to do than babysit you on dungeon runs where you do more harm than good.", how can we try to re-establish a smooth social flow in a guild whose roster totals 8?
I'm not demanding that we kick him out entirely by any means, but I am finding myself enjoying the game a lot less when Charlie's online bugging us to run Trial of the Champions every 4 minutes. Especially as the rest of us are starting to want to move into harder content, including finding a few more people and trying out the 10-man raids, I'm wondering if you've got any ideas how to restore the interpersonal feng shui (and make our token death knight stop SUCKING.) Thanks a lot, Outside the Corpse Explosions
Drama Mama Robin: Dear Outside, he has called you all jerks and pestered you constantly -- how can your Guild Leader be OK with that? The whole point of an intimate guild like yours is to not have to deal with guys like Charlie.
I have been in a similar situation. When WoW first launched, a bunch of friends/coworkers created a guild. It was great fun except there were two guys who ended up being total online butts (who we all really liked in person before this). One actually speedhacked for fun (boggle) and the other was clueless as to how to play in a group in even the most simple of instances -- and was very defensive about it. They both also spewed homophobic and racist "jokes" constantly in guild chat. We didn't have a real guildleader, so we didn't have an actual authority figure to issue warnings, probations, etc. We all openly complained to them and were insulted for our troubles. They refused to go anywhere, so we ended up being very sneaky: we formed a new guild and then most of us moved to the new one without telling them. Totally cowardly. And it didn't work. The new guild evaporated soon after. Consider this a cautionary tale and not one to emulate.
The moral of the story: even small, friendly guilds need a guildleader who is willing to actually lead. He has to be firm and state what behavior is acceptable and what skill/effort level is appropriate for guild outings. And if he won't, then the drama is going to continue or the guild will fall apart. I recommend going to him as a group and ask him to give Charlie a friendly "shape up or ship out" warning.
At the same time, it sounds like you all might be happier if you could grow your guild a little. Warning: you're going to get more Charlies as apps. But you're also going to a wider variety of classes (if you do it right) so that you all can do more of the instances you would like to try. Here are some dos and don'ts:
- Don't: Have open enrollment. Set up an app and an approval process.
- Do: Have a probationary period
- Do: Recruit people with similar schedules
- Don't: Spam trade channel. Please.
Drama Mama Lisa: "No." That's the magic word. Just ... "No."
Oh sure, you can couch it a little: "Nahhh, he asked not to be called if he wasn't online," or "I'm not really up for that instance again tonight" – but ultimately, you must learn to tell this player "no." Don't allow Charlie to hold your attention and energy hostage all night. A firm, direct "no, thanks" to unwanted invitations and the sound of crickets if he continues to press too far will set a much more effective pattern than caving in to his pestering and demands. It could backfire, of course, and offend him so much that he leaves. (And really now -- would you miss him?)
In the meantime, though, I have to ask: Where is Charlie's point of original contact within your group? Shouldn't he be the one untangling the interpersonal issues between his co-worker and his guildmates? Friends don't let friends make nuisances of themselves ...
Better late than never... NOT!
Dear Drama Mamas: I'm burning, reading the comments from people (last week) who are bothered by latecomers who ruin raids for everyone else. Oh, how I can relate! I whip it to get home through mind-numbing traffic on raid nights, and it really sends me over the edge when we have to sit and wait on twits who drift online 15 minutes after start time. W. T. F.?!??!?!! Signed, Caged BeastDrama Mama Lisa: The best we can do for you, Caged, is to make a public service announcement to guild leaders and players everywhere.
Guild Leaders, you simply must cut players who repeatedly show up late to raids. You're in dire danger of allowing them to drive the other, more responsible players out of your guild.
- Set time limits on how late you'll allow players arrive at the raid location ready to go before you replace them with a standby. (My guild used to call standbys for anyone who wasn't online 10 minutes before start/pull time – you have agreed that "start time" means "inside the instance and ready to buff and pull," haven't you?)
- Use your standby list to fill open slots the moment you pass your "late" threshold. Make no exceptions; if a player misses the cut-off by two minutes and gets replaced, he'll have to figure out how to be ready two minutes sooner next time.
- Also set limits on how many times you're willing to permit lateness and no-shows. Make reaching the limit an offense worthy of revoking raiding or guild membership privileges.
- Finally, if a large number of your members are having a hard time getting to the church on time, consider changing the time of the ceremony.
(Oh, and Caged – talk to your guild officers about your feelings and these suggestions. If they can't or don't want to change the guild's approach to latecomers, you'd be better served looking for a group whose straggling schedule doesn't send your blood pressure skyrocketing. Good luck!)
Drama Mama Robin: I'd like to add to Lisa's Open Letter to Guild/Raid Leaders:
- Have a backup plan for your raids – don't postpone the start time when you don't have enough people for your original event. If you plan for a 25-man raid and only 20 people show up, run two 10-mans. If you end up with the wrong class combination to make a smaller raid go, run a battleground or hit up an old world raid achievement. Reward the people who show up on time and ready with an activity right at start time.
Remember, your mama wouldn't want to see your name on any drama. Play nice ... and when in doubt, ask the Drama Mamas at DramaMamas (at) WoW (dot) com.Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, WoW Social Conventions, Virtual selves, Features, Drama Mamas
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
doofman Oct 14th 2009 2:10PM
"Players, would you pull into the parking lot 10 minutes past game time for your softball league?"
You've apparently never played rec league softball.
Dr Charles Benjamin Oct 14th 2009 6:36PM
lol real name FireThunder, but to protect his anonymity we'll call him Charlie
hyasenwow Oct 14th 2009 2:14PM
"Have a backup plan for your raids – don't postpone the start time when you don't have enough people for your original event. If you plan for a 25-man raid and only 20 people show up, run two 10-mans. If you end up with the wrong class combination to make a smaller raid go, run a battleground or hit up an old world raid achievement. Reward the people who show up on time and ready with an activity right at start time."
This will only appease people for so long. Raid disruptions need to be dealt with, not just brushed aside. It may be fun for some people to once in a while go do something different, but in most cases people sign up for Uld/ToC/etc because it benefits them. If someone is consistently having a problem with people showing up, then they need to either try changing the days/times of their raid or make sure the latecomers know that if they are late, their spot may be filled via PUG and they may be SOL.
Robin Torres Oct 14th 2009 2:29PM
Agreed. That's why I added the backup plan to Lisa's steps 1 - 4, not to replace :)
Beli Oct 14th 2009 3:57PM
Agreed... and that's why just last week one of our "raiders" got the distinction of being the first (and only) member of our permanent standby list. He's chronically inconsistent in terms of showing up (not to mention a bit annoying to many of us), and the officers were pretty unanimous. I haven't actually been on for a few days now, so i'm not sure if he's been told, and if so if there's been any backlash...
Iratio Oct 14th 2009 2:17PM
Re Charlie:
Theres process and then there is just forstalling the inevitable, /gkick and whisper why.
velutina Oct 14th 2009 4:44PM
I like this suggestion. However, there is another measure that's not quite so drastic. Create a new, lowest level guild rank called "Charlie," and demote Charlie to that rank. Then remove the ability of that rank to use guild chat. We've had to put people on probation a few times and this is a good way to do it.
Monica Dickey Oct 14th 2009 2:28PM
that first pic made me wonder... is wow this generation's mixer at the park! lol
more fun that's for sure.
anyway this article is pretty much common sense but it lays it out well. If you join a good guild with a reliable core of people who are reliable and cool to hang out on raids with you've pretty much got it made. Pruning a guild to make it good like that is the hard part...
Mummrah Nov 12th 2009 9:09PM
While at first glance it might look like a mixer at a park, it's actually a couple of lovely young women about to engage in some fisticuffs.
CATFIGHT!!!!!!!
Jabadabadana Oct 14th 2009 2:37PM
This may sound annoying, or stupid, or just plain obvious, but if you know that people show up 10-30 minutes late to raids; and that your raids functional start time is that much later; why is your blood pressure rising while in traffic? You know you have a consistent cushion. Granted, this encourages the same behavior out of everyone else, but the likelihood is that there is still an aggregate start time that your raids tend to fall on. Don't worry until it's getting to be about that time, and you will save yourself a great deal of stress.
Yes, it's annoying to start late.
Yes, it's irritating to wait on other people.
Yes, maybe you should consider changing guilds (though a great deal have this problem, so unless you are trying for actual hardcore raiding guilds, don't hold your breath.)
No, you aren't the only person with a life that may interfere with getting to the raid on time, or that is annoyed by it.
(I'm military, I show up to everything 15 minutes early out of habit, but I've also gotten comfortable with the idea that most people aren't, don't, and won't.
Deadly. Off. Topic. Oct 14th 2009 5:23PM
There's the possibility that the time Beast has a set time he can play when he gets home. And if you're going to put a raid up for X time to X time, then he's probably only alloted for that time. (Still, you're going to be pretty annoyed if you planned to play only a few hours and have to SIT there waiting for people to show up when you could be doing something else with your time. Fishing? Maybe. But if you're in a raid party waiting, you're not able to do quests or pretty much anything else wow related except farming - (provided you're not near any other members))
I know for me they would book the raids from 9 pm to12 am and if people were late than we were forced to stay UP an extra hour. Now that's going into my bedtime and I can't afford that or I end up shitfaced for work. Of course you can say "then go to bed". That doesn't fix the problem though. In fact those of us who have to leave for bed will often miss out on loot if they fill our slots with other guildies who logged in late thus we're screwed out of the lock out period for that week. Now if they started on time, there wouldn't have been a problem.
Gamer am I Oct 14th 2009 2:46PM
"That's "just a game," too. Get real. Get responsible. Get there on time."
Truer words have never been spoken. Thank you, Lisa.
Sparcrypt Nov 9th 2009 11:11PM
God yes.
It drives me insane when I organise a raid, and myself and 20 other people are waiting only to have 5 people log on late then demand a summon. Or the people who sit on alts until right before raid start doing dailies or whatever, then log over to the mains... who are in dal and 'just need to repair and get my flasks and ammo and and and...'
I look at raids as a team sport... in fact I view it the same way I view ANYTHING I say I'll do at a specific time. I show up and if I can't or will be late, I let someone know.
AndremedaSC Oct 14th 2009 2:54PM
To Robin's excellent do's and don'ts for guild recruitment, I'd like to add the following observation about guild management: even once the probationary period is over, there still needs to be standards in place for guild member's behavior. The smoothest-running guilds I've seen have a charter that has a code of conduct, and procedures laid out for when someone might get a warning, or a demotion, or a gkick. Such procedures need to be fair, but flexible enough to handle unforeseen situations.
Sometimes a player manages to play nice when they know they are on a probationary period, but later on, whether because their life outside game has changed (they are under more stress, for example) or because they don't care now that they are a full member of the guild, they stop trying to be nice and considerate. It's much easier to deal with this sort of situation if you can document the occurrences, and are able to say "here is the charter, that says all along that if you were consistently late, and missed x number of raids without clearing it with an officer, you'd be kicked" or whatever.
AndremedaSC Oct 14th 2009 3:06PM
As for starting late; the thing about consistently waiting for late comers to show up is that people who DO show up on time start getting into the mindset of "well, we always start 5/10/15 minutes late, so I can stop on the way home for a cup of coffee" or whatever. Start time starts creeping further and further back, and the people who still ARE on time get more and more frustrated. And this is not purely a MMORPG thing; I see this in my evening choir practice ALL the time.
What's necessary is to start on time, every time*. In a choir room, the person who walks in in the middle of warm ups is pretty conspicuous, and that helps make them less likely to do it again. This doesn't work as well online, of course, but I like the idea of having a hard and fast deadline, with no exceptions, after which the raid spot goes away for the night. I personally would probably impose no other penalties, aside from missing the raid, unless it happened repeatedly. We can all get stuck in traffic once in a while.
It's also important to communicate expectations clearly ahead of time, though, and this is doubly important if things have been lax and the raid leaders are trying to tighten things up. It needs to be acknowledged that yes, lateless was permitted in the past, but it was an inconvenience to many, and it's no longer tolerated.
*Now if only I could get my ADD prone choir director to be consistent about starting on time, every time...
Rob Oct 14th 2009 3:15PM
Another cautionary tale about Charlie. He will destroy your guild. These people exist only for themselves, and your guildmates will find things that really need be doing while he is around...alts on other servers, the laundry, etc. You must deal with him and quickly. Frankly if nobody really knows him IRL that well maybe a gkick will do the trick. If he is a actual friend the person who knows him needs to lay down the law. "This is what we expect from people in the guild". Adults need to be reminded that they are mature and not 15 year old kids. 15 year old kids need to be taught to act like an adult in an adult guild. (Which is a whole other topic). We had a guild destroyer in our guild, he was the raid leader. It nearly caused our guild of 100+ accounts to crumble. Finally the GL took steps after a unanimous decision by the other officers.
As far as being late to raids, the RL sets the tone. Ours is a casual guild, and for example one person showed up late (and we all knew ahead of time that would happen), and one person went afk for 10-15 min mid-raid to do something important IRL. While annoying, there isn't much you can do about it other than not raid or find someone else. Particularly when the player fills a crucial role, it can be quite challenging. Bad/late players to me is a sign that we need to recruit more so we have some choices. It really sucks when you have a bad apple and there is nothing you can do other than call the raid or suck it up.
Irregardless, my position as raid lead is clear. Either we have 10 warm bodies and the right roles online and in the raid by 15 minutes after start, or we disband the raid. If we have only say 8 warm bodies and the right roles (2 tanks, 2 heals) we can run naxx or OS10. If we are missing crucial people, then the thing to do is run heroics and recruit more, and perhaps think about moving the raid time. (however, try not to move the raid time on the whim of one person, you just aren't going to please everyone all the time.
curtisrutland Oct 14th 2009 3:22PM
Our guild had/has a problem with late-shows and no-shows as well, so we have recently instituted a form of punishment. We use the EPGP loot system rather than open rolls, and part of that is providing an "on-time bonus" to those that show. Before, it was just a small bonus that people got for showing up ontime. What we have done now is increase the bonus, and restrict it to those that have signed up on the calendar and showed up on time. Conversely, we have added a penalty for signing up and not showing. If you don't show, you actually lose points. Considering that it doesn't two minutes to change your calendar status, and that you can do it even from the Armory now, and that you have 24 other people depending on knowing if you're coming or not, it's worth having a "punishment" for screwing other people.
insertAliasHere Oct 14th 2009 3:29PM
"Another cautionary tale about Charlie. He will destroy your guild."
Truer words were never spoken. My story is almost identical to the one that the author wrote, except our guild was larger. We had a nice, casual, friendly leveling guild. And one member decided that we should be raiding and running and over the period of three days consistently made such a jerk of himself that most of us /gquit and formed a new, ironically re-named guild. And it was nice for a while, but it eventually evaporated.
So, yeah. If you know him IRL, you have to let him know that he's being disruptive. Absolutely have to. If you don't, a quick /gkick and /ignore will solve your problems.
"Either we have 10 warm bodies and the right roles online and in the raid by 15 minutes after start, or we disband the raid."
I am a raid leader in my current guild as well, but when you have 25 adults, not just 10, that specifically made time to play tonight, disbanding just plain sucks. And doing 2 10 mans isn't much of an option, since we are for the most part fully geared, or have those runs scheduled for another night. We have to pressure people to commit and follow through, or we have to get new people.
Mujahadeen Oct 14th 2009 3:53PM
Type /ignore Charlie
Problem solved.
Mau Oct 14th 2009 4:23PM
I don't really agree to the comments for "Outsider"... one of my alts is in a VERY casual and small guild of friends who share the attribute of being latinamericans in a US english server.
"Charlie" has to realize that's its a VERY casual and small guild, and if he can't cope with it he should go. And why all the drama about 3-man Heroics? Ever heard of /1, /2 and the LFG in-game tool?