Raid Size Part Deux

There has been progress within Militiae Templi around the raid size issue that I mentioned yesterday. I do not think it is a permanent solution, however, I think some of the insights posted by one of our guild leaders in response to the issue could contain a few grains of insight for my readers who are going through similar struggles, or who will start to soon.

It is also worth reading Tolbold's post about the race to 70 and the impact of 25 man raids on the WoW2.0 guild.

Shaso, one of our fearless leaders, and our Main Tank, pointed out the length of time necessary to prepare for Gruul's Lair and Magtheridon's Lair. These are presumably the first 25 man raid zones that players will access, both for ease of progression, as well as the lack of keying necessary to enter. The Eye and Mt. Hyjal both require a complex key process and are considered to be a much more difficult instance.

That leaves Kharazan and the 3rd instances. By 3rd, I mean the level 68-70, 5-man instance at each major dungeon hub. Shattered Halls, in Hellfire, Steamvault in Coilfang, etc... Kharazan is a 10-man instance with an extraordinary amount of content within, as well as an exceptional array of gear for new 70s to begin the epic hunt. Guilds will most defiantly be running multiple Kharazhan runs each week for the first few months of the raid season, and this is going to smooth the transition to a multi-team approach to raiding.

An unspoken element of all of this is that during that time, many will remember why they wandered away from the game and shrink the available players down further. Once Gruul's Lair is started, having 35 online will not be unusual, and presumably, a Kharazhan run and a Gruul run could happen at the same time.

My feelings on two raid units is basically this... no matter what you call them, there will be an A team, and a B team. A 'good' team and everyone else. Which teams to the officers play on? Which team progresses faster, and who is getting their T4-5 first? Because of instance timers and raid lockouts, teams become fairly static after a while, and you start to see the divide. Two raid teams starts to mean two raid banks, and two sets of leaders. AKA, two guilds in one guild chat.

If it can be done drama free, that's fantastic, but I have never seen it happen before. Hopefully, the officers commitment to spreading time among all prepared members, is genuine, because eventually enough will quit or move on, that we will have one strong raid unit, with a few people benched at a time, but not on an ongoing basis. If only a few are trained and geared in the first few months, everyone suffers when regulars quit or jump guilds.