Penance Priest

In which he digressed radically from the stated mission of priesting, and veered into the more interesting territory of leadership and integrity.

Ah, the craziness that is raid leadership. There is too much to say to capture it all in one post. Or one blog, devoted entirely to raiding. Or one blogosphere.

Failure #1: “We don’t take pugs”

I spent several months in a casual guild. More accurately, “a casual guild that raids.” Ok, so failure is built right in, but let’s ignore that for now.

One time in TK we had to pug a healer. Twenty four guildies, one pug. It seemed that folks kind of knew him, so he wasn’t a complete stranger. Loot reaver drops T5 shoulders, and because we had a pug, our GM said that anyone who needed it (guild or pug) should roll, rather than using DKP. Pug priest wins the roll, and the guild’s main tank, who had been saving DKP for months for those shoulders, seethes, since it was a warrior/priest/druid item.

After the raid is over, seething turns into full-on hissy fit. Spreads to other guildies. GM turns hissy fit turns into new guild policy: No. Pugs. Ever.

“Wow,” I said to myself. “How come this only became an issue after the pug won? Shouldn’t loot rules have been clearly articulated and acknowledged by all beforehand? Maybe even discussed, before the GM announced a final policy? Shouldn’t our MT have been ticked off before the run? At the policy, not the result? Or shouldn’t he at least have accepted the fact that loot rules would be different because we needed to pug a healer to do the run?”

Failure #2: “No, we really don’t take pugs”

Fast forward a month. Casual Guild that Raids is having a hard time filling SSC on Saturday night. Really hard time. Nineteen…ok, now twenty…twenty-one…and that’s it, we hit the ceiling of people that even vaguely qualify for SSC. And this is not a raid on farm, or an easy-mode post-nerf walk through the park. Twenty-one is not enough. Desperate phone calls to offline guildies commence.

I’ve been politely whispering to the RL that I have two friends I play with a lot, a mage and a hunter, who are not only geared enough for the raid (far more geared than most guildies), but are skilled players. Team players. Know how to run out of the fire. Have offered to pass on loot, just willing to help. I believe I had enough clout to make my recommendations carry some weight.

“I’d rather take some half-dead guildie than wipe ‘cause of some pug.”

Hard to describe the amount of spit required to say the word “pug” in that sentence as it came thru on vent.

Okies…begin planning an exit strategy from Casual Guild that Raids.

Alternate Universe: This time, with Leadership

Original TK raid goes down without a pug. We can live with 24.

Or – we get a pug to fill slot #25. GM announces that, like it or not, we need to fill a slot with a guest healer, and therefore they have a right to roll on loot, within certain reasonable and stated bounds. This is the price we must pay to make this happen. Guildies surrender, because they want to do the raid rather than not.

Loot reaver drops T5 shoulders. GM acts on the stated policy, allows priest to roll. And lo, the pug priest wins. Grats from all, perhaps even with an acknowledgement that in some way he deserved such good luck for helping us out. Main tank bites his tongue, hopes for better luck next time.

GM gives two epic gems to the top DKP, the one who would have won the shoulders, as a consolation. The warrior, while not as happy as he would have been with shoulders, realizes that the GM did the best job under the circumstances.