Motivation -- my soapbox

Drumble · Post by **Drumble** » August 18th, 2007, 11:13 am

Prepare yourself for a novel .. I just read a blog from one of the tanking guru's out there, Cinderhelm. If you dont know him, he's the guy who practically launched warcraftmovies.com with his warrior movies, he's crafted numerous guides for tanks - most notably "Fortifications", considered by many smarter than myself to be the tanking bible for WoW.He hit on something that I've been trying to put into words for a while, and I know Mahnalor and a few others have attempted the same. It was all to do with a situation that arose in his guild when people started bringing their alts to the raid. In his example, he termed the runs as "non-essential" raids -- gearing up alts does nothing for the progression to the guild in his opinion (obviously there are exceptions to the rule) -- and it inspired him to start a MC Pug group. Much to his suprise, his ragtag group of people in greens who never really had the full-week to commit to a hardcore guild, and people who left other guilds for time/drama reasons ended up kicking the crap out of MC, much better than the group of alts that were coming from his own guild. He got a lot of backlash for this from people who's mains were stacked with T3 - but at the core of it, his motley crew became leetsauce because there was a desire and motivation for performance. People who performed were first invited next week. Soon they were tearing through MC faster than I ever thought possible ... The difference. Motivation. Motivation > gear -- motivation = the desire to self-assess and improve your own performance. This comes from being as prepared as possible for the encounter, with consumables -- with knowledge from posts/videos -- with a focused understanding of your characters talents and abilities.As MT, I feel driven almost to a fault by my performance, if I make a mistake - the raid wipes. If I die -- we start again. I dont really have any battles where I can lay face up and see if the boss goes down. Whenever anyone in the raid wipes, I do a little self assessment of what I could have done to change the situation -- throw a concussion shot on the mob that got loose to give the healer time to re-shackle -- intervene his target to make sure he doesn't get 1 shot or interrupted -- gear up +hit so I dont miss my opening move -- etc. It's definately the key to improving -- I dont think I'm a "great" tank, I always see room for improvement and many mistakes I make. What makes me a "good" tank is that continued self-analysis - some of what I share here on the forums.I've gotten ridiculed by level 6 alts in the WoW forums when I talk about how much I spend on a given battle. For Nightbane as an example, I used 5 Ironshield Potions, 4 Nightmare Seeds, Greater Rune of Warding, Greater Rune of Shielding, Battle/Guardian elixer, Crawdad, sharpening stone, Scrolls of Strength/Agility/Protection V. For one combat .. the rough total is around 40g in consumables. I'm not suggesting that others follow my OCD example exactly, but I'm merely pointing out that I'm trying to do everything possible to insure we one-shot this boss. I expect the same kind of motivation from the rest of the raid. If I hadn't done that -- and we wiped, it would not be such a learning experience as what I could improve on would be obvious.My point is -- this is not the tank and/or healers sole responsibilty. EVERYONE needs to be doing that self assessment if we're going to have a successful, progression oriented raid group. A rogue seeing a loose mob could gouge -- a mage could frost nova -- another healer can shield, etc, etc, etc. If you think the reason you died is you didn't get healed -- do the SELF analysis on why were you getting hit, and when would have been a good time to pot/bandage/feint/flash/soulshatter/invis/stop attacking. For DPS, you need to be riding right behind that tank threat -- push him to higher numbers, never exceeding his of course.Raiding with only 10 people doesn't afford anyone to be slacking. Dont be the weak link -- it's obvious, especially to those people who are motivated to do their best.

Blave · Post by **Blave** » August 20th, 2007, 3:11 pm

/emote applaud respectfully

The harder 10 mans is one of the things that drew me back to WoW ... When I left, people were posting in the boards about how they were watching TV while running MC ... and still clearing the instance in 1 week. (farm status)

Blizzard had 2 problems to solve with the older system:
- how do we stop people from AFKing during a boss fight
- how do we allow casual players, over time, access to the same content as the hardcore players

Solution: Hard 10/25 man instances. But what does this mean?
Pros:
- you don't need to join a 200 man guild and hope to get a spot on a 40 man raid (Been there, done that)
- you don't need to spend 4-6 hours per run 3-4 times a week to get farm status
Cons:
- MORE EFFORT is required! Everyone must do there best or the team fails.

I personally like the new system better ... however some people still think 10 man = Baron run where only 4 people really need to play

Blave · Post by **Blave** » August 20th, 2007, 3:20 pm

I think we have two types of people in our guild ...
- More than casual player
- Casual player

Chuunks is a more than casual player and I am wanting to become more than a casual player ... I want to see more content. Now, how do we successful mix more than casual with casual and successfully run Kara and higher instances? I think this is the main problem we have been voicing. I don't have a solution

Here is what I do know ...
- I don't want to push people into becoming "more than casual" if they don't want it
- I don't really want to recruit
- I am sick of wiping in Kara

FYI, these are the types of things that break guilds apart ... just be warned, I have seen it happen.

Gathgor · Post by **Gathgor** » August 20th, 2007, 5:28 pm

What consumables are the clothies using for aggro dumps? Is there a use for that Ironshield potion for a clothie that is getting beat on? Or would you use a heal pot? Or other?

Drumble · Post by **Drumble** » August 20th, 2007, 5:51 pm

There are no consumables for aggro dumps that I'm aware of.Ironshield potions increase your armor for 2500 for 2 minutes -- but that wouldn't really help a someone in cloth, it's more designed to be taken advantage of for that full 2 minutes of face smashing (tanking).For a clothie -- I think your options are heal/mana/resist pots. Aggro dumping is a skill -- Warlocks soul shatterMages go invisibleDruids ummm . cower? Rogues flash/feint Hunters feign death Paladins=there's some spell / training that overall lowers threat, no idea honestlyPriests=fade? get a better tank?DPS Warriors=need one of 2 trinkets that lower threat .. other than that they get punched pretty hard

Drumble · Post by **Drumble** » August 21st, 2007, 5:19 am

Gathgor wroteWhat consumables are the clothies using for aggro dumps? Is there a use for that Ironshield potion for a clothie that is getting beat on? Or would you use a heal pot? Or other?

... and might I add WHOOOOOSH for the point of these posts going right past your head.

Baraccus · Post by **Baraccus** » August 21st, 2007, 9:20 am

Gathgor wroteWhat consumables are the clothies using for aggro dumps? Is there a use for that Ironshield potion for a clothie that is getting beat on? Or would you use a heal pot? Or other?

Generally you want to get to the point that, along with KTM, you never pull aggro unless you're doing it intentionally (and there can be reasons for doing so...). This is particularly good practice when you get up to mobs that will simply one-shot anyone other than the MT. I know there are a few in Kara (non-bosses), but the number grows exponentially in 25-mans.

Fargol · Post by **Fargol** » August 21st, 2007, 10:48 am

Actually there is a pot

http://www.wowhead.com/?item=22871

It's about as good as the handful of trinkets that are out there - they all only reduce threat by a little bit. It's not even close to a soul shatter (50%) or a full aggro wipe (100%). If you pull aggro, don't count on something like this saving your life - it most likely won't.

But, thanks for hijacking another forum thread, gath

Gathgor · Post by **Gathgor** » August 22nd, 2007, 12:54 pm

Mason, I'm sick and tired of your self-aggrandizing bullshit. You have good ideas, but the amount of responses to other people's threads that come out of your mouth that is actually helpful and not demeaning could be counted on one hand. Baraccus and Fargol, thank you for answering my question. While Mason was blubbering on about Motivation and offering suggestions on how he does this or that to act as a better tank, I had an honest question on what a clothie could work on regarding anything consumable to reduce threat. It seems like the same thread to me...

Drumble · Post by **Drumble** » August 22nd, 2007, 1:11 pm

? You mean in this thread or in general? You *did* read all the posts/responses, right? Perhaps you're extra sensitive to things I say? I thought I was pretty polite and playfully teasing - ah well, I guess I'm just an asshole. Self-professed if we all recall? Sorry to offend -- I'll stop offering to help you in particular, seems if that's what you'd prefer -- stop posting in my threads too please.

Drumble · Post by **Drumble** » August 22nd, 2007, 1:22 pm

I'd also like to add that some of the "things that come out of my mouth" are things that many others in the guild have had conversations with me over, I'm just the outspoken person to bring it to everyone's attention. I honestly AM trying to be helpful. Though I'm tracing through some older threads to see if perhaps I was being cruel .. please enlighten me with particulars if you'd like. Ask Rob or Tim how outspoken I can be.

This isn't the first place where I've been labelled the "group ass".

Fargol · Post by **Fargol** » August 22nd, 2007, 2:30 pm

No personal attacks or anything - but this was mason's rant thread of sorts. I don't see why he shouldn't be allowed to "blubbler" on about motivation.

While a valid question about the threat pot - it's not on topic. Why? because no one is going to look for suggestions on caster pots in a "blubbering rant" thread. If nothing else, in a month, when I think back, oh yea I talked about that threat reduction pot on the forums, and someone else is wondering the same, even I won't be able to find what I said, I"ll have no clue which random thread it was in.

Let's be honest - not everyone takes the time to go over the forum pages with a fine tooth comb, like a few of us do. It's the people who skim over / skip some rant thread, are the people who could benefit from info about pots, etc.