Old Raiders don’t die…

…they just wipe at 1% (with thanks to Spinks for the ending, I was too lazy to think of one).

Or, can you just drop raiding and not worry about it? I know at least one person who’s happily made the transition that way. I’m vacillating about it.

There’s things I don’t like about the current raiding I do, solely in LotRO, in the Dol Guldur cluster. I’m not overly keen on the radiance gating, I’d rather it was trait-based, or .. hrrm many other proposed systems. I prefer a closed-ish raiding group, but our kin has opted to go for rotations, and a much more broad brush approach.

There’s things I do like about raids in general, and the current one is included in that. I like the social side, the larger group size and chance to group with people I may not group with every night of the week. I like the more interesting fights a raid can bring in (though to be fair, lots of the 3-man instances have some fairly interesting fights in them which probably allow me to display my ‘leet skillz’ more obviously than in the current raid.

But, I have to admit I’m finding myself a little ambivalent about raiding in general. Some of it is being in the doldrums about LotRO, but it’s a far more complex reaction than that and I’m not even sure I would be able to explain all its facets. I’m still signing up, but perhaps being a bit more honest about nights I’d rather sit on the sofa watching crappy TV.

And yet, when I think of myself as a player, I think of me raiding. So I guess I’m not quite done with it yet.

Why Raid?

Was having an interesting Twitter chat with a kinmate this morning (@sauronsbeagle to give him his due) when we touched on amusing reasons to raid. He’s a Minstrel, I’m a Captain – we both heal in raids. And there’s your context:

I felt my #3 key wasn’t being pressed often enough. The 1st boss and gauntlet make up for that!

Yes, I like to use Gauntlet to bask in the smugness of my 8.3s on-defeat heal. Will go when I break DN* set up.

*DN = Dar Narbugud (previous raid in Moria – the Captain set bonus reduces the cooldown on all on-defeat skills).

Now, we were just joking about the relentless nature of ‘The Gauntlet’ in Barad Guldur. It’s ~30 mins of constant fighting of wargs, uruks and goblins while climbing a number of staircases and rushing across landings. And slightly on the nature of being a healer in a raid, but it did make me think – why do I enjoy raiding?

For me, personally, it’s mostly the social aspect. I get to group with 12 people instead of 6 (and an even wider circle with the rotation system we run in-kin). They have to listen to my bad jokes, my innuendos and my insistence that Captains really aren’t needed in raids, when we all know they are! I play MMOs to group, and while I do enjoy soloing during the day and spending some time with myself, I love being able to chat in kin-chat, fellowship chat and also raid chat – and teamspeak these days, though I used to avoid it like the plague. I don’t NEED to group to have that social side to my gaming, but the shared goals of a raid do add something.

The challenge? Hrrm, this is a reason I’d have said I wanted to raid, but if I examine my motives a bit more truthfully I pretty much approach every raid knowing we CAN do the fights. It might mean we have to wipe a bunch learning placement, tricks of the fight, etc. But I have faith in my kinmates. There’s solo instances that I found more challenging that certain boss fights, there’s certainly 3-man and 6-man content I’ve had to wipe at almost as many times before getting the hang of. This is just larger scale. But I’m not all THAT motivated by the ‘saying we’ve done it’ aspect, even if I know I should be. Maybe that’s been the biggest change in my attitude towards MMOs recently. Either my attitude has shifted, or I’ve been thinking about it a bit more intently of late.

The loot? Um.. actually I almost dread it at the moment. I don’t really like radiance gear, I hate the lottery of checking each new class-specific raid set to see what the devs have decided Captains will get. For Barad Guldur, the set is not only ugly, it has stats that I personally wouldn’t choose – and yet I know I’ll have to get it so I can pass through the next radiance ‘gate’ for future content. The set bonus is pretty rubbish for me also, especially going from a very good one from Dar Narbugud. Jewellery, trinkets, other drops – probably all more appealing for me as actual loot drops, but I know I will need this ugly, un-appealing statwise armour. So what was a reason to raid for me for previous raids, in WoW and in DAoC, has become more of a stressor! Sad. But the next raid might have a great set of armour, let’s try and stay positive!

Downsides of raiding? There’s always a touch of friction when the group size increases and a touch of mob mentality pops in to show its face. It’s easy for people to take things the wrong way, myself included. It’s quite focused, moreso than most other content, and you have more people relying on you (I say this as a healer, but it’s true for every single person in a smallish raid). People get tired, because raids tend to go on longer than other grouped content. Wipes are inevitable and everyone takes those differently. I’m on the richer side in LotRO, so even when I gripe about repair bills, it’s really no big deal to me. But some people really don’t have as much time to get cash to cover what can be repair bills of up to 1g! And if you go twice in a week, that can soon add up!

On the whole, raiding is for me… for the moment, anyway. I’m just changing my attitudes towards it a little. Which is probably a healthy thing!

Any reasons to raid that I missed? Any compelling arguments against raiding (other than time?).

The Name Game

LotRO has 12-person raids, on the whole. We go on fridays and sundays, on the whole.

Tonight, as our group formed, I noticed the first 4 members all had names that started with vowels. And then we started to play the name game – working out which people who raided in the kin had names that started with a vowel that we could incorporate, and whether we could get a rounded group that way.

I have a feeling I’ll be playing this and other name games all night. Next, I was thinking how another kin Captain whose name starts with a B would manage, and decided he could try for a group that had names starting A,B,C, etc.

It’s a silly thought and perhaps an odd way to return to talking about games on this blog. But I had it, so I thought I’d share.

Quick raiding update

Last night we downed The Blind One, for the first time, and got The Mistress of Pestilence down about halfway. Found the last mushroom for the deed, by a stylish case of falling. I won’t spoil how or why, but it was kind of funny.

The first time we get a boss down there’s a definite sigh of relief and a cheer. Followed by a strange pang of fear that we now have to show we can repeat the feat. I’ve said it before, but the second kill is my favourite in any raid. The one that proves it wasn’t just good luck that got us through the fight. Of course, I love the first kill – that goes without saying, but nothing quite beats the sensation of feeling we’ve conquered the fight, and I tend to get that on kill no. 2.

So – looks like we may have a good chance of finishing Dar Narbugud before Siege of Mirkwood launches. Although I’ll miss the Mistress/Blind One fights next week as I’m taking a trip down south for a family lunch, and then to go stay with Spinks and sneak a peek at Dragon Age: Origins, so everything makes sense to me ;p

The Blind One

He’s a big, bad, monster deep within Dar Narbugud. It’s a tricky, Thrang-style fight. We’ve been at it a few weeks (I think would have been a bit faster with a fixed group, but our kin practices ‘rotations’ so we often have people new to the fight with us). We can now easily get through 1st and 2nd stage and yesterday got him to 38k on one attempt and then 28k on the next (from 500k). We’re making progress. And soon, it’ll be second nature to handle the transitions.

But for now, he’s my biggest frustration in LotRO. Captains, in our kin, are a rare breed at max level and radiance-d out. We get to go to most raids, which is quite a bit deal as every other class has to rotate between 3-4 players (we have more guardians but one is sitting out the rotation). I’m not a huge fan of rotation on such a wide-scale, but it’s meant to be fair to those who want to raid. Strictly, we’re very close to being able to run two raid groups, just not every week, and we’d be missing the Captains. So it’s a Catch 22 situation.

My personal views of rotations aside, what the situation does mean is that I get to see the fight every week, with both new and old people. I get to judge when I feel it’s gone better, when we’ve taken a step backwards, and I also get tired of the content faster, I imagine. For me this is attempt who-knows on the Blind One (we’re going again tonight after such close shaves), most people know how many times they’ve been. It’s blurring for me. And even if we do it tomorrow, there’s no guarantee we’ll do it next week. I worry I’m burning out a little. I still concentrate on being the best I can be when the fight starts, but I’m not enjoying it like I once was.

Would be nice to finish Dar Narbugud before Mirkwood comes out. I think and hope we will. The boss after The Blind One is supposed to be a lot easier, and is the last boss. I’d kind of like the armour set, as the Captain bonus is actually a decent one for once. Funnily, I’m not usually an ‘achiever’ in raids, I tend to go for the social aspect. Maybe skirmishes will fill that hole soon… though who doesn’t want to go to Dol Guldur and kick Nazgul butt!?

/ramble off.

Does everyone hate DKP?

Since when did DKP become a polarising factor? I quite like it, and I’ve seen a few different versions. Each DKP system  can be tweaked for a specific raiding group/guild, it’s up to you how you award points and how to spend them. But it seems people either love it, or despise the very concept.

Dragon Kill Points. Something we’ve all become aware of since the old Everquest days. Who knew they’d become so fixed in the MMO world?

In the days of massive raid numbers in Dark Age of Camelot we had a pretty simple system going. Turn up for a Sidi raid, get 10 points. Spend points each week bartering for items that dropped at the guildhouse of the guild running said raids. Either save up points for armour or weapons (at say 40 or 50 points per piece), or spend 10 points on the cheaper loot, such as respec stones. Perhaps from this I started with a good opinion of DKP.

What makes it less fair?

1. Bind on Acquire loot that requires not just your presence, but the presence of the character you want to have the item in the raid on the night/day it drops.

2. Non-fixed groups in the days when raid size is mandated by the game. So if you’re not lucky enough to be picked for the raid, but you signed up for it, is that rewarded or not, and at what level?

There’s probably a thousand other little nuances of unfairness… being docked points for turning up a little late through no fault of your own, or for mucking about during the raid. As I said at the start, each DKP system can be tweaked to be that little bit different, depending on game and group.

If I was doing a LotRO Moria one, I’d probably award points for helping people get radiance gear, but that already gives benefit to those who can play more often and have the time, or those with especially useful classes. All things you don’t and shouldn’t think about when picking a character class you love and want to spend time with.

Our kin in LotRO doesn’t use DKP. It uses something called the Suicide Kings method. I hate the name. It was, of course, devised for World of Warcraft and is supposed to suit casual raiding where loot isn’t the primary concern. We have separate SK lists for barter coins and set gear loot. But anything that isn’t covered, such as jewellery ends up being rolled for because everyone knows that if you choose not to ‘suicide’ over it, it goes to a roll. It’s not the most satisfactory system, and I have a few problems with it. But it’s hard to think up a DKP system for our kin that would work.

Why? Because we’re a supposedly casual kin (and in many ways we are casual), but we also have a core of raiders, such as myself, who have both the time and the desire to hit raids hard. Currently our pool of raiding-geared characters means we have quite a rotation system set up, and we need a specific member of the kin to decide who goes and on what night. It’s not ideal, but it lets the widest pool of people participate in the raid. Of course, it also means some of the more focussed raiders have to sit out, and don’t really get to choose what nights they sit out on.

And, at some stage, we’ll have enough geared up people to run the raid twice, but who wants to go on the discovery (ie. full of wipes) raid, when you can go with the established group. It’s a problem that isn’t going away. In trying to please everyone on both sides of the casual/more hardcore divide, we’re left with a compromise raid. It’s working, but it’s definitely more of a slog.

Lootwise, I generally don’t care too much about loot. But it always makes me sit back and wonder what the truly fair way to do it is. It isn’t fair to be told you can’t go even if you have the time and commitment to. But then it also isn’t fair that I ended up with a class that gets to go every time I want, more or less, purely because Captains are seen as raid-desirable and very few people in our kin have managed to get one to 60 and geared them up. While recognising it’s not fair, I also like it, from my perspective. I don’t get time to forget the fights, I see it work with different sets of people, and of course, I keep my place on the SK list. 

I can sometimes show my hardcore colours. I’d like a loot system that rewarded punctuality, helping others, sitting out if you have to, participating, coming with a full set of potions, tokens, and having traited appropriately. Less so the first kills, because it’s no longer in anyone’s power to decide if they get to go on the night we kill something. Multiple wipes would be nice to reward, as they cost a fair bit in LotRO – I’d rather reward those than the first kills, I think. But, I’d also like the full Captain set, and that ain’t going to happen anytime soon. Shame, it has a nice bonus – which not all the sets do. 

I wish I had the time and energy to work up a DKP system I felt would work for our kin. But truthfully, many people don’t see any problem with SK. They raid when they can, and get gear in some kind of rotation made fairer by the intervention of the raid leader.  And while that’s the case, there’s no real push to change things.

It’s a bit of a ramble. But I mainly wanted to spew my thoughts out to see if anyone out there had any kind of solution to a raid looting system for a casual-ish raid with rotating members, I don’t really think there’s one out there. But it’s been a while since we went and looked, and I want to be fully prepared to suggest something better for the Mirkwood raids on Dol Guldur, if possible.

ps,. this post is made more awkward by the fact I know some of my kinmates read this blog. Don’t take any offence anyone, and don’t read into this anything other than what it is, a consideration of how much I dislike SK for our current loot distribution system. With the new, revamped NtC blog, I’m spending very little time considering other people’s opinions and this is just me, on the moment I write the ramble! Liable to change my mind in 5 minutes, but unprepared to change what I write to save any hurt feelings.

I Never Promised…

Did you notice how directly after saying I’d come back to the blog, I kind of vanished down to London? Ha ha.

I’m at Spinks’ house overnight though, reading through Vampire: the Requiem (it was the Masquerade in my day!), and thinking I need my own copy. But that also I should update as to what I’m playing and where, before I get back to commenting a little on MMOs.

I’m playing LotRO exclusively now. I tried WAR again for the 10 days, and didn’t do much more than play Nordenwatch and Gates of Ekrund. Both very enjoyable. There’s a lot of fun around the game, but without my old guild and the people I wanted to say hi to, I found it tricky to stay for a long period.

Plus, our LotRO kin has finally started on DN (the new end raid). We did pretty good, I think. Got the first bosses down in few runs, and they cleared them again on friday (though I was in London!). They’re doing exploring tonight, and I fully expect another one or two bosses to drop. And next week I’ll be back with them again.

I kind of like new raids. I like learning the encounters, and try to go to them as clear of spoilers as I can. Often I might try and find out if I need anything specific to watch out for as a Captain, but I do try and stay fairly clear of direct discussion of fights. I like to see a boss drop for the first time. But I can make do with it being MY first time. I don’t much like loot and loot distribution, it stalls the raid a little – but I appreciate it’s there and has to be done, and I don’t mind the system we’ve gone for in-kin, so it could be worse. I like the familiar chit-chat, hanging out with more than a group of kinmates. But I’ve also been in a very dark place recently and found the first return-to-raiding night a bit shouty for me. I think it’s because I wasn’t joining in, or felt unable to.

Which is something I’ve noticed about myself. I used to be one of the loud ones in TS, and would be shoutier than anyone during raids. I feel something is holding me back, and it’s probably myself. I’ve gone a bit reflective and insular to deal with my mourning. And I have a liability to snap that previously I had under far better control. So I try and stay quiet to avoid it. Even though I hope people understand. Yesterday I snapped at two people I didn’t 100% mean to. And one I did!

Anyway, digression over. We’re raiding DN in LotRO, as well as the Turtle (or Filikul). We may even return to the Watcher when we can be bothered and have the right people together. And in the meantime I want to get back into grouping with kinmates and helping them through content.

I am considering the refer-a-friend WoW trial Spinks sent my way. But then I remember I’d have to buy the game AGAIN, and I have cold feet. I’d like to return to the familiarity of the game in a way, but I don’t want to buy it. I could just resub on an old account, but then I lose the 3x xp. And I’ll probably get bored by level 20!

All my excitement is based around World of Darkness and Rohan.

/update.

Who Watches the Watcher?

… Apparently I do.

Last night our kin finally got to The Watcher, after some drafting of raid rules that took weeks, and also toying about with loot rules. It’s not been an easy time to work them all out, and it’s caused a lot of misunderstandings which I’m sure aren’t quite ironed out yet.

But anyway, I signed up for the first raid and was accepted into the initial group and we all got together last night for a series of learning wipes. At least it’s fast and furious. And I’m not going to talk in terms of spoilers here, but I think everyone knows by now it involves going into the Vile Maw, where The Watcher is hanging out and beating on him, and his tentacles. Of course, we don’t have the advantage of the Fellowship, and we’re all a bit wimpier, so it needs 12 of us and some ‘tactics’.

The learning stages are some of the most fun in any raid, but I found myself missing two of my friends a lot. And I was shattered, which also didn’t help. But it was interesting to go in, even though I’m not sure how many times I’ll get to see it… but I’m not that bothered anymore, either! Tell me long enough it’s not worth caring about, and eventually it sinks in, eh?

I am glad Turbine gave us the option to see some of the famous baddies of Middle Earth, just right now I seem to be too tired to appreciate it.

I did get some screenshots of what I imagine is just the first stage of the fight, but didn’t want to spoil it for people, so may have to drop them in another time!

1-Day Weekend

Due to my own folly, I only had sunday off this weekend, so I haven’t really been up to much, in any game.

I finally got to Mourkain Temple with my Warrior Priest. Seeing dude with the thing made  my heart warm. But I stopped playing regardless, because I don’t want to hit rank 12 before my Slayer buddies have had a chance to catch up a little.

In LotRO we’ve been helping people get more of their radiance sets (these are the bigs of armour you get for completing  Moria instances on hard-mode and that you need 5 of to safely do the Watcher fight). Still no idea when we’ll get to see the Watcher. It’s been handed over to kin bureaucrats, so my raiding fate is in their hands. Not altogether happy, but I’m sure I’ll survive. So, instead of any of that, I signed up the kin ‘Beginners’ Rift raid, which isn’t really a beginners group at all – they just started a little after we’d been doing it for months, and it seemed the easiest differentiating title at the time. These are people I don’t get to group with much, but now quite a few of us are level 60, it makes the Rift a little more relaxing. I don’t mind it at all, but I don’t think I could go too regularly since it’s a fair timesink at any level.

And then I’ve been pondering doing a trial for a game at some point. Probably after the Slayers have been played up, and after we’ve explored Lothlorien (and hopefully got to see the raid there and complete it). Not decided, but contemplating EQ2 or Vanguard. Vanguard because I was in at the start and actually quite liked it but didn’t really know anyone, EQ2 because everyone is always very nice about it. I suspect they’re both more my style than many other games out there.

Also, finally signed up to GoodReads.com as Arbitrary (if you want to add me, but be warned, am reading through a lot of graphic novels in the run-up to Comic Con!). And got to see my dad sign up to twitter. Scary!