Last night was my weekly Dragon Soul run. It's normally two other guildies and whoever we can PuG from trade chat. Last night, we decided to try something a little different and ask other guild members to come along with us. All went well for Morchok and the trash in Zon'ozz's room. But we encountered problems during the actual fight. Due to insufficient heals and Zon'ozz spawning the Void of Unmaking at a wonky angle, we wiped. Normally we have trouble with Zon'ozz at first anyway, but it was the healing numbers that worried our raid leaders. Our Pally healer was fine, and so was I. Our other guild healer, a resto druid, was not. Upon inspection, her gear was hardly gemmed, she only had her leatherworking enchantment for her bracers, and she had absolutely no reforges. This resulted in her only having 125k mana, which is a major problem after the Hagara fight and would be absolutely hellish if we had proceeded to the Spine fight.
Our leaders discussed some things which I was not privy to, but the decision was reached to kick the guildie druid healer because her gear wasn't up to non-LFR standards. The Pally healer, an officer in our guild, abruptly left after saying it was childish and petty to kick someone whose gear wasn't up to normal raiding standards. I jumped up to our Vent's lobby and heard the Pally healer just raging about what had happened in the raid and how we had been petty and cruel to a fellow guild member.
This only raises one question with me. Is it fair to kick a guild member whose gear isn't up to the DS10 normal minimum? Extending on that, was it also fair for said officer to all but bully a fellow guild member and one of our strongest tanks out of the guild?
When I ran DS for the first time last week on my shaman, my gear was a combination of Firelands and Hour of Twilight gear, and my gear wasn't the best for what we were attempting, but it was fully gemmed, enchanted, and reforged. I know my responsibilities as a healer and I wouldn't let myself go raid without my gear being as optimized as possible. I could make up for my lack of gear and I managed to heal successfully. Our guildie Druid was in LFR and Valor gear, and I didn't feel horribly comfortable healing with her in the first place. It goes without saying that I'm now left with feelings of awkwardness regarding my guild and all of the drama that went down last night. I even refused to go on my main and help them with an ICC achievement run and spent the rest of the night on my lowbie DK tank. So what is a player to do when disillusioned with their guild?
It isn't fair to the rest of the people in the raid NOT to kick someone who's gear doesn't make the cut. Of course I'm somewhat biased on the matter, being one of the people who made the relevant decision. However, that said, I left anything about healing to my co-Raid Leader, who knows healing better than I do. I think it's petty of the person who was raging to do it behind my back rather than speaking about any problems he had to my face. Which is one of the reasons I took the actions I did.
ReplyDeleteI appreciate your input, David, however biased it may be. The fuss our Pally healer made after the Druid was kicked was completely uncalled for (trying not to name names here just in case anyone from that guild finds this blog). I trust your judgment, along with the co-Raid Leader for our weekly DS runs, and I feel like the right call was made on your end, although that's probably biased on my end too. ;)
ReplyDeleteThe fact of the matter is, Dragon Soul has very strict requirements and very little room for error. Hearing the guild's run last night and how the Pally kept trying to make excuses for the Druid healer's bad healing output just proves that we wouldn't have made it far at all if we had kept them in our group. I almost fear how the Spine fight would have gone with their low mana pool. The fact that you even offered to gem and enchant the druid's gear and them not taking you up on it just highlights many problems with this guild and adding to my disbelief that it hasn't imploded due to the cliquey behavior of some members and the hubris of the Pally healer.
I was made to feel as though I was somehow callous and cruel for making what was an easy decision for the raid. It is, to me, common courtesy for someone who comes to a raid to have gear sufficiently gemmed and enchanted. It doesn't have to be the best gems or enchants, just enough to show that you care enough to do the requisite prep work.
ReplyDeleteWow. Awkward! As an officer and a healer I understand what it's like if you have an undergeared guildies join you. If they turn up like that I normally whisper them to let them know it will be intense and see how they go but if they can't keep up they will be replaced. Kicking is a harsh word, but politely removing would be a better way to do it. I hope you feel better and the drama settles down.
ReplyDeleteThank you for the kind words, Navimie. Things have settled down a bit, but it still feels kind of awkward to be raiding with the same people who were so rude. I like to keep things relatively drama-free, but sadly 10-man raiding leaves very little room for error compared to 25-man. Perhaps things will be handled differently if this kind of scenario is encountered again during a raid.
Delete