The Guild Visits Gruul's Lair

Lol, I said "the next post is a doozy". Not this one, the next one, so go get another cup of coffee.


So, Sunday night. Our normal night for Team 1 to go to Zul'Aman and Team 2 to continue progressing through Karazhan.

Not this week. The time was right for the guild to move into 25-person raiding.

Gruul's Lair was on the calendar.

19 people signed up. There was much buzz and excitement in the days leading up.

I log in about an hour before the event. Immediately get an invite from the Guild Manager / Raid Leader. I see the other officers in the group already. To delegate some of the duties and spread out the responsibility of leading the group, they want me to be Raid Leader.

I was blown away. A mix of feeling happy from the respect my friends have for my performance leading a group, and a huge overwhelming feeling of the weight of just how challenging it will be. More on that later, as the experience leaves me with lots of thoughts. This post is about the raid.

All those who signed up were logged in and ready to rock on time. We ended up with 21 from the guild. Partnering with another guild at our stage of progression, we picked up 3 more players, although filling in the extra slots took us a long time. We started the night with only 24 players because time was ticking and we were anxious.

5 tanks (2 Warriors, 2 Paladins, 1 Druid)
7 healers (4 Priests, 2 Druids, 1 Paladin)
12 DPS (6 Hunters, 3 Rogues, 1 Mage, 1 Warlock, 1 Priest)

Generally a good blend of classes, with the only real issue of 6 Hunters, which is too many, and zero Shamans, which is too few.

We started the run 49 minutes later than our scheduled start time, which is my only complaint for the evening. I'm ok with it for our first night, but this is the chief area that I want the team to improve.

Waltz through the three trashies.

Spend some time figuring out strategy for High King Maulgar. The only people who did the fight before had done it in raids where the Raid Leader pretty much knew the fight and just told people where to go, so they didn't really know how to explain the fight.

First shot. Complete and total chaos.

Second shot. Lets put those 6 Hunters to work. I gave out clear Misdirection assignments for each tank. Much more control over the fight.

Third shot. The only missing piece that was really causing chaos during the Second Shot was the Mage Boss. We got that under control in the third fight.

And we kicked his @ss.

First night, three shots, High King Maulgar down.

For the first time in Guild History, Amava decides to roll for T4 loot. And with 9 people rolling, drops a 98 and wins the shoulders. I actually felt bad and wish I hadn't rolled, I'd much rather see the gear go to a Guildie, but I suppose I won't complain, I like the look better than my Beastmaw Pauldrons.

We pushed on to Gruul.

The group agreed to extend our raid by 30 minutes to allow for some Gruul experimentation.

2 shots, both wipes. 24% at 9 growths.

And there you have it. Our first foray into 25-person content, a smashing success. Positive attitudes abound. Good progression for the guild. Lots of good things on the list, and only a start time issue on the bad side.