May 22 2009
Dumb people in raids.
By the title alone you may be able to make an educated guess on what this post is going to be about. If you guessed “Taking dumb people into raids” then congratulations you may possible be a smart person and thus a smart raider, please read on. If you guessed “gum and pennies” or anything other than the previous answer then please read on as well and pay extra special attention to the last paragraph, I think you’ll need the help.
Now what constitutes a dumb person? A dumb person is characterized by their actions and their actions alone. A dumb person is usually a poor performer in the raids. And don’t confuse poor performance due to gear with poor performance due to the abilities of the raider. As well not every poor performer is a dumb person but those that continually don’t meet expectations fall dangerously close to this category.
A dumb persons’ lack of performance stems from a few other very noticeable traits. They do not pay attention. If when you do a ready check and they don’t respond time after time from raid to raid then that’s one more case for you having a dumb person in your raid.
Ignorance is another clue to let you know what you are raiding with. If the person has no idea about the mechanics of a boss fight then that person probably didn’t read up on the fight. This isn’t always a bad thing but if you’ve had thoughts a particular raid may actually be a dumb person then this only supports your claim.
And the last key piece of evidence that you may have a dumb person in your midst is, (drum roll here) …… if they don’t move out of the fraking fire! And I am not talking about once or even maybe twice but every single time any AoE zone is laid on the floor, if this person doesn’t move out of it or even more proof if you think you actually saw him move -into- it once or twice then we may have just located a dumb player in your raid.
Now that we have successfully decided if you have a dumb person in your raid we can talk about why they are there. There are really only two reasons you would have one in your raid. Reason one is that you just didn’t know, but once you do know you can remedy the situation and bring in someone who won’t suck the fun out of the other twenty-four people trying to raid. And reason two is that you are in desperate for people and its convenient when they make your twenty-four man raid into a twenty-five man raid. This is fine and dandy however if leads to sort of a third reason to have them in your raids. And that is loyalty.
Some leaders don’t have the heart to tell a person who has been raiding with them for a few months that we found someone better, go suck an egg. The policy we have run with is if we need the body to fill a spot then take them but if someone comes along who is willing to put more effort to raiding than the dumb person then take them instead. Not so much out of a selfish idea for the leader as an individual but for his being concerned with the well being of the other twenty-three people who are willing raid and know what they are doing.
Now recently our policy has changes slightly, ever so slightly. We now have added the rule that we, under no circumstances take dumb people into ten man raids. We can get away with it in twenty-five mans since they only represent 1/25 of the raid, A small fraction to be sure. Or he represents 1/7 of the healers or 1/15 the dps. Having such a small fraction of the raid not perform as well as the rest is manageable, it can be done. Whereas in a ten man the fraction of the raid s/he represents is much larger, 1/10 or ½ of the healers or even 1/6 of the dps. To have that large of a portion of the raid bringing down the group may just be too much. This is not to say that a bad player in a twenty-five man cannot single handedly kill the entire raid but barring that its more manageable than in ten mans.
On a side not you’ll notice I didn’t mention any dumb people playing tanks. That’s because you just don’t do it, it’s not a pretty picture.
Now that you know how to identify a dumb person in your raid and you can decide if you can afford them being in your raid you can decide what to do.
If you do have a dumb person and you can afford to go without him here is what I want you to do. I want you to wait five minutes and say nothing that entire time. Then come back on and tell everyone that you are calling the raid. Disband the raid and then reform leaving out the dumb person. NOW, if you are in a raid and things go quietly for about four minutes and you think your raid might disband and you think they just might reform…then you’ve got a lot of work to do.
You need to improve your game anyway you can. And it’s very easy to do.
1. Pay attention
2. Read up on the fights
3. Read up on your class
4. Pay attention
5. Ask anyone in your guild for help – they will help
6. Move out of the fire
Reading and paying attention will make any dumb player into, at the least an acceptable player if not a great one. Most people in your guild will help you. In my guild we have helped quite a few raiders go from being a burden to being an asset to the raid. As a leader it can be a hard decision to balance having enough people to raid, the welfare of the other twenty-three people, and when a person is being dumb enough to be kicked. Ideally it would be nice to have everyone that comes your way be or become a good raider but it’s ultimately up to them to improve themselves.
