What did a heroic Ragnaros kill cost us?

Every now and then a boss fight comes along that is known as "the guild breaker." 25-man Heroic Ragnaros justifiably earned this title. The last time this moniker was used as extensively was in Sunwell for M'uru. Sure there were tough fights in Wrath, but nothing like Sunwell, and certainly nothing like Heroic Ragnaros.

The difficult issue many guilds faced, and the very one that we did, was a choice between returning the commitment of dedication versus the very real prospect of stagnation. For us, it came down to clearly defining a starting roster, one which left many raiders on the sideline feeling marginalized by the guild.

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Raiding. Leading. Again.

Saltycracker, Big Crits' former Raid Leader, has returned to Big Crits after a brief hiatus. The following is a blog post from Salty about his new role in Big Crits. You can read his blog at http://randthotgen.blogspot.com/

About a month ago, I got that itch again to start raiding. I missed it. More importantly, I missed the people that enjoy raiding. The people that make new friends constantly, tell geeky jokes, make bad sexual innuendos and double entendres. You know, fun people. Not like all those stuck-up people you meet everyday in real life.

Ishraaq, our fearless Da Crew chief, approached me about leading another Firelands run. Something simple, something 10man, something for mains/alts/those not raiding enough. I agreed to lead it. This has now morphed into a 25man Dragon Soul run with expectations attached to it. Yikes.

Let's talk about Da Crew for a second quick. Da Crew is our "casual" raiding rank for people just not up to snuff with the standards of the main progression team, but still wanting to raid with good people. The problem is that casual is a very grey word. Back when Big Crits was formed and the guild was starting to pick up steam, there were a lot of people wanting to be a part of the guild, who did not have the time/desire to raid in a progression environment. Couple this with the fact that pugging raids on Sen'jin Horde was AWFUL, Da Crew started joining up and became a casual group of people with whom the alts of the main raiders and the casual folk could play and have a good time getting some phat purps. 

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Ten Man Raiding - A Postmortem

After raid leading 25mans during Wrath, I decided to see how the 10man side of progression raiding would measure up to what I thought was the more stressful and chaotic 25man side of things. While it lived up to my expectations in some areas, 10man progression raiding underperformed drastically in others. Would I call it a win or a loss? I’d call it a wash. Both models have their warts, but as long as the Internet exists there will be people from both camps lobbing grenades at each other.  Let’s dive in.

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Leadership Philosophy

A few years ago I started a blog dedicated to guild leadership. I folded it shortly after launching because I wanted to pursue my idea for Big Hit Box, but starting this leadership blog meant writing about leadership, which got me thinking about my own leadership philosophy.

I've managed people in real life and in game and have developed over time my own guiding principles to help me in my day-to-day life and decision making process. For me, the three guiding principles of leadership are:

• Communication
• Consistency
• Accountability

Why only these three components? What of loyalty? Or Motivation, order, friendship, respect, control, or any number of other principles that are absolutely applicable to leadership? There are no right answers but I believe that of all the principles these three are of the utmost importance; without even just one of these even the most powerful guild can fail.

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