This post comes to you courtesy of the mailbag.
I read your excellent posts in http://parttimedruid.com/category/casual-play/ and I really enjoyed them.
I’d like to look at it from a slightly different angle though. What advice would you give to someone looking to form a Casual Raiding Guild.
For this discussion, let us assume our CRG is a 9 hour a week guild.
This is something that I’ve kinda sorta covered before, though not in terms of guild formation. Well, it got PTD’s old gears humming, and I’ll do my best to share my thoughts on building a casual raiding guild. I initially planned to do a “how-to” kind of post, detailing it step by step, but I soon realized that what would really help were a few key points to focus on. Without further adieu, here they are.
Key #1: Strong Leadership
The first thing you’ll need for a casual raiding guild is strength at the top. Casual players have a whole host of wants and needs, and you’re going to need a Mother Brain that can keep everyone fed and happy. “Casual Raiding” can be a bit of a contradiction in terms. The raiding environment is more naturally suited to the hardcore player, but that doesn’t mean casual raiding can’t work. In order to MAKE it work, however, you need determined leadership.
The leader of a casual raiding guild must be flexible. You are basically living in two separate worlds, one focusing on raid progression with the other focused on alts and keeping things fun for the non-raiding contingent. Let’s face it, even in a casual raiding guild you will HAVE to have a portion of your membership that doesn’t really raid, at least not much. How else will you gear up new toons, if there is nobody willing to run Heroic Mechanar while the guild at large is busy in SSC?
This is important because as a casual raiding guild, you might need a larger overall membership to make sure you can fill those 25 man runs. Hardcore raiding guilds can recruit to fill specific class slots in specific time periods, you most likely will not be able to function that way. You will have to continually reinforce your raiding contingent from within. Having a guild that can focus both on raiding progression and leveling new toons is ideal.
Key #2: A Reliable Core
In a casual raiding guild, your raiding roster will no doubt be fairly fluid. People will be attracted to your guild because they want to raid without being “required” to be there 4 nights a week. You will attract a lot of people that can only raid one night a week. Don’t turn them down. You need all the help you can get. You might end up with 4 Resto Druids, for instance, but they all can only attend a different night.
So what do I mean by a reliable core? Well, you’ll still need a STARTING point for all your raids. You’ll need, for 25 mans at least, a dozen or so dedicated players who DO make most or all of your raiding nights. This reliable core will also ideally encompass many “key” classes. A couple of tanks, a couple strong healers, some of your best DPSers. And, of course at least a couple of people to lead those raids. Raids don’t lead themselves, you know. You’ll want a main raid leader and probably an assistant who helps call out orders throughout the night. You could also employ healing leads, DPS leads, or a variety of other things, but you can get by with two strong raid leaders.
Most importantly, you want to start with a good amount of reliable members. You don’t want to start any raid night saying, “Need 18 more for SSC.”
Key #3: A Narrow Focus
You will have your share of challenges raiding casually. The last thing you want to do is try to go in too many directions at once. Keep a narrow focus, at least at the beginning. What this means is, don’t run TK for 3 hours one night, SSC for 3 hours the next, then ZA for 3 hours. My specific recommendation, at least at the beginning, is do one 3-hour run in Kara, and then spend the other 2 nights on ONE 25 man instance. You could start with SSC, depending on the strength of your raiders, but it might help to start with Gruul’s Lair, as it is short and gives you a good primer on 25 man coordination. If you clear Gruul’s in one night, try Magtheridon the next.
Another element of focus that could help is make sure the guild at LARGE is focused. By that I mean post and discuss strategies for the bosses you plan to attempt in the near future. Because at least some of your raid will be fairly fluid, you need to make sure everyone is on the same page. Set up some message boards and USE them to be sure this is the case. If you plan to work on Lurker in the coming weeks, make a post about it on your boards in advance. Make sure everyone takes a look at videos and reads the strategies. You need your members to be OVER prepared for boss encounters.
Key #4: Flexible Scheduling
Hopefully, you already realize this. You have to set your raiding schedule a little differently than a more serious raiding guild. You can’t raid every Thursday, Friday and Tuesday from 7-10. A schedule set in stone will likely lock out too many people. You’ll need a greater degree of scheduling variance to give the majority of your guild access to raiding. Perhaps a 2 week rotation would work. Raid Tues, Thurs nights and Saturday during the day one week, then Wednesday, Friday night and Sunday day the next. You have to give your members options. If you find you can set up a hard schedule, chances are you aren’t really a casual raiding guild. Be aware when setting up your schedule when the various raid instances reset, of course. (You could also use this to your advantage early on, setting up Kara on successive nights.)
Key #5: A Casual Loot System
This could be the most difficult decision you have to make. People raid for fun, but they also raid for loot. If you have members that don’t see any shot at getting drops, they won’t bother signing up. A DKP system, for instance, could favor the members that can make most raid nights over those that can only come once a week. This is not acceptable in a casual raiding environment. You need a system that will NOT punish people who can only get there once a week.
Now, I can already hear the arguments from those who think constant raid attendance means they deserve more. In my experience, there is one element that contingent always seems to forget. If you’re making every raid, your chances at loot are already MUCH MUCH better than those who only come once a week. Honest. In a month you might see SSC 12 times to the more casual player’s 4 times. That’s a huge advantage already.
The system that has worked well for my casual raiding alliance is Suicide Kings. It’s simple, constant attendance does HELP, but erratic attendance doesn’t kill you either. I’m sure there are other systems out there, but I frankly don’t know much about them. 
We have always used SK, dating back to Molten Core, and have never had any real issues.
Conclusion
Admittedly, I wasn’t even really aware of how and when our “casual raiding” alliance was formed. At the time I didn’t see myself running Molten Core anytime soon, so I didn’t think much of it or pay attention. I don’t know what decisions were made, or how every thing was hashed out. I do know, however, the ways in which what we do, well, works. My raiding alliance has been around a LONG time, and we were never in any real danger of it dissolving. We got it done before Burning Crusade in Onyxia’s Lair, Molten Core, and Blackwing Lair. Now we’ve accomplished quite a bit in every 25 man short of Sunwell. I know that technically my alliance is not a casual raiding “guild” per se, but I think its philosophies can be easily translated to a single guild.
I hope this article didn’t ramble too much for you, but its a rather large topic to try to tackle. If I had to try to sum it up in very few words, I would say this: a successful casual raiding guild needs strong leadership along with great flexibility. Remember that, and you’ll do just fine. Thanks for reading!
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nice job i learned some things