First of all, a little introduction:
I am the raid leader of a 25 man guild on Archimonde EU. I have ended up with this position because our two previous raids leads stopped playing. I had to learn from scratch everything , raid comps and so on. I has not been easy and took an enormeous effort from me in order to make my players advance. We are currently on hard modes in ICC25 and advancing steadily.
I feel that I need to greatly enhance my raid leading skills and awareness in order to drive my team to more success. I have however realised that I just cannot see everything and know everything in a typical raid encounter.
Considering my goal is to be as best a raid leader for my guild, I am therefore turning to you with some questions, which I hope might direct me towards this goal.
I have a few questions to you guys regarding raid leading.
How many raid leaders do you use in a typical raid?
How does your raid leader come up with strategies?
Does your raid lead take input from raiders during new raids (attempts)?
What could you advise me to be a better raid leader?
Regards and thank you for your feedback.
Raid leading strat and the like
Re: Raid leading strat and the like
27 May 2010 12:40
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Suppa
- Posts: 26
Nice to see you are willing to learn more about raid leading then you do know now. Seeing you say you are going through 25hm hardmodes now, most boss mods got all encounters worked out. All content strats have been given away already.
For you its just to put the right players at the right positions. Do you have an sample of a fight your strugling with?
In our guild we are open for comments of the guild. Raidleader and officers then decide what tactic is best to use after discussing it.
We ussualy have one raid leader and one helping out on the parts he forgets. We also have another backup raidleader in case our leader isnt there... Can happen once in a while ;)
About how to approach things... its all depending on ure guild, on your roster, how you guys play, if your more into casual, into hardcore..
Its hard to say how to lead best, because each person has its own way of dealing with things.
From my pov: Id like to keep my group motivated, even after 40 wipes on putri 25 HM, or Sindra 25 HM. We do however replace people who dont wanne learn from their mistakes. Everyone has gotten the chance to learn the encounter, and after 20 tries you should know how a boss works.
Dont call things which arent important. Keep the chat and talk clear that when there is a need of some talk, its free to do so. I can keep going on forever about this, but again, leading you gotte learn yourself. How to handle certain fights is something you read / watch from forums and vids (while its already cleared).
Good luck on your journey.
For you its just to put the right players at the right positions. Do you have an sample of a fight your strugling with?
In our guild we are open for comments of the guild. Raidleader and officers then decide what tactic is best to use after discussing it.
We ussualy have one raid leader and one helping out on the parts he forgets. We also have another backup raidleader in case our leader isnt there... Can happen once in a while ;)
About how to approach things... its all depending on ure guild, on your roster, how you guys play, if your more into casual, into hardcore..
Its hard to say how to lead best, because each person has its own way of dealing with things.
From my pov: Id like to keep my group motivated, even after 40 wipes on putri 25 HM, or Sindra 25 HM. We do however replace people who dont wanne learn from their mistakes. Everyone has gotten the chance to learn the encounter, and after 20 tries you should know how a boss works.
Dont call things which arent important. Keep the chat and talk clear that when there is a need of some talk, its free to do so. I can keep going on forever about this, but again, leading you gotte learn yourself. How to handle certain fights is something you read / watch from forums and vids (while its already cleared).
Good luck on your journey.
Re: Raid leading strat and the like
27 May 2010 15:16
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psyquest
- Posts: 4
Boss mods have indeed all the CDs etc. However what mods dont tell you is how you and when you make the call to split dps, put dps here and there, assign this person or that person to a specific task and so on.
My guild used to be hardcore, we are currently a casual guild raiding 4 nights a week. 3 nights attendance is required and our roster does not usually give me a ton of flexibility: still cannot recruit a enhance shaman nor frost DK, cannot afford most of the time to replace someone playing poorly etc.
Currently we have done the easier fights in HM.
Our main issues:
Done some tries with lady deathwhisper and found that 2 groups killing on each side the adds was taking us too long. May be we should bring both sets of adds to the center next to the stairs and aoe them down.
Saurfang: we have 3 KBs available but cannot kill adds enough using ffa. We have no stun available so I might try splitting the dps into two groups for the adds. (If you have a suggestion, I am all ears)
For the rest we have done successfully (not putricide and syndragosa of course).
My guild used to be hardcore, we are currently a casual guild raiding 4 nights a week. 3 nights attendance is required and our roster does not usually give me a ton of flexibility: still cannot recruit a enhance shaman nor frost DK, cannot afford most of the time to replace someone playing poorly etc.
Currently we have done the easier fights in HM.
Our main issues:
Done some tries with lady deathwhisper and found that 2 groups killing on each side the adds was taking us too long. May be we should bring both sets of adds to the center next to the stairs and aoe them down.
Saurfang: we have 3 KBs available but cannot kill adds enough using ffa. We have no stun available so I might try splitting the dps into two groups for the adds. (If you have a suggestion, I am all ears)
For the rest we have done successfully (not putricide and syndragosa of course).
Re: Raid leading strat and the like
27 May 2010 23:22
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Suppa
- Posts: 26
About DW:
We put two of our highest warrior dps on the adds with one tank picking them up. Rogues are interrupting lady and for the rest we just split arround at last phase and evade the spirits.
Beginning we stack arround the circle where the boss is standing and we use MD's and death gribs to get the ads close so we can aoe them down.
For saurfang; elemental shaman knockback? balance druid knockback? shaman earthbind totem, hunter frost traps, dk ice chain... should be fine. Just assign your ranged to the marks and ure fine :) Thats atleast if they do some decent dps.
We put two of our highest warrior dps on the adds with one tank picking them up. Rogues are interrupting lady and for the rest we just split arround at last phase and evade the spirits.
Beginning we stack arround the circle where the boss is standing and we use MD's and death gribs to get the ads close so we can aoe them down.
For saurfang; elemental shaman knockback? balance druid knockback? shaman earthbind totem, hunter frost traps, dk ice chain... should be fine. Just assign your ranged to the marks and ure fine :) Thats atleast if they do some decent dps.
Re: Raid leading strat and the like
28 May 2010 02:17
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Themess
- Posts: 4
Hi mate! I'm going to do my best to give a run down of what to do in every raid leading situation, it's going to be a pretty long post but hopefully you'll read it along with others as I think you might find some useful advice in here somewhere. At least, I hope you do :)
Firstly a bit about me. I am a mature student (25) studying in the UK, I hold a degree in behavioral psychology and currently as a hobby I do alot of work with TA, or Transactional Analysis, which is the study of how people communicate. I've been playing wow since early TBC, and raid leading for the last 2 years with a realm first guild.
Now to get down to your questions.
1. How many raid leaders do you use in a typical raid?
Now do you mean raid leaders or officers? Usually there is only 1 RL talking on vent and giving instructions on /raid as this prevents confusion. One voice means your raiders know who to listen for and who is calling the important stuff. It's always a good idea to have 2-3 of your officers in the raid as well to make sure when decisions are made that it is the guild as a whole making them and not a lone RL. I have one officer assigned as master looter so we can all press ahead without much of a hold up.
2. How does your raid leader come up with strategies?
This is a broad subject, but it's never a good idea to make tough decisions alone. Always involve other people when formulating strategies on new encounters and let your classes do most of the work for you. An example would be on a fight that needs taunting after a certain amount of stacks try not to hand hold the tanks too much, Rather let them discuss it between them as they know their limits better than you do. Same with healers. To be honest this is a pretty vague question that has no absolute answer! Just try tactics, if they dont work then try something else. Remember that this might take a few attempts on a new boss though, so try not to make too many tactic changes too fast.
3. Does your raid lead take input from raiders during new raids (attempts)?
Yes. 100% take advice from the raid as they are in the best place to tell you if something is going wrong and why. There is a fine balance to be had between time management and progress however so try to make the questions specific to get specific answers. The ideal question format is: State what went wrong, say how this effects you (the raid), state what needs to change, ask the question.
Example:
"Guys, we keep wiping on P3 Sindragosa because people aren't DPSing the tombs"
"this isn't cool because it means we wipe from too much damage"
"We need to DPS the tombs faster"
"does anyone have any ideas on how we can increase our DPS on the tombs?"
This makes it very clear what it is you want changing, and opens the door for some constructive thinking. Alot of light bulb moments come from raiders, not RLs.
What could you advise me to be a better raid leader?
This is a huge question so I am going to answer it as best I can. There are many things you can always do to be a better raid leader, or rather, a better manager of people.
Firstly, be forgiving. Everyone gets angry sometimes, but different people vent in different ways. There is nothing wrong with getting frustrated so long as the person doesn't cross the line (the personal line). I am always cool with people getting a little hacked off after making a mistake more than a few times, but if they start swearing and blaming others for their mistakes then they will be punished. Wait until they are calm (a good 10 minutes) before letting them know why they are having this punishment, and make sure they understand where they crossed the line.
Secondly, keep your calm. You are the voice of tranquil waters that the raiders hear. You are the voice that feeds their energy, be it positive or negative. If you are angry at people, make it clear why whilst being as neutral as possible.
Example:
"DUDE.... FOR FUCK SAKE! STOP STANDING IN THE FIRE!" works right, but makes -everyone- tense up. Do this enough you end up like 50dkp minus guy, angry all the time. The right way is the same structure as the question above.
"That was a good last attempt apart from dude standing in the fire. This attempt like the last one, but with less fire related injuries as health and safety are really on my back about this one! Lets buff up and get the kill"
How you feel is how your raiders feel. I always have a can of relentless when i'm raid leading :P
Finally, play fair. If there is a rotation of any kind of people in and people out one week to the other, make sure that everyone gets left on the sides evenly. Don't be a favouritist, even if people aren't good find a way around it. Like on a new fight don't take that average DK, take the better one, then sub the average one in for the farm bosses (extreme example, obviously play around a bit). Raid comps are the same, just because you have to take a specific comp to a specific fight doesn't mean you can't chop and change halfway through ICC. Be flexible with who you can bring (if you can) and if it's not looking good, don't be afraid to be real. Tell your raiders that "this week we are going to do it on normal as we just don't have the comp available" if you need to. Nobody likes wiping on a boss for the sake of wiping on a boss, you don't learn anything new.
I use a few addons to help me raid lead:
RaidBuffStatus - tells everyone what buffs are missing from whom
Ensidiafails - this addon defaults to /raid so make sure you turn it to /whisper you instead. Tells you who failed on what avoidable stuff, and helps you pinpoint the mistakes and failpoints.
Recount - Everyone knows this, but in a glance tells you how people are performing or not.
I hope this has been helpful :)
Firstly a bit about me. I am a mature student (25) studying in the UK, I hold a degree in behavioral psychology and currently as a hobby I do alot of work with TA, or Transactional Analysis, which is the study of how people communicate. I've been playing wow since early TBC, and raid leading for the last 2 years with a realm first guild.
Now to get down to your questions.
1. How many raid leaders do you use in a typical raid?
Now do you mean raid leaders or officers? Usually there is only 1 RL talking on vent and giving instructions on /raid as this prevents confusion. One voice means your raiders know who to listen for and who is calling the important stuff. It's always a good idea to have 2-3 of your officers in the raid as well to make sure when decisions are made that it is the guild as a whole making them and not a lone RL. I have one officer assigned as master looter so we can all press ahead without much of a hold up.
2. How does your raid leader come up with strategies?
This is a broad subject, but it's never a good idea to make tough decisions alone. Always involve other people when formulating strategies on new encounters and let your classes do most of the work for you. An example would be on a fight that needs taunting after a certain amount of stacks try not to hand hold the tanks too much, Rather let them discuss it between them as they know their limits better than you do. Same with healers. To be honest this is a pretty vague question that has no absolute answer! Just try tactics, if they dont work then try something else. Remember that this might take a few attempts on a new boss though, so try not to make too many tactic changes too fast.
3. Does your raid lead take input from raiders during new raids (attempts)?
Yes. 100% take advice from the raid as they are in the best place to tell you if something is going wrong and why. There is a fine balance to be had between time management and progress however so try to make the questions specific to get specific answers. The ideal question format is: State what went wrong, say how this effects you (the raid), state what needs to change, ask the question.
Example:
"Guys, we keep wiping on P3 Sindragosa because people aren't DPSing the tombs"
"this isn't cool because it means we wipe from too much damage"
"We need to DPS the tombs faster"
"does anyone have any ideas on how we can increase our DPS on the tombs?"
This makes it very clear what it is you want changing, and opens the door for some constructive thinking. Alot of light bulb moments come from raiders, not RLs.
What could you advise me to be a better raid leader?
This is a huge question so I am going to answer it as best I can. There are many things you can always do to be a better raid leader, or rather, a better manager of people.
Firstly, be forgiving. Everyone gets angry sometimes, but different people vent in different ways. There is nothing wrong with getting frustrated so long as the person doesn't cross the line (the personal line). I am always cool with people getting a little hacked off after making a mistake more than a few times, but if they start swearing and blaming others for their mistakes then they will be punished. Wait until they are calm (a good 10 minutes) before letting them know why they are having this punishment, and make sure they understand where they crossed the line.
Secondly, keep your calm. You are the voice of tranquil waters that the raiders hear. You are the voice that feeds their energy, be it positive or negative. If you are angry at people, make it clear why whilst being as neutral as possible.
Example:
"DUDE.... FOR FUCK SAKE! STOP STANDING IN THE FIRE!" works right, but makes -everyone- tense up. Do this enough you end up like 50dkp minus guy, angry all the time. The right way is the same structure as the question above.
"That was a good last attempt apart from dude standing in the fire. This attempt like the last one, but with less fire related injuries as health and safety are really on my back about this one! Lets buff up and get the kill"
How you feel is how your raiders feel. I always have a can of relentless when i'm raid leading :P
Finally, play fair. If there is a rotation of any kind of people in and people out one week to the other, make sure that everyone gets left on the sides evenly. Don't be a favouritist, even if people aren't good find a way around it. Like on a new fight don't take that average DK, take the better one, then sub the average one in for the farm bosses (extreme example, obviously play around a bit). Raid comps are the same, just because you have to take a specific comp to a specific fight doesn't mean you can't chop and change halfway through ICC. Be flexible with who you can bring (if you can) and if it's not looking good, don't be afraid to be real. Tell your raiders that "this week we are going to do it on normal as we just don't have the comp available" if you need to. Nobody likes wiping on a boss for the sake of wiping on a boss, you don't learn anything new.
I use a few addons to help me raid lead:
RaidBuffStatus - tells everyone what buffs are missing from whom
Ensidiafails - this addon defaults to /raid so make sure you turn it to /whisper you instead. Tells you who failed on what avoidable stuff, and helps you pinpoint the mistakes and failpoints.
Recount - Everyone knows this, but in a glance tells you how people are performing or not.
I hope this has been helpful :)
Re: Raid leading strat and the like
29 May 2010 17:46
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psyquest
- Posts: 4
I would like to thank you all for your answers. There are very helpful indeed.
I any of you go passed Paris one day, let me know, you have a beer and a nice meal on me!
I any of you go passed Paris one day, let me know, you have a beer and a nice meal on me!
6 posts -