Blah.

So it was a rough raid last night. 20 attempts on heroic Sindragosa. 20 failures.

Below, a lot of bitching and a little discussion about some of Sindragosa’s abilities.

As I’ve mentioned before, there’s a raid leading channel my guild uses to coordinate things.

I was asked to join the channel, by the caster officer, just about a week ago. So I did, very, very reluctantly.

It makes sense for me to be in there, so that the caster officer isn’t playing messenger boy, right? Wrong. Everything I say in the raid leader chat basically isn’t answered. Occasionally, the hunter lead will answer, but many of my questions are directed at the MT/GM, so the hunter doesn’t know. The caster officer doesn’t know. And yet, I need to know these things.

I’m telling you right now that I’ve had all of ONE information request answered in the last week. Sunday, Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Sunday. One question actually answered.

So it’s frustrating for me. I’m sitting here with the officers, trying to be polite, trying to do a job I don’t even want and do it well, and I can’t even get an answer to my questions. They’re simple. “Which tank is kiting on Rotface?” “Same taunt rotation on Putricide?” “Two or three-tanking Deathwhisper tonight?”

They’re all reasonable questions requiring short answers. It’s not like I’m saying “Yeah, hi, I think your entire method of doing X is ridiculous so can you please explain that to me?” or anything. It’s basic information.

So I’m already frustrated and I’ve already complained numerous times to the caster officer and been all “What is the POINT of being in the channel if he’s not even going to respond to me?!” and “does he have me on IGNORE?!” and the like.

We had a very rocky start to our Sunday raid.

It began thusly:

[23:28:05.505] Sindragosa hits MT 24370  (A: 13665)
[23:28:05.869] Not Awesome Resto Druid Regrowth MT +1762
[23:28:05.895] Sindragosa hits MT 36655
[23:28:05.895] Not Awesome Resto Druid Rejuvenation MT +3460
[23:28:06.160] Madrana Flash of Light MT +927
[23:28:06.346] Sindragosa Frost Aura MT 3939 (R: 1200)
[23:28:06.424] Awesome Resto Druid Wild Growth MT +1230
[23:28:06.600] Other Holy Pally Holy Shock MT +7414
[23:28:06.877] Not Awesome Resto Druid Glyph of Rejuvenation MT +1730
[23:28:07.080] Sindragosa hits MT 11695 (O: 24245)

1.5 seconds, dead tank.

Now, there are mitigating circumstances. For one, in ALL of our previous attempts on Sindragosa, heroic (all three of them) and normal (let’s not even count them up, but five kills prior to last night), the tank stands out in the middle and points Sindragosa’s head to the left as you look out on to the platform.

What happened last night? He’s suddenly tanking her RIGHT BY THE STAIRS and turns her to face the RIGHT.

This should not have been an issue. But he pulled her directly towards the raid and so I was getting the hell out of there so I don’t get Cleaved. So I’m moving and not casting on him. The other holy pally at least has the presence of mind to Holy Shock. There are hots ticking. None of it’s enough and suddenly he’s dead and I’ve just been whipped by the tail.

“nice heals,” he says in raid chat.

So, wonderful beginning, n’est-ce pas? :P

The next few attempts weren’t wonderful, either. To make matters worse, I kept screwing up.

Attempt 1 was a wipe very quickly, as previously mentioned.

Attempt 2: We were trying a new way to place the stupid frost tombs during an air phase. Instead of them spread along the base of the stairs, we did two lines of three tombs each on the stairs (as there are six on heroic mode). Well, people didn’t get the positioning right because I got the center back position and promptly took 36k damage from my own frost tomb and the two tombs beside me. And died.

Attempt 3: Ice Tombed to death again. Thanks for paying attention to the request to SPREAD OUT a bit more, people.

Attempt 4: This is where it got bad. I died to Blistering Cold. In our hundred or so attempts (both successful and not) I have probably died to Blistering Cold about 10 times. 10% is a large amount, but most of those were on the first night. A night where I was on the fight, had never seen it before, and was on the phone with my RL friend the resto druid who was very upset due to RL circumstances. I shouldn’t have been ON the phone that night, but she didn’t want to take me away from the raid, but I didn’t want to leave her alone. Since that night, I’ve learned how to deal with the Icy Grip and the Blistering Cold and my stupid laptop. I honestly raid at something like 5-7 fps, on a good night. So I take a few steps forward, I prepare myself to turn left and strafe out, then I do so. If I get in trouble, I DS/DS.

But I died to Blistering Cold on that attempt.

Why?

I still had stacks of Instability on me. If I kept running, I couldn’t cast. If I couldn’t cast, I’d drop my Backlash stacks. If I dropped my stacks, I’d hit the raid.

There was this moment of pure indecision, which doesn’t make a lot of sense, to be honest, but I was like “OH MY GOD, WHAT DO I DO?!” because I was totally torn between running and hitting half the raid with my stacks and just staying where I was to cast.

Obviously, staying where I was would be the wrong choice. I realized that, after my moment of indecision had passed and I was like “shit, shit, shit, MOVE.” And I died. Because I had realized too late that blowing up the raid is better than dying to Blistering Cold. And no, I didn’t think to DS/DS, because I’m a nub.

Also, and I don’t know why this plays a factor, but I think it did, having the dragon facing the other way screwed me up. For some unknown reason, I feel compelled to face the same direction as the dragon as I strafe out. Maybe it’s to keep an eye on the tank, but I was adjusting to the new direction. (Also asked about this in the raid leader chat. No response. Obviously.)

Attempt 5: I died to Asphyxiation. Whew. Not my fault. NOTHING I can do there.

Attempt 6: Blistering Cold. Again.

It was roundabout this time when the MT/GM said the following in the raid leader chat:

[MT] i have one rule. if you’re gonna be in this channel, you don’t fuck up.

… I’m sorry, is it a bad time to tell you that I don’t WANT to be in your stupid channel? Or that I am trying to HELP YOU by doing a job that I am, sadly, the most qualified to do? How about that I raid on a POS computer that means my frame rate is slower than what normal people would deem “acceptable”? Or even “playable”?

Of course, I couldn’t say anything. At all. I didn’t even say okay. But oh my God, was I furious. SO ANGRY. I told the caster in a whisper “I don’t even want to BE in the fucking channel!!!!” and all he said back was “lol”. ><

So I took a minute, unloaded some addons I didn’t actually need for the fight, including Recount (which is a huge, huge resource hog) to try to ensure I wouldn’t lag. Of course, the issue here is that, without Recount, I couldn’t see even a very basic overview of who was healing whom and with what spells. I was, however, doing a live log to WoL, so I checked that, periodically.

The good news is, I didn’t eat another Blistering Cold.

The bad news is, this didn’t seem to improve our MT’s mood at all. After the previously mentioned death where he took 80k damage in .526 seconds (which was attempt 7), he started yelling about Frost Resist Aura. He demanded to know which paladin had it and demanded that they put it up.

Uh.

It was up.

It was up ON MY SCREEN when he started bitching. I screenshotted it.

The hunter chimed in, thankfully.

Anyways, this is where we noticed 40y might not be enough range and started dropping a FrR totem by the tank, along with the aura.

But it’s like, even after I assured him it was up in the raid leader chat, even after the hunter chimed in, he kept going in raid about it. And I stepped in, in raid chat, to reassert that the new holy pally app had it.

It’s like I am being completely ignored, purposely, until I screw up and then it’s okay to bitch at me. Even though I’m doing the guild a favour. Even though I really could use the break from doing healing. Even though I actively dread raiding these days. I’m not a paid flunky, you know? I’m a volunteer who plays to try to master the content. I’m a volunteer who’s trying to help out a friend. I’m a volunteer who’s trying to help out the guild by helping out my friend.

And this makes it okay to ignore me until I screw up and then tell me it’s some kind of privilege to be in the raid leader channel with them and because I’m in there I can’t fuck up?

What about the MT taking a frost bomb? That’s not a fuckup? What about neither tank wearing Frost Resist gear? That’s not a fuckup? I don’t care if I’m called out on my mistakes; chances are I already know what the mistake is and I’m working to correct it. But if someone calls me out on my shit and gives themselves a free pass, that’s where I start getting angry.

So his comment to me happened just after attempt six. We had 20 attempts on heroic, 1 unsuccessful attempt on normal (OT disconnected) and one successful attempt on normal.

That was two hours of me quietly seething to myself about how I don’t want to be in the channel in the first place, how I don’t want to be healing lead and, frankly, how I don’t like most of the guild.

I joined for two reasons:

1) My old guild was falling apart and supposedly, I was to blame for my former raid leader’s gquit.

2) It meant that I could raid with my RL friend.

Well, while you couldn’t pay me to go back to Bronzebeard, I don’t really like it on Proudmoore. The alternative is, of course, back home to Eldre’Thalas. And since I’m NOT raiding with my RL friend, it’s become a lot less fun. And since I’m acting healing lead, it’s become sucky.

So I seethed all night long. And I bit my tongue a lot. And I was silent in the raid leader chat. And at one point, we just had SO MANY fuckups in the same attempt that the MT came into the healer channel, presumably to see what we were doing in there if not fixing what we were trying to do. But he, thankfully, walked in on actual healing discussion with people commenting on various spells and positioning and stuff and I was like “yeah, can you let us know why we want to be moving at this point, caster lead?” and he explained it for us. Then the MT left the channel.

So it was like, not only was HE doing ME a favour by ALLOWING me to do healing for the guild while my friend is away, but then he came into the healing channel to make sure I’m actually doing my job.

UGH.

But you can’t talk back to this guy, you can’t explain things to him. He gets annoyed or defensive and then chucks people out of the guild. I have seen it before, when I was on trial back in September/October. He just throws people out of the guild.

Why should I care about being thrown out of the guild? Because that would place my RL friend in an awkward situation where she would be angry at the MT for kicking me and angry at me for talking back/questioning the MT when I know better than to do so. The last thing my friend needs from her favourite form of escapism is stress, so I kept my mouth shut, for my friend.

The truth is, they need me more than I need them. I don’t need to do hard modes. I’ve done what, 8? Yeah, 8/12. I’ve killed the Lich King. Basically, I could be done now and not touch the stupid game again until Cataclysm.

But for them to go through heroic Deathwhisper, Putricide, Sindragosa and Lich King without a holy paladin who has, let me look, 100% attendence in the last 30 days, 92% attendence in the last 60 days, 91% attendence in the last 90 days and a whopping 96% attendence since October, well… Sure. You go ahead and do that. Good luck organizing people enough for a Lich King kill without me or my RL friend. Good luck trying for repeat heroic kills. Good luck trying to do REGULAR Sindragosa/LK without a reliable holy paladin who’s actually a guild member instead of an app.

Wow, this has been two thousand words of my bitching about last night. I’m not even sure why I wrote all this except that I guess I need to explain what happened and why I was so angry. Maybe to remind myself that these aren’t my friends. These are the equivalent of my co-workers. I do have actual friends (both in and out of game) who appreciate me for who I am and what I do and that I shouldn’t give a rat’s ass what some guy in California thinks of me and my abilities/mastery/knowledge of some stupid video game.

Yeah. That sounds good, but he still pisses me off. :P