Dwarf MIA

I have been somewhat slack about posting.

Partially due to my thirst for achievements, partial because of Wow/Life balance and partly because I had nothing to say. Add to that everytime I had a spark of an idea Sardonica seemed to have the idea soon enough before me to post something first. Which left me with the options of posting and have it appear I was following his thought patterns or say nothing (other than the curses under my breath) .. I opted for the latter.



So an update on the Guild -
Recruitment:
I am still posting recruitment adverts in trade which gets a small number of applicants on the forums each week. I am more about quality than quantity so have recently declined more than I have accepted and have now imposed a +20years age limit to new applicants unless sponsored by someone in guild (My brother, my sister, my kid and the like)
Guild numbers go up and down with our peek being over 100 members but we currently have 80 odd people with over 200 alts. the majority are level 80.

Inactives:
I tend to purge the roster weekly for inactives - If a raider hasnt logged in for 7+ days they are demoted to Domesticated rank and once someone hasnt logged in for 20 days they get demoted to an inactive rank - I even demoted one of my own alts for inactivity - alls fair in guild lol

I also use the Inactives rank for hacked accounts as we had quite a spate of these recently. Afer 2 months of inactivity I kick the toon from guild and send them an ingame mail to the effect that they havent been online so I have assumed they have stopped playing but if they return and get this mail and want to come back to send me an ingame mail.

Departures:
We have also had a few departures by members that left me with a bit of a sting and I confess that I reacted badly to one of them lashing out at him because I was so pissed off about it. One of them who left and then returned recently left again to set up her own guild. Evidently we no longer sought the same things in guild so she went off to set up her own "Raiding guild" which came as a bit of a surprise to me being that we tended to carry her thru runs despite her aversion to dispelling or her inability to get out of the shit on the floor. (Sour grapes anyone? - ok i apologise, I DO take it personally when I feel that the guild has been used to assist a person to get all the achievements they want or the upgrades they want or the exposure they want and then they pick up all those skills/gears/achievements we have helped them get and they piss off somewhere else because we are going a tad slow for them... well HELLO we are going a tad slow because those of us who have been here from the get go are helping upskill and upgear people like YOU! ) But I bit my tounge and plastered the smile on my face and wished her luck and removed her from my friends list and chalked it up to life.

The second recent departure that made me flinch was a Guildie who joined, geared up, got exposure (common theme eh) then decided to go and join a raiding guild. The first I heard of it was his public announcement in guild chat to the effect that he was going off to join a raiding guild but might come back in the future - My kneejerk was "Like F you will!" 

The other thing that pissed me off about this one was that this also occurred the night after our first guild attempt at ICC25man where the person got a loot drop that several who remained in guild could have benefited from - this same individual had previously been GIVEN pieces in other runs by guildies who had won the roles but passed item to him because they thought he would benefit from the upgrade more. Not to mention that i found out they had passed over the items because they couldnt be bothered with his sulks at not getting the gear he wanted.
His attitude to the loot and run was pretty much "If i had been a pug you would have let me roll on it" yep thats true we would have - the point was it was a GUILD run - not a pug gear up!
(so yea another one chalked up to life - had my tantrum, rant and rave and now I can move on)


Anyone else who has departed the guild and subsequently returned has done so because they had the common decency to let me know of thier plans before making it public. For their maturity they have been given the option to return if they didnt find the grass greener on the other side. If they dont have enough respect for me as the GM to say fare-thee-well before heading out the door then they dont get hugs and welcomes back. Petty and churlish maybe - but I dont think its much to expect from people.


Loot Rules:
So during my irrational moments of anger about these two departures ( I guess i felt betrayed/let down by both) I was tossing up changing the loot rules so that these people cant just breeze in stay long enough to buff up and then prance out the door. But the truth is the loot rules we have are as fair as its possible to make them without going to a DKP system. Something I have resisted so far but have thought about opening up for discussion in guild. At least then the people who attend week in week out, doing raids well below what they want to be doing for the good of the guild get the power to outbid those who turn up for one or two runs and walk off with the prized booty.

The jury is out on the loot at this stage.

Guild ranks:
I have had a predominantly cat theme to the guild ranks:
Queen (me- named after the female cat who is the head of a wild pack)
Felidae ( My family)
Pedigrees (what would be officers in other guilds but different)
Pedigree alts
ICC Cats (those who are ready for anything we throw at them)
AlleyCats (In training to be ICC Cats)
Domesticated (not interested in being an Alley/Icc cat)
Kittens ( alts)
Inactives
Strays (New Recruits)

So there are rumblings in guild that arent being spoken persay but I can hear things not said to me :P
The pedigree rank is somewhat of an anomoly - other guilds have officers and this is a role that in other guilds you can aspire to be. you can do x,y,z and a half dozen other things to boot and work uyour way up to officer. This is not what happens in More than raids. because i dont have officers. .. Its symantics I suppose because in all regards people still see them as the "Officers" the difference is that I make decisions based on what I see for the guild.  Sometimes I ask the others for input/advice but having been in a guild where you had to put everything to a vote i dont want to constrict the guild in that fashion. My Pedigrees know that I have total faith in them to make good decisions, to not rip off the guild bank (full access) and to show the guild loyalty to the vision of what we want to achieve as a whole. Its not a role that can be applied for - its totally subjective.

I cant even say why some of the people are Pedigrees and some arent...
If i was to write a list of the things i look for in a pedigree there are many in guild who have the potential to be one. Many who even exceed a written list.. but its that certain something that comes down to Kat Sense that I cant quite explain. Its no critisim of the members who have not achieved Pedigree rank its just a little something that I cant explain. And so i know that there are some in guild who aspire to be pedigrees and have been surprised about some of my promotions. Two recent guild applicants made pedigree status at lightening speed when there are longer term members who havent.

So to those people I say youre great! - you are valuable guild members, we love having you around and raiding with you - as for the pedigree rank - dont sweat it - its not you - its me!