Running a Guild

[Pornolio]

Hmmm see yes I dont really agree with systems like that... effectively you are relying on skilled players to carry "rich" guys through content.

You will be taking Mr Nubmeister with, even though he doesnt have a clue how to play his class... his bank balance is big enough to justify him a spot...

Edit - Nice to see you back Werries... How is shadowsong doing nowdays ?

 

[werries2]

Hmmm see yes I dont really agree with systems like that... effectively you are relying on skilled players to carry "rich" guys through content.

You will be taking Mr Nubmeister with, even though he doesnt have a clue how to play his class... his bank balance is big enough to justify him a spot...

Edit - Nice to see you back Werries... How is shadowsong doing nowdays ?

Doing just fine but myself getting married etc this year have seen my participation in wow dwindle quite significantly.

You are true with the noobs going to instances etc, but you also know that a lot of experienced guys at some stage can do most stuff with half the "required" people. They just need some incentive to keep on raiding. As twixt mentioned this is more of a mercenary thing at the moment, but I imagine that with good leadership and organization you can make this work in a normal guild as well. After all you still decide who joins.

 

[twixt]

Well its not just really carrying rich noobs through though its definitely in part that.

For example my guild only runs 10 mans so I am limited to mostly 10 man gear though we did do everything except LK on heroic before starting our break waiting for the expansion. As such there are a two or three items I am missing - I can either attend a pug 25 man where I can roll against 5-6 other people for an item and get maybe 12 badges on our server as most only bother with 6 bosses or I can attend a GDKP run and buy my item and even if it doesn't drop or I can't afford it, I'll at least get compensated for my attendance and walk out of the instance with some gold and a few more badges. If I have to pug - I'd rather run with a GDKP run as at least it promotes some form of fairness.

 

[Pornolio]

Hmmmm not sure I can see the fairness in the system mentioned.... afterall you are effectively saying, if I dont have large amounts of gold with me, I am kinda wasting my time running with that group for the item i desperately need... but at least I will get some gold out of it ?

For me, to run something like eg. 10 man Heroic instance... its purely for a loot drop, my main focus is 25 man raiding... if I do 10 man... its not for currency reasons, its purely because I need an item like you described above. Knowing there is always a few "rich" guys onboard, you kinda know your chances of getting loot is very very slim.

 

[semaphore]

Hmmmm not sure I can see the fairness in the system mentioned.... afterall you are effectively saying, if I dont have large amounts of gold with me, I am kinda wasting my time running with that group for the item i desperately need... but at least I will get some gold out of it ?

For me, to run something like eg. 10 man Heroic instance... its purely for a loot drop, my main focus is 25 man raiding... if I do 10 man... its not for currency reasons, its purely because I need an item like you described above. Knowing there is always a few "rich" guys onboard, you kinda know your chances of getting loot is very very slim.

GDKP runs are awesome, we have them regularly and the other night one of our guildies walked away with 20K gold.. heroic 277 tokens selling for 50-60k

 

[Pornolio]

It sounds to me, its awsome if you want gold... however, I dont raid for gold, I raid for loot drops and to build my characters raiding gear up. Walking out of a raid with a ilevel 277 bow is waaaay cooler than walking out of a raid with 10k gold.

Dunno, suppose to each his own... different looting systems for different people.

 

[Kaine]

or u can get that 10 or 20k gold, and go buy that piece you've been wanting for ages, and still have enough left over to buy a whole stack of <insert pot, flask, food, ore, herb etc> and still have left for repairs or primordial saonites, and get all the recipes for LW, BS or whatever in one go

 

[zippy]

The most important aspect of any system you choose is that the rules should be clear and always implemented fairly. We started with a simple system which worked well for 10 man:
- 1 dkp to attend
- -1 dkp for an item
- you can only receive 1 item per boss, unless the item will be de'd
- initiates are on a 3 raid probation and will only get an item if no regulars want it
- main spec before offspec
- main before alt
- -50% dkp to switch a char from alt to main

Edit: and if more than one roll with same dkp, it's split by a normal /roll, but usually someone passed in favour of the person who needed it more

 

[zippy]

or u can get that 10 or 20k gold, and go buy that piece you've been wanting for ages, and still have enough left over to buy a whole stack of <insert pot, flask, food, ore, herb etc> and still have left for repairs or primordial saonites, and get all the recipes for LW, BS or whatever in one go

I rather agree with Pornolio. I prefer getting my loot of the corpses of bosses. I have never bought epics from anyone. I have used crafted items to gear up by sourcing from guild mates and alts

 

[werries2]

I rather agree with Pornolio. I prefer getting my loot of the corpses of bosses. I have never bought epics from anyone. I have used crafted items to gear up by sourcing from guild mates and alts

Think you missed the discussion point. Items under GDKP is bought for money during raids, i.e. still getting loot of the corpses of bosses.

 

[DMNknight]

Fayera,

Do yourself a favour and read:
http://www.worldofmatticus.com/guides/build-your-own-guild/

AS for what Pornolio said about EPGP, ignore it. He is blaming the wrong things on the parts of the system. He's saying that a car on railtracks riding on just it's rims is a **** train. Duh :>
You need to select a loot system that is on par with the mentality of the players you have and their maturity.

 

[Pornolio]

Fayera,

Do yourself a favour and read:
http://www.worldofmatticus.com/guides/build-your-own-guild/

AS for what Pornolio said about EPGP, ignore it. He is blaming the wrong things on the parts of the system. He's saying that a car on railtracks riding on just it's rims is a **** train. Duh :>
You need to select a loot system that is on par with the mentality of the players you have and their maturity.

I would love to hear your comments on your statement DMNknight... unlike you, I have actually provided examples of the looting system in question that was discussed.
I have raided under more DKP systems in the past than I think even you realise, so no, this is not a "I have googled it, and its k@k"... So highlighting the "wrong things" on the parts of the system is not a legit post ?

Interresting... if anything, I provided personal experience rather than just mumble complete and utter crap.

 

[werries2]

I would love to hear your comments on your statement DMNknight... unlike you, I have actually provided examples of the looting system in question that was discussed.
I have raided under more DKP systems in the past than I think even you realise, so no, this is not a "I have googled it, and its k@k"... So highlighting the "wrong things" on the parts of the system is not a legit post ?

Interresting... if anything, I provided personal experience rather than just mumble complete and utter crap.

Don't take his comments personally Pornolio. People tend to believe that the loot system they use are perfect, and don't like to change. Just as I prefer to have a loot system that is based on trade, open bidding, and fixed rules for everyone.

 

[twixt]

Most important aspect of any loot system is buy in from the players in your guild. They have to beleive that it will work and end up being fair. With that in mind almost any loot system will work.

 

[Kaine]

MY LEWTZSYSTEM IZ THA BEST!!!!! COS I GET ALL THA LEWTZ!!

 

[DMNknight]

I would love to hear your comments on your statement DMNknight... unlike you, I have actually provided examples of the looting system in question that was discussed.
I have raided under more DKP systems in the past than I think even you realise, so no, this is not a "I have googled it, and its k@k"... So highlighting the "wrong things" on the parts of the system is not a legit post ?

Interresting... if anything, I provided personal experience rather than just mumble complete and utter crap.

Hahahaha I was acually not trying to pick a fight. Just pointing out that while you have a valid point in your own experience, blaming it on a system that clearly does not suit your needs is hardly the systems fault.

Quote Unquote

in other words you dont really care about theorycrafting or tweaking your character within your control. Your upgrade path is in the hand of this god forsaken looting system.

Here you are both right and wrong. Right in the fact that this system does not Cater for the "best" upgrade path for your character. However, you are wrong in the fact your upgrade path is in the hands of the loot system.
That is in the wonderful hands of Blizzard RNG.

However, if your approach to loot is similar to "any upgrade is still an upgrade" whilst still walking the path to your ultimate gear set, then this system actually does work.

Even so, your understanding of the EPGP system is flawed if you think that you are spending EP when you roll on loot. In fact, this system rewards you for spending GP on gear due to the built in decay system. (and you can tweak this further by understanding the MinEP and MinGP settings)
So far, it has the most comprehensive and customizable feature set of any loot system I have come across and it suits my needs perfectly.

But as standalone system, it won't work, just like most other rewards systems. It needs the buy in of the people who use it and the understanding of those who manage it. Above all, with the MasterLooter addon, looting is over in less than 2 minutes.
No other system (DKP, Zero sum DKP, Suicide Kings, Barter, /Roll, Auction) has afforded that on emo items like tokens/weapons and more noticeably, trinkets.

We also don't use just EPGP, but have officers who have a good understanding of the various classes and their needs and will question a player why he isn't taking an item when clearly it's an upgrade. To date, we have only had to use this once or twice on new raiders.
There is also a ranking system in place to manage long term raiders, newbies and absentee's.

Lastly, but not least, your understanding of this system is even more flawed if you think Decay drops your PR.
Here let me demonstrate.
EP - 34256
GP - 825
PR - 41.522

Set Decay at 10%
EP - 30830.4
GP - 742.5
PR - 41.522

Go do an excel spreadsheet if you don't believe me.

In conclusion, it's the people that determine how your systems work, not the systems themselves.

 

[Pornolio]

Ok... now that looks better, now I can see what you are basing your opinion on. I must be honest, because you are kinda agreeing with me, yet disagreeing on the points I illustrated, it is confusing understanding your reasoning...

You do agree that the system does not cater for Raiders that like having their "best" upgrade path in their control... I still say the system is playing a BIG role in terms of who gets what when it drops... so yes the Blizzard RNG determines if your drop will drop... however with this system, if you are not top PR when it drops, kiss the drop goodbye. So I still say this system rips the control away from your raiders. If you have theorycrafters in your raid force that are planning ahead on what they need to achieve their goals... you are pretty much castrating their control with this looting system.

The whole approach of an upgrade is an upgrade, so take it... is stupid... its honestly pathetically stupid... its because of reasoning like this, that you see players that are Hard capped on stats, take items which are marginally tiny upgrades for them, versus a MASSIVE upgrade for other players that are desperately trying to reach the Cap of the stats.

Your next point about "But as standalone system, it won't work"... on that I totally agree. You are relying on other systems like loot council, to fix this supposedly good system in your own guild.

As for the last statement you made... you clearly missed the point I made... those values fluctuate as the decay kicks in.... and your PR gets calculated with the other two values. Your positioning in terms of PR can and WILL change as the new values gets calculated.
If your EP assignment / decay values are not very precise you will see the following :

Player A + B both raid 100% of the time.
Player A = Priest
Player B = Druid
So their itemization is slightly different.

Player A gets 1 drop (or no drops) over 4 weeks.
Player B gets 4 drops over 4 weeks.
2 weeks go by with no drops for either and their PR will have reset probably to very close to each other due to a high decay & EP gain. The priest due to bad drop luck is at a big disadvantage for loot which is a bit unfair tbh.

This looting system needs very well policing and you need very jacked up loot control mechanisms in place to run this mod.

 

[DMNknight]

Without going into all the details of any system:
1) each has it's own downfalls
2) it is more often than not the human element which ruins a system

Let's take your approach to loot for instance. Which is shortest path to 16 BiS items (give or take 1) for 25 players which is 400 items needed to drop at 3 items per boss.
That's 134 boss kills, with 100% drop rate of BiS items in sequence so that eventually 25 members all have their BiS items.
Thats 12 weeks of 100% boss kills, or 3 months of ICC25 give or take.

Now take into this badge and crafted items which are randomly BiS or not across the various classes and the badge tier items. This reduces the number of items needed considerably, but then introduces more complexity in that 5 bosses only drop 1 item, which is possibly BiS, and 2 armor tokens.
As you can see this becomes an infinitely complex system to try and predict and control(or even make "fair"). Now try and get a stable raid pool for that duration (Telskum, Eskom, health, RL, spouse, children, employment, etc)

Hence, My stance on all loot is that even a small upgrade is an upgrade, grab it while it's available. This is said with the understanding that there is a modicum of intelligence applied to giving loot to people to whom the upgrade is "bigger" and a reasonable amount of maturity to pass on loot for others in your player base. Now we're adding more subjectivity to the system that is loot and we have not even touched on any one loot system yet.

I actually don't know of a single loot system that allows any one player, nevermind 25, to take the short path to their BiS full outfit through the treacherous path of Blizzard RNG and the variables that will be introduced into a loot system. (This does seem to me what you are asking for)

(Now is the first time I actually talk about the EPGP system)
In my calculation, I intended to show that your PR value stays the same at the time of Decay. Meaning that all players, except those with 0GP will stay in their positions in respect to PR rankings.
For an active raider that has essentially "paid off" his gear to the guild by his GP decaying to 0, means he is at an advantage when gear drops for him again because his/her PR climbs quickly as he/she attends raids, or decays with the system should they be absent and fail to accrue any EP.
In other words, the more you buy gear in the EPGP system the quicker you pay it off. In fact the more GP you accumulate, the quicker your first gear item's GP disappeares into the ether.

Hence EPGP is built around the "get your upgrades when they are available" mind set, rather than the fast track BiS mindset.

Of all the systems, Loot council is by far the most fair when your guild is mature and the leaders are non-subjective in their decisions. In some guilds it will work, in others it will not.
DKP and Zero sum DKP both have an inherent flaw in the fact that trying to catch up to the long time raiders often proves to be a futile exercise as a newbie and the built in "memory" of these systems inherently either devalues item drops or causes rampant inflation. (with or without bidding systems)

I'm not going to discuss any of the other systems as they can be freely found on google and the like for those curious enough to go and look.

In short, this system works in our guild because of the people that use it and administer it. Just like a car works properly when the driver knows how to drive. It is not, after all, the car that is driving under the influence when it veers of and kills the occupants of another car. So too is the system put in place, not to be blamed for the disparity in loot distribution or the apparent fairness or unfairness of it.

 

[somescrub]

@pornolio : I have read the whole post and the thing that it seems like to me is you ACTUALLY want to play a single player game where you will be able to have the best of what drops.

WoW is a MMO with a emphasis on the multiplayer. That means give and take and peoples ego's emotions time and efforts all come into play.

humans are complete chaos without rules and social norms and trends.

No matter what the system is, when it comes to humans working together there will always require some sort of human intervention.

this links back to the OP, the crux and most important thing about running a guild is the amount of work time and effort that goes into it personally.

FOA is very lucky to have awsome GM's (yes >1) and officers all of whom contribute , take care of admin functions and manage the various personalities in the guild. And there is quite a variety.

The objectives of a loot system are fairly basic.
Get loot sorted in the least amount of time possible.
Make it easy for people to understand.
Reward the people in relation to the effort contributed to the GUILDS success.


The objectives of a loot system is NOT to award the BiS item to the exact person who needs it on it's first drop.
but this can be somewhat achieved, but not guaranteed, under most loot systems, including EPGP

 

[Pornolio]

@pornolio : I have read the whole post and the thing that it seems like to me is you ACTUALLY want to play a single player game where you will be able to have the best of what drops.

WoW is a MMO with a emphasis on the multiplayer. That means give and take and peoples ego's emotions time and efforts all come into play.

humans are complete chaos without rules and social norms and trends.

No matter what the system is, when it comes to humans working together there will always require some sort of human intervention.

this links back to the OP, the crux and most important thing about running a guild is the amount of work time and effort that goes into it personally.

FOA is very lucky to have awsome GM's (yes >1) and officers all of whom contribute , take care of admin functions and manage the various personalities in the guild. And there is quite a variety.

The objectives of a loot system are fairly basic.
Get loot sorted in the least amount of time possible.
Make it easy for people to understand.
Reward the people in relation to the effort contributed to the GUILDS success.

The objectives of a loot system is NOT to award the BiS item to the exact person who needs it on it's first drop.
but this can be somewhat achieved, but not guaranteed, under most loot systems, including EPGP

You kinda have it completely wrong somescrub... I have raided under pretty much every single DKP system in my past 4 / 5 years of raiding, and I can honestly tell you, that no other looting system, is as frustrating as EPGP.
Even loot council with the wrong people in control is no-where near as frustrating as EPGP. I keep hearing from you guys how awsome this system is, yet you emphasise heavily on how you have to rely on intervention from officers / loot council to fix the blatant flaws in the system.

Make no mistake, this system is great for guilds with people that dont care about their loot upgrade path... if you have no clue on where your character is going or what you want to achieve... then its great ! After all in the famous quote from EPGP users... "an upgrade is an upgrade", regardless if its 10 dps or 300 dps (or HPS or whatever) - And this is not always best for the raid as a whole ! Now you award an item to someone with hardly any attendance, and you know he wont be joining in future raids reliably, yet... hey... EPGP says its his turn.

99% of the time, the people that like EPGP are people like the tanks... who hardly compete for loot (with the exception of druids)... after all... if a tanking necklace drops... just how many people do you compete against 2... maybe 3 ???

This system takes away the control from you, that if you want to save for something badly, you will get nailed in the process... you take what drops when its your turn.

Your one point is totally flawed as well " Reward the people in relation to the effort contributed to the GUILDS success. "

You are effectively punishing your people that have the best attendance, purely because they are saving for an item they want to obtain... The decay will screw you.

Sorry my points still stand on this system... its not for every guild. Glad to hear its working for you, but I can honestly say I have not seen the same results.
In my books.... my attendance, my DKP earned... is my CASH, I paid my dues by spending hours in my seat to earn them. How I spend it, should be my choice. When you buy a car, you dont get told, you WILL buy brand X if you want brand Y.
Its part of the system, it prevents people from hoarding up DKP.