Going from high point to high point only would be like cutting all the fluff from Lord of the Rings: “Bilbo gives Frodo the ring at his birthday party. Gandalf tells Frodo to flee the Shire. He meets disaster on the way to Bree.” Etc. Trash killing lets the raid settle down to business and provides a chance to relax and shoot the breeze before the excitement and pressure of the next boss kill. Raids are not just mechanisms to deliver loot to people. Or rather, the well-designed ones aren’t. They are meant to provide an evening’s entertainment to the raiders. Certainly the chance of getting loot on any specific raid would be so incredibly low for any given raider that if raids were only meant to funnel uber gear to people, then they are amazingly bad at it.

Now, I’m talking EverQuest 1 and 2 here. My time raiding in WoW was very different. I remember Molten Core raids where every drop was fought over — even the rights to skin the core hounds was meted out from above. WoW raiding was not relaxing or fun. It was a struggle with half the raid yelling and screaming like children over teamspeak while the other half apparently couldn’t pay enough attention to what CTRaid was telling them to do to avoid wiping the raid.

And then there was the idiot priest who just kept chain casting his heals whether needed or not just to get on top of the heal parse. I had learned from years of being a cleric in EQ1 to only cast the appropriate heals at the appropriate times and always have mana available for emergencies or adds. Nope. In WoW, your skill at healing was your rank on the heal parse. I only mention that because I was a priest in WoW, but raids were rife with that.

I had this thought that people shouldn’t tell non-gamers that they raid or what raiding is. They should call it partying. Like, Monday night I partied. It was AWESOME! Tuesday we didn’t have enough for a good party, so we just sat around and had some brews. Wednesday we went back to this bar we went to last week and we PARTIED SO HARD, WE KICKED BUTT! Thursday, that was a good party. Friday, we went back to that bar again and finished the beers we didn’t get to Wednesday. Saturday — no party. Sunday is PARTY DAY! We always have the best parties Sunday night!

Sure, that’s a lot of partying, but hey, parties are fun :)

I’ve never actually gotten into a situation where raiding affected my work (since I haven’t actually found a career yet, as opposed to just a job) but MMO’s have affected some of my relationships with people and it has taken away time that I should be using for other things. It’s a constant struggle finding the right balance, but it’s something I could never give up.

Oh. Now I have to play :) And if I play, I’ll be bringing my crew. I know you love crafting and all, but these are the characters I have poured my all into. I don’t really need to bring any healer but Dera; she can mentor to help any new lowbies.

Not that you HAVE to move either, nor would I ever pressure you to – but I know a community is key to keeping the games entertaining, no matter how good or bad they are, and since Nostalgia’s started and a few players have gathered together on Najena – it’s an option for EQ2. I really wish SOE let us move between servers a little more freely. As time progresses and we make friends literally all over, it’s always a wish to be able to actually play with these people — aside from the fact that in EQ2 it’s just not viable at all, as you’re limited to the total amount of characters you can make rather then EQ1 where you can make a certain amount per server. I miss that.

I hope to take everyone through some of the smaller (we’re talking tiny, like wailing caverns, blackburrow, stormhold) areas this weekend for some questing and just plain old fashioned exploring. With the mentor system it’s not an issue when people out level one another at least.

I understand ALL too well about having characters stranded on other servers, and the pain it brings. I’ve moved a good portion of my characters to Najena from AB — but there are three (80 troubador, 80 sage, 80 alchemist) who are stranded still, and I miss having them around. I don’t have the heart to delete them and start over since I worked so hard getting them where they are – and I just keep hoping SOE offers us another round of free transfers, as they have twice before in the past.

Then it comes down to the support details. I have an 80 jeweler, Dorah, who won’t be able to help with the crafting on another server. And Dina is not only my main, she’s my harvester and secondary crafter. I have such a support system among my alts that I would feel lost without the ability to make anything I need without having to pay people’s stupidly inflated prices.

Dina (troub main), Dera (inq) and Dorah (jeweler) are my main crew. It’s hard to think of what EQ2 life would be like without my gals backing me up.

As for staffing raiding guilds maybe we are different but CoS has always had a good number of older folks in guild. It is very rare that someone under 20 last very long in our guild and College student are often seasonal players too. Currently, we’ve gone in the opposite direction and recruited a bunch of retired folk. They have a lot of time on their hands but also relatively stable lives. Whether things work out remains to be seen but it will certainly be an adventure.