Since raid groups can’t do the same raid twice in a week on both 10 and 25, raid leaders have to try to get creative when it comes to roster setups in a bid to ensure players stay warm and can see all the encounters. Players need to sit out (or can’t show up) from time to time and it helps to have others who can step in. Preferably, raid leaders want players with the experience. In order to get the experience, they need to get pulled into the raid.
How can a raid pull that off while maximizing their gains?
Baradin Hold
Baradin Hold is the Vault of Archavon style raid where there is a chance for players to receive their tier leg or glove pieces. Traditionally, I would try to get at least one player of each class and spec in the raid so that no matter what would drop, we wouldn’t have to shard it. Alas, it seems that we’ve been striking out with pure PvP pieces.
Priest loot drops when I’m not there either.
Farm content
I define farm content as anything that we’ve been able to consistently take down under 3 shots. For example, on a fight like Halfus which changes every week due to the different drake configurations is an encounter I would consider on farm. The raid leaders would bring in new recruits to assess their performance while the new players would see if the raid environment was a good fit for them. If things go sour and we’re not able to get a farm boss down, then we immediately make substitutions and transform into progression content mode. It’s also a great way to give veteran players a night off if they’re not feeling well or if they need to tackle a last minute paper (Guilty).
Progression content
This is where we activate the A-Team. We bring in the veteran players who have shown consistently high performance. In addition, we’ve started looking at the demands of the encounter and what is the best setup. If it’s extremely melee unfriendly, we’ll add a few extra ranged players. If we need a little extra healing, I’ll add an extra healer as necessary. We tailor the roster accordingly. The leadership is on the same page here. We want to get that initial kill as quick as possible. As our kills get smoother, we’ll start tuning the roster so that eventually everyone will get a crack at it.
Looking at it on a weekly basis
Right now, I’m debating the idea of combining both farm content and progression content bosses. For example, on day one of a raid week, I’d like to enter an instance and take out the farm bosses and then pushing straight for a progression boss. If necessary, I’ll make a substitution mid-raid to get the experienced players in. On day 2, I’ll do the same thing. I would want to enter a different instance and knock out the farm bosses there before making attempts on a progression boss. On the last raid day, I’d try to get down another farm boss before finishing off the week by working on a progression boss.
No matter what the case, no day is really wasted because there’s at least a boss that gets taken down. By spreading out the time in this manner, we have the capacity to get attempts in and then take a day to reflect or analyze an encounter.
I am curious. How do you determine which bosses to go after and what raid roster to bring?
My guild actually rotates players per boss. We have 2 ranks of raiders, core and part-time. The core people are our 12-14 most consistent raiders. We try and keep 2-3 tanks, 3-4 healers and a good mix of melee and ranged DPS. Our core raiders have priority on progression bosses and spots are mostly determined based on the raid comp. We switch the group up for each boss so that our core folks only sit a boss or 2 each night. Once a boss is on farm we’ll start rotating the PTers in as well so they are seeing all of the content.
This system has worked really well for us to date. We only raid 2 nights a week but we’re progressing at a good clip. We’re currently 8/12 with Ascendant Council very close to going down (got them to 10% on our 6th attempt last week). One thing I will say is that for this setup to work you have to have raiders that are willing to sit on any given boss for the betterment of the team.
As far as what raid we work on, we like to stick with one instance per night. We try and get to a new boss as quickly as possible. For example, last week we did BWD on Wednesday and jumped right to Chimaeron, our new boss, after Mag and Defense System. Once Chim went down we proceeded to knock out Atramedes before calling it a night. This week we plan to knock out our farm bosses in BWD the first night and then work on Ascendant Council and Cho’gall our 2nd night.
This is another reason why I don’t like raiding 25s – I don’t like to sit, unless it’s something in RL that takes precedence. If I’m on to raid, I want to be raiding.
As far as picking bosses, we base it on loot and speed. How quickly are we getting certain bosses down, what drops are available, etc. It’s worked for two expansions so far, and I don’t see us changing it.
How dare you say you have an “A” team.
Such an elitist!