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Hey Matt,

I’ve got a good one for you, and I know it’s one you’ve covered before – but a slightly different perspective.

I’m a Hunter Class Leader for my guild, and there’s a pack of Hunters who just came back. They’re very enthusiastic about what they’re doing, but one of them really needs help… he’s just not making the most out of his spec, or his gear, and he’s convinced he’s doing the right thing.

To be perfectly honest, I’ve got a huge problem with this. The guy wants help, but is of resolute mind that running Karazhan will solve all of his loot woes, and that the PVP gear he’s got will be great for PvE. His spec can do well in PVP, sure, but he doesn’t get that it’s not same as PVE, particularly in emphasis on stats… and what worries me is that he wants to raid with us. Not just Karazhan, he wants to come to Gruul’s, Mag’s, ZA, and whatever we do after that.

If he had half a mind about the way he was gearing, I’d be fine… but this guy is even wearing Shaman mail with his PVP gear. No, not +strength or +agility and +crit, anything that’d be useful to Hunters… plus HEALING Shaman mail!

What’s worse is that his DPS has a long way to go before he should even think of raiding. It’s merely OK for Karazhan, and I wouldn’t have issues with him in heroics, but I wouldn’t take him to anything past that.

The Guild Leader’s asked me to offer some helpful suggestions on our forum, and I have. The immediate response from this hunter was that, as helpful as I intended it to be and as nice as I put it, that I have a holier-than-thou attitude, and I’m just trying to make his life difficult, and he’s worked so hard for his PVP gear, that spec is what works for him, that the shaman gear’s the best he can get, blah blah blah.

I’m trying to be patient, understanding, and all of those good characteristics; but this guy makes me want to take the kiddie gloves off. My job is to help, not to coddle, and the person in question is a grown adult, who has no license to be acting this way. What makes things worse is that he feels since he’s been in the guild longer than I have, he doesn’t have to listen to me if he doesn’t want to.

If you have any advice whatsoever, I’d greatly appreciate it. I’m at my wit’s end here.

– Can’t Disregard the Huntard

Dear Can’t Disregard,

That’s a sticky situation. By broadly addressing the subject, and maintaining a respectful tone, you’ve done your job perfectly. Since the Huntard’s excuse for his laziness is to question your authority, It’s time for your GM to stop delegating this task fully to you. The message that needs to be passed on is this:

“For our guild to progress, those we regularly field for raids must be in top condition. To achieve this, our class-leaders have been asked to review the gear and spec of prospective raiders. Those who choose to disregard the advice of their class leads should expect few, if any, invites to raids above Kara-level. I (The GM) will have the final say on whether a raider is acceptable.”

This clearly explains the situation, establishes your authority as a class-lead, defines the choices open to the prospective raiders (comply, or don’t), defines the resulting consequences, and describes the appeals process all in a concise manner.

Since your GM obviously knows this guy has no clue what he’s doing, it should be easy to make sure your raid leaders and anyone else doing invites is aware, too. Then, when he asks for an invite, they can let him know that they can’t make an exception to the policy just for him, and when he implements X of your suggestions, he may ask for another invite. (2 things are important here. You MUST NOT make exceptions for other idiotic raiders, and you have explicitly tell him that he’s welcome back IF he complies with the rules. That keeps it from being personal.)

Alternatively, to save LOTS of time remember my personal staffing mantra:

95% of all guild problems can be solved with a good Gkick. The other 5% can be solved by recruiting.

– From Wynthea

Dear Can’t Disregard,

You should listen to Wyn because she is full of win. She gave you the long answer to a short answer problem. I believe the problem can be solved quite easily. You’re a Hunter, are you not? If only Hunters had abilities that could misdirect additional threat to other players…

– From Evil Matt

Problems in your guild? Need some help and advice? Not quite sure who to turn to for those relationship problems in WoW? Feel free to contact us!

It’s going to be a busy week for me. I was supposed to shoot with the Twisted Nether folks last week but I caught a nasty cold or flu or a cocktail disease containing a runny nose, wet cough, and a sore throat. I’m slowly recovering and I should be good to go for the shoot. My greatest fear is that I sound too “nasaly” or something. Following that, there’s also the WoW Insider show on Saturday. I’m going to see if there’s an opening for me there as well so you can have a double dose of Matticus to kick off your weekend ;).

Breana’s already sent me a few questions that they wanted me to touch on. I’ll do my best to answer a few of those. Actually, if you want to take a quick look at what I’ll be answering:

• Why do you blog?
• Your main is a dwarf, how do you feel about the lack of dwarf children in the game?
• What motivated you to start writing?
• What measure do I use to know if someone is a good healer?
• Why have I never been Shadow?
• Why do I love healing so much?

On the other hand, I love doing things on the fly. They’ve opened up the floor for listeners to ask their own questions.

I told them specifically not to tell me what the next set of questions will be. Surprise me. I used to do a bit of improv in high school. We’ll see if that translates well over iTunes. If you have any burning questions to ask, the above link is the way to go. We might not have time to get all of them in, but I will do my best and make an effort to try.

By the way, if you want to play a fun drinking game, every time Matt says “eh?” take a drink. Every time Matt says “aboot” down the whole glass.

Heh, I know I’ll at least have one person interested in listening.

Dear WoW Bloggers,

I’m directing this post to you in the hopes that you will break out of your creative shell at some point. Blogs die every day for various reasons. The author no longer has the time or maybe they’ve lost interest. Another common reason is that they can’t seem to come up with anything “good” for their blogs so they give up because they fail to attract visitors or fail to generate discussion.

What is a good blog?

That doesn’t matter. Don’t worry about the “good” part until you get the “blog” part down. I’ve spoken to my share of bloggers on the internet and I have sensed a common ailment that affects every single one of them. It’s dangerous, it stunts growth, and it slowly eats away at them without their realizing it.

It’s known as fear of failure.

For bloggers, this is bad. They’re afraid of writing because they’re afraid of being rejected. I believe every blogger out there is capable of great ideas and great posts. I also know they’re afraid of writing it down and exploring the idea because they feel “it’s too stupid” or “boring”.

Realize now that no two readers are made the same. What’s appealing for one person may not be appealing to the other. For instance, I read daily posts on encounters, raiding, and guild business. I tend to avoid story posts where this boss was downed. You might have a nice personal story to share, but I’m not interested. I want to get something of value out of what I read. I want to learn something new. Not everyone’s like that. Others read to escape or to entertain themselves. Readers want to have fun and laugh at stories that bloggers share.

Sometimes, the headlines speak for themselves and I can skip over the story. Let me give you a quick example of how the removal of even 1 character can change the face and feel of the story:

“25-manned Gruul”

vs

“5-manned Gruul”

Now what do you think I’m likelier to pick and read? Even though the 5 manning of Gruul may not be real, it’s still an eye catching headline that will make people pause and read.

Don’t worry

Guy Kawasaki is a business man I look up to. At one of his infamous keynotes, he made a reference to Walt Disney. There’s a song in the Disney franchise called “Don’t worry, be happy”. Guy twists it around in his talk and tells innovators to instead don’t worry, be crappy.

Everyone works hard in the real world to maintain an image and to be the model citizen. They live to serve the expectations that society dishes out. The internet’s a great place to escape that pressure. Write something outrageous! Be daring!

When you first start blogging, you can’t expect an audience immediately. Blogging is a social thing which encourages interaction. You’re not supposed to be a lecturer.

You’re going to write something once in a while that isn’t going to fly with what your readers like. They’ll let you know. Use that reaction for the future. Again, you’ll never know if people will like a post or not until you pen it and publish it.

This is how it works

You write a post which happens to link to another blog.
This other blog’s owner finds out they have an incoming link coming from your blog.
The curious blogger then clicks the link to your blog and starts reading.
The curious blogger proceeds to either like or dislike what you have to say and mentions your blog on their blog.
Other bloggers and readers pick up on it and come to your blog.
The process repeats.

It takes a lot of time to develop. A lot of bloggers give up because they don’t have the patience. This post isn’t directed to them. This post is aimed at the bloggers who claim they don’t have ideas.

Wrong.

You have ideas, you just don’t have the confidence to follow through on them. I want to read what it is that you have to say. I can’t form an opinion of a post if it hasn’t been written yet.

Get over your fear of rejection and just start writing.