Leadership

Why You’re Sitting Out in Raid Tonight

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Nobody likes hearing it.

You show up on time, your consumables are ready, your addons are updated, and the raid plan has been reviewed. You’ve been grinding this tier for 10 weeks. And then five minutes before the first pull, you get the message.

“Hey, sitting you for this one. We’ll get you in later.”

It stings. Even if you’ve been raiding at a high level for years, even if you’ve made this call yourself a hundred times, being on the receiving end never stops being uncomfortable.

I’ve been on both sides of it. In Death Jesters, I’m sometimes the second or third choice to come in, and it’s usually when one of our primary players is away. In Last Call, I have to handle the roster responsibility from boss to boss. The honest truth is that making the call is often harder than getting it. Not because the decision is unclear, but because I know exactly how it feels to read that message and wonder what it means about where you stand.

Here’s a glimpse of what actually goes into it, from someone who’s been working through a roster every week for a long time.

There Is No Formula

The first thing to understand is that I don’t have a spreadsheet that automatically sorts the roster and spits out who’s sitting next. There’s no universal ranking where the bottom person gets benched, and everyone moves up a slot. It doesn’t work that way. There were times when I wished I had some type of grading tool akin to Fantasy Football rankings, where it would help make that lineup setting and decision-making easier, so that I didn’t have to think about it.

Every boss asks for something different. Every week has a different context. Roster decisions are almost always a blend of several factors at once, and the weight of each one shifts depending on where we are in the tier.

If you’re trying to reverse-engineer why you sat by comparing your logs to someone else’s, you’re probably looking at the wrong thing entirely.

On Progression, the Boss Decides

When we’re actively progressing on a new boss, my first question isn’t “who’s performing best?” It’s simpler than that: what does this encounter actually need?

That question has many answers, depending on the boss. Sometimes it’s about raw class or spec composition — we need another ranged, or we’re running too much melee, and people are tripping over each other. Sometimes it’s specific utility: a Warlock gateway, a Death Knight grip, a Paladin immunity, a Druid knockback. Sometimes it’s survivability — I need players who can reliably handle a specific mechanic without needing a rez every other pull.

I ran into this exact problem just last week on Crown of the Cosmos. I’d committed to a comp that ended up being short on mobility tools, and I spent an entire night patching around it with awkward grip assignments that only worked as long as nobody died in the wrong order. It was my mistake on the comp, and it cost us time. The players weren’t wrong — the setup was.

Some bosses make the requirements even harder to negotiate around. Midnight Falls, for example, has a minimum floor: you need at least two Death Knights for grips, at least two classes that can do knockbacks, a Priest for friendly crystal grips, and an Evoker for the mobility. That’s not a preference list. That’s the encounter telling you exactly who has to be in the room. If you don’t have those pieces, you’re not progressing that boss. Someone who doesn’t fit that checklist isn’t sitting because of anything they did. They’re sitting because the encounter is making the decision for me.

That’s the thing about progression sits: they usually aren’t about you. A very good player can sit a progression boss because the encounter favors a setup that doesn’t include their class. That’s not a judgment on their value. It’s the boss asking for something specific, and we’re trying to give it what it wants.

But hey, that’s the demands of Mythic raiding. I know some of my players have lamented the requirement of certain class compositions, but that is part of the difficulty at this echelon of playing.

On Farm, Loot Becomes Part of the Equation

Once a boss is on farm, priorities shift.

We’re not solving the encounter anymore. That means I start looking at loot wishlists, Droptimizer recommendations, who still needs tier, who’s missing a key trinket or weapon, much more closely. If two players are equally viable for a slot and one of them has a meaningful upgrade on this boss while the other doesn’t, that becomes a real factor.

Farm nights aren’t easy breezy runs. I still want clean kills with a full team that knows what it’s doing. But farm is also how you build the raid for the next tier. Getting the right gear onto the right players now is part of the investment.

It’s also the time to consider the future and work in any alts or main switches for the following season.

Fairness Matters More Than People Think

Beyond composition and loot, I’m keeping a mental ledger of who’s been sat and how often.

A roster dies slowly when the same people keep getting the short end of the rotation. Even if the decisions are all individually defensible, if you look up three weeks in and the same two or three players have been sitting more than everyone else, something’s wrong. People start to feel like permanent backups. That quiet resentment builds into attendance issues, then recruiting drama, then players quietly finding another guild.

I try to catch it before it gets there. If someone has been sat multiple times in a row, that weighs on the next decision even if the current boss could theoretically work without them. Long-term engagement matters more than optimizing a single pull.

Trials Need Real Reps (And So Do Some Veterans)

If I’m recruiting a trial and they never actually play, I can’t evaluate them.

Logs tell me a fraction of what I need to know. I can see throughput and mechanical awareness from a log, but I can’t see how someone communicates under pressure, how they respond after a bad pull, whether they ask smart questions or mentally shut down when things go sideways. Farm bosses are where I find out who someone actually is as a raider.

Our roster has a real range of experience. Some players have multiple Cutting Edge achievements and have seen versions of these situations before, such as Fyrakk seeds and the crystals in Midnight Falls. Others (and there’s no shame in this) are in their first serious Mythic environment. Those players need reps too, maybe more than anyone. It’s one thing to read a strategy guide or watch a Taktyks video. It’s another to be mid-pull, realizing a mechanic is about to overlap with your cooldown window, and having to think through it on the fly. That kind of decision-making isn’t something you can shortcut. You have to earn it through repetitions.

I’ll rotate someone into a farm boss because they need the practice planning their movement, managing their cooldowns around boss events, or adjusting their rotation when something unexpected happens. It’s not supposed to be filler. It’s meant for development. And that development pays off weeks later when we’re deep into a progression boss, and I need everyone thinking, not just reacting.

Scheduling is part of this too. If a raider is heading out on vacation for a few weeks, it doesn’t make much sense to bring them in on a new progression boss we’re expecting to kill while they’re gone. They’d be investing pulls into learning a fight they won’t be there to finish. Better to give those reps to someone who’ll be present for the kill and needs the experience.

If you’re a veteran sitting a farm boss for any of these reasons, I know that’s frustrating. But it’s also how the guild builds depth for when you actually need it.

Reliability Counts, Even When It’s Invisible

Here’s one factor people underestimate: I notice who makes the night easier to run.

Showing up on time. Having consumes. Knowing the plan without needing it re-explained (but confirming their position or interrupt order). Having addons sorted for the mechanic we just talked about in Discord. Keeping a character properly maintained. None of these things show up in a log, but they all add up. When two players are genuinely close in value, the one who creates less friction usually wins the spot.

Raid leaders remember who makes the night smoother. It’s not glamorous, but it matters.

The Call Isn’t About You, Even When It Feels Like It

The most common things I hear after a sit decision are some version of:

“But my numbers were better than his.”

“I must’ve done something wrong.”

Almost none of that is true. Most sit decisions are strategic, logistical, or developmental. They’re made with the team in mind, not against any individual. The fact that I’m rotating you doesn’t mean I’m sending a message. It usually just means the context of this particular boss, on this particular week, is pointed elsewhere.

What I’ll always try to do is be direct about it and give you enough context to understand the call. Not a lengthy justification, but enough to keep you from guessing. If you’re sitting because of comp, I’ll tell you it’s comp. If it’s loot, I’ll say that. Vague non-answers are where resentment grows.

Raid Leaders Get It Wrong Too

This goes both ways. I’d be doing you a disservice if I framed every sit decision as perfectly calculated and correct, because that’s not always true.

Sometimes the wrong person starts. Sometimes I overvalue a class that ends up not mattering as much as I thought it would. Sometimes I build a comp around what the top guilds were running in Warcraft Logs during the first week of the tier, only for Blizzard to patch the encounter and change the math entirely. The Paladins fight is a good example since early on, the dispel quantity was high enough that two Mistweaver Monks felt close to mandatory. Then the nerf hit, the number of dispels dropped significantly, and suddenly you only needed one. Any comp decisions made around that original requirement had to be revisited.

That’s just the reality of a live game. Bosses change. Tuning shifts. What was a hard requirement in week two can become a preference by week four. When that happens, I try to catch it and adjust, but I don’t always catch it immediately, and sometimes players pay the price for a call that looked right at the time and turned out to be wrong.

If you genuinely think a sit decision was a mistake, I’d rather you say something directly than let it fester. I’m not infallible, and I don’t expect to be treated like I am. What I ask is that you bring it to me directly, as opposed to working its way through half the guild before it reaches my ears.

Nobody’s Happy Every Week, and That’s Fine

Every week I’m balancing progression needs, composition, loot, fairness, development, attendance realities, and morale. Sometimes all at the same time, all pulling in slightly different directions. There is no decision that satisfies all of them simultaneously.

If everyone in the raid is mildly annoyed from time to time, that’s honestly a decent sign. It means the rotations are being spread around honestly instead of a permanent hierarchy forming at the bottom.

Being sat sucks. Making the call usually isn’t great either. But if it gives the team a better chance on this boss, or keeps someone engaged who would otherwise start checking out, or gets a trial the reps they need to become a real contributor — it’s the right call, even when it doesn’t feel like it.

One week is not the whole tier. There’ll always be opportunities to shine.

How to Become a Top 10 Two-Night Guild

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I received a question during a recent trial interview.

“Hypothetically, if you wanted to grow the team and convert it into a top 10 two-night guild, what are some of the steps you would take? What does that road map look like?”

It’s a great question, and it caught me a little off guard. But here’s my honest answer:
If I really wanted to push this team into a top-10 two-night team, it would require commitment across the board. Not just from the players, but from me as the raid leader as well.

Here’s what that roadmap might actually look like.

Define the Goal with Precision

We’re not just saying “get better” or “rank higher.”
A top 10 two-night guild is already achieving Cutting Edge. They’re likely killing the final boss around top 150–200 worldwide. On a limited schedule, that’s a tall order.

This means defining success like:

  • CE within the first 6–8 weeks of a tier
  • No more than 1 sub-2% wipe per boss
  • Kill bosses within 50–70 pulls, not 120+
  • Finish ahead of reset-based nerfs

It’s an intense pace which brings me to the next point.

Raise the Floor, Not Just the Ceiling

You can’t build an elite team on the backs of just your best players. You do it by raising the minimum performance bar across the board. That means:

  • Execution mistakes are rare, not routine
  • Players are expected to own mechanics independently
  • Logs are reviewed weekly for accountability
  • Players can’t afford to fall behind on progression systems, M+ gearing, or knowledge

Every player has to be operating at or near the same wavelength. That’s hard to achieve if only a few are pulling the team forward.

Optimize the Roster

You need a roster of players who:

  • Are consistent, hungry, and coachable
  • Don’t need their hands held on every mechanic (just the really critical ones)
  • Can take constructive feedback and self-review
  • Bring value beyond damage (interrupts, CDs, utility)

That means being ruthless with cuts. Players who aren’t improving or matching the pace can’t stay, no matter how nice they are or how long they’ve been on the team.

More Support at the Top

Right now, leadership is basically just me and one other person.
If I want to scale us up, I need more lieutenants — experienced players who can:

  • Take ownership of healing or tank assignments
  • Do log reviews post-raid
  • Help with group compositions (left/right group splits, interrupts, cooldowns, and raid planning)

But it’s not just about adding people — it’s about clearly defining their roles. I can’t just say “I need help,” I need to say what I need help with and what authority they’ll have.

Build Systems, Not Just Raid Plans

At the top end, strategy alone doesn’t win bosses — systems do:

  • A repeatable planning template for each encounter
  • Pre-assigned cooldowns, debuffs, interrupts
  • Well-structured review and feedback loops
  • Roster depth to rotate people in without missing a beat

Most teams plan the fight.

The best teams plan the tier.

Time Management and Off-Night Investment

With only 6 hours of raid a week, everything around those hours matters more:

  • M+ for gear catch-up and trinkets
  • PTR testing or log analysis before a new fight
  • Video review of what’s coming up (for their own class)
  • Personal research or even custom WA tracking

This doesn’t mean mandatory off-nights — but if 5–6 people are doing nothing outside of raid, we fall behind.

Final Thoughts

I’m not chasing top 10 two-night status right now — but if I were, these are the first things I’d do. Death Jesters is already one of the top two night teams in the world (and we mean actual two night, none of this overtime at the start of the tier crap).

A roster of skilled players will only take you so far. You need discipline, structure, and a team culture that prioritizes growth, learning, and personal responsibility. It’s a climb, not a leap. That means making tough calls and sacrifices along the way.

But the roadmap exists. It’s just a matter of deciding whether the destination is worth the cost.

Raids Fail When Leaders Don’t Explain the Why

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We had been deep in the trenches on Gallywix before we finally defeated him, and let me tell you, this boss is no joke. As with most late-tier Mythic fights, we hit that phase of progression where execution hinges on precision, coordination, and everyone knowing exactly what they’re doing. Sounds familiar, right?

What’s been interesting this time around is how much work has gone into our Raid Plan. I’m up to nearly 20 slides now. And yeah, I can already hear some of you groaning. But every revision, every screenshot, every zone marker has a purpose. Or at least I thought it did.

Let me walk you through a key moment that perfectly illustrates something raid leaders (myself included) often get wrong.

The Warlock Gate Wipefest

There’s a point in the Gallywix encounter where we drop a Warlock gate from the back of the room to the center. That’s nothing unusual on the surface, right? This one occurs right before the third coil needs to get neutralized (or using the third bomb).

However, this specific gate serves a layered purpose. It’s timed around canister soaks, or the healer soaks, specifically. The expectation is that the healers will gate into the center to meet up with DPS who are already soaking their assigned canisters, so they can get help fulfilling their mechanic. Sounds simple.

Before this, our healers were stacking with tanks. This change required them to re-learn their movement entirely.

So what happened?

  • Some players took the gate too early.
  • Others too late.
  • A few sidestepped into beams they weren’t supposed to bait.
  • The rest just stood around trying to figure out where they were even supposed to go.

For hours.

The Missing Link: The Why

I gave the callouts. I gave the slide. I even drew the lines. What I didn’t do? Explain the why.

Once I actually walked the team through the reasoning behind the gate timing and placement — how it allowed for quicker healing support, why baiting mattered in that moment, and what the positional advantages were — things just clicked. Execution became consistently cleaner. The team died less. We made real progress.

It hit me: as raid leaders, we assume that giving instructions is enough.

But if your team doesn’t understand why they’re doing something, it’s never going to land with the precision it needs. You’ll get compliance, not necessarily the buy-in. And there’s a difference.

Overexplaining vs. Clarity

I hesitated to explain too much because I didn’t want to overload people with information. I thought, “They’re smart. They’ll figure it out.” But I’ve learned the hard way that clarity supercedes brevity when it comes to raid strategy.

Some things are intuitive to me because I’ve spent hours in logs, watching replays, tweaking plans, and seeing it in action in DJs. That’s not true for the average raider. If I don’t walk them through the mental model I’m using, how can I expect them to follow it perfectly?

Ownership Starts at the Top

This ties in perfectly with a concept from Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink and Leif Babin. There’s a chapter where the leadership team makes an unpopular call, and the people under them get frustrated — all because no one stops to ask, “Why are we doing it this way?”

If I tolerate confusion or silence, that’s on me. If I don’t create space for questions or curiosity, I’m building a raid culture where people are afraid to raise their hand and say, “I don’t get it.”

And to be clear, there are no bad players, only bad coaches. That includes me. I want to be better.

Next Steps for Us

We’re going to start encouraging more midweek questions in Discord. If someone doesn’t understand something, they should never feel like the only time to ask is in the middle of a pull. That’s already too late. Alas, sometimes it doesn’t always happen though because they don’t know what to ask until they’re actually there.

This happened again yesterday night during our Mug’zee reclear. We had a Holy Paladin in who missed out on progression kill the first time. He did not stack with the group on the second rocket soak and unfortunately he got selected for the third rocket (with the four Gaol set) and it led to him being unsure what to do or where to place it.

Normally, we have five designated players soak the first rocket, then avoid the second rocket. Anyone who gets hit by the rocket receives a debuff so that they won’t be targeted again. By the time the third rocket comes around, the first five players who took the first rocket are now eligible targets for the third one, and it allows us to add consistency to where that third rocket should be positioned, and immunities can be used.

I’m also looking at bringing in a few more CE-level veterans during the offseason — people with leadership chops who can help reinforce strategy across multiple roles and add another layer of mentorship to the team. People who raid week days and are looking for something to do towards the end of the week are also encouraged, so check us out and come apply!

Final Thoughts

Raid leadership isn’t about barking orders. It’s about helping your team buy in, understand the vision, and execute with confidence. Don’t assume they know why you’re doing what you’re doing. Spell it out. Walk it through. And most of all, listen when they tell you they’re confused — even if they don’t say it directly.

Because once they understand the “why,” you’ll be amazed how much faster the “what” falls into place.

It’s Not What You Preach, It’s What You Tolerate

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We had a raider recently who didn’t even realize we’ve been using raid plans the entire season.

Slide numbers were being called out, cooldown assignments had been posted, and key positioning diagrams had been up for every major encounter. Yet somehow, this person (who had been with us for multiple weeks) acted like it was brand new information.

Look, mistakes happen. Miscommunication happens. But this wasn’t a one-off moment of confusion. It was part of a larger pattern.

And it reminded me of a concept from the book Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink and Leif Babin: the “tortured genius.”

The Problem with “Tortured Geniuses”

This isn’t about someone dealing with mental health challenges or emotional instability. In the context of leadership, a “tortured genius” is the person who’s talented but toxic.

  • They never accept responsibility.
  • They always have an excuse.
  • They point fingers the moment something goes wrong.
  • They’re too good to follow instructions, but never at fault when things break down.
  • And they assume their DPS or logs are enough to justify any lack of accountability.

These players are a trap. They often look good on paper, and they might even be “top performers.” But they are absolutely corrosive to your team if left unchecked.

What You Tolerate Becomes the Standard

One of the most powerful lines in Extreme Ownership is this:

“It’s not what you preach, it’s what you tolerate.”

You can talk about standards all day. You can write raid plans, post cooldown assignments, link guides, and review logs. But none of it means a damn thing if your actions don’t match your words.

If you let someone show up unprepared, ignore instructions, dodge feedback, and stay in the raid team week after week, then that becomes your standard.

The rest of your team sees it. And whether they say something or not, they’re thinking:

Why should I bother putting in the effort if that guy doesn’t have to?

Red Flags: How to Spot the Behaviour Early

Sometimes you don’t realize what’s happening until the damage is done. Here’s what to look for before it gets to that point:

  • They aren’t in Discord for strategy discussions.
  • They never reference or acknowledge raid plans.
  • They need constant reminding of their assignments.
  • They respond to feedback with sarcasm, excuses, or silence.
  • They do well on meters, but that’s where their contribution ends.

If you’re seeing this, you’ve got a “tortured genius” on your hands. And it’s time to deal with it.

How to Handle It (Without Nuking Morale)

Start with a direct 1:1 conversation. Be clear, but not confrontational.

“We’ve noticed a consistent pattern of missed prep and dodged feedback. That’s not going to fly on this team.”

Lay out your expectations: reading plans, owning mistakes, showing up to strategy sessions, and staying engaged with the team. These aren’t optional, they’re the baseline.

If they want to improve, give them the tools. Offer a second chance. Track their behaviour over a week or two. But if nothing changes?

You already know what needs to happen.

Removing a high-output player who’s dragging down team culture is addition by subtraction. You don’t build a CE-calibre team by tolerating passengers with attitudes.

Culture Over Numbers

Cutting someone isn’t about drama or proving a point. It’s about setting the tone.

If you want your team to value preparation, ownership, and collaboration, you have to reinforce that with actions. That means cutting loose the ones who refuse to buy in (even if they can crush a target dummy).

Culture on a team can be fragile. If you let one person ignore the standard, that standard crumbles.

It’s not what you preach. It’s what you tolerate.

Ask yourself the hard question. What are you tolerating right now?

The Mug’zee Pivot: When (and How) to Change Your Raid Strategy Mid-Progression

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Although we killed Mug’zee last night in Last Call, I wanted to put pen to paper on a strategy change last week that didn’t ultimately work out well for us.

Our raid progression is never linear. It tends to crescendo and decrescendo. Your team strategizes, plans carefully, and yet sometimes the team hits a wall. That’s exactly where we found ourselves recently on Mug’zee.

With a fresh 3% DPS buff for our raid (15%), we saw an opportunity. Maybe we could shake things up, make an aggressive strategic pivot, and secure the kill faster than anticipated.

But the thing about strategic changes is that they’re easy to plan, but a lot trickier to execute.

Strategy Change Fundamentals

Before diving in, let’s cover why you might even consider shifting gears in the middle of progression. Generally, you look at:

  • Significant raid-wide buffs or nerfs (like we received).
  • Roster adjustments (for us, going from 4 healers down to 3).
  • Persistent performance issues or plateaus where your current approach feels stuck.

These pivots aren’t guesses. They’re carefully calculated risks that raid leaders take, hoping for a big payoff (like skipping an entire problematic phase, such as the 3 Gaol set).

Why We Made the Change

The newly implemented 3% DPS buff felt like our window of opportunity. We previously planned for a 4-minute DPS push on Mug’zee. But with the added firepower, a tighter 3-minute push strategy suddenly felt achievable, letting us bypass the notoriously dangerous “third jail set.”

To enable this, we made the call to drop from 4 healers to just 3, adding one more DPS to meet our new aggressive goal. It was bold. But the math checked out (on paper, anyway).

The Reality Check

Initial pulls seemed promising, but reality quickly set in. With one fewer healer, we felt the squeeze immediately. Damage was higher than anticipated, healer mana started running dangerously low, and our throughput suffered. Our mine popping was no longer consistent, and we suffered sporadic deaths.

Despite careful planning, something became clear fast: our margin for error had shrunk drastically. Mechanics we used to comfortably heal through suddenly became critical threats.

What We Learned (And Why It Wasn’t a Mistake)

Did we secure the kill with the new aggressive strategy? No. But we got something valuable: a clear understanding of our actual DPS and healing thresholds. We identified exactly what we needed for the faster push, and it gave us concrete data.

We pivoted back halfway through the night, returning to the safer, original 4-minute strategy, and immediately saw results. Our best pull got Mug’zee down to 0.4%, proving our initial instincts were fundamentally solid.

Timing and Feedback: What Could’ve Gone Better

One notable hiccup: we waited too long to fully engage our healers for their feedback. It wasn’t until our mid-raid break that we stopped to reassess and found ourselves burning valuable raid minutes sorting things out. In hindsight, quick temperature checks after the first few attempts would’ve saved us significant time. We should have asked healers more frequently (maybe every 20 minutes or so). We still needed to give them a few reps to get accustomed to the change in damage coming in.

Early and frequent feedback loops are essential during major strategy shifts.

Raiders Grumbling? That’s Normal (and Okay)

Naturally, not everyone was thrilled. Some raiders grumbled about the mid-raid strategy pivot, suggesting we should never have tried it in the first place. It’s always easy to say that in hindsight, knowing how things played out. But the truth is, strategic adaptability means accepting uncertainty while failing to gain knowledge.

I still stand firmly by our decision to try. There was undeniable value in the potential to skip an entire challenging phase. It felt mathematically possible with 3 healers, but achieving that strategy would’ve required an exceptionally high individual skill ceiling. Realistically, getting there would’ve taken far more pulls and raid hours than we wanted to commit at this stage.

Best Practices for Handling Strategy Pivots

Here’s how you can manage similar situations better:

  • Quick Feedback Loops:
    Check in with key players and roles (especially healers and tanks) after just a few pulls to gauge viability.
  • Clearly Defined “Pivot Indicators”:
    Decide in advance how you’ll measure if the new approach is worth sticking with. Set those benchmarks!
  • Always Have a Backup Plan:
    Know when to switch back decisively.

Final Thoughts: Adaptability is Leadership

Strategic pivots aren’t failures. These leadership decisions are designed to push the team forward, even if they don’t always pan out. We might not have achieved the 3-minute push, but thanks to what we learned, we were able to secure a clean (or dirty) kill using the original strategy.

Raid leadership is about managing calculated risks and adapting quickly. Even if you fall short, you’re still one step closer.

We’re on to Gallywix!