Are casual raiders F'd?
So the theory goes like this for MOST guilds. You come, you raid, you earn some way to get loot, you get loot, end of story.
And the theory about drama goes like this for MOST guilds. I can't always make raids, I earn little dkp, I can't get loot, I hate raiding.
But what people should really look at here is the bigger picture of the new opportunities in wow that Blizzard has created to allow casual players the best of both worlds.
Simply put, you don't need to raid 25 mans on a hardcore basis to get good gear. You can run BGs, farm Arenas, and run kara pugs and heroic instances for badge gear.
Badge of Justice gear is as good as a lot of BT gear. You don't need to run SSC or Tempest Keep or Hyjal to have good enough gear to be a good player.
Also, crafted items are amazing as well. Spellfire cloth, Shadoweave, Mooncloth, etc. You can put in the time to farm the mats or do dailies to buy the mats for these items. There are also several BOE patterns that drop from high level instances that you can pay someone to craft for you... such as the [Belt of Blasting] or [Mantle of Nimble Thought].
Daily quests are completely easy and you can earn your way to gear without having to commit to hardcore raiding.
By being able to put aside the need/greed attitude about loot, it's far easier to allow yourself to raid casually. Many of the guilds in our server only raid 3 nights a week and only 3 hours a night. There are more than a handful of Gruul, Mag, and SSC pug runs hosted by raiding guild on our server.
Of course there are limitations. Casuals will never see Black Temple or Sunwell 25 mans on farm status or may be limited to content. But I would say that there are far more opportunities now for us casuals than there ever were before last year.
3 comments:
As much as casual raiders may be f'd content/gear wise, I think Blizzard has the casuals in mind for Wrath. With the recent information that all Wrath raid dungeons will have 10 and 25 man instances, casuals will be able to experience the content.
The 25 mans will of course have the better gear, but for me, I really just want to see the content.
The problem I have with gear and being casual is that I need money and hate to think of dropping either mining or skinning on my warrior.
Hoping by the time I get to 60+ lvl area, I will be able to get into 5 or 10 man raids that are on farm status and able to help out and get some gear.
But the change up to blacksmithing I think might cut into my income pretty heavy, but then again I could be wrong with the dailies seeming to bring in a good amount of funds everyday.
Also, badge gear will help casual guilds get geared up for raids like BT and Sunwell if they can only go 1 or 2 nights a week, which really isn't enough to farm gear to get all players to the BT level.
This way, the 1 or 2 times a week when schedule actually permits all 25 people to go, hopefully the raid will be more prepared to tackle the harder mobs and bosses because many people already have good badge loot.
And I agree, even though the loot itself is similar, it's still cool (for many) to hang out with friends, experience the content, work as a team, and wear BT gear like a medal of honor. :)
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