News from July, 2008 - Our Forum - The One: A Thunderhorn World of Warcraft Guild

There seems to be some confusion about sign-ups for Gruul & Magtheridon, so I thought I'd write a quick post to clarify some things. The most important thing is: just because you're in the sign-up list doesn't mean you get to go.

We've been a little slack about enforcing gear and class balance in the past for Gruul and some of the initial Magtheridon runs simply because we needed people, any people, to even make the attempt. That often meant we were going with drastically undergeared people, but it was that or nothing. Now, however, we have a fairly sizeable population of appropriately geared people and we do need some particular class balances in order to make a success of things.

For Gruul:

5-7 Healers:
We can get by with 5 healers but they have to be top-notch healers. We normally run with up to 7. By top-notch, we mean their +heal is in excess of 1500 and they show up as being well beyond Gruul at [be.imba.hu]. Ischtap, Shekin, Elsheindra, and Shekky are examples of top-notch, well-geared healers.
3 Tanks + 1 Mage Tank:
We need 2 well-geared tanks and a spare tank for Gruul and High Council, plus a stamina-laden mage tank for the High Council. Check out Cannonfodder, Kanine, and Jeanda for examples of well-geared, well-performing tanks. Phoebus is often our mage tank.
2 Hunters: For misdirects and often for tanking Kiggler on High Council.

That's already 13 slots used up out of 25. The rest can be DPS but too much melee DPS doesn't help on Gruul, so it's not ideal to have the majority of the DPS be rogues, retribution paladins, feral druids, and DPS warriors.

For Magtheridon:

6 to 7 Healers:
We can get by with 6 healers, almost all of whom need to be top-notch healers (see above). 7 is better.
5 Tanks:
One for each of the channelers. Well-geared for at least 3 of them and reasonably geared for the other two.
3 Warlocks:
They're used to control the elementals that spawn, so those elementals don't whack the healers. Warlocks should aim to be able to do a decent amount of DPS (more than 600 dps sustained in Karazhan or a heroic). You'll need to be able to fear and banish two separate targets simultaneously, in addition to DPSing. Check out Wandjina for an example of well-geared warlock.

That's 15 slots out of 25. The rest can be DPS.

If we're planning on doing both Gruul and Magtheridon in the same evening (as we try to do on Tuesdays), then we try to start off with a balance which will work for both instances without needing to replace people.

If you've been excluded after signing up, it's probably been because:

We had insufficient numbers of healers/tanks/other required roles, so we filled those first and then filled in with DPSers off the sign-up list after that.
You weren't online on time or you were online and AFK when the raid invitations were issued.
Your gear is poor. Use [be.imba.hu] as a rough guide. If it's showing that your gear doesn't have you performing well in Gruul's Lair/Magtheridon at least to the midpoint, then you're not going to be contributing significantly to our efforts. We've seen DPSers signing up who can do less damage than our healers can in their healing gear or who are showing up on [be.imba.hu] as performing well pre-Karazhan or near the beginning of Karazhan. If that's you, you need to work on gearing up by going to Karazhan, buying heroic badge items, or buying PvP gear. Teams Purple and Tangerine are looking for regular players for Karazhan.

I know there's been some grumbling because people who were not on the list have been going. Riders of the Storm have applied to join The Honourbound Alliance. As we've done with other such guilds, we've agreed to take them on some joint runs. They've been providing the missing healers and warlocks that we've needed. We started getting Gruul down when they joined us. They can't sign up because they're not allowed on the GEM channel yet. As a rule, we've been using them to fill needed classes that haven't been filled by THB sign-ups, taking THB sign-ups off the list, and then filling in anything leftover with them. They are not being given priority over THB members.

Cannonfodder and Wandjina/Basil will be making more of an effort to shuffle and prioritize the Gruul and Magtheridon sign-up lists at least a day or two prior to the runs. If they believe your gear is inadequate or there's too many of your class, you will be shuffled to the substitute or replacement lists. Given that people may drop out after they do that or not show up, the list may also be adjusted at raid time, dealing with any gaps as best as possible. Making these decisions is part of their responsibilities as raid leaders, because it's their job to try to ensure we have the best possible chance for success.

As we get better at taking down Gruul and Magtheridon, the number of "required" role spots will likely drop, as it did Karazhan, meaning we can take along a larger complement of other people or people who aren't yet as well-geared as the initial people. Your time will come! In the meantime, help yourself by going to Karazhan, doing heroics for badge gear, or doing PvP.

If you have any questions about this or how to improve your gear, feel free to chat with your Honourbound representative or with the raid leaders when they're not busy raiding.

Thanks for your understanding and for helping make The Honourbound Alliance a successful and fun raiding environment.

Elsheindra & Basil
THB Co-Coordinators