advice on raid performance - multiple players lacking

[rexort]

im currently in a 25 man guild where we are slowly working towards hard modes (halfus and chimareon down). unfortunately, we lost a few players to RIFT, so we're repairing for advanced hard modes. the officers have been reading and noticing (from these forums and the dungeon&raid forums) that current content appears to favor ranged. however, our recent WoL records show otherwise. all of our members use class appr. addons and read EJ. we are having a meeting before our raid today, giving an ultimatum: step it up, or get replaced (we are starting x-server recruitment soon).

suggestions welcome. we're on the final straw

WoL order - halfus/Val/Coun/Chog/Omni/Magmaw

(WORLDOFLOGS[DOT]COM)/reports/rse6mk5dqdqhwhs2/sum/damageDone/?s=32&e=301
(WORLDOFLOGS[DOT]COM)/reports/rse6mk5dqdqhwhs2/sum/damageDone/?s=1281&e=1599
(WORLDOFLOGS[DOT]COM)/reports/rse6mk5dqdqhwhs2/sum/damageDone/?s=2778&e=3126
(WORLDOFLOGS[DOT]COM)/reports/rse6mk5dqdqhwhs2/sum/damageDone/?s=3841&e=4379
(WORLDOFLOGS[DOT]COM)/reports/uv5jrv1de14npz2e/sum/damageDone/?s=42&e=335
(WORLDOFLOGS[DOT]COM)/reports/uv5jrv1de14npz2e/sum/damageDone/?s=710&e=989

we dont want to disband but raiding has been miserable lately for us

thanks

[Mudkiper]

Well... I really have no idea how it's possible for mages to be that low on dps... Unless they are in greens with 500ms...

Maybe make them go arcane since its the most faceroll spec in the game. Ret / Lock / Hunter / Ele all also low :<. Maybe suggest they post their armorys on class forums looking for some advice.

[Deleted]

Just from having a quick look at the Omnotron Defense System, the Elemental Shaman has only casted 48 Lightning Bolts total. That's a very, very low amount. It can easily be double that amount.
The damage-spread between abilities looks normal, so the rotation seems to be in order (just not sure what Earthquake is doing there), so it seems to be a case of simply not pressing the cast-button fast enough.

[seam]

Just from having a quick look at the Omnotron Defense System, the Elemental Shaman has only casted 48 Lightning Bolts total. That's a very, very low amount. It can easily be double that amount.
.

Indeed. In my log I cast around 94.

[MarizzaDraenor]

Didnt see the logs but in general yes encounters favor ranged hugely not in terms of sheer dps amount but in terms of easiness/survivability.

They did fix a few things recently on a few hc modes to make them more easy for melee like on Magmaw etc but still ranged survives easier. If your melee is good though you shouldnt have issues regardless just dont stack 10 of them on same fights.

In general current content favours ranged all over the board on hc's and raids just way easier to stay alive.

Btw mass recruitment isnt doable at this point infact recruitment last weeks is harder compared to the late months of expansions. So instead of killing your guild (because thats what will happen if you try to replace 9-10 raiders all together) chill it out a bit and do what you can with what you have and make minor adjustments as you move on.

We kick 7-8 we get 7-8 cant work at this point. You just wont get applications.

Also you have Halfus an Chim down i suggest Magmaw and Atramedes as your next ones they are pretty easy after the last nurfs. Dont even go close to Maloriak or Omnitron until you do those.

[foergis]

I find a lot of the times, raiders can bump up their dps hugely just by following a couple simple rules.
1: Always be casting. Rotations might be perfect, and gear might be perfect, but all that goes out the window if players are taking half a second between each ability to figure out whats next.
2: Stack your cooldowns appropriately. Make a macro that hits all of your racials/trinkets/whatever. Hit it at the start of the fight (in most cases) and you will have it again in 2ish minutes. Postpone it for bloodlust, or for external dps boosts, but the macro should be used at least twice in any fight.
Bonus Rules: Know the fight, and plan for movement phases. If you keep trying to pull off your 3 second soviet style nuke ability during a fireball phase, and end up missing 5 seconds of damage because you keep cancelling, your dps is going to go through the floor.

Edit: Your hunter is only managing to keep "Improved steady shot" up 45-60% of of the time. He needs to remember to always cast steady shot in pairs, and never let the buff fall off. Marksman hunters are balanced around that haste buff.

[Deleted]

Moonkin needs a kick up the ass. His dmg is poor.

[oatmealpoet]

My guild is running into the same problem and it's gotten to the point where friendships need to be put on the backburner in order to progress. We've tried the whole keeping our "core" together, even if a few people aren't the best, but its ultimately making us hate eachother because of all the wipes to idiocy. I gave the ultimatum last week and tonight is the first of 3 raid nights this week where I'll be analyzing logs and making cuts. I already know of 2 dps and 1 healer who are probably going to go, but I wanted to be nice so I gave them the weekend to get it together and try to improve. It sucks but I think this is the only way we'll get past the hurdles we've been facing. (BTW, the healer can't stay alive on movement fights, one of the dps can't interrupt to save his life, and the other dps is failing hard when movement/target switching is involved.)

[sicness]

I find a lot of the times, raiders can bump up their dps hugely just by following a couple simple rules.
1: Always be casting. Rotations might be perfect, and gear might be perfect, but all that goes out the window if players are taking half a second between each ability to figure out whats next.
2: Stack your cooldowns appropriately. Make a macro that hits all of your racials/trinkets/whatever. Hit it at the start of the fight (in most cases) and you will have it again in 2ish minutes. Postpone it for bloodlust, or for external dps boosts, but the macro should be used at least twice in any fight.
Bonus Rules: Know the fight, and plan for movement phases. If you keep trying to pull off your 3 second soviet style nuke ability during a fireball phase, and end up missing 5 seconds of damage because you keep cancelling, your dps is going to go through the floor.

Edit: Your hunter is only managing to keep "Improved steady shot" up 45-60% of of the time. He needs to remember to always cast steady shot in pairs, and never let the buff fall off. Marksman hunters are balanced around that haste buff.

These things, especially number 2, are vital for dps to learn in order to optimize themselves. Knowing the fights are half the battle and knowing not only when to use your most powerful abilities but when to use survival abilities is what separates good dps from great dps. If they don't know this teach it to them. One way to help with this is by literally telling people on vent when to use their 2/3 min cool downs and trinkets so they get the most out of them.

[Herecius]

For casters in general, the best possible advice you can give them is to figure out how to do a fight with as little movement as conceivably possible. It's possible to stand still even on 'high movement' fights such as Omnotron more than half the time.

[Balto]

Our guild is currently in a Hiatus from raiding and playing rift, mainly due to similar issues. We scaled back from 25 to 10-mans for Cata from WOTLK mainly due to the fact that we had several people in 25-mans that were not cutting it in the content previously, or unreliable. We ended up with a roster of about 15 people total for the main 10-man raid. Was going good for a while, we got 1/4 HM Bastion, 5/6 BWD and didn't put a lot of effort in on TOTFW yet but 1/2 on it. Some people started getting burnt out from some people still making mistakes and not being up to par for the encounters (similar things as in your logs) and it got to the point where even trying to replace them was difficult, as recruitment for guilds right now with the way the WoW forums are is very hard.

I don't know what advice I'd offer you at this point on what to do for it, because quite honestly you will not kill hardmodes with the way some of them are performing and honestly if they don't already look at the meter, see where they are at and have it light a fire under their butt to improve it, they probably don't care enough to actually make the jump in improvement you're going to need from them, so they're ultimately going to need replaced... thus starting the cycle of finding people and if anyone of those people are attached/good friends with someone in the guild whos performing halfway decent... (not trying to scare you) just it seems right now with the way the game is (and I personally LIKE the challenge of it to some extent) the bosses require so much of everyone, and if you don't get it or at least close to it you don't have a chance at beating it, leading to frustration among the members then as you try to get better people in it can cause frustration and need even more people as some people you DIDN'T wanna lose leave because their crappy friend couldn't play the game... Essentially what I'm saying is be ready to just... put your foot down and fight for it and stand by your choices, cause it can and in my experience will get nasty as you make cuts as peoples feelings get hurt and they can't admit they were messing up too much.

Best of luck to ya.

[Jenerena]

thus starting the cycle of finding people and if anyone of those people are attached/good friends with someone in the guild whos performing halfway decent... (not trying to scare you) just it seems right now with the way the game is (and I personally LIKE the challenge of it to some extent) the bosses require so much of everyone, and if you don't get it or at least close to it you don't have a chance at beating it, leading to frustration among the members then as you try to get better people in it can cause frustration and need even more people as some people you DIDN'T wanna lose leave because their crappy friend couldn't play the game... Essentially what I'm saying is be ready to just... put your foot down and fight for it and stand by your choices, cause it can and in my experience will get nasty as you make cuts as peoples feelings get hurt and they can't admit they were messing up too much

Unfortunately I've seen this happen myself and it's very true. It's one of the biggest challenges a small, social guild can face when facing heroic mode content right now. The best guilds have to eliminate some of that social atmosphere just to get the best players. The content is far too challenging to allow you to face it without having the right raid setup and the right players. It's a shame really because a lot of the fun of raiding is working on something with friends to achieve the same goal. In guilds that have a constant turnover of players it becomes more like a job rather than a game, and you don't really get to know people as well as you could in a more social, tight-knitted guild. It would be a real shame if we didn't clear all content just because we wanted to play with a certain group of people.

[cFortyfive]

Unfortunately I've seen this happen myself and it's very true. It's one of the biggest challenges a small, social guild can face when facing heroic mode content right now. The best guilds have to eliminate some of that social atmosphere just to get the best players. The content is far too challenging to allow you to face it without having the right raid setup and the right players. It's a shame really because a lot of the fun of raiding is working on something with friends to achieve the same goal. In guilds that have a constant turnover of players it becomes more like a job rather than a game, and you don't really get to know people as well as you could in a more social, tight-knitted guild. It would be a real shame if we didn't clear all content just because we wanted to play with a certain group of people.

And why exactly would that be a shame ? I don't know but aren't heroic modes meant especially for people who want something more challenging ?
Anyways regarding your dps classes I don't know but that cho'gall log is seriously horrible. If you are really interested in getting into heroic modes you should just start recruiting everything that you can get and looks promising. People will start to care and perform better or fall through.

[Jenerena]

And why exactly would that be a shame ? I don't know but aren't heroic modes meant especially for people who want something more challenging ?

You presume because we all want to play together as a group of friends we don't want something challenging? Of course we do, we just can't have both. That's what is a shame. We aren't serious enough to start recruiting people, but we also don't allow people to slack either because slow progress is boring. I've been raiding with the same players (give or take a couple of people) since the start of Ulduar and never until now has our skill and setup been challenged so much with this content.

[kaergerroz]

additional logs from Thursday:

WoL order - omnitron, magmaw, maloriak, conclave, alakir

(WORLDOFLOGS[DOT]COM)/reports/70vlizcoh352pbpz/sum/damageDone/?s=715&e=1096
(WORLDOFLOGS[DOT]COM)/reports/70vlizcoh352pbpz/sum/damageDone/?s=1651&e=1988
(WORLDOFLOGS[DOT]COM)/reports/70vlizcoh352pbpz/sum/damageDone/?s=2971&e=3333
(WORLDOFLOGS[DOT]COM)/reports/70vlizcoh352pbpz/sum/damageDone/?s=4033&e=4341
(WORLDOFLOGS[DOT]COM)/reports/70vlizcoh352pbpz/sum/damageDone/?s=5619&e=6139

observing the top 200 for each class, a majority of our raiders are 1-5k below where they should be. they are gemmed/enchanted properly, so the only thing i can assume is that it is a skill issue, or lack of true understanding of their own class.

we tried heroic omnitron, but didnt last more than 45 seconds
tried heroic maloriak, didnt last past the first dark swirl phase
tried heroic magmaw and the contructs didnt die on time
tried heroic atramedes but people got too much sound before first air phase

should i just disband the guild? this is pathetic

my patience is wearing thin..

[Slickx]

LOL @ your mages, maybe you should have them go arcane and just spam arcane blast

10k dps? seriously? i lol'd hard.

[Deleted]

One good thing is that as you are a 25m guild there can be no doubting things, you can clearly link the mages meters, and assuming they all have approximately equal gear then you can say "xxx does this damage, why are you doing half this amount?".

Nothing encourages slack play like being the only xx class in a raid as there are no easy comparisons. On the flip side, nothing encourages pulling your thumb out of your bottichelly like seeing a new trialist of your class join the guild. Plus as long as you have all the major buffs / cd's present in the raid there is nothing stopping you replacing say one of your mages with a hunter or a boomkin or w/e. I'd certainly be reminding them that there are xxx ranged dps slots, and if they don't perform they will be replaced. It might mean you need to make an example out of someone (or two or three), but such is life.

One thing i would say, and I know you are struggling, is to stick to one HM and keep attempting it, ironing out the problems and tweaking things as you go. Swapping encounters really doesn't help people learn the fight, when to use CD's etc etc.

[Theholypally]

I do more dps as my offspec ret in crafted epics and heroic 5 man gear. All it takes is a little bit of dedication to their class in order to improve...and it goes beyond reading Ej and gemming right. They need to test their rotations, study the boss strategies and plan cooldown usage beforehand.

If the thought of being replaced doesn't get them going, then they don't give a shit and just want to be carried to free purples. If they don't want to be replaced, they will improve but here is the difficult part for you: you have to keep your word, friend or not, you must replace those who do not perform or the raid will eventually just stop listening and not take you seriously as a raid leader

[Spoiledkid]

Destro lock isn't using Bane of Havoc at ODS.

[Mudkiper]

Destro lock isn't using Bane of Havoc at ODS.

Doesn't that trigger shields.