Just got kicked from my casual guild for refusing to play affliction-hug this kitten

[Subetei]

Hard to tell without more evidence from the OP... officers can often be quite wrong about this mistaking very marginal gains for huge critical differences. Perception is 15/9ths of the law. I suspect this may not have been just a spec change issue.

[Kissme]

Pretty much what topic says.Well,i wasnt kicked(casual guilds dont usually kick,unless you make drama)but i got the"we dont invite you in farmraids anymore,and progress raids only if there's a free spot"treatment.Thing is,

1)Im not a bad player.I perform the mechanics of a fight without making stupid mistakes(something players on my guild did plenty) and often offer advice on the fights we do.
2)Yes,especially on non-havocable fights,dps is shit.Still,it's always acceptable for enrage timers.

Well nothing much to say,just venting.It's annoying that although lots of locks like playing destruction they're pretty much unable to play it(since my example shows that even casual guilds like mine that havent killed even normal mode Ta'yak yet benchkick you for it).

Also,600k chaos bolts on pull,wtf are people smoking.I got 4500 mastery,3900 crit,and havent broken ~460k ish crits with potion,double trinkets,and dark soul up.

As a former officer and raid leader here's what I'm reading:

1) My spec is underperforming
2) I refuse to change to a better performing spec
3) I tell everyone else what they are doing wrong
4) I refuse to change what I'm doing wrong

I doubt you are being benched strictly for your dps. Someone constantly calling out the raid and saying "we should do this", especially if they aren't the raid leader, is annoying to say the least. If they are doing exceptional dps this can be overlooked, but if they are merely average or below, why would you want a back seat driver irritating the other raiders and the raid leaders while refusing to make any changes to their own play for the betterment of the group?

High end casual groups would kick you for underperforming.

Moderate range casual groups would kick you for being a stressful player to manage.

Low end casuals would kick you for being irritating.

Basically, it sounds like you are bringing no benefits to the table other than being able to not stand in fire. There are LOTS of players that are capable of not standing in the fire and bringing average dps. So unless you bring something special to the table (RL friend, exceptional raid analysis, crazy guild mat farmer/crafter, etc) there's at least one reason to get rid of you and no reason to keep you since you fall into a pool of players that is a large segment to recruit from.

The more casual the guild, the more likely they are to kick or keep you for personality issues despite performance (good or bad). So rather than focussing only on your spec and chart numbers, maybe you should look at some of those intangibles as reasons why you've been benched.

---------- Post added 2012-11-22 at 12:40 PM ----------

if your raiding normal your not casual

Casual raiding has a spectrum, and casual usually just refers to the time investment. Casuals play less hours per week than hardcores, that doesn't mean they don't work on normal and hardmodes.

A high end casual raid guild usually only raids 6-10 hours a week (2-3 nights in 2.5 to 4 hour sessions) and depending on skill level will clear normal content very fast. Raiding 5-6 hours a week back in Cata my 10 man casual group cleared DS normal on the second week it was open (and then made the mistake of growing to try 25 man). Raiding 9 hours a week that same casual guild was in Sunwell prenerf during TBC, and was on Putricide heroic 25 and Lich King heroic 10 during Wrath. Casual does not mean bad and since they implemented the toggle mode retread raiding model after Ulduar, normal mode raiding has tended to be fairly easy for any remotely competent group. I can't judge MoP raids since I stopped playing a few months into DS, but I doubt the scaling and difficulty curve has changed much.

[TheGravemind]

You were not optimizing your DPS; you were deliberately gimping your DPS by playing a weaker spec. I would not give you a spot in my raid if you even paid me.

[Alltat]

Whether the raid can beat enrage timers or not is irrelevant - if you can't do your share, you don't belong in the raid, and then you can either stay out of it or expect others to carry you. No raid group/guild that brings people that need to be carried is going to live very long, because the people who are constantly forced to carry others will burn out, and will either retire or switch to a guild where they're not held back by people who simply don't want to improve.

Doing poor DPS is one thing. Not caring that your DPS is poor is another.

[Netherspark]

You people are unbelievable... a guy likes playing his class and spec and his selfish guild demand he completely change to something he does not enjoy playing then you insult HIM for choosing to enjoy himself instead of letting a bunch of joyless douches bully him into doing what they want. You act as if choosing his favourite spec is damaging everyone around him, like it's 100% ineffective which is complete bollocks and you know it. It actually makes me sick!

You sit there arguing over the meaning of the word "casual", attatching meanings you've constructed yourself and you try telling someone else how they should play the game like your opinion even matters to them. It's disgusting.

Just because one spec MAY deal a little more damage per second does not make the others useless. You pretend that it's impossible to play a game without "optimizing your dps". Anyone claiming that is either incompetent or intentionly being a dick.

"Optimizing your DPS" is utter bullshit. You people need to learn that your way is not the only way.

[klaps_05]

casual guild, you will easily find a better one or one that will have you.

dont play what you dont like.

[IdowhatIwant]

Sorry but a casual guild is a non raiding guild. Any guild that is trying to do any sort of progression cannot be considered casual. As such, they have every right to kick someone who intentionally gimps their raid. You're in the wrong here guy.

[slime]

Tough call - normally I'd be siding with the guild on this one because that's how teamwork works - sometimes someone has to do what they don't like for the benefit of the team. BUUUT - you did say casual, and normally casual guilds (even in raids) aren't gonna be that harsh about specs and dps pushes - unless you are waaay behind. My guess is you might not even have been benched for this particular reason. Maybe it was more of a test to see where your priorities lie, will you "take one for the team"? Not even giving it a shot - you come off pretty "my needs outweigh the groups needs".

You should probably find another guild that actually acts like a casual guild and won't get peeved by a player doing what they like over what might be optimal for the group.

[Kinjin]

Your view of contributing enough to the raid is obviously different than the raid team's.

You recognize you could be performing better but choose not to.

I'm not sure what you have to be upset about. You've already identified yourself as the problem. One you aren't willing to do anything about.

[Revantis]

I just find this sad, by the logic in this thread him switching to affliction is akin to saying you shouldnt have a hunter spriest or a ton of other specs in your raid ever going by simcraft. There is nothing wrong with destruction, there is on the other hand somthing wrong with doing bad dps as destruction. In 5.1 destro's sim is less then 2k behind demo. I am in a casual guild raiding 2 times a week at 4 hour raids and have not once had an issue with destro's dps or gimping my raid. I just find it extremely sad that the game has to be numbers/minmax circus where any personal joy in what you like to do has to be sacrificed or called selfishness. I will not respec aff or demo for any fight, because frankly, i love destro and i would quit the game/raiding if ever asked to do so.

[Buttfear]

In my experience you do what the raid leader says or GTFO.

[Morsker]

Find a more casual guild who doesn't care what spec you are? Really not sure what else you were lookin for here.

There aren't guilds this casual, because playing the wrong spec is anti-social. It's not about hardcore vs. casual, but about social vs. anti-social. It's selfish, and it's poison to a guild to tolerate it.

[Kinjin]

The OP can play any spec he likes. He can do however little dps he wants. That doesn't mean the 9/24 other people in the raid are required to take him with them.

Destro isn't that far behind the other specs, and in fact is ahead of many other classes. You aren't being sat because you refuse to change specs. You are being sat because you do low dps.

How are you somehow being wronged by them sitting you? Are there some special all inclusive raid policies that your guild has that we aren't aware of?

Why do you feel entitled to go?

[Fallensaint]

Even the most casual guild that raids just for fun cares about progression, because spending a whole night wiping without progressing isn't fun.

So, even though you're in a casual raiding guild, you should at least put in an ounce of effort to maximize your DPS if you want to raid, be that through a spec change, better knowledge and performance from your current spec, or grinding out VP/LFR/crafted gear to improve your stats. Expecting the guild to conform to a lower level of play won't work, because as a DPS most of the time it's easier to find a replacement than it is to deal with a lazy or lax player.

[foxHeart]

Casual does not mean that you are allowed to be bad and drag down your raid.

I am pretty sure that's exactly what being casual means. lol

[Deleted]

You people are unbelievable... a guy likes playing his class and spec and his selfish guild demand he completely change to something he does not enjoy playing then you insult HIM for choosing to enjoy himself instead of letting a bunch of joyless douches bully him into doing what they want. You act as if choosing his favourite spec is damaging everyone around him, like it's 100% ineffective which is complete bollocks and you know it. It actually makes me sick!

You sit there arguing over the meaning of the word "casual", attatching meanings you've constructed yourself and you try telling someone else how they should play the game like your opinion even matters to them. It's disgusting.

Just because one spec MAY deal a little more damage per second does not make the others useless. You pretend that it's impossible to play a game without "optimizing your dps". Anyone claiming that is either incompetent or intentionly being a dick.

"Optimizing your DPS" is utter bullshit. You people need to learn that your way is not the only way.

This was the best fucking post in the entire thread.

People always talk about 'buhu maximize your dps'. While in reality, the gain from changing specs is often zero to none. Especially when the gear you have isn't that great. Like in normals for example.

If you do 75k dps in affliction and 70k in destrucion in a guild that's just doing a couple of 'fun' nights of raiding every week simply doesn't matter. At all. Ever.

On the other hand, if everyone is doing 80k dps, and you are doing 40k, yeah, the leader is probably right to exclude you. But, in that case changing spec won't help all that much. The difference really isn't that big.

People often refer to 'buhu simcraft shows 10k dps more'. Yeah. So what? In full hc BiS gear. Those numbers doesn't count for shit in any reality at all.

---------- Post added 2012-11-22 at 11:03 PM ----------

I just find this sad, by the logic in this thread him switching to affliction is akin to saying you shouldnt have a hunter spriest or a ton of other specs in your raid ever going by simcraft. There is nothing wrong with destruction, there is on the other hand somthing wrong with doing bad dps as destruction. In 5.1 destro's sim is less then 2k behind demo. I am in a casual guild raiding 2 times a week at 4 hour raids and have not once had an issue with destro's dps or gimping my raid. I just find it extremely sad that the game has to be numbers/minmax circus where any personal joy in what you like to do has to be sacrificed or called selfishness. I will not respec aff or demo for any fight, because frankly, i love destro and i would quit the game/raiding if ever asked to do so.

This is the issue.

Everyone compares themselves to Paragon, Method, Vodka, whatever. And, they pay waaay to much attention to current simcrafts. Which, isn't actually even the slightest viable untill you have BiS gear. And, even then they don't count for much.

[Deleted]

This was the best fucking post in the entire thread.

People always talk about 'buhu maximize your dps'. While in reality, the gain from changing specs is often zero to none. Especially when the gear you have isn't that great. Like in normals for example.

If you do 75k dps in affliction and 70k in destrucion in a guild that's just doing a couple of 'fun' nights of raiding every week simply doesn't matter. At all. Ever.

On the other hand, if everyone is doing 80k dps, and you are doing 40k, yeah, the leader is probably right to exclude you. But, in that case changing spec won't help all that much. The difference really isn't that big.

People often refer to 'buhu simcraft shows 10k dps more'. Yeah. So what? In full hc BiS gear. Those numbers doesn't count for shit in any reality at all.

---------- Post added 2012-11-22 at 11:03 PM ----------




This is the issue.

Everyone compares themselves to Paragon, Method, Vodka, whatever. And, they pay waaay to much attention to current simcrafts. Which, isn't actually even the slightest viable untill you have BiS gear. And, even then they don't count for much.

Thats just not true.
Take 4.3, being fury instead of arms was a noticeable loss.
Same 4.3. Being anything besides destro was a noticeable loss.(bar some add fights)

With that said, often when being unfamiliar with a spec you'll end up performing worse for a while.
Still i dont think this is the issue with OP, just judging from his mentality, he shouldn't be raiding, raiding is a team effort, casual or not imo...

Saying, ohh well, but the rest of the raid is carrying me so we're not hitting enrage timers, we're fine...
WRONG, the longer the fight, the more human error comes into play, resources(mainly healer mana) is being pushed to the limit.
Doing 7-8k more dps is about 3 million damage done, which is NOT negligible in any way.

As an example, i played prot mainspec with arms offspec, i still went fury to help the raid during spine hc progression(due to loss of a raider) just so we could keep pushing trough. Moral of the story, its a team effort, you do whatever YOU can to help the raid, if that means playin affil for some progression fights, then play it.

Edit. SimC also has normal t14 bis profiles, so that argument is not valid im afraid

[Kissme]

This was the best fucking post in the entire thread.

People always talk about 'buhu maximize your dps'. While in reality, the gain from changing specs is often zero to none. Especially when the gear you have isn't that great. Like in normals for example.

If you do 75k dps in affliction and 70k in destrucion in a guild that's just doing a couple of 'fun' nights of raiding every week simply doesn't matter. At all. Ever.

On the other hand, if everyone is doing 80k dps, and you are doing 40k, yeah, the leader is probably right to exclude you. But, in that case changing spec won't help all that much. The difference really isn't that big.

People often refer to 'buhu simcraft shows 10k dps more'. Yeah. So what? In full hc BiS gear. Those numbers doesn't count for shit in any reality at all.

---------- Post added 2012-11-22 at 11:03 PM ----------




This is the issue.

Everyone compares themselves to Paragon, Method, Vodka, whatever. And, they pay waaay to much attention to current simcrafts. Which, isn't actually even the slightest viable untill you have BiS gear. And, even then they don't count for much.

Everyone seems hung up on the spec and dps issues. Honestly, the OP is keying on being benched because "he won't play afflict and the RL wants him to", but unless his performance is drastically below the group's average, he's more likely being benched for attitude and personality. Everything in his post comes off as him wanting to do things his way regardless of the group's performance or desires. When you are part of a raid team, you are part of a team. Sometimes you have to make sacrifices so the group can succeed. The OP has every right to play the spec of his choice regardless of what other's think, however the group has every right to not bring him.

People are focussing too much on the spec issue. If he was dropped for not speccing to afflict it wasn't because of his choice of spec. It was because he was underperforming compared to what the raid leaders and officers expected, or underperforming compared to the hassle of bringing him. They wanted him to spec to afflict because it is theoretically the best spec, thus they thought that playing the best spec would improve his performance (whether or not it would is open to debate).

Whether it was performance or personality, the simple fact is the OP was benched because he wasn't up to the standard the guild wanted. It's on his shoulders to either improve his performance, improve his attitude, or find a guild with lower standards. It's that simple.

[Rotted]

How much lower is your dps than the others?

What you are missing out on here, is some specs just dont suit the player, for example when I played my lock, destro was my MS, Demo OS for pact in wrath, even though aff was higher at one point, I couldn't play it, I tried but couldn't get to grips with it and I did less dps than my other two specs

but if your not hittin enrange, and your casual and they are too, I dont see the problem, but if I was in your RL postion, I would turn around and say, look, your doing this that and this, which is fine, but I have to swap you out for a higher dps for x fight when we attempt it, and I'd try to keep you in on farm runs, and give you epgp for being on stand by for a progress boss

[Deleted]

Thats just not true.
Take 4.3, being fury instead of arms was a noticeable loss.
Same 4.3. Being anything besides destro was a noticeable loss.(bar some some add fights)

With that said, often when being unfamiliar with a spec you'll end up performing worse for a while.
Still i dont think this is the issue with OP, just judging from his mentality, he shouldn't be raiding, raiding is a team effort, casual or not imo...

Saying, ohh well, but the rest of the raid is carrying me so we're not hitting enrage timers, we're fine...
WRONG, the longer the fight, the more human error comes into play, resources(mainly healer mana) is being pushed to the limit.
Doing 7-8k more dps is about 3 million damage done, which is NOT negligible in any way.

As an example, i played prot mainspec with arms offspec, i still went fury to help the raid during spine hc progression(due to loss of a raider) just so we could keep pushing trough. Moral of the story, its a team effort, you do whatever YOU can to help the raid, if that means playin affil for some progression fights, then play it.

Edit. SimC also has normal t14 bis profiles, so that argument is not valid im afraid

You can't compare simulations to a real raid. Ever. Even the slightest difference from the actuall simulations throws everythin in the dumpster. For example, BiS normal gear. Which they obviously don't have. So I am afraid it is a valid argument

Yeah, you can get an estimate of what your spec is CAPABLE of performing. But, kicking someone out of a guild that is still doing normal (w/e boss it was) with the only reason being 'wrong spec' is just stupid. And is not a valid argument in any way.

Now, I don't know if it was the only reason. I highly doubt it. I would guess, that he is playing destruction and doing bad dps. But in that case changing spec won't help.