What is a Main, an Alt, and Raiding?

[Bladesinger]

There will soon be a thread being posted somewhere to discuss our thoughts on loot and loot rules. Like Chris I have thoughts to express that are outside of that topic and as such I'm posting them here in this thread rather than the other. However, this post and the post I make in the loot/loot rules thread should be considered two parts of the same. My reasoning here is meant to explain my contributions to that post.

Lately I've been in the center of a firestorm surrounding loot. Why? That's a good question. To be quite honest the circumstances that precipitated the current situation should never have happened. Unfortunately they have and it's up to all of us to come to a consensus and agree on guidelines that will prevent such an occurance again in the future.

Whenever this topic comes up the first thing to be said is "It's just loot! We're not a raiding guild why the heck is it important?!!!!!!!"

In response to that I can only say that we weren't a raiding guild. The moment we started running Molten Core on our own we became a raiding guild. We're far from being a hardcore raiding guild, but we are a raiding guild now and I for one don't see that changing.

It's true that the majority of us play the game for the fun of interacting with our peers more than we play to obtain new gear. Again though I would say that has been more a thing of the past group and is true more for our members who have been around for a long time than it is true for those members who have joined since we started running MC with KoA. People know we raid and I see the majority of our new members having a greater interest in raiding than members we recruited prior to the time when we started running MC regularly.

The emphasis is shifting now matter how we try to deny it. Is that a bad thing? Not in and of itself but it can be. Why? I'll go into detail on that next.

What is a raid? It's both the group of people running the content and the content itself. Taken down to the bare essentials a raid is players running through content in an attempt to down bosses in order to explore unseen content or to down the bosses in order to get the loot from them that will allow the group to progress to new content.

I believe we can all agree that we're more interested in progressing to new content than we are in obtaining loot for its own sake.

Based on the definition above raiding is 10% new content and 90% farming. Once we see new content it is no longer new. At that point all effort is put into overcoming the newest obstacle and farming the previous bosses.

Why is this distinction important? Because loot becomes the limiting factor in a raid group's ability to progress to new content. The desire to obtain loot then becomes not only a possible motivating factor for an individual to raid, it by necessity becomes the reason to raid. In order for a raid group to be prepared for new content they must farm the old content.

This is where Blizzard let their players down. At this point in the game, not considering any possible expansions, loot improvement is the only mechanism by which a player can improve his or her character. I believe we all agree on this and all see it as an unfortunate issue that we must contend with as we play end game characters whether they be mains or alternates.

What is a main? I define a main character as that toon which a player will use exclusively for new content if give the choice. It is the character that each player prefers to play and will play in new content unless there is a need for a different class by the current raid group.

Why do we need to have mains? That's another good question. We need to have declared mains for the purpose of ensuring the most effective gear dispersal. This does not count those times when a player is asked to fill in on an alternate for the betterment of the raid group at that time. Rlyan, Moonknight, and Trixster are the prime examples of this. At such times when an alt is called in they should by all rights be considered mains for that raid when it comes time to roll for new gear because the players are making a sacrifice for the group's benefit. We need to recognize and respect the players' willingness to make that sacrifice.

The issue arises when a player chooses to raid on a toon that is not their declared main because they're either bored with their main or feel they can derive some benefit from playing an alt that they won't get on their main. While I'm all in favor of allowing players to make their own choices on what toons to play choosing to play an alt in a raid often decreases the raid's overall effectiveness. Not always, but more often than not. Every single one of us needs to have enough respect for the rest of the raid group to make the choice that benefits the group most.

What is an alt? I define an alt as any character that is not a player's main.

Why is this distinction important? In order for the raid group to progress to new content it is of the highest importance that each player's main be outfitted as well as possible. A player obtaining gear on an alt that is also needed by another player's main by definition reduces the raid group's ability to progress toward new content with the greatest speed and efficiency.

Furthermore, a player rolling for loot on an alt is not only hindering the raid group's progress but it's also disrespectful of the effort put into a main by each and every player . We're a guild built on Friendship. The building blocks of Friendship are respect, courtesy, and trust. Every single player needs to be able to trust the others in his or her class group to respect the mains enough to show the courtesy of passing on gear in favor of the mains (as a proxy for the raid group as a whole) even though that alt may also benefit from the obtaining that gear.

In the end it all comes down to loot and the use of loot to benefit the raid group. Taking a long term view that means those toons which will be used during exploration of new content from the start to the point where such content is put on farm status need to be the ones recieving the best gear possible as quickly as possible to provide the greatest benefit to the raid group. All other toons, by the above definition, alts, should be secondary to mains when it comes to obtaining gear improvements. That is the only way the raid group will be able to reach the real goal of swift and regular progression into new content. There will be ample time and opportunity to farm old content to gear out alternates after the mains are optimally outfitted.

[Bladesinger]

Since the post isn't up and coming to the forums lately has been more a matter of aggravation I'll just give my opinion here. Mods, move/delete this post as you see fit.

I believe we need to have declared mains, period, no conditions.

Our loot distribution options:

1. Mains are the only ones to be allowed to roll on items if such an item is needed by a main that can use that item. Alts may roll off on items that have been declared defaults by the loot master.

2. Alts receive a deduction to their rolls when rolling against mains that can use the item. For example, Mains A B and C are rolling on an item and Alts X Y and Z are also rolling. A B and C will have straight rolls while X Y and Z will have a certain amount, say 25, deducted from their rolls. This still allows alts a chance to get an item but at a reduced probability.

3. Alts receive a modification to their loot percentage for purposes of determining item distribution. This isn't an actual change of the player's percentage, just a modification for the alt when it rolls for determining distribution.

4. Combination of 2 and 3.

5. No alts allowed in raids unless the raid leader specifically asks a player to come on a different character because more of that class are needed for the run.

6. Straight players percentage all the time.

7. Track each toon separately and base percentage on toon attendance, not player attendance. **If a player is asked by the raid leader to participate on a certain toon said player has the choice of which toon to apply the attendance too. All loot gained during this run will be counted against same toon chosen to apply the attendance to.** <- should rule out much of the ability to stack attendance while minimizing loot gained.


I'm in favor of #1. Based on the argument that "Everyone will get all their gear eventually it's just a matter of time" alts will also eventually get all the gear they want. Mains will simply get the items first which will have the benefit to the guild of not hindering progression to new content.

Likewise I'm also in favor of #7 is also fair to everyone involved and I like it. If a player wants to generalize and play multiple toons he/she will have to live with the consequence of poor percentage overall. Such a mechanism will also benefit the players who put the time and effort into improving one character in order to provide the most benefit to the guild that the particular toon is capable of providing.

[callania]

"It's true that the majority of us play the game for the fun of interacting with our peers more than we play to obtain new gear. Again though I would say that has been more a thing of the past group and is true more for our members who have been around for a long time than it is true for those members who have joined since we started running MC with KoA."

~Ouch. I'm a little hurt. This statement is a little uncalled for I think, and seems more like a jab than a relevant point to the topic at hand.

[Bladesinger]

It wasn't a jab, I'm sorry you took it as such. Having been with the group for a while I've noticed a difference in the tenor of the guild since we started raiding and have also noticed a shift in focus (in general) of the members we've recruited since we started raiding regularly. All generalizations by nature contain exceptions.

[RagingDeath]

Why does that hurt? Phil is merely stepping up to the plate and laying out what needs to be said and nobody else has the courage to say it. And it is an opinion of a friend, which is the relationship of the whole guild. We do have a small loot problem and posts like this are what we need to correct this before we lose friends. I still like the loot rules we have now. The raid attendance and perts are great. But I agree that we should announce our Main chars and use them for the new instances. Also we need to have our main geared and the other mains geared as well. Once we start doing BWL we wont have any probs for awhile because all the loot WILL goto the mains. That will prob ease some of the MC probs and alts, like now, will continue to get the gear they want. I think starting BWL might bring up a whole new prob as well. I believe when we start major BWL runs noone is gonna wanna run MC and all the gear we need for BWL will be lost. So we better just ease our way into BWL very slowly. Lets not forget Ragnaros has some very nice gear so we gotta just hone our skills in MC and take him down week after week and build up some major confidence and gear. Thats just my opinion and please feel free to voice yours.

[callania]

It wasnt his opinion on loot problems i had a problem with, the part that hurt was quoted and sounded like a negative reflection on newer guild members... I feel a little removed from the loot issue since i have no alts and as such didn't mention it at all, i was focusing on that one comment that i explained was perceived by me as a jab, i thought that was clear I'm sorry if it wasn't.

[Rlyan]

I can see why you are hurt Callania, and I want you to know that not all of us in the guild feel this way.

I can not see the shift in mindset of our members as you claim there is Bladesinger. I can understand the theory behind it, because a shift would make sense. But I see no physical proof of this from where I am standing. I've been trying to think of an example of this all night. I'm just not finding one.

If anything, I think this past week has shown a shift in some of our older members. This is not meant to be an insult to anyone who may take it as such. Change can be good. It's how we express ourselves and what we do with the change that can make a "shift" either good or bad.