We had a small bit of general bad attendance / slacking on consumables. But when Blizzard announced the Jan 07 release date it made people realize that 2-3 months is a long time not to be raiding.

If i werent in the place i am now, i would be all for farming content and not caring about progression.

my guild is working on saph atm, one of two guilds on our server to be attempting him and one of four guild to have made any serious progression (read: beyond anub and raz) in naxx. these same 4 guilds are also the only guilds killing cthun. needless to say, we dont have many guilds in the extreme endgame raiding scene.

what my server does have is a number of guilds who can farm BWL and get up to the Twin Emps in AQ. if i were not in my current guild, i would be all for farming content, getting the best of what i can get, then pvping or farming gold. I see alot of ppl standing around IF with tier 3 bracers and belt, but nothing more than that. and they will never get anything beyond it either.

my guild is cutting edge, for our server. i do stand around IF and can pick out all the hunters in Strikers cause they're my guildmates, with exceptions for a few players. i am super happy with where im at, gear wise, progression wise, and guild wise. what i dont get is seeing guilds who have yet to clear the trash to the Twin Emps talk about progressing in Naxx. Simply put, the time frame just isnt there to make any significant progression. January, maybe Febuary if the xpan gets delayed, and everyone is going to be in the Outlands, never again to set foot in BWL, AQ, or Naxx.

im not saying "TBC is coming out, your gear will be useless, stop all progression". but i do advocate some sense of being realisitc. for that guild that just killed the Twin Emps, just focus on Cthun. you may get him down before TBC, and with luck, Ouro too. Focus your energies where they will make the greatest impact. for some, that may be killing KT. or Cthun. or Nef. or hell, even Rag.

in short - figure out what you, and by extension your guild, want before TBC

on a side note - i do see more and more ppl who have quit the game come back and want to get BoP items, ranging from ZG rep items all the way to the Claymore of Unholy Might. *shrug*

I think you basically have to do this. It's really not all that different from any other point in a guild's progression--you need to maintain a full raid team. People who go on extended breaks have to get replaced, so coming back in isn't necessarily easy. In general, your core group to start any zone is the enthusiastic group of people who helped you work through the last one. Just don't let people assume Naxx->TBC would somehow be any different.

Nice post Elog, I agree with your conclusions. There's kind of a watershed effect happening. Certain guilds and certain people are falling one way or the other and it's pretty interesting to see.

This tore up our guild weeks ago. Our guild was a bunch of small groups playing together...we never had our own identity, really. I was kind of blind to it before things started to unravel, but it became quite plain later. Lots of people transferred to play with friends, or left temporarily to raid with other guilds till TBC is out.

I see it as a blessing. It means we get to see who actually feels like the guild is home and who was just there for the raids and items. Who will want to come back for TBC? Who is on their alt still playing with the guild except for raid time? Who's gonna ask the guild bank for shadow pots to use with some other guild on Loatheb...and how will they ask? Interesting stuff for sure...seeing it all play out.

Personally, I've always liked raiding for the challenge and all, but the laughs I had while raiding and the nights where I couldn't wipe the smile off my face were always the reason keeping me coming back. I always took screenshots of guild/raid chat or w/e to post on our site (http://www.manic-guild.com)...this is the stuff I'll always love to remember about this game the most, not killing bosses. Point is, a lot of the people who left never enjoyed raiding for the same reasons...they couldn't see past "omg progression gogo" and see all the great people in the guild trying to have fun together. I'm not sorry to see them go.

Sure it sucks to not raid after doing it nightly for soooooo long, but for me this game is always fun with the right people, wether it's lvling, raiding, pvp, or whatever. My 47 gnome warlock can't wait to go get juiced in AV trying to conflag people at 51. Would I ever have lvl'd it by myself? Not in a million years, but it's been incredibly fun because of who I'm doing it with.

So that's the blessing in disguise. No raiding for a while, but ending up with a much tighter and more like-minded group for the xpac. I'll take that trade any day.