The Raiding Bug
Back before the Burning Crusade came out, I was in a casual raiding guild that was working on ZG, AQ 20, and the occasional foray into MC. I enjoyed a lot of the aspects of raiding: getting to see the high end content, the challenge of working on a new boss, learning the fight, and then finally defeating him, laughing with my guildies when a pull went bad, and getting new awesome gear were all enjoyable parts of raiding.
A lot of what I didn’t like about raiding was caused by having to get 20 (or 40) people together, coordinated, organized and ready in order to get anything done. It seemed like a huge part of our time was actually spent listening to instructions, buffing, waiting on AFKers to come back, rebuffing because buffs wore off while we were waiting for the AFkers, and listening to the instructions again. We probably spent 75% of our time out of combat preparing to go into combat. It was a bit of a drag.
When Blizzard developed BC, they wanted to make raiding more accessible to a greater number of people, and so the beginner raid dungeon - Karazhan - only requires 10 people. Not only does this make it easier for a lot more people to see the content, but it solves a lot of the logistics problems that pre-BC raiding had. If your guild can’t get 10 people together every now and then to raid Kara, then your guild is either incredibly small, or it has a complete lack of direction and purpose.
So when I joined my current Horde guild - The Blood Legion - I saw that they were just beginning to raid. Things started off pretty slowly, but the more I heard about how they were progressing, the more I started to look forward to the day that I would be able to join them.
I was around 62 when I joined BL and I hit 70 about one month later. A bunch of us got keyed for Kara at the same time, and so the guild started running Kara more frequently each week to let more of the new people join in. I was sort of lackadaisical about going to start. It was fun (and much better than the pre-BC raids), but it took some adjustment to get used to raiding again. So for the first few weeks, I went to Kara when I had the time. I enjoyed myself, got some new gear, /cheered when we downed a new (to me) boss, and was fairly neutral about the whole thing. It was fun, but not earth-shatteringly fun.
That was, until this happened:
More specifically, this happened:
Helm of the Fallen Hero dropped.
I won the roll.
And I turned it in for the Tier 4 headpiece - Voidheart Crown
Something in my head went *click*. I started to think, “Oh wow, I’ve actually got some decent gear now. This is fun. I need more. So much more. Maybe I can work things out with Egwene so I can start coming to more raids. Maybe if I sell everything I currently own, I can afford to get some better pants. And a chestpiece. And wristguards. More spell crit! No, more spell hit! I need it all. Maybe I can join a real raiding guild now. What’s the spell hit cap? Is it worth 1000G to get another 50 spell damage? Should I respec? I’m kinda tired of my Felguard anyway, right? 41/0/20? Hybrid? Dare I even think it…. 0/21/40??? What’s the spell hit cap? I need to start farming some primals. I need more gold! What about gems?! And enchants?! I need more Sha’tar rep! I need to start running TK! WHAT’S THE HIT CAP!?!?!?
Eventually everything went black.
I woke up the next morning, and Egwene looked at me. “You didn’t come to bed until like 2 last night. What in the world were you doing?” I just laid there and tried to remember. I didn’t do anything foolish, did I? Did I really sell everything I owned? Did I really consider leaving my guild? I love my guild! Why would I do that? What happened??
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That, my friends, was a classic case of the Raiding Bug. Onset usually happens after the dropping of phat lewtz, as my case did, but the sickness has also been known to occur after such things as dinging 70, the end of a school semester, and the dumping of (or by) a Significant Other. Symptoms include, but are not limited to, sleeplessness, irritability, lack of patience with distractions, sudden (and possibly frequent) /gquits, uncharacteristic spending of Gold, and increased usage of the terms “scrub and “noob.” In extreme cases, the victim’s irises may even turn purple.
I was lucky. My sickness passed quickly and I did very little while under its influence. Others do not fare so well. If you find yourself coming down with a case of the Raiding Bug, the best remedy is to simply close your eyes and repeat “It’s only a game… it’s only a game.”
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