Problem Solving: Getting Better Groups

In my past post, Getting into a Flexible Raid, I showed you how to put yourself into the queue for flexible raids.  However, getting into the queue is one thing, getting into a good raid group is quite another.  Every one of us has experienced those groups that seem thrown together.  As soon as anything goes wrong, the yelling and blaming starts, then half the raid just quits in a fit of rage.

Some of this you can just attribute to luck of the draw. When you're in a queue, there is no guarantee you'll get into a good group. However, there are ways you can both increase your odds of getting into better random groups and ways to get consistent invites, so you won't have to rely on random groups for runs.

So, I've described a number of different ways to increase your odds of raiding in more reliable groups. Some of it, you might know, some of it you might not have really considered before, but all of it should help you over the long-run.

Item Level:
In the post referenced above, I said groups will choose to invite you to a flex raid based on the class and role you play, as well as your item level.  Changing your class and role is a considerable project, usually not something you can dive into immediately.  Therefore, it is probably easier to increase your item level.

The raid groups looking to recruit someone from the queues will usually be looking for people with higher listed item levels. This means, that the higher your item level, the more groups will try to invite you, but characters with lower item levels will have less options. More likely, they'll get invites from groups throwing out mass invites or from groups which want a certain number of different classes. The former of these groups usually implodes, while the latter can go really well or really horrible.

Realize that your item level for your character is an average of your gear.  This means you can add the item levels for every piece of gear and divide it by 15 (if you have a two-handed weapon) or 16 (if you have two weapons or a weapon and an off-hand) to get your character's score.

So, you're not going to upgrade your way to a high item level.  Even if you collect all the valor points you can for a week and use them to upgrade gear, at best, you'll get 1 item level for a whole week's work.  Its actually better to save your valor and only upgrade when you have gear that is at least 528 or you're nearing the 3000 valor cap.

I would suggest everyone begin doing the Black Prince Legendary Cape quest as soon as you can, because this is a very long-term project.  You can start this by looking for one of the Black Prince's minions, hanging out in one of the Inns throughout Pandaria, or by looking in your quest log because you've probably picked it up already.

Realize that this quests leads to many others, which will have you running numerous raids per week. You won't see many dividends from this until you finally get the cloak at the end of the rainbow. However, this cloak is essential if you want to keep running harder raids.

Once you have it, you and all your characters can participate in killing Ordos every week on the Timeless Isle. The gear that drops from Ordos can bump you up multiple item levels. Even without the cloak, you should defeat a Celestial on the Timeless Isle every week, because they can drop 550 PvP gear, which is good temporary gear, and 553 tier gear (gear that unlocks special abilities the more pieces of it that you have).

It may seem like you need a raid group for these, but you don't have to go asking people in general chat to join. Instead, you can use the same queue system that you use to get into flex raids. If you notice, on the picture I posted on the "Getting Into a Flexible Raid" post (right picture), the first two options you can queue for are "Celestials" and "Ordos". This should make these fights easily accessible.

Finally, I would suggest making a list of any gear that is lower than 528 and planning on replacing that through the Looking for Raid option, or by running around the Timeless Isle killing rares in hopes of getting a Burden of Eternity to drop or accumulating 50,000 Timeless Coins so you can buy one from the vendor there.

Just realize, gear gives you a better chance to get a better group, it does not guarantee you a good group.  There will still be group implosions and drama. Therefore, the next section is about moving past the need for a random group and developing a connection network that will lead to more consistent invites.

Connections:
If you want to be a part of more successful groups, sooner or later you're going to need to know the people you're running with. Random groups are full of questions that must be answered every raid. Does everyone know the fight? Does everyone know how to play their character? Are they doing something different than what other groups do?

To this end, the key to a more successful group is getting to know the people you're going to raid with. So, here are some tips on how to make friends, or at least acquaintances, and then how to use the connections you make to run with more stable raid groups.

The first, and foremost advice I have is simply be nice. It should be common sense, but it seems like the internet increasingly enables the rude and abrupt. It may seem like there's no point in connecting with a random group, but World of Warcraft is fascinating in that people from all over the place can come together and find common ground that they wouldn't find elsewhere. If nothing else, the fact that we all play World of Warcraft is something we have in common.

The "battletag" system is a great way of accumulating connections without endangering your personal privacy. It serves as an alias that everyone who has your battletag ID can see.  It doesn't matter which character or server you're on, as long as you're playing World of Warcraft or any other Blizzard game, your battletag friends can see and communicate with you.  You can see and communicate with them as well.

If you don't have one set up yet or you're not sure how to set it up, go to your World of Warcraft account, either through http://us.battle.net/wow/en/ or http://us.battle.net/en/. Listed along the left side of the account summary screen should be a "Battletag" option you can click on to set one up.

Once you have it set up, offer it to the most engaging members of your most successful raids, or if you get lucky enough to be recruited into another guild's run, use it to try to stay connected to them so that they'll look for you when they need recruits for something.

If you play a healer or tank, you'll find there are many guilds that are looking for reliable players in those positions, so don't be afraid to get involved.  If you don't have a guild already, you may even find a good guild to join using this.

Finally, be equipped when you go into raids.  Its not just the gear, the potions, and the food buffs, its also the programs you have.  The most successful groups are the ones that can communicate with each other with more than just raid chat.

So, its always good to have a headset, even a cheap one, and to have one, or all of the most used voice-chat systems.  The three voice-chat systems I've seen the most have been Ventrilo, TeamSpeak, and Mumble.  Downloading the clients of these should be absolutely free. Voice-chat is a must for organized raid groups, and never underestimate the power of recognition when someone else can put a voice to your name.

I hope that these suggestions help you in your raiding.  As always, any questions or comments are appreciated.