Why Do I Raid?

Recently, I catch myself asking that question. Well, why do I raid?

For one, it's because I like the challenge. Fighting bosses that require movement, require skill, require all your attention to not screw up and die.
That is what I like and hope to encounter everytime new bosses are added to the game.

I also like having a responsible position in the raid. I am a healer. The raid's success highly depends on my - and the co-healers - performance. If I screw up not only might die - other might as well.

I strive for perfection. I try to always do the best I can, paying attention to things around me.

I don't really care about what drops. It's nice to upgrade items, getting better at what I'm supposed to do, having to worry less about healing output, mana issues and stuff like that.

There are downsides to raiding, however.

Having to put up with people's inability to walk a straight line, seemingly. There are cases in which I ask myself "what is this person DOING here?"
You should at least try to do your job in an acceptable manner, try to not be the reason why the raid as a whole is failing in the end.

Second, the mentality of depending on the healers to save you from dying to your mistakes, simply ignoring damage sources or debuffs or reacting to slow, puts a vast amount on stress on the healers. For example, if my fellow healers and I are struggling with mana on bosses which we killed several times already, some people are doing stuff wrong.

I'm also quite pissed off by the fact that people blame their own inability on outside sources. Weather... their own lack of gear (and by now, several months into ICC you should have been able to take care of that - if not, raid on your main, not on your bazillionth twink)...
Yes, but your healers always have to be playing perfect, because else we would accomplish nothing at all.

We are just as you. Not perfect. But, in contrast to you, we recognize our mistakes. We even try to save the situation if we messed up. I got caught in a malleable slime on Festergut Heroic because I was just a second too slow?
Fine, I'll resort to instant spells for a few moments. As disc, I have enough of them. I see Sucara got caught by one? I'll just put out some more healing to compensate.

As I mentioned in another post, I have no problem with wiping several times.
It's a part of raiding, that I somehow enjoy. It means we made a mistake and we have to analyze what went wrong.

However, it's no fun, when people start to make the same mistakes over and over again. Ignore given tips and just repeat the same bad performance all over again.
Some people refer to these people as noobs.
I refer to them as being lazy, not caring about improving themselves.

Is it that hard to remember what you have to do for more than ten seconds?
Is it that hard to put out the needed DPS you should be able to pull with your gear, and the buff?
Is it that hard to try to not screw up every single try?

There are superb players. There are good players. Then there are the players who are good on some bosses, but totally overwhelmed on others.

That is okay.

But I don't want to boost "noobs".
I don't want to have this extra stress on my shoulders because I have to smooth away their faults.

That is what causes me to lose the fun in raiding. Asking myself "Why am I doing this?"

I accepted that I'll probably never see some bosses on Heroic. Putricide, Sindragosa, Lich King... hey, that's okay. I don't care that much. Maybe we'll kill them in Cataclym on Level 85 with Tier 11.
That's why I don't need to raid 25mans, or search for a guild that maybe is just a little bit better than you guys. I don't care that much about being in the 5% of the best players on our server.

However, some days of raiding make me think if I should take a step back with raiding till Cataclysm. I don't NEED that much gear from the first bosses there. Maybe a ring from Festergut. Or a neck from Deathbringer Saurfang. Sure, some Tier 10 upgrade tokens would be nice as well.
But... I don't NEED them that badly. They'll get replaced in the next leveling process anyway.

Nevertheless, I'm having fun raiding, most of the time. I want it to stay that way.

I'm not sure it will, if I have to lead stupid discussion about a Paladin Tank thinking Vindication could be skipped. It shouldn't even be a POINT of discussion. It reduces the damage you take. SKILL IT, for all that is holy.

I'm not sure it will, if I as a player that never played some classes could DO MORE DAMAGE than the people we have there. Give me five minutes to read a guide and I can pull 5k and more on any class, easily.

Everyone should try to improve. Not just your healers!


With that, I'll pass the question.

Why do YOU raid?