For week after week we've been pounding our heads against Rallos Zek. Very
early on, it became clear that our lackidaisical raiding manner would have
to change. No longer could we afford to screw around, go afk, not pay
attention. We had to *focus*, *really* concentrate and execute in order to
get this done. It took about three weeks for that lesson to sink in. After
that, we actually began *learning* the RZ killing process. It was a slow
but steady process - first of all, where to position TZ, then where to
position clerics and casters, then were to go position ourselves for VZ,
then how to pull him, then how to engage the fake RZ and how to deal with
the adds... the list goes on and on.
Examples of the things we learned: make sure to clear the gindans in the
fake RZ's room. We left a gindan up and he got aggro'd and cast his AE
knockback. All the clerics got blasted across the room - and right into the
AE rampage. As one of the tanks said, "It was like a cleric-killing bomb
was set off." Another example: We had some people positioned incorrectly
for VZ. The raid leader said into the channel, "Back up". So we did -
except for a few AFK people. So the raid leader said again, "Back up!" So
we did - except for the AFK people. A third time: "Back up now!" So we
did - except for the AFK people. Then finally the AFK people woke up and
joined us all - but we, having backed up three consecutive times, were way
out of position. When VZ was pulled, he would run up to us and warp back to
his spawn point. Then we got aggro from behind and wiped. From that point
on, it was "Move to where Tank01 is standing" when people were out of
position.
Finally, finally, we felt we had VZ and TZ down pat, and we could beat fake
RZ most of the time as long as dealt with the adds appropriately. Real RZ,
though, was a major pain. The adds were just destroying us. It's
incredibly frustrating to have to stay focused for over an hour just to get
to the real RZ, only to wipe. (And yes, I know this is just a precursor to
Plane of Earth.)
Last Thursday, I went with the guild to Plane of Tactics to try Rallos Zek
yet again. The day got off to a bad start - one of my guild members started
giving me grief for no reason right off the bat. I asked him to stop and he
bluntly refused to. I decided to ignore him and we went on. We got Tallon
Zek down all right, but we were having real problems pulling Vallon Zek.
One of our regular pullers wasn't on, and the other had taken an hour-long
break for dinner, so we had a new monk trying to pull VZ. This led to a
miscommunication where VZ came with four adds. We wiped and were rezzed
back in and got ready for the cycle to respawn. A curious thing happened...
Vallon Zek despawned and Tallon Zek immediately respawned - as in, suddenly
appeared behind us. To our credit, we got organized in a gawdawful hurry
and took him down. Then we pulled Vallon Zek the right way and killed him.
Then we moved in to kill fake Rallos Zek. Here, I had a bad moment - our
druid was getting ready to succor us to zone and I told him to wait, not
yet. Of course, RZ immediately disappeared, everyone accepted the TL to
zone, and half of my party died before I, too accepted the TL out. Bad move
on my part, but we got everyone summoned and buffed all right.
We moved down the Arena and prepared to engage Rallos Zek the Warlord. RZtW
was pulled - killing some of the raid along the way. Then the Main Tank
decided to wait a good minute before calling engage. A minute too long -
clerics started getting healing aggro, summoned, and killed. Me, for
instance. Despite losing 75 percent of the clerics right away, we got him
down to forty percent before finally wiping.
However, this attempt left us feeling extremely optimistic. The adds had
been handled well, which before had been a problem for us. So now we knew
how to deal with them. We learned not to wait to call engage. We also
learned the correct way to pull Rallos Zek the Warlord. One of our rogues
found a diagram highlight the "right" and "wrong" ways to pull RZtW, which
had me laughing out loud in real life, as it *exactly* described our
problem. Here's the link, from Triton's web site:
http://www.tritonguild.com/images/RZ/strat.jpg
Anyway, we felt *good*. We felt that we had at last put all the pieces of
the puzzle together, and now all we needed to do was do it all without
error.
That night, three people left the alliance to join our server's resident
uber-guild. One was the rogue who had been giving me grief right at the
beginning. I have the strong suspicion that he was planning to leave all
along and had been hoping to ninja an RZ flag before deguilding. Since he
knew he was leaving, he could act any way he wanted to without reprisal.
That behavior saddened me tremendously.
The next day was Friday, and Friday is my D&D night. So I went, I played, I
had fun even though I had thought about ditching D&D for EQ. But I didn't
want to break the commitment I had made to be at my D&D group. I did race
home, log on, asked if we'd done it... and we had. We'd killed Rallos Zek
the Warlord just an hour before.
I was both tremendously exhilarated and slightly disappointed. Terribly
terribly happy that we'd finally gotten this monkey off our back.
Disappointed I wasn't there to share in the moment. It also turns out that
only about 40 people got flagged; the adds were still up and killing people,
and the Planar Projection despawned after ten minutes. So we'll need to RZ
at least a couple more times.
I also have to admit that I felt deeply satisfied that members of my guild
were flagged for the elemental planes before the rogue that had left the day
before. =) The whole guild was just buzzing with wonderfully good
feelings. We had killed RZtW! The elemental planes were open for us!
Hooray!
Saturday I logged in, and lo and behold - Rallos Zek is up again. Yay! We
don't have enough people yet, so we begin assembling in Tactics to kill the
real Vallon Zek while we wait for more people. Alas, the uber-guild got all
sneaky and formed up in the Tower of Solusek Ro, then stormed into Tactics
to take down RZtW themselves. Of course, I can't complain about their
tactics - we didn't have an RZtW-capable force. We stand aside and let them
move in. We went and killed VZ, all the while hoping they'd wipe. (Last
time they'd tried, they had wiped to TZ three times before giving up.)
Alas, they succeeded. So no flag for me yet. Durn it.
Sunday was Easter, so no raiding. There were lots of elemental planes
groups going on that, alas, I couldn't take part on. After doing some
smithing, I logged off and played some Xenosaga instead. Just as I was
about to go to bed, I checked the guild message board - and two more people
had left the guild to join our uber-guild. Two of our oldest, most
well-liked members, too.
This hit me hard. I opened up MSN Messenger and IM'd one of the people who
had left. We had an hours-long discussion about why she had left. The
answers were depressing. The uber-guild has *such* a bad reputation - they
react without honor, without respect for other people on the server, and
that has been a pattern of behavior that hasn't changed since the inception
of the server. Of course, they're not totally evil - they let us use their
VT coth-bot. Still, I have trouble grasping the concept that some people
would consider loot and end-game content more important than the honor and
reputation of the guild they choose to associate themselves with. Join a
guild that killed someone else's triggered VSR, then taunt them about it?
Never!
So I'm mildly depressed, despite the fact that we just killed RZtW. Is my
guild viable long-term? I sure hope so; I have no alternatives. At this
moment I'm trying to address the issues my friend who left brought to my
attention, in the hopes it will keep more people from leaving.
We'll see. Dang, but this should have been a better moment for my guild.
--
-Richard
Monual Lifegiver
Archon of Rodcet Nife
Winter's Light
Drinal server
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Most, if not all stories, were taken from newsgroup alt.games.everquest (AGE), I recommend that anyone who gets a chance to read it should!