High Adventure in Black Temple

Requiem is completely man-handling (for some of the guild members, I mean that literally. They can get a little grabby) the very end of end-game content that World of Warcraft has to offer. After just a few weeks in Mount Hyjal and Black Temple, more new bosses fell this past week: Kaz’rugal Thursday, Shade of Akama Friday, and Teron Gorefiend Saturday.

I attribute the guild’s juggernaut advancement within MT and BT to two factors crucial to any end-game raiding guild: recruitment and research. Requiem officers have done an outstanding job filling class openings with talented and dedicated players. The guild has suffered a typical rate of attrition throughout its existence. In fact, I can’t recall a time when the guild wasn’t doing recruiting of some kind. But that hasn’t stopped the guild’s officers from tracking down and recruiting the best people they can find. That’s no easy task. Silvermoon suffers severe shortages of some classes, particularly healing and tanking. Requiem has been trying for weeks to get another resto druid, but you can’t recruit what’s not there; the guild’s shortage of a leafy dr00d isn’t from lack of trying to get one.

The guild also excels in research. Raid leaders come to new content fully briefed on the intricacies of novel boss fights. They explain the fights well and offer positive (most of the time) feedback after failed attempts. Teron Gorefiend is a great example. I was anticipating that it would take us a few weeks to topple this boss. The biggest challenge to the fight is being turned into a ghost and having to cc and kill four constructs before they reach the raid and wipe it. The guild leaders made sure to post a simulator that allowed a potential raider to practice the construct mini-fight before ever logging into WoW. It’s that kind of preparation and attention to detail that made the difference between Requiem defeating Teron the very first night it faced him and a night of nothing but wiping.

There’s still a lot of raiding content to face and defeat. And there’s every chance that a MH or BT boss will prove uncooperative on the path to Illidan. To overcome such obstacles, Requiem must continue following its proven formula by not getting cocky, managing inevitable personality conflicts, continuing to research the few new boss fights that remain, and recruiting the last remaining class openings with the best people they can find. When faced with a setback, Requiem has always come roaring back.

I expect Illidan will be dead by May.