WoW I've got things on my mind...

I'm not sure what to talk about first! I guess I'll just start typing and hope that I get where I'm going in the end. Be prepared for a long post! :)

Yesterday when I got home, hubby was working on some Loremaster quests on his druid. So I hopped on Asara and started working on quests in the Draenei starting area, trying to get to Exalted with Exodar. While I was doing that, people were actually talking in guild chat, and I chimed in a few times. Mostly goofing around, which felt good, as I've been very out of the loop with the guild lately.

After a while, hubby asked if I would come tank a couple of heroics on Saraabi. We recently left the small family guild that we'd joined for a much larger and more active one, in hopes that we'd be able to run more instances and stuff. He'd gotten three DPS from the guild, and just needed a tank. I was a bit loath to leave Asara, because I finally felt like I was clicking with people again, plus I was (mostly) having a good time running around pwning the heck out of low-level quests.

I finally decided to go, but only for a couple of heroics. I was tired, and tanking requires quite a bit of concentration, I didn't want to let the group down too much because my attention was wandering. So we decided to run Utgarde Keep and Utgarde Pinnacle, since they're very close together, and I'm comfortable with both, having run them before. We got an achievement in Utgarde Keep for not letting the first boss cast Ice Block on anyone, and quite a few people said grats and good job. I hadn't even realized that he hadn't cast one! The rest of the instance went quickly, and the end boss dropped plate pants that I already have, and a lovely tanking ring that I didn't have, but won.

So we moved on to Utgarde Pinnacle. Had some trouble getting in (stupid instance servers), but finally made it. Things went well, we lost the rogue on Svala Sorrowgrave for some reason, but that was it. No problems on the other bosses, including the end boss, who was nice enough to drop a Red Sword of Courage for me. So as much as I protested going in the first place, in the end I was really glad that I had gone. Plus the group of DPS-ers we ran with was super friendly and nice. They were all already friends, but they tried really hard to include us. There are a lot of people in the guild like that, actually. They'll grats people for the silliest things, like catching 500 fish. But you don't get an achievement in this guild when people are on and not see a bunch of green text congratulating you for it.

After UP, I went back to Asara for a little while before actually going to bed. I was sooo close to Exalted with Exodar, I felt that a couple more quests would probably do the job. Guild chat was a lot quieter because most everyone was in Ulduar. About a half an hour later, ping! Asara has earned the Achievement "Ambassador of the Alliance"! Woo! And.. one person said grats in guild chat. One. Person. Not even one of the people I'd consider a good friend, either.

See the contrast? It really bothers me that people I've been playing with for almost my entire WoW career can't be bothered to take two seconds to type /g grats! because they're so busy with their "srs bsns" raid and people I've been playing with for less than a week do so as a matter of course, regardless of what they themselves are doing at the time. They could have a macro to do it, but the point is, they do it.

Asara's guild used to be like that. I mean, there weren't achievements or anything back then, but the environment was much more friendly than it is now. There was an effort made by the officers to include people, there were social events, everyone just seemed a lot closer. Things have changed quite a bit since those days. Maybe they don't do those things any more because the majority of the guild doesn't want them. Maybe the majority of the guild is only there for raiding now, I can't really tell. There are a lot of newer people, most of whom were recruited to raid, so I guess that might be true.

It kind of hurts, to feel like such an outsider among people I've known for such a long time. Having Saraabi in this new guild is just illuminating the differences more and more clearly. This feeling isn't new, in fact I've talked about it with Asara's guild leader once before. His solution was to wait things out until I can raid again, because then I'll be included in raid chat and people can get to know me better. So that's.. maybe in a couple of months. Maybe never.

They only raid on nights when I have to work the next day, and I don't think I'm comfortable with that any more. Plus they outgear me so much, I'd likely be waitlisted even if I did sign up for a raid anyway. Saraabi and Lumae's new guild, though, they've already invited us to 10-man Ulduar. Someone asked me about it the other day, and I said I'd have to see, because we're 3 hours ahead of server time. But she said they raid it on Friday and Saturday nights. I'm tempted. I really am. I'd have to go as DPS, so I'd have to work on Saraabi's Ret spec, but I think it would be fun to go.

We'll see.