/Sigh

So if you read this blog you know this is where I like to vent my World of Warcraft (WoW) joys and frustrations.  I seem to be more inspired to write the frustrations, perhaps I am a cranky writer.  I generally vent about really stupid people here, and this post is no exception.  Hey, I don't see any point in trying to be nice anymore (ha ha, was I ever nice?).

History
My main character (the one I prefer to play), Chala a Tauren Druid, has been in 5 1/2 guilds.  I have been playing this character almost from the beginning of the game coming out.  I started out alliance but after frustration with the age range of players we switched to Horde, we were told it seemed to be more mature than alliance.  So needless to say, I have been playing Chala for years now.  The 1/2 guild is a guild merger, which I'll cover below.  All my guild endeavors have been shared with my Elfy, of course.

Counsel of Redrum (CoR).  We started out and remained un-guilded for quite awhile.  One day on a blimp we say another character with a really cool tabard.  We asked to join the guild on the grounds of the tabard.  What is really funny is they actually invited us!  CoR was a decent bunch of people.  They were friendly enough, and we got to do our own thing and enjoy some friendly conversation.  We made some friends, which led to our next guild.

Requiem (Req).  Req was a newly forming raiding guild.  We just happened to be classes they needed (Elfy, aka Elfbite, an Orc Hunter) and we were interested in seeing raid content.  It seemed like the next logical step.  We had not hit the level cap yet, so we hurried through the last few levels and then started running dungeons to get gear to start raiding.  It started out fun, it wasn't a big guild and we all got along pretty well.  As we started building up our raid skills we started adding more members.  This began the long road to me feeling really bad about my skills.  I suddenly had people telling my my bonus healing wasn't high enough, that I needed to be faming for better gear and that I was healing wrong.  No one was dying on my watch, I didn't understand what the problem was.  But it seemed that my numbers weren't good enough, and I guess that was more important than if I kept my group alive.  It got even more confusing.  I was asked to pass on loot for other players, even though I may have rightfully won the piece and regardless of what a huge upgrade it was for me.  And weren't they telling me how bad my gear was?  That was also the beginning of the elitist attitude that crept in.

Evolution (Evo).  Req built up a decent reputation on the server, and were progressing well.  Then our guild leaders and officers decided it would be a good idea to merge with another raiding guild so we would be bigger, and progress further and faster.  Bigger is not better, I believed it then and I believe it now.  So we merged with a guild called Bloodpact of the Chosen (BToC) and became Evo.  It all happened very fast, and I think it surprised most of the members of both guilds.   

Evo lasted only a few weeks and people quit to go back to what was left of their original guilds.  After that, Elfy's and my days in Req were numbered.  Peoples attitudes were very elitist and it was becoming very had to like some of the people we were raiding with.  Tempers flared, egos and attitudes swelled and it was starting to take the fun out the raiding experience.  Instead of a fun game, it was starting to feel like a job.  So, after thinking about if for quite a while, and crying about it just as much (hey, I am a girl) Elfy and I decided we would be happier if we left the guild.

We left and went back to quiet, un-guilded life.  We still talked to friends in the guild, there were still some good people that all the nastiness and pressure had not gotten to yet, but it was only a matter of time before a lot of them left too.  We weren't ready to answer all the "Why'd you leave" questions so we left Horde side for awhile and went back to Alliance.  We leveled a Priest (me) and a Shamen (Elfy).  Elfy had friends from work Alliance side, and we joined the guild he was in.  That went bad, they were not very open and were quick to push those they didn't know as well out.  But I'm not going to go into Alliance now, this is all Horde.

Union of Lost Souls (ULS).  After the frustration Alliance side we came back Horde side and joined a friends guild, ULS.  Elfy really enjoyed playing a Shamen, so we power leveld a Tauren Shamen named Scritch for him to play Horde side.  Chala and Scritch became the healing team for ULS and it was great, while it lasted.  While we were running with ULS, Req was falling apart.  People were leaving for various reasons, some came and joined ULS (much to my dismay) and eventually Req turned into the guild Minion.  Meanwhile, some of the people and reasons why we left Req in the first place were coming back into our gaming world.  So, after a bunch of really snarky frustrating crap happened, and rules that were put in place to be fair seemed to not matter to everyone we left ULS.

Current
Everything we have been though has just about killed the game for us.  We took some time off, and after a nice break we started playing casually again in our new guild that we formed with one of our friends from the early Req days, Pocket Full of Hate (Pocket).  In the peace and quiet of our little guild of three we have found our quiet place.  We are no longer obligated to run with people because they are guildies.  In a way, we were free.  We started running heroics (dungeons where you get gear and badges for gear) with our ULS friends and life was good.

ULS started having more personality conflicts (not unlike why we left) and we found our ULS friends recovering Alliance side.  So we switched over to Alliance for awhile and ran around with them over there.  Talk of forming a new raid group came up, and Elfy and I were recruited to heal.  We were all for it, with a few conditions:  we would not participate if certain people were in the group.  The guild master was not planning on most of the people on our list being invited.  There was one, but I was prepared to let the one slide.  I was firm in regards to everyone else.  It seemed like everything was on track, and then someone stepped in to help the guild master get the group rounded up.  This opened up the door for the people on our list and caused Elfy and I a lot of frustration.  To prove my point about how much I will not run with anyone on the list I actually left a heroic because one of them was invited to fill in an empty slot.  If that didn't get my point across, along with me saying I would not run with these people I don't know what would.

So today, I log in and find there is an invite for the first bonding raid with the new forming group.  Can you guess what happened?  /sigh  Yup.  The person at the type of my list was invited, so I declined.  They can find another healer.  I have put in my time and had to run with this person through most of my raiding life in this game.  I'm done with him.  I have earned the right to say hell no, and I wish my "friends" would understand and respect that.  All the had to do was tell me from the start they wouldn't tell him no.  I had a feeling in my gut.  But you know, I hoped that just this once it was wrong.  I hoped that the guild master had finally heard me, and understood where I was coming from, that I had earned her respect enough that she would respect my views and be honest with me rather than try to sneak me into a raid with him or bully me into doing it.  I am DONE being a doormat.  And I'm really cranky.