In the morning, I deguilded from Eternal Chaos. I didn’t ninja deguild. I wrote a letter to the guild leader, and I explained to the people online at the time that I was leaving, and why.
Being guildless gives you a certain kind of freedom. Spend the day crafting? Why not! Join pickup groups? Sure! Pickup raids? Definitely! Back in EQ1, guildless people (or more commonly, people in small, non-raiding guilds) were more famous and respected than the top players in the top raiding guilds. Raiders grouped only with each other. Groupers grouped with everyone, and the best groupers were known by their skill.
When I got home from work, I applied to Clan of Shadows, and then set out to enjoy being guildless.
That didn’t last long :) While I was just about to bring Dera on a CoA run, an officer sent me a tell (on Dina, I had her logged in, too, just in case) asking if I’d like to join, and of course I did, and suddenly my cloak had a pattern again, vent info showed up, and I was on my way to Castle Mistmoore to kill contested Mayong.
It was messy and chaotic, nothing like the ironically precise positioning we used to spend so much time on in Eternal Chaos, but after awhile, he died. A guild first kill of contested Mayong, I think.
We headed then to the zone deep in Karnor’s Castle I’d stumbled upon my first day in Kunark, there to kill one of the three bosses that comprise the Rise of Kunark Tier 1 raids. The Tier 1 quest is given by a cheerful, Billy-loving halfling beneath the City of Mist (huh, I thought I took a screenshot… but Fraps and Picasa both say no…)
Note to my Clan of Shadows guild mates: Sometimes you might see me hanging back, apparently lagging or something. No, I’m just taking screen shots. You let me in your guild, you get in the blog.
Here’s a shot of CoS doing a Rodney King on poor Pawbuster. Everyone is trying to keep behind him – otherwise he’ll stop ya from attacking or casting. Very naughty of him. He died, I got the update, a third of the way through the tier 1 raids now. The guild itself just finished tier 2, so I have some catching up to do.
Here’s a picture of me taking screen shots while we’re wiping :) If you know you’re going to die anyway, why not grab some pictures first?
Afterward, we broke into groups, and I logged on Dera and joined up with other guildies for that CoA run I bugged out on earlier, followed by a ring event outside Sebilis, some named hunting, and a quick run into the City of Mist to take on the Black Reaver.
I really missed grouping with guildmates. Not that I hate pickup groups – those are usually surprisingly good (and I did an earlier pickup Maiden’s group which was very good, though ultimately unsuccessful) – it’s just nice to see what people are like outside of raids. You don’t really get to know people on raids.