1/ We decided that Class Leaders will be more organised with their respective classes. They will be discussing attunements, gear, and general advice. Also a possible rotation system for raids.

2/ Initially the plan is to collect information about those people in the guild at lvl 70 who want to go to Kara. This information can then be put together so that we may have a change to organise a 2nd Kara group. It is hoped that this information collecting stage will only take about 2 weeks.

3/ We also discussed Class leaders having meeting with their respective classes to help allow more information to filter through the guild, so the members are more on top of what is going on and can have questions answered at this time…

4/ We have also decided that it would be helpful for the Class leaders to meet with GM every 2 -3 weeks to discuss any issues, such as Raids, gear, problems, recruitment etc….

5/ Lastly discussed was the GEM and help with attunements, and quests issues. It seems that GEM still inst working for people. Please if your GEM isn't working see if it is set up properly, or maybe if you have another Addon that may be clashing with it. Secondly if this isn't the case we suggest if you need help with something, rather then spam it in GC to try and whisper people of your level and organise a group that way. Or use the forum. There are people that will help when and where they can. But you have to realise this time given, has to be given at an appropriate time for all.

Please feel free to add to this, as I may have missed a few points or things that can be reviewed in our next meeting =)
Itty.

Oak 'can we please get an event manager that works for all of us'
Lucklas 'Why not use the Forum, to get events going, you can see this in use already for Mechanar tonight.
Alternatively what have you found out there. Did you search on any alternative Mods and have any ones which we can test out?'

I have spent considerable time 1. Looking at alternatives which are supported as an up-to-date add-on for WoW and 2. Reading the Forums listing issues with GEM

I have been unable to find any alternative which will run as an add-on within WoW. There have been several in the past but these have fallen behind the patch updates of Warcraft and many no longer supported or even working. I think we will find it quite hard to find an alternative at this moment in time which integrates as an add-on. It does, of course, not preclude the option to find an alternative in the future.

This leaves us with the option of using an external system to WoW at the moment. Here we have two further problems - people have to use it outside of the game by closing WoW or switching to an Internet Browser window and people will either have to use an account to sign-up to an event (or type this information in manually each time they wish to join one). I can see this as being more problematic as time goes by (not to mention the Admin overhead).

The GEM Forums have listed a few minor bugs, but these fall in to two groups - either a new patch release (and GEM has to play catch-up) or an incompatibility with another add-on. Although the later are really few and far between. GEM has the advantage of being widely used across the world (best still from within the game) and one add-on which is still being developed.

This leads to ask the question as to 'why people have issues?' The forums list 'Incorrectly set up' at the very top of the list closely followed by 'Incorrect understanding of GEM' (funnily enough marked as RTFM on many Forums). I wonder if these problems are ones that are affecting UNITY's use of GEM?

To assist I have created a GEM HELP page here. Check this page out and I hope this will resolve 99% of the current issues.

Cronoz

As for these requests for Attunement help well I can say that I have not seen one at all. Admitedly due to family commitments I tend not to be on until later in the evening so perhaps am missing your timing. Also I am not glued to Guild chat while fighting/questing/grouping and focussing on mobs etc and can easily miss a large majority so I don't believe Guild Chat should be solely relied upon.
How about posting a Forum message saying you are struggling and need help getting a group. I'd be happy to organise a group (it would have to be late night for me, after 10pm (11pm Game time)). I would also be happy to sit there for a hour pugging 3 others which I have done time after time to get my badges of justice (without reliance on the guild).

'I am expecting the guild to do what a guild is supposed to do which is to offer help where it can'
This is a dangerous expectation, people pay their own personal money for this, people have time restrictions, people may want some time to themselves. So yes it is nice for help to be available but it depends who is on and when and a host of other things.
Yes guilds are about 'organization of persons with related interests, goals, etc' and this involves collaboration. But I don't expect, I believe that a guild greatly increases the chances of help and I greatly appreciate any help that comes my way and realise that people are giving up their personal time.

At the moment it appears that the people within the Kara runs are unwilling to help anyone else get attuned, for with each new person attuned it lowers they're chances of getting in to that magic 10 group.
I would be astounded if I found anyone with this attitude. We want as many people as possible for Kara, we want to get two groups going each week, we want people experienced and geared up so 25 can be put together for gruuls lair aspa. Look at what Carth said, how he is going to bring as many rogues in and they will eventually replace him in the progressive groups (not in his personal interest). I'm happy to run once a week even though we are approaching at least 3 Karas a week in continuations. People have offered to drop out for others. The general attitude is extremely humble from teamspeak/raid chat and certainly not about me me me and epics. If it was I think you would find these people would not be invited back.

The biggest problem at the moment for people left out is the fact that a rotation hasn't got off the ground but think about how hard it is to get something like this organised and efficient. Who does it, how, who goes first, when, what…..
There is a meeting tonight and maybe this can move forward.

Help our own members with there attunement or recruit from outside the guild ?

As my previous posts state there is not a lot of evidence of the first one happening at the moment…

As to heroic runs… well as no one will any longer run a non-heroic run as there is nothing in it for them apart from a repair bill, those of us without the rep to get the keys will be pugging those as well then…

P.S. GEM is still broken for a small amount of players and no amount of uninstalling and reinstalling will fix it as it appears to be an account issue. Can we please use a secondary calander system.

I am expecting the guild to do what a guild is supposed to do which is to offer help where it can and we don't at least for the last 10 weeks. Just about the time that the guild started raiding Kara the amount of useful people dropped thru the floor.

You have whispered me and it was bad timing that I couldn't skip in and pick up a fragment, but it's not just me I'm talking about here. What about people like Engom, Toxicuk and Alva ? How often did they shout for help on the guild channel to end up PuGing the fragments they have ?

The problem is the people who were the most likely to help are the people in Kara, the original idea of those not on a Kara run helping others to get they attunement wasn't working very well (zero runs to date) but I was holding out on it happening sooner or later. With two Kara runs the whole attunement helping thing isn't going to happen at all.

I also understand that for the guild to get so far in Kara it needs a certain spec of people, so some people must be in the group every run effectively removing them from anything else. I'm not asking for four people to hold my hand in to and out of the instance and I hope that people would realise that, I am asking that when someone, anyone, asks for the 2nd or 3rd week on a row for help, someone will answer them even if it is to say tomorrow or the weekend and to mean it.

There are 25 man raids next, what will unity do then ?
Two Kara groups gives you 20 of them, the other five will have to come from somewhere, the best place would be from within the guild but is that a likely thing with the situation as it currently is ?

Finally, this isn't about you Niffy your still one of the most helpful people I've ever met in any mmorpg I've played and been playing them for far to long to remember ;) But as I posted earlier, 97 odd level 70's even if one in two are alts that still leaves over 40 people of the required level who could make the effort to help and don't.

secondly, for 3 runs in a row i have taken on different players to karazan. I try to differentiate players and still have a good dps/healing ratio.

2 runs this week had to be cancelled if not we were able to pug 2 tanks, which made us loose about an hour of waiting and praying.
What i suggest is that everybody does his best to poke tanks and healers and get them interested in joining Unity.
As of now… we want to progress in Kara. It is nice to be able to advertise potential newcomers to Unity that we are a social guild which also happens to achieve a fun and challenging game in raids and heroic instances.

We continue to help eachother out getting their attunements and reputation done and are trying to compensate for players feeling left out by holding a rotation schedule.

Never the less I have been both in normal Ramparts and Dire Maul and given a hand with healing in group quests here and there during the past two weeks, so I don't feel that I should be accused of dropping everyone else for the Karazhan team. Also I have at several occations been in shadowlabs or arcatraz trying to support guildies attunment quests, and even if you weren't in it I have always tried to spot if you've been online and able to come grab the fragment, but timing has been bad so u haven't been online. I think most of us giving a hand here and there doesn't make a big deal out of it as in announcing to the world that "look guys I am helping a guildie getting attuned", which maybe makes these efforts invisible an therefore the talk about people not helping out. I think that there is much more helpfullnes in the guild then you make it out to be.

But it is not always about someone already attuned helping unattuned people. Also it is about people on different levels of the attunment ladder to help eachother out.
For instance I spent nearly three weeks in shadow lab after I had the fragment there til enough other guildies also had the fragment so we could form groups to go after the next comming instances for fragments. I didn't mind spending that time in shadowlabs without being able to get to the next step because it gave me the great fortun to play with many different loverly guildies and getting to know them a bit. For me this game isn't about the items and how fast we can down the end boss in Karazhan. It is about having fun while doing a group activity, and what makes any group activity fun is the gamers doing it together. And if people are cheerful and silly and a good company, it doesn't really matter to me that I am standing still achievements wise in the game. Also my philosophy is that help and support to others is also a way to help one self. And the reward for the time I spent there in shadow lab was not only a successful attunment to Karazhan when everyone was on the same step, but also new friends.

I sometimes get sad when I hear so much talk about people not being helpful but all the supportiveness and warmth and generosity in this guild is seldom spoken about… Some has been helpful to the amount that the game lost its charm because they feal that they NEVER get any time to do something they want to do them selves - because everyone expect them to drop everything and come help whenever they call for it. (And if they have a new characther to level, interestlingly enough none of those they have helped in the past are interested in returning that favour by giving a hand when the supportive one needs help… ) Some even have had to start anonymous out of guild charaters so they can get some game time where they can chose them self what to do with it. Many of these are just so tired of helping and helping and not getting much back, no cheerfullness in the run, sometimes not even a thank you when done helping, but in stead demanded to help again with a new task!!! The minimum effort someone who just have had a helping hand - no matter if it was a run that failed or a true success - should in my book at least be to revard the helper/helpers with a "thank you" and an "if u need me at some point, just ask"! (For me getting help from anyone is a gift, someone actually think helping me is okay time spent! - and I am trying to return that gift by being a good game company and I always always tell people how much I appriciate their help, and that I will be returning the favour when I can… And yes, I admit that sometimes when I have gamed with members that has been whining trough the whole game and then left without a thank you, It usually will take ages before that one gets any support from me again. Why should I bother when there are others who better appriciates the support…?)

And this examples above are not exceptions. I could make a long list of guildies who are supportive and helpful and willing to give anyone a helping hand - unless they already are signed up to a raid or a run or helping someone questing - or just prefere to spend some time grinding because they need to stress down and be alone to think for awhile - this game can be good for such as well, and wanting to just chill in silence and privacy should also be respected… There are so many lovely souls in this guild that never get credit for it in this constant complaining about a non supportive climate. An what is repeted over and over again tend to become "truths", even if facts prove different.

Sorry for ranting but I just had to defend all the lovely souls that are making unity so special…

We have several of the "Missing" class specs within the guild already at the correct level but as the chances of getting anyone out of Kara to actually help these people get there attunement appears to be slight less then seeing the devil ice skating to work on a morning the guild has chosen to recruit outside ?

Is this why Enook left and came back? To find a guild that would help them get up the gear and atttunement required to join the 'Almighty U N I T Y raiders'?

Is that what the rest of use who are stuck, without help from the guild no matter how many times we ask, will have to do? Leave the guild get the gear/attunement and then come back?

At the moment it appears that the people within the Kara runs are unwilling to help anyone else get attuned, for with each new person attuned it lowers they're chances of getting in to that magic 10 group.
I'm not asking for people to spend all there in game time helping other people, but out of the 95 odd level 70's one or two could, occasionally, when not in Kara, farming motes to make the item from the pattern that dropped for them in Kara or general gold grinding to pay for the repairs for all those expensive to repair purple items they've got in there nightly Kara runs could spend perhaps 2 hours a week helping someone else join the 'Almighty U N I T Y raiders' ?

The officers in the May officers meeting agreed that attunement runs would be a matter of priority to get these people who needed attunement the help they needed due to the diffuculties people where having… so far over a month later there has been no official runs held for those needing attunement. Now with the farming and progression groups the chances of getting any help from within the guild has managed to prove something previously thought to be mathematically impossible, dividing zero by two.

I spent over 8 weeks asking for help for the first key attunement, made over 10 GEM runs all stating 'Kara Attunement', 'First Fragment' or 'Fragment run' so as not to be confused with anything else, one of them had more then 3 people sign up for it and on that run the four who did sign up two didn't log on and the other two joined a different instance run half hour before the SL was due to start, so don't say 'Use GEM to set a run up and they will come' that line only worked in Waynes World.

Yes this is a rant and yes it is full of sarcasm however the points are true -
Unity currently does not help it's own.
Those people in Kara do not want more people able to go to Kara as it will lower there chances of getting in.

So recruit from outside the guild, get your missing classes from those who have the attunement but able to join Unity, don't wonder why they are not in a guild or able to join us, we may be lucky and they won't all annoying children with a fetish for loot linking.

1) progressive group and farming group going to Karazan
- Where the farming group tends the raids in a rotation schedule to gear up from boss 1 to 4/5
- Where the progressive group is made up of more or less the same group to challenge new bosses in Karazan
2) class leaders
- Providing aid where needed and info to their classmembers e.g attunement and gear requirements for raids
- keeping the rotation agenda for the raids
3) epic leather drops in karazan in relation to the dps warior class
- does or does not has a dps warior equal priority on these drops

I take into consideration that not all attendants to yesterday's meeting have had their full say. Some might have not been able to speak using teamspeak

Overal my opinion is that there is an agreement upon the topics we discussed, although the last topic remains unresolved
I have had a discussion with Skogis and i agree with him that if he is put in a waiting queue for the rogues (not his class but in effect the same duty) i think it is only fair he's on the same priority as the rogues on leather rolls. This is due to a lack of any plate dps drops in karazan, aswell as a lack of any dps gear to be made using the blacksmithing skill.
We like diversity in the raids. It makes the raids stronger and more fun. So my opinion is we have to give the dps warior class a spot.

Mind u all that the first 2 points discussed are hopefully a suited solution for the current situation but, we all agree that we need to change our problem asap.
The problem we have currently and this is why the meeting was held in the first place, Unity not able to give certain classes equal playing time in raids like karazan, even when they might be ready for it.
This is due to a lack of the healing and dedicated tank classes (wariors-protection, druids-feral and druids-resto, priests-holy and as a last bot not least healing shamans)

We need to recruit them. Go out and find them. If u ever encounter a nice group with a player listed as above, ask if they are interested.
Prefferably at lvl 70, since we want to resolve the issue fast, and e.g a level 60 priest will need about 1 month to get up and ready for karazan.

as a last thanks all for coming and i posted this summary in need of feedback. Idd like to see people if needed posting comments upon this summary, so we can all keep track on eachothers needs & ideas.

• Guild size, and what number do we stop at to keep it manageable.

• Another was the rude and misbehaviour in Guild Chat and what should be done to append that.

• An officers reward day on a job well done.

1. Role of an officer - what is expected (what to do about the ones that dont participate or refuse to).

2. Class Leaders - Will recruit their own class when they think more numbers are needed. ALL Guild invites will go via the website (with the exception of alt’s)

3. Nominate Raid leaders- with their own Rank (so the role is clear) They will have proof period of say 10 raids, if they have proved themselves to be capable of leading these raids with reasonable amount of succession they will remain as Raid Leader.

4. Raid instances- such as ZG and AQ are important still and why they are….(as a means to practice team work and getting together to do things with each other as a guild)

5. Reward for officer rank (also maybe include Raid Leader rank ?)
Officer day 1 per week or 1 per fortnight. Do what they want. Officer only raids 5 man through to 20 man. Any other rewards that ppl can think of…

6. Guild Ranks - set new Ranks for the whole Guild…
Examples of this are:

Peasant - Noob

Peon - level 1 - 39

Master - level 40+

Marshal - level 60+

Champion - level 70+

Guardian - Officer

Warden - Commander

Raid Trainee - Potential Raid Leader ( after successfully leading 10 Raids).

Raid Leader - Raid Leader

Wannabees - Officers alt’s

Lost Souls - Members that have been absent from guild for 2 months or more.

*Core Raid Team
- Intoduction of Class Leaders and Raid Co-ordinator
We discussed at length with those that attended the meeting the need to introduce a Core Raid team…
There are several reasons that this is needed, if we are to continue to grow as a guild and to maintain the feel and balance in the guild.

We decided that we needed a more structured and controlled group if we are to succeed in succesful raids.
This entails a more diciplined and stricter raid format, based upon selection of people that are right for the team.
We have therefore nominated A Co-ordinator (Cronoz) and Assisting him is Morethan.
We have also Nominated Class leaders, Treestump= Warrior, Holyjoe= Paladin, Golith= Priest, Morethan= Warlock, Matisse= Hunter, Marcel= Druid and Mage still to be decided on!
We found it to be a difficult topic but one that must be set into place, as you have probably all noticed the increasing numbers of good players leaving the guild. So to survive we have to make a few compromises.
The Class leaders and Co-ordinater functions are to help choose the right class for raid team, also to help their class and provide information for and tatics, in this way forming a group of regulars. And information to those in need of it. If we are to get to the end of some of these runs we really need to be more structured so its in the benifit of all those who participate in this venture that is to be a sucess.
Now for those who of course feel that they maybe left out of this because of the preselections on the Monday and Thurday night raids we have also taken their situations and home lives into consideration, that is stated the in next topic:

*Continuing Raid runs for casual players
Because we know that there are people, who cant possibly make such a commitment to a Core Raid team, as their rl is demanding. We have also made sure that we continue to do a guild open raid once a week or more often depending on demand, (This day still to be anounced, on asuitable day for these people) that is open for all of the right lvl to join (Taking into account that it still needs to be a ballanced group.). We also know that people may feel disapointed by the selections of teams and feel left out, we really want to try however and accomodate this issue as much as we can by ways of this compromise. I have to point out however that if you arent picked for seclection at this stage that this may not be the case next time, as people learn and improve on their play style they may also be elegible for selection. And we really need people to understand that the only we can keep UNITY going to try and have something for both sides, we dont want to loose the feel of the guild or what it initialy stands for…So if we can all work together on this it will work. I also realise that we may loose people through these changes. But we hope that most of you will realise in order to keep things going as they were UNITY we need to do this. UNITY was falling appart and this is the only way to keep what we have and the atmosphere of the guild together.

*Guild Control
It has come to my attention that we have in the last weeks recruited some very unsavoury people into the guild, I have made a point of rectifying this problem and nipping it in the butt. I know this is an issue that has been bugging quite a few people.

*And more assistance for lower level members
I also believe that there should be more attention paid to lower lvl members of the guild (Where help can be offered ofc.)…