Goodbye, so long, Night Shift

So Wednesday, I'm happily trailing along behind the rolling bloodbath that is Viamedia, when I get a whisper from one of the Night Shift members, asking me if I wanted to join that high level raiding guild...

Ok, I should back up.

Night Shift was my guild because it was OUR guild on Blackhand, and after we moved across and the Fellison/Gimpee drama happened, I stayed mostly because I felt beholden to Brudie for taking us under his wing. I knew I'd always be able to run with Hallgrima and Viamedia regardless of guild, but I don't like feeling like a social butterfly, so I figured, "love the ones you're with," and though I enjoyed running with Felli, figured it wasn't that big of a deal.

And in fact, that's proven itself out. I've mostly played with Hall and Via, as well as my IRL buddies here at the college. Occasionally I've run with Brudie, or other NS guildies, but mostly it's been pickup groups, or the SMASH crew. I know Eddiva's still poking around in NS, but she's got better time managment skills than me, so I don't see her very often, and the differential in levels has become a challenge to overcome. (As an aside, there's something real to study about what happens when IRL friends find themselves separated by their virtual level differences - It's not just a difference in toon ability, it's also a difference in IRL play experience and expertise. I'm so much more comfortable of withstanding a bad pull now than I was 3 months ago, and it's not just that the toon has more time before death.) But in general, the guild didn't matter much, and if you'd asked me, I'd have said that SMASH was my real guild.

There has been a core of Night Shift, however, that has pushed forward, and one by one, 60s started appearing on the guild roster. Brudie, Gimpee, Sarianas, Arianas, Renton ... gradually they dinged over. Several weeks ago I'd have said there were maybe 10 or 12 60s in the NS guild, and I knew they were running the higher level instances, but didn't know what they were talking about, until a new guild MOTD showed up from Renton saying "Don't worry, the 60s have gone to a new raiding guild, but they're still around if you need anything." I caught up with Brudie and asked what was up, and he said that the players who'd reached 60 were looking for a way to participate in end game raiding, and that had led them to start talking with a larger guild, Crimson, about joining. Crimson agreed to take all of Night Shift's 60s, and Brudie said there was also talk about forcing all of Crimson's non-60s to move to Night Shift, as a sort of minor leagues for levelling up. Just as a matter of communication and group dynamics, it seemed a bit presumptuous to assume guild members were going to be willing to swap around. I thanked Brudie for the information and went on my way - as I'm still not a 60, I was content to let things fall out a bit, work on levelling up, and working on the SMASH experiment.

In the days that followed this, I did notice that there was a decrease in the number of members in the guild list, and not only the 60s were missing. I also notice that Sarianas, who'd been a Guild Mommy to Night Shift, popped up advertising a new guild in IF. Clearly, not everyone who'd been "elegible" to move to Crimson had found it a perfect fit.

So I was a little surprised when Renton contacted me and asked if I wanted to join Crimson. It seemed like somewhere the rules that I'd been playing under had shifted again. But I figured, it's all part of the process, so I told Renton that sure, I'd play along, and he walked me through the /gquit process, and then got me into Crimson. The GM is Blizzarov, and I was welcomed warmly enough by the guildies on at the time.

Perhaps the only thing I feel badly about the move was that it happened just after Eddiva logged in, and all she saw was the /gquit process. I'm sorry Holls - I said I'd explain it that evening and I didn't.

On the whole, I'm not sure what to make of it - I'm still focussed on 60, and SMASH, and the dialup at home has been so bad of late that I'm hesitant to enter into raids where people might be counting on me, for fear of dropping at an inopportune time. All of that said, the most notable thing about the shift has been the guild chat - there are people talking about the planned Zul'Gurub run, and the attunement process for MC. I'm back in newbie land after feeling more and more expert for the past several months, and that's an intriguing place to be again.