Highs and Lows

Leading a raiding guild is a lot like riding a rollercoaster: a tense ascent, followed by soaring highs and soul-crushing lows in frighteningly rapid succession.  (I extended the hell out of this metaphor in my first draft of this post, but it ended up sounding more like sex than Six Flags... so, nevermind.)

Two weeks ago, Surreality downed the Heroic Beasts of Northrend for the first time.  Riding that high, we went on to one-shot Three Lights in the Darkness — allowing our Discipline Priest to forge Val'anyr, Hammer of the Ancient Kings — and two-shot I Choose You, Steealbreaker!, starting us on the long quest for Algalon.

Last week, we 24-manned Trial of the Crusader and called two of our three weekly raids for poor attendance.  One of my veterans admitted that he was contemplating a strategic /gquit and an officer suggested that we seriously consider merging with another failing guild.

Yesterday, we one-shot the Heroic Beasts and took down Heroic Lord Jaraxxus — breaking into the server's Top 10 for the first time since our inception.  Tonight, we have every intention of taking on the Faction Champions on hardmode — and a preliminary look at sign-ups tells us that its very possible we'll succeed.  (In filling the raid, that is!  The Faction Champions themselves are another story entirely.)

Update (12:14 AM):  Yep, Faction Champions > us!  But we did go from wiping ten seconds into the fight to downing the first three focus targets, so it's only a matter of time before it clicks.  We also managed to pick up a new warrior, rogue, hunter and elemental shaman in the last two days — so I think I can close recruitment to anything that isn't a shadow priest or critchicken for the time being.