About The Flat Roos

About the Flat Roos.

***Special thanks to Krugerkor/Neztor for writing this document***

The Flat Roos are a Horde based Casual Raiding guild on the Oceanic Khaz’goroth server within the World of Warcraft universe. We are a friendly guild that aims to provide a structure for all its members to enjoy their time within the World of Warcraft.

So there’s the basic information, which sounds very similar to other Guild’s "About" pages.

You might even be thinking "ah the usual… blah blah blah"

So what does it truly mean?

Preface.

The following will hopefully provide an insight into where the Flat Roos have come from, their ethos and some explanation of why certain policies have been adopted.

Firstly to tackle the "Guild" part of it. The term "Guild" was first used in medieval times to describe an association of crafters or trade persons that came together with a view to Co-operate with each other.
In the immediate context the term "Guild" is used within the world of Warcraft to designate a collection of players that have decided to unite as their own community, to achieve their goals within the game world. Many guilds neglect to really define what their goals are. This is seen as one of the main reasons for the high failure rate of guilds.

Why the "Casual Raiding Guild" label?

Oh boy, here we go.

With the dawn of the Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game (MMORPG) it has been recognised that players will achieve a lot more if they work together and Co-operate. Especially as the game progresses and you reach what is referred to as "end-game" or "high level" content.
Naturally within these games communities formed, sometime calling themselves Clans, sometimes Corporations (Corps) and often calling themselves Guilds. (see Ultima Online, Everquest, Anarchy Online, Dark Age of Camelot, EVE Online, Star Wars Galaxies, Asheron’s Call and of course World of Warcraft)

Whatever they called themselves it was the same thing essentially – for the purpose of this discussion all the types of private player communities will be referred to as Guilds.

So why the History lesson?

It quickly became apparent that those players that had the time to devote to the game got further and advanced faster.
The players with a lot of time to play and enjoy the high level/end game content were loosely referred to as "Hardcore"
The players that, usually due to Real Life (RL) commitments, had less time to play and therefore usually got to see less high level content were referred to as "Casuals"
As you can imagine both sides had very different views on how these games should be developed.
As the Guilds formed they would in one way or another fall into three main categories.
The Casual Guild, The Hardcore Guild and the Casual Raiding (aka Casual High level) Guild.

Where are you going with all this?

It is commonly agreed that the hardest to maintain and effectively manage is the Casual Raiding Guild. (not saying the other types are a walk in the park to manage)

Why is that you ask?

The guild has to deal with goals that are (or can be seen to be) in direct conflict. The Casual nature means the membership may not have the ability from a time perspective to achieve the requirements that are layed out by the high level/end game content. This content is often designed to be time consuming and requires a number of pre-requisites. These requirements remain constant regardless of a players availability. Oh-Noes!
So as you can see, it puts a bit of pressure on the guild.

The "Hardcore" guild usually dictates to its members what the time and resource requirements are and you are expected to achieve them or you will find yourself kicked out. They know what they are there for; there’s no confusion.
The "Casual" guild usually has a very relaxed approach and may only occasionally organise a group to attempt to see the high level content. Often with mixed results. Members know its casual and do not expect regular events or raids.

However there are those that don’t have all the time in the world but yet still want to enjoy the game in all its glory. This is what the Flat Roos attempt to provide. A framework to achieve this goal.

So now you understand the "tightrope" we walk.

The Real "About Us"

We are a guild that was formed on day 3 of the server being opened and have grown to be the largest Horde guild on the server. When we say a "friendly guild" its just not another throw away line. We are often seen as also one of the most sociable guilds on the server. (Largest and most sociable- funny that)
The guild membership is mostly made up of people over the age of 18 but this does not mean we don’t accept younger players. This being the case we are also seen as a "mature" guild.
In order to deal with the conflicting interests of a Casual Raiding guild a good level of maturity is needed. However this does not mean we don’t have fun.
We have our own Teamspeak facilities, which is often engulfed with fits of laughter.

The way in which we achieve the guild's goals is through trying to "balance" the needs of the membership.
As a large guild we have members whom could be mistaken for being "hardcore" We also have members who are not even that interested in high level content, but just to have the occasional chat and maybe a 5 person run.
An interesting aspect of the guild is that because of our size and ethos of Co-operation, we have a number of high level (skill point) crafters within the guild. These characters have a good collection of rare recipes and patterns. Its ironic that some of the Hardcore guilds come to us to get items made.

It’s through utilising the resources we have that we achieve the best results for all. We’re not saying this is always smooth sailing and not without friction, but as a group we come together and do a great job.
One of the reasons for our size and longevity is the organisation, planning and policies that have been put in place. Like any organisation we do have rules and regs., these are even more so needed given the size and interests of the guild. However you’ll find that they are mostly centred around providing a great playing environment while achieving our goals as efficiently as possible.

Asset wise:

Our own WebPages (but you knew that – your reading them)
Forums
Teamspeak (its similar toVentrillo if that’s what you’re used to)
Guild Tabard
Guild Banks (with in-game mod)
Established leadership team (that doesn’t change week to week)

Recruiting Info.

You are most likely reading this as you are considering joining the Roos (or just sticky beaking)
To get an idea of what we are after and what we’re not so much after, here are a few guidelines on the subject.

There are no game specific requirements to join the Roos. However, obviously level, experience and personal goals do come into it. Class leaders have the 1st and usually last say in recruitment. (So spamming the Guild leader will not always help)

Just so you know, we are an Oceanic based guild. Our most active hours are between 7pm – 12am server time. Most of our raids run at night, start at 8:30pm and average three (3) times a week.
The majority of our membership are level 70, many do have alts but if you are levelling, you may not get as many "guildies" to help as you would perhaps like. (you will have to PUG it a lot probably)

You will never be forced to attend any event you don’t want to, or asked to change classes or specs. You won’t be asked to donate items or gold or use any of your trade-skills if you don’t want to. By the same token we ask that you don’t "demand" things of the guild.

Who we DON’T want:

True Hardcore players – if you really are looking at Raiding 6+ times a week till 3am in the morning then we are not the guild for you
(Our max is 4 times per week – we may go above this on rare occasions)

Passengers – if your cunning plan is to join the Roos to see what you can get, or turn up to raids and the second your in the instance do a /follow and go watch TV, then we are not the place for you

Immaturity FTL– if you like to spam chat, talk endlessly about pointless topics, cannot follow suggestions or instructions, don’t want to help unless there’s something in it for you or just make trouble "cus its fun"- then please look elsewhere.
BTW – if your sent chat log looks like this "OMFG m8 hw u gt –2 - PHAT lootZ ???!!!!! – You’re probably in this category.

Loot hog – if you’re all about the loot and believe that that’s all there is to the game and the Guild, then your needs may be better served elsewhere.

You owe me- just because we we’re nice enough to offer you a guild invite does not mean we "owe" you anything. This includes gold, items, crafting or SPOTS IN RAIDS!

You think our no swearing policy is stupid. (or gay, retarded, dumb, nutbag, stuffed or the "F" word – we’ve heard it all before) We’re not saying that there is never the odd slip up or that we never feel like swearing – it just goes towards a pleasant playing environment and there may be younger people present.

(FYI – we have members from the military, construction industry, factory environments and other "high swear word climates" and they manage to control themselves)

Who we DO want:

Happy to help – your willing to give things a go and help others even when there may be little apparent benefit to you.

Good attitude – even with the ups and downs you still have a laugh about it

Willing to see others view – what’s that old saying -"I may not agree with what you have to say, but I would die for your right to say it" Bit heavy, but ‘nuff said.

Willing to get involved – the old proverb is so true- you get out, what you put in.

People who think or say "I may not be the best player, but I’m willing to give it a go"

Down to earth people who realise what’s really important at the end of the day



Want to know more?

Please read the FAQ along with having a browse through the web pages and forums. Of course you can contact an officer in game as well.