Many of us struggle to make enough to keep our items in gems and our kit repaired but to some unique individuals such as Magz everything they touch turns to gold, read on for some hints and tips to turn yourselves into banker on the rise!

Tell us a little bit about yourself the man behind Magz and your character?

I started playing WoW on March 1^st 2005 and haven’t looked back. Magpawacar was the first character I created and while I played a warlock and mage for most of TBC, WOTLK felt like the right time to rekindle a love for the old shaman. Throughout WoW I’ve always been in small guilds, mainly because I prefer the company of friends as opposed to acquaintances. It was the hero of the horde, Bonzo himself, who invited me to Embers of Honour, and along with Malborn, Diet, and Sazon, we rapidly formed a friendship within the game which remains unbroken. Throw a Boynk and a few others into that mix and you have my reasons for never wanting to join a larger more raid-focussed guild. We all left the game for a short period to play Hellgate London but the lure of WoW was too great and we all rejoined, forming Twenty Percent Sober, our current incarnation. In simple terms, having been through so much together as gamers and more importantly, close close friends, if they left the game, then so would I.

I have two accounts, with 4 level 80’s which I play regularly. The remaining chars all perform a function geared towards making gold, be they low level crafters, gatherers or bank alts. It’s a bit excessive but it’s invaluable if you have your fingers in as many pies as I do.

In real life, I live in Northern Ireland though I’m from the Republic and am married with 2 kids.

Hey Magz, give us a loan huh! So come on, tell me, did you set out to intentionally to hit the gold cap or did it just happen?

Round about August last year I was made redundant and having a bit of spare time I did a little reading into how to make gold. I just fancied making enough to be able to afford the finer things in game, be they mounts or gear. Then I learned about the gold cap and wondered what it would be like to have that amount of gold and not have to worry about ever having to scrimp and save in game. I came back from a holiday to Portugal in September and started in earnest to make a charge for the GC. All in all it took about 3 months although it can be done a lot sooner with more focussed effort. I tend to take the Irish approach to gold making for “ if you throw enough shit at a wall, some of it will stick”, so for the first month I spread myself far too thinly. Though you do learn quickly what works and what doesn’t and then it’s all systems go. I hit goldcap on the 29^th November 2009, 2 days after my son was born.

How much money roughly do you make in a week?

It varies and really depends on how much effort I’ve put in in a given week or as mentioned above, if it’s a patch week. On average I make about 40k a week in sales although some weeks I spend about 20-30k in materials etc. So there are some weeks, as a result of aggressive purchasing I’ll make a loss but then the following weeks are usually a gold fiesta. There is a thrill logging into the game, opening the mailbox and hearing the kerchink kerchink sounds through the headset. I have a screenshot I took a few weeks back, prior to updating my UI (which borked the figures in Auditor), that shows I have made 1.2 million but spent about 1 mill. Whilst being extremely proud of that fact, It did make me wonder whether I could have been a little more efficient. IF I can work out how to hide a few details on a screen shot, the pic will be included with this post. I’ll explain though in a later question, though that’s it’s not just me who has benefited from this endeavour, and I’m not talking about gifts for me muckers.

Ed: He worked it out and here it is!

Which professions do you have on your characters and why did you choose them? Many people choose professions to enhance there character but your reasons could possibly be different can you elaborate?

I have all professions on the go apart from LW, Skinning and Engineering. I have two JC and two Miners and one of each of the rest. I was meaning to get another alchemist for Transmutation procs but in the end I couldn’t be arsed. Anyone can make gold without a profession by buying low and selling normal-high but using your professions is the easiest way in my opinion. The only profession I levelled specifically for gold making was inscription, the rest were all initially for character enhancement. Gold can be accrued with all professions, some more than others, it just requires a little research. I could go into great details as to the best areas of each profession but in all honesty it would take a week to write it all down. Seriously! There’s no shortage of ways through using professions. I would say that you should be prepared to think outside the box. The “saronite shuffle” is a perfect example of this. Through using mining and jewel crafting you can level an enchanting profession really easily and subsequently make a lot of gold via scrolls or just selling the mats. A word of caution though. This method is not as profitable as it used to be as a result of a number of patch changes surrounding disenchanting.

Do you have any regular methods for making gold and what addons, if any, do you use?

I use a whole rake of addons, but the predominant ones are, Auctioneer, Postal, Quick Auctions, ATSW, Lil Sparky’s Workshop and Tiny Tip Wealth. LSW tells me the cost for producing a particular item, very handy for determining profit margins and Tiny Tip Wealth is for fun. This tells me the most wealth a character has had on their person at any one time. I don’t imagine it’s 100% accurate as it doesn’t read a seller’s guild bank but it gives me a general impression of who has had what. It helps identify potential competitors as well as suppliers.

The most common method I use is the simple methods of manufacturing. I source mats from AH and then start production. This covers virtually all mats required in the professions mentioned above. If I find something cheap on the AH that I use regularly I’ll buy everything I can find. It’s not uncommon for me to buy 250 stacks of saronite or adder’s tongue at a time. This is where having a multitude of alts comes in very handy, especially if they’re decked out with Frostweave bags. To give another example of what it takes to sustain a particular market, I currently have enough materials to mass produce 5000 glyphs. And that’s a bloody slow process. ON occasions I’ll flip items, i.e. buy low sell at a reasonable price (more on this later) but I find that too time consuming. I used to farm a lot of my mats before realising that this was a sure-fire way to burnout, especially if you have a target like the Gold Cap. You might need to farm some things from time to time but if you’re are mass producing goods for sale then buy your materials. Especially if you have a little gold at the beginning to bankroll yourself.

Do people always ask you for gold, are you expecting after this interview to have many more requests!?

Thankfully no and I may well get some requests from people reading this but  unless I know them personally they’ll get short shrift from me. If they’re persistent and courteous I’ll give them a tip on how to make gold. I’ll even ask them if they have a profession that’s gathering orientated and if they would be interested in farming mats for me. It’s about creating a situation that’s beneficial for both parties. If this lazy-assed Paddy can make pots o’ gold then anyone can. All it takes is half a brain and a little commitment.

How much time a day do you spend on making gold and how does it effect the rest of your gameplay?

Twenty Percent Sober is a social guild and we only raid ICC 2 nights a week. So outside of these raids and the customary daily heroics I devote a fair amount of time to making gold. The Saronite shuffle and milling herbs takes quite a while, particularly when yer dealing with thousands of items. Although a lot of these processes can be macroed it still requires constant button pressing. Now this may seem tedious and it can be but it’s also a productive way of passing the time instead of sitting in trade chat spamming retarded bullshit about Anal(I’m a 18yr old Vegetable) and Your Mom jokes.

It have affected certain areas of my gameplay. I used to run a lot of BG’s during TBC and this is now non-existent. I reckon that if I’d spent as much time levelling chars as I do on making gold I’d have another 3 -4 level 80’s. Then again you can only raid with one char at a time!

The economy Horde side is not the greatest, do you have Alliance characters that you make gold on as well?

It’s a misnomer that the Horde side economy is slow. Considering we’re a fairly small population, the AH is fairly active. I know of 5-6 other characters Horde side who have hit or about to hit the gold cap, and that’s not possible in a slow economy. There’s a fine line in this scenario. On one hand The number of items available to buyers Horde side is small. There are small amounts of 264 epics  etc on our AH as opposed to the Ally side. Funnily enough, there might be more supply on the Ally AH but the prices are not much cheaper, and certainly not worth the effort and cost, in my view, of working the neutral AH. Mind you I’m not into selling pets so I may be wrong where that business is concerned.

I have a lvl 5 Dwarf who sits in Stormwind but he’s there really for curiosity value. The thoughts of levelling an Ally char to 80 fills me with a innate sense of dread.

Do you bulk buy items to keep the auction house prices high?

I stated earlier that I do bulk buy items on the AH but it’s not to inflate prices, it’s more to keep my costs down. I happily admit to not being unscrupulous enough to list a stack of titanium ore for 2000g or something similar. I pride myself on being fair to sellers of mats and the buyers of my produce. They’ve been good to me and I cannot see the value in garnering a reputation for being a greedy twat. However I will not turn an opportunity to make fair profit on a particular item. Most will be aware of an acute Lichbloom shortage on the Horde AH. Well about 6 weeks ago I bought 250+ stacks of the herb on the AH for 12g a pop. In the two weeks prior to that, there was another shortage so I decided not to allow this to happen to me again, hence the bulk purchase. What it did mean, was that I was able to keep my Flask prices low and in plentiful supply something which benefits everyone. Okay other flask sellers might not be happy, but I’m sure they would have done the same  a) had they thought of it and b) had they the money to bankroll it. I would also like to add that as a heavy buyer on the AH as well as a seller, I’m making money for many others in the game.

What one item do you think has made you the most gold?

There’s no one item  but if ye are talking about something which is a surprising seller for very little cost, then the Rituals of the New Moon is a clear winner. Depending on the price of Eternal Shadow, it can cost between 10-30g to make and I sell 8-10 a week for 170g each. Mind you it’s an item I have to promote via trade chat, easily done whilst crafting something else. I’m surprised that even after 7 months of making that item I’m still the only seller of it. It’s worth the abuse I get from the invertebrates who think it’s a crap item. They obviously have no clue on the personal value of vanity items to a lot of people.

Come on then, give us some of your best hints and tips for making gold on WoW!

1. Think about what items you need for your own characters. Then make them for everyone else. Examples are Belt Buckles, Enchantment threads, Scrolls, flasks, glyphs, Gems and many many more.
2. Treat any suppliers you have fairly and with respect.
3. Don’t be afraid to lower your profit margins to make sales.
4. Learn to use the addons I’ve mentioned above. They’re invaluable.
5. Read the latest patch notes.
6. Diversify. If a market is becoming flooded – look at new angles. Be prepared to sit it out and wait from the storm to pass. If prices are dropping rapidly, don’t panic and even consider purchasing items to replenish stock.
7. Experts in WoW gold making say the best trading cycle is generally after maintenance day. Personally all days are good is you trust your products and know your server’s economy. I purchase more a the weekends but I also make more sales then.

All that cash mmmmm what do you spend it on?

The short answer would be whatever takes my fancy. I have a hog and traveller’s mammoth on Magpawacar, and have spent quite a bit on gearing up him as well as various alts. I don’t raid in 25mans so the best way for me to acquire quality 264 gear is via the AH. If a necklace appears on the AH for 15k then the decision doesn’t take long. It also means that I can gem and enchant my main characters to with the best available rather than have to compromise.

I’ve spent large amounts on my longtime closest muckers in game, mainly on valuable gear. It’s not real money and if it helps others then why not?

Though like all “business” enterprises, I mainly spend my gold reinvesting. If it means levelling a new profession or just simply buying up materials in advance of the expansion, then that’s what I’ll do. And am in fact doing ;p. One thing I considering doing is trying for a server first in some profession once Cataclysm arrives. I haven’t decided yet which one.

What are your long term aims in World of Warcraft?

To keep having fun and enjoying the craic with my friends. People moaning about the state of the game etc etc really should take a step back and realise just what a wonderful experience Blizzard has created for us.

I’ll keep on making money as it’s fun to do and AH pvp sure as hell beats the various Arenas anyday for me. I’d love to be able to say I’m aiming for a million gold, but that’s not a target that’s on the immediate horizon. Then again, with WoW, one should never say never!

Readers Questions:

Molpadia: I wants a pony, can I has one?

Mol, are you looking for the shitting in a field type of pony or £25?

Bonzo: g1ef gl0d pl0x kkthx?

The last time I did that mucker you only cleaned the windows out the front of the house, so for now I’ll have to decline. (The temptation to use a risqué analogy was overpowering but had to be resisted.)

Gothmogs: Which profession do you find the most profitable?

A lot of professions have boom and bust periods. A consistently profitable trade is jewelcrafting, which has been helped greatly by the release of TOC and ICC 5 mans as well as the raid instances. An avalanche of epics  = an avalanche of gem sales, both blue and purple. This probably will taper off a little though the closer we get to Cataclysm. I buy uncut epics off the AH and via the trade channel and cut them myself on my two jewelcrafters. I don’t have all epic patterns though, only the ones I know sell well. And I won’t purchase and uncut gem if I cannot make at least 20-30g profit on the final sale. An important factor to note when entering the AH is the fees for certain items and it’s pricey to list gems.

Sazon: Do you need to adapt and change to keep making money?

Constantly. One of the main causes of change in playing the AH is the release of a new patch. No surprises there. But what many people don’t realise is that if you read the patch notes thoroughly and are quick enough off the mark, you can make a quick killing in the first few days, especially if certain mats costs lower dramatically or become more plentiful on the AH to purchase. You could also say you need to adapt to other sellers on the AH but there are ways and means to deal with that, sometimes via certain addons, sometimes through a certain amount of AH camping (something I am loathe to do and do so very rarely) and generally through just using your wits. The one thing I would advocate to anyone looking to make a few bob on the AH is to research gold making strategies and to adapt them to suit your needs. Also you do not need to spend $40 on a guide either.

If you would like some more advice on how to make moar monez amongst other titbits visit Magpawacars blog which can be found at www.gombeen.wordpress.com

Related posts:

1. Money makes the world go round
2. Our Survey Says: Goldmine
3. Our Survey Says: Mounts for money?

I speak to you of Prue, a level 80 purr/growl/miow Druid who has set their sights of gaining as many achievement points as possible and currently stands as 55th highest in the WORLD. That’s right my fellow Dreamers, we’re not just talking server or EU ratings but Prue is getting to bash some Yanks as well!

I caught up with Prue to discuss why the fascination with achievements and to share some stories about achievement……well…… achieving!

Tell us a little bit about yourself and your character?

Well, my character name is Prue, more commonly called Pwuebear by friends and foe, and she is a feral druid. I picked the name from a friend, who played a rogue on an old MUD I used to spend a lot of time on (read: too much), Prue Shimmergloom. I did not, but I am sure he did at the time, think of Prue Halliwell when creating it!

I have always been rather geeky about computer games ever since the first IBM computer where I played Digger and Leisure Suit Larry (which was solely text-command-based back then) and later on puzzle and adventure games like Under a Killing Moon, Day of the Tentacle, Secrets of Monkey Island, Myst, Goblins, Full Throttle etc. were the favourites. I do enjoy a good first-person shooter too though, but prefer sticking to one game because I know how “addicted” I get.

How long have you been playing WoW and what’s your /played?

I have been playing the game since the EU release (only played the Beta a single afternoon on a friend’s account). I was playing EverQuest to a great extend long before there was even talk of World of Warcraft, where I ended up raiding on my rogue Nell (the Cookie Muncher!) with the Arch Overseers on Bristlebane who, at that point, was the leading guild worldwide (during the Omens of War expansion). The WoW beta was catching people’s attention though and a lot of guild members migrated just before we broke through to the final stage of the expansion. Having over 400 days played on my rogue in EQ, but none of my friends to play with, I more or less made my peace with it and took a few months in limbo, having a hard time deciding whether or not I should give WoW a shot.

Release day came and I found myself standing in line at the gaming store to get my hands on the box. Prue was the first character I created, even though I made a side-kick rogue; I spend all of my time on the druid, loving the versatility that it brings. I guess you could say it has a lot of sentimental value to it as well. I get bored on alts very fast and only resort to playing them if it is absolutely needed.

So, in short, despite a few months away here and there, I have been playing the game since the European release in February uhmm, 2005? Geez, that is such a long time ago! Lots of fond memories though. Server first Onyxia being one that springs to mind every so often, more now that it will be revamped, but back then decked out in blues and quest greens, nerd-raging over ventrilo. Back on track – my played on Prue as I am writing this is 384 days, 14 hours, 10 minutes and 21 seconds.

Do you think there are any benefits of being your class when trying to attempt all the achievements WoW has to offer?

Perhaps not as much for the things that you can do at level 80 like grinding reputations or doing quests. In some ways though it’s easy to get yourself sorted so you are more accessible to do achievements within the confines of a group, like having gear setup for tanking and healing, but the only way that I have felt that my class have a few ups compared to others is going back to older instances to try your luck on a rare mount or other desirables (ie. Zul’Gurub, Karazhan or Magister’s Terrace). Beyond that you really need at least the effort of a five man group in order to be successful.

How many achievement points do you have right now, and how many points are left to reach your final goal?

Right now I am at 11140 achievement points and I still feel there are much more to do and as long as there are I doubt I will ever feel that I have reached my goal. Achievements – for me – serves as both an element of frustration but also as a motivational factor at the same time. The amount of achievements I can do single-handed is diminishing very rapidly, so I have to rely on group efforts a lot more, which adds a new dimension to it, as you have to inspire others to share your passion and goals for achievements within the raiding environment. That is not always an easy task, especially with new content, such as Icecrown, where the focus is more on getting to and beating the heroic modes rather than spending time setting up for the individual achievements during the normal clear. But I have no doubt that we will get it all done in good time.

For my part the addition of achievements has changed raiding to a huge degree. You no longer plow through an instance on auto-pilot to get that next “phat epixx”. It is a breath of fresh air compared to the old content in vanilla and The Burning Crusade and all the tedious trash clearing that inevitably got the best of you. They can also be seen as a stepping-stone from doing an encounter on normal mode to doing it on hard mode. It just keeps everyone at the edge of their seats, and hopefully brings out the a-game!

Something I had the most fun with during Wrath was running through the 5-man heroics with more or less the same group. That social feeling and team spirit just does not get any better than that and it is just more fun that way! Meeting up every day and scouting out, which achievements are on the agenda, and just keep cracking at it till it is done. Share The Love would have to be the one I remember the most because it took us forever to get everyone impaled, a good 10-15 minutes if I am not mistaken. I hope to see more of that  5-man heroic stuff in Cataclysm.

Do you have many achievements left to complete and which are you least looking forward to?

There are still a few fair achievements to do in the 25-man content, sadly a good chunk of them are in Ulduar, which we are not likely to revisit any time soon – so I fear that I have to set up some sort of “Let’s just go back and get this done already?!” kind of thing further down the line. It requires a bit of determination and mustering up the courage and will to gather 25 people can be quite the pain. If I had to single out any of the ones I am missing I fear that killing Algalon on the first pull with no deaths will be quite tricky. Looking at the achievements that requires less people I would say that getting the rank of Gladiator in the arena is of a similar difficulty – we have not been very lucky or spectacular in our game play to qualify and for each season that passes I get the feeling that we are even further from achieving that goal.

What achievement would you rate as the hardest and why?

The Master Angler of Stranglethorn was one of the most nerve-wrecking experiences and I must have tried out for it a good half a year or so before everything finally went my way. Coming close to it many a time really gets you going and the competition just seems to get harder and harder every week. The hearthstone also took longer to cast, mysteriously enough, and by the time the loading screen had faded I was chewing on my elbow. It is nice to have Sunday afternoons back to chillin’ on the couch again and not raging over yet another level 16 fishing out of my school of speckled tastyfish. Good riddance!

What achievement caused the most “air punching” for you?

I had nightmares about the We Had It All Along *cough* achievement for a long, long time. Mostly because it is impossible to find motivated PvP’ers, and even at that, you have to find fourteen that actually want to sit and wait for a match making to occur and then execute some kind of spur of the moment strategy to win by a small margin. Seems more reasonable to have an “At Least We Got The Stables Guys!” achievement – Get 10 points in an Arathi Basin match before you lose – it would be just as random as the other. I have mostly been doing all of the battleground stuff alone, so it has been a long, troublesome ride – fun at times, but I doubt I will be going back to Arathi Basin anytime soon. Five months and three days passed between the second last achievement was completed for Battlemaster and the last one was completed – was it worth it? Yes. Does it drive you crazy? Most definitely yes!

I would definitely say that I am pro PvP. I might not be great at it, but it is a new level of competition that I both hate and love at the same time. Especially arena games can lead to a mouse breaking or multiple keyboard digits flying about, and grinding to Marshal was just plain stupid and caused many a sleepless night. Been playing the arena with real life friends for a long time now too, and though we mostly find ourselves at the receiving end of the a**-whooping-bat, it is by far the most fun thing about PvP.

Which achievement took the longest to do?

If we are counting feats it would probably be a tossup between We Had it All Along *cough* and Insane in the Membrane. The latter actually being the more sane of the two if you ask me, simply because grinding reputation, farming materials and all that gives you a feeling of “this is actually going somewhere” even though it took a lot longer to complete – the sheer frustration connected with doing Arathi Basin that many times just made it the longest and biggest pain in the rear that I have had to endure. For the others you can more or less monitor your progress day by day, week by week or month by month, depending how serious you are about it.

Achievements that are based solely on the luck of a roll just annoys me – especially the Hallow’s End masks where I think I got a grand total of four new ones – woopie-doo, there is a mask in my bag … ohh wait, it’s troll male again. So I think in terms of asking “Which achievement took the longest to do?” you have to also consider how the process of getting the achievement is. I could have a fun time grinding a lot of reputations over a longer time and not feel that it actually took a long time to get there or on the other hand I could spend a few days trying to do the Wyrmrest Temple daily in two minutes or less and fail every time and just curse the fools who came up with the idea.

Has your high number of achievements influenced your World of Warcraft playing experience?

I have never been much for playing a game half-heartedly and for me getting achievements provides me with a feeling of completion for my character, kind of like if you would feel weird about not wearing your good luck speedos every day or brushing your teeth holding your tooth brush in the other hand. It just feels wrong! In a way adding achievements definitely changed my playing experience, because I knew the day it was announced that I would spend more time on it that I would probably want to. It was the same back when I played EverQuest and they introduced alternate advancement abilities (an experience gain converted into new character specific abilities system) and I would just find myself grinding these new points till 4 am every day. I just cannot help myself. And yes, I also think my gear looks weird if the socket bonus is greyed out.

What, if any, advice can you give other players in regards to accomplishing some of the harder achievements?

Steadfast determination if you are doing stuff single-handedly. If you are into the whole five-man heroic dungeon achievement stuff I would definitely recommend hooking up with a few friends, guildies or like-minded to make it a joyous occasion – forcing achievements on the puggers in the random dungeon finder tool just feels wrong, since not everyone is there for the same reasons you are. I already knew I would be farming for the Insane when it was added but it was also one of those that left me wondering “Why the heck didn’t I grind these reputations years ago?”. Vaticinium ex eventu, right? But this is definitely one of those achievements where grouping up can save you a lot of headaches, especially when you have to grind Bloodsail Buccaneers reputation and then redo all of your Steamwheedle Cartel reputations. Past that hunting for librams, pristine black diamonds, and darkmoon cards is just another very random element from server to server and from character to character. Farming dropped items was definitely not an option for me since I have the worst luck known to man and woman!

What is your plan to get the rest of the achievements?

The biggest concern would be the 25-man content achievements and I usually just keep bugging Celeus or Olog till they finally cave in, uhmm, or I mean, I ask them politely and they immediately go “Great idea, let’s do it!”  – but right now, with our focus on getting to heroic modes for Icecrown, I guess I will keep a lid on it till we get it more or less on farm status and be more on edge with the 10-man achievements instead.

After completing so many achievements, is there anyone you’d like to thank?

There are so many that have been very forgiving with my desperate and sad nature of getting more and more achievements, over nine thousand, but first and foremost Bridgeburners for being the guild that it is and been a huge aid for me personally. Secondly, without naming names, because I always forget someone in the mix, the many people whom I did five-man instances with, the dedicated people that did the 10-man runs week after week, my arena partners, the people who joined in for some random battlegrounds here and there, and the people crazy enough to help with late night reputation grinds, material farming and the likes. Thank you, everyone!

As a side note I can also say that doing achievements with others will, for the most part, always prove to be more satisfying than struggling with them alone – having farmed all the battlegrounds –mostly alone – I can vouch for that! It gets bitter sweet very fast!

If you ever come by a duck in a dungeon, you will lose a level if you pick it up

I want to thank Prue for taking the time out to answer my questions and wish you the best of luck in your achievement gathering for the future… You have the “Insane” title and I think we can all agree you have to be just a little bit crazy to go after a goal like Prue’s!

Related posts:

1. Feature interview: Bridgeburners
2. Feature Interview: Money makes the World (of Warcraft) go round!
3. Feature interview: Omen

With an aim to balance Emerald Dreamers to provide neither a Horde or Alliance blog, but a blog for the server, I bring to you this month the leading Horde raiding guild of Emerald Dream…. *drum roll* Omen!

I want to thank Darcuri for taking the time to discuss the Guild and progression with a dirty ex Nelf, Aka’Magosh, Omen and /salute.

The serious bit

I always try to do my background research for my interviews, but after searching the internet for some hours I have drawn a blank on the origins of Omen. Could you tell me a little about how, why and when Omen was formed?

Certainly, Omen is a merge between two guilds, being The Stealth Shadows and Total Control. Both those guilds existed from when WoW was released.

I was a guildie of Total Control, foolishly – they made me an officer in that guild. This being my first MMO I ever played, I found myself trailing quite a few people and guilds who had MMO experience from the likes of DAoC and Everquest before. I quickly noticed that “all the cool kids” were running places like Molten Core and such and I wanted a piece of the raid pie!

So I worked on a merge between the two small guilds to see if we could pull something like that off. In February of 2006 we founded Omen and that’s how it all began.

A guild name that has come up again and again is Mortalis. Back in Vanilla they were fighting tooth and nail for the server firsts with the Alliance Guild Ashes. They seem to have been a large factor in pushing many other Horde guilds to better there accomplishments, do you have any memories of this time you would like to share?

Yeah, some memories, although Mortalis left the server eventually as you know. For me personally and I think that goes for Omen as well, we were more influenced by guilds as Infernal Legion and Nocturnal Fear. Both those guilds still have a foundation in Omen today, in fact, after various cross server ventures for both guilds we were able to welcome several great people from those guilds back to Emerald Dream as raiders and socials in Omen.

Before we start talking about raiding, we would all like to know about how you recruit. Most people are aware that the Horde community of Emerald Dream is quite small, is it a case of quality over quantity Horde side or do you have any cunning recruitment techniques you would like to divulge?

Recruiting on Horde side of Emerald Dream is indeed not an easy task. With the smaller player base here, there’s simply less skilled and able players to choose from. We keep posts of our recruitment needs on the various fora on the net and actively pursue good ones we find on other servers when they put their self-advertisement up.

The advantage we have is that we’re “top of the food chain” on horde side, so that has some appeal and we are building on having a good reputation and results in raiding to back that up.

It’s even more difficult for the other guilds on the server like The Firm, Anastasis, Outlaws Torn, Arctic Vikings and such to get good players who are there to stay.

The function of having people from alliance side crossing over is helping us as guilds in some ways now, but to be really helpful and regain some sort of balance, we would still need to see quite a few players or guilds cross over.

Relating to the above question how do you find guild member retention, on Alliance side there is perhaps a “Guild hopping” culture, I imagine you don’t suffer to much with that Horde side, perhaps you could enlighten us?

There’s no guild hopping culture on horde side as far as I know – we hardly ever experienced it in the almost four years we’re up and running now, so I presume that goes for most if not all guilds here. We still have many people here that go back to the very day we started with Omen and were part of the original merger.

Omen are a Hardcore raiding guild but with some of the social aspects of a more casual guild. What do you believe separates a casual guild from a hardcore guild?

My my, you have done your homework well – Yes, I am very proud of our social atmosphere in guild, we’re not a guild filled with people who are just there to raid and then log off again. We like progress and beating raid encounters with some passion yes, but not at the expense of everything and anything.

I consider my guildies as my online family, who I enjoy spending a lot of time with, having fun and frolicking about, reading our guildchat daily makes me believe we are all likeminded souls in that respect.

Omen I believe completed 2/6 of Sunwell before the patch 3.0.2 nerf, how did you feel overall with your accomplishments in Sunwell and what would you have done differently if you had that time again?

Sunwell came at an impossible time for us, we had cleared BT and were geared for it yes, but the exam and summer time hits ED horde side extra hard.

The already small player base sees a lot of it’s players have less chance to put as much time in the game as in the rest of the year. Quality per raider wise we could have done better, number wise we did what we could.

Done differently? No, we chose our path and it went as it did, of course we all still learn of such things, but the idea is to look ahead of us – for example we try and maintain a quality body of raiders now that can also survive more trialling times for raiding guilds on ED. Relying on a small group of core raiders, like several guilds on alliance side can do, is not an option for us.

Which hard mode so far has taken the most total hours to learn and defeat and which have you found the most fun to learn?

Firefighter and Yogg-Saron hard modes have taken us the most time to master and are also amongst the most fun ones, but we’re still working on Anub’arak trying to get the last phase done. We have an excellent healing roster though, so I am confident my boys and gurls will get the job done.

So far are you guys satisfied with the endgame that you have played through? How would you rate it against the pre-WOTLK endgame?

Like we learn how to do certain things, I think Blizzard does just as well.

Ulduar is an exceptionally well designed raid instance, with the addition of having hard modes for different difficulty settings it’s almost impossible to go back in time and compare it to pre-Wotlk content – also nostalgia plays a big factor in looking back.

TOTC sadly has felt too much like a “filler”, although the encounters itself are not bad in design at all, it just doesn’t have “that feel” to it. I sure have high expectations for ICC though, can’t wait to start cracking at the heroic version!

How do you feel about the gated progression we have seen with both Sunwell but more recently with TOTC and very shortly Icecrown Citadel, is a good or bad thing and why?

Hmm, well I like the principal of having to unlock the heroic mode. For the 1st wing in ICC they’re using a 28 day unlock period, but that’s just due to the holidays that are coming, if they stick to a week after that, then I don’t see any problems with it in them extending the content a little bit. Until I run into any possible disadvantages it may have for us as a guild I’m indifferent about it I guess.

I read Shell’s soapbox article on your blog – I don’t particularly agree with her view that it can create more rivals for progression and more competition. I think it will only, at best, create the illusion of there being more rivals, specifically for Emerald Dream the heroic mode of ICC will tear the guilds and progress apart and gating will have very little influence on the whole.

Lastly for this bit, how does it feel to be the leading Horde guild on Emerald Dream and what aspirations do you have for the future?

Oh it feels good, I’m very proud of my team and my guildies for being where we are for as long as we have been. And we’re not done yet, we have been working on restructuring our raid force since before the summer and it’s close to being done and ready just when ICC is here. We’ll be looking to really represent horde side raiding in full in ICC heroic progress.

Our raiding goal for the coming year is to become the 2nd raiding guild on Emerald Dream after Bridgeburners, we are just not in a place yet where we can compete with them, but they can be sure we will take aim once we are getting them in our sights of course.

If we can establish that I think we can be even more proud of what we have achieved for a raiding guild from such a small community.

The fun stuff!

Many people may not realise you are a lovely girlie, both myself and Shell share this trait with you but of less hardcore guilds. How do you think this reflects on your guild leadership? Are there, in your experience, pros and cons of being a female GM of a hardcore raiding guild?

This would be a good question to ask my guildies I think – they could probably answer it better than I can, but I’ll give it a go!

I’m not sure there’s things you can really call pros or cons, but especially in the beginning I have pressured myself to be the best I can be at my class. Be it my old main warlock or now, for quite some time, as a paladin just to make sure I got the respect of the mostly male community. If you have the respect, you can get things done.

In the end I think it’s more your personality that defines you in regards to leading a guild than your gender.

I see you’re sporty a shiny legendary item, most of us get at least a little bit excited from a new epic… but a legendary… wow. How did it feel throwing the pieces at Yoggy and receiving it and more importantly how was it decided that it was to be you to wield it?

Of course getting a new cutting edge item is nice, but for me the real feeling came through my guildies thinking I should be the one to wield the mace.

We as management had put some ideas forward on how to select the person getting the mace, we posted that on our forum and let guildies respond to it and share their views. I myself stayed out of the whole thing as it made me highly uncomfortable, but I can tell you that reading some of the forum posts and getting tells from guildies was a truly heart warming experience, more so than getting the actual item itself.

You have a number of larger than life characters in Omen (I gather this from your message boards!) Its there any one person that sticks out in your mind for this and why?

I could never single out any one person, we just have so many great people in guild that influence all aspects of our guild on a daily basis. Forcing to name one would not be fair to others. I do try and make it my job to make sure everyone knows they’re appreciated for who they are and for what they do, in fact, let me take this opportunity to thank all my Omen-ers now – Guys and gals we could not do this without you!

When your not raiding what do you and your guildies get up to? Do you spit roast Gnomes for example?

I’m a self-confessed achievement junkie, so I spend a lot of time outside raiding getting as many of them done as I possibly can. Other than that I love to PvP in arena and BG’s.

And while on this topic – Fiver, if you’re reading this, stop hiding behind your zillion smelly friends in WG and come forward so I can smash you in da fais!

Have you ever played Alliance? and can you tell me why you picked a female Blood Elf Paladin for your main?

I managed to level a paladin to 53 on alliance side, but was much more taken by horde side which made me focus there and I have never regret that for 1 second.

Why a female belf paladin…well, funny story…for some…I actually played a male belf paladin named Ucuri, but I was so fed up with the character in voice, animations and graphical displays that I rerolled female belf last year, of course this meant I had to do EVERYTHING over again, rep grinding, quests, achievements etc which has taken me looooaaaaads of time…and then Blizzard introduced… gender changes… much to the amusement of my fellow guildies I might add. I still get teased with this now and I even suspect someone telling you this and suggesting you ask me this question /shakes fist.

If in real life you could have one ability from any class, what would it be, and how would you use it?

I’d have to say Hammer of Justice – cause some people really need to wake the f*ck up!

Where do your guildies come from and do you ever meet up in real life for beers (I’m going to ask this question until I get a bloody invite!)

All over the place! We have quite a few Dutch people here, but also a lot of English, Greek and Scandinavian based people. Slovenia, Bulgaria, Belgium, Scotland, Ireland, Austria, Denmark, Poland all countries represented in Omen – I’m sure I am still forgetting some now.

We’ve not had an official get together yet, although I know some people met each other in real life, but if we do set such a thing up you’re more than welcome to come along for some drinks.

Just be sure you have something with you to smack Althfo with – you are warned.

Finally Darcuri, thank you for agreeing to take part in my mini grilling, is there anything you would like to add for the players on Emerald Dream.

It was my pleasure entirely, thanks for selecting me for your interview and preparing such nice questions.

My message to the players of Emerald Dream – let’s restore some balance!

Horde side guilds need YOU!
FOR THE HORDE!!!

Related posts:

1. Feature interview: Bridgeburners
2. Feature interview: Realm achievement master Prue!
3. Feature Interview: Money makes the World (of Warcraft) go round!

After repetitively typing /who brideburners to track him down I’m glad to realise the guild name has a less mistyped masochistic theme. I have thoroughly enjoyed finding out a little bit more about Bridgeburners and hope the rest of the realm does to.

Many will realise that Bridgeburners just aren’t into self PR, modesty is a strange but wonderful thing to find in any number one spot. For this Celeus and the rest of Bridgeburners get a friendly /bow from me.

The serious bit!

What’s the story behind the name Bridgeburners?

It’s was borrowed from a fantasy novel entitled Malazan Book of the Fallen written by Steven Erikson in which the Bridgeburners are an elite unit of soldiers in the Malazan Empire.

Bridgeburners was created around the same time at the launch of the Burning Crusade with a refreshing guild philosophy, striving for realm firsts whilst upholding this must of at times be challenging, can you explain the mindset behind the philosophy?

The guild was formed on the principles of trying to provide an enjoyable and mature raiding environment. Which aims to experience all the PvE challenges the game has to offer while at the same time keeping a balanced raiding schedule. Therefore we raid four nights a week as a maximum and try to be efficient and effective during that time. Hopefully allowing members to maintain their real world commitments and interests or time to enjoy the other areas the game has to offer.

You finally defeated Kil’jaeden in Sunwell Plateau after the patch 3.0.2 nerf. After putting so much effort into defeating Mu’ru pre nerf and making steady progression with Kil’jaeden were you angry at its implementation and feel cheated or were you just happy to have cleared Sunwell.

At the time there were mixed feelings, as it’s always nice to beat all content before the large nerfs are implemented. However we had a tricky time beating M’uru as it was such an exacting encounter that for us required a very specific set of classes back before the flexibility changes of WotLK. So repeat kills weren’t always straightforward and with us struggling a little on the numbers and raid balance front due to the summer we never really had the time we required to beat Kil’jaeden before the changes were implemented. 

Onto Wrath of the Lich King and Ulduar. Has the raid as a whole lived up to your expectations of how difficult Blizzard made it out to be (hardmodes obviously)?

Ulduar was an enjoyable and well-designed instance and the addition of hardmode encounters were an interesting change of direction offering something for nearly everyone. Difficulty wise there was a good spread and probably the only small disappointment was some of the hardmode encounters didn’t introduce more unique changes giving them that extra bit of longevity and learning curve. However Firefighter was one that really came up with something special and was a completely different challenge to its normal version.

Are you still trying for “Alone in the Darkness”? and how does this hardmode compare to the others you have accomplished?

It’s not one we have spent much time on mainly because Yogg-Saron with no keepers can sometimes be a random and frustrating fight and after completing the +1 version shortly before Coliseum we only fitted in a few tries and weren’t really that close. With our four raids a week we switched our focus to clearing Trial of the Grand Crusader after that became available. Now that has been completed we may well return and have a little play with Yogg +0 though its probably not a full focus thing with Icecrown Citadel being so close.

How do you feel about the abolition of trash mobs in The Trial of the Crusader and about the raid as a whole?

Coliseum had the disappointing feel of a filler and experimental instance as well as acting as a gear reset before Icecrown. The plan of releasing one normal boss a week was also a poor one and big anticlimax. With only five encounters the difficulty progression was never going to be smooth and in the end Anub’arak was on a different level to the rest. This could mean having 40+ attempts and only him available with no other options including trash to give you a change of focus. Hopefully Icecrown Citadel will live up to everyone expectations, as it will be the instance that defines this expansion.

Which hard mode so far has taken the most total hours to learn and defeat?

If we are talking WotLK that ‘honour’ goes to Anub’arak. He took us in the region of 150 to 200 tries over 5 weeks to get that first kill with phase 3 being the really nasty part including quite a few low health wipes. However M’uru would still hold the most time required for a first kill if we include everything we have faced.

So far are you guys satisfied with the endgame that you have played through? How would you rate it against the pre-WOTLK endgame?

It’s going to depend hugely on Icecrown Citadel. The first set of raid instances, were as Blizzard intended, very entry level and great to introduce more people to raiding however I think buffing one or two of the later fights would have added to them. The variable difficult on bosses such as Sartharion and Freya, for example, were a nice idea and worked well. As mentioned Ulduar was really good overall but has had to carry the load for too long a time.

I think we have a tendency to look back fondly on the past and well maybe there was a bit more epic feeling on some of the earlier bosses much of this due to the fact we had never seen anything like them before. Lets hope the Lich King has that truly epic feel we all enjoy and want him to have.

Has any of the guild been active on the PTR and if so what have they reported back? What are you most looking forward to with the implementation of the next patch and how are you preparing for the Lich King?

We don’t have any organised raids on the PTR though a few are trying using them to see what their class changes will bring and getting a sneak preview of what 3.3 has to offer. The few snippets I have heard all sound very positive so far. I wouldn’t say we are making huge preparations outside of the norm for the Lich King just farming ToTC for gear upgrades and restocking preferred consumables.

Lastly for the “serious” bit can you tell me how it feels to achieve realm firsts, personally and collectively as a guild?

Personally beating any boss for the first time is an enjoyable feeling if they took at least some progress and effort to achieve. If it’s also a realm first I guess that’s the cherry on top certainly not your only/main aim but a nice bonus.

Now for the more lighthearted stuff!

When your not raiding what do you and your guildies get up to? (I hope for some information on naked dancing in a secret location.)

The usual bits really some enjoy PvP/Arena, some play an alt or two (or whole armies) and some just stick to barbecuing stray gnomes to keep the population under control!

Where is your favourite place in WoW?

My favourite zone is probably either Nagrand or Storm Peaks mostly for how they looked and felt when I first visited them. My favourite place is probably Moonglade as playing a druid I have spent quite a bit of time there to respec with the handy teleport and its normally very peaceful. I remember visiting it nearly every raid during Sunwell before the much welcome addition of dual spec, I think we probably funded the whole village’s summer vacation that year!

Do you enjoying the levelling process and what is your favourite quest/questline and why?

I quite enjoy that side of things (well first time through anyway), as it tends to be a great way to explore the new zones. Favourite quest lines are probably ‘Are We There, Yeti?’ love the name its just a shame the pet only had three uses. The druid epic flight form chain is also a favourite as it has such a great reward at its end.

If you could steal one ability from another Class what would it be and why?

Playing a druid there’s probably not many out there we don’t have some small approximation to!  Though a better interrupt would be handy (or just give the pre nerf FoK!)

Do you have a favourite and least favourite raid boss, can you tell us who they are and why?

Favourites from the old raids would be Ragnaros and Nefarian just for their scale (plus I love killing dragons). Current content probably Mimiron on either mode he’s something different from the usual bosses. Least favourite is probably General Vezax I just thought there would be more to him with his position in Ulduar and then not being a caster I don’t get to stand in the crashes and put out huge numbers!

Can you recall the funniest thing that ever happened during a Bridgeburners raid any classic wipes or hilarious mistells?

I do remember one of our shamans, who had a slight habit of falling asleep at their keyboard, auto running into Kel’thuzad’s room creating a rather unexpected wipe and much enquiring as to what happened! There’s always a few good mistells floating about though sadlyI never seem to get enough of the best ones!

Where to the majority of your guild live and do you ever meet up in real life for beers!

We are widely spread across Europe covering quite a few countries including Holland, Sweden, UK, Finland, France, Spain and Greece (and more besides before I get lynched – we even used to have a few US based players at the start of TBC, though all have now stop raiding). We haven’t had an official whole guild get together though many have met up in smaller groups on their travels.

Thanks very much again for doing this, and congratulations on all the success. Anything else you’d like to say to players of Emerald Dream?

Thanks to everyone who plays on ED for making it an enjoyable place to be and all the best with your WoW journeys whichever part of the game you prefer to enjoy.

Related posts:

1. Feature interview: Omen
2. Feature interview: Realm achievement master Prue!
3. Icecrown Citadels first guests