Scott Andrews
Articles by Scott Andrews
WoW Archivist: How forum trolls broke a CM
WoW Archivist explores the secrets of World of Warcraft's past. What did the game look like years ago? Who is etched into WoW's history? What secrets does the game still hold? Last week, I included some passionate but mostly reasonable discussion of debuffs on the official forums from the earliest days of WoW and beyond. The official forums have always been a rough and tumble part of the game -- an area that Blizzard has always wanted to improve. Trolls invade One can speculate about a dozen different reasons for why WoW's official forums have been so full of jerks. Is it because there are just so many players and thus so many people with forum access, raising the statistical jerk demographic? Does the game's immense popularity encourage people to demand more of the company that makes it than any other in gaming? Does the ongoing passion for WoW simply make the forums the best place to troll on the Internet? The forums have become gradually better over time, but the vanilla and Burning Crusade eras were completely out of control. Caught off-guard by the game's explosive early popularity, Blizzard's first team of community managers found themselves overwhelmingly outnumbered in their own forums. They couldn't possibly hope to keep up with the sheer volume of threads being generated. The CMs did what they could, but it was a losing battle from the start. The trolls took the forums by storm, and Blizzard never fully ousted them. Then, in May 2007, one community manager simply couldn't take it any more.
Officers' Quarters: Elegon, the Raidslayer
Every Monday, Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership. He is the author of The Guild Leader's Handbook. Oh, Elegon, you magnificently annoying Titan-created celestial Internet dragon. You are far from the hardest boss Blizzard has ever designed, but you require precision in all phases in order to win. One mistake by any member can botch the whole attempt. You are part of the tradition of unforgiving first-tier bosses such as Magtheridon and Blackwing Descent's Nefarian. It's no surprise to me, then, that some guilds are struggling with you. This week, one raid leader is questioning what he can do to improve his chances before his entire team falls apart. hello Scott, i really need some advice here. i am a officer and raid leader in a progression guild. i run two raid teams - the second and third for our guild. when i joined here, i came to be with friends, and with the understanding that there was no raid spot for me in the primary team, so to raid i would have to start my own progression group. that was almost a year ago. I already had a group that i raid my primary alt with, a casual fun group that i love, and now this progression group for my main. Both groups joined the guild with me. so, in a nutshell, here's the problem: I'm not much good at raid leading.
WoW Archivist: The long fight for debuff rights
WoW Archivist explores the secrets of World of Warcraft's past. What did the game look like years ago? Who is etched into WoW's history? What secrets does the game still hold? Debuffs help us beat bosses, but not all debuffs are created equal. Over WoW's eight years, debuffs have dealt extra damage, prevented damage, healed us, given us mana, slowed boss attacks, sped up our own, and helped us to hit harder. Some are more powerful than others, but today those concerns are meaningless. Applying every possible debuff and keeping it active is a critical component to success. Believe it or not, however, there was a time when your raid leader would yell at you for doing exactly that. Your weaker debuffs weren't just considered useless -- using them was a dire liability. Eight is not enough Vanilla WoW had an interesting, longstanding, and highly criticized technical limitation. A raid of any size could only apply a maximum of eight debuffs to a boss. As you can imagine, forty-player raids had many, many debuffs at their disposal, but only eight could ever be active at one time. To make things worse, the game didn't differentiate between debuffs. The latest one that was applied would knock off the oldest one, regardless of type or power. It's not difficult to figure out how this could become a huge problem.
Officers' Quarters: Gnome and punishment
Every Monday, Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership. He is the author of The Guild Leader's Handbook. Like any group that runs an organized activity, raiding guilds need rules. Rules define expectations, set boundaries for behavior that might cause problems, and establish consequences when a member hurts the team. The latter part is often tricky. The week's email asks, What do you do when someone breaks the rules? Hello, I have a question about guild management. Coming into MoP raiding we have afew new people and we've written up our rules on the forums such as being on time, gemmed/enchanted/flasked, etc to make it clear to everyone what we expect from our raiders. One challenge that we currently have is coming up with consequences for breaking these rules. Our guild roster isn't large enough to always bench someone from coming to raid and while we're all gearing up denying someone gear seems to just make things harder for everyone else overall. If occurrences are excessive we will recruit to replace the person, but otherwise we need some good consequences for rule infractions.
WoW Archivist: Blizzard's hot and cold attitude toward weather
WoW Archivist explores the secrets of World of Warcraft's past. What did the game look like years ago? Who is etched into WoW's history? What secrets does the game still hold? Weather has been kind of a big deal this week, at least if you live in the eastern U.S. Though it's an essential part of the planet, weather can be devastating. Azeroth, like Earth, has dynamic weather. It's a feature that makes the game world feel more alive, and one of the few that players love almost universally. Even so, Blizzard's commitment to the immersion of dynamic weather has been up and down over the years. A static start Eight years ago, WoW launched without any weather at all. The game had a day/night cycle, but no other changing conditions. Hillsbrad was always sunny, with no rain to dampen the constant Southshore/Tarren Mill PvP battles. It never snowed in Winterspring, despite the heavy snowfall in evidence. Blizzard was working on weather. Like many aspects of WoW, however, it would take a long time for them to deliver it.
Officers' Quarters: All in the family
Every Monday, Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership. He is the author of The Guild Leader's Handbook. This week, a player wants to start a new guild with family members as officers. I'm not quite sold on the idea . . . Hi Scott! I've got a bit of a 2-part conundrum for you, and I was hoping you could help. First, I want to start my own guild. I know I've got the qualifications, as I've run several events in the guild I'm in now. The reason I want to leave is the guild I'm in now is completely ignoring (and shows no interest in starting) the challenge-mode dungeons and scenarios, things that I want to experience in it's entirety. The guild I'm currently in, however, has a great player-base. I've developed many relationships here that I don't want to give up. My Guild Leader is a gem, and she and the officers have been nothing but nice to me. In fact, they even took me on my first raid! Starting my own guild is something I've always wanted to do, and both my dad and brother (who both play) have both expressed interest in being officers, but I'm not so sure.
WoW Archivist: WoW's most terrifying secrets
WoW Archivist explores the secrets of World of Warcraft's past. What did the game look like years ago? Who is etched into WoW's history? What secrets does the game still hold? Last year, Alex gave us a thorough look at the hidden Karazhan Crypts area, with its massive pile of bones where hundreds of people were thrown down a well, and humans drowned by chaining them upside-down underwater. The crypts were never meant to be explored by players, but WoW has had plenty of other terrifying secrets through the years that are just waiting for us to discover them. The C'thun Kids Club Above the leatherworking shop in Goldshire, something is amiss. If you venture there, you will sometimes discover six children, arrayed in a strange pattern. They stand there, silently facing each other. The light music of Elwynn changes to an ominous low rumble or a creepy hum. Every so often you will hear ghostly noises, or even the voice of C'thun himself. Outside of the house, two tiny children's skulls are hidden in the grass. They have been called the "creepy children," the "demon children," and the "evil children." They also run around Elwynn to Stormwind and back, always in formation. Sometimes they will stop and stare at each other again, or all look in one direction for no apparent reason. Presumably this is just to creep us out even more.
Officers' Quarters: Leading as a teen
Every Monday, Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership. He is the author of The Guild Leader's Handbook. How young is too young to lead a guild? What do you do when your guild doesn't even know your true age? This week, a teen guild leader wonders how long he can keep things going. Hi Scott. I'm a fifteen year old teenager who loved Wow. A couple of months ago I joined this guild, it was a level three guild full of nice,social players. I loved the guild as it had a brilliant atmosphere. I joined there raid team and rose through the ranks to become an officer. In August, I took two weeks off and when I returned the two guild leaders were absent. Neither of them had been online in a few days and members were leaving the guild. So, I took over the guild and have begun rebuilding it. It is now a level 10 guild with nearly a full raid team. But, I am worried about a few things surrounding my leadership.
WoW Archivist: The ghosts of Hallow's End
WoW Archivist explores the secrets of World of Warcraft's past. What did the game look like years ago? Who is etched into WoW's history? What secrets does the game still hold? Yesterday, Hallow's End went live for the seventh time! The holiday began as a modest one, but it has evolved into one of WoW's most elaborate. Over the years, it has endured more controversy and intrigue than any other holiday. Let's take a look back! The first Hallow's End The original incarnation of Hallow's End went live in October 2005. The files were included with patch 1.8. It was a far cry from the elaborate holiday we know today with its quests, achievements, vendors, masks, and ghosts taunting us with awful poetry. Here is Blizzard's 2005 introduction: When the decorations of Hallow's End light up Azeroth's cities, you know there's mischief afoot! Seek special vendors in Orgrimmar or Ironforge and get your hands on treats! Aid a sick orphan in a little trick-or-treating! Darkcaller Yanka, attending the Forsaken's Wickerman Festival, and Sergeant Hartman of Southshore are seeking your aid in keeping the enemy out of their holiday affairs - are you up to the challenge? The first Hallow's End wasn't much to write home about. Towns were decorated with pumpkins. The inns got apple bobbing. In addition, the holiday made three quests available. The first was to collect candy from capital cities for your faction's kids. The other two were faction specific -- and were the focus of intense forum-griping.
Officers' Quarters: DPS the vote
Every Monday, Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership. He is the author of The Guild Leader's Handbook. As some of the insane political tactics in recent weeks remind us, we're less than a month away from election day in America. On. Nov. 6, nearly all Americans will have the opportunity to vote. Guilds don't often work that way, but should they? This week, one officer wonders whether his new guild leader is giving too much voting power to the masses. Dear Scott, I recently stepped down from being the leader of my guild due to obligations outside of World of Warcraft. Before I stepped down, I placed a new system in effect that is very similar to a city council at the request of the existing members. I selected our five current officers and myself as councilmen. I appointed a trusted friend of mine as the new guild leader/council chairman, and he has some pretty colorful ideas as to how our guild's structure should work. My friend feels that our guild should allow members who have been active to become councilmen, like us, giving them an equal vote on all issues. Quite frankly this scares the heck out of me.
WoW Archivist: The rocky history of meeting stones
WoW Archivist explores the secrets of World of Warcraft's past. What did the game look like years ago? Who is etched into WoW's history? What secrets does the game still hold? Now that Have Group, Will Travel has been removed as a guild perk, raid groups are once again turning to meeting stones to summon their fellow raiders to the entrance. Meeting stones have a long and uneven history in WoW. They were despised and ridiculed when they were first patched in. They've gone through periods of high use and periods where they were all but ignored. What was their original purpose? How have they changed over the years? Read on to find out! The original dungeon finders Even in early vanilla, Blizzard was trying to find ways to make it easier for players to run dungeons together. In those days, most dungeons formed either in guild chat or trade chat. Players made their own groups and then took zeppelins, flight points, etc. to the dungeon entrance. In March 2005, patch 1.3 gave us Blizzard's first attempt at a grouping system: the lowly meeting stones. In their first incarnation, meeting stones could be clicked to place you in a queue for their dungeon. The queue tried to match you up with players of a similar level and to find a tank and a healer. Players hated meeting stones immediately. It was a deep and abiding hate.
Officers' Quarters: 9 suggestions for a new guild leader
Every Monday, Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership. He is the author of The Guild Leader's Handbook. This week's email is short and to the point. A player who wants to take the plunge into guild leadership is nervous about the prospect. I have some suggestions for him that I think can also apply to just about any officer, but first, the email: Hello Scott, I've been playing WoW for an extremely long time, a shameful amount of time to be fair... but I've never been happy with the guilds I've been in, so I'm thinking about starting my own guild. I'm willing to put the effort and money into making it work. I mean, I've got a crazy amount of ideas I'd like to implement to create a sense of community and loyality into the guild but I'm absolutely petrified about starting off. The recruitment for example just seems so damn daunting! I'm scared Scott :( but I'm afraid I won't be able to see the content the way I like to see it if I don't do this though. From Craig of Azjol-Nerub EU Hi, Craig. I'm always thrilled to hear about players who are ready and willing to lead. I'm happy to help you. Also, I love your lists. Here's mine. 1. Have a vision. Hundreds of people a week, I'm betting, say to themselves, I want to start a guild and do things my way. But what they really mean is, I want to start a guild exactly like all the other guilds out there, but I want to be in charge this time. When you say you want to see content "your way," that sends up a red flag to me.
WoW Archivist: Strange choices behind WoW's earliest talent trees
WoW Archivist explores the secrets of World of Warcraft's past. What did the game look like years ago? Who is etched into WoW's history? What secrets does the game still hold? It's strange to think that players who first start playing in Mists might have no idea what the old talent trees looked like. To them, the new talent system is simply the status quo and the image above conjures no memories. The status quo has never lasted very long for talents in WoW. Through the years, talents have changed possibly more than any other aspect of the game. It's a good thing, too, because the earliest talent trees needed a lot of work. Let's take a look back! The first beta talents It's not easy to find solid information about the first iteration of talent trees from early beta. From what I can gather, WoW's original talents were more like spell ranks (which have also since been removed). You could invest talent points into particular spells to give them more damage/healing, longer range, etc. These talents were also tied to stats. By investing talent points, you gained stats relevant to your class. These talents were generally considered workable but lackluster. They were removed from the beta in patch 0.6. Blizzard promised to "make them even cooler than before," and players speculated heavily about what the new trees might look like.
Officers' Quarters: Leaks in the ship
Every Monday, Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership. He is the author of The Guild Leader's Handbook. You know things are bad in your guild when a newly appointed officer decides to leak private officer information to nonofficers. This week, an officer/raid leader seeks advice for a guild that feels like its sinking. Hi Scott I belong to a small social guild with less than 400 on the roster. Given that a lot of people have alts the number of players is going to be a lot less than that, though I'm not sure of the actual figure. Recently the GM posted on the MotD that the guild needed new officers and could people please send him recommendations. The next day I logged on and saw 4 people being congratulated on their promotion. I'm a senior officer in this guild and I had thought that it would go to a vote before anyone was promoted. . . . I asked the GM why we needed more officers and what their responsibilities would be. His response was "we're down to 16 and need more for advisor's and to help the guild". None of the officers currently have specific duties and everything falls to three of the senior officers, myself and two others. Most of the officers don't even attend the meetings he promoted them to advise at. This morning I logged on to drama as the new promotion (that I'd had reservations about) had leaked some officer notes to their friends in the guild. These notes I admit weren't flattering but they were accurate of their behaviour which is why there were there.
WoW Archivist: 7 ways vanilla Wailing Caverns baffled us
WoW Archivist explores the secrets of World of Warcraft's past. What did the game look like years ago? Who is etched into WoW's history? What secrets does the game still hold? We've come a long, long way, haven't we, since the days of Wailing Caverns? The dungeons of Pandaria are gorgeous, vivid, and varied. The bosses are dynamic and engaging. The best way to appreciate what Blizzard is doing now is to look back at what they were doing eight years ago. Vanilla WoW's dungeons were not always so expertly crafted. Some dungeons, like Deadmines or Stratholme, were a big hit. Others, like Razorfen Downs, were not so warmly embraced. The popularity of vanilla's Wailing Caverns is not easy to nail down. For some, especially old school Horde players, they have fond memories of the place as the first real dungeon they experienced in WoW. For others, memories of endless hours wandering its unforgiving maze haunt them to this day. One thing is certain: vanilla Wailing Caverns runs led to a lot of questions -- questions that we no longer have to ask today when we step into a dungeon. Here are seven of them!
Officers' Quarters: 4 radical ways to help your guild stand out in Mists
Every Monday, Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership. He is the author of The Guild Leader's Handbook. Today we stand at the precipice of a new era. In less than 24 hours, Mists of Pandaria will usher in what could be called the Fifth Age of WoW. The long wait through 2012 has been hard on guilds, but that time is now over. If your guild has made it this far, you should be proud of that, but this is not a time to rest. This is a time to ensure that your guild will thrive. In this new era, the best method to recruit players will not change: finding ways to set your guild apart from the dozens of others on your server. Here are four ways to do just that -- but be warned! These are not for the faint of heart. 1. Offer tutorial runs of the new dungeons. Blizzard's new guild mentoring program is a great idea, but just because your guild wasn't selected doesn't mean you can't be a force for good on your server. This strategy requires patient guild members who have run the dungeons in beta or who get a lot of practice in the early weeks of the expansion. Start an initiative on your server in which, one night a week, you offer to run players through dungeons while teaching them the boss mechanics. Players will very much appreciate the chance to learn the runs in a low-stress and constructive environment rather than the merciless meat-grinder boot camp of the dungeon finder.
WoW Archivist: Vanilla WoW's launch event was out of control
WoW Archivist explores the secrets of World of Warcraft's past. What did the game look like years ago? Who is etched into WoW's history? What secrets does the game still hold? This Monday, WoW fans will line up at stores around the world to buy the game's fourth expansion, Mists of Pandaria. For Blizzard, the past eight years have been an incredible run, setting records for sales and building one of the largest virtual communities on Earth. Let's look back at the game's original launch, when Blizzard wasn't quite as prepared as they are today for the game's overwhelming popularity. A moonlit walk Blizzard's chief operating officer Paul Sams couldn't wrap his head around what he was seeing. Just after 11 p.m. on November 22, 2004, he was sitting in deadlock traffic on a freeway offramp in Fountain Valley, California. He looked over at the Fry's Electronics outlet not far from the road. The store had been surrounded by some sort of dark, seething mass. Caught in traffic, Sams was in danger of missing the game's launch event at Fry's. Rather than fight his way through the jumble of cars, he decided to park some distance away. It was still unclear to him what was happening. The electronics store was only minutes from Blizzard's headquarters in Irvine. He thought he had left the office with plenty of time to spare. He never imagined that getting to the store would be difficult this late at night.
Officers' Quarters: Five ways to spot scam guilds
Every Monday, Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership. He is the author of The Guild Leader's Handbook. Internet scams are nothing new. They're as old as the Web itself. MMOs have opened up new channels for scammers to operate, and WoW is no exception. As we approach the launch of Mists, unscrupulous players may try to take advantage of the influx of players by setting up fake guilds. This week, one reader wants to share a scam story from her server in the hope that it won't happen to others. Let's take a look, and then examine how you can spot one of these scam guilds before it's too late. Greetings, The following was posted to our server forums. I was hoping that maybe, with names redacted, you might address this in a future officer's quarters: Edited by [name] on 9/6/12 4:22 PM (PDT) [Player 1], [Player 2] and how to scam Guildies and Maximize Profit. We all know by now the sad story of what happened to . According to legend, [Player 2], booted everyone from the guild, took everything out of the guild bank, leaving a lot of members confused and wondering about what happened to their guild and their friends. Blizzard did nothing. Fast forward to the present day, we have [Player 2] bragging about his exploits and his mount in general chat / trade, flaunting the results of his ill gotten wealth and guess what? Blizzard still does nothing. was a guild created by [Player 1], promising members fast progression and offering PVP, raiding and a stable community. Recruiting was fast and furious, with [Player 1] and his alts spamming general/trade all hours of the day, and baiting players of all levels to join what would be a huge guild with progression in every aspect of the game. Under that promise, the guild expanded fast, never quite achieving the kind of raiding success that would make it noteworthy in that category (3/8 HDS), but still sucessful enough to garner a sizable amount of members. All seemed well for a while.
Officers' Quarters: All the red flags
Every Monday, Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership. He is the author of The Guild Leader's Handbook. It's not easy to find talented, knowledgeable, and highly motivated raiders. For a guild that doesn't attract such players very often, the excitement over adding them to your roster can be enough to overlook some of the potential drawbacks. However, as we see from the email below, it's a good idea to talk to them first to make sure they'll fit in. All summer we've been raiding our regular ten man. ... Some have come and gone on break, some have quit permanently some just vanished, but it was going along okay. ... There were enough [PUG players] that could fill the roles, pay attention and follow directions and we managed to go 6/8HM through the summer even though we only raid two nights for four hours. I fully believe that if we had a full group, we would have already cleared the instance on heroic mode, but that is the nature of filling the group with random players. ... Fast forward to September 3rd. I wake up to my husband telling stories about how [one of our raiders] is mad at some random player we brought a few weeks ago. They had some weird argument, things were said in weird ways and feelings were hurt, but by time I got up, my husband mediated the problem and offered this stranger and his friend spots on our raid team! They're skilled friendly players that I wanted six weeks ago, and are expecting preference over our real life friends for raid spots, and I don't have the heart to say no, especially if people quit later in Mists, which may happen. I tell them that I'm going to try and form a 25-man raid and they start in with "this guild is bad. You've achieved nothing. 6/8HM in a year is garbage. Lesser guilds have achieved more. Why do you have an enhance shaman? Their numbers don't compare to x-class. Bear tanks are terrible, you should have your other tank reroll. If the priest does a race change we can stack these racials; etc."
WoW Archivist: Burned by Hellfire Peninsula
WoW Archivist explores the secrets of World of Warcraft's past. What did the game look like years ago? Who is etched into WoW's history? What secrets does the game still hold? When Mists of Pandaria goes live later this month, players will all begin leveling in the same zone for the first time since 2006. In Cataclysm and Wrath of the Lich King, Blizzard gave us two zones to choose from at the beginning of our adventures. Wrath split players up on either side of Northrend with Borean Tundra and Howling Fjord. Cataclysm's starting zones put players on different sides of the planet with Mount Hyjal and the less popular but unique underwater saga of Vashj'ir. In contrast, The Burning Crusade's Hellfire Peninsula put us all on opposite sides of the street. That is not a joke. It is literally true -- see the image above! As you can guess, this led to problems. Let's look back at the Hellfire experience and try to gauge what we're in for when we arrive at the Jade Forest shortly after midnight on September 25.