Community Fun

Back in July 2011 Blizzard announced that they were activating the much talked about Real ID grouping feature that would allow you to group with your Real ID friends for random instance fun. When I heard about this feature I instantly though "Sweet I can run randoms with twitter friends so they can see how awesome I really am and want to be my friends forever!" Blizzard then decided that they would make the Real ID system use your real name and verily the twitter community took up arms against this invasion of privacy. Some of my readers will remember that I posted about the Real ID feature when it was first announced, along with the huge controversy that came along with it. I honestly didn't have a problem with it but I also don't have a one of a kind super unique name like some people out there.

Well the Real ID announcement was pretty cool but you could only run random 5mans with Real ID friends, which was nice and all but the system was a little lacking. Yes you could get a full group of RID friends and not worry about having to pug in randoms but you couldn't run a raid with them or even run a battleground with them. As someone who grew up in one city in one state and then moved to a different city for college and finally moved out of that state, I tend to have a few friends that I am too far from seeing without much planning and travel. Real ID allowed me to be able to talk to my WoW playing friends regardless of the faction that they were playing. This alone was a pretty sweet feature.

Now don't get me wrong, I ran many a heroic with many people from the twitter community. Incoming name dropping: I did a ZA bear run with Ophelie and Lodur(which let Lodur slap Matticus), I did several trollroics with Vidyala and Vosskah(where I might have let Vid die /shame), A few trollroics with Matticus and Lodur where Matticus let me die a few times(guess he knew I was responsible for him getting slapped :( ), Fox Van Allen, and a few other people that I can't remember at the moment but at the time I was stoked about running with.(bad memory for the loss) I might have whored myself out for Real ID twitter groups a tad bit. But I was left wanting to do more, like run old raids for achievements, gold, and possible gear and the system sadly wasn't letting me do that.

Well, in patch 4.3.2 Blizzard decided that letting Real ID buddies run only heroics was kind of lame and they finally allowed us to group together for raids!!! Not the Dragon Soul raid mind you but at least we could run anything else prior to DS, this includes the Firelands, Naxxramas, Sunwell, and even Molten Core! I could finally group with peoples across the internets and pull them into many a fun run for old mogging gear or achievements or just over powering whatever raid we wanted!

Since 4.3.2 there have been many community sites that have popped up to help players find other likeminded people to run instances with and the coolest one that I've used so far is Twitter Land Raiding. I heartily recommend this site for anyone who has any interest in finding a cross-realm raid. There are many members from both factions there and people are both friendly and nice. Within days of 4.3.2 going live, I had signed up for an Ulduar 25 mount run on my mage through the site and at the end of the night I walked away with a super sexy mount as well as many achievement points!

Along with the TLR forums there is also the Sleepy Hams Mumble server which has been provided free to twitter by the ever so nice Vitae. This server has given twitter a central location to gather and be social together without being constrained to 140 characters. Through this mumble server I've met some nice and interesting people and added even more people to my Real ID list. Many Real ID runs, Handle it!

Through Real ID groupings and Twitter, I ran the Firelands with the Waypoint crew Deiter, Snack, Lizzyuh, Rezznul, Zable, and a few other people I'm sure I have forgotten because I have the memory of a squirrel on crack...oooh shiny. /wanders away. Wait I have to focus! It was a great time and we spent the whole time being silly and carefree. These silly people were nice enough to drag me along to the Firelands on my mage. I think Dee saw my mage's transmogged set and thought it was so cool that she had to have me in her raid. At least that's what I'm going to tell myself instead of the truth that I was just the first person who responded her inquiry for a person on twitter. 

For the last two Saturdays in a row I've also had the pleasure of raiding Firelands with many a twitter people. It started with Oestrus wanting to do something on her resto shaman and it turned into a lot of fun and fire. Some of the twitter peoples who came along were Hestiah, Hempia, Poneria, Rilandune, Ekinara, as well as a few of my guildees. The latest run was so much fun that Hestiah and Poneria stayed in mumble with me and the three of us ran the LFR into the wee morning hours. It was such a blast and we were having such a good time snarking about the people in the LFR raid that none of us realized that it was so late until it was over.

If you are looking to get into the raiding scene or even just want some people to run things with I highly recommend the TLR forums. You can always just join the Sleepy Hams mumble and introduce yourself there as well. I am glad that Blizzard finally listened to our pleas to allow Real ID raiding and I am looking forward to more cross realm raids with my twitter peeps. Now if only I could persuade Blizzard to let me pull Real ID people into my Guild’s Dragon Soul runs. 

We are still looking for two people (DPS/Heals/Tanks) to join the raid group and help us down more bosses. We are currently 5/8 reg and I know that if we can pull in two more stable raiders we can easily down the whole instance. If anyone is interested, check us out. We are looking for 2 people, class/role doesn't matter as we have several people who would shift around to accommodate. I would  just be happy not having to pug the last two spots each week.

Until then, if anyone wants to be Real ID friends with me feel free to send me a DM through Twitter or a private message on the TLR Forums. Let me know who you are and then we can be friends. =D