Being a raid leader is hard. Being a guild leader is hard. Let nobody tell you any differently. Sure there are moments when you will have nothing to do but for the most part a big piece of your playtime is taken up with it. You know when you log in and think “ok I’ll get the molten front dailies sorted and I can go do the things I want to do”? Well as either guild or raid leader you log in and have to sort out guild business even before your dailies and unfortunately you don’t really get the option to skip a day and there isn’t even any rep rewards.

They both require a certain mind-set accompanied by the supporting set of skills to pull off successfully, and these skills don’t mix well at all.

Being a raid leader means choosing a goal and looking at the means needed to achieve this. “What do I need to make x-boss go down in the best way with the least amount of frustration to all involved?” You are the no-nonsense man that gets things done, when you tell someone to do something they do it or they get replaced.

Being a guild leader means looking at what you have and then choosing your goals based on what is possible. “Where can we go which includes everyone and is the most fun?” You are everybody’s best friend, whether it’s to link your latest epic to or shoulder to cry on when things aren’t going so well. You’re a buddy, a pal, and whenever someone is missing a tank for Ozruk in stonecore or even just needs another body to help summon their friend to dalaran you are the one to go out of your way to save the day.

These 2 ideals come head-to-head when you are both the raid leader and guild leader. To have 10 people on at raid time with the exact set-up is the Holy Grail, and unfortunately it will most likely be for the 1st boss only, the reality is you will be leaving out friends you have played with for years and asking people to play roles they don’t enjoy, and generally constantly at logger-heads over the best way to handle something.

While the jobs can be hard, they can also be very rewarding. Building your raid group into a solid raiding machine and also having them guild achievements flash up for things like 50,000 fished up pools is a great feeling, even if it is fleeting. But switching from one job to the other in a heartbeat can kill it all as well.

It all comes down to the strict nature of raiding. You will inevitably reach the point where you are having to choose between:

• Guild Pwn Sauce – geared to the teeth, can attend every raid, expects to attend every raid because, hey, he’s the best isn’t he? Once managed to top both the damage and healing meters while tanking.
• Ye Olde Faithful – This guy was your main tank on the original Ragnaros and tanked all the way up to the Lich King, he’s taken a back seat now due to having a kid/getting married, but he is as good as ever even if his gear and time are lacking. Will have to emergency /afk twice a raid to pacify his child/wife
• Guild Hot Totty – One of the members girl/boy friends. Not the best but a lot of fun and always there when you are short a spot, they have single handedly saved more raids than the entire guild combined simply by turning up on short notice.
• “My Mate”!! – members friend who is in another guild way more advanced on the scene than yours. In fact they killed everything on the PTR before it all got nerfed for the casuals. Having them takes a lot of pressure off others to perform, even if they can be a bit condescending to your tactics at times. Guild Pwn Sauce loves/hates them
• Guild Idiot – You have no idea how they actually got in the guild, it was probably when the guild was just starting out and was one of the top members friends who has long since stopped playing. He has no idea of the requirements needed to raid, thinks his 10k dps on Argoloth is going to see him soloing Nefarian. He’s never actually done anything to get him kicked from the guild either. Harmless and innocent and as irritating as hell when they spam for invites
• Arena Junkie: He only wants a spot to get the uber 2-hander and trinket that is OP in arena. Won’t sign up for a raid after getting it until the next tier of raiding is released. He is also always top dps in his PvP gear and takes the least amount of raid damage. Will turn up 30 minutes before everyone else and spam guild chat for “raid invites started yet?” Responds in a heartbeat to people asking for help with something, especially if it involves ganking
• Re-Roller – just discovered how truly OP DK dps is and decided to switch from his healer, in fact flat out refuses to heal anything but expects to replace other dps instead, he is a healer after all

This isn’t to mention to other bunch of characters that fall into the more regular roles. As a guild leader you want to bring them all but you only have 10 spots. Being a raid leader you want to bring your very best as you only have 2 nights

You end up in this muggy grey area where nobody is unhappy but everybody knows things could be running better. Members feel rejected and raiders feel held back.

You meanwhile feel stressed out

This sounds like I am slamming the jobs. I’m not, as I’ve mentioned they can be incredibly rewarding and I honestly don’t think I could play the game without being the boss anymore. I just don’t think it is ideal for these 2 roles to be given to the same person. They split focus meaning you are essentially ignoring half the guild when doing the other job.

So yeah, being a guild leader is hard, being a raid leader is hard too

Being both is stupid