Well where to begin. I recently suffered severe loss of time which resulted in my not being able to access the net fully, or be able to play WOW for two weeks. I got a call a few days ago from Sarah, who also has been unable to play due to real life circumstances.

Seems my guild has lost many of the core raiders in my absence and pretty much I feel responsible for this due to the unplanned absence.

We've struggled through the holidays with lackluster attendance and then we had some folks just decide to transfer off the server. For some folks they could not play due to new jobs, the lack of job, or other matters. It upsets me that real life pretty much hit me hard and it compromised my ability to do anything.

Now after thinking about it I am not sure what to do. Part of me I guess is grateful due to my not having to deal with any more stress about raiding with the guild. Part of me always had a reservation when I was looking for work that I had to find something that would permit me to play with guild. When we had a drop in attendance I stressed over having to make it back in time to raid so that the raid would happen. Now that the guild is no longer capable of raiding, I am wondering if it is not a blessing in disguise.

While I did trust some administration of the guild to other officers I still had a lot of stress with regards to complaints and issues. However I think we were cursed in that we just tried to be too casual. Nothing wrong with casual play as well... I still feel Real Life is more important then a game. I lament the loss of online fellow gamers, whom I had hoped to consider friends. However only one person called me and no one except one former member emailed me to inform me that they were leaving the server.

Gevlon recently posted something that well, is very relevant to what has occurred.

"Many people claim that they are in a casual guild that is progressing. In these "casual" guilds the leadership and the tank/healer corps is HC. The same people tank, lead the raid or do main healing every raid. The DPS and the off-healers rotate casually. Without the HC core, the "casual" guild dies."

That pretty much describes most guilds that try to raid. Yes the raids are easier however with recruitment issues abound you normally settle for trying to be a 10 man raiding guild. The guild twice almost had the numbers to be a 25 man guild however we kept falling apart for several reasons on those occasions. When you have casual attendance with just barely the numbers to fill a 10 man, you will suffer from absences.

While I am severely disappointed in what has happened... enough that my stomach is upset over this due to the stress... I feel I am not completely at fault. Heck others have had RL circumstances take time away. This time I had a severe amount of excess issues and well it resulted in the loss of thousands in gold from both AH items as well as items I will never recover in the mail. I lost too many emblems of frost on four 80s.

Now however I think if folks wish to remain in the guild, I will keep it around. I don't think we will have the will to recover at the moment. Most folks want to be progressing and it was members that raided leaving that really hurt the "community". I always stated community comes first and I want to see if this will remain.

Right now the game does not give much incentive to remain in a guild when pugs can do most of the raids. If folks want Hard Modes then sure you want your own group. On my server there are already raiding groups that are not guilded clearing ICC every week.

What I think this will mean is that I may perhaps finally get to play as I want to. I can not stress about potential work and conflicts with guild raiding. I'll raid when I can and not have the stress of a schedule conflict. I may take more time off working on my characters and focus on my hunter getting her achievements done. Not sure.

Don't get me wrong but at least I have the freedom to state I can work ANY hours with no concern as to guild raids. I may have my main join another guild once my work situation settles. I can actually BE SELFISH for once and play for myself. Seems like my other "friends" decided to do so and while I am disappointed one has to be happy. I am not sure how long I would have been able to stress myself before I came up with the solution to quit the game.

WOW is about having fun. It is no crime to be selfish about it and want to have as much fun as possible. Maybe... just maybe folks leaving the guild to rot is a blessing in disguise.

The guild was still more pleasant then others I have been in. I just hope the remaining members help make it remain so.