`Ironwall’ and ‘Stonewrought’ Explained

So I’m sure almost everyone in The Dambusters has heard the raid team names mentioned already, ‘Ironwall’ and ‘Stonewrought’.  I have had numerous questions regarding the 2 teams and how they work and I have given some exhaustive answers but I thought it would be a good idea to punch out a blog post to deliver some basic information that ensures everyone can have a clear understanding of how things will work.

First of all, ‘Ironwall’ is the primary progression team which will be trying to push the boundaries as far as possible. Ironwall will be demanding, expecting a high level of attendance and a good standard of class play, fight knowledge and dedication to the team getting bosses killed as fast as possible without going crazy into hardcore.  The raiders will be expected to already know a lot about their role and their class, have consumables covered at least for themselves and raiders will be scrutinised/criticised or even replaced if they’re coming along and then doing things such as asking “anyone got a spare flask?”.

‘Stonewrought’ will naturally be slightly less demanding and will form a level of raiding which suits a more casual player, however…. this does not mean players will get to slack off when they are in the team. Stonewrought will also have standards and people must respect the requirements of Stonewrought’s leadership which I imagine will be very much the same as Ironwall’s requirements with regards to consumables, dedication etc. The difference will be that players may not be expected to have such a high attendance rate as with Ironwall and that the overall standard of player will inevitably be slightly lower than in Ironwall.  The difficulty level Stonewrought will raid at depends on how the team shapes up and how the raid leader sees the group’s capabilities. Keep in mind that the raid leader of Stonewrought will be just as likely to ask raiders to sit out as the Ironwall leaders are so Stonewrought will be hoping to do well, especially after the first few raid nights when things have settled a bit.

Important! – Ironwall and Stonewrought will be selected from the same overall roster of raiders so if you want to be considered for the raid teams then you MUST contact the raid leaders:- Damsy/Spyrot/Sonicay otherwise your name won’t be on the roster for selection. There might be situations where Stonewrought can accept guild members on the night but that will largely depend upon availability of raid spots and whether the prospective raider deserves a trial. All trial raiders will start off in Stonewrought and all Stonewrought raiders’ performances will be monitored on WarcraftLogs as well as physically inside the raids. Attitude, dependability, fight knowledge and understanding, class skill and social behaviour will all be considered with opportunities arising to join Ironwall if players are excelling within Stonewrought.

It should be remembered that Ironwall and Stonewrought will likely start with 30 each and Ironwall will reduce to a 20-man team in preparation for mythics so Stonewrought will backfill, possibly creating a powerful heroic farm team which actually could eventually turn into another mythic team in it’s own right if managed properly.  This is an exciting time for raiding with the Dambusters and although I am painting the best possible scenario here, there is actually every reason to believe that if we all stick together then things will go as I’ve described.

What I need from every Dambuster who is interested in raiding, is a little patience if they aren’t immediately selected in the team they hoped, stick it out and help us get things settled over the next week or 2 and it will soon become apparent where we stand. Ironwall and Stonewrought may be 2 separate entities but it is crucial that everyone is aware we are all ONE TEAM and our aim is to have the Dambusters competing high up the server rankings, building a good platform for future content patches and maintaining team stability, especially among the raid leaders.  I really hope that we see Thursday’s release of Ironwall’s initial 30 and the remaining raiders rally together behind Stonewrought because remember, Ironwall will need to change out players for certain fights, some players might have emergencies etc. so you could find yourselves being called into Ironwall at short notice. Otherwise, work hard at your raiding and even if Stonewrought do some bosses on a lower difficulty level, the players who stand out on the logs as reliable raiders will no doubt find themselves being considered by Ironwall.  On the other side of the coin, Ironwall raiders must perform because the raid leaders will know they have a solid bank of Stonewrought potential to call upon.

Let me just recap the basic points to take away:-

• Ironwall and Stonewrought take raiders from the same large roster pool.
• Ironwall is dedicated progression from the outset, Stonewrought is the remaining roster coming together with a separate raid leader (currently Actz) to build a support team capable of feeding raiders to Ironwall as required.
• Ironwall raids at 8-11pm Server times Wednesday/Thursday/Monday and Stonewrought will form immediately after Ironwall enters, will start 30 minutes after Ironwall on the same nights.
• Stonewrought is not a holiday camp, it will generate it’s own standards based on the same expectations as Ironwall and Ironwall will use these standards to then select future raiders to step up.

Excellent times for this guild, busy and interesting period coming up in the next couple of weeks so I’m looking forward to it. Lets all stick together and support the Dambusters!

/Salute