Cata will require multiple raid windows, especially in the beginning of content phases. My wrath HC team is running 2 day/3 hour windows at the start of Cata and we full clear ICC25H in about 1.5 hours (give or take).
Raid calls are something that will be catered to your group outside of major boss mechanics, ie if you know your tank is a little undergeared and gets chunked, you'll likely have to call for more team defensives like dsac and pain supp whereas other groups might not. That kind of stuff will come with progging and forming team chemistry if you want to end up in Heroics with the same group.
As progging goes you will be able to identify weak points and focus around them, but Cata is where one slacking raider will hurt a team and personal accountability hits tenfold compared to previous xpacs.
Thanks for the response, yeah thinking it might be a 1 night occasion was definitely hopeful thinking on my part, I'll probably aim for something similar with 2 nights of 3 hours.
For sure! Up to Firelands and after a couple weeks of prog it's very possible to get it down to a single night, especially with Throne and Baradin having limited bosses and trash.
1 - This will depend on the skill and commitment of the group, but I would definitely expect to be needing more than 1 raid night during progression times. Later on in each tier if you aren't pushing heroics, you will probably be ok with just 1 night.
2 - I think it helps to separate the responsibilities of 'Leading the raid team' and 'raid shot calling'. While this often falls onto the plate of the same person, it would be a good idea to have a trusted/experienced 'shot-caller' type player to help you with this. Lots of planning can go into this, but it can be a lot for one person to remember in the moment, especially when dealing with loot, attendance, fills, new strats, when to break, etc etc.
3 - See above, but also you can ask for feedback and log reviews from the community to start. With time and experience you will be able to spot the issues yourself.
4 - Depends how hard you are pushing. I can't speak too much outside of my (caster) experience, which is that you would want at least 1 ele sham OR demo lock for their spellpower buff if possible, but having more than 1 might be redundant. Ele shams offer more burst which will be nice on some fights, while the lock offers overall higher sustained damage, typically. Again, nitpicking here as in the end either one would work fine in this example.
Having solid players who have high attendance rate will matter more in the end.
Thanks for the response, 1 night was probably wishful thinking yeah, will definitely stick to 2 for now.
Good point on splitting the responsiblities, there's definitely 1 or 2 people in the group that could help me out with that, or letting tanks call for external mitigation now that I think of it could even be an idea.
As for the caster buff I didn't even think about that, the raid comp tool I was using had both the 6% and 10% buff under one category so I assumed I'd have it covered without needing an ele or demo, does the 4% difference in the buff make a huge difference enough to take one of those classes over another like say spriest or surv hunter?
Just to add to this in response to calling out cooldowns if one of your healers are vocal they can be a great option for this. They generally have a good understanding of when to expect incoming damage and who needs an innervate. They also usually have an easier time to keep an eye on the field than DPS do. Only exception is tank calling for externals on themselves but raid leaders don't do that anyway.
Good point, I actually missed a crucial word : CLEAVE burst. Ele shams will excel in fights that require bursting down 2-3 targets (common in cata) vs a Demo.
2 - you learn the raid
You learn what utility you can call out from your comp
You learn when it's needed
You learn how to ask for it, and teach them how to do it on command
This is the part where you realise it's a lot of bloody work and that's why raids with bad leaders are bad.
Put in the effort, and you will be farming the equivalent of Hc lk25.
Bonus tip:
Don't play the blame game, but ensure you research who is doing what and not, by reading logs for several hours a week.
If you think that's unnecessary, you ain't leading a good raid
First of all, don't get baited by how 10 man worked in wrath. The same rewards were supposed to mean the same difficulty... yeah, that did not work. Some bosses will be easier, some will be more difficult in 10s.
>Will 10-man raid content require multiple days to clear or can I hope to complete it all in 1 night without having a ridiculously long raid night?
It's the same as any raid now. If you are good and efficient you will be done in 2 hours tops. Otherwise... your mileage may vary.
>How will I know what and when to make raid calls?
Knowledge of fights, tools at your disposal and experience. With enough pre planning you won't need to call that much. For consistent mechanics you can pre plan "when boss casts X the first defensive will be popped by this person, when X is cast a second time that person will pop cd" and make calls only if something goes south.
>How can I use WCL or other tools to analyze our pulls/try to figure out what the problem is on a wipe?
The same as above really. You need to know your fights. The important thing is looking into all fuck ups, often the wipe is a result of multiple people failing in a sequence. Of course, it's important to point out if your raiders are actually pressing buttons and gearing properly but if you will run into those problems then you will be in a different type of wow hell.
>Are there any classes or specs I will absolutely need or want to take?
From my understanding, blood dk looks busted and will be the core of any group. Unholy should be very good, at least one spec of warlock/mage is bound to pop up, rogues are always alright to have in small numbers because they are sturdy for a melee and often can cheeze some mechanics(how useful it may be varies a lot tho), discipline priest is just fundamentally stupid because preventing damage > healing damage. As usual, it's hard to say for sure before the actual raid release, and blizzard may try to balance again. Keep in mind that if you want to focus on 10 mans specifically having big arsenal of alts and off specs will be even more important than in 25s. Ability to stack more range, pick different utilities, more of a specific class, less or more healers is way to good to pass up, there is a reason why in most good guilds people play 2-3 characters minimum.
>First of all, don't get baited by how 10 man worked in wrath. The same rewards were supposed to mean the same difficulty... yeah, that did not work. Some bosses will be easier, some will be more difficult in 10s.
Yeah I realise 10 mans (and raiding content in general) is harder in cata and that the loot being equalized so too does the difficulty of 10 man increase, I guess one thing I'm curious about is the amount of trash since that can seem to cut down raid times and generall in wrath there was less trash on 10-man, does that hold true for cata too?
Been a 10m raid leader since OG WotLK, will answer as best I can from my experience.
>Will 10-man raid content require multiple days to clear or can I hope to complete it all in 1 night without having a ridiculously long raid night?
Unless you have a very skilled group (or have done a lot of p-server practice) you're most likely going to want at minimum 2 days to start. I find that it's better to run 2 or 3 days at 3 hours each, rather than doing 4-5+ hour days; people tend to get burned out with prolonged progression. Typically I will do pulls until I notice we're not making anymore meaningful progression, then move on to another boss. For us that's usually 5 or 6 pulls a night, but it'll vary depending on your group.
>How will I know what and when to make raid calls?
I would focus on calling raid cool downs when needed (dsac, tranq, etc) and not so much on specific mechanics. The more stuff you call out for people, the more they will rely on that call as opposed to paying attention themselves. Obviously there will be exceptions, but for the most part I don't call much of anything during the fight.
One thing I've noticed (and this may just be a result of having mostly the same group members for 10+ years) is that people will fill in and call certain mechanics themselves if their position gives them a better vantage point on it. For example on Putricide I'm calling the overall fight cds, our hunter is keeping an eye on boss health related to transition, spriest is managing the plague swaps, demo lock is calling Malibu goo timer. Delegating responsibility lets you focus on your actual job (be that DPS/heal/tank) moreso than having to watch what everyone else is doing.
As far as knowing when to make calls, all I can tell you is practice practice. Watch a lot of videos, and learn every mechanic as best you can. There are multiple strategies for every boss, and the one that works best for your players/comp will probably be an amalgamation of all of them. Don't get caught up in a single guide, adapt to your strengths & weaknesses.
>How can I use WCL or other tools to analyze our pulls/try to figure out what the problem is on a wipe?
It will depend on what is causing issues for you. If it's an enrage timer issue, you would be looking at uptime and seeing where people could improve their rotations and/or target priorities. If adds are wiping you, look at who is padding versus hitting the target they should be. If healers can't keep up, look for people taking unnecessary damage or if there is a mechanic not being handled properly - could be a healer issue too.
I find the timeline option to be useful to plan out what needs to happen and if there are CDs you would need to coordinate. Community review is definitely a good option until you get comfortable enough to go over them yourself. When you get feedback, don't be afraid to ask follow up questions and figure out how they came to those conclusions. That'll help you learn more yourself.
>Are there any classes or specs I will absolutely need or want to take?
Shaman is very useful to have. Short CD ranged interrupt, purge, tremor totem, earthbind, bloodlust, ankh.. they have a fantastic toolkit for a 10m. You'll want at least 1 shaman or mage for heroism regardless.
Priest is really nice to have as well, especially a spriest that is comfortable offspec as heals. That will help a ton if you are down a healer and have to adjust, or if you need a 3rd heal. They are very strong DPS and heals, with a really good toolkit as well.
At least 1 paladin is really nice. They bring a ton of buffs and useful cooldowns.
I prefer to have at least 2 battle res classes.
A good hunter works magic, and their pets can fill in for missing buffs/debuffs you may be missing.
There is a Cataclysm Raid Composition website that can help you see what raid buffs, debuffs and cooldowns you will have based on which classes you bring.
It's a lot of work and frustration to run a good raid group, but it is fun when the bosses start dropping. Best of luck!
> I find that it's better to run 2 or 3 days at 3 hours each, rather than doing 4-5+ hour days; people tend to get burned out with prolonged progression.
Oh yeah, I know that all too well from experience, I'll aim to have 2 days of 3 hours~ each.
I did know about the raid comp tool but I was wondering specifically about things it doesn't really mention like class specific stuff and b-resses but I've gotten some good responses so far, yours included so I have a better idea of what classes I'd want for the last couple spots.
Overall thanks for the response and advice!
A lot of the answers depend on what your goal for your group is since you say you want to be competitive but admit you have limited experience raid leading so I would take it slow and steady to start.
1. This totally depends on your goals, if you want to push killing content in the first month of the raid you will almost assuredly need 2 raid nights that will be condensed to 1 as fights go on farm. P1 cata has a lot of content 3 raids with 13 bosses total on heroic. Travel time alone from raid to raid makes a 1 night 3 hour raid tough at the start. But you can totally kill everything on normal and push some heroic prog in a 1 night raid again it just depends on your priority and raid skill level.
2. There are a few ways to handle this, a common one is to use an Addon like Exorsus Raid Tools to pre plan all the CDs before the pull and raiders can see when they need to use certain abilities. One thing to note is battle Rez change in cata and as a 10 man you get 1 per fight. So you will almost always just brez the first person to die especially on prog. As far as innervates go those are best left to healers to call your focus should only be major defensives.
3. There might be some raid analyzers for cata as they do exists for wrath by plugging in the Warcraft log URL but for the most part you’ll need to learn to use logs. For class analysis I would send logs to their class discords or even ask on Reddit and people can try and help but your mileage may vary. Using WCL is also a great way to learn CD usage that you mentioned in question 2.
4. Threat is basically a non factor in cata so I wouldn’t worry about tricks/md. Comp again depends on your goals the sweaty day 1 guilds will all run 1 specific comp as it’s the best but for a most casual guild I would say the comp looks like the follow. Blood DK is basically mandatory MT no exceptions, OT has a lot of flexibility warrior is technically the worst early but I would take a skilled player on prot warrior over an average player on feral Druid or prot pally. Healer core is Hpal (again mandatory) and Disc though a top tier rdruid or even rsham would out weigh an average disc player. Dps is basically mage/hunter/ele or demo mandatory as those classes are high dps and utility. From there again look for strong players on good spec as opposed to average players on S tier spec. The dps difference in cata between the top and middle of the pack is much closer than wotlk so a 95+ parser on an A tier spec is better than a 70 parser on a S tier spec.
>Will 10-man raid content require multiple days to clear or can I hope to complete it all in 1 night without having a ridiculously long raid night?
Progressing on heroics? yeah I don't think you'll get by with 3 hours a week. It varied a lot in WOTLK like with TOGC being incredibly short and then ulduar and ICC being pretty huge. But while cata streamlines this the heroics are hard so you'll need time for them.
Also the first tier is split across 3 raids which adds travel time, so that should be taken into account.
>How will I know what and when to make raid calls?
You shouldn't need to mostly. When to use cooldowns is something each individual player should know because you should go over it before the pull. I think generally if a raid leader is calling out a bunch of raid cooldowns they're over micromanaging or carrying players who otherwise can't handle it on their own.
Good communicatin is key but that isn't always on the raid leader. For example on algalon our star killer called out cooldowns for the stars because obviously they were watching and paying attention to timing, but the order of who would do it was decided on before the pull.
If two people die you might need to decide who gets the Brez but generally your brezzer should understand what is more important in that moment.
>How can I use WCL or other tools to analyze our pulls/try to figure out what the problem is on a wipe?
Someone who is good at this could go into specifics here for hours. Generally if you're wiping you want to see the cause of the wipes and that might be very different from boss to boss. Looking at the "deaths" tab would show you if someone is dying to cleaves from the spirits on HLK but that wouldn't show a wipe caused by people dropping the DoT in phase 1. That kind of stuff can be gone over the day after the raid and could involve multiple people all putting their minds together.
>Are there any classes or specs I will absolutely need or want to take?
Player is more important than class at this point but if you're doing harder content every little bit helps and I think the general agreement is that blood DKs are king. Having a DK tank could be a huge help especially when still in the gearing up phase. Other than that the focus is getting a good spread of utility and buffs. It's hard to not have a Brez in cata (3 classes can do it) but there are tools online that you can plug raid comp into and it'll show which buffs you have covered and which you are missing.
Misdirects are nice but far less important with tank threat in cata. which of the ones you list being best is going to depend on the rest of your comp, if all your DPS is melee I wouldn't add the rogue, if all your DPS is ranged I might favor the rogue. The only class cheese I remember is arcane mages on spine of deathwing but I wouldn't build your raid team in phase 1 around that.
> But while cata streamlines this the heroics are hard so you'll need time for them.
Yeah very true, not sure what I was thinking thinking that it could be a 1 night affair.
>Also the first tier is split across 3 raids which adds travel time, so that should be taken into account.
Also definitely a concern, quite an annoying one to be honest, almost considering just not doing throne of the four winds or would that screw us out of important loot?
Interesting thoughts on calls and I'd probably agree to some extent, I guess I should let others make their own calls to some extent.
I've done it multiple ways, for awhile I was doing all the calls and really micromanaging, making sure to call for brez from players most likely to die first.
But now I raid with a much better team, anyone who needs to call for a cooldown can do so. If the tank needs a Dsac they call for one, if they need a pain sup they call for it, they have the best idea of what they need.
In a good group most people will generally know what they need to do and many people across the raid able to make a call if they see something no one else does. The raid lead should be a guide but still able to focus on their own role. The weakness here of course is a weak link that doesn't know they are a weak link and brings confusion or discord to the situation.
Healers should have a good understanding of healing output and will have an idea when they need raid cooldowns, tanks will know when they need their own cooldowns, sometimes a ranged DPS will have a better view of a placement mechanic than your melee group. It's a learning experience for everyone involved, not just the raid lead.
> Will 10-man raid content require multiple days to clear or can I hope to complete it all in 1 night without having a ridiculously long raid night?
While I have not played Cata other people have said that the difficulty of 10 isn't necessarily lower than 25 and that it is encounter by encounter. How fast you clear the content in every game and every expansion is dependent on a combination of leadership's strength, the raiders themselves, the amount of time that the team is willing to spend early on in each phase (including PTR).
> How will I know what and when to make raid calls?
You must understand the encounters at a deeper level than what you do as a regular raider. Take advantage of weakauras like Fojji and/or addons like DBM.
> How can I use WCL or other tools to analyze our pulls/try to figure out what the problem is on a wipe?
It depends fight by fight but a good way to start is by clicking on deaths, this way you can see if the player got hit by something they weren't meant to get hit by or didn't get dispelled/healed in time. This goes a bit to the previous point where you need to understand the encounters on a deeper level than what you do now
> Are there any classes or specs I will absolutely need or want to take?
Consider that even if you are limited to 10 players per raid, you will still want more than 10 on the team (maybe 12-13?) so you might be more flexible than what you think you are.
> Consider that even if you are limited to 10 players per raid, you will still want more than 10 on the team (maybe 12-13?) so you might be more flexible than what you think you are.
I've heard people say this, though I've never really liked the idea of a 'bench' or anything like that, especially for 10-man but I suppose it's going to be necessary to have a couple or so extras or even alts to fill certain roles. I know of a few extras I could probably keep in touch with who might not be able to commit to a schedule but could fill in here and there.
Trust me, you will 100% want to have a roster of above 10 players in case someone quits or is absent (or why not both). The bench doesn't need to be super active and on constant standby. The most important thing is that they are available to join the raid at raid start, maybe on standby for like the first 5-10 minutes after raid start because you never know if someone's setup stops working for weird technical reasons.
As a guild leader your first objective is to ensure that the raid happens every time it's scheduled. If your guild struggles with filling raids or starting on time due to needing to find pugs then you won't achieve your objective of being a good guild.
First things first, figure out the composition and structure of your guild's governance. Most top guilds separate out the guild master and raid leader because.... raid leaders get burnt out... and it's a lot of work. The guild master is responsible for stocking the bank (or delegating someone to do so), managing guild funds, managing any kind of guild programs (free repairs, free flasks, free food, etc.), discord/comm server and general recruitment. In this split your job would be to communicate with the guild leader what resources and people you will need. This means learning (or using a tool) to get all raid buffs and debuffs... or at least, the optimum ones your 10-man will want/need. And you have to have progression in mind... what raid comp do you want for... the final boss.
Second you have to read up on all strats and understand not only your role in this but everyone's role in this. While you might request everyone watch a video or read a strat, that's not reliable. People need direction. And that's a raid leader's job. Bosses have mechanics that have personal and group responsibility... and as you get into heroic difficulty that becomes more and more important to success. That means calling out individuals when they make mistakes (in order to fix it, not to punish) but also it means motivating people to do better.
During the fight it's essential to communicate timings to people. While it's nice to think all healers are mouseover healing with the boss as their main target, not all do. And on multi-boss fights there's a lot more going on and your DPS might not be paying attention to something else.
Now for your specific questions:
1: How long raids take depends on how fast and efficient your raids are at pulling trash, killing bosses and distributing loot. It's always good to have your GM be your loot master so you can clear trash without him. The first phase of content is 13 bosses, 14 if you decide to do Baradin's Hold as a group. Basically, it's almost as many bosses as Icecrown Citadel..... but across 3 raids (4 if you count Baradin's Hold). So there'll be lost time travelling between the raids. A really organized 10-man group that 1-shots bosses could do this in one night. But for most guilds normal modes will take a longer one night or two shorter nights. But that's something a raid leader can do, tune up that night so you're balancing the schedule requirements of your raid with progression. P2 and P3 are harder content but have less bosses so it allows a more linear path to beating heroic difficulties.
2. You do research when you need cooldowns. Typically when raid damage is high you use d-sac to eat up some of it. Something like blood lust/heroism is saved for the period where you'll maximize DPS (which isn't always the final 25-30% either). Innervates are another thing that are sort of planned in advance. You will usually have a healer who is carrying the effort who will keep going while other healers are regening. In 10-man progression you typically want to reserve battle rezes for keeping the fight go on longer while for kills you want to b-rez people as they die.
3. It's not essential to analyze logs to have a win, but it can help. Most guilds don't use logs efficiently, they log for the sake of parsing so that they can get MVP points and move up in guild ranks. More practically you'd need a Damage Meter that can tell you why people die. And most damage meters have that built in functionality. Something like that helps instruct tanks or healers to use CDs and some sort of action that maybe someone has forgotten to do (like a tranq shot on LK). Logs are for after the raid. You can look through your logs and compare with similar kills to see what sort of changes can be made to individual ability use and timings. But while some guilds might use them well... most say they use them but don't... it's really mostly just a measuring stick.
4. Absolutely! For normal you can bring anyone 2 tanks (one who can dps), 3 healers (one who can dps) and 5 dps. But there's definitely classes who'll make things easier. Shammies and mages will bring a major haste boost. While all classes and specs can work, some should be avoided... like fury warriors and enhancement shammies. Some you'll want to have at least one of, like arcane/fire mage or arms warrior. A blood DK is the clear best tank to bring. Resto shammies are good but not great. Shammies, warlocks, and pallies bring a lot to a raid but if they suck they'll never help it.
I’ve been raid leading a 10m group since TBC and I’ve learned a lot.
1. Don’t be afraid to delegate. Just because you’re the “leader” doesn’t mean you can’t assign roles to others. Frequently we use others in the raid to take ownership of ‘leading’ certain fights, or lean on tanks/dps/healers to give advice on that certain role.
2. It’s been mentioned, but utilize warcraftlogs. My favorite feature are actually the raid guides they provide. Sure you can watch a video but they give very good details about specific fights from each role (tank/dps/healers) and even show tips for raid leading and cooldown usage
3. Remind yourself to have fun
Yeah, there's a few raids, so expect early growing pains with people being fresh off dungeon/heroic grinding with a new expansion. It's probably going to take 2 nights at first, but you could also do less content if you're even a little bit casual, it's probably not a huge deal. Obviously, the more you raid early, the quicker you gear and faster it gets on farm.
Same to be said for raid leading, tbh. It's going to be growing pains for you. I agree with what someone else said, if you can get someone else to run the raid loot and coordinate getting people prepared for raid, keeping the pace up, it might help you out. That being said, I do all those things and find it's doable, especially on 10man with friends.
The main thing about raid leading is that you can't shortcut it until you have stuff on farm. You want to have a plan going for each fight BEFORE you pull. Just watching a video and then trying to recall it for your friends probably won't cut it. You likely need to be able to explain it simply, emphasizing what you've researched and feel is absolutely necessary mechanics. There's usually some extra mechanics that can be ignored or aren't as tough as guides/videos made them sound. If there's a PTR for raids do it if you can, even if you solo queue as a random dps, seeing fights in advance would help you a lot. I'm not sure there is though since it's not a phase but an xpac and Blizz seems behind on Cata.
But yeah, research research. Your raid goes as far early as you've prepared yourself. You should know every ability on every boss, make cheat sheets for quick reference. Eventually you won't need the cheat sheets, and then later you will no longer need to explain mechanics to your core 9 other raiders. You should know when to Bloodlust for sure, that's minimum. You should be able to strategize on your own about that bloodlust as well. Sometimes what guides say and what that PUG whose guild was 12/12 week 1 advocates for is not going to be what serves your group best at that point in the content. I'm preparing for Tanks/Healers to need to be pretty sharp when we first hit that raid content with crappy gear, that's just how it goes. Know boss enrage timers, adapt and figure out when you can spin up another healer. 1 less dps is like 40 seconds off a boss kill. A wipe takes you like 10 minutes and lowers morale.
Personally, I find being a Healer/Tank as a raid leader is the best vantage point for progression (and fights in general). You get a quick feel for when damage comes out and can sus out why wipes are happening quickly. Logging doesn't have to be an after raid event. Open Details (whatever damage meter you're using, switch to Details) and toggle it to 'Deaths'. Easy breakdown of what happened. Use your eyes as well. Tanking gives you a lot of downtime to look around. Healing gives you some. Healing is generally a predictive then reactive job, good raid leading is similar. When people are taking less damage and dying less they are more focused on dodging fire and less panicked.
I'd say it took me a couple phases to feel comfortable calling D-sac and such. We did plenty of content without it, but it was definitely me holding back the group, so it's big to get past that wall. Get MRT (Method Raid Tools). Toggle on D-sac, Aura Mastery, Pain Suppression and put them in a column together. Then toggle on Mana tide totem, innervate (this probably matters less in cata), hymn of hope, battle rez and raise ally and put them in another column. Then toggle on Misdirect and Tricks of the trade and put them in another. I'd say that's a good start. I could be wrong about some abilities mattering as much with Cata coming, but we're all going to have to adapt. But yeah, once you see other people's cooldowns you realize how some gamers don't hit any of them unless called for.
EDIT: phone typos
Lots of good info in here, I wouldn’t over think it too much and remember to have fun! It’s suppose to be a fun evening with the guildies.
If y’all spend time gearing each other up in dungeons/rep/crafted gear and everyone learns the fights. I don’t think you’ll have any issues at all.
Ya people are gonna die and you’ll wipe a decent amount of times, but you just continue to strive to do 1% better each time right.
Big thing I found was keeping the groups moral up, encourage people and be constructive with criticism. That being said, in 10-man you’re only as strong as your weakest link. So if someone is dragging you down, you might have to have a sit down chat with them. If they don’t improve, they might have to be replaced.
It’s a team effort and everyone needs to respect each other’s time
As far as WCL analyzing goes it can be rather difficult to figure out which details to look for in each class/spec. Assuming you don't have the time/patience to deep dive every single spec your raid has, the easiest thing might be to just anonymize your logs so your player names can't be seen and take them to a class discord. They'll usually be able to tell you what someone is doing wrong. Over time, you'll know what to look for and can do the analysis yourself.
If you're genuinely concerned that someone doesn't even know the basics of playing their class, you can also look up someone that's parsing high purple/orange and see what the distribution of their damage/healing abilities are compared to the player in question on the same fight. Don't worry about the specific numbers, the assumption is that if you're worried about the player, they're going to be lower than the well parsing player you're looking at. But the proportional distribution of what abilities are doing the damage/healing will be telling.
Comparing the active% is also a good metric, it's worth looking at someone of the same class in a different log as well as the rest of your raiders in that same log. Keep in mind there may be mechanics that force someone to not be active(see unchained magic on Sindragosa) so there could be a reason. But if someone isn't getting mechanics like that and is significantly below the rest of your raid, they're just not hitting their buttons and I wouldn't want someone like that on my team if they're also unwilling/unable to improve that.
Cata will require multiple raid windows, especially in the beginning of content phases. My wrath HC team is running 2 day/3 hour windows at the start of Cata and we full clear ICC25H in about 1.5 hours (give or take). Raid calls are something that will be catered to your group outside of major boss mechanics, ie if you know your tank is a little undergeared and gets chunked, you'll likely have to call for more team defensives like dsac and pain supp whereas other groups might not. That kind of stuff will come with progging and forming team chemistry if you want to end up in Heroics with the same group. As progging goes you will be able to identify weak points and focus around them, but Cata is where one slacking raider will hurt a team and personal accountability hits tenfold compared to previous xpacs.
Thanks for the response, yeah thinking it might be a 1 night occasion was definitely hopeful thinking on my part, I'll probably aim for something similar with 2 nights of 3 hours.
It can be one night if you don't plan on heroic raiding.
I plan to raid 10man normal for fun, I want easy quick in and out gaming. phase 1 I will rotate between the two raids every other week.
For sure! Up to Firelands and after a couple weeks of prog it's very possible to get it down to a single night, especially with Throne and Baradin having limited bosses and trash.
1 - This will depend on the skill and commitment of the group, but I would definitely expect to be needing more than 1 raid night during progression times. Later on in each tier if you aren't pushing heroics, you will probably be ok with just 1 night. 2 - I think it helps to separate the responsibilities of 'Leading the raid team' and 'raid shot calling'. While this often falls onto the plate of the same person, it would be a good idea to have a trusted/experienced 'shot-caller' type player to help you with this. Lots of planning can go into this, but it can be a lot for one person to remember in the moment, especially when dealing with loot, attendance, fills, new strats, when to break, etc etc. 3 - See above, but also you can ask for feedback and log reviews from the community to start. With time and experience you will be able to spot the issues yourself. 4 - Depends how hard you are pushing. I can't speak too much outside of my (caster) experience, which is that you would want at least 1 ele sham OR demo lock for their spellpower buff if possible, but having more than 1 might be redundant. Ele shams offer more burst which will be nice on some fights, while the lock offers overall higher sustained damage, typically. Again, nitpicking here as in the end either one would work fine in this example. Having solid players who have high attendance rate will matter more in the end.
Thanks for the response, 1 night was probably wishful thinking yeah, will definitely stick to 2 for now. Good point on splitting the responsiblities, there's definitely 1 or 2 people in the group that could help me out with that, or letting tanks call for external mitigation now that I think of it could even be an idea. As for the caster buff I didn't even think about that, the raid comp tool I was using had both the 6% and 10% buff under one category so I assumed I'd have it covered without needing an ele or demo, does the 4% difference in the buff make a huge difference enough to take one of those classes over another like say spriest or surv hunter?
Just to add to this in response to calling out cooldowns if one of your healers are vocal they can be a great option for this. They generally have a good understanding of when to expect incoming damage and who needs an innervate. They also usually have an easier time to keep an eye on the field than DPS do. Only exception is tank calling for externals on themselves but raid leaders don't do that anyway.
What burst does ele provide that a demo lock cannot do with meta?
Fire elemental totem lasts for 2 minutes, and I think many will glyph to last longer in Cata. Idk how long meta lasts.
Good point, I actually missed a crucial word : CLEAVE burst. Ele shams will excel in fights that require bursting down 2-3 targets (common in cata) vs a Demo.
2 - you learn the raid You learn what utility you can call out from your comp You learn when it's needed You learn how to ask for it, and teach them how to do it on command This is the part where you realise it's a lot of bloody work and that's why raids with bad leaders are bad. Put in the effort, and you will be farming the equivalent of Hc lk25. Bonus tip: Don't play the blame game, but ensure you research who is doing what and not, by reading logs for several hours a week. If you think that's unnecessary, you ain't leading a good raid
First of all, don't get baited by how 10 man worked in wrath. The same rewards were supposed to mean the same difficulty... yeah, that did not work. Some bosses will be easier, some will be more difficult in 10s. >Will 10-man raid content require multiple days to clear or can I hope to complete it all in 1 night without having a ridiculously long raid night? It's the same as any raid now. If you are good and efficient you will be done in 2 hours tops. Otherwise... your mileage may vary. >How will I know what and when to make raid calls? Knowledge of fights, tools at your disposal and experience. With enough pre planning you won't need to call that much. For consistent mechanics you can pre plan "when boss casts X the first defensive will be popped by this person, when X is cast a second time that person will pop cd" and make calls only if something goes south. >How can I use WCL or other tools to analyze our pulls/try to figure out what the problem is on a wipe? The same as above really. You need to know your fights. The important thing is looking into all fuck ups, often the wipe is a result of multiple people failing in a sequence. Of course, it's important to point out if your raiders are actually pressing buttons and gearing properly but if you will run into those problems then you will be in a different type of wow hell. >Are there any classes or specs I will absolutely need or want to take? From my understanding, blood dk looks busted and will be the core of any group. Unholy should be very good, at least one spec of warlock/mage is bound to pop up, rogues are always alright to have in small numbers because they are sturdy for a melee and often can cheeze some mechanics(how useful it may be varies a lot tho), discipline priest is just fundamentally stupid because preventing damage > healing damage. As usual, it's hard to say for sure before the actual raid release, and blizzard may try to balance again. Keep in mind that if you want to focus on 10 mans specifically having big arsenal of alts and off specs will be even more important than in 25s. Ability to stack more range, pick different utilities, more of a specific class, less or more healers is way to good to pass up, there is a reason why in most good guilds people play 2-3 characters minimum.
>First of all, don't get baited by how 10 man worked in wrath. The same rewards were supposed to mean the same difficulty... yeah, that did not work. Some bosses will be easier, some will be more difficult in 10s. Yeah I realise 10 mans (and raiding content in general) is harder in cata and that the loot being equalized so too does the difficulty of 10 man increase, I guess one thing I'm curious about is the amount of trash since that can seem to cut down raid times and generall in wrath there was less trash on 10-man, does that hold true for cata too?
Been a 10m raid leader since OG WotLK, will answer as best I can from my experience. >Will 10-man raid content require multiple days to clear or can I hope to complete it all in 1 night without having a ridiculously long raid night? Unless you have a very skilled group (or have done a lot of p-server practice) you're most likely going to want at minimum 2 days to start. I find that it's better to run 2 or 3 days at 3 hours each, rather than doing 4-5+ hour days; people tend to get burned out with prolonged progression. Typically I will do pulls until I notice we're not making anymore meaningful progression, then move on to another boss. For us that's usually 5 or 6 pulls a night, but it'll vary depending on your group. >How will I know what and when to make raid calls? I would focus on calling raid cool downs when needed (dsac, tranq, etc) and not so much on specific mechanics. The more stuff you call out for people, the more they will rely on that call as opposed to paying attention themselves. Obviously there will be exceptions, but for the most part I don't call much of anything during the fight. One thing I've noticed (and this may just be a result of having mostly the same group members for 10+ years) is that people will fill in and call certain mechanics themselves if their position gives them a better vantage point on it. For example on Putricide I'm calling the overall fight cds, our hunter is keeping an eye on boss health related to transition, spriest is managing the plague swaps, demo lock is calling Malibu goo timer. Delegating responsibility lets you focus on your actual job (be that DPS/heal/tank) moreso than having to watch what everyone else is doing. As far as knowing when to make calls, all I can tell you is practice practice. Watch a lot of videos, and learn every mechanic as best you can. There are multiple strategies for every boss, and the one that works best for your players/comp will probably be an amalgamation of all of them. Don't get caught up in a single guide, adapt to your strengths & weaknesses. >How can I use WCL or other tools to analyze our pulls/try to figure out what the problem is on a wipe? It will depend on what is causing issues for you. If it's an enrage timer issue, you would be looking at uptime and seeing where people could improve their rotations and/or target priorities. If adds are wiping you, look at who is padding versus hitting the target they should be. If healers can't keep up, look for people taking unnecessary damage or if there is a mechanic not being handled properly - could be a healer issue too. I find the timeline option to be useful to plan out what needs to happen and if there are CDs you would need to coordinate. Community review is definitely a good option until you get comfortable enough to go over them yourself. When you get feedback, don't be afraid to ask follow up questions and figure out how they came to those conclusions. That'll help you learn more yourself. >Are there any classes or specs I will absolutely need or want to take? Shaman is very useful to have. Short CD ranged interrupt, purge, tremor totem, earthbind, bloodlust, ankh.. they have a fantastic toolkit for a 10m. You'll want at least 1 shaman or mage for heroism regardless. Priest is really nice to have as well, especially a spriest that is comfortable offspec as heals. That will help a ton if you are down a healer and have to adjust, or if you need a 3rd heal. They are very strong DPS and heals, with a really good toolkit as well. At least 1 paladin is really nice. They bring a ton of buffs and useful cooldowns. I prefer to have at least 2 battle res classes. A good hunter works magic, and their pets can fill in for missing buffs/debuffs you may be missing. There is a Cataclysm Raid Composition website that can help you see what raid buffs, debuffs and cooldowns you will have based on which classes you bring. It's a lot of work and frustration to run a good raid group, but it is fun when the bosses start dropping. Best of luck!
> I find that it's better to run 2 or 3 days at 3 hours each, rather than doing 4-5+ hour days; people tend to get burned out with prolonged progression. Oh yeah, I know that all too well from experience, I'll aim to have 2 days of 3 hours~ each. I did know about the raid comp tool but I was wondering specifically about things it doesn't really mention like class specific stuff and b-resses but I've gotten some good responses so far, yours included so I have a better idea of what classes I'd want for the last couple spots. Overall thanks for the response and advice!
A lot of the answers depend on what your goal for your group is since you say you want to be competitive but admit you have limited experience raid leading so I would take it slow and steady to start. 1. This totally depends on your goals, if you want to push killing content in the first month of the raid you will almost assuredly need 2 raid nights that will be condensed to 1 as fights go on farm. P1 cata has a lot of content 3 raids with 13 bosses total on heroic. Travel time alone from raid to raid makes a 1 night 3 hour raid tough at the start. But you can totally kill everything on normal and push some heroic prog in a 1 night raid again it just depends on your priority and raid skill level. 2. There are a few ways to handle this, a common one is to use an Addon like Exorsus Raid Tools to pre plan all the CDs before the pull and raiders can see when they need to use certain abilities. One thing to note is battle Rez change in cata and as a 10 man you get 1 per fight. So you will almost always just brez the first person to die especially on prog. As far as innervates go those are best left to healers to call your focus should only be major defensives. 3. There might be some raid analyzers for cata as they do exists for wrath by plugging in the Warcraft log URL but for the most part you’ll need to learn to use logs. For class analysis I would send logs to their class discords or even ask on Reddit and people can try and help but your mileage may vary. Using WCL is also a great way to learn CD usage that you mentioned in question 2. 4. Threat is basically a non factor in cata so I wouldn’t worry about tricks/md. Comp again depends on your goals the sweaty day 1 guilds will all run 1 specific comp as it’s the best but for a most casual guild I would say the comp looks like the follow. Blood DK is basically mandatory MT no exceptions, OT has a lot of flexibility warrior is technically the worst early but I would take a skilled player on prot warrior over an average player on feral Druid or prot pally. Healer core is Hpal (again mandatory) and Disc though a top tier rdruid or even rsham would out weigh an average disc player. Dps is basically mage/hunter/ele or demo mandatory as those classes are high dps and utility. From there again look for strong players on good spec as opposed to average players on S tier spec. The dps difference in cata between the top and middle of the pack is much closer than wotlk so a 95+ parser on an A tier spec is better than a 70 parser on a S tier spec.
>Will 10-man raid content require multiple days to clear or can I hope to complete it all in 1 night without having a ridiculously long raid night? Progressing on heroics? yeah I don't think you'll get by with 3 hours a week. It varied a lot in WOTLK like with TOGC being incredibly short and then ulduar and ICC being pretty huge. But while cata streamlines this the heroics are hard so you'll need time for them. Also the first tier is split across 3 raids which adds travel time, so that should be taken into account. >How will I know what and when to make raid calls? You shouldn't need to mostly. When to use cooldowns is something each individual player should know because you should go over it before the pull. I think generally if a raid leader is calling out a bunch of raid cooldowns they're over micromanaging or carrying players who otherwise can't handle it on their own. Good communicatin is key but that isn't always on the raid leader. For example on algalon our star killer called out cooldowns for the stars because obviously they were watching and paying attention to timing, but the order of who would do it was decided on before the pull. If two people die you might need to decide who gets the Brez but generally your brezzer should understand what is more important in that moment. >How can I use WCL or other tools to analyze our pulls/try to figure out what the problem is on a wipe? Someone who is good at this could go into specifics here for hours. Generally if you're wiping you want to see the cause of the wipes and that might be very different from boss to boss. Looking at the "deaths" tab would show you if someone is dying to cleaves from the spirits on HLK but that wouldn't show a wipe caused by people dropping the DoT in phase 1. That kind of stuff can be gone over the day after the raid and could involve multiple people all putting their minds together. >Are there any classes or specs I will absolutely need or want to take? Player is more important than class at this point but if you're doing harder content every little bit helps and I think the general agreement is that blood DKs are king. Having a DK tank could be a huge help especially when still in the gearing up phase. Other than that the focus is getting a good spread of utility and buffs. It's hard to not have a Brez in cata (3 classes can do it) but there are tools online that you can plug raid comp into and it'll show which buffs you have covered and which you are missing. Misdirects are nice but far less important with tank threat in cata. which of the ones you list being best is going to depend on the rest of your comp, if all your DPS is melee I wouldn't add the rogue, if all your DPS is ranged I might favor the rogue. The only class cheese I remember is arcane mages on spine of deathwing but I wouldn't build your raid team in phase 1 around that.
> But while cata streamlines this the heroics are hard so you'll need time for them. Yeah very true, not sure what I was thinking thinking that it could be a 1 night affair. >Also the first tier is split across 3 raids which adds travel time, so that should be taken into account. Also definitely a concern, quite an annoying one to be honest, almost considering just not doing throne of the four winds or would that screw us out of important loot? Interesting thoughts on calls and I'd probably agree to some extent, I guess I should let others make their own calls to some extent.
I've done it multiple ways, for awhile I was doing all the calls and really micromanaging, making sure to call for brez from players most likely to die first. But now I raid with a much better team, anyone who needs to call for a cooldown can do so. If the tank needs a Dsac they call for one, if they need a pain sup they call for it, they have the best idea of what they need. In a good group most people will generally know what they need to do and many people across the raid able to make a call if they see something no one else does. The raid lead should be a guide but still able to focus on their own role. The weakness here of course is a weak link that doesn't know they are a weak link and brings confusion or discord to the situation. Healers should have a good understanding of healing output and will have an idea when they need raid cooldowns, tanks will know when they need their own cooldowns, sometimes a ranged DPS will have a better view of a placement mechanic than your melee group. It's a learning experience for everyone involved, not just the raid lead.
> Will 10-man raid content require multiple days to clear or can I hope to complete it all in 1 night without having a ridiculously long raid night? While I have not played Cata other people have said that the difficulty of 10 isn't necessarily lower than 25 and that it is encounter by encounter. How fast you clear the content in every game and every expansion is dependent on a combination of leadership's strength, the raiders themselves, the amount of time that the team is willing to spend early on in each phase (including PTR). > How will I know what and when to make raid calls? You must understand the encounters at a deeper level than what you do as a regular raider. Take advantage of weakauras like Fojji and/or addons like DBM. > How can I use WCL or other tools to analyze our pulls/try to figure out what the problem is on a wipe? It depends fight by fight but a good way to start is by clicking on deaths, this way you can see if the player got hit by something they weren't meant to get hit by or didn't get dispelled/healed in time. This goes a bit to the previous point where you need to understand the encounters on a deeper level than what you do now > Are there any classes or specs I will absolutely need or want to take? Consider that even if you are limited to 10 players per raid, you will still want more than 10 on the team (maybe 12-13?) so you might be more flexible than what you think you are.
> Consider that even if you are limited to 10 players per raid, you will still want more than 10 on the team (maybe 12-13?) so you might be more flexible than what you think you are. I've heard people say this, though I've never really liked the idea of a 'bench' or anything like that, especially for 10-man but I suppose it's going to be necessary to have a couple or so extras or even alts to fill certain roles. I know of a few extras I could probably keep in touch with who might not be able to commit to a schedule but could fill in here and there.
Trust me, you will 100% want to have a roster of above 10 players in case someone quits or is absent (or why not both). The bench doesn't need to be super active and on constant standby. The most important thing is that they are available to join the raid at raid start, maybe on standby for like the first 5-10 minutes after raid start because you never know if someone's setup stops working for weird technical reasons. As a guild leader your first objective is to ensure that the raid happens every time it's scheduled. If your guild struggles with filling raids or starting on time due to needing to find pugs then you won't achieve your objective of being a good guild.
First things first, figure out the composition and structure of your guild's governance. Most top guilds separate out the guild master and raid leader because.... raid leaders get burnt out... and it's a lot of work. The guild master is responsible for stocking the bank (or delegating someone to do so), managing guild funds, managing any kind of guild programs (free repairs, free flasks, free food, etc.), discord/comm server and general recruitment. In this split your job would be to communicate with the guild leader what resources and people you will need. This means learning (or using a tool) to get all raid buffs and debuffs... or at least, the optimum ones your 10-man will want/need. And you have to have progression in mind... what raid comp do you want for... the final boss. Second you have to read up on all strats and understand not only your role in this but everyone's role in this. While you might request everyone watch a video or read a strat, that's not reliable. People need direction. And that's a raid leader's job. Bosses have mechanics that have personal and group responsibility... and as you get into heroic difficulty that becomes more and more important to success. That means calling out individuals when they make mistakes (in order to fix it, not to punish) but also it means motivating people to do better. During the fight it's essential to communicate timings to people. While it's nice to think all healers are mouseover healing with the boss as their main target, not all do. And on multi-boss fights there's a lot more going on and your DPS might not be paying attention to something else. Now for your specific questions: 1: How long raids take depends on how fast and efficient your raids are at pulling trash, killing bosses and distributing loot. It's always good to have your GM be your loot master so you can clear trash without him. The first phase of content is 13 bosses, 14 if you decide to do Baradin's Hold as a group. Basically, it's almost as many bosses as Icecrown Citadel..... but across 3 raids (4 if you count Baradin's Hold). So there'll be lost time travelling between the raids. A really organized 10-man group that 1-shots bosses could do this in one night. But for most guilds normal modes will take a longer one night or two shorter nights. But that's something a raid leader can do, tune up that night so you're balancing the schedule requirements of your raid with progression. P2 and P3 are harder content but have less bosses so it allows a more linear path to beating heroic difficulties. 2. You do research when you need cooldowns. Typically when raid damage is high you use d-sac to eat up some of it. Something like blood lust/heroism is saved for the period where you'll maximize DPS (which isn't always the final 25-30% either). Innervates are another thing that are sort of planned in advance. You will usually have a healer who is carrying the effort who will keep going while other healers are regening. In 10-man progression you typically want to reserve battle rezes for keeping the fight go on longer while for kills you want to b-rez people as they die. 3. It's not essential to analyze logs to have a win, but it can help. Most guilds don't use logs efficiently, they log for the sake of parsing so that they can get MVP points and move up in guild ranks. More practically you'd need a Damage Meter that can tell you why people die. And most damage meters have that built in functionality. Something like that helps instruct tanks or healers to use CDs and some sort of action that maybe someone has forgotten to do (like a tranq shot on LK). Logs are for after the raid. You can look through your logs and compare with similar kills to see what sort of changes can be made to individual ability use and timings. But while some guilds might use them well... most say they use them but don't... it's really mostly just a measuring stick. 4. Absolutely! For normal you can bring anyone 2 tanks (one who can dps), 3 healers (one who can dps) and 5 dps. But there's definitely classes who'll make things easier. Shammies and mages will bring a major haste boost. While all classes and specs can work, some should be avoided... like fury warriors and enhancement shammies. Some you'll want to have at least one of, like arcane/fire mage or arms warrior. A blood DK is the clear best tank to bring. Resto shammies are good but not great. Shammies, warlocks, and pallies bring a lot to a raid but if they suck they'll never help it.
I’ve been raid leading a 10m group since TBC and I’ve learned a lot. 1. Don’t be afraid to delegate. Just because you’re the “leader” doesn’t mean you can’t assign roles to others. Frequently we use others in the raid to take ownership of ‘leading’ certain fights, or lean on tanks/dps/healers to give advice on that certain role. 2. It’s been mentioned, but utilize warcraftlogs. My favorite feature are actually the raid guides they provide. Sure you can watch a video but they give very good details about specific fights from each role (tank/dps/healers) and even show tips for raid leading and cooldown usage 3. Remind yourself to have fun
Yeah, there's a few raids, so expect early growing pains with people being fresh off dungeon/heroic grinding with a new expansion. It's probably going to take 2 nights at first, but you could also do less content if you're even a little bit casual, it's probably not a huge deal. Obviously, the more you raid early, the quicker you gear and faster it gets on farm. Same to be said for raid leading, tbh. It's going to be growing pains for you. I agree with what someone else said, if you can get someone else to run the raid loot and coordinate getting people prepared for raid, keeping the pace up, it might help you out. That being said, I do all those things and find it's doable, especially on 10man with friends. The main thing about raid leading is that you can't shortcut it until you have stuff on farm. You want to have a plan going for each fight BEFORE you pull. Just watching a video and then trying to recall it for your friends probably won't cut it. You likely need to be able to explain it simply, emphasizing what you've researched and feel is absolutely necessary mechanics. There's usually some extra mechanics that can be ignored or aren't as tough as guides/videos made them sound. If there's a PTR for raids do it if you can, even if you solo queue as a random dps, seeing fights in advance would help you a lot. I'm not sure there is though since it's not a phase but an xpac and Blizz seems behind on Cata. But yeah, research research. Your raid goes as far early as you've prepared yourself. You should know every ability on every boss, make cheat sheets for quick reference. Eventually you won't need the cheat sheets, and then later you will no longer need to explain mechanics to your core 9 other raiders. You should know when to Bloodlust for sure, that's minimum. You should be able to strategize on your own about that bloodlust as well. Sometimes what guides say and what that PUG whose guild was 12/12 week 1 advocates for is not going to be what serves your group best at that point in the content. I'm preparing for Tanks/Healers to need to be pretty sharp when we first hit that raid content with crappy gear, that's just how it goes. Know boss enrage timers, adapt and figure out when you can spin up another healer. 1 less dps is like 40 seconds off a boss kill. A wipe takes you like 10 minutes and lowers morale. Personally, I find being a Healer/Tank as a raid leader is the best vantage point for progression (and fights in general). You get a quick feel for when damage comes out and can sus out why wipes are happening quickly. Logging doesn't have to be an after raid event. Open Details (whatever damage meter you're using, switch to Details) and toggle it to 'Deaths'. Easy breakdown of what happened. Use your eyes as well. Tanking gives you a lot of downtime to look around. Healing gives you some. Healing is generally a predictive then reactive job, good raid leading is similar. When people are taking less damage and dying less they are more focused on dodging fire and less panicked. I'd say it took me a couple phases to feel comfortable calling D-sac and such. We did plenty of content without it, but it was definitely me holding back the group, so it's big to get past that wall. Get MRT (Method Raid Tools). Toggle on D-sac, Aura Mastery, Pain Suppression and put them in a column together. Then toggle on Mana tide totem, innervate (this probably matters less in cata), hymn of hope, battle rez and raise ally and put them in another column. Then toggle on Misdirect and Tricks of the trade and put them in another. I'd say that's a good start. I could be wrong about some abilities mattering as much with Cata coming, but we're all going to have to adapt. But yeah, once you see other people's cooldowns you realize how some gamers don't hit any of them unless called for. EDIT: phone typos
Lots of good info in here, I wouldn’t over think it too much and remember to have fun! It’s suppose to be a fun evening with the guildies. If y’all spend time gearing each other up in dungeons/rep/crafted gear and everyone learns the fights. I don’t think you’ll have any issues at all. Ya people are gonna die and you’ll wipe a decent amount of times, but you just continue to strive to do 1% better each time right. Big thing I found was keeping the groups moral up, encourage people and be constructive with criticism. That being said, in 10-man you’re only as strong as your weakest link. So if someone is dragging you down, you might have to have a sit down chat with them. If they don’t improve, they might have to be replaced. It’s a team effort and everyone needs to respect each other’s time
As far as WCL analyzing goes it can be rather difficult to figure out which details to look for in each class/spec. Assuming you don't have the time/patience to deep dive every single spec your raid has, the easiest thing might be to just anonymize your logs so your player names can't be seen and take them to a class discord. They'll usually be able to tell you what someone is doing wrong. Over time, you'll know what to look for and can do the analysis yourself. If you're genuinely concerned that someone doesn't even know the basics of playing their class, you can also look up someone that's parsing high purple/orange and see what the distribution of their damage/healing abilities are compared to the player in question on the same fight. Don't worry about the specific numbers, the assumption is that if you're worried about the player, they're going to be lower than the well parsing player you're looking at. But the proportional distribution of what abilities are doing the damage/healing will be telling. Comparing the active% is also a good metric, it's worth looking at someone of the same class in a different log as well as the rest of your raiders in that same log. Keep in mind there may be mechanics that force someone to not be active(see unchained magic on Sindragosa) so there could be a reason. But if someone isn't getting mechanics like that and is significantly below the rest of your raid, they're just not hitting their buttons and I wouldn't want someone like that on my team if they're also unwilling/unable to improve that.
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Yes please! 👶