Raiding and New Members

Dev Null is currently focusing on heroic Hellfire Citadel. Due to the increased difficulty of these raids, we ask new members of Dev Null to first join us on normal HC boss kills. We currently do normal boss kills on the following nights:

Wednesday: normal Mannoroth and Archimonde, prior to switching to Heroic. Saturday: Full normal HC run, for alts and new members.

Raid Signups

Dev Null uses a heavily customized version of phpraid to manage raid signups and invites.

We attempt to schedule raids approximately one week in advance.

In order to sign up for raids, you must have an account on this website, and add characters to your profile.

When you sign up for a raid, you have a few things to do:

• Select Prefer for any characters you'd be equally happy to bring
• Select "Good" for any characters you are willing to bring if necessary to make an effective raid
• Select the left-most radio button next to the character you are most likely to bring. For instance, if you are usually the tank, but happy to bring a warlock, you should select "Prefer" for both, then the left-most radio button for the tank, so we see the tank's name in the approvals list.
• Please use the Comments field to give us any additional information that will help us to properly form the raid.

You can never give us too much information in the "Comments" field. Information such as your chance of attendance (e.g. "RL may interfere, 75% chance of showing up") is particularly welcome.

Cancellations

You may cancel a signup at any time, even after approvals, if you discover you can't attend. There is never any penalty for cancellation before raid time.

It's very helpful to us if you cancel or add a comment when you may not be able to make a raid.  We will never replace an approved player who has simply added a comment, it just gives us a chance to line up an alternate.  In fact, if you do let us know you will be a few minutes late, we will sometimes hold your spot until the first bit of trash is dead (this is not guaranteed!). We do tend to reduce invites for people who repeatedly fail to show up without a word.

Raid Approvals

The raid approval process takes place in our open "Raid Approvals" forum which all guild members may read. When approvals are finalized they are posted to phpraid.

Raid approvals take place the day before the raid. They may be posted any time between noon server and raid pull time on that day. For example, a raid scheduled for 8pm July 4th will have approvals posted between 12pm and 8pm on July 3rd.

Once approved you are guaranteed a raid invite if you are online during the invite period. We typically schedule raid invite times 15 minutes before raid pull times. Typically no later than 5 minutes before the scheduled pull time late characters will be replaced from the queue. Bear in mind, however, that nothing is guaranteed if your approved character is not online at invite time. If you know you will be running late by a few minutes it is helpful to include that information in the Comments field when you sign up.

We track people who are sat during raid approvals to make sure no one person gets sat too often compared to everyone else. If you sign up for a raid after the end of approvals (raid pull time on the day before) you will not be considered "sat" for this purpose but may still be drawn upon to replace late cancellations or substitute for characters who do not show.

Sometimes a character will be "sat with cause" which indicates for one reason or another that they are not prepared for raiding. If you are sat for cause you are not given additional priority for future raids like people who are sat because of the number of signups. Officers and other guild members are always happy to work with you to correct any deficiencies (typically problems with gearing) that are preventing your approval for raids -- we want everyone to get a chance to raid!

Raid Approval Process

Our policy for raid approvals is as follows:

1. All eligible raiders who signed up before approvals began start with equal priority.
2. People who have had frequent recent raid attendance will have lower priority  than people who have signed up but been sat.
3. People with poor raiding habits (see Raiding) may take lower priority than people with good habits for some raids.
4. Raid composition requirements affect approvals.
5. Officers have final discretion on raid approvals.

If you have ANY questions about approvals please don't hesitate to contact an officer.

Raid Invites

Raid invitation periods are part of each raid's information on phpraid. Typically the invitation period begins 15 minutes before pull time.

At 5 minutes to pull time no-shows will be replaced with appropriate toons if possible. We draw first on queued players and then if necessary on in-guild pickups. We do track no-shows. While real life always takes precedence, if at all possible please cancel your signup rather than simply failing to attend.

In some cases we have the flexibility to allow certain players to show up late for a raid. For example a DPS toon who will be delayed until 5 minutes after pull and states as much in their signup comments may be granted leeway and their spot left unfilled while the raid works on initial trash. Such accommodations are at the discretion of the officers leading the raid.

We expect raid members to be inside the instance and prepared for the first pull at pull time.

Item Level Requirements

You must have a minimum equipped item level to participate in some raids. For Warlords of Draenor, our requirements are:

1. Normal iLevel: 660
2. Heroic iLevel: 680