Introduction

The guild I was a member of in EverQuest was a ‘family’ guild, as they were known.  It existed for social reasons and to allow us to enjoy the group/casual element of the game.  We were also friends with a few other guilds in a similar position.  The thing with EverQuest is that it sucked you in, and so a few of us, starting small, began raiding things with a small alliance of guilds.  Over time the raids grew, but we prided ourselves on casual raiding, we enforced as few rules as possible and we avoided big raid style loot management (DKP).

We ended up beating some of the toughest content in the game, and boy, did we have fun.  These posts are random memories I have about raiding in EverQuest, both with my own raid team and with other raid guilds and alliances.

Burn!

My first experience of large scale raiding in EverQuest was with the Blood & Guts guild.  They were in a raid team formed from two European guilds so they raided pretty much in my timezone.  I’d had almost no raid experience, joined them with my wizard, and went on a learning curve that looked more like a cliff.  As a wizard, my role was simple.

• don’t die
• don’t get anyone else killed
• don’t break mezz
• nuke the mobs until they’re dead

This should be pretty easy, and to be fair, it’s one of the easiest raid roles in EverQuest.  One of the most colourful raid leaders with Blood & Guts was Kasstou.  I was always amazed that one German guild and one French guild used English as the primary language in their raids, which certainly made it easier for me, but must have made it a nightmare for them.  Not only were they typing in a foreign language, but they were doing so in a high stress environment trying to convey critical information.

Anyway, Kasstou had a habit of shouting ‘burn’ into the raid channel.  Here’s a few examples,

[Sun Jul 11 23:17:37 2004] Kasstou tells the raid,  'BURN HIM'
[Sun Jul 11 23:56:41 2004] Kasstou tells the raid,  'BURN INNO DOWN'
[Sun Jul 18 20:17:30 2004] Kasstou tells the raid,  'ok disc burn'
[Sun Jul 18 21:11:01 2004] Kasstou tells the raid,  'BURN NOW'
[Sun Jul 18 23:23:43 2004] Kasstou tells the raid,  'BURN LIKE HELLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL'
[Sun Jul 25 20:56:40 2004] Kasstou tells the raid,  'DISC BURN KILL FASTTTTTT'

This used to frustrate me, because calling for burn suggested I hadn’t been trying to do as much DPS as I could have, the rest of the time.  I was a conscientious wizard, I was always trying to ride that line between aggro and DPS, I was always burning!  Once or twice I even complained about this to fellow group members.

When I started co-running my own raids, however, all that moaning went out of the window.  It became obvious very quickly that sometimes, you needed a single word to inspire greatness in your raid team, to elevate them to greater heights of damage.  At those times, BURN was the right choice, and so over time, I found myself using it more and more as we raided!

Reading back these log entries, even now, reminds me of the events, the mobs and the people involved in raiding in EverQuest, I miss you all, they were good times!

So, for your nostalgic pleasure, Grayhelm calls BURN!

Simple Burns

[Sat Jul 02 22:41:40 2005] You tell your raid, 'BURN NOW'
[Sat Jun 04 23:47:56 2005] You tell your raid, 'burninate'
[Sun Aug 14 00:03:55 2005] You tell your raid, 'burn dis nuke whatever'
[Thu Oct 20 21:08:39 2005] You tell your raid, 'BURN HIM ALL OUT'
[Wed Mar 22 20:39:59 2006] You tell your raid, 'WE CAN DO IT BURN BURN BURN'
[Wed Apr 05 20:28:33 2006] You tell your raid, 'DISC BURN NUKERISE'
[Thu Aug 24 22:13:13 2006] You tell your raid, 'BURN BURN BURN BURN'
[Sat Feb 02 22:51:35 2008] You tell your raid, 'more burn'
[Sat Jul 12 21:49:05 2008] You tell your raid, 'ok mini burn on Emperor Draygun, the Lich King'

Urgent Burns

[Sun Jan 28 00:27:06 2007] You tell your raid, 'BURN COME ON YOU CAN DO IT'
[Sun Mar 26 02:46:07 2006] You tell your raid, 'BURN THE FUCKER'
[Sat Sep 08 20:22:42 2007] You tell your raid, 'ALL GO BURN KILL SHOUT THROW THINGS DIE DIE KITE DOOM DEATH GO'
[Sun Dec 11 00:06:25 2005] You tell your raid, 'OH NO UNIVERSAL CHAT DOWN - BURN Velitorkin'
[Sun Mar 11 00:09:10 2007] You tell your raid, '30 seconds MORE BURN'
[Sat May 20 23:10:59 2006] You tell your raid, 'DISC BURN - throw laundry'
[Thu Aug 24 22:14:30 2006] You tell your raid, 'burn him - use harsh words'
[Sat Jan 13 20:44:10 2007] You tell your raid, 'Full burn - all discs go go go'
[Sat Jun 09 23:34:53 2007] You tell your raid, 'BURN with ANYTHING YOU HAVE'
[Sat Sep 01 21:51:08 2007] You tell your raid, 'BURN clerics light on mana'
[Sat May 10 23:23:03 2008] You tell your raid, 'Burn hard, Burn early, Burn often'

Anatomical Burns

[Sat Aug 27 22:05:21 2005] You tell your raid, 'burn his ass'

Directional Burns

[Sat Sep 29 21:28:34 2007] You tell your raid, 'BURN MY MOB'
[Sat Sep 29 21:29:04 2007] You tell your raid, 'burn east'
[Sat Sep 29 21:30:34 2007] You tell your raid, 'BURN WEST'
[Sat Nov 10 21:03:01 2007] You tell your raid, 'BURN SOUTH NOW'

Complex Burns

[Sat Aug 27 23:33:09 2005] You tell your raid, 'BURN TT - KITE ADDS'
[Sat Feb 10 22:02:59 2007] You tell your raid, 'GO GO BURN KITE KITE BURN KITE'
[Sat Mar 24 19:57:05 2007] You tell your raid, 'BURN DO NOT PUSH BURN BURN BURN'
[Sat Jun 02 23:49:19 2007] You tell your raid, 'Full swarm pets - burn burn burn etc.'

Exasperated Burns

[Sat Aug 20 22:24:37 2005] You tell your raid, 'BURN FFS ARGH - when you see that, go full DPS'
[Sun Sep 11 00:44:02 2005] You tell your raid, 'for gods sake BURN'
[Sun Jan 28 00:24:40 2007] You tell your raid, 'BURN Innoruuk ffs'
[Sat Jul 14 22:02:10 2007] You tell your raid, 'If you have Endurance left - WHY? BURN DISCS NOW'
[Sat Jul 21 22:15:06 2007] You tell your raid, 'If you have ENDURANCE LEFT - ask yourself WHY - BURN THIS MOB'
[Sat Oct 13 21:04:59 2007] You tell your raid, 'someone burn south ffs'
[Sat Dec 01 23:57:55 2007] You tell your raid, 'health going up? BURN'

Polite Burns

[Sat Mar 10 22:27:04 2007] You tell your raid, 'BURN Tqiv Araxt the Enraged please someone'
[Sat Sep 15 23:50:16 2007] You tell your raid, 'ok someone burn this thing to the ground please'

Inverted Burns

[Sat Oct 29 22:17:02 2005] You tell your raid, 'control your aggro this is not a burn competition'
[Sat Sep 29 21:21:50 2007] You tell your raid, 'slow burn'

Pre-emptive Burns

[Sat Aug 11 20:35:03 2007] You tell your raid, 'remember - full burn from the outset - dying with any mana or endurance is a waste'
[Sat May 21 20:38:49 2005] You tell your raid, 'and from 90% you go full burn and nuke the fucker into the ground without mercy'

Complacent Burns

[Mon Oct 29 20:38:21 2007] You tell your raid, 'Grats Burn - loot up'

Apocalyptic Burns

[Sat Nov 27 21:33:32 2004] You tell your raid, 'burn disc or it's all over'

Burns Which Could Be Misunderstood

[Sat Mar 15 20:31:09 2008] You tell your raid, 'burn the cat'

Wrong Burns

[Mon Apr 07 21:16:07 2008] You tell your raid, 'electrical burning smell here, if we go LD,send fire engines'
[Sat May 31 23:16:18 2008] You tell your raid, 'Burn SIDDHAYA'

And finally, When Burns Go Bad

[Sat Mar 15 22:02:19 2008] You tell your raid, 'there will be NO BURN call - we CONTROL this fight all the way through'
and then
[Sat Mar 15 23:27:53 2008] You tell your raid, 'FULL BURN Emperor Draygun, the Lich King DOTS and SWARM PETS GO'