The murlocs, a history

About two years ago, Cardinal and I were questing on our lowbie prot warrior/feral druid combo in Hillsbrad. We were collecting murloc heads along the shore north of Southshore when we accidentally aggroed a pack of murlocs. Bear in mind this was during vanilla WoW, with two untwinked alts (it's one of our alting rules - only gear upgrades from drops, quest rewards and to some extent professions) - a pack of anything larger than 3 mobs was near certain death. We had nearly finished fighting the added pack when one ran off and fetched another two adds. After what felt like a ten-minute epic fight they stopped coming at us, and when the dustclouds settled there were six murloc corpses on the shore and we were both within a sliver of our lives! It felt momentous - we hadn't run away from the adds, but decided to stay and fight and we'd LIVED! So it seemed appropriate to let some of the adrenaline out with a big yelling out of "SIX MURLOCS!".

That became our battle cry - after that fight, whenever we somehow miraculously survived a bad pull, or fought an addtrain and lived, the yell of "Six murlocs!" would be heard in the zone. When we got to 60 we started gathering a small group of friends, to do Scholo/Strat/DM/BRS with. Our channel was called after our battle cry and soon we started referring to one another as Murlocs. Comically enough, our achilles heel always seemed to be running out after a successful six-murloc event.. We'd successfully 3-man an instance, but then decide to run out instead of hearthing - then aggroed a group of adds we forgot we'd left standing, who then proceeded to chase us out in a long loltrain, normally ganking us with the entrance portal in sight... XD

When we returned to WoW in the middle of 2008, Cardinal decided he wanted to run a raidgroup. It seemed natural to call it after our old group and our nemeses, the murlocs. And so, WMD was born...

Incidentally, I've dubbed the murloc healers Team Oracle inspired by countless murloc oracles that roam Azeroth, with their annoying healing spells and their love for running off and chain healing each other. It's kinda cheesy but fitting, imo. I think our tanks and dps could use a name too - this wowwiki page has a lot of murloc names that you can use for inspiration: http://www.wowwiki.com/Category:Murlocs - Tide-Lords, Marauders, Coastrunners, etc

Nightcrawler special ops reporting for duty! How about Murloc Guardiansfor Tanks? There's many that could be used for DPS team, Coastrunner seems as good a choice as any.

Regarding the story, its a lovely reminder of how with the right company and attitudes, what's seemingly impossible can be achieved. It kinda sums up some of the best experiences I've had in the years of playing on ER, and certainly fits so perfectly for the fantastic group you guys have created and work hard to continue for all our enjoyment. So cheers for that

Pryn

It was Marveen who put the seed in my head to make a raid group. I didn't want to do it, I thought it'd be too much stress and bother, but I had the ideas.

Nobody wanted to raid at the end of TBC. Karazhan was old news to most Guilds and people were hibernating until WotLK came out, so when I heard you could see all content as a 10-man raid group, I gave in.

The name was a twist on the movie Where Eagles Dare, with one word replaced, and when I figured out the pun that left, it was the winner!

At the start, all I did was recruit, recruit, recruit. Anybody who could survive a heroic was in.

The real stroke of luck was PUGing with a warrior named Enthesilea, who happened to be a good friend of Taqwa and Derky. Together those 3 formed a solid core to the group. Balgarim, Akari, Faehla all came from PUGs. Dahlaine and Li came from Balgarim's little black book of names. We've been very lucky at finding people.

We have had a few growing pains, and I've made some mistakes as leader, but on the whole I think we've grown closer. I love WMD and I never thought I'd have a raid group I could like, let alone love, being in.

I look forward to Ulduar for the main reason of killing (or wiping) on new bosses with 9 other people I actually like, which was the original goal all along.

This is quite interesting reading for me, as I only recently joined (although I already feel like I've been here forever). Since I missed the early chain of events that led to the creation of WMD, it's nice to know how this whole organization came about. When I joined, you guys had already taken care of the worst bits of wiping and learning the bosses, which sometimes have meant that I felt like harvesting the fruit of your efforts. Now that Ulduar is on the doorstep, I hope that I in some way can contribute to the learning curve (and the inevitable wipes).

Personally, I can't believe my luck that I came to be in this raid group. Joining that CoT:Stratholme-PuG is the best thing that has yet happened to me in WotLK. It was everything I was looking for: Not too hardcore, but still striving to maximize its potential. I'd like to take this chance to thank everyone who made it possible for me to get this opportunity - it truly has made the last couple of months in World of Warcraft worthwhile. At the moment, WMD is everything that keeps me in the game. I simply love this community and I've never before, in any other raidgroup, signed up for raids just because I really wanted to.

I look forward to Ulduar for the main reason of killing (or wiping) on new bosses with 9 other people I actually like, which was the original goal all along.

I'm gonna second that motion. Oh, and there was something else I wanted to comment on... Right! The feedback threads: The one who came up with those is an effin' genious, I have never seen that before in any raidgroup (Maybe I've just been in some weird groups...).

P.S. I wanna join the Nightcrawler crew!

Feel the love <3

A very interesting read indeed. Leveling alongside Balgarim and hearing that he knew a competent tank and healer to do those progression dungeons with was great news. I'd stayed well clear of raids or even dungeons before WOTLK and it was wonderful to be in a group that was so friendly. And then to find out after joining the raid group itself that anyone within it was just as friendly as well was just an added bonus!

Like Akari and Card have said it's nice to be in a raid group of friends, where even though we're only a small group of people we progress and have a laugh while doing it.

Can't wait for Ulduar.

/sign for Murloc Coastrunner.

Nice story!
I sense a lot of awesomeness in WMD, even though I just recently joined.