How I work the loot council system.

If you need help on getting setup with lootcouncil.com try this how-to http://www.lootcouncil.com/gettingStarted.php.

If you're considering loot council but not really sure how to use it ... read on! Like everything on this site, I review and redo things as quickly as possible. Please note this will likely be updated as weeks go by!

Running a raid can be a challenging proposition. When you have to manage loot council issues on top of it, you may find it to even become a bit overwhelming. I currently have a pretty polished process that works well if your loot council stays on top of the issues. I'll try to add some options for you in my explanation so you can get an idea of how you may wish to tailor things to suit your guild. OH, and if you do deviate, please tell us how you work your system!

How we setup our loot council:
You must make sure your loot council is fair and knowledgeable. If your members don't trust your council, this system will fail. You have to be fair and be ready to support the decisions of your loot council with understanding, reasoning and patience. Raiders will become upset at some point, be prepared for it not surprised. Try to find people who understand loot and what classes it typically belongs to. Try to have an odd number of people on the council, my personal opinion is five = win.

How I explain loot council is a better system:
This all depends on your guild. At the end of the day, for me, it helps me get more loot out to raiders who can use it. No matter what type of DKP system you have, people will eventually not bid on items because it's only a slight upgrade. It may also be for a second set, let's say a pure MP5-less set for General Vezax for example. We are also able to put items in the hands of players who will best use them. Letting this be decided by DKP numbers alone is all too often not going to be the best for your raid. While this is not a big issue at a player by player level, when you compound it over weeks of raiding your guild suffers. Using this website helps you publish how your council hands out loot and gives percentages that can be worked very similar to DKP. If you want to try to replicate some of the beneifts of DKP (there are many) there are creative ways to achieve this on lootcouncil.com.

How I deal with loot distribution in-raid:
To start, all raiding ranks in my guild have the ability to write to officer chat (but not read it). This would include all recruit and higher ranks up through officer. This allows your loot council rank (who will obviously need to be able to read officer chat) to privately review any messages that are sent to /o (officer chat) during the raid.

When a boss is downed, I immediately link all the loot on the corpse(s) (or in the boxes) into a /rw (raid warning). When the badges are done spamming my chat window, the actual distribution process starts. For each item this process is repeated:

1. I do a /rw [Whatever Item] OCHAT!
2. I use a DBM (Deadly Boss Mods) macro to give a 20 second countdown/timer. (/dbm broadcast raid 20 LOOT TIMER!)
3. Players have 20 seconds to link their item into ochat. The players must link the item that they currently have and want to upgrade. They use this format /o [Item they have to replace] (2pc or 4pc for tier) (offspec,mainspec,pvp,etc)
4. While the timer counts down, the council decides their vote.
5. When the timer's up the council votes and the loot PROMPTLY goes out. You may consider using ventrilo privately to decide this as well, it's much much faster and does not clutter /o chat.
6. Some things like Trophy's are rolled for.
7. Once a player receives the loot, I update headcount to properly reflect what happened. If an item is banked, shareded or sent out as offspec I mark it as such.

Remember, if you take too long to distribute loot it makes your raiders loose focus fast. It may also show weakness in your council's ability to decide on loot. Do it fast, but do it right; there is a balance you need to find.

If your raiders get out of range when you try to hand them a piece of loot, it may not be recorded. Ask them to stay near the corpse if they are interested in loot.

How we decide who gets an item
Well now here's the real challenge innit'? This is a pretty complex question to solve but the following tips help us greatly:
There is no order of importance here.

The margin of upgrade
A raiders time with the guild, attitude and performance
A raiders loot per raid percentage
A raiders attendance percentage
If it's a 2pc or 4pc upgrade