Guild Spotlight: Conspiracy

Today, we had the privilege of chatting with raiders from Conspiracy: Plonki, Roff, Ricky, and Nexxzz.

Conspiracy is an EU guild that was built after Lotus disbanded. It is comprised of prior Practice raiders and is the home for many known Mythic+ pushers. It has also become a new haven for some raiders from Aversion. For the past few tiers, Conspiracy has quickly climbed the ranks – ultimately landing them in the top 10 world guilds in Aberrus, the Shadowed Crucible!

Read on to learn more about Conspiracy, how they got competitive, what they think about Aberrus, and much more.

Table of Contents

“The main reason I think we did well in this tier and also why I think we will do even better in the next tier is because the team we have assembled is great. We have many different types of people, but we still have fun and own together.” –Roff

Q-1: Thanks so much for taking the time to chat with us today. Can you please tell us more about yourself and your background with WoW/gaming?

Plonki: Hey, my name is Daniel. I’m 23 years old and currently living in Austria between the mountains. I started playing WoW in mid/end of Legion and started raiding more than a few bosses of Mythic/Heroic in Shadowlands (SoD onwards). I don’t really have a main class or favorite class – I mostly play what’s needed, so my current main class is Shaman. If I decide to touch some grass outside, I either go skiing or mountain biking. But yeah, I mostly spend my time sitting at home and playing some games (generally WoW)

Ricky: Ayo! My name is Daniel, and I’m a 28-year-old man from Norway. I started playing WoW at the end of TBC casually, and took the game more seriously mid-WotLK. I then started with 7-day raiding when Lotus was remade into Conspiracy. I would not say I have a main; I’m just a FOTM reroller that plays whatever is needed even though I end up as a Windwalker Monk quite often. If I ever go outside, it's everything from cabin trips, skiing, hitting the beach in the summer, or just sipping some cold ones at the bar.

Roff: Hello! ✋ I’m Lukas but online I go by Roff. I’m a Swede and also the Guild Master and a tank of Conspiracy. I can’t remember exactly when I started playing WoW – late WotLK or early Cataclysm as a Death Knight, so basically half of my life 🙂 Since I’m a tank, I have all of them ready, but I have by far the most playtime on my Brewmaster Monk.

Nexxzz: Hey guys, my name is Marco. I am from Germany and I've been playing WoW for 16 years. I was the guild and raid leader of Aversion for the last 6 years and my 2 main classes are Hunter and Balance Druid.



Q-2: What was your path toward entering the RWF raiding scene? When and how did you decide that you wanted to be competitive as a guild?

Plonki: I joined Conspiracy in May last year when it all started after Lotus disbanded. When I joined, the guild already had the competitive aspect since the core was from Practice and they went international to have more options to get players that share the same interest as them.

Ricky: I joined the guild when they remade into Conspiracy last year and I joined after the MDI. Before that, I was just raiding 3 days a week with some good friends but kind of felt like trying out 7 days before I get too old 🙂

Roff: How the guild formed in the first place was after Practice decided to stop raiding but some raiders didn’t want it to end. So together with a bunch of people from Practice, Robin, Wubby, and I created Lotus, which is now Conspiracy.
Practice was a Swedish guild and recruiting was always very hard, so we decided to go international but still stick to the competitive mindset that has further evolved since then.

Nexxzz: Back in MoP, I had my own 10-Man guild called Tranq and we earned some Top 5 10-man rankings in Throne of Thunder and Siege of Orgrimmar. After the guild disbanded, I raided only 2 days per week for about a year. After that, I joined the guild Impact which was the second-best German guild back then. After The Nighthold, Impact was renamed into Aversion and that's when we started to push for more hours and better world ranks. The first good content was Crucible of the Storms with Uu’nat and we decided from that point onwards to stream the progression and day-raid for the first 5 Days of a Tier.

“We have put together a great team and everyone is doing their part.
For recruiting, having experience is great but not necessarily needed – what’s more important is the player’s mindset and being open to learning new things.” –Plonki

Q-3: How did you get to where you are today as a guild? What does your recruiting process look like? Is there anything in particular that you are looking for?

Plonki: I think the officer team worked the most to make it work in the past year. And looking at our results, I think we did a great job honestly. We have put together a great team and everyone is doing their part. For recruiting, having experience is great but not necessarily needed – what’s more important is the player’s mindset and being open to learning new things. I think what we look for the most in Logs is the defensive usage and the number of deaths someone has – being consistent is very important.

Ricky: From when I joined until now, I’ve seen great improvement in the core of the guild – mostly new players and proper mindsets on those players does the biggest job in that part. When it comes to recruiting, that’s mostly up to the officers (unless I have connections and players that I would want to join us).

Roff: Late nights and early mornings 😀 Haha, just gotta put in the time and work and find like-minded players, finding them is the hardest part. And then experience also plays a big role, but I would not turn down someone that looks to be good just because they lack experience, if they would be willing to learn and have the mindset for it I think after a while that player can be very good.

Nexxzz: Roff did a great job with recruiting when we disbanded after Vault of the Incarnates (VoTI). His goal was to recruit the core-players who are very experienced and know what they are doing and that is still the philosophy for new players joining. But we’ll also recruit very talented players even if they don’t have the experience compared to my Aversion guys!





Q-4: In Vault of the Incarnates, you landed at world rank 15 and consistently made it into the top 20 in previous tiers, with world rank 13 in Nathria and 19 in Sepulcher. This tier, you finished in the 9th spot, so a comfortable place in the top 10 and a huge improvement. How did you prepare for such a jump?

Plonki: We always try to improve our roster and, with Aversion disbanding at the end of the last tier, we got some people from there who were good additions to our roster. We also have Nexx raid leading alongside Roff, which turned out to be good for this tier and will most likely be even better in the upcoming tiers when both of them get used to each other more. We also increased our characters from 3 to 4 to get more gear early on. With the new changes to this tier with loot (upgrading and getting a free Heroic token), 4 splits turned out to be our sweet spot and everyone got 4 piece on their mains – even some 2nd characters we may have used during progress. We also made some changes to how we approached PTR testing and we were more prepared to step into this tier than we were last tier.

Ricky: I would definitely say a good part of this was getting a good chunk of players from Aversion (RIP) but it was just better prep this tier. People were more comfortable playing together and having another raid leader together with Roff. It also felt like people actually took PTR more seriously instead of just vaping around.

Roff: Yeah, insane improvement for sure. We did a big step up this tier from last! We got a bit lucky and picked up some guys from Aversion that were a good addition to the roster together with some other new faces. We also took PTR more seriously than we did in VotI and just talked about the bosses more. We increased our characters / splits from 3 to 4. The main reason I think we did well in this tier and also why I think we will do even better in the next tier is because the team we have assembled is great. We have many different types of people, but we still have fun and own together.

Nexxzz: I haven’t played with the guys in the previous Tiers but the mix of a half german and half Scandinavian guild is an awesome experience and we have a lot of fun which is the most important factor to stay together in my opinion. For this Tier, the chemistry between the new Players and the old ones was from the start onward very good. Everyone put a lot of effort into it and the Top 10 Placement is just a huge accomplishment for the whole team.





Q-5: Did you make any bigger changes or updates on your back-end work for Weakauras and Addons? Or do you not have any people helping out?

Plonki: Nope, not yet sadly – I’m still in WeakAuras prison. I try to fix as much as I can outside of raid hours, but some stuff needs to be fixed during raid hours when we either take breaks or I step out and they pull without me for some time until I’ve gotten everything sorted. For the next tier, we will try to have someone outside fixing WeakAuras for us.

Ricky: Sadly, no…we have Plonki who makes 90% of every WeakAura we use and he is just an officer/raider so he is very limited with time once we actually start raiding and need to either fix/remake certain things.

Roff: Plonki is currently our WeakAuras guy, but he is also a player & officer here so if something needs to get fixed we always have to take a break or just wait until it’s done. We have no one outside the raid doing anything for us which is something we are looking into for the next tier.

Nexxzz: We have Plonki who did a fantastic job as Raider, Officer, and WeakAuras guy. But our back-end are the raiders and it is not comparable to the guilds who are in the Top 5.

“What makes Conspiracy special for me is that the officers and I have put in a lot of time for the guild to be here and it feels rewarding when so many players share a common goal and enjoy gaming with each other while also being successful.” –Roff

Q-6: What are the differences between your previous guilds and Conspiracy now? What makes Conspiracy special?

Plonki: We take everything more seriously and also the prep is a lot more in-depth. Also, a big difference for me was raiding internationally. Before Conspiracy, I only raided in the German scene. Sharing the same goals / having the same interests makes raiding here very enjoyable.
The best part is the late night Officer meetings where we talk nonsense half of the time and have some good thoughts as the other half – that’s probably our most productive time when it comes to doing stuff that helps the guild.

Ricky: The biggest difference is raiding more than 3 or 5 days and the long hours + splits that are frontloaded into the first two weeks of a tier. However, it’s also the players in the guild that makes it fun as well.

Roff: Taking stuff more seriously I think is the biggest difference. What makes Conspiracy special for me is that the officers and I have put in a lot of time for the guild to be here and it feels rewarding when so many players share a common goal and enjoy gaming with each other while also being successful.

Nexxzz: It’s not German-only and I really like to raid internationally for the first time. For me personally, it’s great to just be a normal “soldier” who can help with shot-calling during the raid or improving the tactic, but I don't have to worry about anything else about what is going on in the guild and I really love that freedom right now.





Q-7: On that note, how do you like Dragonflight? What are your favorite and/or least favorite aspects of the expansion so far?

Plonki: I personally like Dragonflight so far. It’s super alt-friendly and the 2 raids were very enjoyable to progress. The talent revamp is very sick and most classes I play feel a lot better than previous expansions. Also, I like that you can min-max a lot of talents for certain situations.
In this tier, they introduced item upgrades that replaced valor – I think that's a good thing but having 10 crests to upgrade stuff in week 1 was too much. Basically, you were fully 441 geared with just upgrading stuff, which made the raid way too easy by week 2 in my opinion.



Also, not having a Heroic week is bad for me at least – it’s a lot of stress doing splits the first 2 days of progress, and sorting loot is horrible. Blizzard would remove a lot of stress for me if they brought back a Heroic week.

Ricky: So far, I’m mostly a fan of it. For me, being able to gear alts quickly and easily is for sure my favorite aspect. The worst part of the expansion is 100% not having Heroic week! BRING IT BACK ALREADY!

Roff: This expansion kind of owns! I really like the upgrade system from this Patch. My least favorite part is the removal of Heroic week. I think they should bring that back 100%.

Nexxzz: I really like Dragonflight and my favorite feature is Dragonriding.

“...I really didn’t enjoy Echo of Neltharion at all because the boss is SO much easier with all the WeakAuras that are used for it – we didn’t have any special WeakAuras and did it old school with 2 people calling the numbers out of their raid frame for the others.” –Nexxzz

Q-8: How did you like Aberrus? Was the difficulty balanced well or would you have loved to see some bosses being harder? What are your thoughts about the race being shorter than many expected it to be?

Plonki: The balancing week 1 was on point with every boss except Magmorax. The boss was not enjoyable to play on PTR and then they redid the fight completely and now it’s just a Patchwerk fight with 1 mechanic and the HP is too little. Echo of Neltharion was a great fight, but WeakAuras destroyed that experience a bit – a Phase 3 map WeakAura that shows where your portal is should not exist and it removes a key part of the fight. During week 2, you already overgeared the whole raid and every boss just flopped over. There were no damage checks at all. Since we got to Sakareth week 2, I personally think the fight was a bit too easy in Phase 2 and Phase 3 – nothing really was going on in Phase 2 except for bomb people/tanks, and at the end of Phase 3, it was just a Patchwerk dummy for 20/30 seconds. Overall, Sarkareth is still a great fight – I just would have enjoyed it more with a bit less item level.



Ricky: I think it had some bosses with good ideas, but overall it was an undertuned tier compared to the gear you had week one. Also, having a boss like “Echo of Neltharion” where you got completely dumpstered without a certain private WeakAura ruined a lot of the end progress for us at least. The fact that the raid is over so fast makes you sit with the feeling of “Hmm, is the tier already over?”

Roff: I think the raid was tuned okay overall. I LOVED Zskarn – we completely owned on that boss. We tried to play on the safe spot after the first Dragonhead for around 15 pulls, but it didn’t really work out. We started playing normally and got a 3% wipe on pull 34 and killed him the next day after a total of 51 pulls. Magmorax 😂 I’m also a bit annoyed at how Neltharion ended up. WeakAura boss. Personally, I wanted the raid to be a bit longer – I felt like I wasn't done when the tier was over.

Nexxzz: For me personally, it’s great to have a raid of that difficulty because, after 10 Days, it’s kind of enough and I have to get back to my responsibilities. I liked Rashok, Zskarn, and Sarkareth, but I really didn’t enjoy Echo of Neltharion at all because the boss is SO much easier with all the WeakAuras that are used for it – we didn’t have any special WeakAuras and did it old school with 2 people calling the numbers out of their raid frame for the others. 😀





Q-9: Do you have any playlists or favorite songs that you would love to share with us? Which songs get you really hyped? Which songs pump you during progress?

Plonki: I don’t really have a favorite song - I like pretty much everything. Here’s a small playlist I created some weeks ago that I use for reclearing ever since:



Ricky: My music has a massive variety during prog as I can go from hardstyle on 200% or death metal. But there is always one song that hits different:



Also, Bring Me the Horizon at Royal Albert Hall is the biggest tilt killer ever:




Roff: I’m a no music enjoyer when I raid. However, something that always hypes me up is the Lion 😀




Nexxzz: Run with the Wolves - Wildstylez, E-Life and a lot of Songs from the German Artist Apache 207 such as Roller, Breaking your heart, Komet.

“...Set a goal, find your strengths and weaknesses, and always strive to improve. If you want to play anything at a competitive level, you always need to put in the effort and play around your own strengths.” –Ricky

Q-10:Do you have any advice for players who aspire to play WoW in an increasingly competitive environment? And what is next for you and the guild? Any specific goals?

Plonki: I think the best and fastest advice to improve is recording your own gameplay and look at what you can improve. Pressing defensives correctly is one of the most important things I’d say – as well as not greeding for an extra global (it’s never worth it). The next goal for us is to keep improving and learning from the mistakes we did during this tier. Maybe we can beat our competition – guilds such as FatSharkYes and Instant Dollars – in the next tier.

Ricky: I always tell people to set a goal, find your strengths and weaknesses, and always strive to improve. If you want to play anything at a competitive level, you always need to put in the effort and play around your own strengths. We aim to just keep on getting better as a guild and striving to improve ourselves.

Roff: When you record your own gameplay, it’s a lot easier to find mistakes and pinpoint what you need to improve. Private streaming on YouTube is what I would recommend. We are going to take what we learned from this tier and apply it to the next. We’ll add/change some things and then go into the next raid and own. We want to beat our competition of course, so it will be amazing if we are on top next tier.

Nexxzz: Keep on improving and always look at what you could have done better to prevent a wipe or smooth out a critical point in an encounter. I just want to have fun with my homies here and keep pushing for good ranks, but no specific goals 🙂

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Links

• Find Plonki on Raider.IO
  
• Follow Plonki on Twitch
  
• Follow Plonki on Twitter
  
  
• Find Roff on Raider.IO
  
• Follow Roff on Twitch
  
  
• Find Ricky on Raider.IO
  
• Follow Ricky on Twitch
  
• Follow Ricky on Twitter
  
  
• Find Nexxzz on Raider.IO
  
• Follow Nexxzz on Twitch
  
• Follow Nexxzz on Twitter

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