RTZS; The most controversial guild on Arthas. It's impossible to bring up the name without receiving a strong reaction. No other guild has inspired such hatred from trolls or such dedication from members. Mute originally made Rogues Take Zero Skill as a statement of fact. He wore the guild tag while pvp'ing on his rogue. Other rogues would spit on opponents or talk trash over the forums. Mute wore "Rogues Take Zero Skill" over his head. For several months, Mute was the only member. These were the months he leveled and pvp'd, and while we edited the first film. After Episode 3 was released, everyone wanted to join. Mute let them. Soon "Rogues Take Zero Skill" was seen around the server. Hundreds upon hundreds of players proudly wearing the tag. There were some rogues who didn't take offense at the name. These were the skilled players. They weren't bothered by a guild tag. They knew things weren't perfectly balanced. And they knew that the statement had truth, many rogues were not skilled. These were rogues like Asmodius, who was a good friend of ours. The other rogues hated it. These rogues refused to admit they had any advantage. They arrogantly spoke down to others, and had come to believe they were amazing players. At this time, most people only had one character. Those rogues took a statement at their class personally. They hated Mute. They were bitterly resentful of the movies. Seeing an army of Mute's fans parading around with "Rogues Take Zero Skill" was too much. They have never forgiven him. And to this day, many still insult RTZS behind alts whenever RTZS is mentioned. At it's largest, RTZS had over 500 members. It's impossible to tell exactly how many because the UI stops counting at 500. It may have been as high as 800, maybe more. These were people who'd rerolled on Arthas to play with Mute, new players, or players making second characters. We pvp'd, ran instances, even got a ventrilo server. Over time a smaller group developed of players who planned to stay in the guild on their mains. This group expressed a desire to raid. Most other members had no interest in raiding. They had joined to meet Mute or to wear the tag. Mute and I had little interest either. But the 20 man Zul'Gurub had just been released, so we set a date and decided to give it a try. We were able to clear the trash mobs and down the first boss. So we decided to keep working on ZG. We only had 10 or so regular raiders. We pugged the rest, usually from our own guild. We were still not a raiding guild, and would not make raiding our focus for several more months. The regulars asked for an "officer" rank. I was still strongly against the idea of becoming a serious guild. And we didn't see the need for officers. There were a few people, like Tab and Caring, who helped out, so we made a rank called "Raid Organizer". This would later become our version of officer. At the time they had no authority to do anything except help organize ZG raids. I made all of the active members Raid Organizers. Some of them really tried to help. Others didn't, and just enjoyed the title. Oh well, it wasn't like there was much to do. That summer we decided to become a real raiding guild. This was a difficult transition. We closed open invitations. We kicked hundreds of members. To run a serious guild is very hard. Kagura, a druid in the guild, took the initiative to make our first MC raids happen. She was a wonderful leader, someone who did the work without asking for any recognition. As we began to progress, another member named Warrek took up the initiative to lead raids. Prior to this, Mute and I had led all of our raids. I enjoyed it very much, but Warrek was a natural. Kagura and Warrek became Raid Organizers, and were more than that. They became leaders of the guild with Mute and I. During that summer and fall, RTZS began an unstoppable march of destruction. We stomped over 9 bosses, killing several on our first attempt, before being halted for fire resist at Ragnaros. Unlike most guilds, RTZS started at zero. Almost all guilds are reformed from former guilds. Several members leave Guild A, and form Guild B. Then they go through the instances with an experienced and well geared core. RTZS had nothing. Mute and I had no raid epics or experience. Our members had all leveled up in RTZS. Most had no experience at, none of them had gear. We entered MC wearing greens. I am aware of no guild since the release of the game that started with so little experience or equipment. But aside from the need for resist gear, it rarely held us back. We downed Ragnaros. We went back to ZG and cleared the instance. We started into Black Wing's Lair. Razorgore went down on our first attempt. The second boss Vael, known as the guild killer, was downed after a few weeks of attempts. Sometime that fall we finished Nefarion. We cleared AQ20, and began AQ40. After Naxx was released, many guilds decided to skip AQ40 to do the first few easier bosses. This way they could call themselves a Naxx guild. We decided against that, and stayed in AQ40. We quickly cleared the first 3 bosses and began to work on our Nature resist for the fourth. RTZS had blazed through MC, BWL, and into AQ40 in only that summer and fall. Few guilds have ever cleared so much content in so little time. The guilds that had been reformed from advanced groups had not done any better than the inexperienced players in greens with a joke guild tag. It was the work of a solid core of dedicated members. Members like Rekthega, Margg, and Moklok, leaders Kagura and Warrek, and the help of fantastic friends like Natoth, who stood by us through it all. It was at this time, as we waited on Nature Resist gear, a few months before the expansion, that Mute and I decided to close our accounts. Kagura had quit playing. Warrek stepped down, and spent some time raiding with friends in another guild. RTZS wound down from it's long march, having accomplished more than we'd ever dreamed. Even with the former leaders gone, RTZS would remain. The friendships in the guild were too strong. New leaders stepped forward. After the expansion, they decided to begin casual raiding again. They cleared Karazhan, and then began Gruul's Lair. But now the time has come to begin a new march. The veterans have returned. The non-serious members are gone. Recruitment has opened. Gruul's Lair has been cleared. It's on to the next challenge. If RTZS's last attempt at progression is any indication, we can expect great things over the coming months. And when this march is finally over in preparation for the next expansion, RTZS will still remain. The friendships will last a life time. The name will live forever. So why do some people hate RTZS so bitterly? It began with the roguecraft films. The original rogue players despise us. They despise the guild for being named Rogues Take Zero Skill. They resent the fact that Mute had half the server wearing the guild tag at one time. They were horrified when RTZS became a real raiding guild. Many of these players still log on alts to make hateful remarks at the guild. RTZS has been involved in several server dramas. Mute and I speak openly of disliking the way other raiding guilds treat members and non-members. If another guild harms our members, we take it seriously. One drama involved the GM of an advanced raiding guild stealing an extremely rare item from one of our members. We made a post about it. The other guild refused to apologize. Instead they laughed about it. This resulted in a huge drama, not by our members, but by the arthas community. They made the problem worse by harassing our guild. This only fueled the drama. By the time the leadership decided to offer an apology, their members were quitting in disgust. This guild that had been fairly advanced, fell apart over drama. Their die hard members blamed us for their troubles, and have hated Mute and RTZS ever since. There were other dramas. Another guild decided to steal a BWL from us. They wanted our Nefarion. We had cleared all of the previous bosses. They asked us to give it to them. They were more advanced, and didn't need the items, so we requested they bring a few of our members. They refused, and took it by force. They began inviting our members at random. One accepted an invitation, he was made leader, and they took the Nefarion. They then claimed a member had sold them the instance. They invited Warrek to their vent only so the leaders could laugh at him. As you'd expect, we made a post. And it became an enormous drama. This guild already had a horrible reputation as rude and terrible people, but it certainly didn't help. Their members hate us still. Another group is the players we've had to remove. For some players, a guild can become very important to self image. Being removed may lead to bitter grudges. A rejected player often continues to hate his former guild indefinitely. You see those players following their former guidmates on the forums, posting hateful comments. RTZS has a very special case, because of our notoriety, former members often attempt to take advantage of the existing negativity toward Mute and RTZS. They attempt to stoke the fire, and repeat the same insults angry rogues or other guilds lob at us. Insults they once laughed at and shrugged off with us. An example is a druid we were forced to remove for incompetence. Unfortunately he wasn't a good player. He has since followed every thread about RTZS, repeating the common insults. More often they post on alts, not wanting anyone to know which member they were, so no one can bring up the reasons for their removal. There were a few of the original Raid Organizers, given the rank before we became a serious guild, who became resentful of Warrek and Kagura. They were jealous of the respect that was shown to actual leaders, and angry for not being given special perks. They were nasty people. Today they follow every thread, posting on alts we all remember, complimenting their mains as excellent players, and claiming that they'll destroy us with videos recorded in their grandmother's bathroom. Most people don't take these players seriously. But those who hate Mute are glad to get help any way they can. You'll see them in every thread RTZS is mentioned. Angry rogues, former members, bitter guilds, usually on alts, all posting the same insults over and over again. What are these insults? - Rogues Take Zero Skill is a barrens guild. Apparently a barrens guild is a low level group that recruits from barrens chat. Well, at one time we had damn near a thousand members. We let anyone and everyone in. People rolled characters on Arthas just to join RTZS. That all ended when we started serious raiding. But the insult has remained. Even after we had a small group of ~60 players (around 100 total members with friends and alts) we still heard the same insult. Nearly a year and a half later, you'd think they could come up with an original insult. But they aren't that intelligent. - Rogues Take Zero Skill is bad. We raided further and faster than most guilds ever do. Yet we never stop hearing this. One of our favorite trolls keeps repeating this insult. This is our friend the druid (now a mage). He was removed from the guild for lack of ability, and he has never been accepted into any other raiding guild. Yet, he'll never miss an opportunity to remind us we're bad. - Rogues Take Zero Skill is evil. It's popular to claim that RTZS is a horrible guild that steals from members to give to Mute. One particular idiot has written literally hundreds of conspiracy theories about how Mute kept the man down to glut himself with their efforts. This of course is the angry rantings of a former member. He'd say Mute drank the blood of babies if he thought people might believe it. All in all, we've come to expect our name to be followed by trolls. It's part of being the most controversial guild on Arthas.