This may sound self pompous, and if it does, maybe I am . To clarify as I just realized it may not be understood correctly... I mean when guides are afk, I don't mean permanent.
But I get pretty angry when I see new players logging into IRC, and there is 2 or 3 devs, and a guide or two in there as well.
They ask a serious question needing help, on a topic which may or may not be covered in manual or faq and after 15 to 20 minutes they leave, angry and frustrated as it goes unanswered.
Dez does a pretty good job when he isn't busy, Virtus is pretty much going to say I dunno, or sorry not my department. No offense Virtus but it wouldn't hurt you to know a little more outside your role here.
For the guides however there is absolutely 0 f'ing excuse... none, nada. If you are not present, you have to go afk for phone.. just log out of irc.
When I see guides in IRC for 2 or 3 hours, after none have been on all day!!! Then they come in and are just afk, picking their butt etc. It infuriates me, as it conveys a false message that the devs do not care about the community.
In game I don't care, cause I can't see you logged in ignoring newcomers, but irc is different, and I expect, and the community should expect that if a guide is in irc, visible to public, that they be present!!!! There!!, Answering!
I appreciate all the hard work by all the Dev's, and some of the guides, and most of all I appreciate the hard work by some of the players, as most of the time they provide the most help of all, such as Drevar, Freon, Plague, etc etc... just to name a couple.
( Maybe I woke up on the wrong side of the bucket, but afk guides in irc .. peeves the hell out of me. )