The Spirit Realm

We normally field between 3.5 and 5 group raid-forces. If we can encourage/browbeat members into getting VT keys, is that still the "starting place" for progressing through content? Alternately, with average gear being of oow/don vendor quality; what else might we do? My main focus would eventually narrow down to EP's, but in the meantime I'm interested in something that will prepare us for those zones, with scaling difficulty. Does that make sense?

Search eqlive for posts by me with "raid" and "target" in it or something. There was a good thread there on this in the past month.

I'd have to agree with Yesak. My guild skipped VT altogether. We went straight from Ssra to PoP, and never looked back. Don't misunderstand--it wasn't easy to do at level 65, but now you have 5 more levels, more powerful spells/armor, etc. Sure, there's some great clickies in VT, but the relative time sink involved just isn't worth it. It may take you a while, but you should be able to handle PoP.

Go fer it!

Chutoi

I'd skip VT totally. It's way too much camping of crap mobs to get in there.
10 shard camps for every single person, Some of those camps tanks 10+ hours
Getting the commandder stuff in ssra for every single person
Getting VT keyed is soul destroying. Trying it and pushing your guildies may well break the guild, especially if you don't have the raid mentality already.

KT is too hard generally until you have good kit. Getting KT flagged is a good way to unify the guild though - and it will be necessary.

If I had to start learnign raiding I'd go all the way back to doing Derakator the Vindicator to practive Complete Heal chains (Derek is always up, and if people are equipped forgiving of errors).
Then I would move on into Ssra, doing the cursed cycle, creator etc. I'd aim to do the Emperor as a low priority target. To enter the emperor's chamber you need to farm 4 items in ssra, for every single person - judge how well your guiildies take to doing this farming - the 10 shards are way worse. The Emperor is a good target, he has some excellent loot.

If your guild seems happy farming then consider the push o VT, but as I've said, I wouldn't

I would jump to PoP progression. Every time you complete a proper flagging raid you get an AA and a charm increase, the lower tiers should be OK and well within your grasp. These teach a lot of the basic raid strategies you need.

I'd push PoP progression all the way then up to the elemental planes. EP stuff is excellent all around. After you have an average of 2-3 Elemental items per person that's when you should start progressing to do the Elemental Gods and GoD progression while farming the EP's.

I'd follow Henora's suggestion, mostly.

Actually, no - I'd go join a Txevu guild. Yeah - so I did.

But, if I wanted to get a guild up from start, I'd follow Henora's suggestion, mostly. Hats, gloves, wrists, boots, sleeves - OoW Tier 1 Quest stuff, period. Everything I have listed as non-raid gear at http://samanna.net/sham.gear/nonraider.shtml can be one-grouped by senior Level 70s... or, if your guild isn't that leet yet, two- or three-grouped, provided you can get to the zones. Take a three-group raid of peeps 65+ into MPG and clear your way to one of the four leg-droppers; stay there for a few hours or until the legs rot. Then (or next time) clear in to another one. Repeat. Once you get the hang of it, put your lowest level members in with the big dpsers, have that group out of raid, let them get nice XP (while the rest of the guild helps, but doesn't KS) and they'll get a level or two each by the end of three hours. Level people up and do the same in RS, find a named that's not camped and raid it. Get everyone a wrist and a BP who wants one. By the time you're done, everyone is level 70 and has some AAs, plus nice pants, chest, and wrist. And you've learned how to give and follow raid commands. Off night? Back to getting Tier 1 quest drops and XP.