wait. what... just happened?

It's a question I've asked myself several times recently, as I've encountered something I hadn't seen before. As some of you know, I recenlty rolled a toon on a new server.  Most of my PUG's have been run with a fellow guild member, a tank, and have been tolerable, if not completely successful. However, I've been running on my own for a couple days, and regretting it.

Not only is my queue time ridiculous(even for a lone healer) but the groups are more often than not of the epic fail variety. They are composed of the usual suspects- dps pulling, huntards not controlling pets, everyone standing in any fire available, etc. Those are the types of fail that I am used to and generally prepared to overcompensate in my healing for.

But! I have been introduced to another kind of fail group. This one I honestly have *never* encountered before now. I suppose variety is the spice of life, and my recent wow pugs have been spicy indeed.

Here is a rundown of this new and improved kind of fail:

Step 1: Queue up. Browse the AH. Clean out bags(why the fuck am I rolling around with 8 and 10 slot bags at level 54, anyways?!) Repair. Turn in quests. Run around and learn flight paths. Go back to the AH. /facepalm at trade chat trolls.

Step 2: ZOMG! Queue popped! Yay! Make sure I'm in the right spec for what the LFG tool says I'm susposed to do and hit accept.

Step 3: Loading screen. Protip:  Don't stand in the fire!

Step 4: Zone in. The scene is set as follows- Tank is way ahead out of range and appears to be in the middle of getting zerged by little red bars. One of the dps is already dead. The rogue uses his vanish while standing on a flamestriked area and doesn't move. The third dps is trying to hearth out in a corner. Suddenly, and not surprisingly, the tank dies then leaves group. The dead guy and the rogue leave group. All the little zerglings who were pummeling the tank turn their beady little eyes on me, the healer. I die under their gaze. The hearthmaster then dies and leaves group. All mobs reset to their original locations, revealing that the tank had pulled SEVEN GROUPS while the group was waiting for the lfg system to find a healer.

Step 5: uuhhh..... wut just happened? /boggle

Step 6: Loading screen. Protip: Dungeons are more fun when everyone works together as a team. Be patient with players who are still learning the game. ( /facepalm )

Yeah. That's the group I ran into this weekend. Not just once, either! This happened three or four times! My mind was totally and completely boggled. I can understand a geared tank pulling a group that he/she is comfortable tanking without heals. They want to continue to have progress so the other members of the group don't bail out. Hell, I've even done it. Cautiously. But I would never pull exceptionally large groups with no healer. It just doesn't make any sense.

Even if you had all died due to the stupidity and impatience of a shitty tank, why would you leave when you finally got a healer from the queue? Yeah, you're dead. Just run back. bailing out wastes an amazing amount of time. The deserter debuff sucks balls, and then there's the wait for another group to form. As dps, that's about half a day. Just waiting for a queue.

I suppose, when the fail is just too much, that there's is no alternative than to bail out and wait for all those timers. Sometimes, doing nothing really is better than suffering through some of the PUG's there are nowdays.

How to win at guilds

ZOMG Heals!!!

HEAL ME HEAL ME HEAL ME!!!

The insistant whining of dying toons is like a badly tuned alarm clock, sounding over and over again, despite the fact that the healers have managed to keep everyone alive and well.

HEAL ME HEAL ME HEAL ME!!!

Oddly enough, this practice of screeching like a cat set on fire is not limited to PUGs. It certainly isn't excluded from them, either. But it exists outside of them, in regular raiding guilds. Guilds who have had their healers for awhile and are well aware of what their capabilities are. Groups who have encountered horrible /facepalm pulls and survived because of the mad skills of their healers.

HEAL ME HEAL ME HEAL ME!!!

Even the very best healers have to put up with that desperate plea. It's bad enough to encounter in raid chatter or even raid warnings [HEAL THE TANK!] With vent, we now hear it in a whole other perspective- we get to hear them screaming it in a decibel that even dogs would complain about.

HEAL ME HEAL ME HEAL ME!!!

Here's a small factoid for the non-healers. Typing/Yelling at your healers to heal you, doesn't do anything except waste the time it takes to type and waste vent time when more important info could be put out. Not only that, but screeching louder and faster will not make the heals land any quicker. Not to mention, by the time you've said something, the heal is either coming, or it's not. If the heal is already enroute (being cast) then demanding heals is merely annoying the healer who is healing you and causing other healers to waste their mana trying to "compensate" for something that isn't wrong in the first place. If the heal isn't enroute, then it's because you are not a priority and capslock/outyelling the raid leader isn't going to change anything. If, by some odd chance, you are a priority (tanks) and you're not recieving the heals you should, then the group will wipe anyways and the raid leaders and healers can discuss assignments to be sure you're kept alive the next time.

HEAL ME HEAL ME HEAL ME!!!

Achievement-whaat?

I am an achievement whore. I love knocking out achievements, watching the little dialog on my screen and getting grats from people who feel like sending out grats. I really enjoy the hard achievments, the ones that require skill, time, and effort on the part of several people. So when I see achievement PUGs forming, I'll usually jump on board to work on my own achievements or assist others with theirs.

Most of the time, those achievement runs are smooth and hitchless. People get out of the fire, kill what they're susposed to kill, don't kill what they're not susposed to kill and stack and scatter appropiately. Those kinds of runs can even be down right enjoyable. Unfortunately, there is a chance of ending up in a group that rocks the opposite end of the spectrum.

"Eveyone know what to do, right?"

"yeah, yeah, we got this" "OMG GO"

*que wipe

"Ok... so what are we susposed to do in phase one?"

/facepalm

For some reason, there are people who see "achievement run" in a PUG's advertisement and jumps on board for a free run. I think the reasoning is that a baddie knows that the majority of the group will be well-geared and knowledgable about the raid. Said person will attempt to blend in with everyone else who knows what to do. When an achievement run gets infiltrated by one such person, it's usually workable. The rest of the group can adapt and improvise enough to compensate for the baddie. But when an achievement run is overrun by baddies, is ceases to be about the achievements, which can be frustrating for the people who are prepared and have ended up saved to a group that will be unable to complete normal modes.

And so, Baddies, this is a request for you: PLEASE stay out of my achievement runs. I want my achievements. On "carry the baddie" days, I will gladly carry your ass to free epikz, in exchange for you staying out of my achievement runs.

That was great guys, but next time lets...

It seems that every time there is a wipe, there's always a few people who feel prompted to make themselves known to the group.

Guy#1:  "ZOMG GUYS YOU SUCK SO MUCH, JUST KILL THE BOSS. FUCK!" Guy#1 is fairly useless, but definitely high on the annoying meter. He will usually be the first one to bail out. Sometimes Guy#1 feels it is his job to inform trade chat, the barrens, and his mother, that the group he was just in failed.

Guy#2: "Guys, that was a great attempt, but I think next time we should try not dying. It's that dying that's really kicking our butts. I think if we make an effort to not die that we would be able to take this boss down with no problem." Guy#2 is harmless, equally as useless as Guy#1, and not as annoying. Guy#2 likes to state the obvious, so much so that sometimes I think there's a [CPT OBVIOUS] achievement or feat of strength. (I have yet to find any proof of said achievement)

Guy#3:   /ninjalog

Guy#4: "Strategy, strategy, strategy, blah blah, strategy. Profit!" Guy#4 is usually right and some groups will subconsciously promote Guy#4 to raid leader and expect him to carry them through the rest of the instance. Other groups will completely disregard any advice he has to give and, on failing to find fire to stand in, will start up a cooking fire and stand in that.

Guy#5: "Guys, in my one group, we did blah, blah, and bugged it out and it worked great back in (four or more patches back) Lets do that for guaranteed win!" Guy#5 is useless and annoying. But groups like to listen to this guy. I believe it's the key phrase "bugged it out" that makes groups want to listen to this guy. In the end, his advise is usually useless and several of Guy#3 will make themselves known when the group fails. Again.

This was a quick list, and certainly isn't complete. Please feel free to add more to the list in the comments section!

Blizzcon2010 nerds

When in a Pug is going to Blizzcon2010! I'm sure some of you already knew that. But for those of you who didnt know, now you do!

Blizzcon.... Blizzcon. Every hardcore wow-ers (daiblo-ers and starcraft-ers, also!) wet dream. At least, that's what I thought. After all, countless masses wait breathlessly for Blizzcon announcements and then rush the forums after each one. Tickets are sold out in seconds, and then resold (sucessfully) by scalpers for more than double the face value.

And yet, when I asked ingame who was going to Blizzcon, I was confronted with a few "wut?". Even more baffling, I was called a nerd.

/gasp

Online. In a video game. By another person who was playing the same game. I suppose that's a topic for another thread.

/equip murloc hat

Yes, I am a blizzcon nerd. I'll see all you awesome people in a little less than a week. And all you haters can just kiss it!

Competition for Gear

I consistently see groups searching desperately for a component to their raid- a tank, a healer, sometimes even a dps. And yet, when they receive pm's from geared and experienced players, the raid leader turns them down and continues to spam trade chat. When this first happened to me, I was baffled. A nearly full raid that is sitting around, ready but not able to begin because the raid leader is refusing to bring along one or more people who are biting at the bit to go.

It seems a waste to me. Common sense states that the longer a group is actively not full and not raiding, the more likely it is that people will leave. But then again, common sense never was that common.

I finally uncovered the reason behind a raid leader holding up a group of people. One would think, maybe we need a super specific class for a certain buff or ability- a shammy's bloodlust, a mage's spellsteal, something along those lines. Something that would benefit the group as a whole and increase the likelihood of a successful group. Something like that is certainly an acceptable reason to turn down offers that don't fit the needs of the group.

Unfortunately, more and more often, encounters with the phenomenon of turning down ready and willing pugers has nothing to do with benefiting the group- the reason is *much* more selfish.

Raid leaders are refusing to invite people who will compete against them or their butt buddies for gear.

......

I'll say that again.

Raid leaders are refusing to invite people who will compete against them or their butt buddies for gear. Granted, it is nice to have evolved beyond raid leaders simply inventing an excuse to place everything shiny in their inventory and suddenly, inexplicably, developing an issue maintaining a connection.  However, keeping a group waiting and waiting. and waiting. and waiting so that one person can have everything they want essentially reserved? It's not only wasting time of 9 or 24 other people, but it's also exceptionally greedy and entitled.

While it is beyond annoying being turned down for groups because I was deemed a threat to loot, I have been on the other end of the spectrum as well. I have been in a group that was held up for an incredibly long time while the raid leader looked for another tank. After a while of observing the raid leader spam for another tank and observing a paladin tank spamming for a group for the dungeon I'm in, I asked the raid leader why he wasn't grabbing the guy in  trade. He told me that he wasn't sure if I would be "ok" with it. I'll have you know that I squared him away, we grabbed the other pally tank and blasted through the run, with me and the other pally rolling on gear and neither of us getting hurt feelings when we were out-rolled.

Regardless.

This practice that has come about is, in my opinion, no more than a combination of reserving items and ninjalogging. The raid leader has essentially reserved "their" items, but without telling anybody else in the recruiting pool or group that it is reserved. But because there is nobody else in the group to ninja it from, they're saved the inconvenience of having to log out of the game after their first piece of free loot that they get without having to roll against anyone else. A group with a raid leader who does this is simply put- carrying them, whether they can hold their own or not.A raid formed with the purpose of gearing up a single person is a group that is carrying said person. And, wether they say it or not, nobody actually likes to carry anyone else. Especially in a pug.

So. Raid leaders. Form your pug. Get the people you need and don't be such a sissy. If you just *have* to have a specific piece of shiny purple gear, don't block out the competition just reserve the item. You'll form the group faster and won't have to turn down so many people. Besides, a little competition is good for you. It makes actually winning the gear more wowgasmic.