This is post is brought to you by Sanity Tap TM. I apologise, it’s totally incoherent, there’s even a moment towards the end where I start honest-to-goodness frothing.
First of all, Blizzard, thank you very much for responding to my complaint about lack of a decent off-hand. I had no idea you were reading and am touched by your concern. The shrivelled heart is perfect, and I will also tendering my gratitude to Lady RNG for letting it drop in the first place and secondly for making sure I won the role and not the pissant little warlock who also randomly decided he wanted it.
On the other hand …
I accidentally logged out with the Argent lance equipped - I think Tam's compensating for something...
Seriously, that’s a shrivelled heart?!
NO WAI!
That’s a maraca! A swirly orange maraca. I guess it’s for keeping time with his Divine Hymn, but poor Tam looks like he’s going to break out with the kumbayas at any second.
I mean I’m glad it doesn’t look like a dildo or a butt plug (or if it does it’s a sex toy for the inconceivably hardcore) like most of my other off-hand items but if you’re going to call something a shrivelled heart, you have no right to get me so excited and then present me with a percussion instrument.
Damn you, Blizzard, damn you.
Shrivelled heart my arse.
I was going to do a picture-by-picture comparison but the only ones I could get were so icky I couldn’t bring myself to put them on my blog.
BUT AT THE VERY LEAST THIS IS NOT A SHRIVELLED HEART:
Kum bay ya, my Lord, kum bay ya...
In other news, I’ve been checking out the LFG Interface. Err. Gosh. And by “checking out” I mean “using obsessively in an insanely short space of time to gear myself up”. I am now geared up, but I have also lost my fucking mind. I hereby suggest LFG be re-named Sanity Tap: converts x sanity into x emblems.
All right, to give it due credit, it is very effective in putting together groups and facilitating the whole business of running 5-mans, and thus must be seen as considerable advancement on the old system. However, I also it takes all the advantages of PUGs and all the disadvantages PUGs and ramps them up skyhigh. So, yes, at its best, it provides an extremely efficient, extremely low-investment way of chaining dungeons. I think the longest I waited in the queue was 1 minute, and at the absolute pinnacle of ubergearing, we were knocking down heroics in about 10-15 minutes, 15-20 for OK. That is, to be honest, pretty awesome.
On the other hand … the utter lack of investment makes people more inclined to be dickheads than ever before. This, by the way, includes me. And at least if you PUG a heroic on your own server there’ll be some passing attempt to make a connection, and not dishonour the names of your ancestors, but most groups constructed through the interface progress in deathly silence, and if somebody is talking, it’s because something has gone wrong, either with the run or with their personality.
And the “when is a boost not a boost” feeling is more pronounced than ever. I am, actually, semi-smug at my current level of over-gearing because I didn’t fail to heal anything – including groups so broken the Sanity Tap interface would throw me at them halfway through their instance. I was, however, conscious of a prickle of resentment, even through the smug, in that essentially the Sanity Tap seems to be a tool that allows inadequate DPS to cruise their way to loot, on the back of the hard work of others. I know this is churlish, inevitable, insoluble and just a formalisation of the PUG system anyway but it continues to piss me off. And, for the record, as I think I said in my original post on this subject, it’s not a question of gearing, it’s a question of performance. All I expect from DPS is that they don’t stand in fire and output DPS commensurate with their gear level – whether that’s 2k or 12k. I’m sick of dragging people through instances by their Tier 9 robes, when their rotation appears to be a consequence of smacking the keyboard against their arse. I’ve been basically 2-manning with a range of over-geared tanks.
I fell in with a relatively newly dinged 80 at one point – I think he had a crafted epic weapon, all the rest blues and quest greens, well-itemised, gemmed and enchanted. “Nice gear, lol,” observed the tank. And the cow, who was a genuine noob and too clueless to recognise the obvious dickheadery going on here, started to explain proudly how he’d saved up the mats for his weapon and made it himself… whereupon the tank and 2 of the DPS dropped the group.
God. WANKERS! Sanity Tap, minus 300 points of sanity.
Thankfully, myself and the other DPS (a rogue, who incidentally, was also from Argent Dawn and casually output 5-6k DPS in the nicest possible way) were not quite such inexcusable stains on the backside of humanity, cheered up the devastated cow and stuck around to re-fill the group. The next tank was pissy about it as well (why are tanks, by and large, such fuckheads, that is a serious question, answers on a postcard please?) but I quickly enlightened him: “no cow, no healer, capiche?” And actually the noobcow put out a very respectable 2.5-3k DPS, compared, for example, to the silent DK who trailed along behind us (when he wasn’t dirtnapping, from all the bad stuff he stood in), drooling intermittently and doing about 1k in emblem gear.
I stuck with noobcow pretty much all afternoon, having to fight groups to take him (highlight: “are you 2 gay or something, lol” – thank you tank from Crushridge, YES WE ARE, WE ARE CYBORING WITH OUR ARSES RIGHT NOW!!!) but, by the end of it he was nicely purpled, very grateful and seriously thinking of server-transferring to AD. I am still infuriated the poor bastard had such a hard time of it.
Also what is wrong with Crushridge?! Is it AD’s buddy server are something because I haven’t been in a single random group that hasn’t had somebody from Crushridge in it. And, by the way, from what I’ve seen you of you guys, it doesn’t bode well for your server. Crushridge is clearly the place where the tards come from. I am about 50% of the way to insta-dropping a group if it has somebody from Crushridge in it.
I fear this post is just a wee bit ranty. It’s the Sanity Tap affect. *gibber* *drool* I am in fact wearing my underpants on my head, and in the process of sticking knitting needles up my nose…
I think I need a holiday. Already!
Oh, I did see the new 5-mans as well. At least, they went by in a blur of incomprehension, given the speed at which PUGs dash through them.
Um. I think there’s some, like, plot in them? And like I thought I heard Syvlanas talking. And maybe Arthas followed us really slowly at one point? Like, whu? I’m still a bit shaky on the boss tactics but I managed to brute-force heal my way through them, and not stand in any of the nasty stuff DBM told me about (unlike, coincidentally, many of the DPS I ran with). Hopefully, at some point, I will actually get a chance to, y’know, experience something other than little green bars going up and down (mainly down). It’s all a bit sad really.
And my final tip for any healers using Sanity Tap regularly. Make a macro. Mine goes:
/p Hello, I will be healing your PUG today. Please note these three simple rules for your comfort and convenience:
/p If we wipe, we all run, including the tank. If you pull aggro I won’t heal you. If you stand in bad stuff I won’t heal you either. Enjoy!
[and, if there’s a lock in the party] /p Warlocks will receive 1 renew worth of life tapping. Any more self harm and it’s your own problem.
I had to make the last one because so many puglocks seemed to thank my mana bar was their’s to rent, and we’d end up in these insane battle of wills whereby the warlocks would lifetap themselves to the point of death in an effort to get me to heal them and I’d pointedly ignore it. I had a guy go into Garfrost on 3% health. His problem.
And Garfrost is assuredly a PUGkiller if ever there was one. I hate that fight already.
Mage: (splat)
Mage: WTFFFFF WHY NO HAEL
Me: Because you exploded.
Mage: WTF WHY NO HAEL !?!!!!
Me: Because he hit you in the face WITH A ROCK, why do you think?
I had a group with two people in with a mix of blues and greens in Utgarde Pinnacle. One of the other DPS (I was tanking) said something along the lines of “2.2 GS WTF O_o”.
I stuck by them and said “Funnily enough about a year ago when we were first clearing this place people were doing 1500 DPS. We’ve not wiped so far so sod off with your GS elitism”.
First time I’ve actually encountered someone moaning about gearscore – we don’t seem to have that addon on Eonar.
God, it’s absolutely infuriating isn’t it when people start making a fuss about DPS, like they were never in blues and greens, and pulling in 2k DPS on a good day. It drives me crazy. I’d rather have somebody in blues who knows what a rotation is than somebody decked out in purples who doesn’t give a shit.
Also I remember how grim it was when I was trying to gear Tam and everybody sneered at me – I genuinely don’t get what other players think this will achieve. Is there some kind of fabulous prize to be won for putting genuine newbies off endgame?
To be honest, I partially blame AD (not in a serious way) – I was getting used to good PUGs with sensible people in them, and suddenly I’m back with douche-ville. I wasn’t quite prepared for it.
I think I must live a very sheltered WoW life, or maybe I am just too clueless to grasp things going on around me, but I can’t remember ever having a really bad pug with really nasty people, so I read these stories of yours with a kind of horrified curiosity.
I’ve been using the dungeon finder a lot these last days and maybe one day soon I can write my own horror story!
In the case of noobcow here I think I would have gone into overprotective mama bear mode instantly – just reading about hurts.
Also, I think the dungeon finder only works within the server battlegroups, so I guess you will be seeing a lot of players from the same four (?) servers.
I was getting used to living a sheltered WoW life, that’s the terrible thing. I think I’ve had one bad pug during my entire time on AD, and a copule of non-ideal ones, but mainly people have been fun and sane, and the standard of play has been high. I was totally unprepared to be thrown back into outer darkness where this wailing and gnashing of teeth.
It’s possible I just bring out the worst in people – maybe it’s Tam, he does look kind of smug and self-righteous but to be fair I did design him that way =P
Yes, poor Noobcow, it shouldn’t have been necessary, it really annoys me thinking back on it. I have no idea why other players feel the need to go on like that: it’s not like owning a bunch of epics suddenly makes you able to the play the game. But the rogue was perfectly happy and I was perfectly happy, so I guess it was just random tanks throwing their weight around?
Noooo! Not more Crushridge! Noooooo!
(Actually last night I was with a group *not* from Crushridge, and they were all lovely)
You are so brave – I would never in a million years go into a PuG as a healer. I do want the pet though, so maybe one day I’ll dip my toes in there as DPS (I have very good gear, but little group experience, so goodness knows how much DPS I can output though.)
Actually I’ve always felt self-conscious about DPSing, in my case numbers didn’t meet the arbitrarily imposed standard – whereas, with healing, at least I know if I keep people alive nobody will be frowning over my recount performance. I don’t think it’s a question of bravery – it’s more a question of not being able to do anything else =P And to be honest, it cuts both ways, I mean you get more shit from people but you also get more control.
Also if you have a very active heroic-running guild, then why put yourself through pugs for no reason? There are advantages to pugs sometimes, but I’d much rather run with friends.
As always another awesome post Tam.
Good on you for taking the cow with you throughout. You’re right, you do get some god awful tanks in groups. The arrogance of some amazes me…
I ran a late night (well, late night for me – half 11) HoS with a friend last night to net him his two frost. We had a mage, myself healing, my friend as a DK dps, DK tank and a paladin DPS.
The DK tank “loled” at the mage and the paladin, asking them both whether these were “alt” characters.
Granted, the mage wasn’t putting out exceptional DPS, but it was certainly decent.
What REALLY pissed me off was the fact that the DK insisted on using “pala” and “mage” as names. Nobody in the group had particularly complex character names, there were no funny accents or difficult characters, not even particularly long. But throughout, he brought himself to the attention of the other characters by using their class name.
After a wipe on the…thingy thing with Bran and the computer and the tanks’ flat out refusal to move out of the big orange shooty fires, I quietly mentioned that nobody had a particularly complex character name and it was far more polite to use the names rather than class. I explained I expected at least a modicum of decency from my PuGs, to which the paladin commented I must be disappointed a lot…
We then continued and squished Loken without any issue, and just before the group disbanded the tank apologised to the party for using class names.
Whether or not he will use character names in the future is another matter entirely, but I like to feel he may have left the group a little more humble than he entered!
Thank you kindly
And I don’t think I deserve praise for being human to poor old Noobcow, I would have thought it was the default state. I was pretty horrified by the way people were inclined to treat him, and he wasn’t like he was a noobie-noob – he knew what he was doing, he was just beginning to gear. Also he was genuinely enthusiastic about the game, which was lovely. I mean, I’m enthusiastic too but I can get a little jaded sometimes.
I *hate* it as well when people don’t use my name as well – somebody insisting referring to me as “pri” (which I assume was short for ‘priest’) throughout a run, and I was basically too pug ground down to complain. “come pri” – grrrrr! When I’ve bitched about this in the past, people who tank pugs a lot hve explained that there’s so much to concentrate on that trying to remember a random name is sometimes more trouble than it’s worth.
I see both sides, but ‘Tam’ ain’t that hard, and I’d much rather people had some awareness of me as an individual, not just a tool for their use.
But well done on speaking up and actually getting somebody to apologise! Whenever I try to do that, people just go nuclear on me. Perhaps you can get away with more when you’re a cute tree =P
I think it might have been the fact that I was a) a cute tree, b) the healer and c) the fact I used words with more than two syllables.
I have to say, I do like to crank out my vocabulary when dealing with the particularly irritating.
I am keeping that macro by the way, and will be using it from now onwards
Fun post. It was very nice of you to stand up for the cow
Thank you kindly – high praise from you, Jong
I don’t comment nearly enough on your blog but I read you whenever you update.
Also I don’t think it was a question of kindness to cows, more basic standards of decency. It’s not like the guy *needed* help or anything – he absolutely pulled his weight. It really annoys me that people wouldn’t give him a break simply because he wasn’t covered in epics.
Sadly, I think my server is the dick server on our battle group. Only times I’ve grouped with Vashj people, one of them spent the entire Strath lecturing the healer about his gemming (which was mostly intellect, it wasn’t THAT bad) and then a lower level pug where the healer ran in decided to ninja a lockbox (??) and then not heal, at all. We eventually voted to kick him after he sat there refusing to leave just saying “well vote to kick me then noobs, or leave and get the debuff. lol” We got in a new healer and the rest went smoothly we even did another. /sigh.
I’m actually a little worried about gearing up my lesser geared alts, or even my freshly dinged alts, because of the dickery that’s going to ensue. And not the good kind. In fact, I actually think a lot of groups are formed by looking at their gear level. And if I’m not in Halls of Stone, Utgarde Pinnacle, or Caverns of Time, I’m in Dalaran.
BUT overall I like the feature.
Since moving to Argent Dawn, I look back at Emerald Dream and suspect I was on a dick server back then. It’s not a happy feeling, although as soon as you get used to a certain standard of behaviour you’re left completely horrified and unprepared when you’re suddenly thrown in among people behaving … well … like WoW players =P
A priest ninjed a lockbox…?! Like, whu? Was he really desperate for a healing potion and some silk? That’s so utterly random.
I think I’ve possibly just had bad luck – M’Pocket Tank has been gearing her blood DK and, despite rocking up in heroic blues, she’s done absolutely fine. Although possibly people expect Deathtards to be shite
And overall I like Sanity Tap as well – it’s really really nice to be able to walk into a PUG just for the asking. Benefits of being a jobbing healer I guess.
I think I’ve had a much more positive experience with the system than you have, but I see some of the same flaws. This patch has kind of brought pugging back in a big way, and pugging used to be one of my favorite things to do back in classic before they totally ruined the LFG system. Now it’s fixed, but the newer mentality you speak of, where lesser geared players are mocked, no one tries to talk to each other (whether to give useful advice or just chat), and people need to bang out instances in record times, has changed the atmosphere.
These dungeon runs are plentiful and ruthlessly efficient, but they’re not as fun–it feels like there’s no room for talking, joking around, or anything that distracts from getting things done. And the new instances are so short anyway, and the strangers more strange (i.e. you may never see them again), that there’s little incentive to do otherwise.
To be honest, I’ve been focusing on the negative a lot here – simply because ranting and frothing is the only thing that keeps me sane after too much healing. The business with Noobcow really really pissed me off, but actually I also had some perfectly functional PUGs, and some amazingly efficient ones as well.
I think I must have some kind of twisted love/hate relationship with PUGS since I do PUG an awful lot, and I’m really glad that I can do with so little effort these days. I do feel generally positive about the Sanity Tap system, despite the bad apples.
But you’re right – there’s definitely been a shift in atmopshere. I mean, the people I ran BRD back in the day stayed on my friends’ list for ages – it was like we’d been to war together or something, and we did basically spend all afternoon in each other’s company so we came out of that like comrades.
I guess what you’ve lost in ‘romance’ (so to speak) you’ve made up in efficiency…
You have had, by far, a worse time with the randomizer than I have. My worst groups have been from my server. I had a group completely made of one guild that was in such a hurry through one of the troll instances that we wiped on King Dred because the tank didn’t wait to make sure everyone was in range to start. Then, after everyone was back up, the other death knight’s pet pulled the boss. The paladin was nice enough to throw Divine Intervention on me, and I resurrected the lot. It was kind of funny that the second cause of our wipefest was sporting the “Patient” title. Patient my left butt cheek.
To be fair, I am bitching and frothing about the stand-out failpugs, and the business with Noobcow really trauamatised me … but I actually had a bunch of perfectly adequate, even super-efficient pugs which were perfectly fine.
I think I have just earned myself the patient title – although you may be assured I won’t be wearing it, I feel very far from patient a lot of the time =P The desperate speed is particularly annoying. I mean, readychecking before a boss takes less than 5 seconds. And if I was a tank I’d make bloody sure my healer was behind me before I invited a fuck off enormous dinosaur to chomp on my face.
I am totally stealing that macro, except I’m going to add a line to “make sure the tree is with you before you make the next pull!” I’m all for chain pulling, but I’ve had tanks run through so fast, I don’t even get time to loot my sparklies!
I’ve never liked pugging as a healer, but I’ve done it quite a bit since the new tool went in — usually with my pocket tank. Only once did we have to kick someone: a mage in blues and greens, with no gems or enchants and who hardly dps’d at all. I think he wanded. He said he didn’t care about gems and enchants when he was getting loot through heroics. We gave him a chance through the first boss in HoL, then booted him. I don’t mind helping people get geared, but I’m not going to carry some lazy ass through if they don’t care enough to even try and contribute to the group.
My server has an idiot brother as well, but I already knew that from battleground chat, where I’m frequently asked “r u leik haelz?”
Ooooh, good point. I need to add an another line to remind tanks not to run away from their healer – amazing how many tanks seem *determined* to outpace me. Strange. You’d think it would be pretty basic.
I imagine PUGing would be less traumatic with M’Pocket Tank but Chas really hates tanking PUGs.
I’m really annoyed that AD has been paired with the moron-server. What did we do to deserve that? Can we vote to kick the server?
Absolutely need to add the line about waiting for the healer. I play a tree, and I have started to hate warriors in particular. I need to remind them that I don’t have a charge button. I also tend to stand back away from the group. Consequently, if I try to loot my corpses, I find the warrior was sprinted off toward the next pull. The *instant* they are within range of charging, they warp into the mob, leaving me waving my branches with futility, watching their health drop to roughly 30% by the time I can get caught back up and start panic healing.
I am *SO* making a macro!
GRRR, yes, I feel your pain – thankfully when this happens I tend to go racing up and give them wings, which I have glyphed so it’s the best low-maintenance ‘oh shit’ button in the world. On the other hand, I have no idea what a tree does – frantic swiftmendathon?
Also I can’t help but think if I was a tank, I’d be damn certain my healer was in range before I ran into a group mobs shouting “WEEEE, HIT ME HARDER!”
On behalf of noobcows everywhere, thank you.
It wasn’t so long ago that I was wearing home-made crafted epics, and damn proud of it. Also the guy was *perfectly capable* of contributing effectively to a heroic run, it infuriated me to see everyone behaving so badly. In short: being basically human to noobcows should be the default behaviour in Azeroth.
I laughed so hard reading your trials in PuGland (as I have named it). I agree with you on everything you said.
I actually just roll into the PuGs as DPS though now. It is too aggrevating to try and heal these folks. I will gladly heal for my guild and friends, but I do not have the patience to put up with healing for PuGs any more.
On the poor little cow, I would have defended him too. People get pissed that a “lowbie” fresh 80 is in their group, but how the hell are they supposed to get gear? Snap their fingers and twitch their nose?
As a Warlock, I get yelled at by healers cause I refuse to Lifetap myself down to nothing. I have the glyph, so Lifetap is just part of my rotation when running anyway, so unless it is a prolonged fight or an “oh shit” moment, I rarely need to drain my mana down so low. Who knows, maybe I am doing it all wrong?
Anyway, good post. Love starting my days off with your blog.
Awww thank you for the kind words, I’m delighted to entertain
Healing for strangers is a bit of an uncomfortable situation – I think it’s because you essentially have to bear responsibility for the inadequacies of others. Wipes are pretty complex (the tank didn’t hit his cd, the DPS stood in fire that just that moment) but the most obvious, surface reason for any wipe is LACK OF HEALZ so thus healers often find themselves taking a lot of unfair shit. Also nobody notices healing – if someone does massive DPS you can well imagine the party that ensues, but if you heal really effectively nobody notices because staying alive is pretty much the default state of play.
I like the idea of the ‘irresponsibility’ of DPS but ultimately I’m too much of a control freak and rotate bores me.
Also, yes, alas poor Noobcow. Makes me actually furious – we were all gearing once.
You get yelled at for *not* life-tapping? That confuses me since nothing makes me grit my teeth harder than warlocks snacking on mana bar like it’s their property. I mean, I’ll always throw instant heals towards a good luck but it’s scary as all hell if you’re in a dangerous fight and the warlock is standing there grinning, with blood dripping down to his elbows, and 12% life left.
Anyway, good post. Love starting my days off with your blog.
Knitting needles and underpants… Blackadder?
Yes! I’m glad somebody got that and it didn’t come across as merely random insanity
That’s a lovely story, I feel sorry for all the new 80s being mocked in this new PUG system. I have a newly 80 paladin tank, and had her tank Violet Hold. The Fury Warrior who outgeared me (had as many HPs as I did) proceeded to pull everything for me, even though I warned the group I was a fresh 80. He claimed he was ‘allowed’ to do that because he was the group leader. Sigh. We made it through somehow, but it makes me want to hold off on doing pugs with the babytank. Had good experiences on the main, although I found HoR very hard to heal. Only had to kick one member who thought it was funny to come in with resurrection sickness…
Don’t give up, Liadan!
You’ll get some jerks, no doubt in your baby tanks gear you’ll attract it.
But that’s what the pugland is for! Let the crap slide off your shoulders, tank your best, collect your badges, and off you go!
You’ll be uber tanking it up before you know it.
I genuinely believe treating Noobcow like a human being is not something that makes a ‘lovely’ story – it should be *default* behaviour. We were all gearing once, after all, and if people spit on you when you’re trying to play the game, what kind of message does that send out?
And grrrr – that fury warrior sounds like a total bastard. Had I been healing that run I’d have freaked out and probably let him die – after all, even if you’re wearing plate, you’re still damn squishy compared to a properly specced tank.
I’ve only healed HoR once – I think I had the blessing of ignorance upon me because I healed it, and then later learned it was meant to be horrid to heal. Sometimes when you’re clueless you don’t notice how you’re struggling.
Anyway, don’t give up on the babytank – not everybody is a total dick. I hope.
Thank you for standing up for the cow.
I’m a fairly casual player, so my 80 has less than 3 days /played time at 80. I have a bizarre mix of crafted epics and blues, tier 9 shoulders, and random items from dungeons. I’m not the best player, but I pull about 2.5-3k as a lock. Not awesome, but enough to clear heroics.
This weekend one ass of a tank and healer decided to mock me and the mage for sucking. The tank posted recount, and it showed me doing about 1k dps. I posted my recount (showing me at 2.3k), since the tank hadn’t set up recount to include pet damage and that’s kind of an important thing for a lock. The tank and healer then started giving me crap for standing up for myself. They accused me of stealing shards (I’m rolling just like everyone else), then the healer got pissed I won a cape that a good upgrade (I stole that too) and when logic undermined those arguments, they started telling me I just sucked too much to even run heroics. I told them they were more than welcome to kick me, they said they didn’t want to run with an empty spot, I reminded them they would get a new DPS in under a minute. Logic wins again, so the tank says “Well, I’m not trying to be mean, but you just really suck.” I stuck with them because I wanted my damn emblems, but I probably shouldn’t have. I’m still upset about their attitude.
And that’s not even getting into what my poor boyfriend encountered in a random PUG. He’s an early 50s pally and honestly doesn’t know much beyond soloing. He decided it would be fun to tank an instance, without knowing he should probably be prot spec vs ret spec (because he’s in his 50s, and does it really matter that damn much at that point?), and got so much crap that he left the group before he hit the first boss.
Sorry for the rant, but thanks for sticking up for the cow, because I imagine his fate would have been similar to both of ours.
No, no rant, away – I understand the impulse entirely. And, really, I deserve no thanks for sticking up for Noobcow – as far as I’m concerned, not being a dick to people who have just hit 80 should be *the default* behaviour.
Also I’m pretty casual myself, I have to say. And I remember what a struggle it was when I first dinged, and it wasn’t all that long ago! As far as I’m concerned, as long people don’t stand in the fire, are tolerably civil and pull in around 1.5k DPS, I’m happy. In fact, I’d much rather less DPS and more sensible play. No point going in there, and doing 6k DPS for the 2 seconds before every bad guy in the room starts eating your face.
Anyway, I’m really sorry some idiotic randoms decided to have a go at you. I’m really shocked – it’s a horrific story, and they had no right to treat you like that, when you *clearly* have every right to be running heroics, and definitely don’t suck. Rant and then let it go is my usual practice, and hopefully don’t let a few absolute wankers put you off entirely. Also if you’re *that* insecure that you have make other WoW players feel rubbish then, well, I think it’s time to take a good long look at your life – really it was unspeakably pathetic behaviour on their part.
And your poor boyfriend – the group should have been grateful they *had* somebody willing to tank them. Truthfully, although it’s *possible* to tank off-spec during the levelling game it’s probably better not to risk it in general, unless you know your healer really well. I’m always completed shocked at how squishy non-prot pallys can be (I remember trying to heal someone through a group quest when they were ret and I managed but I remember thinking to myself “YIKES!”).
But even so, my response would probably be something like “Um, have you forgotten to change specs” or “could you please go prot for this” no “LOL GO PROT YOU NOOB! WTF?!!!”
Honestly, people forget what it’s like not to be 80 and under the impression they know everything. I hope you have better luck in future – I promise you, there are nice people in Azeroth !
“[Shrivelled Heart] I mean I’m glad it doesn’t look like a dildo or a butt plug (or if it does it’s a sex toy for the inconceivably hardcore)”
[...]
“Shrivelled heart my arse.”
That’s our Tam, he puts the Cor! in hardcore.
Yeah baby!
Good morning!
I really like the new interface!
As you mentioned, with queue times in the seconds, it’s really a blessing.
Also as you say, with current levels of overgearing, the idiocy we see in pugs is essentially irrelevant.
On my DK – where I’ve only queued as dps – I end up tanking half of the trash simply due to agro and undergeared tanks not being able to hold agro, but it really doesn’t matter because mobs die too fast to kill me. I’ve had runs that were less than 8 minutes long – 8 minutes! Where the other dps were also geared out. I’ve had runs where I did over 80% of the party damage. Yes. 80%. But it didn’t matter. We cleared it, finished the instance, done. Thank you very much, good run all, /leave party.
On my shammy, I have yet to experience a wipe. I’ve healed every run even though I queue as dps/heals, I’m sure the ‘line’ is much shorter for heals. No boss/fight has been so bad that I couldn’t keep at least myself and the tank up.
The only wipe I’ve had so far was on my DK in Old Kingdom when the tank ran in and aggroed literally every single trash pack in that nasty area down the steps. I think he wanted to see if he could wipe us. Still managed to kill over half of the mobs with anti-magic shield, icebound fortitude, and Draeni self-heals.. but that was a lot of mobs.
The silence is indeed deafening, but I’m usually in my guild’s vent, chattering away. Haven’t had any group come to vote-kicking yet.
All in all, really, just what I’m looking for and as much as I could have expected from such a system.
I just noted I looked like a dickead for pulling agro on trash. Hmm, maybe I am. Point being, I don’t cause undue strain on the healer even when I do pull agro on the trash. Mobs die, I’m at 75% health, no worries.
On the other hand, if the tank is undergeared, for bosses at least I just wait long enough to ensure they have agro before lighting it up.
I’m an elitist jerk, I admit it, but I never never talk bad about others in party (and after my long-ago error of posting recount as a healer trying to get a group through VH, I won’t even do that ever again). A helpful hint now and again (um, ret sir, could you please turn of rightous fury?), but it’s not worth being mean, makes it all more unpleasant, and honestly doesn’t help anyone, no matter how crappy the player is.
Hine, you’re really *really* not an elitist jerk. You play to a high standard and expect the same from others, but it’s not the same. You don’t condemn people who are learning, and you’re not arrogant or rude or superior. You’d never in a million years even dream of trashing a Noobcow, and you don’t criticise people for a more casual approach than yours. Also confidence is not dickheadism – from even just reading your blog it’s obvious that you like to do big DPS becuase it pleases it to excel at the game, not because you’ve got some unhealthy element of your self-esteem bound up in it.
And I can’t believe you’re still dwelling on the healer-recount incident. I mean, heavens, if there was *ever* an excuse for losing it, that situation would have been it. It wasn’t perhaps the fluffiest way of dealing with the situation but, hell, you’re under no obligation to cater to the vanity of others – dude cleary wasn’t doing his job, and had it been me I would probably have deplored the method but I’d have seen your point (eventually).
Equally, if there’s a hard hitter in my PUGs, I tend to assume they can take care of themselves. It only bothers me if somebody rushes in, pulls aggro and then stands around with a half-munched face, wringing their hands and going “healz plz!”
Avast there!
The Sanity Tap is definitely changing our attitudes to 5-manning, and to pugs – I do like the efficiency but I also miss the recognition of other players as human beings, and I’m apalled at the unforgiving elitism it seems to inspire.
I’ve had incompetant pugs but I haven’t left, or been kicked, from a single one. And I think I’ve only had a couple of wipes (usually due to displays of absolutely mind-boggling stupidity from other players) so for sheer concrete “sucess” then I guess I shouldn’t be complaining.
I’m not actually complaining – I do like the system, and it has revitalised PUGing, but the attitude it seems to bring out of people does worry me rather…
So far I’ve only encountered one jerk in a random PuG, and that was a druid healer who deigned to eloquently inquire “lol why u beast mastery,” and after my carefully crafted response of “Because I love BM, it’s my favorite hunter spec and is good DPS if you know how to play it.” retorted with “lol still worst dps”. I sighed, but not wanting to screw over the rest of the group, decided not to get into an argument with the healer in case he got uppity and left.
The worst part about it was that I was far and away the highest DPS of the group, so he didn’t even have a legitimate reason to complain. Just wanted to prove how smart he was.
If I was a hunter I’d totally be BM – actually, if I was a hunter I’d probably be *huntard*. There’s something about firing a gun and having a pet that brings out the worst in me. FASTER PUSSYCAT KILL KILL!
Ahem.
Also, what a complete tard. I really hate it when some random decides to tell you that you should be playing the game his way. Especially when his way is a way devoid of imagination, passion and fun.
Tam –
We ran with a noobrogue yesterday, and very similarly, he did extremely respectable dps, he was on the ball, didn’t stand in bad, didn’t eat Loken’s Lightning Nova in the face, and was good natured and friendly. He was a little squishy, and I made sure I kept Sacred Shield up on him most of the time, just in case, but on the whole I was glad to get to run with him.
Also, I think the silent pug fix is to be over-bubbly at the start of the run. When people start zoning in I make it a point to be chatty, and soon everyone’s loosened up and it sometimes almost feels like a run with friends-list people. I’ve had a few quiet pugs that way, but no silent ones.
You almost sound like someone who may well have been grouping with my boyfriend. He’s recently gotten his Rogue to 80 and he’s addicted to the new PUG tool. He’s usually a pally tank, and he’s done all the instances so he knows what he’s up to, but he was – shall we say – poorly geared. I think he played that Rogue nearly non-stop this last weekend. He’s a little bummed that he’ll probably get the Perky Pug on his alt before he gets one on his main.
I make no claims as to his skill though, I’m comfortable with random coincidence.
Yay for noobs – being genuinely good at the game and genuinely good to play with! I have no idea why people are so hostile, well, I do, it’s becuase they’re dickheads, but I think back on everybody who was nice to me when I was noobing it up and try to pay it forward.
Hmmm..I’m not sure I’m the bubbly type. Maybe I should get Tam to let his hair down, and perhaps he’ll look more approachable. Also I wonder if you get away with it cruising on the female-toon-is-probably-a-40-year-old-dude-but-will-be-nice-on-the-off-chance-she-is-genuine-honest-to-goodness-female-of-species effect
Well done with the noobcow.
It’s kinda sad that it’s cross-server now. If I ran across someone in blues and greens who pulls 2.5-3k, I’d move heaven and earth to try and recruit them for my guild.
Being nice to noobcows should be the default, not something for which one garners praise.
His DPS crept up significantly over the course of the runs – starting nudging 2k in well-itemised blues and greens, and his crafted epics, and ending comfortably around the 3k mark.
Go Noobcow – soon he will be knocking over Icecrown.
3k dps in HC’s is very respectable… the only class I could think a Cow could be that could hit 3k dps with crafted gear would be DK?
He was hitting 3k by the end of our instance chain – by which time he’d accumulated enough emblems to get a few serious upgrades to accompany the purples he’d already picked up. He was a warrior noobcow.
I’m going to have to stop reading these in work, people are looking at me weirdly when I start laughing.
Totally agree with Crushridge, I had a Mage from there in UP with one of the guild DK tanks the other night. She managed to kill herself on *every* trash pull – he’d mark a kill target since another was new to 80, she’d blow cd’s on a different one and rip aggro in 3 seconds flat. Smooshed. I just cringed back into my seat. Deathwing’s not too bad, and I think there’s an Italian server in the group too judging from /g over the past few days.
Just to make you feel better Tam, avg. wait for a dps seems to be 2-3 minutes at peak times. I think the longest I’ve waited is 30 seconds. Nice to be in demand
Crushridge is the “Italian server”. It has a predominant Italian-speaking population. I remember doing PvP back in the day and the people from there would refuse to talk anything but Italian in /bg. Now they’re back with a vengance in /p instead. :<
Yes, it’s really terrifying when there’s all this Italian before a boss pull and you’re like “Um, guys?”
Actually paranoia makes me think they’re complaining about me. “Look at that belf in his sissy robe. Lol!”
Certainly gives a whole new meaning to NSFW
And, yes, the LFG tool is brilliant if you’re a solitary healer or a healer + tank combo but I think I sat on here for like thirty minutes the other night with Vorla and a couple of others – all dressed up with no tank to go.
Mages and Warlocks on LFG seem particularly suicidal. I’d have thought it would be DKs and hunters but actually I’ve had decent luck with them, but between mages not following kill order and locks self-harming to the point of death… sigh! Still, at least with all the over-geared tanks floating around the DPS are largely incidental these days.
Soon we’ll do away with them entirely
I’ve done about 10 random heroics as DPS (either my dwarf hunter or my severely scrubby orc DK)…only one on Linedan, my tank, and that was Azjol. During that one, the DPS death nugget helpfully decided that he was going to do some of the pulling for me when I actually let two seconds elapse between pulls because I was looting to pay for my repair bills. He also linked Recount in party chat after the first boss (7500 dps, then he patted the other two DPS on the head and said “lol but thats ok”) and then dropped Army of the Dead on the last two bosses.
Mostly, though, I’ve had good luck. Some of the tanks are pulling at hyperspeed (healer four rooms away around a corner still drinking? no problem!) and nobody says much, but in general, I haven’t run across any serious d-bags yet. Yet. It’ll happen.
By the way, I was in a heroic Old Kingdom on my dwarf yesterday…the shadow priest with us was doing 800 dps. I inspected her. Average item level in the 170s. Maybe one or two pieces of ilevel 200 gear, and mostly level 76-78 normal instance blues and a couple quest greens other than that. Fortunately nobody said anything, we explained the fights when she asked, and she got some nice upgrades at the end. She did pretty good considering what she had to work with. So good job with the noobcow, and I hope he transfers over to AD.
This time last year I remember being amazed when I pugged Heroic Drak’Theron Keep and was in a party with a shadow priest doing 2.5K dps. The rest of us were puddling about at 1.5K. I seem to recall we completed the run just fine, it was a laugh, the Dinosaur died and I even added some friends.
I recently dragged that character out – orc hunter, now well behind the gearing curve with my Nesingwary 2000 rifle (I feel the love for the proud crafter cow!) and used him to test the waters in the PUG system.
If I didn’t know the dungeons from tanking them until my eyes bled for my guild, I would have been lost. The echoing vast silence was punctuated only with brief, despairing squeals as mobs that were inconsiderate enough to notice the party were squashed. Strategies or options were never mentioned – brute force FTW?
If you were new to 80, what have you learned? I fear it only reinforces the bad behaviour and poor attitudes we are seeing: why get out of the fire? I’ll be healed through it! Why follow a kill order? AOE!! Who cares what the boss does at 75% and 50%, they won’t live long enough to be inconvenient. Pity the poor fresh 80 who confesses it’s their first time in the dungeon and would like to know what to do for the boss. I suspect their screen would melt from how fast the vote to kick option comes up.
Still, the silent run was better than the next where I struck a group all from the same server (not mine) who spoke in a strange code language that was incomprehensible to anyone, except for the parts where the Deathknight decided to berate the “shitty dps” i.e. me. My dps? 2.5K – same as the once-awesome priest.
Have heroics suddenly gotten harder that we all need to be 3 or 4 times tougher than we used to be? If it were a group for ToTC, absolutely my dps was low, but a heroic??
Apologies for the wall of text, but since I don’t run a blog of my own this was a good place to comment on a subject that pushes all of my annoyance-buttons
Much respect, Tamarind, for your cow-support! If more of us start noticably acting like actual human beings in these instances, hopefully we can make things less horrible for people who get enjoyment from playing the game, not from belittling others. Like your pocket tank, I too loathe tanking for pugs, but I think I shall do more from now on. As you note indirectly in your post, the rare roles of tank or healer have much more influence on the tone of a run as they are much harder to replace.
What happened was people’s expectations changed. It used to be that people accepted that heroics were a challenge that took 45 minutes, and wiping 1-2 times was normal. Now people feel like they’re being “forced” to “farm” Heroics for their two EoF, so they want to get in and out as quickly as possible. When the instances aren’t dropping any loot for you, and the two badges at the end are the only thing you’re interested in (and even those are like 1/40th of a piece of gear – EoF costs are insane), there’s a lot less patience.
A lot of those people also probably feel like they farmed those heroics to death the first time they leveled their character, when they were looking for Essence of Gossamer or Mark of the War Prisoner or whatever and gearing up, and now they feel like they outgrew them, and thus don’t enjoy being forced back into running them.
I’m not condoning it, I’m just trying to say that that appears to be where people are coming from – with Daily Random Heroics dropping as many badges per week as ICC right now, there’s a lot of pressure to do that heroic as quickly as possible.
That’s a perspective I hadn’t at all considered, thank you.
As a relative newcomer, by the time I was running heroics they were still challenging for people at my gear level but there wasn’t quite the same degree of focus on running them for nothing but the meta-rewards (emblems) and quite a few people were still expecting to get drops they could use. But, actually, you’re right, there’s a huge leap between running content for stuff you can use and will directly improve your character, and grinding through that content for rewards not contained within it.
This was really insightful. Thanks again.
I loved this post
That’s really nice of you to stick by the noobcow – you probably reaffirmed his faith in himself AND humanity (at least the healer kind).
Also, I thoroughly agree with your macro – I wish I had been able to utilise that when I was on my healer!
Awww, thank you kindly
By the way, I’ve been meaning to say for a while: Chibicow is so cute!
I’m still bewildered that some people were so inclined to be shitty to Noobcow. It wasn’t like he was harming the group or anything. I hope he’s doing well for himself, and having fun.
Actually, watching the way some DPS behave, I wonder if tanks also need a macro. Something like: LET ME ACTUALLY DO MY JOB!!
Sanity Tap: converts x sanity into x emblems
ROFL
Very well said, great sum up of the new system. As a healer I know exactly how you feel. People are running a race to see who can be the biggest jerk before the instance is over.
Warlocks.. Oh Drinks are on me today? Sometimes I will drink before a boss to top off if I need and see the warlock tap all the way down and just stand there. /facepalm I guess they wanted a quick trip outside for some fresh air.
Personally my tank and I have been treated pretty badly some days. Before an instance even starts.. I want to bash in some pug faces these days. The lack of respect I’ve noticed is at an all time low. That’s saying something, even for WoW.
P.S. That’s one hot maraca there =p
Hehe, delighted to have entertained – and yes, as far as maracas goe, that’s the absolutely the one I’d want to be wielding in my off-hand =P I just wish it wasn’t advertised as ’shrivelled heart’.
I think healers probably get the worst of it, to be honest – despite getting a bit of a grief, I’ve never seen anybody lay into DPS the way they do healers. No wonder healers are in short supply.
I joined one group recently and they spent the whole run bitching about the previous healer and how crap he was – I did okay but only because I grossly over-gear heroics, not because they were playing in any way well. I pointed out why their previous healer might have left them at the end of the run but nobody seemed to care.
I don’t know why they haven’t cut the middle man out of lifetap. They might as well have an ability that lets the warlock suck mana out of the nearest healer
Been reading your wonderful ramblings for a while now, And I gotta say this one is über, so OMG FIRST POST FOR ME!
I play a Warrrior-tank and… well longest wait I’ve had on the lfg-tool is about 5 seconds. It’s abso-ma-friggin-lutely INSANE!
Haven’t had any fail-pugs using the LFG-tool and people generally haven’t had the urge to d-bag too much. Mostly it’s just been real quiet, which I honestly don’t really mind. I get enough fun chat with my guild, no need to seek it out in pugs.
Being a tank I usually dont have the time to type either, so it works out fine.
BTW, Good job on cracking skulls for your “noob-cow”, that’s real decent of you. I think I would have had a similar reaction, I tend to get all “aaaw-schucksy” when someone shows enthusiasm for their character, especially when they’re nice people, cos I’m the same exact way. I absolutely love my cow, and I loved my night elf warrior before him too. Second, if it had been my group I wouldn’t ever have checked, I trust my dps and healers as a principle. (It’s probably madness in pugs, but I’ll quit WoW before i start d-bagging innocent cows I just met)
Only totally lazy players or complete D-bags really get my ire.
Yay! Welcome, and thank you so much for your kind words and for commenting. Sorry it’s taken me so long to reply, I’m usually a bit more efficient than this – I guess my blog is lagging.
From the time I’ve spent on the Sanity Tap, it really is a good time to be a tank or a healer – I think tanks get snapped up even faster than healers do. My waiting time is usually somewhere between 1 second and a couple of minutes – M’Pocket Tank on her DPS DK can sometimes wait up to half an hour for a group.
So I guess I shouldn’t whinge too much!
It’s not the quiet that bothers me as much as the “deathly silence” – like sometimes you’ll have to ask a question or speak to your fellow pugees and they’ll just goggle at you in a “is he insane, talking like that” kind of way.
The Noobcow situation was really infuriating to me – I don’t think my behaviour in not being a total arse to him was especially laudable, it should be the default, you know? We were all Noobcows once upon a time, and, for me, it wasn’t so long ago that I can comfortably lay claim to the tile of Nonnoobcow.
I remember my first epic was my titansteel destroyer – M’Pocket Tank made it for me from titansteel and frozen orbs I farmed *myself* and, oh my god, I loved that thing. Not, err, physically. And the day I traded it up for Mariel’s Sorrow (which looks like a bloody deep sea diver’s helmet on a stick!) broke my heart. I still have my destroyer in my bank.
So I agree with you in regards to the new 80s (and most of the posters), we need to be patient with them. Hell, even try to help them out. The only thing I won’t do is carry them. I think it is good for them to take the good and the bad. It will show you the kind of player they are. I have helped a lot of folks and some turn out good others take what you give them and then bail to go to the next higher geared person offering cookies…..maybe I need to make better cookies?
Entirely agreed about the carrying – but the thing a large proportion of newly dinged 80s neither want, nor expect, to be carried – they just want a chance to gear up like anybody else. There’s no point ‘boosting’ people as they won’t actually learn how to, y’know, play the game – but it’s really depressing when people are starting to look down on tanks with less than 35k health and DPS who do less than 3k. I mean, we weren’t born in purples. And I remember the days when I couldn’t heal UK normal.
I had the same experience with the new instances. I did speak up: “Uh folks, I have never been here before”. Not a word in reply, and it all passed in a blur. A perfectly successful blur, mind you, but I didn’t get to hear what Sylvanas said, or read the quest text, or anything like that. Disappointing, after all the hype leading up to it.
Nevertheless: I do love the new LFG, and I think that the only reason we seem to be seeing so many more douchebags is that we are seeing so many more strangers in a short time, period.
It’s a bit of a depressing experience, isn’t it? It’s like if somebody gave you a novel and then expected you to read it while cycling very fast up a hill, and being chased by wild dogs. I’m assuming I’ll get a better chance to see what’s what when I go with guildies or friends or something, but, yes, it strikes me as a rather foolish way to try deliver important information to the player.
And, yes, there are a lot of good aspects to the Sanity Tap – I like that it’s revitalised pugging, and as a healer it does mean you’re never out of a group for a long.
And one does tend to remember the bad apples rather than the good ones.
Oh my, is it wrong me to be so glad that another blogger seems to be having as much problems with the new LFG system as I do?
+1 on the Renew statement for Warlocks. Like comon! And don’t do it just as the tank pulls either. Pull time is no heal time, okay?
Yeah the tanks and healers are generally pretty sweet (from experience so far) but there’s a lot of DPS boosting going on in my groups.
Although I did help “carry” a tank through H PoS. I say carry because he seemed determine to lead the way even though he’d never been there and decided he could pull the entire gauntlet at the end in 1 fell swoop. We stuck it out, wipes and all. Healed my ass off, though!
Not at all wrong, it’s a bit of a relief actually because otherwise this is just me whinging and bitching in a corner.
I don’t know what’s with the suicidal warlocks in pugs – I guess because you’re just some random they don’t think they have to pay you any consideration at all. Like I’ve caught them lifetapping to under 10% in the middle of fights. In the middle of fights! Jesus!
I’ve had a couple of poorly geared tanks for the new heroics who, like yours, have pretended desperately they were totally capable and have consequently pulled too many mobs and died horrible deaths. And tried to blame me occasionlly.
Still – we live in interesting times, huh? It keeps us on our toes =P
Cross-server PUGs have just made me appreciate AD even more. Normal servers really aren’t normal.
They really aren’t. They should be called abnormal servers.
http://theechoisles.blogspot.com/2009/08/few-thoughts-on-normal-servers.html
ZOMG! A post!!!
As a fellow healer I have to say I feel your pain. My gf is a new 80 hunter and its also her first max level character ever. I usually just cut off the complaints by telling them that I’m gearing her up, the implication that if they try kicking her they loose a healer seems to come across clear enough.
But I have encountered some idiots as well.
Apologies for the delay, my blog is lagging
Being a healer is quite nice for allowing you a degree of control over the idiocy of others but it’s annoying the way people will get so absurdly elitist over gear – as if they sprung fully formed from the head of Zeus at level 80, decked in purples
Unfortunately having got used to being in demand, I’m not sure I can ever go back to DPS (not that I’m all that hot at it anyway)
I normally tank pugs on my dk and heal on my druid. As a tank I don’t mind newly level 80 characters in greens and blues. I actually encourage it because they need to gear up as well and we were all in their shoes at some point even if it was when WOTLK came out. If someone wants to leave over it feel free no big deal.
I also know why many of those tanks charge ahead in front of the healers. For tanks who overgear an instance by a significant margin they no longer need a healer for trash packs.
For example my dk is at 38.5k hp unbuffed now and for kicks and giggles I decided to solo the front part of Heroic Halls of Lightning just to see if I could. I managed to kill the first boss with his lightning charge up and got to the second boss and died at 30% because there were 12 adds on me at that point. Its at this point the healer is really there to just toss the occasional heal to the tank and keep the dps alive, though the Icecrown dungeons do really need a healer.
It just seems you have run into some dick tanks though and there are plenty out there.
Hello there and thanks for the insights – sorry for the slow response, my blog is clearly lagging
I’m just a healer so I have absolutely no experience of life on the other side – I have no objection to players gearing up either. As long as they don’t expect to be carried and don’t stand in fire, I really don’t care what numbers are being crunched.
Again, I don’t think it’s massively over-geared tanks and DPS that are causing the problems. I mean, if somebody is doing THAT much DPS, the mobs will die before they’ve reached them and you can assume they can take care of themslves anyway. Ditto extremely powerful tanks. The issue is when some middling tank rushes off, pulls half a room, dies ignomiously and immediately starts shrieking WHY NO HEALZ YOU SUCK!!!
And although I’ve whinged about dickhead tanks, actually I had some pretty good ones too
I’d like to vote this weekend ‘Be Kind to Fresh 80s’ weekend in honour of NoobCow. ^_^
Haven’t really had any problems with the new PuG system yet, but then again, the only thing we’ve been pugging is a healer. Probably going to do some solo pugging (wth is solo pugging?) tonight, so I’m sure I’ll have all kinds of stories. ~_^
Long live Noobcow! He’s probably, like, raiding ICC as we speak
Good luck with the Sanity Tap. Remember, this is not an exit
I am going to steal that macro and use it while on my healer. Maybe modify it a bit to say “If you pull while I am not in the room then you don’t need me and won’t have a problem not getting heals.”
Or something to that extent.
Hehe, good luck with it. To be honest, I was afraid if I had too much text nobody would read it and be all tl;dr about it. So it’s a highly edited version of the original epic I wrote
I’m glad you helped that fresh 80 cow out. I mean, everyone has to start from somewhere… and it didn’t sound like he was going in expecting to be carried, for example. Good karma your way on that one
As for life tap… I usually have to tell healers to not heal me so much. I try to time my taps with my haunt return. I tell them this, but they insist on freaking out to heal me as soon as I tap and I’m absorbing life as they finish casting.
He was just a nice cow getting on his with life – he didn’t impose, he wasn’t a burden, he didn’t want to be carried. It makes me genuinely furious that some people were going to treat him so badly, especially considering some of the absolutely terrible groups I’ve had. But, yeah, I think being nice to noobcows should be the default behaviour!
(so far the karma has been working out so well, maybe it’s delayed in the post!)
I think it’s just the healer instinct kicking in “ZOMG! LOSS OF LIFE MUST HEAL NAO!!!” – warlocks are not good for one’s blood pressure
Usually I find a renew between pulls seems to be more than enough to keep a competant warlock fuelled up and ready to go.
My friend was using the Dungeon Finder tool at around level30 for his paladin tank.
He kept having to HEAL HIMSELF, seriously… there were 2 priests in 1 group, one of which was marked as a Healer yet he had to heal himself!
The second time he ran he also had to heal himself, and the idiot shaman who had marked himself as healer was an Enhancement Shaman, with Enh gear, apart from a 1hander mace and shield, and spent most of the fight trying to DPS and when my friend said “Why no heals? A tank should not have to heal himself, I had 5hp and had to Lay on Hands!” the shaman replied with “Lol, no mana, don’t cry” (yeah your mana was wasted attempting to DPS idiot).
It seems people are marking themselves as Tank/Healer to get faster groups and are then hoping to be carried with occasional heal here and there.
That’s … insane. Actually I had something similar to that during my long weekend of Sanity Tapping. I got put with a group for CoS, and the ‘tank’ was a DK. He had only 25k health but I thought to myself “don’t be elitist, you used to heal people with 20k health back in the day.” But something made me check his gear.
No tanking gear bar a belt and a trinket so it was pretty unlikely he was def-capped.
I checked his spec.
No tanking talents.
Um.
“Have you forgotten to change spec?” I enquired, politely.
He ignored me.
“Are you a tank.”
“I’m gonna be.”
“Um.”
So I just put my foot down, refused to heal and left the group.
So, yes, soon rogues will be signing themselves as healer and mages as tanks… bandages and mana shields here we come!
Funny story, word for word that was the macro i used 4 frikking years ago in vanilla on my priest. (not the lock part though).
I just never had the heart to not renew everyone who took damage.
The worm has turned full circle … or something =P
I just got soooo pissed off with locks drinking deep of my mana bar like it was their right and priviledge.
Crushridge is overpopulated.
After creating my first character only minutes after the WoW servers came online, Crushridge was the server recommended to me by the realm selection screen.
I guess it was recommended to a lot of other people too.
Soon, I was waiting in queues of 2000+, just to get into the game. Crushridge residents have been given dozens of free realm-transfer opportunities over the years and it’s still overpopulated.
I rerolled on a new server a few years ago and I’ve never seen a queue since.
Good on you for sticking up for the cow. We should all try to protect a newbie from the horrors of the LFD system. I hate the new LFD acronym – it makes me think Left For Dead which is often the case to be fair.
Not the LFD but I actually nearly got kicked from a pug VOA25 because joking with a friend who was also in the group I said my gearscore was 1000! I had literally half the group on my case. I hate gearscore with a passion because itt doesn't show how well itemised you are. Hell you could take the worst pieces that happen to be 264ilvl and put epic stamina gems in every slot as a hunter and it would be hi-fiving you and giving you a massive score. We even get applicants to our guild who list "wanting to be the best geared on wowheroes on the server" in their ambitions.
My recent post Mend Pet Glitch
Crushridge, you say? They’re… not quite as bad as Dunemaul on the whole. I think it’s somthing to do with being named for a tribe of Ogres *shrug*
Or at least, the LFD sections thereof. One assumes that there must logically be at least a few pleasant, courteous players to be find on either server.
I can’t really comment on the arrogance of tanks in LFD, since I invariably end up tanking. Admittedly, I can be extremely arrogant at times (although I like to think I have sufficient to be arrogant about!). Someone makes a stupid mistake – cool, it happens, I once made one myself – I mention what they did wrong. If they repeat it another two times, I get less pleasant.
People who who say more than 1 line in party chat get extra consideration. Further, if those lines are in legible English, it tends to become quite enjoyable, even when the rest of the party screams at us to shut up and pull more.
Crushridge, you say? They’re… not quite as bad as Dunemaul on the whole. I think it’s somthing to do with being named for a tribe of Ogres *shrug*
Or at least, the LFD sections thereof. One assumes that there must logically be at least a few pleasant, courteous players to be find on either server.
I can’t really comment on the arrogance of tanks in LFD, since I invariably end up tanking. Admittedly, I can be extremely arrogant at times (although I like to think I have sufficient to be arrogant about!). Someone makes a stupid mistake – cool, it happens, I once made one myself – I mention what they did wrong. If they repeat it another two times, I get less pleasant.
People who who say more than 1 line in party chat get extra consideration. Further, if those lines are in legible English, it tends to become quite enjoyable, even when the rest of the party screams at us to shut up and pull more.
I’m late to the party but…
I remember what seems not so long ago when pulling 800 dps was super elite! You were TOP of the game. People forget how much work it took them to get where they are today, and aren’t accommodating enough to newly dinged 80’s. Glad there are some of us still out there willing to help and not look at the blues and greens as bad, just as fresh 80’s who are working their way up.
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