The entire game of WoW is a funny community to me with players of so many different attitudes. They like stuff one day, then they hate it not too long after. They like you today and they hate you tomorrow. People beg and for new tools from Blizzard over and over and when Blizz deliver its great for a short period of time till the newness wears off and its back to the stupid reasons and playing stupid antics why a good majority of players that have skills don't enjoy and choose not to group with some more casual players and many random players that have hard time find groups themselves.
I've spend the better part of the weekend running my ass off in LFG randoms and the last few days. I ran enough Heroics that I got my Shadow Priest up to gear where I'm fairly satisfied to leave him there for now and just do one heroics if be on him daily maybe for now just to get the extra frost and if I feel like doing another maybe I may or wont. But he is decently geared from the LFG heroic randoms and often he is topping out on the damage meters if not at least second one or the other for dps. But now he wont be running as many randoms for gear and no need to unless I feel like it.
So then I decided to go down to the garage and dust off my Paladin. Felt like last time I really played him WoW was in a different era because its really been a long break from playing him to dpsing for some time. His gear just seem so outdated and at least 2 major patches have come and gone and haven't played him or tried out any the new changes. I'm just rusty playing him and even thinking to use a spell here and there is not as quick on the reflexes since haven't played for a while. But I've managed to rack up enough Emblems of Triumpt for a new Libram. T9 Chest, Helm, Shoulders and Gloves to update my gear and even picked up some nice heroic ICC heroics tanking boots for upgrade just from running allot of LFG. Sometime ran as Tank yet more often as Ret so he easily upgrade his gear as well on rolls as well. Even got the achievement for looking for multitudes for grouping with over 100 players in LFG and my new Puggie Pug pet.
One my realm LFG queues for dps are like 15-20mins long due to all the people in queues for dps and waiting on tanks and healers. But queue up as a tank and you in the queue faster than you can finish hitting that damn button. Its damn near instant. So I went to tank a few runs on my Paladin.
One thing for sure is I'm rusty like I never imagined but still tanked decently as if I did most the time. But in my mind I'm well aware of the things I'm rusty even if no one else really notices. But it was all ok and got a few runs in to remove some the rust of just not tanking in over 7 months. Most the queues I got were for the normal heroics so made it easier getting back into a bit of a tanking mode.
I switched to playing Ret for a quite a bit to get used to playing my Paladin off spec and to remember how to dps as a Paladin. OMG faceroll as dps and more than 95% the time #1 on the dps meter and my Ret gear is over 8 months old and many gear piece is just ilvl 200 gear and even got a blue piece in there somewhere. I was easily doing 3300k-3800k in LFG randoms depending on buff. A bit of the time had some decent dps groups. Then had a few groups with the occasional dpser in group around 1000 dps and even seen some lower. It was so easy to faceroll dpsing as Ret it wasn't even all that fun usually.
I remember in one H VH with a 31K HP DK dpser with average 226 ilvl gear on that could barely do 1100 dps. At first I was thinking he was the tank, then I realize he was dps and I was like wow. So had to inspect his gear and yeah full epic gear he had on and even some pvp gear. But I'm seeing a bit mix and match for dps and I'm topping the damn dps meters almost every run in my Ret off spec to get a few Ret gear from the new heroics.
But I've been in quite a few heroics where stuff just start getting stupid. I remember one run I was in as dps in H.UP I was in that in the middle of a trash pull the healer just quickly said "hey gtg guild need me for raid bye" poof and was gone. No one barely saw it and we only knew the healer was gone when the entire group wiped. Everyone was like wtf! Just like that healer bailed and didn't even wait till after trash was done so can get a replacement. Less than 10 secs later that LFG group was done for. I remember yesterday on another run in H.HoS a dps and a healer dropped out for reasons I have no idea and no warning in middle of a pull and wipe the group that was in pull I remember. That group was over before you could wonder what happened.
Been in a few the new ICC heroic where on a wipe the healer and another player couldn't find how to get back to the Instance or even the entrance and this one was just too funny because of the time it took. But it wasn't long that party fell apart as the healer just couldn't figure out how to get back to instance. I'm starting to see allot of LFG runs like that especially in the new ICC heroics.
I see some groups like to hurry or dps hurrying the tank for whatever and instead of waiting on the tank either pulling or running ahead and accidentally pulling trash which wipe a group. Immediately someone just quit group then or two people do and group falls apart. I've been in now a few groups like that. I remember in one run in heroic Pit of Saron we had a fairly new DK tanking. She was doing ok learning the pulls and doing her best in my opinion. After the first boss died at the forge. A few other people wanted the run to go faster so they decided to quickly mount up and run off to go to the next boss area. They immediately pulled a few trash and before you knew it the entire group wiped and barely anyone even knew what happened. Wasn't long group fell apart.
I was in another heroic run, one the new ICC heroics and the grouped wiped on trash for some reason. The healer immediately quit just like that. The funny thing was the healer never recovered their body which was still there later when the group wiped again on last boss. I thought that was funny seeing the players body still there face down. I mean all kind of stupid stuff I'm starting to see that ruin groups. As well I'm noticing players in LFG random have a low tolerance ratio for wiping, stupidity. I call it low resilience.
Then there was the totally classic heroic Nexus run with the 2 tanks a Warrior and a Paladin bot extremely well geared who couldn't decide between themselves which one of them was the real tank to tank the run. This one was just too funny. But apparently they seem somehow to know each other been from the same realm. Since they couldn't decide who was going to be tank the entire run one of them switched spec and started the run when backwards starting from the 3 boss at the rift then to the stone boss. Then the other tank decided he wants to tank while we then loop back around to the first boss in the ice and then to the mage boss then loop back to the last boss. Took forever it seemed. The entire time both tanks argued as well as kept vote spamming to vote each other out the run. No one did, everyone else just wanted to finish the run and get their emblems. I mean it was a comic show the entire run. As much as it was plain stupid it was just too funny.
The newness of the LFG system will be over eventually, when that is I can't say. People will get tired of random group stupidity, antics or people that act stupid in LFG or cant pull their weight and may be less likely to queue and rather run chain heroics with guildies or friends from their realm. The dps wait for LFG queues are much longer than queues for Tank/Healers by a long shot for people waiting to go as dps. Before in the old LFG it was the thing that many good tanks and raid tanks didn't run LFG all that much on their own realm where they knew the players from their own realm.
However for the moment many tanks will run LFG for now. But eventually I just don't see many good tanks putting up with random group stupidity in LFG for too long after they gotten all their emblems for their gear they need or the extra frost emblems once they get all their gear and the rest of ICC raids are open. Probably aren't really going to see many high hp tanks and the ones that do will likely be newer tanks. And I can only imagine how things will get in heroics with newer tanks with the random LFG cross realm system.
Its can be funny to think how players in WoW cause themselves undo problems in the long term with new unique group functions to make it much easier with allot of stupidity and stupid antics in LFG which causes good players to eventually at some point not want to use it eventually unless they really really have to. While LFG is still hot I'm using it to gear up as fast as possible while I can when I can. But LFG to me already seem to be on the decline and when tanks and healers are not in queue it will just take longer for dps to get into LFG and people will start complaining all over again how the LFG system don't work.
Edit: 12/25/09 - Corrected some grammar errors.
7 comments:
A good read. I agree many of the veteran instance runners will not be in the random LFG(s) after they get their badges/gear. I enjoy taking my Pally tank wanna-be into these random instances. I am still learning how to tank also. Some groups are good and give me advice. Others can be complete jerks. Another reason to get with a good active leveling/raiding guild with Vent...
I've tanked a fair amount of pugs in the new LFG system and over the past few days there have been less and less people going for it. I think in a few weeks it will be back to normal only slightly quicker to get a group. I have healed some as well but I've found that it's easier to tank - I can control the flow and speed of the group. Plus, I know I won't be stuck with a tank with 21k hp...
I have noticed a lot of intorlerance, and it's been growning. For whatever reason, healers tend to be the most reactive and quit if things go bad.
The anonymity of the game itself lends to more callous and rude behavior, the new LFG seems to have only enhanced that already nasty behavior that people can get away with because you don't have to say it to somebody's face.
It's still a good tool, even if it's awesomeness wanes over time. What will be left won't always and only be the stupid people, good players will still use it to teach a guild-mate or farm for offspec or some other reason. It won't blow up, but its power certainly has diminished.
Had a warrior making rude comments to the healer before we fought the first mob. "Trees suck..." Holy cow! As a tank trees have saved my butt many times. Love the HOT spells. Since LFG is cross-server they will probably never meet again. Will the ignore list work cross-server??
To extend the comment from G-Rebel some. Since the tool battle group wide the degree of anonymity is increased a bit more. As far as I know you can't ignore some one on another realm and the LFG tool removes the ability for the leader or party to exclude someone they know to be awful or ninja quit. I don't think things will go totally down the toilet, but I do agree that the warm fuzzy feeling we have about the tool will pass and people start complaining more about the realities. I do still see the tool being used though, especially by DPS since there is a structured line that guarantee's that you will eventually get in a group. Before the tool my hunter could easily spend 2 hours in Dalaran advertising without so much as a single whisper.
@Paul. The ignore list If i remember can if you probably put the player on ignore while "still" in party. But once you leave party and back to your own realm you don't have a chance to and it won't work best i know of. Usually say by they Player not found.
By ignoring a bad player on your realm what that does is ensure in the system that you never group with them on that character account. At least best that i'm aware of atm.
@ Martin. yeah agree the LFG system will continue to be used cross realm for Pugs. It just won't be anymore what it was during the first week of patch 3.3.
I have discovered that the LFG systems is the same as anything else in life. Some groups have been fantastic and extremely helpful (so much so that I wish they were on my server) but other groups can disseminate into chaos and the inevitable wipe, which results in high repair bills. If I am in an area that I am uncertain about, I always let the players know up front. Some will be good, others will be bad. I love the concept but I just have to hope there is more good than bad...
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