As a healer, I have found recently that people will rush in, not think, and basically just think that they are going to faceroll everything. This point was highlighted to me when I was yelled at by a DPS because I wasn't healing, thereby letting him die. And I replied something like this...if you are continuing to get aggro from mobs then you need to slow your DPS or the tank needs to up his threat. As a healer in a Dungeon Pug, I should not have to heal you as much as the tank.
However, it gets back to the idea that players aren't focusing on their roles. Their will be some serious growing pains with this new XPAC. New players who just joined during WOTLK may not remember or understand LOS or CC. And I have had to explain LOS and CC to people on LK dungeons plenty of times. People will need to learn their roles. And I hope that Blizz allows for them to learn their roles, and does not simply nerf shit.
Unfortionately dungeon PUGs are one of the major reasons I wont be returning to WoW. I tend to run solo most often due to lack of time so organized guild runs arnt usually an option for me. With que'd cross-sever drungeon groups I can only imagine the headaches they cause. Thank god I found a MMO to keep me occupied as much as WoW ever did.
As a healer, I have found recently that people will rush in, not think, and basically just think that they are going to faceroll everything. This point was highlighted to me when I was yelled at by a DPS because I wasn't healing, thereby letting him die. And I replied something like this...if you are continuing to get aggro from mobs then you need to slow your DPS or the tank needs to up his threat. As a healer in a Dungeon Pug, I should not have to heal you as much as the tank.
However, it gets back to the idea that players aren't focusing on their roles. Their will be some serious growing pains with this new XPAC. New players who just joined during WOTLK may not remember or understand LOS or CC. And I have had to explain LOS and CC to people on LK dungeons plenty of times. People will need to learn their roles. And I hope that Blizz allows for them to learn their roles, and does not simply nerf shit.
Unfortionately dungeon PUGs are one of the major reasons I wont be returning to WoW. I tend to run solo most often due to lack of time so organized guild runs arnt usually an option for me. With que'd cross-sever drungeon groups I can only imagine the headaches they cause. Thank god I found a MMO to keep me occupied as much as WoW ever did.
There are large casual guilds with good leadership where you can login and do 5man guild heroic runs pretty much any time if the day when time allows.
I don't have a problem with the new difficult content. In fact I welcome the move away from the AoE tank'n'spank fest LK heroics had become. The new heroics are like mini raids with lots of new tricks and a requirement to be on your toes.
The problem however, is the combination of this new content with the PUG dungeon queue system. I have never seen so much useless drama and finger pointing in pugs. Every time there's a wipe the bickering starts about whether the healing, tanking, dps or CC sucked and was the cause of the wipe... rage quits and group kicks are the order of the day. I don't think I've completed a single PUG heroic with the same 5 people that started it!
The obvious solution is to queue with friends from your guild but we can't always do that, can we?
This is starting to remind me why I almost never did PUG ICC raids.
If you've been doing heroics already you probably know what I'm talking about. If you haven't, I hope you have thick skin when you start on them
This is a good thing....makes the game challenging..
If 5 random scrubs could run heroics without a wipe at first try something would be very wrong...it would mean the game was made for blind people that dont need a minimum os skill to run a dungeon.
After I finally got the item level to do heroics (because blizzard doesn't allow you to queue for heroic dungeons unless you have a certain average item level) I queued up with my friend for a random heroic. We got into the dungeon, which was Halls of Origination. We wiped on the first pull. I LOVE cata dungeons now. Actually needing some sort of strategy, and working together. We managed to scrounge along without wiping until the first boss. Then we wiped another like 10 times because the tank didn't know the fight too well. Suprisingly nobody left yet. We beat that boss, got to the second boss, downed it first try, because it was easy. Then we wiped again on a mob pull. Everyone except me, my friend, and a dps left. At this point the dungeon had taken an hour and a half to down 2 bosses and get to the third. I honestly can say, this challenge, is very welcome from me. I have friends who have quit because it was "too hard" but why, why play a game that isn't a challenge. All in all, we didn't end up finishing because for some reason every single healer couldn't heal through the boss that does the mass AOE that reduces your health. But I like having to actually work to get gear. It's nice.
I am a Pally Tank on my battle group, I am still learning it all because tank is difference at least since I havent tank since early Lich King. But anyway, it seems to me that people just dont get it, at least on my server and battle group. Let me try to brake it down to what I mean:Disclaimer: This is my observations and options!
There are the one that are DPS that can get DPS gear alot easier then tanks and and healers. What I mean by that is at least to ME., that on the AH there are all kinds of 316-333 gear for the leather, mail and Plate DPS, plus the stuff you can get for rep. So they have the attitude that its that easy for a tank or a healer to get gear. And as a Tank I can say I cant.
Then there are the ones that will cheat theyre way into Heroics. Just buy or get gear no matter what. What I mean by this I have been told over and over, just by what ever you can get wear it to get in to heroic then change it out when in. Or get stuff that doesnt have any stats I need as a tank other then stam. Just because they want a tank for Heroics.
THen the last group of people I seen, are the people that dont want to do it right. They want to run this Heroics as if they are Lich King Heroics. And they need to be ran as if they are 10 ro 25 man raids. With thought, planing and learning the fights. I have also been in groups where people havent even ran the normals and seen the fights. But then dont want to learn them now. I mean come on, you cant just go balls to walls on anything thats in a 5 mob group then bitch when the tank cant get the mob off of you. I run into this all the time. Dont want let me pull, dont want to let me get aggro. Then I will mark stuff for CC and what order to kill stuff, and they will CC other stuff, they will pull and some times 2 groups and I will be the only one on the skull. then mobs are every else.
And what common about all this groups, is its everyone elses fault, not them. Its the tanks fault for not holding aggro on adds that he isnt to be holding aggro on, because DPS is to burn them. Or its the Healers fault for not healing a dps becuase the tank is needing heals. etc etc etc. you can see whats going on. How are this people going to make it in Raids. If heroics are this hard, how are are raids.
Now let me say this: I love how things are now. Have to think, have to CC, Have to play your class. no face to keyboard when your drunk and can still win.
Just give it a week or 2 more, a month tops. By then most of the playerbase (that is currently still leveling and running normals) will hit the heroics wall and a massive whinefest will ensue, followed by dropping subs and blizzard will nerf the crap out of everything in response.
BC sucked and going back to it's design of heroics was a bad idea from the start and it will bite blizzard in the ass very soon.
It is one of the things that has played in the favor of getting Cata for me (but there is more not in favor still). I always enjoyed the Forgotten Fourth Role more than raw DPS (could not stand tanking/healing).
As said though, to an extent it is about PUGs regardless of level. Since the merger of the battlegroups, it really has become a trip. While I am grateful to those that tank/heal, the attitude of "I'm a 5-man God" got old fast. So now, if a tank/heals is having a hissyfit - they are easily replaced and life goes on. People are less likely to kick a DPS that is pointing out how bad a tank/heals might be...
...but it is funny how few instances are finished with the same five that start them. Have five 80s sitting there, but I am leveling up three other toons 72, 56, and 42. It is odd to note how the drama increases in level. For the most part, I have found very little drama going on in the "Vanilla" instances - some drama in the "Burning" instances - and palmface drama in the "Lich King" instances. If one can extrapolate from that... can only imagine what is going on with "Cata" instances.
...which would be another thing not in favor of Cata.
As for those that say find a good guild - no. The first thing that comes to mind with the mention of guild is drama. It is a game. It is not a job. It is not a lifestyle. Even with folks that you have known for years, played others games without issue (FPS, RTS, co-op RPG, MMORPG, etc)...WoW breeds drama.
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
WoW holds people hands from the start, shielding them from the terrifying prospect of using their own grey matter. It allows people to level to the top with a few buttons never seeing a threat, never needing other people, never grouping in the majority of cases. All the while making the player feel like a god among the exp giving masses of mobs.
Why does it then suprise people that when the majority hit max level they have no idea how to work together? How to squeeze that bit more damage out of their characters. How to tank, heal or how to interact with a tank or healer. Why, when up until that point they have done well with hitting the same 3 buttons, being patted on the back, do players then think they will see any fault at their end? They have done just fine so far, so surely the blame lies elsewhere!
Wrath didn't cater to the casual crowds, it catered to the clinically retarded. Most casual players I knew felt insulted that Blizzard felt normal dungeons were what they wanted and heroics were what they would find hard.
In my experince PUGS suck in WOW no matter what level dungeon you are ding. that is why i stick with my friends and guildies. You guys really need to find some good guilds.
This is why there are PUGs, though. It's because a lot of guilds are often exclusive to the point of being snobs. People wanted to go through the content and couldn't do it with a guild, so the dungeon finder system was implemented.
SHORT VERSION: PUGs do suck compared to being in a guild run, but it can be hard to find a good guild if you are a casual player who cannot commit to a set raiding schedule because of RL.
Anecdotal version:
In my case, I have been in a good raiding guild and though I don't consider myself l33t or anything like it, I'm also not a "scrub." I read up on fights and I know my class. I get the gear, glyphs, etc. that I need and I do my job. But because I don't know anyone in RL who plays WoW and because I have a family and a job with a lot responsibility, I put that before any guild. I can't promise to be there at raid times anymore, like I did in the past.
For people like me, the PUG system is necessary. I've been lucky that I've had mostly good experiences (about 10 Cata PUGs). But they have not been Heroics yet, just regular dungeons at 82-85.
I understand what OP is saying because I have been in bad PUGs before Cata, and I know what that's like. I would rather be in a guild and wish I did have some RL friends that played WoW, but it's not the case.
Just everybody "find some good guilds" is not so easy for a significant part of WoW's player base, even if they aren't scrubs.
Trying to be patient and dealing with all the frustration that PUGing involves, not to mention having to potentially spend hours crawling and wiping through a dungeon vs. the old near instawin... well... I can deal with that if there's a nice juicy carrot at the end. A meaning to all the mayhem. But there isn't. The minute the next raid tier goes live, all that effort becomes obsolete and it's back to repeating the same old grind. So there's no point to it other than for the fun, which isn't going to be there. I know that I can save myself the trouble and money by simply unsubscribing and wait. It's like I can't win here. The journey isn't going to be a whole lot of fun and the goal is pointless because it's so temporary.
Oh, but I can join a GOOD guild. Joining a GOOD Guild (tm) solves everything. It cures cancer. It brings world peace. It solves the global warming. It even feeds the hungry children in Africa. Problem is finding one AND have it stay alive. You think you have found it after going through a pile of crap. Everything is peachy and you start getting somewhere in the grand scheme of things. Then some asshat decides to level his dramaqueen skill to 525 and you have this epic failure cascade that sends the whole affair straight to the guild graveyard. Been there, done that, bought the T-shirt. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for GOOD guilds and people having fun together, but when the game gets to the point where it requires a GOOD guild in order to be truly enjoyed and those are hard to come by, then there's something wrong with the game and the community as such.
But the experience up to level 85 is awesome, so Cataclysm isn't a complete dud. It's just the endgame that strikes me as being the same old, same old, with a new coat of paint that unfortunately makes it much more obvious that WoW got the short end of the stick in terms of community.
I'm a big ol' fluffy carewolf. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
Agreed. The only thing I'm really confused on though is this: the game's been out for 6 years, and has always been known to have a plethora of children inhabiting the world; how have those same 13 year olds not aged a day mentally?
I haven't played a mmorpg in years, but once I read your post it reminded me of the dude that lives right next to me(I live in a college dorm).
The whole floor can hear him scream like a kid on Vent lol... He is a freshman majoring in computer science, but he skips class all the time. He will probably dropout of college. Last week his mom came over to pick him up for Christmas, and she was yelling at him. Man that was embarrasing.
I don't have a problem with the new difficult content. In fact I welcome the move away from the AoE tank'n'spank fest LK heroics had become. The new heroics are like mini raids with lots of new tricks and a requirement to be on your toes.
The problem however, is the combination of this new content with the PUG dungeon queue system. I have never seen so much useless drama and finger pointing in pugs. Every time there's a wipe the bickering starts about whether the healing, tanking, dps or CC sucked and was the cause of the wipe... rage quits and group kicks are the order of the day. I don't think I've completed a single PUG heroic with the same 5 people that started it!
The obvious solution is to queue with friends from your guild but we can't always do that, can we?
This is starting to remind me why I almost never did PUG ICC raids.
If you've been doing heroics already you probably know what I'm talking about. If you haven't, I hope you have thick skin when you start on them
That is the reason people in most MMOs don't PUG harder things with totally unknown people.
Try to get a group with people you know at least a little.
Lol and the fact that you never seen so much drama in a PUG say a lot, there usually is at least some.
I really don't understand why people make suck a big deal about wiping...
dying is part of the game, you either accept this and move on or quit playing.
I did my first HC with the guild last night.. yes we wiped, probably even because I caused some of them because it was my first time. No one raged, no one was upset (well maybe for a second at the repair guy).. because everyone knew this was a possibility.
I probably died more in Guildwars than I did in WoW.. and I almost always PUG in GW and I never seen this attitude, not once. I used to die... ALOT back in my Diablo II days while doing Nighmare and Hell mode.
Okay I played alot with friends, but I did play with randome peeps too.. and appart from to occational cheater, all was fine.
So why is it so bad in World of Warcraft ? Do the newer generations consist of only whining brats ? I mean, seriously ?
You are playing a game... dying is part of that game... GROW UP AND DEAL WITH IT! lol
I haven't had as bad of a time as you described. Maybe your battlegroup is horrible or you're just unlucky. There are douchebags out there for sure, but maybe it's time to make some good friends or join a guild that'll run heroics with you. You know... that community building stuff people throw around as WoW not having.
I think the lack of gear just rears its ugly head at the moment.
Personally, I like a challenge to the dungeons. Whether its because of inexperience, being new to the instance, or simply just on the lowest cusp of having enough gear to do it.
Two nights ago, I was in a group that wiped easily 10 times. We talked about what we did wrong and we made it through. It's a video game - I prefer a cooperative challenge.
The last night we had some punk tank who flagged a mob for sapping, then charged it after it was sapped, then got pissed at us and left. The replacement tank got pissed off because the warlock didn't immediately understand what he wanted, then disbanded in mid pull and killed us all.
I bet that butt wipe still puts teeth marks in his mommy's teats.
I just don't get it. If you came to my house to play euchre (card game - midwest area) and don't know the rules. I'd help you get it together so we could play and have a good time. Not storm out of the house like a goat tool. WoW is the same thing.
What WoW does provide is an environment for ignorant little brats to excersize their e-peens without any fear of repercussion.
The pugs are tough right now, I agree. But there's a logical explanation for it. The little twirps that throw a tantrum because they think their 'wow' ability contains a special license to treat people like crap? They don't deserve to lick the gum off the bottom of my boot.
I haven't started running heroics yet because my gear isn't up to par, but I remember in Burning Crusade that I had a fair amount of success w/ pugging heroics, and thats when CC was pretty mandatory before everyone started outgearing stuff. If you did dumb shit like breaking CC or attacking the wrong target, you got kicked and labeled as a baddie on the server.
WofLK kinda screwed the game up by holding the hands of really terrible players w/ lame ass AoE tank & spank fights, unlimited mana, and other retardo "make the game easier for everyone" nonsense. Lots of really bad players started to think they were actually good because they can press their AoE button, or spam major heals, or AoE tanks a billion mobs... and now those players are coming into heroics and sucking ass and pissing everyone off w/out realizing that they are terrible.
I think Cataclysm is going to start making players actually learn how to play the game again, but its going to take some time to undo Lich King's damage.
I haven't started running heroics yet because my gear isn't up to par, but I remember in Burning Crusade that I had a fair amount of success w/ pugging heroics, and thats when CC was pretty mandatory before everyone started outgearing stuff. If you did dumb shit like breaking CC or attacking the wrong target, you got kicked and labeled as a baddie on the server.
WofLK kinda screwed the game up by holding the hands of really terrible players w/ lame ass AoE tank & spank fights, unlimited mana, and other retardo "make the game easier for everyone" nonsense. Lots of really bad players started to think they were actually good because they can press their AoE button, or spam major heals, or AoE tanks a billion mobs... and now those players are coming into heroics and sucking ass and pissing everyone off w/out realizing that they are terrible.
I think Cataclysm is going to start making players actually learn how to play the game again, but its going to take some time to undo Lich King's damage.
Do you really think they are going to gimp there sub's...dream-on.
Velika: City of Wheels: Among the mortal races, the humans were the only one that never built cities or great empires; a curse laid upon them by their creator, Gidd, forced them to wander as nomads for twenty centuries...
People say Cataclysm didn't change anything, but while it's still the same game, pretty much the entire game has changed since the Cataclysm patch. Not only are players having to relearn how to handle themselves in heroics and how to utilize skills they probably never even had on their hotbar, but many people are having to completely relearn their entire class.
I'm not a fan of how Blizzard seemingly tries to reinvent the wheel with every expansion. They should find a direction in both gameplay and class design and stick with it because what they're doing now is alienating a good portion of their longterm subscriber base by changing the game into something in which they may or may not like.
Even with a good guild group, when we started doing them undergeared it was hard, but after the first week and everybody was in a good mix of rep gear and heroic gear, we started chain pulling and only CC'd on certain pulls. Blizzard made the requirements to queue for heroics too low imo -- sure, as soon as you hit the minimum, you can queue, but the instance is going to take a group of similarly geared people three hours to clear. If you hope to raid this expansion, you'll need to find a guild. There is simply no way a trade PUG is going to down any of this content when it matters.
When a boss has 5 million HP, healer mana is limited, DPS are used to being carried through avoidable damage by heals, and PUG DPS is only doing 9k DPS, then yeah, heroics are going to be hard. People need to get out of the Wrath mindset and their heroics will go much smoother. The bottom line is that most of the PUG DPS you run into will stand in every avoidable source of damage in the game. Healers no longer have the throughput to carry a group through that damage, so everyone blames the healer when it's actually the derpy DPS causing problems.
I stopped pugging. It's just far too frustrating. I'd rather log off or not do my daily than have to PUG, but in a few months when everyone is running around in full heroic gear, crafted epics, and epics from rep, people will start AOE'ing every pull just like they did in Wrath.
I haven't started running heroics yet because my gear isn't up to par, but I remember in Burning Crusade that I had a fair amount of success w/ pugging heroics, and thats when CC was pretty mandatory before everyone started outgearing stuff. If you did dumb shit like breaking CC or attacking the wrong target, you got kicked and labeled as a baddie on the server.
WofLK kinda screwed the game up by holding the hands of really terrible players w/ lame ass AoE tank & spank fights, unlimited mana, and other retardo "make the game easier for everyone" nonsense. Lots of really bad players started to think they were actually good because they can press their AoE button, or spam major heals, or AoE tanks a billion mobs... and now those players are coming into heroics and sucking ass and pissing everyone off w/out realizing that they are terrible.
I think Cataclysm is going to start making players actually learn how to play the game again, but its going to take some time to undo Lich King's damage.
Do you really think they are going to gimp there sub's...dream-on.
Warcraft hasn't grown significantly since BC, and BC had instances that were close to what Cataclysm is. So I really don't think it will make a damn bit of difference.
Agreed. The only thing I'm really confused on though is this: the game's been out for 6 years, and has always been known to have a plethora of children inhabiting the world; how have those same 13 year olds not aged a day mentally?
I haven't played a mmorpg in years, but once I read your post it reminded me of the dude that lives right next to me(I live in a college dorm).
The whole floor can hear him scream like a kid on Vent lol... He is a freshman majoring in computer science, but he skips class all the time. He will probably dropout of college. Last week his mom came over to pick him up for Christmas, and she was yelling at him. Man that was embarrasing.
Comments
Unfortionately dungeon PUGs are one of the major reasons I wont be returning to WoW. I tend to run solo most often due to lack of time so organized guild runs arnt usually an option for me. With que'd cross-sever drungeon groups I can only imagine the headaches they cause. Thank god I found a MMO to keep me occupied as much as WoW ever did.
"I play Tera for the gameplay"
There are large casual guilds with good leadership where you can login and do 5man guild heroic runs pretty much any time if the day when time allows.
Remember Old School Ultima Online
This is a good thing....makes the game challenging..
If 5 random scrubs could run heroics without a wipe at first try something would be very wrong...it would mean the game was made for blind people that dont need a minimum os skill to run a dungeon.
After I finally got the item level to do heroics (because blizzard doesn't allow you to queue for heroic dungeons unless you have a certain average item level) I queued up with my friend for a random heroic. We got into the dungeon, which was Halls of Origination. We wiped on the first pull. I LOVE cata dungeons now. Actually needing some sort of strategy, and working together. We managed to scrounge along without wiping until the first boss. Then we wiped another like 10 times because the tank didn't know the fight too well. Suprisingly nobody left yet. We beat that boss, got to the second boss, downed it first try, because it was easy. Then we wiped again on a mob pull. Everyone except me, my friend, and a dps left. At this point the dungeon had taken an hour and a half to down 2 bosses and get to the third. I honestly can say, this challenge, is very welcome from me. I have friends who have quit because it was "too hard" but why, why play a game that isn't a challenge. All in all, we didn't end up finishing because for some reason every single healer couldn't heal through the boss that does the mass AOE that reduces your health. But I like having to actually work to get gear. It's nice.
I am a Pally Tank on my battle group, I am still learning it all because tank is difference at least since I havent tank since early Lich King. But anyway, it seems to me that people just dont get it, at least on my server and battle group. Let me try to brake it down to what I mean:Disclaimer: This is my observations and options!
There are the one that are DPS that can get DPS gear alot easier then tanks and and healers. What I mean by that is at least to ME., that on the AH there are all kinds of 316-333 gear for the leather, mail and Plate DPS, plus the stuff you can get for rep. So they have the attitude that its that easy for a tank or a healer to get gear. And as a Tank I can say I cant.
Then there are the ones that will cheat theyre way into Heroics. Just buy or get gear no matter what. What I mean by this I have been told over and over, just by what ever you can get wear it to get in to heroic then change it out when in. Or get stuff that doesnt have any stats I need as a tank other then stam. Just because they want a tank for Heroics.
THen the last group of people I seen, are the people that dont want to do it right. They want to run this Heroics as if they are Lich King Heroics. And they need to be ran as if they are 10 ro 25 man raids. With thought, planing and learning the fights. I have also been in groups where people havent even ran the normals and seen the fights. But then dont want to learn them now. I mean come on, you cant just go balls to walls on anything thats in a 5 mob group then bitch when the tank cant get the mob off of you. I run into this all the time. Dont want let me pull, dont want to let me get aggro. Then I will mark stuff for CC and what order to kill stuff, and they will CC other stuff, they will pull and some times 2 groups and I will be the only one on the skull. then mobs are every else.
And what common about all this groups, is its everyone elses fault, not them. Its the tanks fault for not holding aggro on adds that he isnt to be holding aggro on, because DPS is to burn them. Or its the Healers fault for not healing a dps becuase the tank is needing heals. etc etc etc. you can see whats going on. How are this people going to make it in Raids. If heroics are this hard, how are are raids.
Now let me say this: I love how things are now. Have to think, have to CC, Have to play your class. no face to keyboard when your drunk and can still win.
Just give it a week or 2 more, a month tops. By then most of the playerbase (that is currently still leveling and running normals) will hit the heroics wall and a massive whinefest will ensue, followed by dropping subs and blizzard will nerf the crap out of everything in response.
BC sucked and going back to it's design of heroics was a bad idea from the start and it will bite blizzard in the ass very soon.
It is one of the things that has played in the favor of getting Cata for me (but there is more not in favor still). I always enjoyed the Forgotten Fourth Role more than raw DPS (could not stand tanking/healing).
As said though, to an extent it is about PUGs regardless of level. Since the merger of the battlegroups, it really has become a trip. While I am grateful to those that tank/heal, the attitude of "I'm a 5-man God" got old fast. So now, if a tank/heals is having a hissyfit - they are easily replaced and life goes on. People are less likely to kick a DPS that is pointing out how bad a tank/heals might be...
...but it is funny how few instances are finished with the same five that start them. Have five 80s sitting there, but I am leveling up three other toons 72, 56, and 42. It is odd to note how the drama increases in level. For the most part, I have found very little drama going on in the "Vanilla" instances - some drama in the "Burning" instances - and palmface drama in the "Lich King" instances. If one can extrapolate from that... can only imagine what is going on with "Cata" instances.
...which would be another thing not in favor of Cata.
As for those that say find a good guild - no. The first thing that comes to mind with the mention of guild is drama. It is a game. It is not a job. It is not a lifestyle. Even with folks that you have known for years, played others games without issue (FPS, RTS, co-op RPG, MMORPG, etc)...WoW breeds drama.
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
Explorer: 87%, Killer: 67%, Achiever: 27%, Socializer: 20%
this is no suprise happened at the start of wotlk too , either wait till tactics become useless or find smart players in a good guild
WoW holds people hands from the start, shielding them from the terrifying prospect of using their own grey matter. It allows people to level to the top with a few buttons never seeing a threat, never needing other people, never grouping in the majority of cases. All the while making the player feel like a god among the exp giving masses of mobs.
Why does it then suprise people that when the majority hit max level they have no idea how to work together? How to squeeze that bit more damage out of their characters. How to tank, heal or how to interact with a tank or healer. Why, when up until that point they have done well with hitting the same 3 buttons, being patted on the back, do players then think they will see any fault at their end? They have done just fine so far, so surely the blame lies elsewhere!
Wrath didn't cater to the casual crowds, it catered to the clinically retarded. Most casual players I knew felt insulted that Blizzard felt normal dungeons were what they wanted and heroics were what they would find hard.
This is why there are PUGs, though. It's because a lot of guilds are often exclusive to the point of being snobs. People wanted to go through the content and couldn't do it with a guild, so the dungeon finder system was implemented.
SHORT VERSION: PUGs do suck compared to being in a guild run, but it can be hard to find a good guild if you are a casual player who cannot commit to a set raiding schedule because of RL.
Anecdotal version:
In my case, I have been in a good raiding guild and though I don't consider myself l33t or anything like it, I'm also not a "scrub." I read up on fights and I know my class. I get the gear, glyphs, etc. that I need and I do my job. But because I don't know anyone in RL who plays WoW and because I have a family and a job with a lot responsibility, I put that before any guild. I can't promise to be there at raid times anymore, like I did in the past.
For people like me, the PUG system is necessary. I've been lucky that I've had mostly good experiences (about 10 Cata PUGs). But they have not been Heroics yet, just regular dungeons at 82-85.
I understand what OP is saying because I have been in bad PUGs before Cata, and I know what that's like. I would rather be in a guild and wish I did have some RL friends that played WoW, but it's not the case.
Just everybody "find some good guilds" is not so easy for a significant part of WoW's player base, even if they aren't scrubs.
Trying to be patient and dealing with all the frustration that PUGing involves, not to mention having to potentially spend hours crawling and wiping through a dungeon vs. the old near instawin... well... I can deal with that if there's a nice juicy carrot at the end. A meaning to all the mayhem. But there isn't. The minute the next raid tier goes live, all that effort becomes obsolete and it's back to repeating the same old grind. So there's no point to it other than for the fun, which isn't going to be there. I know that I can save myself the trouble and money by simply unsubscribing and wait. It's like I can't win here. The journey isn't going to be a whole lot of fun and the goal is pointless because it's so temporary.
Oh, but I can join a GOOD guild. Joining a GOOD Guild (tm) solves everything. It cures cancer. It brings world peace. It solves the global warming. It even feeds the hungry children in Africa. Problem is finding one AND have it stay alive. You think you have found it after going through a pile of crap. Everything is peachy and you start getting somewhere in the grand scheme of things. Then some asshat decides to level his dramaqueen skill to 525 and you have this epic failure cascade that sends the whole affair straight to the guild graveyard. Been there, done that, bought the T-shirt. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for GOOD guilds and people having fun together, but when the game gets to the point where it requires a GOOD guild in order to be truly enjoyed and those are hard to come by, then there's something wrong with the game and the community as such.
But the experience up to level 85 is awesome, so Cataclysm isn't a complete dud. It's just the endgame that strikes me as being the same old, same old, with a new coat of paint that unfortunately makes it much more obvious that WoW got the short end of the stick in terms of community.
I'm a big ol' fluffy carewolf. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
I haven't played a mmorpg in years, but once I read your post it reminded me of the dude that lives right next to me(I live in a college dorm).
The whole floor can hear him scream like a kid on Vent lol... He is a freshman majoring in computer science, but he skips class all the time. He will probably dropout of college. Last week his mom came over to pick him up for Christmas, and she was yelling at him. Man that was embarrasing.
That is the reason people in most MMOs don't PUG harder things with totally unknown people.
Try to get a group with people you know at least a little.
Lol and the fact that you never seen so much drama in a PUG say a lot, there usually is at least some.
I really don't understand why people make suck a big deal about wiping...
dying is part of the game, you either accept this and move on or quit playing.
I did my first HC with the guild last night.. yes we wiped, probably even because I caused some of them because it was my first time. No one raged, no one was upset (well maybe for a second at the repair guy).. because everyone knew this was a possibility.
I probably died more in Guildwars than I did in WoW.. and I almost always PUG in GW and I never seen this attitude, not once. I used to die... ALOT back in my Diablo II days while doing Nighmare and Hell mode.
Okay I played alot with friends, but I did play with randome peeps too.. and appart from to occational cheater, all was fine.
So why is it so bad in World of Warcraft ? Do the newer generations consist of only whining brats ? I mean, seriously ?
You are playing a game... dying is part of that game... GROW UP AND DEAL WITH IT! lol
In what MMO are a majority of random PUGs good?
None that Ive played.
Bad random PUGs is not exclusive to WoW.
Also, Ive had mostly good experiences with PUGs in Cataclysm heroics. A lot of low DPS but no people acting bad yet.
I haven't had as bad of a time as you described. Maybe your battlegroup is horrible or you're just unlucky. There are douchebags out there for sure, but maybe it's time to make some good friends or join a guild that'll run heroics with you. You know... that community building stuff people throw around as WoW not having.
He who keeps his cool best wins.
I think the lack of gear just rears its ugly head at the moment.
Personally, I like a challenge to the dungeons. Whether its because of inexperience, being new to the instance, or simply just on the lowest cusp of having enough gear to do it.
Two nights ago, I was in a group that wiped easily 10 times. We talked about what we did wrong and we made it through. It's a video game - I prefer a cooperative challenge.
The last night we had some punk tank who flagged a mob for sapping, then charged it after it was sapped, then got pissed at us and left. The replacement tank got pissed off because the warlock didn't immediately understand what he wanted, then disbanded in mid pull and killed us all.
I bet that butt wipe still puts teeth marks in his mommy's teats.
I just don't get it. If you came to my house to play euchre (card game - midwest area) and don't know the rules. I'd help you get it together so we could play and have a good time. Not storm out of the house like a goat tool. WoW is the same thing.
What WoW does provide is an environment for ignorant little brats to excersize their e-peens without any fear of repercussion.
The pugs are tough right now, I agree. But there's a logical explanation for it. The little twirps that throw a tantrum because they think their 'wow' ability contains a special license to treat people like crap? They don't deserve to lick the gum off the bottom of my boot.
Don't let the jerks make you forget that.
Peace.
I haven't started running heroics yet because my gear isn't up to par, but I remember in Burning Crusade that I had a fair amount of success w/ pugging heroics, and thats when CC was pretty mandatory before everyone started outgearing stuff. If you did dumb shit like breaking CC or attacking the wrong target, you got kicked and labeled as a baddie on the server.
WofLK kinda screwed the game up by holding the hands of really terrible players w/ lame ass AoE tank & spank fights, unlimited mana, and other retardo "make the game easier for everyone" nonsense. Lots of really bad players started to think they were actually good because they can press their AoE button, or spam major heals, or AoE tanks a billion mobs... and now those players are coming into heroics and sucking ass and pissing everyone off w/out realizing that they are terrible.
I think Cataclysm is going to start making players actually learn how to play the game again, but its going to take some time to undo Lich King's damage.
Do you really think they are going to gimp there sub's...dream-on.
Velika: City of Wheels: Among the mortal races, the humans were the only one that never built cities or great empires; a curse laid upon them by their creator, Gidd, forced them to wander as nomads for twenty centuries...
People say Cataclysm didn't change anything, but while it's still the same game, pretty much the entire game has changed since the Cataclysm patch. Not only are players having to relearn how to handle themselves in heroics and how to utilize skills they probably never even had on their hotbar, but many people are having to completely relearn their entire class.
I'm not a fan of how Blizzard seemingly tries to reinvent the wheel with every expansion. They should find a direction in both gameplay and class design and stick with it because what they're doing now is alienating a good portion of their longterm subscriber base by changing the game into something in which they may or may not like.
Even with a good guild group, when we started doing them undergeared it was hard, but after the first week and everybody was in a good mix of rep gear and heroic gear, we started chain pulling and only CC'd on certain pulls. Blizzard made the requirements to queue for heroics too low imo -- sure, as soon as you hit the minimum, you can queue, but the instance is going to take a group of similarly geared people three hours to clear. If you hope to raid this expansion, you'll need to find a guild. There is simply no way a trade PUG is going to down any of this content when it matters.
When a boss has 5 million HP, healer mana is limited, DPS are used to being carried through avoidable damage by heals, and PUG DPS is only doing 9k DPS, then yeah, heroics are going to be hard. People need to get out of the Wrath mindset and their heroics will go much smoother. The bottom line is that most of the PUG DPS you run into will stand in every avoidable source of damage in the game. Healers no longer have the throughput to carry a group through that damage, so everyone blames the healer when it's actually the derpy DPS causing problems.
I stopped pugging. It's just far too frustrating. I'd rather log off or not do my daily than have to PUG, but in a few months when everyone is running around in full heroic gear, crafted epics, and epics from rep, people will start AOE'ing every pull just like they did in Wrath.
PuGs have never been as good as they were in "vanilla."
I used to love PuGs, now i wont even play the game if i have to PuG but thats mostly only cuz ive already cancelled my sub anyways.
It is absolutely ridiculous how much worse PuGs have gotten over the years.
We can thank blizzard for catering to the casuals for that. I dont blame them for that, just sayin.
Jeremiah 8:21 I weep for the hurt of my people; I stand amazed, silent, dumb with grief.
Join me on Twitch Facebook Twitter
Warcraft hasn't grown significantly since BC, and BC had instances that were close to what Cataclysm is. So I really don't think it will make a damn bit of difference.
Humanity terrifies me anymore.
They suck at first, but as more people get better gear, they will be easy mode just like WotLK heroics
if everyone has iLvL > 349, you can basically zerg through all of it.
It was the same way in WotLK. Fresh 80's wouldn't be able to zerg through heroics.
Take the Magic: The Gathering 'What Color Are You?' Quiz.