Monday, January 19, 2009

Rez. Your. !@#$%^&. Pet.

It seems like I'm not the only one with bad PuGs these days.

Now, as most of you know, I received WotLK late, and did not really start levelling until after the New Years. Now I'm 77 1/2 (yes, that's a level) and enjoying the conveniences of an epic flight form once again. I've also been pugging almost everything; as most of my friends are 80, half the time they'll be in raids or heroics when I want to do an instance.

Now, in doing so, I've met some really great people. For example, Arik the gnome warrior. He said he'd never done Violet Hold on some of the bosses before. Yet he adapted to every single one, and we never wiped. No one ever died. It was just flawless, and afterwards we put each other on our friends lists in the hope of running things with each other again.

Then...then came the Azjol-Nerub run.

Or, at least, that's what it was supposed to be. But the instance wouldn't let us in, so we headed to Old Kingdom to do that instead.

It should have been a tip-off when the hunter said they only had 800 arrows, and they hoped they lasted.

It should have been a tip-off when the mage didn't have reagents for a table or group buffs.

It should have been a tip-off when the shadow priest mentions she's tried Azjol-Nerub 11 times and only once gotten past the first boss, and never gotten to the end.

But, well, those are all "in hindsight;" people just happen to be forgetful, and these things happen. She could have been horribly unlucky with PuGs. It's okay, we'll be fine.

Then the ret paladin tank (he's 80, in tank gear, so I figured it would be okay), pulls two groups and has no concept of AoE threat. That's okay, though; his dps has no concept of kill-order.

We wipe on the first boss because, even though they were told to do so, no one killed the Guardians. The priests says she'll try to announce it, and I point out that the game announces it, in yellow, in the center of their screen.

We down him the next time.

The shadow priest starts pulling for the paladin, since he has no range. She uses Mind Blast, so she gains enough aggro the ret paladin cannot yank it off her, and she dies. Multiple times. Except for the time the ret paladin runs into a group, and pulls a second, and then everyone dies but me because I shadowmelded. It's about this time that I see they're all in the same guild.

Oh yeah, guess what else? I figure out that the hunter hasn't rezzed his pet since the first time it died. It was a warpstalker. I ask him where his pet is. The mage and him say that it is dead. I, of course, respond that he should rez it. The answer is that it is bad, so he doesn't want to. This is also the hunter that didn't bring enough arrows, and at this time is down to 80. I know someone who would be very dissappointed in you, sir.

Also...they're standing in fire. Repeatedly. After I say in chat not to. Review the results:

This was after the second time I had asked. And he wasn't the only one!

After the wipe on the third boss, I split. They said they had to go repair; my armor was only at half durability by that point, so it was obvious they came unprepared. I said I was done, left group, and went to Drak'Tharon Keep with Sannhet, where we killed everything with ease.

This group bothered me because I had never before felt so abused. I am overgeared for the level I am at, thanks to my dedication, research, and raiding in the Burning Crusade. I have made about four upgrades, maybe five since entering Wrath of the Lich King, and I still have over 1.1k +healing. My healing saved them from their own stupidity and clumsiness time and time again. I saved them from standing in the fire, from pulling too many groups, from being too slow on dps by pounding every key, every cooldown, every OSHI- button. And I know I shouldn't have; after all, I wrote an entire post about why that was a bad thing.

So why, then, would I specifically hide the name of one of them in that picture? Why haven't I called out their guild?

They were nice. They were not rude, or mean, they never yelled at anyone over wipes. It was obvious they were not hardcore players, and they were just in it for the fun. Even after wipes, they were like "it's okay, we'll try again." And I love and support that mentality. I left because I no longer wanted to carry them through the instance.

And trashing their guild would do me no good, at all. In Sannhet's group, we invited in a hunter (different hunter) from their guild. And he was great. Did everything hunters should do.

So, in the end, the four members of that guild, I will never instance with again. They were nice, obviously there to down some bosses and have fun, but they had not put any effort to be prepared or even really know what they were doing. They didn't follow direction well (which I suppose could be coddled by the "don't worry, we'll try again" attitude) and got me killed more than I liked.

Great people. Bad players.

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

1100 heals is really low for almost being 8. Maybe you should consider more upgrades?

Anonymous said...

that was suppose to read 78*

Scarele said...

@Healdin: It's hard to get upgrades when you are already geared from ZA and up. I admit when I rolled my death knight through everything, it was a nice thing to see these awesome blues and greens that fit me.

Now with my druid (currently a balance druid to level but in resto gear) is mostly set from anything pre-SSC back from BC. I've seen one upgrade in Wrath and it was kind of a side-grade. She's currently 74. I don't see any problem with Bell's 1100 heals.

But all the good groups are pretty much 80 now and are pugging Naxx. Seriously, I had a great Naxx25 pug last night with people I leveled with. But on my baby druid...man everyone's not their best.

Bell said...

Everything that ups my spellpower decreases half my other stats. Or things that upgrade my stats decrease my sp. The "upgrades" I have taken actually have given me a negligible hit in many places. It's hard to find gear with everythng in balance.

A said...

sorry to hear that :( I've always hated pugging in BC, but I don't mind so much anymore. Glad to hear my IRL hunter friend is doing well, Tekuo just started like a month ago & I'm always worried ppl are going to be mean or she might miss something.

Bell said...

Tekuo was awesome and fun. :) No worries there!

krizzlybear said...

yeah, in order to get the right spellpower without gimping your spirit and whatnot, you gotta pick up every single boss blue from each of the dungeons.

having leyola level up exclusively through dungeons (and not having the convenience of raiding in the 70's), she was still in the 1200's by the time she hit 78.

But once she dinged 80, and all the pre-bought/crafted healing gear (both earthgiving pieces, titansteel guardian, other BoE blues), it shot straight up to the 1500's.

Sir Sannhet said...

Lol at going from one ret paladin in tanking gear to another ret paladin in tanking gear in another instance.

:) Still, you know I'm always happy to help you, if'n you need it.

Anonymous said...

:( At least you got a interesting blog post from it!

- sounds like they were used to wiping alot.. that sort of playstyle worries me, because they accept that they are going to die often, so a wipe is just another wipe.. and so they don't try and learn from it.

Anonymous said...

One thing I noticed for levelling is my spellpower actually declined a bit until I hit 80 and started hitting heroics and getting the epic crafted gear, like the Moonshroud and Earthgiving.

So dont worry on that count, your spellpower WILL increase, Bell.

Anonymous said...

You are not the only one...be not afraid... I am a resto druid who is constantly facepalming in Old Kingdom with PuGs...

Also...I did not start upgrading my BC raid gear on a massive scale until 80 heroics, you are fine.

Healdin, HoTers have a much lower SP requirement to Pali healers due to the efficiency of our ticks... I roll with a Pali in 10 mans and we split 60% druid (1820sp) /40% pali (2000sp)

Unknown said...

I read this post for the second time after you linked back from another post (about how you love pugs).

I must have missed it the first time, because I just cracked up laughing when the hunter said that the pet was 'bad' so he didn't want to rez it.

Did it doo on the carpet or something??? :P