Crappy Groups

[Kalliope]

*hugs Velk* Those are the groups that just make you facepalm so hard...:/

[VelkynKarma]

Yes...just....ugh.

/facedesk

Hugs are appreciated though

~VelkynKarma

[Sarayana]

I find it's just really, really up and down. I completely avoided doing randoms on my horde druid for a while because I got into some nasty arguments about what constitutes "reasonable" dps when you're mostly wearing greens and blues and just dinged... but lately I've had the itch to gear her, so I've been doing more. Surprisingly, with a lot of success. Your luck will change again.

[VelkynKarma]

Yeah....venting helped, I went back and que'd for one more random and got Old Kingdom. Which I was expecting to suck, but it went surprisingly well. We only did 3 bosses (I was kinda afraid to ask to do the other two, just because of my rotten luck of late), but they all went down quickly and efficiently, and the tank praised the group after, so...I guess it went well in the end...

The up and down thing is terrible though. This is one of the many reasons I don't even bother raiding (even if I had the time to); my confidence is so easy to break with dungeons alone

~VelkynKarma

[Sarayana]

Well raiding would be very different. (Unless you pug it, in which case you're really just a masochist...) You'd be in a group you knew well and the same people would be there every time, working with the group to improve from week to week. Not at all the same as a dungeon pug, where people are just trying to rush through as fast as possible and often don't give a crap about the people they've been grouped with.

I'm glad you had a good group after.

[Kalliope]

Been getting a bunch of tanks who queue and bail immediately lately. :/ That's pretty dumb. Had it happen to my rogue yesterday and my mage today. My rogue was lucky; the rest of the run was fine. My mage.....not so much.

Halls of Lightning is still one of those instances where you don't want to get stuck with a crappy group. Lucky me, right? Tank #1 bailed immediately. Pretty sure it was a griefing queue, regardless of the instance. The second tank, a druid, decided to skip the first boss for some unknown reason. Things went okay, with me carrying the terrible melee dps, until the hallway after the second boss. Somehow, two groups got pulled (my guess is that the tank went too far ahead, or maybe a melee dps got feared in the wrong direction and I didn't see it). We wiped after the healer gets aggro and dies. Tank #2 leaves. We cleared up to the third boss (with me pulling aggro constantly....argh) when tank #3 got queued in. It was a warrior and one who knew enough to put vigilance on the mage rather than the healer. Third boss dies. Then the fun really began. We got the constructs AND the first patrol due to bad positioning on the tank's part. Wipe again. By this time, I had started to notice that the pally isn't cleansing, bopping, or salving me. We ended up limping through the first three pulls of the room before an LoS issue on a pack with two runeshapers and a sentinel got the tank killed. Keep in mind that the terrible melee dps wasn't interrupting the runeshapers (naturally), so there was simply fail all around. On the run back, someone decided to pull the first boss....and we wiped again. The tank left and so did I. I only needed one triumph badge anyway....it wasn't worth it.

[kamoodle5]

Ooo, boy, do I have a story of a crappy group to talk about. So far, this have been my first worst group run so now I am feeling your pains, guys. Our run was in DM West. My second time being there, I already learned the horrors of this part of Dire Maul, which makes the eastern part look easy as hell.

Introducing the members of our group. There was me, a warrior (the tank), a dps druid (moonkin), a healing shaman, and a warlock. The first two things that hit the alert button right now was I noticed how much less health the warrior had compared to mine, and I am a hunter. I was only two levels (eventually three levels higher), but still, I was expecting her health to exceed mine. Buffed with a stamina buff from the lock, the tank only had barely 4.5K hp (mine was barely over 6K). The other big, bad thing with the warrior was her aggro threats; it wasn't good enough. There were plenty of times where my pet and even me at times exceeded her aggro...without Growl on. Fortunately, I never got chewed at for that. Next, our freakin' healer in the group happened to be...an...enhancement...shaman. Proof was there were no Riptides and he summoned his spirit wolves a few times when things got tough. Lastly, our dps druid and lock kept dying too many times. The lock ended up getting votekicked and a rogue was brought in; the dying was probably one of the reasons but I think she got kicked for not carrying any water for mana and constantly begging for heals. The rogue did become a slightly better asset to our team. As related to the druid, I was expecting more endurance out of him; moonkin may not have much armor as bear but I know they can withstand things if they had good gear.

Okay, on to the run, as I mentioned, the lock kept dying, and her first death was when we were at the third trash mob group of trees, not far from the first circle of blue blobs that I detest so much. By the time we got to the first boss down the ramp, things were going fine until his adds came in and killed both the lock (second death) and the druid, and my pet ended up having the boss on her. Fortunately, he died quickly after that and us remaining three managed to down his adds, with me and my pet having one of them to ourselves. After we rezzed the weak druid and the begging lock, we went back up the ramp and went to the right side. When we entered that hallway full of ghosts and we had only one group on us, already the tank was nearly dead and my pet had to save the day. By the time we went up that ramp, that was when our first wipe hit. The tank ran to a group of mobs not far from the next ring of blue blobs, and next thing I know, we pulled more than intended, including two of those blobs. We wiped, including me when I was trying to dismiss my pet before FDing. We came back to the top of the ramp and the tank had to go back to town to respec to Prot (which should've been what she should've done in the first place?). Still, that didn't prove to be any better. Once we got back together, we downed the rest of the mobs and all the blobs with a bit of difficulty. When we got to the other side, to another ring of blue blobs, that was when we learned that the lock wasn't carrying any water on her for mana. During this run of blobs, the lock died again. That was when she got kicked and a rogue came into our game.

Here was our second wipe: apparently the two bosses (a princess and a bear that charges) must have a wide aggro, and came after the tank when she was trying to down the mobs slightly far away from those two. We came back and took the other way to them. Near wipe again but this time, I was able to dismiss my pet in time and I FDed. Third time was a charm; we showed those two no mercy but the tank did nearly die again. We went down the ramp and cleared that hallway full of ghosts. However, the tank died at least twice there and I was getting beaten pretty badly because of my better damage. We did down our third boss, which wasn't too bad. I ended up having to use my pet's food to heal up throughout much of the run since the shaman clearly wasn't paying attention to my health even when it was low. Once we got to the part with the demon dog boss, that was when things couldn't be any worse. We had one near wipe, the tank and the druid died a few times themselves, and for some reason, this part of the dungeon seemed to cause some glitches on my pet which was preventing her from moving at times when we were just running or we were engaging mobs. At this point I was definitely feeling that it was worthless to go on with this group, but I wanted to see how much longer they can handle.

We were able to down the demon dog and lastly the Prince just fine, although the tank nearly died once again and my pet ended up with the demon dog on her during his last few breaths. We went through about two courtyards full or ogres and hyenas before we had a near wipe with an armored ogre boss. I survived again but this time, I had to watch my pet die, which was heartbroken. Fortunately, I had her Heart of the Phoenix up. The shaman was the first to return back to the dungeon but died again on the way and finally that was when the group distintegrated after they returned to the dungeon and it was over. All the good that came out of that run was my ding to level 62. I am not sure but I think the part where the ogres start is where the northern part of DM starts. That's right, I was gonna be with these weaklings a little longer but that ogre boss made us had to change our plans, thank goodness.

P.S. Shortly after, I was very curious about why the tank sucked so much, so I looked her up on WoW Armory. All she had was blue gear, one of which was mail, that was all outdated by at least 12 levels. That was the reason why my pet and I dealt with more damage than her, and all I have on is currently-in-date greens.

EDIT: Just noticed this post of mine has just made post number 666 here. Must be that bad, eh?

[VelkynKarma]

I've never done Dire Maul, but that sounds pretty obnoxious all the same, Kamoodle Though the irony of the post number is....iiiiinteresting....

And Kalli, I've been seeing a lot of join-and-immediately-ditch situations of late too, it's really bizarre. Only mine have mostly been join-then-ditch healers, not tanks. I wonder if there's some reason for that Oo

~VelkynKarma

[Kalliope]

Dunno. I guess people are bored with WoW and are in the mood to grief others for sport. :/

[Sarayana]

I will never for the life of me understand the way some people get pleasure out of griefing others in WoW. I really don't get it. I take pleasure in a fun, relaxed, and interactive encounter. If I run into someone who's going for the same node as me and they say thanks when I pass it to them (or vice versa), I take it as an opportunity to crack a joke about scarcity of resources... if I'm in a group where the going is tough, I'll joke about how we've at least not wiped yet (and proceed to take the blame if we do - after all, you can only jinx things so much before you'll catch hell for it)...

Are people like us, who enjoy playing WoW socially, such a rarity? Or is it just that the griefers stand our more in our memory?

[Kalliope]

Are people like us, who enjoy playing WoW socially, such a rarity? Or is it just that the griefers stand our more in our memory?

The latter, mostly, is my guess.

[Silvershade]

I had a REALLY bad group recently.
It was wailing cavers (my least favourite dungeon) and when the dungeon started I realised I had a tank pet out, not a big deal but I was close to a stable master and could just teleport out and in quickly. So I told them and teleported out. After I got my wolf I noticed that the other hunter had died. I hadn't been gone longer than a minute so surely they couldn't have gotten far...? When I came back I looked and.... They had killed the second mob... The hunter just sat there begging for a rez but the tank didn't talk... Or rez. There was a mage that told the tank to rez but he didn't. After about five minutes of awkward silence and not doing anything the tank moves forward, hunter still begging for a rez. We were forward a bit and the tank lost aggro and the mage got attacked, I saved the day with growl, Which by that time I had done about three times. The tank stands and does nothing and eventually the mage leaves. The hunter is still begging for a rez the tank isn't doing anything and I couldn't stand this group anymore. So I leave. Horrible group. Didn't even manage to get to the first boss.....

[Kalliope]

There was no healer in your group? Usually they're the ones getting begged for reses. D:

[Magyck]

It's been too long since I've ranted about a terrible group, so I've two to talk about. For both of these I was playing my holy priest. I dinged 80 a couple of days ago, and have been doing heroics to farm triumphs in order to upgrade my gear. I've got a few purple pieces and had the 245 body crafted, but I'm still wearing a lot of pre-80 blues, so I'm not overgeared for heroic instances and can't breeze through them without ever dipping below 90% mana, like most tanks think I should.

Anyhow, first group was my first run through heroic forge of souls. Having never been there before, I threw down a fish feast when I entered and used the opportunity while they were eating and not yet pulling to tell them it was my first time there, and to please let me know if there were any trash/boss mechanics I should know about. The response from the tank was "just heal." Gee thanks, I never would have figured that part out on my own, being the holy priest who queued as healer. Dur. I didn't respond to that, since I couldn't think of anything nice to say in response, and decided to just see how it went.

After the first couple of pulls, I realized it was not going to go well. Everyone was taking massive damage. I was hammering all of my cures as soon as they were up, and burning up my entire mana pool on trash. We got to the first boss, and I asked again about mechanics and got no response. The boss was nerve wracking, since I had no idea what was going on or what to expect, but we killed him without any deaths. Made our way to the second boss, with people continually taking massive damage and me keeping everyone up aside from a mage, who dropped while fighting those spectral wardens who both do a lot of AoE damage and give debuffs which reduce healing by 75%.

On to the last boss. Again, I had no idea what to expect here, so it was just a lot of confusion and me hammering my heals to keep everyone up as best I could. We wiped, which I later figured out was due to people standing in purple circles during well of souls and not stopping dps during mirrored soul. But, guess who got the blame for that? Yeah, the healer. I blew everything I had on them to keep them up, and it wasn't enough. I didn't know enough about the boss at the time to know that it wasn't my fault, so I couldn't defend myself from the "where were the heals?" comments from the tank/dps. Not fun.

The second group was heroic azjol-nerub. It's a short instance and I've healed it a bunch of times before, so I wasn't worried. First boss went down okay, but I lost the tank on the second, quickly followed by the warlock. One of the remaining two dps tanked it and we got it down, and I then got a "sorry, I should have moved out of the poison" from the tank.

Third and final boss. We made three attempts at the boss and could not seem to make progress. The tank was trying to turn the boss away from the dps so they wouldn't get hit with pound, but they insisted on stacking on the tank. Every time the boss did pound the two melee dps were getting dropped to 25% hp. On the third attempt they both got one shotted. The other two failed attempts were due to the ads - I can only use my aggro dump once every 30 seconds, and they seemed intent on ignoring the ads that were heading in my direction. On the fourth attempt we finally managed it, and it's a good thing too; I was about to lose it on the dps and start yelling about learning to pay attention to boss mechanics and that they can't just stand in the line of fire and expect me to keep them alive. Argh.

tl;dr: I hate when people stand in fire and then yell at me for not being able to heal through it

[Silvershade]

There was no healer in your group? Usually they're the ones getting begged for reses. D:

There was but they left after the hunter died. I guess they could see the group was going to go downhill from there

[Kalliope]

Ughhh, that sounds utterly horrific. >_<

I wonder if that tank was a bot...

[bluddy]

YES AFTER 1H 12M and 30to 50 seconds! a group! HUZZAH

teleoprting in.

BAM tank left. wondering what's that good for.
okay everyone's confirming roles. after 20 mins (was questing outside dungeon)
a new tank. everyone was yelling at me for not being in the group. i said i was coming and that i was in a short combat.
kicked. Okay re-randoming dungeon. 48 mins yay dungeon. Tank left. okay everyone confirming roles searching...only 10 mins to get a new tank....tank from the very first time strangely he decided to stay. Huzzah but i shoumdn't be surprised that he coumdn't tank. healer got aggro healer died. Tank angry at healer and me for feigning (like i could have solo killed 4 elites when i was nearly dead!) that i could have made a difference. He left healer did the same in like one second guess if one would have been slower for 1 second only one would have left. Group leader disbanded getting out of dungeon. Skoll's dead. Getting realy pissed now. Luckily a friend guild mate went online (tank HUZZAH!) and we did the fcking random together HUZZAH

[kamoodle5]

I've never done Dire Maul, but that sounds pretty obnoxious all the same, Kamoodle Though the irony of the post number is....iiiiinteresting....

~VelkynKarma

That must've been a grade A for the worst run I or anyone with good skill would have had to face. The western part of Dire Maul is quite tough, which actually makes the eastern part look a cinch. Seeing as I quickly learned of the dire consequences of that dungeon after going my first time, and then when I started to learn of this group I was in, I had a feeling it was gonna get tougher. I would have said something about the tank's lack of endurance or the healer's lack of sense healing as an enhancement to them during the run, but I didn't figure it'd be worth it.

[Mockingbird]

Dire maul's one of my favourite dungeons, for the level

I had an... odd group last night.

Since I picked WoW back up after a break, literally all I've done is make and level a hunter to 80. I've popped over to old characters to get gold/bank bits, but not actually played them.

Last night a guildie (who had repeatedly helped us with levelling boosts) asked for people to join a heroic farm group to get them the last x badges for an upgrade - I asked if I could help and found they were all full on DPS, but could use a tank...

So I got my old feral druid out:
http://eu.wowarmory.com/character-sheet ... ockingbird

Not played it in... A year, I guess?

I managed to tank a few random heroic by muscle-memory (what's that fingers? 32, 32, 32, 12, 42?) but it was quite nerve-wracking having NO CLUE what to do

It was weird, being very, very nervous on a run where absolutely nothing went wrong (one death, an elem. shammy got a chain lightning crit on a pack when I had been stunned by the first mob, but other than that it was fine).

I then switched to my hunter and we did another run, where we had guild tank, healer, 2x DPS and picked up one random.

A ret paladin called something like "Palabad the Patient" who honestly said nothing but "go go go go" and "pull more, noobs" every single pull, and changed it up on bosses by instructing us that we should do the achievements (coincidentally the last few he needed for his meta achieve) because it would be "noob" not to. I asked him to change his title but he didn't seem to get it.

We considered in /g whether to deliberately fail one of the achievements, but decided to rise above the temptation and just carry on regardless.

[bluddy]

good job mockingbird. U mock him very good