Pulling when the healer is AFK’ed? Been there.

Pulling an entire room at once, hoping like crazy that my cooldowns and the healer can keep me alive? Yup.

I can, and for lesser geared groups, have, done normal pulls. But I love to challenge people, including myself, and discover just how much we can handle in a pinch. My healer in a heroic Nexus D/c’ed once after the first boss. I just stated in group “healers are optional, right?” and we did several trash pulls and the mage boss. Me and the Ret pally healed. No one died. We didn’t finish because the healer never returned – but the thrill of doing a heroic boss that was actually hard for a change, was exciting. Some people get scared off by that – yet others love it.

BTW, thanks for the PUG checker. I looked myself up on that, and I think it is pretty cool. Can help to see what experience people have had.

That being said, I do expect to see a certain minimum level of DPS when I go into Heroics (usually around 1400 DPS), since that’s what was expected of me when I was first brought in to DPS Heroics. I don’t think that number is unusually high in the game as it is today. But what I really expect DPS to do is their job – to hit the targets in the right order, hit them intelligently (watching aggro AND using utility abilities appropriately and to the best of one’s ability), and then as hard as capable – in that order.

Where I start to get wary is when I see someone who IS geared decently, who still puts up significantly worse numbers than expected, or is very inconsistent in performance. One warrior I run with regularly has a DPS line that would make the most hardcore rollercoaster junkie sick, as it goes up and down so much between fights. One trash fight it might be around 4500, the next around 1800 (with generally the same mob composition). Whereas, I might on those same fights run a consistent 3600 DPS, and have more DPS and damage overall. Further, when his DPS was up, he was pulling aggro like crazy.

Truth be told, I’m not out there to COMPETE on the meters. I don’t put that much stock in it for success. However, I do see it as a tool to see if there might be something that needs tweaking. That same warrior, a few weeks ago, had better gear than I had at that same time – almost fully Conquest geared out, but there was a consistent 1200 DPS difference in our performances on raid (I’d run about 3000, while he’d run 1800 in Naxx25). The fact that it wasn’t a gear issue, even initially, was pretty clear to me, and to some of the others in our regular group, but that warrior’s mentality was “If I can just get better gear, the numbers will go up.” It wasn’t until he finally respecced and tuned his regular rotation that his numbers went up to the upper 2000s to lower 3000s during raid.

I don’t /fail people for gear – with the caveat that it’s clear that the gear and DPS output are relatively appropriate for the area. I’d probably run one Heroic instance, and only one, with someone who put out only 600 DPS for any reason – because 600 DPS is really not appropriate for Heroic instances. I’d probably continue to run if that number was closer to 1000-1200 DPS, if it seemed like it was a matter of simply gear, and that the rest of the expecations were in order. I’d probably be back to one, if I saw someone who was Naxx/Ulduar/ToC geared and only putting out 1600 DPS in the same run, despite the fact that 1600>1200.

It’s about the perception of performance. If I can explain to myself why a person might have lower numbers, and it doesn’t appear to be about the player, then I will be more likely to help. Gear is something that can be easily fixed and has a great rate of improvement in performance, for a decent player. Gear, generally speaking, does not make a weaker player decent – something else must also be done to improve (respeccing, re-rotating, or just plain out practicing the current stuff).

In short – as a DPS, do your job intelligently, and try to make sure that you’re geared for the content you’re attempting (or, if slightly undergeared that your performance can make up for it, because it can – a slightly lesser geared player CAN outdo a higher gear player sometimes, if the lesser geared player plays smarter), and let the group leader know if you are undergeared and let them make a decision based on full disclosure. Don’t surprise the group during the run – that’s not fair to them, either.

But most of all, play smart. Try not to autopilot anything. Even higher geared players die when on autopilot to stupid stuff – don’t do that to your group.

My 2 yen,

Akiosama
.-= Akiosama´s last blog ..What’s in a (Guild) Name? =-.

I recently ran it with a buddy of mine whom I respect greatly as a tank who kited Kerstraza in a slow walk back and forth. The group was him tanking, me healing, a mage friend of ours, and two other dps pugged in . . . a feral cat and a DK. Everyone’s dps stayed about as high as it had been the whole instance. Healing was easy. The fight took, maybe, 3-4 minutes. I never even had to innervate. No problems.

And yet the DK still felt compelled to comment, “you should just jump up & down when you tank that instead of moving around.”

To which my friend responded, “Oh, habit. Keeps pets alive.”

I’d never considered that. I mean, after the first time I tanked it, I was astounded that the hunters, ranged dps, right? were so concerned about me moving around a little bit . . . and I am even more astounded now that it has dawned on me that my friend is right; pets don’t jump in place!

Granted, we didn’t have any pets in our group (not even a ghoul), so it really wasn’t necessary. But neither do I think it’s necessarily a bad habit to be in.

That “Defense” guy is going to be *pissed* when Cataclysm comes out…

Oh this is exactly like one tank I healed right there. I was healing on my Shaman and keep jumping up and down in one place having problems as is to cast heals. And he starts pulling the dragon accross the room and Melee get kicked by the tail and he keeps dragging. I try to not let anyone die while typing “don’t move it” into party chat getting a bit panic-y. So he keeps dragging and I find my caps lock and YELL in party chat. Just jump don’t drag. Nothing. DPS goes down. I’m dead, he dies. We run from the cemetery to the entrance. And then he writes in party chat: “If you can’t heal this simple instance, that is your problem not mine.” That’s when I left the group and went offline to vent.

I assume Swipe = Bear-Thunderclap.

And good advice to anyone at all that gets smacked by something when the tankadin is very occupied: If you bring it to us and stand in the consecrate for even 2 seconds, that almost always gets threat back where it belongs. If it doesn’t, it brings it to a place where the tankadin can easily see and taunt it. Warrior tanks are very similar in that a single thunderclap is usually enough to get it’s attention back to where it should be. I don’t have a DK tank or bear tank so can’t say about them so well, but I’m certain things are similar. I do know that NOT HITTING IT is always a brilliant idea.

Great article, BBB.

Moral? as long as that dps is doing their job and not causing problems for others (pulling, dying, afking, blah blah) then keep your eyes off the damn meters because they are pulling their weight, they just dont have the gear to pull weight like you are.