Comments on: Tales from the PUG: The Return

By: jealouspirate

jealouspirate — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 17:35:36 +0000

I know I’m late to the party, but I just want to say this:

I think it was actually you, BBB, who once said “You don’t have to be anyone’s bitch”.

This is a lesson I’ve carried with me through PuGs, and it’s true. No one, ever, should tolerate that kind of behaviour. The rewards of the dungeon are not more valuable than getting treated with the basic respect and civility all human beings deserve.

I don’t hesitate one second to leave a group mid-instance when there’s awful behaviour like that, and NO ONE should tolerate it. Because, get this, if no one tolerated it then IT WOULD STOP HAPPENING. If everyone started kicking assholes instead of putting up with them, they’d either have to stop playing or change their behaviour. We have the power over asshats, not the other way around. We just need to recognize it, and use it.

By: Moonstalker

Moonstalker — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 20:24:33 +0000

Most pugs I get fall into the extremes. Either the most pleasant and fun group (/cry at cross realm friends) or total ass-hattery. I usually either tank or heal on my druid and can better influence the group if needed. I’ve always felt that it’s the total dps that matters not any individual output. I always defend the new 80′s as I’ve been there. As a tank, my gear makes it easy for healers and I can usually let the asshats die (oh – did that growl miss?) As a tree, heals can mysteriously get mis-applied to the really nice players instead of the asshat.

One of the best pug runs started out bad with a rockstar tank that was constantly berating the dps. I whispered that they should let him pull and die all by himself as he kept saying that he was carrying everyone else. There were a few trepidations by the dps about the tank leaving and waiting for a new tank but I told them not to worry. He’d either straighten up or we’d be better off when he left. After he died, bitched about how we abandoned him (I thought he was capable of doing everything himself – he kept telling us that), and dropped group, I switched specs, queued in heals and had the most fun run. We kept chatting for 30 minutes after the run was over.

As I learned here – “I can’t fix stupid, so I won’t heal it either.”

By: Sahele

Sahele — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 09:50:06 +0000

Honestly I tend to keep quiet. But that’s mainly because I’m too busy healing to have time to type (I’m a slow typer). It’s also because I often don’t know how to respond. I might have spoken up sometime but since I’m just back from a 10 month break I don’t remember everything too well.

By: Gnomeaggedon

Gnomeaggedon — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 00:03:25 +0000

I’m glad I’m not the only one that writes 1/2 in fear of Kes’ grammar hammar (see what I did there?).

Of-course-the-other-half of me just wants to …. Taunt…. Know what I mean?

Sorry Kes!

I know I am a bad writer… Hopefully I still write good things if in a bad way.
.-= Gnomeaggedon´s last blog ..When will I learn… =-.

By: niceas

niceas — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 22:06:36 +0000

Sorry BBB – its not often I recognize a guildy on a public forum.

Back on topic – the reality is that right now tanks are seen as the rockstars of the LFD. I remember (waaaaaaay back) when healers were the same – and as a result I ran more than a few pugs with prima donna healers that behaved as asshats because people were terrified that they would leave the group in the lurch. Back then, gear was harder to come by (I’m talking vanilla days – I didn’t play enough in BC to notice it as much) and unless you were with a really fantastic group you couldn’t just roll through the dungeons like you can now-a-days.

Unfortunately, as long as a particular role is in demand, I suspect that PUGs will always be saddled with asshats who think that they are too hot to handle, and will behave as such. Attention-mongers (trying to keep this reasonably pg) will always tend to gravitate towards those roles if they are able to be successful at them… and as long as it is a royal pain to replace them they will continue to behave badly.

By: bigbearbutt

bigbearbutt — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 21:20:57 +0000

Since when am I running a matchmaking service in the comments?

By: Meebs

Meebs — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 21:09:53 +0000

@Magdellan
I recently switched to running heroics in bear spec/dps gear for the sole reason that I never lose aggro on anything, even with icc 25 geared raiders. My dps gear is also icc 25 man and aside from the gems/enchants is pretty much the same as tank gear.
I normally run with fellow raiders and made the change based on how often I’d lose a mob to them if they went aoe crazy. My healer said I wasn’t bad to heal at all and my dps were gratefull for the chance to cut lose.
Now when I tank randoms on my own, I rarely worry about people complaining about aggro or going to slow or whatever.
The perks of being feral :)

By: niceas

niceas — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 20:11:50 +0000

@Phae – As Midg is now erm, imbalanced, no. Lane, no. Belle, no.

I’ll give you a big hint though – I’m one half of one of the other guild duos :)

By: Phaedra

Phaedra — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 19:18:02 +0000

@Niceas – Midg? Lane? Belle??

By: Phaedra

Phaedra — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 19:11:47 +0000

@Jeremiah – not every PuG is a bad PuG. The bulk of my PuGs have been mostly silent affairs: I to my macro about tanking at the beginning, everyone buffs up, I check to make sure we’re ready, and away we go. The only talking is generally when I pause and ask if people are ready for a boss.

I’ve had more good PuGs than bad ones. I had one PuG group that was so awesome, we continued to run instances together for another TWO HOURS. None of really needed the badges – we were just working well as a team. I’ve had many people I wished I could friendlist – they knew their stuff, they were polite, they listened, they asked questions, they were patient, they were funny, etc.

For the most part though, reading stories of “we entered the dungeon, buffed, stuff died, and we all said goodbye” isn’t as fun as the stories of THE BAD PuG.