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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsMore dungeon finder tips
by Eliah Hecht 
Dec 14th 2009 at 9:00AM
Like many of you, I've been spending the last few days happily hitting up the new dungeon finder over and over again. The rewards are pretty amazing for the time involved, and the whole system is usually pretty painless. I've picked up a few tips and tricks along the way, on top of what was covered in Saturday's post by Mike Schramm, and here's what I have to share.
- If your dungeon pops and then gives you the dreaded "additional instances cannot be launched," you can try again by simply selecting "teleport to dungeon" from the DF menu on your minimap (the eye icon).
- If you have a full group (of guildies, say) and want to do a particular instance, you can use the DF to queue up for just that instance, and thereby gain the ability to teleport straight there. Sure beats flying.
- Damage meters are not yet working reliably cross-realm. This is because the channel that addons use to communicate with each other is not cross-realm, and meters only scan in a small local range aside from the channel. Mike mentioned this, but it's worth repeating.
- The following configurations will probably get a group instantly (or close enough): solo healer, solo tank, any group that includes both a tank and a healer. Any other configuration is likely to have a ten-minute wait or more. That's been my experience, anyway. Oh, and if you want any chance of DPSing, don't queue as "heal or DPS" or "tank or DPS," or you'll almost certainly end up healing/tanking.
- Roll greed on Frozen Orbs (or pass if you don't want them).
- Roll need for offspec and sort it out afterwards if someone needed it for main spec. Rolling greed for offspec is too likely to result in the item getting disenchanted.
- If you run into a really terrible player, you can put them on your ignore list, which will prevent you from getting matched up with them in the future.
- As I learned firsthand yesterday, random dungeons do not respect instance locks; it's fully possible to do a dungeon more than once in a given day if you're doing randoms. I'm told the system is more likely to give you a dungeon you haven't done today, though.
Have you learned anything interesting from what I think is one of the greatest features ever to come to WoW?
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 8)
Edge Dec 14th 2009 12:00PM
If you actually REALLY needed the frozen orb, because it was the last mat you needed to make your epic, then if everyone else used need instead of greed as a regular thing, then you wouldn't have the chance to need it anyways. Here's the thing. EVERY pug I've run so far, people have been nice enough to ask if they need something. So if you do that first BEFORE hitting need, I'm sure that people would be nice enough to give it to you. Sure there will be people that will argue, just explain your situation and if it's still a no go, there's another pug like 5 minutes away.
Don't tell people to use need and then argue that there may be people who actually need the thing and will lose out because your arguing for everyone to need the damn thing.
Jack Miles Dec 14th 2009 12:15PM
Noone has any greater claim on a frozen orb as anyone else, at least while pugging, so you don't need a two tiered loot roll system. So you should just use need, since it still does the exact same thing as anyone choosing greed, but completely destroys the ability to ninja it.
Sure, if the rest of your group hasn;t thought this through or discussed it, and all hit "Greed", and use greed, but the standard should be to need.
Marita Dec 14th 2009 12:33PM
When I started doing content where Frozen Orbs appeared, my guildmates said to me: "it's always need on frozen orbs" and I've been doing that way since.
I'm no longer in that guild, but everywhere I go people do it this way.
I think if it where greed, it would be the same, because it would be standard procedure.
As it is a crafting mat, is no different than dream shards or frostweave. You don't need it to equip it, you need it to do something with it. And if you want to craft something that uses it as a mat, then is no different than stacking cloth to craft bolts. (I'm tailor-enchanter, that's why I use this examples).
I've never seen anyone anywhere saying "hey, I want all the runecloth in this run because I have to craft XX".
Needing Frozen Orbs is no different than needing other crafting mats. Having a reason to need it now shouldn't be a reason to get it now. I'm used to wait to get my crafting mats, because they're rare and expensive.
I know it can sound egoistic, but I'm used to wait when I need to stack a mat. If it's urgent, there is always the AH. And if it is so expensive that I can't afford buying it, then it is not something I need right now.
Ringo Flinthammer Dec 14th 2009 12:52PM
Your server economies baffle me if you guys still care this much about frozen orbs. You get more than the cost of one just by doing a random dungeon. Heck, if it's the first one of the day, you can buy six or seven of them on Silver Hand.
souvlaki Dec 14th 2009 2:23PM
In spanish servers the norm is to "need" on Frozen Orbs (I've never seen anyone ever greeding on them). So i think rolling need or greed depends on what has been stablished in your server.
Zanathos Dec 14th 2009 3:12PM
Looks like most people fail at reading comprehension, no reason for the original to be downranked. Dah clearly said everyone should roll need so everyone gets a fair shot at it and he asks his parties to do so. He didn't say wait for everyone to roll green then lulz need it.
It would make a lot more sense if everyone did just need orbs, i'm not sure why the convention on my server is to greed them. If everyone needs orbs, highest roller gets it. If everyone greeds orbs, highest roller gets it. If everyone but one person greeds, then they're out of the running for it. Everyone rolling need would eliminate the possibility of ninjas or misunderstandings.
Random Dec 15th 2009 12:22AM
Y'know, I've been watching the comment wars regarding Frozen Orbs with great interest, and I see a lot of people saying that you should always roll Need to prevent ninjas. When asked what they Need it for, the answer seems to be either professions or money. I'm wondering if people have considered that they are advising rolling Need on an item every time regardless of any actual need, purely to prevent the possibility of someone else doing the same thing? I mean, really, the logical extension of that mindset is that the player is entitled to a Need roll on anything that's worth money to them. Can you say... ninja?
Perhaps a parallel example would make my position clear. Frozen Orbs are worth maybe 10-15g on my mage's server, which is where I've been playing a lot lately. I have, however, always rolled Greed on Frozen Orbs because even though I could use the gold on that 'toon, the mage's professions are inscription/herbalism. (Yeah, yeah, not near optimal, but I didn't want to do the Sons grind again and I wanted to hit 80 with money. Sue me. :-D) So Frozen Orbs are mostly AH/guild fodder for me. I have a stack sitting in my bank in case I ever decide that I absolutely MUST waste mats crafting really bad offhands. However, books of Glyph Mastery run around 50g on my server right now. The similarities to a Frozen Orb should be fairly obvious... profession requirement, only particular people can use, worth gold, etc.
If I saw someone rolling Need on a book of Glyph Mastery without actually being a scribe, I would be pissed and consider that person a ninja. They're rolling Need on an item for no purpose other then to sell it. Saw it a couple times when the books were going for 1k, back when they first dropped. That is the definition of what should be a Greed roll. Frozen Orbs are the same way. If you're going to take the Orb for an Icy Prism or spellthread or armor kits or what have you, you're welcome to roll Need... because you're actually going to use the item yourself. Otherwise, I would fully expect to see a Greed roll. (And yes, that means you Greed even if you're assembling mats for someone else to craft you a spellthread... after all, d/e rolls are greed, even though I really need that shard/crystal so that someone else can enchant my new cloak.) Any exceptions to that rule should be cleared with the group in advance.
Battered Hilt drops, as someone above said, should go the same way. A guildie was raging the other day because someone rolled Need on a Battered Hilt, won it, then said, and I quote: "YES! Epic flying, here I come!" That's a ninja.
TL,DR: If you, on that 'toon, will use the item, be it the Battered Hilt or a Frozen Orb, you can roll Need. If you're rolling on it purely as a cash item, roll Greed. That's why the rolls are set up the way they are. If someone else rolls Need unnecessarily, they're a ninja... but that's their issue. Don't make yourself a ninja just to potentially stop someone else.
Samuel Reese Dec 14th 2009 9:08AM
One of the more helpful things I've found is when your Party Leader disconnects for any reason for longer than 60 seconds, the next-highest Gear Score player (or so it seems most of the time) will be reassigned as leader. This has definitely saved many headaches from having to break up the group and deal with the 15-minute Dungeon Deserter debuff.
Just like the title you get at 50 random players, some patience is needed if things seem to fall apart for players with serious lag issues.
Cale Dec 14th 2009 9:52AM
Thanks for mentioning this. I've been wondering what happens when the party leader DCs.
Now I know! And knowing is half the battle.
Vladeon Dec 14th 2009 1:48PM
Same thing happens if you're in a normal group. The days of having your group leader (whether your group is made up of guildies or what have you) go afk suddenly and then not being able to invite that last person to the group, are now gone. Which is nice because I'll sometimes start up a group of guildies and have one person be finishing a quest or a dungeon or whatever and I'll go make myself a sammich only to come back with guild mates angry at me because I wasn't there to grab the last person. Sure, I could've given somebody else the lead before I left, but sometimes you forget.
Ryosei Dec 14th 2009 9:10AM
Even though the Random Dungeon will ignore instance locks, if you do a heroic for the first time, it still creates an instance lock. So if I get Heroic HoL as a random, I can't go back to it that day unless the RNG gives it to me as a random again.
vandenhamster Dec 14th 2009 9:10AM
"I'm told the system is more likely to give you a dungeon you haven't done today, though."
Tell that to Oculus or Ahn'kahet: The Old Kingdom. STOP STALKING ME. The dungeon system seems pretty biased in where it sends me. I've only seen a few of the instances sparsely (Nexus, UP, CoS), one not at all (DTK) while it keeps sending me to certain instances so often I'm tempted to leave the group and eat the 15 minute wait when I enter them because I'm just so damn tired of those same old places (Oculus, Old Kingdom, Gundrak).
Perhaps you're more likely to get repeats if you fill a role that's in demand? I dunno. I'd like to see more TotC, ICC instances and DTK though.
Foxfyr Dec 14th 2009 9:13AM
I'm a little surprised at the number of times I've been sent to Oculus as well. I'm a little more surprised that two of those times we did it fast enough to get Make it Count for a couple of the party members.
Shot Dec 14th 2009 9:25AM
From what I can tell, you're right - you're more likely to see the same instances if you're filling the healer/tank role.
A blue poster stated that when you sign up for a specific dungeon, the empty spots in your group can and will be filled by people who signed up for a random dungeon. (http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=21626383487&sid=1&pageNo=3#59)
So when I sign up as a healer and get Old Kingdom 4 times in one day, it's because people are signing up specifically to do OK and I'm filling a necessary slot.
I've had great experiences with the dungeon finder, gearing up one of my new 80s from 70-79 quest/instance blues to an average item level of 220 in 3 days - she's now nearly as geared as my main!
Bob Dewane Dec 14th 2009 9:28AM
As further proof that the cursed RNG will hunt me no matter where I hide in the game, I got sent to DTK 3 times and UP 4 times IN THE SAME DAY!!!! (with 2 UP runs being back to back) The chance of the monotiny is the only thing I don't like about the dungeon finder.....because the monotiny can be crushing. If I had been one of teh people to get OC or OK more than once, I'd SERIOUSLY consider slashing my wrists!
Alexa Dec 14th 2009 9:28AM
Yesterday I was random'd into Halls of Reflection 3 times in a row. I seriously thought my key for chain heal was going to fall off my keyboard! :)
I agree that it would be great to get more variety... but all in all, I am really enjoying the new dungeon LFG!
patrick Dec 14th 2009 10:02AM
Okay, I have a theory about why you get the same dungeons frequently. Sometimes people do sign up for certain dungeons more frequently and therefore as the system has to find random players to do those dungeons, it'll sometimes have people do them more often than others. Another poster mentioned this and it sounds like sound logic, however I also think the following holds true:
If people keep leaving occulus over and over eventually the other dungeons get done by the majority of the people in the system and it comes up more frequently for groups b/c there are still more people out of the 5 who haven't done oculus that day so it thinks, oculus would be a good group for these guys, none of them have completed it today.
I don't want to run oculus more than once a day, but I will run it the first time it comes up in hopes it'll keep me from getting it as much trhoughout the day if I intend to run a great many more random heroics on the toon.
Schubie Dec 14th 2009 9:11AM
I found you are not able to whisper another character from another realm while doing the new dungeon system; I got an error saying "player can not be found".
but while doing x-realm BGs, you can whisper people from other servers.
Josin Dec 14th 2009 9:24AM
Yeah. It's quite annoying. Especially when you need to ask someone to do something differently, but don't want to just call them out in front of the group. Having whispers available would cut down on a lot of hostility that comes from embarassed people who'd have been completely fine with a friendly whisper.
Alexa Dec 14th 2009 10:28AM
I raid lead the 25 man raids for my group and I run the RankWatch addon that was featured here on wow.com as a matter of course. The way it works is it whispers people who are downranking their spells just to notify them. Since you can't whisper cross-realm, the addon is kind of useless in the random cross-server groupings... however, I usually end up saying something in party chat anyways, just so the person can fix it. Sometimes people are totally bitchy about it, sometimes they're glad you've said something. I usually always preface my comments with "I would have whispered you, but I can't in a cross-server group..."
I've been totally freaked out by the number of people who are unintentionally downranking!