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The latest patch 5.4 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 3 of 8)
pietrex Dec 14th 2009 10:05AM
@Alexa
This, this, this and this. I've been running this addon for over a week now and rarely meet a group in which no one is downranking. In most cases there's at least one person, like a resto shaman who's DPS-ing at the same time or a priest who's usually healing but specced shadow for this dungeon. And I find the lack of automatic whispers horrible, mostly because I'm afraid that some people might feel offended that I write it. I've also nearly caused a wiped once (as a tank), because someone pulled while I was writing about the ranks. I hope they fix it so we can whisper crossrealm people soon.
ciskos11 Dec 14th 2009 10:08AM
Yes - what Josin said. I was healing UP with a Paladin tank yesterday, and he could not hold aggro on anything. I checked with a Pally friend, and he mentioned Righteous Fury. Didn't look like the tank had it active. I wanted to whisper to him about it, because it was probably an accident, but that didn't work. So, to that Paladin (who was otherwise just fine): sorry for calling you out!
Shrike Dec 14th 2009 3:07PM
@Alexa:
Last time I leveled up a character who had dual-spec, my action bars for my inactive spec did NOT update with new ranks of spells I had just gained. This may be the cause of some of the unintentional downranking going on.
Foxfyr Dec 14th 2009 9:11AM
I know people have a tendency to hit Disenchant right away on things they can't use but the system as it stands now has one major flaw as I see it.
Several times I have seen an item drop that would have been an upgrade where the player was unable to roll need (example: Moonkin on cloth). As a result the greed roll ended up going to one of the people who rolled disenchant and was destroyed.
I really like that it gives priority to cloth wearers on cloth, but I believe that leather and mail wearers should be allowed to roll need on them as well. The system should give priority to the cloth wearer but award it to a leather or mail wearer if no cloth wearer is present.
As a result I no longer hit disenchant on ANYTHING until I see that no one is interested. As a rogue, I have been able to need roll on a couple leather spell power items and then toss them to a shaman or paladin that could use them who was unable to roll.
Zuka Dec 14th 2009 10:30AM
"As a rogue, I have been able to need roll on a couple leather spell power items and then toss them to a shaman or paladin that could use them who was unable to roll"
That only works if the other player is from your realm, as you are unable to trade the gear to players on other realms.
Foxfyr Dec 14th 2009 9:51AM
Yup. It's a situatioal solution that blizzard should address.
ciskos11 Dec 14th 2009 10:11AM
Zuka: that's not true. You can trade BoP drops to players from other realms, as long as they were eligible for the drop in the first place. Of course, that doesn't help if the drop was already sharded.
I believe you cannot trade the Frozen Orbs, however.
Hëx Dec 14th 2009 11:46AM
I have traded items dropped in a xrealm instance to a player from another realm in at least two different situations. Have not tried it with orbs though.
vanye111 Dec 14th 2009 12:36PM
I was in a run yesterday where the BOE Signet of Edward the odd dropped. I was on my mage, the healer was a priest, and neither of us could roll for it. /sadpanda
bdaneila Dec 14th 2009 9:29AM
The Dungeon Finder is also great for finding groups for specific non-heroic dungeons.
On some of my toons I am still trying for specific drops from ToC regular (thirty-two runs for Black Heart TYVM Blizzard!!), but it was becoming increasingly hard to find a group to run it on my server. With the Dungeon FInder, I was able to find groups relatively quickly over the weekend and farm up some of the drops from there.
At some point this week I will have to see how it works for lower level instances, the ones which have several quests leading into them (Uldaman, Zul Farrak and Sunken Temple for example).
Yvels Dec 14th 2009 9:50AM
58 runs reg TOC for damn bloody trinket . 30+ runs I was been the highest DPS in the group ... i hateeee toc .....
lilproductions@hotmail.com Dec 14th 2009 9:13AM
been doing randoms all week and getting OCC atliest twice a day and have goten HoL once all week long. to me it seems like blizz just wants you to run dungons that don't get played as much
Silversol Dec 14th 2009 9:13AM
There should be an offspec need button IMO, so the priority list would be:
1. Need
2. Off-Spec Need
3. Greed/Disenchant
jealouspirate Dec 14th 2009 9:23AM
This is a great idea.
Just the other day something I wanted for my offspec dropped, but I passed because someone rolled need. I didn't find out until after he'd won that he'd rolled need for his offspec. Doh!
K Dec 14th 2009 9:58AM
This, this, a thousand times this.
The endless "Can I need for offspec" stuff is just too much.
pietrex Dec 14th 2009 10:10AM
Agree, but I would make 'Offspec Need' applicable for 'lower armor level' as well (example: druid rolling on cloth). Lower priority than Need, but higher than Greed/DE.
Truffled Dec 14th 2009 10:34AM
True, K, but when you are gearing up a Tank, but filling the roll as DPS, the LAST thing I want to do is tick off the current tank by rolling need on tanking items without asking first.
Exanimo Dec 14th 2009 10:49AM
Seems quite simple to implent the need button so that druids and all can roll on cloth items, but a priest/lock/mage get first pick on it.
No clothie rolled need? Check the Pala's, Druid's and Shammies needroll.
Same system for warriors, paladins, etcera who want a leather or mail item for dps.
Kragragh Dec 14th 2009 9:13AM
need on orbs need on orbs need on orbs
Also, I've been having way more luck than 10 minutes. 1 at the most!
Random Dec 15th 2009 12:31AM
For what do you actually need them?