Breakfast Topic: Spill your 5-man PUG stories here

I'll start. I usually tank heroics but decided to heal recently (that was my first mistake), and I landed a group of guildies from another realm in a Well of Eternity PUG. Now, the average Cataclysm heroic isn't all that tough to heal these days as long as you're sensibly geared, but it didn't take me long to realize that this group was blowing through an unusually large percentage of my mana pool. They stood in front of the Dreadlord Defenders' Carrion Swarm, couldn't find an interrupt button with two hands and a guide dog, and seemed to DPS at an unusually slow rate even with the crit buff given by Illidan's Shadow Walk.
It was around the time I noticed most of the group sitting in Peroth'arn's Fel Flames that it occurred to me that either this was the most legitimately incompetent group I've ever had the misfortune of encountering, or they were doing it on purpose. But because they never quite managed to get themselves or myself killed, I let it slide. I left at the end with 50 gold and a Forest Emerald from my Satchel, wishing for a Dungeon Finder system sufficiently advanced to recognize that some groups are definitely worth, say, a pony.
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Reader Comments (Page 5 of 9)
Bruce Jan 26th 2012 1:10PM
Scrub. PvP gear as a tank is not doable. PvP gear never has any avoidance, and is therefore useless to a tank (Apart from maybe having one 390 piece instead of a 318 piece for example).
Healers and DPS can get away with it a bit more. I have to say though, that having people in LFR or BH runs (Especially) who explain their lack of DPS because they are in PvP gear gets my goat. Do we PvP in PvE gear? If we did what would the PvPers say?
Swifteye Jan 26th 2012 12:45PM
Hehe, I love the word "tallywhacker", and hardly anybody uses it.
Anywho, yes, being asked for a brez by a DPS who died to stupid on trash is one of my pet peeves as well.
Actually had a Rogue just yesterday who died to Tyrande's trash (.....) and started yelling for me (DK) to brez him. When I flat-out told him I wasn't going to waste the long CD on a non-tank/healer and on trash, he started in with the "Liar bet you just don't have it on your bars bet you didn't even know DKs HAD a brez until I said something just now now just find raise ally in your spellbook and rez me already k?"
... -_-
Ozzard Jan 26th 2012 1:24PM
Bruce - check Allison's comments about PvP gear and ferals sometime.
chaosdefined Jan 26th 2012 9:31AM
Also, whilst levelling my hunter I was in Grim Batol HC with a Druid Healer and three guildies. A tank in mostly Raid Finder gear, a DK in mostly raid finder gear and a mage about the same gear as us.
First boss the tank dies when the boss is at around 5%. Luckily I and the Mage get him down. So I just say "Tank, with that boss you need to get out of the way of Blitz."
Then I get politely told by the DK, Tank and Mage "Huntard, you need to do some DPS!" and some explicits. After I linked the DPS meter showing I was only 2k behind the Tier 13 clad DK they shut up and began on the healer instead.
After about ten minutes of them constantly swearing and shouting at the Healer because the Tank couldn't keep aggro despite his gear, saying everything from asking if he was a pedo to saying they were too busy masturbating to play properly I eventually just said "Sorry I'm really not in the mood to PUG with immature idiots." and left. I imagine the healer wasn't far behind.
I swear I never noticed such horrible attitudes from players before the end of Wrath, and it's only gotten worse.
Bril Jan 26th 2012 9:31AM
After a Sylvanus wipe I asked the player with lead if he'd drop a raid mark so everyone would focus down the same ghoul. Got told to go eff myself while his two guild buddies went lol.
Yup, some really awesome humans playing this game.
Pamela Jan 26th 2012 11:30AM
Nice thing is you don't have to have lead to drop a raid mark. I automatically drop a mark everytime we get into that fight.
Namssob Jan 26th 2012 9:35AM
I know a player who created a toon named "Ipullevrythng". He goes into PUG's and just starts pulling. Everything. it gives him an amazing amount of laughs, and if often takes MULTIPLE wipes before people realize it's a PUG-Troll.
chaosdefined Jan 26th 2012 10:09AM
Well that guy is an asshole.
evoxpisces Jan 26th 2012 10:14AM
At least he's honest about it.
Ryan Jan 26th 2012 10:13AM
Ive been on my low level hunter and been in a lot of fail groups lately we were fighting a boss and we aggroed 1 extra guy on accident and the tank completely stops tanking the boss and goes for the add so the boss started attacking everyone else. In another dungeon I looted a creature and a health potion dropped so I took it tere was no rolling necessary for it and the tank goes crazy saying how I wasn't supposed to take that and how he needs it.i guess he doesn't have a healer healing him and the fact he wasn't even able to loot the body because it was an add
lia.ksd Jan 26th 2012 9:44AM
um, Well of Eternity is bitter experience for me. Right when the dungeon was available, I joined a guild group on my FL geared Resto Shaman. I wasn't all clear about the encounters in this dungeon yet. On Paroth'arn, I thought I shouldn't be healing a person with Fel Decay, so I stopped healing here and there. Then entered the "Eye" part where everyone's HP drops, I prioritized healing a tank and myself, and tried to run away from eyes as much as possible. Nobody died, but it was bit risky and the pugs didn't like it. They started to accuse me of how horrible my healing was to the gear I had, and just ranted through Azshara encounter. I kept polite attitude but got fed up with them when one of them started to use offensive words and threatened me to ticket my 'harassment' to be banned.
Now I know how to heal on that encounter and the healing on that day was horrible for sure, but, hey, that was Day 2 of its release.... I had awesome pugs when Cata itself and also ZG/ZA came out for months after their releases. But this time, I wasn't so lucky...
account Jan 26th 2012 9:45AM
Oh soo many stories to share...
1. A while ago, I decided to use the empty slots of a second account to level a new shammy, priest and druid. Instead of trying to heal the first time at higher levels, I this time wanted to start healing instances as early as possible.
First run with the priest... the bear tank (it seemed like there were always bear tanks) immediately hit the ground running, pulling a lot of mobs. Around a corner. With me not even being close. When I was finally in range, I stopped to cast a heal. He moved on. Then complained when he died.
2. The next one was on the same char, in BFD... another bear who, at the temple towards the end, managed to pull pretty much every single trash mob in front of the building and then managed to pull them over the bridge, using every single pillar and corner to LOS me. Again, complaining.
3. My favorite had to be the pally tank in SFK though... he joined the PUG with another guy from his guild, a warrior. I didnt notice anything unusual because I was mainly focussed on keeping an eye on peoples health.
Until I noticed that a) that warrior did not do ANY dmg. b) did not move when the pally stood still c) had an unusual amount of HP for a DPS warrior at that level. So I noticed the shield. He was prot spec, afk and was "on follow"... apparently, those two guys had rolled two tank chars and were doing this the whole time, switching whoever was actively tanking while the other one prolly chilled out watching a movie or something.
Not only did both the tank and his buddy stand in all the fires, we also had to stop all the time because "auto follow broke" (corners and stuff...when you walk over the roofs in SFK, it's easy to have that happen), until I eventually flipped and told him something like "Leveling in Cata is so FAST now, especially with heirlooms and stuff... and you still do the "on follow" thing, expecting people to both make up for one dps, the healer to keep your friend alive even though he contributes nothing, and for all of us to wait every 10 secs so he can set his char to follow again?". I quit the group, obviously.
Some nicer things happened as well, but those came to mind right away. Most dungeons go smoothly these days, even though no one talks, but that's still better than people with a rotten attitude, elitists etc that you end up with sometimes too (people STILL do the "can someone post recount? I don't have it" thing?! REALLY?")
arkhan Jan 26th 2012 11:22AM
>(people STILL do the "can someone post recount? I don't have it" thing?! REALLY?")
Hahaha, that never gets old. Sure you don't have it buddy, sure. But miraculously people only ask this when they are topping the meters.
Aaron Jan 26th 2012 2:56PM
I've pretty much come to expect that anybody who posts Recount is a jerkwad. A few weeks ago I was in a Heroic Halls of Origination group. We'd just downed Temple Guardian Anhuur, despite an unclear "pull both levers at once" strategy that left my shadow priest to kite half of the snakes and brought Anhuur almost to the bottom of the stairs before the tank picked him up. After the fight, the tank posts a Recount list showing himself way on top, then says "dps need to do better" The boss died, we didn't, can we move on please?
Ati Jan 26th 2012 9:52AM
So I was in regular Stonecore the other day, healing on my druid. We get an 85 blood dk tank and the rest 82s/83s - a hunter, warlock, and mage I believe. I figure it'll be a nice fast run.
Well then we down Corborous, and he drops the nice Agi trinket. The tank (blood DK) and the hunter both need. The tank wins. Having used that trinket myself on my hunter main, I casually comment that it's a 'nice hunter trinket.'
The warlock proceeded to take that comment and RUN with it. He insisted that the tank give it to the hunter. The tank agreed, but said he'd do so 'later.' The warlock then accused the tank of being a ninja, saying he wouldn't give it to the hunter, because he should be giving it to the hunter now to increase their dps, so on and so forth. I hadn't said anything more since my initial comment, and the hunter occasionally piped up to go "it's fine," but the warlock would NOT let it drop. The tank eventually said he wasn't going to give the trinket to the hunter simply because the warlock was calling him a ninja.
We got to the final boss and the tank was so pissed off at the warlock by that point that he pulled the adds for the boss with his ghoul, then dismissed the ghoul. Issue: healing aggro. I think he was trying to get the lock or the hunter, but either way, he got me.
Once the adds were gone, I was all set to just muscle through the boss with the same tank, but the group decided to /votekick him. It took us 15 minutes to find another tank. Longer than the rest of the dungeon had taken, even with a whining warlock. *sigh*
jdryner Jan 26th 2012 10:45AM
You say the warlock was 'whining,' I say he was doing the right thing. The fault lies with the rest of the party for not kicking the tank immediately after he ninja'ed the item in the first place. No points for you; you get NOTHING, good day, sir!
DocX Jan 26th 2012 9:53AM
I'm leveling a hunter almost entirely via the LFG tool and it's going pretty well so far (up to level 75 in a few weeks). Overall the LFG has been good for me, but the thing that still irritates the hell out of me happened in Azjol-Nerub. The healer was a Shaman who rolled Need on Hallowed Mandible Legplates (a pretty good upgrade for me at the time). When I asked about it in whisper (because I don't want to cause loot drama in party chat) and pointed out that as a Healer she got dibs on the SPI Mail gear but all I could use was the AGI gear, she replied with a snarky "Huh. Imagine that. Oh well."
Later when one of the DPS rolled on tanking gear, she commented disapprovingly about it. When I pointed out the hypocrisy, she got even snarkier and bitchier saying something to the effect of "If I can Need on it, I'll do it if I want to." Finally, we down Anub'arak and Crypt Lord's Deft Blade drops. She rolls Need again and, after winning says ":P" in party chat right before she drops group.
So, yeah, Lytia @ Garona (in "Honor Guild") you successfully got under my skin. Grats on your successful trolling.
Adnarish Jan 26th 2012 10:41AM
That's always unfortunate. It makes me wonder if, generally speaking, it's a better idea to take these issues to whisper or put it out in party chat. On the one hand, as you say, whispers avoids party-wide drama, but the flip side of that argument is that people might react more defensively if they're confronted one on one. At the end of the day though, the fact is that people are so anonymous, and the chances you'll group again so small, that those of ill will can probably never be convinced to 'do the right thing'.
What I sometimes do when such an issue comes up is that I will also roll Need and, should I win the roll, trade the item to the most appropriate party member. I do this only very rarely since it's easy to get bogged down in arguments and delays - and, to be honest, oftentimes I just don't really care if Mage123 gets his +hit belt or not.
Scuac Jan 26th 2012 10:46AM
I feel ya. Last night I was healing heroic DM and the robot boss drops the dsp caster staff. The mage rolls need on it, I pass because I had something better, and the BEAR TANK rolls need on it and wins it. The mage is clearly just a new 85, his has a lower level staff from normal dungeons, and the bear tank is in raid finder+ gear, he has a lvl ~400 weapon. The mage points this out to the bear tank and he replies "We'll I am carrying all of you so I will need what I want", I pointed out that that was a very classless thing to say, at which point he started getting really abusive. We then proceed to kick him.
andres.dc39 Jan 26th 2012 9:55AM
I was leveling my prot warrior and I get Throne of the Tides. BAM! Hunter drops group, so we start, we get another hunter, everything goes fine until we get to the second floor.
On the gauntlet hallway, hunter goes afk, and me with a mage and a dk start the event anyway. This was damn frustrating cause in the middle of it all mage goes afk aswell so there is practically no dps. No interrupts either, except for my 10 second one. We were stuck in the last pack, after hunter came back but since we had little dps, we couldn't kill the last pack. I was doing my best to interrupt every time I could, but 5 minutes in I nerd-rage, say "useless dps" and drop group.