exactly why pick-up groups (affectionately known as PUGs) suck. If you don’t know… imagine getting together with your buddies for a team sport of some sort. When you get to the game field, you find out your buddies weren’t able to make it, and you’re moved into some random team with folks who don’t know each other. One guy doesn’t have cleats, another doesn’t have any protective gear, and yet another hasn’t ever played the sport in question but wants to try anyway. Then you have somebody else who you’ve seen around and know is generally competent, but doesn’t play well with others and likes to showboat a bit. Naturally, a team like this gets nowhere fast. I was in a lovely PUG this evening that started out as a Scholomance group. Eventually it was decided that we didn’t have the right group make-up for Scholo and why not run Sunken Temple instead? Once all but one person got there, the other Druid in the group suggests we try Dire Maul instead. “No problem,” I said. “We still need a healer.” “Oh, I can heal,” replied the other druid, who proceeded to find us a level 70 Warlock. I didn’t think much of it when we started, but as we continued, it became apparent that this dork had a one-track mind, and partially had his head up his arse. I realized very quickly that we didn’t have the healing to stick it through, so after my druid hit level 58, I logged him out and brought on my shaman (see here for more info about Shamans) as healer. Having a level 70 healer with us made all the difference in the world. Unfortunately, the ‘lock thought he knew everything, and got us almost wiped a few times. When we get to the first boss, he kills the boss before it could kill the NPCs that were there, then starts his Warlock quest event before we were ready. Yep, it was a wipe. After we rez and get healed, he asks to do it again. This time we succeed in the summoning ritual to summon the boss he needs to kill for his quest. I rez the dead and we get healed up to full. He started the second part of the event, and when the going gets tough, he runs OUT OF SPELL RANGE. I had to run after him to keep him alive, which put the rest of the party at risk. Yeah, after we finished, I laid into him something fierce in party chat. One – you DON’T run out of heal range if you want to live. When all else fails, run toward the tank. Oh right, his pet was the tank. Nevermind. Two – after you finish suckering us into finishing your quest for you. you DON’T tell the group, “Whew! I’m going AFK for 5 minutes for a Smoke!” We called his bullshit and had him come along for the other boss in the instance. …And finally… Three – DO NOT treat the rest of your party as if they’ve never grouped with a level 70 toon before. Two of us in that group have more than one level 70, and our toons are geared out MUCH better than yours, thankyouverymuch. Lesson Learned – I will not run with that asshole ever again. On the flip side, the rest of us in the group were cool, and I added the party leader to my /friends list. That, and I hit level 58 this evening! Two more levels to go and I can go kick ass in the Outlands. (Technically, I can go there now that I’m 58, but I’d much rather have a fighting chance.) 🙂 It’s past my bedtime… I’m going to take a nap now. Thanks for visiting and Keep Coming Back!!!]]>